The Whim of the Dragon by PAMELA DEAN Read Free Book Online Page B

Ruth. “Believe me.”
    “Well, okay, so it’s all or nothing,” said Patrick. “So persuade me to come back.”
    “Patrick,” said Ellen, “you can’t get anything done while we’re gone anyway, because we’ll have to fix the time again.”
    “I told you,” said Patrick, “we didn’t fix it last time.”
    “No, that’s right,” said Ted. “Laura and I left home at night, and when we got back home it was afternoon.”
    Patrick said, “We left here in the daytime, and when we got back it was night. We’d lost twelve or thirteen hours.”
    “Well, that’s not so bad,” said Ellen.
    “You’ve got a remarkably selective memory,” said Patrick. “Shall I recite for you what Dad said? And what Mom did?”
    “It doesn’t matter,” said Ted. “The red man fixed the time for us, and I bet that holds for the whole planet.”
    “That’s really persuasive, Ted,” said Patrick.
    “What’s the matter with you?” said Laura. She had to say something violent to squash her impulse to run over that hill, or in whatever direction was necessary, and find her parents, and forget about adventure and philosophy and riddles. She went on, loudly, “So what if we get in trouble? Isn’t it worth it to save the Secret Country? Why don’t you worry about the rest of this when we’ve done the important stuff?”
    Ted looked at her; he knew what was wrong. “Well?” he said to Patrick. “What is the matter with us?”
    “ You are soft in the head,” said Patrick. “ I am practical. Why should I want to save the Secret Country?”
    Fence stared down at Patrick, who still knelt with his arm around the dog. “Consider it,” said Fence, in a light and very terrible voice, “the price of thy fencing lessons and thy room and board these three months.”
    “I’m not at all convinced,” said Patrick, perfectly coolly, “that you roomed and boarded anything except my imagination.”
    Laura felt a shiver go over her skin. When all this was only a game, Patrick had played Fence, and he had used just such a tone and just such a level look from cold blue eyes as he was turning on Fence now. Fence had an altogether less alarming face, but his demeanor made up for it.
    “The lunatic, the lover, and the wizard,” said Fence, “are of imagination all compact. What art thou, then, that setteth the housing of thine so low?”
    “Jesus Christ!” said Patrick, passionately. Nobody reproved him for swearing. “Don’t quote Shakespeare at me! All right. All right. I’ll come back. But I promise you, I am not leaving again no matter who doesn’t want what to happen until I have figured out what the hell is going on. Is that clear?”
    “Abundantly,” said Ruth, in her dryest tones.
    “And also ,” said Patrick, “I want to test whether time stands still here while we’re in the Secret Country.”
    “Okay,” said Ellen. “You just take off your nice watch and leave it out in the rain, and we’ll come back tomorrow and see what time it says.”
    “It’s good to two hundred meters,” said Patrick, calmly. He unbuckled the strap and laid the watch down in the vivid grass, where it said, in evil red characters, 8:45.
    “Is it a bargain, then?” said Patrick, looking up at Fence.
    “Oh, of a certainty,” said Fence, still in that voice. “For I most earnestly desire these discoveries also.”
    “All right,” said Ted, whom this exchange seemed to have made extremely uneasy. “Send Shan home, Patrick, and let’s go.” Laura remembered other bargains and their outcomes, and didn’t blame him. He caught her glance, and shrugged resignedly, as their mother would do when their father got silly. Then he said to Fence, “Let’s get out of here.”

CHAPTER 5
    I T was dark when they got back to High Castle. They had missed supper. Fence spoke to the yellow-haired boy who was stationed in the stables for just such emergencies, and then hustled them up the two hundred and eight steps to his rooms in the