The Wind on the Moon by Eric Linklater Read Free Book Online Page A

Mrs. Taper too, set off at a great pace, their handcuffs clinking and clanking, and all the other people, in two big columns, marched on either side of them.
    But scarcely had they gone a hundred yards when they were brought to a halt by the most extraordinary sight. Coming up the street towards them, leaping high in the air and going twenty feet at a time, were two large grey kangaroos!

Chapter Seven
    Dorinda had been the first to wake that morning. She had dreamt that she was already a kangaroo, and she was disappointed to find herself still in human shape. She began to imagine, or try to imagine, what it would feel like to be enclosed in a furry hide, and to lean backwards, as if in a chair, against the support of a long strong tail. And from that position she would also be able to leap the length of quite a long room. Kangaroos were very lucky in some ways.
    She slipped out of bed to practise a jumping position, and at that moment Dinah got quietly out of her bed with the same idea in her head. For she too, as soon as she woke, had started to think about the new experiences that were awaiting her. So she and Dorinda both began to practise kangaroo jumps on the bedroom floor, but found it difficult without tails to help them. They had to wait, it seemed, a very long time before breakfast was ready.
    Then, as soon as they could get away, they left the house and ran without stopping to the nearest part of the Forest of Weal. That, they had decided, was the best place in which to drink the magic draught, because they did not want, of course, to turn into kangaroos in the nursery, where they might frighten their mother. And it might be difficult, added Dinah, to get downstairs. She did not think that kangaroos were very good on stairs.
    So they hurried to the Forest, carrying the little box of plaited grass with Mrs. Grimble’s medicine in it, and two small bundles that held all the things they wanted to take with them. When they came to a suitable place, they stopped and looked all around to make sure there was no one within sight. Then they opened the grass box, and read the directions on the bottle. This is what Mrs. Grimble had written on the label:
    D IRECTIONS FOR T URNING Y OURSELF INTO A NYTHING Y OU W ANT TO B E
    1. Shake the Bottle.
    2. Undress Yourself.
    3. Fold your Clothes Neatly and Put in Safe Place.
    4. Turn Three Times against the Sun and say: I Want to Be Whatever You do Want to Be.
    5. Shake the Bottle again.
    6. Drink one Dose.
    7. Replace the Cork.
    8. Go for a Little Walk.
    ( Signed ) M rs . G rimble
    â€˜This is a solemn moment,’ said Dinah, as she began to take off her shoes.
    â€˜Very solemn,’ said Dorinda. ‘I’m glad it’s a warm day.’
    â€˜There’s a hole in that oak-tree,’ said Dinah. ‘We can put our clothes away there.’
    They packed their clothes into the hole in the oak-tree, and shook the bottle for the second time. There were just four doses in it, and Dinah had remembered to bring a tablespoon. She gave Dorinda the first dose, and quickly took her own.

    They packed their clothes into the oak-tree
    â€˜Oh!’ cried Dorinda, turning quite pale.
    â€˜I have never in all my life tasted anything so horrible,’ said Dinah. But she put the cork back in the bottle, and in a firm voice said to Dorinda, ‘Now we must take a little walk. You go that way, and I’ll go this.’
    She wanted to be alone, because she thought she was going to be sick. But in a little while she felt much better, and curiously strong. She felt far stronger than she had ever been, or ever dreamt of being, and never, she thought, had all the leaves and the grass looked so nice. She put a few leaves in her mouth and chewed them, and to her surprise they tasted rather like bread-and-honey. Then, seeing a bush in front of her, she jumped over it, and thought: Well, I’ve never been able to jump as high as that before!
    But then she got a terrible