by Laurence Yep
Even in my human form, it is difficult to hold me because I’d picked up a few tricks from my stay in Mongolia, where wrestling is a national pastime. When I saw Willamar’s arm curling toward me, I raised both my forearms close against my torso so the circle of his arms was larger than it needed to be. Then, by easing my own arms down to my sides and shifting my feet and hips, I could slip away. The next moment, I’d plucked Winnie from his grasp.
While I straightened her hair and clothes, I said, “We got lost, and by the time we knew where we were, it was too late to see the theft, so we headed here.”
Willamar knew it was a lie, of course.
But a troll in Willamar’s position would prefer my fiction to facts. Ultimately, Willamar and the other time-traveling councilors were responsible for letting Winnie and me run amok in the past. My explanation would spare them a lot of embarrassment.
Exactly as I had anticipated, Willamar sounded grateful. “How awful for you! Please, you must restore your spirits.” He indicated the rear of his property, where a canvas tarp with a time badge held quite a credible spread of cheeses, crackers, cookies, and fruit along with small bottles of juice and other beverages.
Then, while he left to talk to the other councilors and make sure we all shared the same story about my misadventures, Winnie and I headed for the food.
“Miss Drake, we missed your sharp eyes at the ball.” Silana dipped a strawberry into a glass of champagne.
I tried to change the subject. “Yes, I’m devastated. Did you discover who stole the Heart of Kubera?”
Silana lifted the strawberry by its stem and nibbled its side. “No, it was just like the newspapers reported. One moment, the Heart of Kubera was sparkling on Lady Gravelston while she waltzed with Senator Bradley, and the next moment—poof!—it was gone.” She added, “But the greater mystery is, what happened to you?”
“We got lost,” Winnie said quickly.
“Oh, my, Miss Drake, I thought you went to the Exposition almost every day.” Silana swirled the strawberry around in her glass. “How could you forget where things were?” Pretending to be shocked, she raised her eyebrows, and her mouth made a little circle. “Unless…oh, you poor old thing. Are you going senile?”
No doubt Silana would have a delicious time telling everyone that I had become a doddering old fool.
I narrowed my eyes in warning. “Haven’t you heard the proverb, ‘You only tease a dragon once’? It’s carved into many a fool’s tombstone.”
Silana smiled maliciously. “No, I hadn’t, but since it’s carved in stone, that’s one thing you won’t be able to forget.” She turned away then, no doubt eager to spread her slander about me.
Winnie grabbed my sleeve so I couldn’t follow the sorceress. “Don’t get into a fight. We don’t want any more attention.”
“Don’t exaggerate. I was simply going to teach her a lesson in etiquette.” I tried to shake free, but Winnie wouldn’t let go. “After all, what if she insults a dragon who doesn’t have my vast store of patience?” I added, “And don’t roll your eyes at me, young lady! One day, they’ll lock while you’re looking upward, and you’ll never be able to see your feet again.”
“Ah,” Sir Isaac said as he got a plate, “but always gazing skyward is perfect for an astronomer.”
Lady Louhi, though, wasn’t in the mood to tease us. “Have you seen my nephew, Miss Drake? I seem to have misplaced him.”
I assumed that Rowan had told her that he was going to search for us, and this was her discreet way of asking us what had happened. Her worry seemed genuine, so perhaps she really had adopted Rowan as a kind of nephew.
“Yes,” I said, mentally crossing my claws. “He’ll be here soon. I wouldn’t worry. He struck me as someone who can take care of himself.”
Rowan was not only capable but had a sense of duty as strong as Caleb’s. I might have admired him except for one problem: I remembered Gilbert the Guardian only having one son, and that one was long dead—yet Rowan seemed devoted to the wizard. The evening kept piling up one mystery after another.
“Sometimes I think he tries too hard.” Lady Louhi sighed.
“The boy wants to win his spurs.” Sir Isaac began to heap cookies on the plate.
“So give. Did your stuff work? Did you see the thief?” Winnie asked him.
“We won’t know until Lady Louhi and I analyze our recordings.” He offered us the plate of cookies, but Lady Louhi simply shook her head. She had no appetite for snacks while Rowan was missing. Then he added in a low voice, “But an intriguing thought occurred to me when we returned: What if the thief didn’t come from 1915? Instead, what if one of our fellow time travelers is the real thief? He or she took off their badge and cast an invisibility spell upon themselves so no one from the club would see him or her. Most likely the Council of that time only investigated magicals from 1915, not the future.”
Winnie started to reach for a tart but hesitated, then reluctantly picked up an apple. Her mother, Liza, had been dropping hints that we needed to eat healthier. “Wouldn’t the Fellowship see one of its members stealing the Heart of Kubera?”
Sir Isaac’s eyes shone, and I wondered if he had been this excited when he had discovered gravity. “Ah, my dear Burton, not if the thief used an invisibility spell beforehand—once the badge was off, the jewel could be plucked from around Lady Gravelston’s throat.”
I disengaged Winnie’s hand from my cuff and picked up a small plate with a slice of Black Forest cake. Liza could lecture her daughter on human nutrition all she liked, but a dragon doesn’t survive thirty centuries by eating like a rabbit. “You would have noticed someone was missing—I mean, besides Rowan and us.”
Sir Isaac had an odd way of eating a cookie, turning it so he could take mouse-like nibbles from around its edge. “I can account for the ones like Willamar, who remained with Lady Gravelston, but when we got to the ball, Lady Luminita said she was going to follow her prime suspect.”
“Schmidt the waiter?” Winnie asked through a mouthful of apple.
Sir Isaac wagged the now thumb-size cookie at her. “That’s the fellow. When the lady went off on her own, many of the others also decided to trail their choices. So you see, since we lost track of them, they could have done anything they wanted.”
I got a fork. “Silana thinks the thief is a magical, so did she follow one of the ballgoers or did she follow one of the club members?”
Sir Isaac popped the cookie into his mouth. “All I can say is that Silana wasn’t with us.”
Perhaps there was something to Sir Isaac’s theory. I wouldn’t put it past her to fool everyone and take it herself.
“Well,” I said, “if anyone can identify the thief, it’s going to be you or Lady Louhi.”
He merely grunted. “The proof of the pudding will be in the eating.”
“And the cake too.” I put a forkful of dessert into my mouth, and the sweetness instantly rejuvenated me so I began to feel at least twenty—no make that thirty years younger. The cake was that delicious, just like all of Willamar’s bounty. Winnie watched wistfully as I took another bite.
An anxious-looking Lady Louhi peeked at the watch pinned to her dress. “If you’ll excuse me,” she said, and she drifted to the street-side edge of the property to wait for her nephew. Sir Isaac kept her company.
The other time travelers ignored them, too intent on arguing about the identity of the thief and the method of the theft.
Winnie whispered to me. “I don’t think the trip solved anything.”
“Well, you can’t expect them to give up their hobby just like that,” I replied softly. But a different puzzle seemed more important to me than the stolen jewel. The pin on Winnie’s badge might have been defective as she had suggested, but the pin had looked fine when I’d handled it. It bothered me that my inattention to some details had almost gotten my pet arrested and risked changing our time line.
—
Nearly midnight, traffic had thinned in the
streets, but it hadn’t completely disappeared. Willamar had begun pacing along the string boundary line while Lady Louhi and Sir Isaac stood, keeping a vigil for Rowan.
Suddenly we saw Rowan running, his long coat flapping behind him like wings. On the tan leather, I saw a bright round dot that must have been Winnie’s badge because he was passing straight through pedestrians or vehicles. He had a curious bouncing gait, bounding slightly into the air with each stride as if on springs, but he covered an amazing amount of ground with each second in his race against time.
Lady Louhi waved her arm as she shouted, “Hurry, hurry!”
The other club members got to their feet and began urging Rowan on as if we were at a track meet.
He was still half a block away when I glanced at my watch.
“Is he going to make it?” Winnie asked nervously.
I shook my head.
“Help your nephew,” Lorelei called to Lady Louhi. “Don’t you know some kind of transportation spell?”
“Yes, but I’m forbidden to use it here,” Lady Louhi said helplessly.
“Someone, anyone,” Lorelei begged.
Enough was enough. I would risk the High Council’s wrath. “Stand close in front of me,” I whispered to Winnie.
For once, she obeyed without peppering me with a dozen questions first. I barely moved my lips and fingers as I murmured the spell.
At Rowan’s next step, he suddenly soared high into the air like a giant grasshopper, landing just within the cords and stakes.
He looked as shocked as everyone else. He stared at the street and then the sand where he was standing. “How…?”
“What an amazing run!” Willamar pounded him on his back and then called to the rest of us, “Wasn’t it everyone?”
The other councilors nodded. Like my being lost, Rowan’s mad dash was going to become a convenient truth.
Rowan stood there panting as the world of 1915 began to quiver, and the ground grew spongy. I had the feeling of being turned inside out and wrung like an old dishrag, and then I was staring at the walls of Willamar’s parlor once more.
We were back in our time again—with more mysteries to solve than ever. And very bothersome mysteries to boot!
CHAPTER NINE
I wish—two words that can spark an adventure or turn one topsy-turvy.
Winnie
I sighed with relief as we entered our house. “Phew, time travel’s like any long trip. It’s fun once you get there and once you get home, but it’s the traveling part that I don’t like.” I grinned at Miss Drake. “But at least we got away with it.”
“It would seem so,” Miss Drake said as she stretched. “But there’s something still bothering me.”
“Not my badge again,” I groaned as I hung up my jacket in the hallway closet. “You checked the one that Rowan found, and there was nothing wrong with it.”
“And there was nothing wrong when I put it on you,” Miss Drake insisted.
I’d met mules at stables, and none of them had been half as stubborn as my dragon. “Then maybe the spell only partly worked on my badge. There’s bound to be one dud when Lady Louhi made so many.” I added with a grin, “Or the badge was allergic to me and jumped off.”
Miss Drake frowned. “You’re getting sleepy, and that’s making you very silly. So go to bed and we’ll open the time capsule tomorrow.”
Bed was sounding like a good idea after a long, exciting evening. Besides, my costume was getting itchy. But I turned to Great-Granddad Caleb’s portrait, which had started our whole adventure.
The man in the business suit was older and had less hair, but I saw now that his eyes had the same kindness that I remembered in the boy’s—but maybe sadder.
I rubbed at the dried water spots that I had left on the glass. “Not a chance. Now that I met him, I want to see what he wanted to leave me.”
“Don’t expect much,” Miss Drake warned. “He was only eleven.”
We went down to Miss Drake’s apartment in the basement. I couldn’t resist taking one of my keys from my pocket and opening her door. Great-Aunt Amelia had left me the original, and I’d made a zillion copies so I could go in anytime I liked. It still annoyed Miss Drake sometimes.
Tonight, though, she seemed grateful that she didn’t have to hunt for hers. “I don’t suppose you’d like a cup of tea first?” she asked. That was her way of saying she wanted one.
I was too impatient, though. The whole evening had been leading up to this. I fell to my knees by the coffee table where a rusty old square tin cookie box sat. On the lid was a picture of steamboats in the San Francisco Bay. “I’m not thirsty. Let’s get this puppy open.”
“Wait. Before I forget, this is also for you,” she said, handing me a bundle she had made from her handkerchief.
Untying the knot, I gave a yelp. “Pink sand! How did you get it?”
“When we were in real time, I put two handfuls in my handkerchief,” she told me. “I figured if the scones from now could make it there, whenever I was able to snatch some sand, I’d carry it in my pocket. It was an experiment.”
“So much for always obeying the rules,” I said, grasping her treasure.
“One of my rules,” she reminded me, “is to always wear clothing with deep pockets.” The next moment she disappeared in a golden haze, and when it cleared, she was a dragon again. “Ah, scales are so much more comfortable than human clothing.”
I was eager to get inside the time capsule, but the lid seemed stuck when I pulled at it, so I drummed my fingers on the top. “Open it, open it,” I said in rhythm to my tapping.
“It might be rust from the foggy air,” Miss Drake said. She slipped the tip of her claw into the thin line between the can and the lid. There was a loud, screechy creak as she pried it loose.
“There it goes,” she said, giving me the tin. “I’ll leave the honors to you.”
As I lifted the lid, I took a deep breath of the century-old air inside. Great-Granddad’s air.
Despite Miss Drake’s warning, I had been expecting something amazing, but on the very top was a bunch of postcards like the giant typewriter and the Tower of Jewels. Below them was an old sock. Picking it up by the toe, I shook out some brass commemorative coins and a miniature lucky horseshoe.
Miss Drake lifted an opening-day badge with a blue-yellow-and-red-striped ribbon and a closing-day badge with a picture of a woman waving good-bye. Miss Drake smiled, as if it brought back memories, and then she set them on the pile of souvenirs I’d found.
At the very bottom was a bundle of felt, an old pennant with the Tower of Jewels on it. Even though I was careful when I unrolled it, red paint flaked off, and something fell onto my lap. It was the whistle with the mongoose etched and painted on the side.
Miss Drake sighed. “So that’s what happened to it.”
We were learning how to play the recorder in music class, so I put it to my lips. I blew softly, and the notes of the scale floated around us. It still worked. Slowly, I played the beginning of “Molly Malone.”
Miss Drake put her paws on her lap. “You play better than Caleb did. I only heard him blow the whistle at the fair and once more when we got home—but never again.”
I set the whistle down on the table to keep as a souvenir of tonight. Miss Drake picked it up and examined it in her paws. “It is ivory,” she said, “and no mere peddler crafted this. Another puzzle to ponder.”
She put it on the table again.
The whistle was interesting, but I was more curious about my great-grandfather.
“If the older Caleb met me right now, what would he think?”
“That you’re up way past your bedtime,” Miss Drake said.
“No teasing,” I begged.
She scratched her muzzle. “Hmm, he’d find you rude and rough, perhaps even a bit crude.”
“Oh.” My shoulders sagged, disappointed.
Miss Drake relented. “But you’re no different than the other children of today, and despite
all your flaws, he’d love you as much as he loved Amelia.”
“Did he love Granddad Jarvis too?” I asked.
Miss Drake defended Great-Granddad. “Caleb tried to be a good father and husband, but he and his wife never saw eye to eye on his charity work.” Miss Drake told me a little about some of the good things Great-Granddad had done when he had grown up. “Your great-grandmother Mary was very kind to friends and family, but she was of her class and thought the poor were stealing resources away from her children. I’m afraid that Jarvis got infected by her contempt, and that started a rift between him and his father that became a canyon over time. Sometimes things happen that way.” I could see that Miss Drake regretted it, though.
Granddad Jarvis had been mean enough to chase Mom and me all over the country so he could take me away from her. But I had to be fair. “Granddad has been trying hard to be nice in his note cards to me,” I said. He’d left Mom and me alone in exchange for letters from me.
Miss Drake nodded slowly. “Caleb would like that.”
Once we had put everything back in the time capsule, I took it upstairs to the second floor, where my bedroom was. I took out the whistle and then put the box in my closet before I went over to my special shelf. I put all the souvenirs from my adventures with Miss Drake on it—like a phoenix feather that glowed softly in the dark, a misty piece from the veil of Iris the rainbow goddess that floated in the air and other neat treasures. It was like my own museum of wonders.
I checked my bookcase too, and all my Little House Books were still there. So I hadn’t changed the past enough to change the future. Or the Council had fixed things for me. Maybe Mrs. Wilder thought I was just a dream. But I remembered meeting her and hearing her intend to do some writing that would count. Hmmmm.
I set the whistle on the shelf and then texted Mom.
All the riders on her trip had had to turn in their phones, so she would read it with all my other texts when they got to their destination.