Chapter Four
‘I can’t put the baby back now, it’s too late,’ thought Rachel, and ran out through the nearest archway. She almost collided with Toby who was pushing through the crowd towards her.
‘Come on, quick. It feels like an earthquake,’ he said briskly.
‘It’s not an earthquake. It’s a dragon,’ wailed Rachel, but Toby took her hand and ran with her out into a courtyard.
‘Don’t talk, just run,’ he instructed. Rachel clutched her sweatshirt to hold the dragon to her chest with one hand while being pulled along by Toby with the other. Breathlessly, she tried to keep up with him as they pounded through archways and in and out of a series of courtyards. Gradually the shaking of the ground settled down and the roaring noise faded as they ran through one final doorway to find themselves beside the river again.
‘What do we do now?’ asked Rachel.
Toby frowned. ‘We really should try to get back to your place, I suppose,’ he said doubtfully. ‘We’ve been gone for ages and your Mum will start to panic if we’re not there. At least she will if she’s anything like my mother.’
‘How do we get home?’
‘How should I know? I don’t even know how we got here.’
‘We ran through the rainbow and over the bridge,’ said Rachel practically. ‘I haven’t forgotten that.’
‘That’s all very well but there’s no rainbow here and there certainly isn’t a bridge.’
‘How do you know there isn’t a bridge? Rivers always have bridges. We’ll just have to walk along the bank until we find one.’
‘Oh all right,’ grumbled Toby, who was unable to come up with a better idea than this.
They walked along in silence for a few minutes. The mist grew thicker and it became harder and harder to see very far in front of them. Finally they came to a small flat stony area where the ground sloped down to meet the river. Pulled up on the stones was a small rowing boat.
‘We could try that,’ Toby suggested.
Rachel shuddered.
‘I can’t swim very well’, she said in a small voice.
‘I’m not suggesting that you swim,’ said Toby impatiently. ‘I’ll row us across the river. All you have to do is sit still.’
Rachel agreed to this and climbed hurriedly into the boat as Toby pushed it into the water. He jumped in after her and after a few wild splashing attempts, he managed to row in a wobbly path across the river.
‘It’s an awfully long way,’ said Rachel after a while. Her teeth were chattering with the cold and the mist closed around them so they could barely see. Even the little dragon was quiet although she felt its warm little body snuggling close against her under her sweatshirt.
‘I think we’re in a current,’ said Toby ‘I can’t really tell which way we’re going.’
He rowed on, hoping he wasn’t taking them in circles. ‘The castle was fun, wasn’t it?’ he said, to take Rachel’s mind off the cold river. ‘I had some neat games with those guys and the food was wonderful.’
‘I didn’t dare eat or drink anything,’ confessed Rachel. ‘And I’m really thirsty.’
‘Plenty of water in the river,’ said Toby with a laugh as she made a face at him.
A few minutes later Rachel said, ‘Toby. Um, I don’t want to worry you, but my feet are getting wet.’
Toby looked down and saw that there was a spreading puddle of water in the bottom of the boat. ‘Oh help, we’re leaking,’ he said. ‘See if there’s anything under the seat we can use to bale it out.’ Rachel looked all around the boat, which didn’t take long as it was very small.
‘There’s nothing here,’ she said, trying not to panic.
Toby looked grim and pulled harder on the oars. ‘We must be nearly across,’ he said. He kept rowing as Rachel anxiously watched the water gradually fill up the bottom of the boat.
Finally Toby looked over his shoulder and through a gap in the mist he spotted a dark bank of boulders.
‘We’re there, we’re across,’ he said in relief. He gave a final thrust with the oars and they both made a jump for the shore as the boat gave up the struggle and sank under the water.
‘Ow, it’s cold,’ shrieked Rachel.
‘It smells too,’ said Toby in disgust. The mist suddenly cleared and the children found themselves standing on the edge of the fishpond.
‘Do you suppose it really happened?’ asked Toby in bewilderment. ‘Or was it a dream?’
‘Yes it definitely happened,’ said Rachel. ‘Look.’
To Toby’s astonishment, she pulled the baby dragon out of her pocket where it had been sleeping. The dragon woke up with a squeak and tried to scramble over to Toby to play with him. Toby beamed in delight and he and Rachel spent a happy half-hour playing games with the dragon. Toby wanted it to retrieve sticks like a dog but it spurned this idea. Instead it happily waddled between them snuffling hopefully at their fingers.
‘It’s probably hungry,’ said Rachel, who had forgotten her own thirst in all the excitement. ‘What do you suppose it eats?’
‘I don’t know. Princesses probably. I’m only joking,’ Toby added hastily as Rachel turned a hurt look towards him. ‘What about milk? All little animals like milk.’
They raided the kitchen to find that no time at all had passed on their adventure. Aunt Phoebe was still not home from her meeting, so Rachel put a saucer on the floor and filled it up with milk for the dragon. The dragon tasted the milk and promptly spat it out with much spluttering and sneezing. It eagerly accepted a chocolate biscuit, finished the meat in the cats bowl, then wolfed down a large piece of Toby’s cheese sandwich and three bananas.
After all that it was still complaining loudly about how it was starving and how no one cared about it, and how it would fade away if it didn’t get any more food. Rachel gave a resigned sigh and opened a new tin of cat food, which it gulped down happily.
The cat arrived at this point as it heard the electric can opener being operated. It took one appalled look at the dragon and the hairs stood up on its back. The cat growled. The dragon gave a whuffle of pleasure and growled back. The cat hissed and spat. The dragon replied by blowing two tiny perfect smoke rings from its nostrils. The cat lashed its tail angrily and the dragon entered into the spirit of things by walloping its own scaly tail on the floor. The cat at this point decided that discretion was the better part of valour and made a hasty retreat for the door, closely pursued by the dragon, which was desperate to join in the game.
Fortunately the dragon wasn’t sure how to climb out through the cat door, so Rachel was able to retrieve it before it disappeared outside. She plonked it onto the mat in front of the door where it settled down with Rachel’s father’s slipper. It chewed this contentedly with a dreamy look on its face and Rachel didn’t have the heart to take it away.
Where are we going to keep it?’ asked Toby. ‘We can’t show it to anyone. They’ll take it off to a laboratory and dissect it or study it or something.’
‘It can sleep in a box under my bed,’ said Rachel confidently. ‘Mum hardly ever looks under there and if I offer to clean my room she won’t come in at all.’
‘We probably can’t keep it forever,’ said Toby regretfully. ‘It’s bound to grow bigger. But it will be fun to have something to play with.’
‘Better than jigsaws,’ agreed Rachel. ‘Bother. We were supposed to get those done and put away while Mum was out. I’ll tell her they were so hard we only had time to do one.’
She fetched a carton from the shed and lined it with an old towel, then carefully lifted the dragon into it. The dragon went to sleep curled around the slipper, which it was fiercely protecting.
‘I’m going to call him Whiffles,’ announced Rachel.
Toby sniggered. ‘What a ridiculous name. Sounds like a bad case of sinus trouble. Anyway, we don’t know if it’s a boy or a girl. Widdles might be more appropriate.’ He pointed to a puddle on the floor while Rachel glared at him and rushed for the disinfectant
and a cloth.
‘You come up with a name then, as you’re so clever.’
‘What about Hercules? He was really strong and the dragon will be strong when it grows up.’
Rachel made a face. ‘It doesn’t seem right for a dragon. What about Blazing Star?’
‘Smoky,’ retorted Toby.
‘Silver Streak.’
‘Scaly. Anyway it’s not silver, it’s all different colours.’
‘Sequinned Glory.’
‘Puffy.’
‘Oh, you’re not even trying,’ Rachel exploded.
‘I have an idea,’ suggested Toby. ‘Why don’t we put the dragon in the middle of the room then each call a name. Whoever it goes to gets to call it that name.’
Rachel could see the sense in this so they dragged the sleepy dragon back out of its box and began calling.
‘Precious Diamond, Precious Diamond,’ coaxed Rachel.
‘Hey Spike, over here,’ called Toby.
The dragon looked back and forth between them then waddled slowly over to Toby.
‘Spike it is,’ he said smugly, giving the dragon a piece of biscuit he had concealed in his hand. ‘And I say he is a male.’
‘You cheated,’ said Rachel in outrage, but Spike seemed happy with his name and fell asleep in the box again.