The Magic Meadow (4 page)

“That's it. So it shouldn't be long—” He caught his breath, and burst out excitedly, “
Will you look at that!
”

The sky had brightened, and on the right it was turning a brilliant red. Then the entire horizon seemed to burst into flame. It was as if there'd been a vast explosion that had set the world on fire. It was awesome and frightening and beautiful and incredible—and it was absolutely soundless, save for the now-awakened birds. And suddenly, as he stared, a monstrous molten ball of gleaming gold slid upward and flung its brilliance over the land.

Princess whispered ecstatically, “The
sun! It's the sun!
”

Brick clutched the grass and blinked at it until its growing brightness forced him to turn his eyes away. He was overwhelmed. Until now, the grimy buildings of the city had bounded their world and had shut out all horizons. This was the first sunrise they had ever seen.

“Boy!” he said finally. “Boy o' boy! I sure never dreamed it could look like that!”

Without realizing what he'd done, he found he'd somehow managed to sit upright. Though it was tiring, it raised his eye level well above the grass, and he was able to see everything he had missed before. He braced himself with his arms and peered curiously about, filled with the wonder of a world that was so different from all he had ever known.

They were on the edge of a bowl-shaped meadow tucked between low, forested hills. Immediately on the left, he could make out the tiny stream he had been hearing. It went tumbling down through a carpet of dandelions and other flowers to the foot of the opposite hill, where it was joined by another small spring flowing in from the right. After the first careful glance about him, his attention went quickly to the spot where he had briefly glimpsed something on his first visit.

At the moment, he could make out nothing. It was too early, and the misty woods on the other hill were still deep in shadow. As he squinted at the trees, trying vainly to see through them, the mounting sun brightened the distant edge of the meadow on the left and outlined three animals grazing there. One was a great black horse with a long mane. Near it were two deer—a slender doe with a fawn.

He glanced eagerly at Princess, and found that she, too, had managed to sit up and was looking with wide-eyed fascination at the animals.

“They're so
beautiful!
” she whispered breathlessly. “Oh, I wish I could go over and pet them. I believe I could if I tried.”

He was astounded when Princess actually got to her feet and took several faltering steps down the slope. Then she collapsed.

He crawled over to her. “Are—are you all right?”

For a few seconds she seemed unable to speak. Then she stammered, “D-did you see me? I
walked!
I actually
walked!
”

“You sure did! I'll bet everybody can do it if we can just get 'em over here.”

“Maybe we ought to go back and get them,” she suggested happily. “Shall we?”

“Not yet. We'd better find out all we can about this place while we're here.”

He glanced in the direction of the animals, and was almost relieved to see them moving away downstream. The deer were probably safe enough, but the horse wasn't exactly his idea of Black Beauty. The huge creature impressed him as being absolutely wild.

Again his attention went to the woods on the other side of the meadow. The mist was clearing under the warm sun, and now he could trace a vague shape back in the shadows.

“Look!” he said, pointing. “That's what I saw the first time I came here. That long dark thing—it looks like it's on the other side of the trees. What is it?”

“I see it,” Princess said in a low voice. “I believe it's a house.”

“If it's a house, it's sure got a funny shape. It stretches 'way off to the left.”

“Brick, that's a fence on the left.”

“It's doggone high for a fence. It's more like a stockade. You know, the kind we're always seeing around a fort in one of those westerns on TV.”

“Oh, Brick, maybe it
is
a fort with a stockade! Wouldn't it just boggle you to find we were actually 'way out West somewhere, with Indians and cowboys and settlers and soldiers—”

“Yeah,” he muttered. “It sure would, because it's impossible. Don't you realize that's all Hollywood make-believe? This is for real.”

“Then where
are
we?”

He shrugged. “That's what really boggles me. I can't figure it. But if I can get over to that house or fort, or whatever it is yonder, maybe I can find out.”

By using great care and effort, he managed to stand up as Princess had done and take a few faltering steps. But his longunused legs were too weak to support him, and abruptly he crumpled. Then he saw that Princess was on her hands and knees, crawling. He tried it, and found it fairly easy, except that they both had to stop every few feet and rest.

The sun was hot on their backs now, and it was a great relief when they finally reached the little spring at the foot of the slope and buried their faces in the cold sweet water. It was the best water Brick had ever tasted.

Princess said finally, “My, that was good! But I'm afraid I can't go any farther. I—I'm just too tired.”

Brick was tired, too, and he was dismayed when he glanced over at the slope ahead. Though it was a gentle slope, carpeted with flowers like the one behind him, he doubted if he could make it to the top. Yet he had to try. Something told him that the most important thing in the world was to reach that building and find out everything he could about it.

“I've just got to go on,” he told Princess. “Only, I don't like to leave you here all alone.”

“Oh, but I won't be alone,” she said happily. “There are thousands of unspeakably wonderful things everywhere around me. I could spend days and days right here, just looking.”

“Well, if anything happens before I get back, all you have to do is think real hard of your bed in Ward Nine, and you'll be back there in no time.”

It must have taken him nearly an hour to crawl painfully up to the trees, a comparatively short distance which anyone with good legs could have covered in seconds. The most awkward part was crossing the spring. The ground was too boggy on the right to attempt going around it, but he managed to sort of sprawl and flop to the other side without getting anything wet but the lower parts of his pajamas and his feet.

Just before entering the trees, he stopped and glanced back at Princess, but she was so absorbed in something in the water that she did not see him. He was very tired now, and if his goal hadn't been clearly in sight, he might have thought twice about going on. But there it was, just a little way ahead. A low stone building with a thatched roof, and it was built at one corner of what seemed to be a long stockade.

Sudden excitement rose in him. He forgot his weariness and went scrambling through the trees as fast as he could move. What parts of the world had stone houses with thatched roofs? The only place he could think of was Ireland.

Ireland?

He stopped a moment in sheer surprise. Was Ireland far enough around the world to explain the difference in time? And what about the trees? These looked like pictures he'd seen of pines, but they were awfully big, and some of them had slashes in the bark with odd-looking cups fastened to them. Did the Irish have pines like these? But what of the stockade? Somehow he had the idea that the Irish built stone walls instead.

Could this be Russia—or Siberia? Still, the climate …

A little chill came over him, and he looked intently at the structure and realized it wasn't a stockade after all. It was a very high fence made of slender poles placed about a foot apart. In between, near the ground, were short pieces that made the lower part of the fence practically solid. Was it built that way to keep something out—or in?

As he began crawling forward again, cautiously now, Brick found himself unconsciously listening—listening for some sound that would indicate the presence of people. Instead, he was again impressed by the quiet. Other than the small sounds of birds and insects, it was so very quiet that the sudden chattering of a squirrel overhead gave him a momentary fright. Squirrels, like the brown lizards and yellow butterflies he had already noticed, were creatures he had never seen except in pictures, and ordinarily he would have been enthralled by them. But the strange building ahead demanded all his attention.

He pressed forward with a sort of cautious eagerness, and seconds later he was crouched before a curiously carved wooden door.

Brick peered up at it almost in disbelief. Somebody had spent a lot of time carving that door, for it was covered with a design of interlocking squares of all sizes. Even the wooden mechanism that served as an outside latch was part of the decoration.

Now, why would anyone put that much work on a door—especially for a place as remote as this? Then he saw that every detail of the structure, including the many-paned window on the left, was just as carefully designed and made.

What was inside?

As he studied the door, he realized it didn't have a lock. Anyone could open it by raising the latch.

Brick argued with himself a moment, wondering if it would be wrong to enter, but he quickly decided it wouldn't be. He
had
to get inside so he could learn all he could and report it to the others.

By grasping the cut stones framing the entrance, he managed to get to his feet and cling there long enough to raise the latch. He had a few seconds of trouble when he discovered that the heavy door opened outward instead of inward, but presently he was crawling inside, blinking with astonishment at the broad room before him.

It was much larger than he had expected, with a great fireplace on the right and double bunks of old carved wood lining two walls. An immense long table with benches around it occupied the center of the place. Most of the far wall beyond it was taken up by a broad window, but from where he crouched he couldn't see what was on the other side. His amazed eyes roved about, taking in the carved wood, the tools and musical instruments hanging from pegs, the strings of dried onions and corn dangling from the beams overhead, and the polished cooking things in the alcove by the fireplace. Everything here, including the stone floor beneath him, was old and worn, but carefully preserved and shiningly clean.

Only the faint film of dust on the flagstones gave evidence that no one had used the place for a long time.

Brick was puzzling over that, and wondering why it hadn't been locked, when he heard a rush of wind outside and the big carved door suddenly banged shut.

For a moment he stared at it uncertainly, feeling he had somehow made a mistake. Then with rising uneasiness he crawled over to it and tried to push it open.

The heavy door refused to budge.

Now he remembered how the stone casing outside was slotted to engage the wooden mechanism, and he realized the door would automatically bolt itself when closed. He struggled to his feet and began tugging and twisting the wooden handle that was part of the inside design. It should have released the bolt on the outside—but it didn't. Feverishly he pulled and twisted, trying everything he could think of, but the door would not open. He was trapped.

Under this awful realization he sank exhausted to the floor. What a crazy door! Whoever built it must have been off his rocker, because the mechanism with the bolt should have been on the inside.

What was he going to do?

He was so tired by now that he could not help closing his eyes a moment and wishing he had a place to rest a while, a comfortable bed somewhere. Unconsciously, as he did so, he visioned his own bed in Ward Nine.…

This time, because he wanted so desperately to be out of his prison, the change came almost instantly.

He hadn't been ready to return, and it was a shock to suddenly find himself huddled on his bed in the same position he had been in on the flagstone floor. He straightened and swung about and looked wildly around. The lights were on, and Nurse Jackson, who apparently had just entered the ward, was standing frozen near the door, staring at him as if she had never seen him before. He realized the others were staring too, and were babbling questions, but his attention was on the bed to his right.

It was empty.

Lily Rose, half in tears, asked plaintively, “What's happened to Princess?”

“Oh, lordy,” Nurse Jackson gasped. “I pray to heaven she's all right. I should never have allowed you—” She came swiftly over to his bed. “Brick, what in the world—How did you get so dirty?”

He swallowed and said, “I—I didn't mean to come back without her. It was an accident. I mean, we'd crawled down to that little stream—”

Charlie Pill said, “Are you nuts? You know Princess can't crawl! Why, she can hardly move—”

“She can crawl now,” he told Charlie. “She can even walk. I can, too. I—”

“
Walk?
” Nurse Jackson whispered.

“Yeah, but not far. Give us a few days to get used to it, and I'll bet—”

“But what
happened
, Brick?”

“Well, as I was saying, she was too tired to go on when we reached that little stream. So I left her there and crawled on up to that building I saw. Only, when I got inside, the wind blew the door shut, and it locked on me. I couldn't get out.”

“So you teleported back here?”

“Well, that's what happened, only I didn't intend it that way.”

Nurse Jackson frowned. “And Princess is waiting where you left her?”

Brick nodded. “I—I'm sure she's all right. We got there too early—it was still dark, and without a blanket it was awfully cold till the sun came up. But that sun's hot, and she was sitting right out in it.…”

“‘
Sitting right out in it?
'” Nurse Jackson repeated, aghast. “Brick, don't you know what the sun will do to her? Why, that poor little pale thing, she's never been exposed to it in her life! Her skin's so tender it could kill her!”