Kristin & Ally "The Deliverers Of Their Country"

It all began with Kristin getting something in her eye. It hurt very much indeed, and it felt like a red-hot spark - only it seemed to have legs that wiggled, and wings like a fly. Kristin rubbed her brown eyes and cried; not real crying, but the kind of watering your eyes do all by themselves when something is in them. Then she went to David (Dad) to have the thing in her eye taken out.David (Dad) knew everything there was to know about anything, so of course he knew how to take things out of eyes and he did it very cleverly using a Q-tip. Peering down into those big brown eyes, David (Dad) asked Kristin to look up, then down, then up again, and then he gently ran a Q-tip around the edge of the tearful eye. When David (Dad) finally got the thing out, he said, 'This is very curious...'Kristin had had things in her eye before, but David (Dad) had never seemed to make much of a fuss about it. Kristin stood holding a tissue to her eye, and asked, 'Are you sure that you got it all out?' (Of course, people always say this when they have had something in their eye!) 'Yes, it's out,' said David (Dad). 'Here it is on the end of the Q-tip. But this is very remarkable.'Kristin wondered what David (Dad) had found so interesting as to grip his attention so intensely. 'What?' Kristin asked.David (Dad) carried the Q-tip very carefully to the kitchen and peered down at it under the light. After a moment of close scrutiny, he reached into a cupboard drawer and pulled out a small magnifying glass. David (Dad) was constantly investigating something new and interesting, and the kitchen cupboard drawer was the hiding spot for many a useful tool; butterfly specimen containers, rubber gloves, tape, glue, and in this case, a magnifying glass. After centering the wiggly, winged creature under the lens, David (Dad) twisted up his face and peered attentively with one eye. 'Dear me,' he said. 'Dear, dear me! Four clearly defined legs, a tail and five toes - unequal in length. It looks like some sort of reptile, yet there are traces of wings.' The creature under his watchful eye wriggled about on the Q-tip, and David (Dad) continued, 'Yes; a bat-like wing. Kristin, my guess is that this is some kind of a new specimen.' David (Dad) paused for a moment before saying, 'Run over to the Professor's house and ask him to be kind enough to visit for a few minutes.' 'Perhaps I deserve a reward, David (Dad) you might give me a dollar...' said Kristin coyly, 'after all, I did bring you this new specimen. I took great care of it inside my eye, and my eye does hurt.' Big brown eyes stared back at David (Dad) from under a mop of brown hair.David (Dad) was so pleased with finding such a new and interesting creature that he gave Kristin a dollar and promised another if she would run immediately and fetch the Professor - Kristin was off like the wind. The Professor was a friend of the family who lived only a short distance away. Soon Kristin returned with the Professor - both of them panting from running the entire distance back - the Professor being quite impressed with the story about the winged wonder that David (Dad) had discovered. In fact, the Professor was so impressed that he stayed for lunch, and he and David (Dad) quarreled very happily all afternoon about the name and the family of the creature Kristin had so conveniently captured in her eye.Kristin soon grew bored with the intense discussion, especially since they were using long words with more than three syllables. So Kristin went in search of her friend, Ally, inviting her back for a look at the newfound creature. But while they were sipping on cold drinks, half-heartedly listening to David (Dad) and the Professor, Ally fished something out of her lemonade. At first she thought it was an earwig. Ally was just getting ready to drop it on the floor and end its life in the usual way, when it shook itself on the spoon, spread its two wings, and flopped onto the tablecloth. There it sat stroking itself with its feet and stretching its wings, and Ally said, 'Why, it's a tiny newt!'The Professor overheard the excited chatter of the children and before David (Dad) could say a word, he fished into his pocket for all of his spare change. 'Ally, I'll give you five dollars for it,' he said, speaking very fast. Ally eagerly accepted the Professor's offer, who then carefully picked up the creature and deposited it on a paper towel for safekeeping. 'It is a new specimen, and finer than yours,' he said smugly to David (Dad).It was a tiny lizard, about half an inch long - with scales and wings.So now David (Dad) and the Professor each had a specimen, and they were both very pleased. But before long these specimens began to seem less valuable. For the next morning, the boy hired to cut the lawn and water the gardens was reaching under a bush when suddenly he screamed out that he had been burned. From under the bush came crawling a lizard as big as a kitten, with large, shiny wings. Then that afternoon, Fido, the neighbor's dog, was bitten in the garden by a dragon about the size of a rabbit, which, of course, Fido had immediately tried to chase. The next morning all of the newspapers were full of stories of the wonderful 'winged lizards' that were appearing all over the country. The papers would not call them dragons, because, of course, no one believed in dragons. At first there were only a few, but within a week or two, the entire country was simply overrun with dragons of all sizes, and in the air you could sometimes see them as thick as a swarm of bees. They all looked alike except that there were many different sizes of these creatures. They were green with scales, and they had four legs and long tails and great wings like bats' wings, only the wings were a pale, half-transparent yellow.They breathed fire and smoke, as all proper dragons must, but still the newspapers went on pretending they were lizards, until the editor of the town's newspaper was picked up and carried away by a very large one. Then the writers for the newspaper had no one left to tell them what they ought or ought not to believe. So when a dragon carried off the largest elephant in the zoo, the papers gave up pretending and put 'ALARMING PLAGUE OF DRAGONS' as the headline on the front page!People soon learned how to avoid trouble. They discovered that the dragons always went to bed early because they were afraid of the chilly night air. So, to avoid the dragons, you only had to stay indoors all day and come out and play in the evening, that way you would be safe from the really big ones.But some of the dragons could be a real nuisance - especially the smaller ones. The ones the size of earwigs became stuck in the soap, and they got in the butter. The ones as big as dogs floated in the bath, and the fire and smoke inside them made the water steam like a geyser. Also, if one wasn't careful, a person could be scalded quite severely while enjoying a warm soak, if a dragon were to suddenly fly into the tub as they often did. The ones that were as large as pigeons would get into linen closets or laundry baskets and bite you when you were reaching for a towel or doing the laundry.The ones as big as sheep were easier to avoid because you could see them coming. But when they flew in through open windows and curled up under your blankets and you did not find them until you went to bed, it was always a shock. The ones this size did not eat people, only lettuce, but they always dreadfully scorched the sheets and pillowcases.Of course the city council and the police did everything they could. It was no use offering the hand of a princess to anyone who slayed a dragon. This way was all very well in olden times - when there were princesses in every county. But princesses were scarce and anyway, nobody actually thought that marrying a complete stranger would be a great prize. But, even without any promise of reward, it wasn't long before the townspeople took matters into their own hands, laying traps and snares of every variety just to get the nasty things out of the way. The city council agreed to transport all the dragons to a cave if they were delivered to their offices between the hours of ten and two. Whole wagonloads and cartloads and truckloads of caged dragons could be seen every day of the week in a long line on the street of the city council offices. Kristin and Ally brought wheelbarrow loads of bagged dragons after school. And yet there seemed to be as many dragons as ever. Then the police put up great wood and canvas towers covered with model glue. When the dragons flew into them, they stuck fast as flies and wasps do on the sticky papers in the kitchen, and when the towers were covered all over with dragons, the police inspector would pick off each gooey dragon and throw them in a pile. Not even a single dragon could escape as they were all stuck together in a mass of claws and wings. And yet there seemed to be more dragons than ever. The shops and stores were full of special dragon traps and anti-dragon soap, and dragon-proof curtains for the windows. And indeed, everything that could be done was done. And yet there still seemed to be more dragons than ever.It was not very easy to know what would tempt a dragon into a trap because, you see, they ate such different things. The largest kind ate elephants as long as there were any, and then they ate horses and cows. Another size ate nothing but lilies of the valley, and a third size ate only apes and gorillas, if they were to be had, and if not, would feed freely on chimpanzees. Another size feasted on bricks, and three of them ate two-thirds of the hospital and half of the school in one afternoon.But the size Kristin was most afraid of was about as big as your dining room table, and that size ate little girls and boys!At first Kristin and Ally were quite pleased with the change in their lives. It was so much fun to sit up all night instead of going to sleep, and to play in the garden lit only by candles and flashlights.It sounded so funny to hear David (Dad) say, when Kristin was going to bed, 'Good night, sleep sound all day, and don't get up too soon. You must not get up before it's quite dark. You wouldn't like the nasty dragons to catch you.'But after a time they got very tired of it all. Kristin and Ally wanted to see the flowers and trees growing in the fields, and to run in the pretty sunshine outside, and not just see it through glass windows and dragon-proof curtains. They wanted to play on the grass, which they were not allowed to do in the candle-lit garden because the night dew might dirty their clothes. They wanted so much to get out, just for once, in the beautiful, bright, dangerous daylight. Soon they began to try and think of reasons why they should go out. Only they did not want to disobey David (Dad)... ****One morning David (Dad) was busy preparing some new dragon bait to lay down in the cellars. The Professor was busy helping Kristin bandage her hand which had been scratched by one of the dragons that liked to eat apes and gorillas (the dragon must have been fooled by her brown hair). So, because of all the activity, nobody remembered to say to the children, 'Don't go outside until it's really dark!' 'Let's go now,' said Kristin to Ally. 'No one has told us not to go out. And I know exactly where to head, and what to do. I just don't know how we are going to do it.' 'What are you talking about?' asked Ally. 'We are going to wake St. George, of course,' said Kristin, with a confident grin. 'St. George is the only person who knows how to manage dragons - I read all about him in a book David (Dad) had stuffed away on a shelf. The book said that St. George is lying somewhere just waiting for someone to wake him up,' her brown eyes gazed downward as she finished, 'but David (Dad) said that nobody believes in St. George anymore.' 'I believe in St. George,' said Ally, stubbornly sticking her chin forward. 'Me too,' agreed Kristin. 'He is the only one that can save the town from the dragons. And we have to believe in him if we are to wake him from his deep sleep. You can't wake people if you don't believe in them, can you?'Ally agreed - but where were they to find St. George? 'We need to just start looking,' said Kristin boldly, a plan forming in her mind. 'You will need to wear a coat made of dragon-proof curtains. And I will smear myself all over with the best dragon repellent.'Ally jumped up excitedly and cried, 'Oh, Kristin! I know where we can find St. George! In St. George's Church, of course.' 'You're right,' said Kristin, wishing she had thought of it herself. 'You're smarter than you look,' she teased.So the next afternoon, quite early, long before the beams of sunset announced the coming night when everybody would be up and working, the two children got out of bed. Ally wrapped herself in a coat made of dragon-proof curtains. Kristin made a horrid mess of herself with the dragon repellent - she certainly smelled badly and Ally made a point of telling her.They quietly snuck out the back door and went in search of St. George's Church. At first they tiptoed along very cautiously, suspicious of every turn and corner. But as the dragons took no notice of them, they began to skip along in the bright sunlight, feeling very brave and adventurous.There was no one about in the streets except for dragons - and the place was simply swarming with them. Fortunately none of the dragons were just the right size for eating little boys and girls, or perhaps this story might have had to end here. There were dragons on the pavement, and dragons on the roadway; dragons basking on the front doorsteps of public buildings, and dragons preening their wings on the rooftops in the hot afternoon sun. The town was quite green with them. Even when the children had made their way out of town and were walking in the country lanes, they noticed that the fields on each side were greener than usual with scaly legs and tails, and some of the smaller sizes had made themselves nests in the thorny hedges.Once, when a fat dragon brushed against Kristin, she screamed out and a whole flight of green dragons rose from the field at the sound and sprawled away across the sky. The children could hear the rattle of their wings as they flew away. 'I think that I want to go home,' said Ally fearfully, her eyes dark with concern. 'Don't be afraid,' said Kristin, trying to reassure her friend. 'We are going to be famous. People who are going to be their country's deliverers never scream and say they want to go home.' 'What do you mean, 'deliverers' of their country?' asked Ally. 'It means we are going to save our country, maybe even the world, from the dragons.' 'And are we?' asked Ally. 'Deliverers of our country, I mean?' 'We will be,' said Kristin proudly. And on they went.When they came to St. George's Church they found the door open, and they walked right in - but St. George was not there, so they walked around the churchyard outside. It wasn't long before they found the great stone tomb of St. George - with a large statue of him carved in marble lying on top of the tomb, the statue laid respectfully at attention. St. George struck a commanding pose in his armor and helmet, his arms folded upon his chest. 'However will we wake him?' they wondered.First Kristin spoke to St. George - but he would not answer. Kristin yelled - but St. George did not seem to hear. And then she actually tried to waken the great dragon slayer by shaking his marble shoulders - but St. George took no notice.Kristin began to cry in frustration, and threw herself against St. George. Kristin rested her forehead against the statue's marble cheek, her brown eyes slowly closing as tears ran down her face and fell onto St. George's lips. Kristin sniffled and pleaded, 'Oh, dear, good, kind St. George, please wake up and help us.'And with that, St. George opened his eyes sleepily. He stretched and said, 'What's the matter, little girl?'Kristin and Ally stepped back in amazement; their eyes opened wide with wonder. But they soon got over the shock of actually waking the famous St. George and they began explaining all about their dragon problem. St. George turned over on the marble tabletop and leaned on one elbow to listen. But when he heard how many dragons there were he shook his head. 'It's no good,' he said. 'That would be too many dragons for poor old George. You should have woke me up before now. I am always up for a fair fight, but one man to one dragon is my motto.'Just then a flight of dragons passed overhead, and St. George half drew his sword.But he shook his head again and pushed the sword back as the flight of dragons grew small in the distance. 'I'm afraid that I can't do anything,' he said. 'Things have changed since my time. The dragons' claws are much longer, and with their shorter wingspan they are much more maneuverable than they used to be. By the way, what sort of weather have you been having lately?'This change in topic seemed so heartless and unkind that Ally could not answer and turned away, but Kristin said, politely, 'It has been very fine. David (Dad) says it's the hottest weather there has ever been in this country.' 'Ah, I guessed as much,' said St. George thoughtfully. 'Well, that's the problem then; you see dragons can't stand wet and cold. Now if you could only find the taps...' St. George began to settle back down again on his stone slab. 'Good night, very sorry I can't help you,' he said, yawning behind his marble hand. 'Oh, but you can,' cried Kristin. 'Tell us - what taps are you talking about?' 'Oh, like in the bathroom,' said St. George, still more sleepily. 'And there's a looking glass too. It shows you the entire world and what's going on. I'm sorry... I can't stay awake any longer - good night.'And he fell back into his marble pose and was fast asleep again in the blink of an eye. 'We shall never find the taps,' said Ally woefully. Then looking carefully around for dragons, Ally said, 'I say, wouldn't it be awful if St. George woke up when there was a dragon the size that eats statues flying by?'Then Ally bravely pulled off her dragon-proof coat. 'We didn't meet any the size of the dining room table as we came along,' she said. 'I daresay we shall be quite safe from here on.'So Ally covered St. George with her coat, and Kristin rubbed off as much of the dragon repellent as she could onto St. George's armor. 'We might hide in the church until it is dark,' Kristin said 'and then...'But at that moment a dark shadow fell on them, and they saw that it was a dragon exactly the size of the dining room table at home. They exchanged knowing glances and, at that very instant, they knew that all was lost.The dragon swooped down and caught the two children in its claws. It caught Kristin by her brown hair and Ally by the sleeve of her shirt and then, spreading its great yellow wings, it rose into the air, rattling like an old washing machine filled with too many clothes. 'Oh, Ally,' cried Kristin, 'I wonder where it's taking us?' The dragon was flying across woods and fields with great flaps of its wings that carried it a quarter of a mile with each flap.Ally and Kristin could see the country below; hedges and rivers and churches and farmhouses flowing away from under them, much faster than you see them running away from the sides of the fastest express train. And still the dragon flew on. The children saw other dragons in the air as they went, but the dragon who was as big as the dining room table never stopped to speak to any of them, but just flew on steadily. 'It sure knows where it wants to go,' said Ally. 'Oh, if only it would drop us before it gets there!'But the dragon held on tight, and it flew and flew and flew until at last, when the children were filled with fright, the dragon landed. With a rattling and scraping sound echoing from all its scales, the dragon settled down upon the peak of a huge mountain. And it lay there on its great green scaly side, panting and very much out of breath, because it had come such a long way. But the dragon's claws still held them captive, holding Kristin by the hair and Ally by her shirt.Then Kristin remembered that in her pocket she had the knife Ally had given her on her birthday. It was still very sharp, as it had never been used for anything except sharpening pencils. Somehow she managed to remove it without the dragon noticing and she cut off the handful of hair holding her captive, leaving the dragon with only a tuft of brown hair dangling from its claw. In a panic, she moved to her friend's aid but the little knife would not cut through the thick material of her shirt. Kristin continued to try for some time; the precious minutes ticking by until she finally realized it was no use - the material was too strong. However, not to be deterred Kristin pushed and pushed and tugged and tugged, until finally Ally managed to wriggle quietly out of her sleeves. Now the dragon had a tuft of brown hair in one claw and a shirt clutched within the talons of the other.Quietly Kristin and Ally crept away on their tiptoes until they miraculously came upon a narrow cave that had been carved into the mountainside, and there they hid together quietly in the cavern opening. After much huffing and puffing the dragon eventually found them huddled in the mouth of the cave but the cave opening was much too narrow for the dragon to wriggle through. With much glee, Kristin and Ally stood in the mouth of the cavern and made fun of the dragon by making faces as it peered in at them. The dragon was very angry indeed, and puffed fire and smoke, but Kristin and Ally retreated farther back into the cave so that not even the smoke could reach them. When it was tired of snorting and carrying on, the dragon launched itself off the side of the mountain and flew away, disgruntled and dismayed by the loss of what would have been a tasty meal.But Kristin and Ally were afraid to come out of the cave, so they continued further into its depths. In the shadows they could hear water dripping slowly down the damp, musty walls. It was not far before the cave opened up and grew bigger, colder and wetter. When they had come to the very end of the cave there was a door, and on it was written: UNIVERSAL TAPROOM -- PRIVATE -- NO ONE ALLOWED INSIDE!Then they remembered that St. George had said something about finding taps to deal with the dragons. So they stepped boldly into the taproom and shut the door behind them.As their eyes adjusted to the dim lighting, they found themselves in a room cut out of the solid rock, and all along one side of the room were taps. Each tap was labeled with white china labels like you see in old-fashioned bathtubs. There were six big taps labeled 'Sunshine', 'Wind', 'Rain', 'Snow', 'Hail', and 'Ice' plus a lot of little ones labeled 'Fair to Moderate', 'Showery', 'South breeze', 'Nice Growing Weather for the Crops', 'Skating', 'Good Open Weather', 'South Wind', 'East Wind', and so on. They realized that this was the place where the world's weather was controlled. This had to be what St. George had been talking about! And the big tap labeled 'Sunshine' was turned full on! Inside the cave, they could not see the sunshine though - only a skylight of blue glass lit the cave.Then they saw that one side of the room was a big looking glass, and when they looked into it they could see everything that was going on in the world. They saw the carts delivering the caged dragons at the county council offices, and they saw St. George asleep under the dragon-proof coat. And then they saw David (Dad) at home crying because Kristin and Ally had gone out in the dreadful, dangerous daylight, and he was sure a dragon had eaten them.The whole country looked like a great puzzle map - green in the field parts and brown in the towns, and blue over the lakes, ponds and streams. Scattered all over it, on the blue parts, and on the brown, and on the green, there was a network of green dragons. It was still broad daylight with brilliant sunlight, and so no dragons were sleeping.Kristin recalled the last words of St. George; 'Dragons do not like cold.' So Kristin tried to turn off the sunshine, but she discovered that the tap was broken. Kristin yelled, 'Voila!' (This was the only French word that Kristin could think of at the time.) Now she knew why there was so much hot weather, and what had caused the dragons to hatch in the first place! So she left the 'Sunshine' tap alone, and turned on the 'Snow' tap - then scrambled to look through the looking glass. In amazement, Kristin and Ally saw the dragons fleeing in every direction, like cats when you spray them with a sprinkler. And the snow fell more and more, creating large mounds and drifts, making it difficult for the dragons to run and launch themselves into flight. Next Kristin turned the 'Rain' tap on. The dragons began to wriggle less, and it wasn't long before some of them lay quite still. Kristin and Ally were ecstatic - they watched as the water from the rain put out the dragon's fires. The dragon's reign of terror was over! But just to make sure (and because they were having so much fun turning on the different taps watching the weather change), they turned on the 'Hail' tap. Of course, they only turned this tap halfway for fear of breaking windows. Soon, not a single dragon was seen to be moving - and thousands of dragons lay motionless in the streets and fields.Now the children knew that they were indeed the 'deliverers of their country' - rescuing everyone from the plague of dragons. 'They will put up a monument to us,' said Ally proudly. 'All the dragons are harmless now.' 'I hope the one that was waiting outside for us is harmless,' said Kristin. 'And Ally, I'm not so sure about our monument. What will they do with all those cold, wet dragons? It would take years and years to ship them off to a cave and anyway, there's no cave big enough for all of them! I wish the rain would just wash them all into the sea.' 'I wonder what this old thing's for,' said Ally grabbing onto a rusty old tap. It seemed as though it had not been used for years and years - ages in fact. Its china label was coated over with dirt and cobwebs. When Kristin cleaned it with a bit of her shirt, they found that the label read, 'Waste.' 'Let's turn it on,' she said. 'It might carry off the dragons.'The tap was very stiff from not having been used for such a long time, but together they managed to turn it on, and then, once again, they ran to the looking glass to see what had happened.Already a great, round, black hole was opening in the very middle of the 'map' of the world, and the sides of the 'map' were tilting themselves up, so that the rain ran down towards the hole. 'Oh, hurrah, hurrah, hurrah!' cried Kristin, and she hurried back to the taps and turned on everything that seemed wet - 'Showers', 'Fog and Mist', 'Wet Flurries' and even 'Westerlies' - because she had heard David (Dad) say that those winds brought rain.Now the floods of rain were pouring down on the country, and great sheets of water flowed towards the center of the 'map', and torrents of water poured into the great round hole in the middle of the world. The dragons were being washed away and disappearing, like down a waste-pipe, in great green masses and scattered green bunches - single dragons and dragons by the hundreds; dragons of all sizes, from the ones that carry off elephants down to the ones that get in your milk.It wasn't long before there was not a single dragon left. So they turned off the tap named 'Waste,' and the great black hole closed tight. The taproom was completely silent except for a steady drip from the 'Rain' tap.Kristin and Ally stood in awe at what they had just done. Then, suddenly, the silence was shattered by a sharp knock on the taproom door. The children jumped at the unexpected noise, and looked at each other with puzzled expressions on their faces. 'Who is it?' Kristin called out. 'It's me... George,' came the reply.Kristin eagerly ran and opened the door and there stood St. George, water dripping from his armor. 'Thank you so much, kind children, for covering me with the dragon-proof coat and dragon repellent. I felt so very safe,' said St. George. 'But what are you doing here?' asked Ally. 'The rain on my face woke me,' St. George explained. 'I came to see if I could help but it seems you found the solution to your dragon dilemma.'St. George then wandered about the room inspecting various taps, stopping occasionally to adjust a tap or two. 'I used to play here as a child. My mother would scold me if I caused it to snow in the summer or created a warm wind in the winter. Ahhh... how I loved this room,' he said as he shined one of the china tap handles.Kristin was full of excitement and with brown eyes blazing, said, 'Why don't you stay here and control the taproom? That way there will be no chance that the dragons will ever return.'St. George's grin stretched from ear-to-ear. 'Young girl, you are so very smart! What a fabulous idea! I think I will do just that. There is so much work to be done. These taps are in a state of chaos...' he started to hum happily to himself as he set to work on the dripping 'Rain' tap.Kristin and Ally decided it was time to make their exit and wished St. George well as they headed out the door to begin their long journey home... ****David (Dad) and the Professor jumped for joy and hugged Kristin and Ally tightly the instant the dynamic duo walked through the door! David (Dad) was ecstatic and cried out, 'We thought that the dragons had taken you away and we would never see you again!'After much celebration, the Professor said, 'We have had nothing but cold rainy weather, and it made the dragons quite senseless. Then an incredible hole opened up in the countryside and the dragons were washed away! It's too bad you missed it.'Kristin and Ally winked at each other and kept their journey a secret. 'But look here,' announced the Professor proudly to David (Dad) and the children. 'I managed to save this dragon from several weeks ago. You remember - the one I pulled from your lemonade, Ally.' Kristin and Ally snapped to attention and watched helplessly as the Professor pulled out a plastic container and revealed the wriggling creature.The brief silence that followed was suddenly interrupted by a loud burst of thunder that seemed to come from nowhere, and then the heavens opened up and it began to rain...