Read Online The Game by Diana Wynne Jones - Free Book Online Page B

time to notice anything they were passing, but she did notice that the star-shaped flake in Troy’s other hand grew dimmer as they went. And now that Tollie did not seem to be around to distract her, she caught glimpses of planets whirling in the distance, and saw a centaur – unless it was a man on a horse – and a person who seemed to be half goat, and several odd-looking ladies, and a man with a bull’s head. After that she kept glimpsing people, who seemed more like ordinary humans as they went downwards, until Troy dragged her between some bushes and they were once more in the garden shed. By then the thing in Troy’s hand was a shiny curved oval that looked like a metal seashell.
    Up at the top of the paddock, where Harmony was standing by the table, the clock was still chiming out its tune. Harmony smiled as Troy and Hayley came panting up to her. “Any luck?”
    â€œWe got one!” Troy gasped.
    â€œIt kept shaking them loose,” Hayley explained.
    Before Harmony could answer, Lucy came dashingup, pink and proud and pleased. “I got it! I picked it up when it fell off her foot,” she panted, and held out a little glass shoe. “This truly is Cinderella’s slipper! Have I won?”
    James raced in from one side, equally out of breath, and held out something clenched in his fist. “Prester John’s beard is seventy-seven centimetres long and he says we’re to stop coming and asking him for hairs all the time.” He looked at Lucy, Troy and Hayley. “Damn! Didn’t I win? Who did?”
    By this time, the clock’s little tune was slowing down. Tighs and Laxtons began arriving from all directions. Harmony was soon surrounded by people waving strange objects at her and saying things like “This is Blind Pugh’s stick!” or “I got the firebird feather! Look!” or “One Aladdin’s lamp, as ordered!”
    Harmony picked each object up as it was pushed at her and looked at it very closely. She nodded at the curly grey hair James was holding and at Troy’s dragon scale and Lucy’s shoe. “Those are genuine,” she agreed. “They can go in the trophy cabinet. So can this lamp. Put it down on the table, Charlie, and be careful not to rub it.But you got this feather from the vase in the lounge, didn’t you, Sarah? Go and put it back. Yes, this says DRINK ME – it’s from Alice all right. But this isn’t a walking stick, Oliver. It looks like a broom handle to me.”
    â€œBut I was in the inn when Blind Pugh arrived!” Oliver protested.
    â€œThen he must have fooled you,” Harmony replied. “He may be blind, but he is a pirate, you know. Yes, the drinking horn truly was used by Beowulf. That can go in the cabinet and so can this One Ring. No, don’t put it on , you fool! It’s dangerous!”
    All this time, the tune from the clock was going slower and slower. Just as the last three notes were dragging out, Tollie came staggering up, looking exhausted but pleased with himself. “Here you are,” he said. “Bowl of porridge from the Three Bears!” and he dumped it on the table.
    Harmony looked at it and sighed. “That’s from the kitchen here,” she said. “Why must you always cheat, Tollie?”
    â€œBecause he wastes his time rushing about the strands trying to put the rest of us off!” James said.“I don’t think he should be allowed to play.”
    â€œHear, hear!” said almost everybody else. “He’s a pest!”
    â€œWe’ll see,” Harmony said soothingly. “Everyone come indoors to the cabinet for the presentation.”
    As they all trooped towards the house, where Sarah joined them, looking decidedly ashamed of herself, Hayley whispered to Troy, “Why did she let Tollie get away with it?”
    Troy made a face. “Because he’s quite capable of telling his dad –