Bob, the Invisible Dragon Read online

  Winnie had researched arthritis and she had an excellent memory. She mind-messaged Patella who tapped seven times.

  "Correct."

  The man wasn't smiling now.

  The man leaned over and put a $100 bill into the cap. "I'd like to talk with you. Up to that question, I thought I knew how you were doing it."

  Winnie whispered back. "Do you know a lot about arthritis?"

  "I do."

  "After the show."

  The show was brought to an end shortly afterwards.

  # # # # # # # #

  The fat white policemen had pushed his way through the crowd using his burly arms to shove anybody in his way to the side. "Everybody clear out. This is an illegal gambling activity and I can take you all in."

  The crowd evaporated before Winnie could finish her two fist pumps in the air. The arthritis blue suit walked half a block away before turning around and leaning against the wall next to a door to a shop named Starbucks. A steady stream of people were going in with one hand free and coming out with that same hand holding a cup of something. Stars? Bucks? An older man who had been on the fringe of the crowd didn't wander as far. He stepped into the doorway of a closed movie house, took a note pad out of an inside pocket of a black jacket, and began writing.

  "I've told you people before. No sitting on the sidewalk. Stand up."

  Winnie did, grabbed the cap of money, held it against her chest, pushed Patella behind her, and bumped herself up against the wall to keep Patella contained. She reinforced that with a strict audible "Down" command plus mind instructions to Lie very still. By this time, Granny was hobbling towards them. Without her bow, she was struggling to maintain her balance. "That's my granddaughter," she said. "The people weren't gambling. She was putting on a magic act. She's done nothing wrong."

  "It's not even noon and you're drunk already," the constable said, not even trying to hide his disgust. He turned towards Winnie. "Busking without a permit, sitting on the sidewalk, dog not properly under control, no plastic bags for the dog's refuse, and your grandmother is drunk and disorderly. Should I go on?"

  "I was only trying to raise some money to buy drugs for my grandfather."

  "Add purchase of illegal substances."

  "Arthritis pills," Winnie explained.

  "Sure you were. Using little children to beg for money to buy drugs. What's the matter with you people?"

  "At this point, the man in the black jacket took a cell phone from the left front pocket of his blue jeans, held it in front of him, and walked closer to the impending arrest. The blue arthritis suit saw him and did the same.

  "She was putting on a magic show and she told people that the money was going to be used to buy arthritis drugs," the old guy said to the camera. "They are not illegal."

  "The dog was totally under control," blue suit said. "This lady is handicapped and that's why she can't walk in a straight line. Hip problem. I'm a doctor."

  The constable turned towards Winnie and pulled out a thick pad of paper. "Name."

  "Winnie."

  "Sleep on the street much?"

  "No, in a bed. All the time."

  "Where? Mission basement? Church hall?"

  "In a house."

  "Squatting, eh. Is the house condemned?"

  "She lives in a house that has been given to her father because of his military service." Granny had almost mentioned the Aboriginal Nation's border patrol but caught herself in time. The constable would have changed "Drunk" to "On drugs."

  "You shut up, you old squaw. Don't speak until I tell you to." To Winnie: "Where's this supposed house?"

  "Near Cranbrook," Winnie answered.

  "How'd you get down here?"

  "We flew."

  "Dog fly too?"

  "Of course. It's too far to walk."

  Another constable appeared. White, female. "What'cha got here, Smitty?"

  "Two of them. This is my collar, Gorgeous."

  The woman looked at the little aboriginal girl, holding the cap tight against her body. She didn't appear scared. She looked angry which was surprising. Natives in this area were well aware of what Smitty and his buddies were like. If Winnie were from one of the local tribes, she'd be scared. "What's your name?"

  "Winnie."

  "You're from out of town?"

  "Cranbrook area," Winnie repeated.

  The lady constable whispered to her.

  Winnie put the cap down against the wall so nobody could see what was in it, undid the ribbons around her pigtails, fastened them around Patella's neck, and held one of the ends of the ribbon in her left hand. Then she picked the cap up again in her right.

  "What's your dog's name?"

  "Patella."

  "Could you tell her to roll-over for me?"

  Winnie moved away from the wall to give Patella room, released the homemade leash and said "Roll Over." Patella did. Winnie pointed back to the wall and Patella obeyed. Winnie picked up the end of the make-shift leash again.

  "Do you like dogs?"

  Winnie nodded.

  "Do you have any others at home?"

  "Scapula. One of Patella's."

  "Would it be fair to say that you have bred them and trained them?"

  "Definitely. I picked out Patella's mate."

  "An experienced breeder and trainer had a dog without a leash for a temporary period of time but has her on leash now. I don't see the infraction, Smitty."

  "No baggies."

  The constable looked around. "They don't appear to have needed any."

  "No busker permit."

  "It's April. Busking season starts in May. The three buskers on Robson Street didn't seem to bother you."

  "Grandmother is drunk."

  The constable moved in front of Granny. "I'm sorry about this," she breathed to her. "Your name, please."

  "Yolanda."

  "Please exhale, Yolanda." ... "Peppermint tea, Smitty."

  "The cap is full of money. Gotta be a crime in there somewhere. Soliciting?"

  "A six year old girl? Are you out of your mind?"

  "She could be. No telling with them."

  "You. In the black jacket. What was Winnie doing?"

  "Wonderful magic tricks," the old guy in the jacket said.

  "Community coach?" she asked. Kind of hard to be wrong with the word Coach embroidered on his sleeve.

  "Warriors Basketball Club," he said. "We're in Victoria."

  "You, in the blue suit. What was Winnie doing?"

  "Wonderful magic tricks with the dog. Amazing tricks."

  "Do you work in this city?"

  "Doctor. St. Paul's Hospital down the road."

  "Smitty, two community citizens have vouched for her. These same two citizens have phone cameras that have recorded every idiotic word coming out of your bigoted mouth. Put your ticket pad away."

  The lady constable motioned the two camera holders to approach her. "You mind turning off your cameras now?"

  Both men did.

  "If what you taped were to appear in the media, yes, the police would be embarrassed, but only until the next news story. These two people would be affected by the media exposure for much longer. How about you trash the videos, I move Smitty out of here, and we forget the whole thing? As they say in basketball, No harm, no foul."

  Both men trashed the video in front of her. "How'd you know about the basketball?" the old guy in the Warriors jacket asked.

  "There's a basketball in your team logo," she answered.

  "Oh, yeah. Senior citizen moment," he explained and she laughed.

  "There's a line up forming at MacDonalds, Smitty. They may need crowd control. Don't call me Gorgeous again. Name is Vitali. Remember it."

  "Just complimenting you, Vitali. Nothing wrong with that."

  When Smitty's fat backside had slunk out of view, Constable Vitali turned to Winnie. "May I see your cap?"

  Winnie showed her.

  "You can't have that much money lying loose down he
re. It's too dangerous."

  "I have Patella."

  "True, but if Patella hurt somebody, they'd put her down. It wouldn't matter that she was defending you. A wolf in the city would not go over well, and don't tell me that she's a dog. I was born and raised in the Cariboo."

  "My pockets are already full."

  "I can take some," Granny offered.

  "Were you going to put all of that towards arthritis pills?"

  Winnie nodded. "I didn't know how much they would cost. My grandfather's arthritis is very bad. I was going to buy as many pills as I could. We can't come to Vancouver very often."

  "Recommendation, Doctor?"

  "Where's the pain?"

  "Knuckles."

  "Rheumatoid arthritis, probably. I'd need to examine him to be sure."

  "Not really possible for us," Granny said.

  "It will have to be over-the-counter medication. Try Ibuprofen. Instructions for its use are on the container. Cut back the dosage if your grandfather gets an upset stomach."

  "You wanted to meet with me?" Winnie asked.

  "I did. I know it's silly, but I thought that you were reading people's minds and somehow telling Patella what to do."

  Winnie snorted.

  "I know. Crazy. How'd you do it?"

  "I can't tell you that. Magic tricks have to be kept secret."

  "Why did you agree to meet me? You knew I'd be asking."

  "I wanted to ask you what books we should buy so that we could learn how to help my grandfather. Proper medical books. Like if you went to a university."

  "I have one in my office that I'm not using any longer. It's a little out of date. I'll give it to you. But you'll find it very hard to understand."

  "We have somebody back in the compound that can understand it. How about I give you the $100 bill back to you in exchange?"

  "OK. I'll meet you back here in twenty minutes."

  "No drug store is going to sell her all those bottles of Ibuprofen," the old guy said.

  "I think you will need a police escort to guard that money and convince the druggist that you aren't making some crazy new drug," Constable Vitali said.

  Half an hour later, Winnie was clutching a thick book and Patella was carrying a thick, heavy plastic bag hanging from her teeth. Granny approached Constable Vitali and said quietly: "Thank you. You were very kind."

  "I hate this job," the constable said. "So much bigotry everywhere."

  "It's going to get worse before it gets better," Granny said.

  # # # # # # # #

  A retired teacher returned to her home in Surrey later that afternoon. Her brother's black coaching jacket was slung over the back of a chair. David was visiting from Victoria for a day or two. Dianne wandered into the kitchen and saw him engrossed in a whole lot of papers strewn across the dining room table. "What'cha doing?"

  "Planning. I saw a little aboriginal girl named Winnie performing the most amazing magic tricks with her dog. Actually, a wolf. She and her granny were down in Vancouver from the interior to raise enough money to buy her grandfather some arthritis drugs."

  "What are you planning?"

  "I'm going to write a series of science fiction e-books for youths. You mind for a bit? I gotta think to myself."

  "I prefer it when you think to yourself," Dianne said. "Means there's less stress on the people around you."

  I'll set it sometime in the future. In the interior, near Cranbrook. Little Winnie and her wolf. Two wolves, she said. Both named after bones in the body. So I'll have her interested in medicine.

  There's somebody who has some medical skills in their compound, she said. They must live in a little community. So I should have a Doc as one of the characters.

  Plus the grandfather with arthritis. The grandmother. Yolanda. Not sure about that. That's a young woman's name. Perhaps I could make Yolanda the name of the mother?

  The father was in military service of some kind. I'll make him RCMP.

  I can have lots of kids in the family. I'll need other people too. An extended family of some kind?

  Family. Family.

  "Dianne, I'm going to write Lily into my series."

  "You can't put your own granddaughter into your books. She's only 3 years old. There are rules!"

  "She can be the ancestor of one of the characters. I can do whatever I want. It's science fiction."

  I can do whatever I want. Whatever I want. The arthritis doctor had thought that Winnie was mindreading, so that can be what she does. She mindreads by looking at faces; she also can communicate with her wolves through mind-messages.

  Whatever I want... Invisibility? Flying through the air? Means I need a scientific genius somewhere in the family.

  What about time-travel? Could be tricky. What if they travelled back in time and saw somebody they shouldn't and that changed the future? I'll have to think about that.

  "Dianne. I need the name of a villain."

  David's sister came over to the table, clapped her hands to her cheeks, and said, "A villain in a novel? Yikes. Who would have thought?"

  Yikes. That's good. Not Yikes. Perhaps Yike. Spelled differently? Zzyk?

  "Do you want to be in the book?"

  "Definitely not!"

  I'll put her in anyway. Just to tease. "Good, you'd probably ruin the entire series."

  "I'm not the one who will ruin the series. Tell me you're not going to put any puns into the books."

  Puns. Good idea.

  "I thought you were focusing on coaching girls basketball. You know – terrorizing little girls."

  "Terrorize in the evening, write during the day."

  "Are you sure about this?" Dianne was trying to warn her brother. Poor guy. He's not going to sell a single copy. He's far too weird. Always has been. Puns in a science fiction book? Really?

  The constable said something about soliciting. I could have a streetwalker. A young girl. Heart of gold? No. That's too boring. A predator. Put her in later in the series when the boys in the family are growing up?

  Lots of wolves. Too many? What about cats too? Not house cats. Panther?

  Melissa had warned them that time travel could have unexpected consequences if something happened that wasn't supposed to happen. Serious consequences for mankind, even. She hadn't warned them about two Wilizy time-travellers encountering one inconspicuous old man who would get the idea to write about a family of ... well, a family like the Wilizy. Think of the psychological harm he could do to his readers now that he's glimpsed the future. Puns in a science fiction book to begin with. Don't complain that you weren't warned.

  Back to the Table of Contents

  Chapter 23

  Double-Tom's offer to supply Stu with more nieces had prompted a conference of the key players. Stu was in the warden's office; Granny, Wanda and Momaka were in Granny's house; Melissa, Mac, Yollie, TG, William and Wolf had risen early to participate from the satellite compound; Hank and Doc were in the WZBN office; and Winnie and Patella were cruising around in the sky.

  "We had started the operation thinking that we'd just trick Double-Tom into confessing on camera that he had murdered his wife and her lover," Granny opened. "That would be a capital crime and we could have a legitimate trial. Some of us would like the operation to continue past that."

  "For what purpose?" Hank asked.

  "He offered to supply nieces to Stu. That means that he has supplied nieces before."

  "We can only sentence the man to die once," Wolf said. "Didn't we want to wrap this up quickly so that Dreamer could have a normal life without being scared of him molesting her again?"

  "She's doing OK now," Wanda said. "If we can find out how Double-Tom plans to supply nieces to Stu, we might obtain some information that could help us prevent men like him from kidnapping other girls."

  "There's been a long history of young aboriginal girls disappearing in B.C." Yollie's contribution.

  "Are we going to start focusing on kidnappers too now? I'm not arg
uing. Just asking." Doc was probably the most sensitive of the men in the meeting.

  "You won't be focusing. We will." Granny said.

  "Who's we?" TG asked.

  "The Raging Gardeners," Wanda said.

  "Who's that?" Although he was battle commander, Stu was completely out of touch with compound activities.

  "Every woman here at this meeting," Yolanda answered.

  "Plus Patella," Winnie added.

  "Hamlet said that T'is an unweeded garden that grows to seed," William deposited his two farthings' worth of Shakespearean quotes into the discussion.

  "Forsooth! Tell Shakespeare's little piggie that the Raging Gardeners will be doing some weeding," Granny quothed.

  # # # # # # # #

  Lucas was sitting in Candi's living room in a kitchen chair with his feet up on another kitchen chair. He was playing Star Trek. She was in her bedroom, changing again. Candi had invited him into her bedroom this visit. The door had been closed the other times he had come back to her place. It was a fancy bedroom. Big, soft bed. It would be good for sitting on and playing his game. Lucas tried to find a signal but couldn't. WiFi dead zone, he concluded and went back to the living room.

  Lucas figured that Candi must really like the colour red because she had a big red heart on the wall over her headboard. The two small bedroom lamps had a frilly kind of red lampshade that must have made it very hard to read in bed. The lampshades would have cut the light down to a dim red glow. She also had lots of pink and red cushions which Lucas hadn't thought would be of much use, but was kind of wishing that he had one now. Kitchen chairs are not built for two hours of straight time on an electronic game.

  Lucas was sitting on a hard chair in Candi's apartment because after the noon rush was over, Candi had asked Lucas if he would like to change their arrangement. Her bills were high and she'd like to find another way to thank him for protecting her without having to pay him. She asked him if he had any ideas about how they could do that, but Lucas thought about it and came up with nothing. So she had suggested that they go back to her apartment where they could think about it some more. Lucas thought about it while Candi was changing in her bedroom. He knew she was changing because she had accidentally left the door wide open. He turned away, of course. Then he became engrossed in his game and didn't notice much of what she was doing any longer. He thought that she was cleaning the kitchen. It must have been sweaty work because she wasn't wearing much and she was always changing what she was wearing with her bedroom door wide open. He caught a glimpse of her from time to time when she passed in front of him on the way to the kitchen, but he didn't want to look at her when she was cleaning; she might try to enlist him into cleaning too.