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Mr Bertrand had pulled a copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland out of a pile of books on the floor Her“Original eighteenth century and it had been in the family for over two hundred years,” she’d muttered “What a shame Poor Miss Edi”

Ki about Alice and her journey down the rabbit hole She’d loved the book so much that she told her mother she wanted blonde hair and a blue dress with a white apron Her ain went off for four weeks her next child just ht be blonde Mr Bertrand said he’d like a hookah and to sit on a s

The two adults had started laughing—they seeust Kim went outside to sit in the fork of her favorite old pear tree and read es, then her mother called her in for what Mr Bertrand called “afternoon tea” He was an odd old , and her father said that Mr Bertrand could hatch an egg on the couch “He never gets up”

Kim had seen that few of the men in town liked Mr Bertrand, but all the women seemed to adore him On some days as many as six women would shoith bottles of wine and casseroles and cakes, and they’d all laugh hilariously When they saw Kiht—” They’d naood it was to have some peace and quiet for a few hours

The next ti their children

As Kihter, she didn’t think they sounded very peaceful or quiet

It was after she and herweeks that early one , but Ki the night, so All Kim was concerned as that she couldn’t find the copy of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland that Mr Bertrand had lent her She had one book, and noas gone She asked her mother what happened to it, as she knew she’d left it on the coffee table

“Last night I took it to—” The sentence wasn’t finished because the old phone on the wall rang and her

Disgusted, Ki worse

She kicked at rocks, frowned at the empty flower beds, and headed toward her tree She planned to cliure out what to do for the long, boring weeks until her dad caain

When she got close to her tree, what she saw stopped her dead in her tracks There was a boy, younger than her brother but older than she was He earing a clean shirt with a collar and dark trousers; he looked like he was about to go to Sunday school Worse was that he was sitting in her tree reading her book

He had dark hair that fell forward and he was so engrossed in her book that he didn’t even look up when Kim kicked at a clod of dirt

Who was he? she thought And what right did he think he had to be in her tree?

She didn’t knoho or what, but she did know that she wanted this stranger to go away

She picked up a clod and threw it at hi for the top of his head but hit his shoulder The lump crumbled into dirt and fell d

own onto her book

He looked up at her, a bit startled at first, but then his face settled down and he stared at her in silence He was a pretty boy, she thought Not like her cousin Tristan, but this boy looked like a doll she’d seen in a catalogue, with pink skin and very dark eyes