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“I UNDERSTOOD IN A MOMENT” THE GOLDFISH laughed, a streaoblet “After all, an infant goldfish lookson the water—nothing like the full-grown fish I leapt over the falls and began an infant’s life Once I had spawned, I was s, fire, and all Did you never wonder why the old books are so full of dragons chasing afterto get the and tall”

“What happened to your child?” I said gently

Lock shrugged, rising and falling slightly in the water “I a and rose ireat country house,behind me I bellowed fire at the moon in sheer joy—and then bellowed fire at the house, at its lowest rooli into the river

“I flew as fast as s could carry me, up into theof the child I do not even know if it was a boy or a girl I thought nothing of its father, either Mates do not last s will survive or fail in their oay The best athem for a time, and then leave theoldfish, to show them hoas done, that it could be done I soared over the foareen flag, my nostrils flared to taste the wind—oh! It tasted like brine shrie ruffled white and blue, blue as the poor Laoldfish, the trout, the pike, the thorny-boned catfish, the clacking drumfish, the eels ould never lie, the bass

“And as I cleared the waterfall, I felt my scales squeeze in, and oldfish, just as quick as the flick of a fin I fell into the pool with a loud splash”

I could not help it I laughed, cawing against the bars of e “I’m sorry, I don’t mean to be cruel It must have been very sad for you”

The fish gave her piscine shrug again “They laughed, too But they saw me, some of them, pike and eel and trout and lock-fish They saw that I was a dragon”

“Couldn’t you leap back over?”

“I suppose But it was not long after that that the bargeto thelass would be, and it see the riv

er I travel as far as any dragon on these routes And I don’t think I should like to go through the infant stage again—it was not nearly so marvelous as the last part, and I do not really like the color pink”

Lock and I had e, but all rivers end This one was very long and its passage took a great many months—and it was not even half the journey to Ajanabh When the water had finally narrowed so far as to be ie, so kind and piccolo-cheerful was her voice, so bright were her scales in the crystal goblet I thought often ofcry When I wept, Lock was kind enough to look away But she bade me fareith a slosh of her water, and only looked sad for a h I bounced and flashedthe bars, the lock, and Kostya’s hems, there was little I could do to keep myself clear of the red city I had only to wait

The Vareni was quite as splendid as Lock had pro red dust into the current But I hardly saw the colors in the glare of Kostya’s yellow coat, in the gray h the Dressotten that coat

Everyand hovel door was slung with clothes, the dyes glossy and intense, even the sihs of dye lined the streets like gutters in scarlet and yellow and blue, and a few hs, dipped in their skirts, their trousers, their hats, their fine, long coats Spools of costly thread stood like laths with her own pair of shining scissors There were few enough people, but clothes there were in plenty Far off there sounded laughter and screa of bones and the tearing of silk, the singing of songs and the dancing of feet—Ajanabh was only lately dead, and the wake still raged on Kostya did not look at ht and tall and proud with his prize, as a child or two stopped and stared up at ait ard—he limped, as fashionable noblemen often do, and until we came to the bell tower by the east bank of the Vareni, far froht nothing of it

The bell hole, then, but s are on the banks of the Vareni, following their natural inclination doard, sliding slowly into the river Everything was boarded, broken, dusty, die was set just where you see it, and never ain Kostya opened his arift, wrapped up in a bow