My other favorite book, The Haphazard House Junior Dictionary for Little Scholars, is a killer. It’s got everything. I read it every night.
On this particular night, I was reading about fowl.
fowl \foul\ 1: a bird of any kind 2a: a domestic cock or hen; esp: an adult hen b: any of several domesticated or wild gallinaceous birds 3: the meat of fowl used as food
Fascinating. Next, I looked up “gallinaceous,” because that was a word I did not know.
gallinaceous \gal-in-ay-shus\: of or relating to an order (Galliformes) of heavy-bodied largely terrestrial birds, including the pheasants, turkeys, grouse, and the common domestic fowl
Then, I had to look up “terrestrial.” I almost knew what that meant, because I knew that an extraterrestrial is a being from outer space. It turned out that terrestrial means living on land or the earth.
You can’t beat The Haphazard House Junior Dictionary for Little Scholars. I wonder what sort of book Nathaniel Inkblotter would write if he had a copy.
After I had read for as long as I could, when I felt my eyes closing, I switched off the light, rolled over, and went to sleep.
One moment I was sleeping, and the next moment I was awake. At first, I thought I might be dreaming I was awake. I wiggled around. I was pretty sure I was awake. I kept my eyes shut. I could not remember waking up like this, in the dark. It was an odd feeling.
Plus, I had an odd feeling on top of the odd feeling. I felt a tingling all over my skin. My nose kept wrinkling, all by itself, as though it were trying to smell something—but at first there was nothing to smell. Then I thought I smelled a smell like the smell of my Uncle Dave. Uncle Dave smokes cheap cigars.
Something’s up, I thought.
I opened one eye.
I opened the other eye.
Something is in this room, I thought.
I sat up. “Who’s there?”
“Me. I’m here.”
“Who said that?” I said.
“I did.”
I looked around the room. I saw something pale and gray. It was in the corner. It was dim, and hard to see—but it was there. Something was certainly there.
“Are you a ghost?” I asked.
“Would you be scared if I were?” the dim gray thing asked.
“I’m not scared,” I said.
“I’m not a ghost.”
“Are you something magic?” I asked.
“I sure am,” the gray thing said.
“I’m turning on the light,” I said.
“Go right ahead.”
I turned on the light.
“You’re a goose!” I said.
“I am. You have a problem with that?”
It was a very large goose, larger than any goose I had ever heard of or imagined. This goose was larger than a large person. I was not sure whether I had actually ever seen a live goose before—but I’d seen pictures of geese, and a goose is what this was. In the light the goose was a beautiful gray. Its beak was orange. It smelled of cheap cigars.
“You aren’t a magic goose, by any chance?” I asked.
“A magic goose. Yes, indeed I am!” the goose said.
“This is good,” I said. “What magic can you do? What kind of special powers do you have?”
“I can speak English.”
“Excellent!” I said. “What else?”
“What else? What do you mean, ‘what else?’ You know any other geese who can talk?”
“I don’t know any geese at all,” I said.
“Well, if you had any experience with geese, you’d know that a talking one is fairly spectacular.”
“I agree,” I said. “But how about other magic powers? For example, can you take me flying? Can we visit strange lands? Can we dance and sing? Will I learn a lesson?”
“I have no idea what you are talking about,” said the goose.
“You haven’t?” I asked.
“Nope.”
“But you are a magic goose,” I said. 1 am.
“So, what magic can you do?”
“I got into your room. I’m talking to you. Forget about geese—are you aware of any animals of any kind who can do that?”
“Well, no,” I agreed.
“See? Magic.”
“In stories, like Seymour and the Magic Pudding, for example, they go someplace.”
“Who does?”
“The kid and the magic thing,” I said.
“Oh.”
“Aren’t we going someplace?” I asked.
“We will go to the kitchen.”
“The kitchen?”
“Yes,” the goose said.