Swan Sister (14 page)

Tom thrashed and struggled to get out, but the gluey stuff held him fast. Even when the lab assistant picked up the pot and scraped it into the garbage, Tom wasn’t able to make himself heard above the deafening music that the assistant was playing while Dr. Lyon was out of the office.

When the lid of the garbage can closed over Tom, he was sure his end had come. The darkness was so complete it was as if he had been swallowed, the papers in the can stuck to him when he tried to move, and every time he struggled too vigorously, he sank deeper into the trash. Twice someone opened the can to throw something in, but by that time Tom had sunk so far that the papers above him muffled his tiny cries.

He wept bitterly.

Finally the lid was lifted again—and stayed open. For a brief moment Tom thought he would be saved. But swift hands tied the top of the plastic bag lining the can, sealing Tom in. He felt the bag being taken from the can and cried out more desperately than ever. Alas, his voice was muffled by the jumble of trash. The bag was flung somewhere, moved, flung again, and Tom was certain he would soon run out of air or be crushed or something equally terrible. But he was not the sort to despair. With his tiny fingers he began to claw at the plastic that held him in. It was maddening work, for the plastic slipped and slid, but he finally managed to tear open a small hole. Thrusting his hand through, he waved it about, hoping someone would see him.

Someone did—an old seagull who was scanning the trash heap for
something interesting. Landing on the bag, the gull quickly pecked it open and snatched Tom up. Off it flew, Tom dangling from its beak.

The boy struggled and squirmed until he realized that if he
did
manage to get the bird to let go of him, he would be dashed to his death on the rocks below. What a choice: be eaten by a bird, or plummet to a stony death!

But when the gull flew out over some water, Tom quickly swung his legs up, wrapped them around the gull’s neck, and began to squeeze. The startled bird opened its mouth to squawk. Tom immediately released his legs and fell to the water some thirty feet below. He struck hard and was stunned for a moment. He began to sink. But before he had a chance to worry about drowning, an enormous pike struck, swallowing him in one gulp—which was actually lucky for Tom, as it saved him from being slashed to bits by the pike’s needle-sharp teeth.

Down the gullet Tom slid until he was in the fish’s stomach, which burned him like fire.

This time he was sure he had come to his final moments. But as he was waiting for his doom, he felt the great fish jerk and convulse. It was flung around then smacked down, moving so violently that Tom had no idea what was happening at all—until he saw a smear of light. He began to shout and scream and thrash about himself.

“Well, well, what have we here?” cried a rough voice. “Something the fishie et is still alive. Let’s have a look, shall we, missy? Always interesting to see what these beasties swallow down.”

Tom shrank back as a flash of silver cut open the stomach wall. He covered his eyes to shield them from the bright light that flooded in. Then he felt himself once more plucked up.

“It’s Tom!” screamed a familiar voice. “It’s Tom! Oh, do put him down. Please, please be careful!”

A moment later Tom was standing on a table, and little Titania was gently pouring water over him to wash away the many revolting things that had covered him that day. “Poor Tom,” she kept saying, and sometimes she would start to cry. “Poor, poor Tom.”

“Not so poor,” he said. “I’m still alive. But how did I get here?”

“That’s what I’d like to know,” said a deep voice.

“Who are you?” asked Tom, gazing up at the tall bearded man.

“I’m Titania’s father, Arthur Kring. We were out for an afternoon of fishing on Lake TTT, and when we caught a fish we caught you as well. Thank goodness the captain here planned to grill the thing now. But how in heaven’s name did you get inside that monster?”

After Tom told them of his adventures, Titania said, “Daddy, we can’t let Tom stay in that horrible lab anymore.”

Her father agreed (he agreed with almost everything his daughter said), and so Tom was brought to live at the executive quarters of TTT.

He sent for Charger to come live with him, but the mouse had disappeared and had not been seen since the afternoon Tom fell into the pot.

Though Tom mourned for his old friend, all in all his new home was very pleasant. He wanted for nothing at all since Titania doted on his every wish. But in time he began to have a hankering to see his parents and asked over and over if he might visit them. Finally Titania agreed and said that she herself would take him. So one morning the two set out for the little cottage where Tom had spent his earliest days. To Tom’s surprise, he found his father in a state of gloom, and his mother in even greater despair.

“What is wrong, what is wrong?” he asked.

“We’ve been let go!” wailed his mother, throwing her apron over her face. “After all these years, we’ve been let go! They’re going to replace us with those mechanical men Dr. Lyon invented. Oh, whatever will we do? Whatever will we do?”

“I shall talk to my father,” said Titania decisively.

But now the little princess discovered the boundaries of her power, for Mr. Kring told her this was a matter of business, and in those things she must not interfere.

Titania was so vexed she stamped her foot, but it did her no good.

“I’m sorry, Tom,” she said sadly. “I cannot help you.”

“Perhaps you still can,” said Tom. “There is a desk drawer in Dr. Lyon’s office that I would like to examine.”

“Why?” asked Titania, wiping away her tears.

“I’m not sure. But he was always so careful to keep it locked that it makes me wonder what is in it. Can you help me check?”

“I’ll be glad to.”

They decided that Titania would visit the lab with Tom hidden in her pocket. While there she would get Dr. Lyon to show her something on the far side of the lab. She would slip Tom out of her pocket, and he would make his way into the desk drawer to see what it contained.

“Why, Titania, what a pleasant surprise!” cried Dr. Lyon when the little princess entered the lab the next day. “We’ve missed you around here.” He scowled slightly at her then added in mock seriousness, “I’m not sure we can forgive you for taking our little friend away from us.”

“He’s much safer where he is now, Dr. Lyon,” said Titania. At the moment this was quite true since he was clutched in her hand, which was in her pocket.

With her other hand she pointed to the far side of the lab. “What’s
that
?” she asked, feigning great interest.

Dr. Lyon, well aware that it was important to keep the boss’s daughter happy, agreed to explain it to her. As he turned to lead the way, she deposited Tom onto the desk. Quickly he slipped into the center drawer.

In his hand he carried a tiny flashlight that Titania had had made for him. Shining it around him, Tom saw that the drawer was like a long, low chamber, one in which he could stand with his head just barely below the ceiling. To his right he saw an eraser big enough for him to sit on. Behind him were pencils as thick as his legs. Not far in front of him lay a file folder that would have made a nice tennis court for someone his size.

Tom made his way to the top of the folder.

“Spacesaver 3000, Mark I,” read the label.

The words had a familiar ring, though Tom could not say why.

He lifted the edge, crawled under it, and began to read. Soon his tiny heart was pounding with rage and excitement.

Suddenly he heard footsteps. Titania and Dr. Lyon were coming back. “Wait, wait,” he heard Titania say. “I want you to explain
that
to me.”

“In just a moment, my dear,” said the doctor.

Stepping behind the desk, he slammed the drawer shut.

Tom was trapped inside! His excitement turned to fear. Had Dr. Lyon known he was in here? Was he trying to catch him? Even if he wasn’t, Tom didn’t want to be found inside the drawer—especially not after reading what was in that folder.

Clenching his tiny flashlight in his trembling hands, he made his way to the back of the drawer.

It was sealed tight. He should have expected that; there was no way that Dr. Lyon would have a cheaply made desk. He was trapped.

Hours passed. Tom wondered if he would ever get out. Then he remembered that it was Friday. What if Dr. Lyon left for the weekend? Tom began to wonder if he would die from lack of food or water before the drawer was opened again.

Then, to make things worse, his flashlight went out, leaving him in utter blackness.

It was impossible to know how much time had gone by before he heard a scratching at the back of the drawer. New fear clutched Tom’s heart. Was something trying to get in here with him?
Scratch. Scratch, scratch.
something was gnawing at the wood. The sound went on and on until Tom thought he would go mad with terror.

Then it stopped, and he heard a new sound, at first terrifying and then, when he recognized it, soothing. It was the sound of a mouse—and not just any mouse. It was his old friend, Charger.

A moment later Tom felt Charger’s furry body rub against him. When he grasped his former steed by the tail, it led him to the back of the drawer where it had gnawed a hole just big enough for a mouse, or a boy the size of a thumb, to escape.

“Wait,” murmured Tom. “Wait!”

He returned to the folder and with great effort rolled a piece of paper until it was no thicker than a pencil. He carried it to the hole and pushed it through ahead of him. Then he followed Charger through the hole.

The climb to the floor was treacherous, and Tom nearly fell more than once. When at last he was down, he embraced Charger. With the paper underneath his arm, he went back to the dollhouse where he had once lived, which was still tucked into a corner of the lab, and called Titania.

A few minutes later she arrived, guards in tow.

When Tom showed her the paper he had found in Dr. Lyon’s drawer, her eyes narrowed in anger.

“Wait until I show this to Father!” she said.

Her father was angry too, not only at Dr. Lyon, but at the jury that awarded Tom half ownership of TTT in compensation for the company’s unethical act of combining mouse genes with his own in order to make him come out so small. Dr. Lyons’s plea that he was only trying to help humanity overcome its crowded condition fell on deaf ears.

It took several years, but the technicians at TTT finally managed to find a way to make Tom grow to a full two feet in height. At Titania’s request they also found a way to shrink her to almost the same size.

Soon after, the pair were wed in a pavilion in front of the very lake where Tom had been swallowed by the pike. His parents sat in the front row, weeping and smiling, and cheered when the happy couple kissed.

As for Tom and Titania Thumb, they ran TTT wisely and well, doing much good in the world and turning a tidy profit as they did.

It was a short life, but a happy one.

“When I was eight or nine,” says
B
RUCE
C
OVILLE
, “my cousin gave me a huge volume of fairy tales as a birthday gift. I doubt there was any book in my childhood that I turned to more often, or pored over more thoroughly, than that one. The mysterious quality of the tales it held was endlessly appealing to me, and thinking of it even now, I can feel myself drifting halfway into that other world it spoke of.

“I decided to work with Tom Thumb for this collection partly because I have always been fascinated by great variations in size. The very first book I published was called
The Foolish Giant,
and I have often written about characters who shrink—or were tiny to begin with.

“I suspect such tales appeal to kids because we all start out trapped in a world of giants. What is life for a character like Tom Thumb but an exaggerated version of what all of us experience as kids, when we find ourselves trapped in a world designed for people more than twice our size?”

B
RUCE
C
OVILLE
was born and raised in upstate New York, where he still makes his home. He has published more than eighty books, including the best-sellers
My Teacher Is an Alien
and
Into the Land of the Unicorns.
Before becoming a full-time writer, he worked as a toy maker, a grave digger, a cookware salesman, an elementary school teacher, and a magazine editor. He is married to illustrator Katherine Coville.