A Wizard Abroad, New Millennium Edition Read Online Free PDF

about fifteen minutes to come about and head back inland, over beaches and then more fields and finally a landscape that started looking very industrial, full of huge oil tanks and factories: and then came the airport’s huge parking lots, and finally the runway, where the 737 put its wheels down with a roar of reverse thrust and a sigh as another journey ended (for the plane) too soon. After that came another ten minutes of taxiing to one of several long glassy terminal buildings with the word DUBLIN perched on its roof. A few moments later the jetway was being trundled up, and some people in high-vis vests got on. One of them was another of the airline’s flight attendants with a clipboard, a lady with blonde hair done up in a tight bun, and she came down to Nita’s seat. “Nita Callahan—? Good morning, pet, how was your flight? Come on, we’ll get you out through passport control and get you sorted, your party’s waiting for you…”

    The two of them headed down the jetway and into a long corridor with a lot of gates off each side, sealed away behind glass: outbound passengers were wandering about on the far side. Nita was grateful for the long walk, which stretched all the muscles that had had time to get stiff on the plane: and also (to some extent) for the cheerful conversation of this unaccompanied-minor lady, who did all the talking her New York-based colleague might have, and as much again for herself, in a lovely soft accent that Nita wouldn’t have really thought of as Irish until now. Nita practically knew Deirdre’s life history by the time they got down to passport control, a series of tall desks with the blue-and-white shield of the national police force over them, and red LED’d signs that said EU PASSPORTS ONLY and ALL PASSPORTS.

    In company with Deirdre, Nita went up to the first empty ALL PASSPORTS desk and laid her passport on it. She smiled a little wearily at the big kindly-looking man behind it, who had a large nose and little cheerful eyes. He looked down at Nita as he glanced at her passport photo and the paperwork Deirdre handed him, then stuck Nita’s passport into an electronic reader in his cubicle. “So here’s a wee dote of a thing to be traveling all alone. Not much more of that ahead of you now! How are you this morning?”

    “Okay, I guess,”  Nita said.  “I didn’t sleep that well on the plane.”

    “Sure I never do myself,” the man said, pulling the passport out of the reader. “Keep hearing things all the time. Coming to see relatives for a while, are you? Isn’t that grand. So, a nice clean passport then. Where do you want the stamp, love? First page? Or save that for something more interesting?”

    Nita thought of the first time she had cleared “passport” formalities at the Crossings, and illogically warmed to the man, who reminded her strongly of the being who’d first welcomed her there (though that one had had a lot more eyes… to say nothing of the tentacles and the feathers). “Let that be the first one, please,” she said.

    The immigration officer stamped the passport with relish, and handed the passport back. “You’re very welcome in Ireland, pet.  Khayd mil’fallcha.”

    At least that was what it sounded like, though Nita those words spelled out about twenty times between here and the jetway, on ads and posters and airport art: céad mile fáilte, “a hundred thousand welcomes.” “Thank you,” she said, and along with Deirdre walked out toward baggage claim.

    It was a complicated route, up escalators and down again, and Nita found herself being glad of having someone to walk her through it just this once. But finally they got into the huge room full of long carousel piers, found the one for Nita’s flight, picked up her bag, and rolled it out through the right customs channel, past a bored uniformed guy at a desk and through more frosted glass doors—
    “Nita!”

    And there, waiting out beyond the railing that kept people