Gideon the Cutpurse Read Online Free PDF Page A

Tar Man."
    * * *
    The Tar Man was now lost to view in the next valley, and Peter listened to the distant rumble of the cart growing fainter and fainter. He let his head sink back onto a clump of buttercups. He felt sick and faint, and the pain in his head throbbed unbearably. The Tar Man--what kind of a name was that? What infernal machine? He stared up at a hawk hovering above him in the pale blue sky and thought of nothing at all. The limp body of the girl was still bundled across his ankles, her bright hair trailing in the mud next to his feet. Soon Peter slipped out of the real world and lost consciousness once more. This time he dreamt that he was a spider caught at the bottom of a glass, and each time he started to climb out, he found himself sliding back to the bottom.
    * * *
    By the time Dr. Dyer had picked himself up off the floor and got down to the basement, there was no sign of the children. Molly soon reappeared, although she was trembling with fright. "Kate! Peter!" called Dr. Dyer at the top of his voice. There was an eerie silence. Dr. Dyer had the feeling in the pit of his stomach that something terrible had occurred. He looked round at Tim's laboratory, and his feeling of dread increased. The antigravity machine was gone! For a moment, where the machine should have been, Dr. Dyer had the strange sensation that he was seeing the blade of a knife, point down, floating in midair. He shook his head and looked again. It was gone. "Kate! Peter!" he shouted. "Molly's here. Where are you? Lunch will be getting cold!"
    FOUR
The Howl of a Wolf

In which the police and Kate come to some conclusions about their predicament and the children spend the night in a birch wood
    "Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaargh!"

Peter was instantly awake again. He propped himself up on his elbows and gawped at the strange girl who was silhouetted against the crimson sky as the last rays of the sun lit up the valley that stretched out before him. Her screams echoed all around, bouncing off one slope after another until each one repeated itself, deafeningly, three or four times. Peter watched the girl staring in horror at a handful of hair that she held in front of her. The sight of the red hair reminded him of something...a memory flickered tantalizingly on the surface of his mind, then vanished just as quickly. Peter's head throbbed even more sitting like this, and he slumped back down into the long grass.
    * * *
    As frightened as she had ever been in her life, Kate looked wildly around her, quite incapable of making any sense of what had happened to her. Where on earth was she? And what kind of creepy person would cut off a chunk of her hair? And where was that person now? She let go of the clump of hair, and the breeze carried it toward a giant thistle, where the long red strands got caught up in its spiky leaves, like horsehair on barbed wire. The sight of it was strangely upsetting. She screamed again.

"Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaagh!"

Peter put his hands over his ears. His head hurt far too much to cope with this.

Kate didn't particularly want to stop screaming, because when she did she was going to have to decide what else to do--and frankly that was going to be difficult. Where was her dad? Where was Molly? What--

"Shut up!" shouted Peter over the racket.

Kate's mouth remained open, but no more noise came out as she looked down at the skinny boy who sat gaping up at her. His dark hair was sticking up on end, and buttercup petals were sticking to his cheek. He looked as horrified as she felt.

"Oh no, it's you!" she exclaimed. Bits of straw and dry mud were now stuck to her matted hair.

"I don't know you!" cried Peter. "Who are you? What have you done to me?"

Kate walked unsteadily over to Peter. She sank down onto her knees next to him and tore the hair away from her face, showing a mass of golden freckles over pale cheeks, and frightened gray eyes. All the screaming had made her voice husky.

"What do you