The Saint of Dragons Read Online Free PDF Page A

but he could not see the landscape well, even with help from the lighthouse and the stern glow of the moon. There was no sign of his father. No sign of anything; the car had vanished. The awful emptiness of the night slammed into him with the power of the ocean wind.
    Whoever he was, the man was gone.
    Simon stood there, watching the boys continuing to pass over the field, and with a confused sort of feeling, he joined them. He couldn’t think. He just started moving with them.
    They began to walk across the dark field, with only their jack-o’-lanterns, a few flashlights, and the lighthouse itself lighting their way. The lighthouse beam would sweep across the field, and then it would spin around and light the ocean, so the field would go dark.
    Flash. Flash. Light. Dark. For most of the boys, it was a weird and perfect end to a Halloween night.
    Light. Dark. Light. Dark. The boys could hear the ocean rushing back and forth against the rocks. Simon thought he could hear something else, too. Thunder. Not the usual kind of thunder from a rainstorm, but something somehow less real. Then he realized it was not thunder he was hearing at all. It was a horse’s hooves.
    Walking at the end of the long group of boys, he stopped to listen. “Do you hear that?” he said to the boy in front of him. The boy turned, and then all the boys turned.
    “What is it?” said the next boy.
    “It’s a horse,” said Simon, “somewhere out there.”
    Everyone turned around, searching the foggy night. They could hear the thunder of the horse’s hooves getting closer and closer.
    The lighthouse spread its beam across the cloudy field. Suddenly a shape launched out of the fog. A man on a great horse. In a second he had swooped up Simon into his arms and thrown him atop the horse.
    The boys screamed and ran. Lanterns were dropped. Before anyone knew it, the horseman had rumbled off into the fog. The librarian called out to Simon, but no answer came. As the lighthouse beam swept past the boys again, the light showed them nothing but the whiteness of the fog. The beam did not fall on the horseman, nor on Simon St. George.
    Both of them had vanished.

Chapter Four
S T . G EORGE, THE E LDER
    S IMON COULD NOT YELL . He was in a panic, with no air in his lungs. The horseman’s face was nearly all covered in a long black scarf, and his great black trench coat was fanning out from the wind, like giant black wings.
    Simon clung to his back, afraid of falling. In that quick moment, Simon felt a strange flash of fear that the horseman was the hideous creature he had seen crossing the street—a creature with a long snaky tail. But now the horseman’s scarf fell down from his face, and Simon could see it was the shabby man who claimed to be his father.
    For some reason, this made Simon feel better.
    Suddenly, he heard sounds up ahead. Shouting. In the grayness near the cliff, he could see three men rushing at the horse.
    The horseman drew a long sword, heading for the first man, who may have held a gun. It was hard to tell.
    But then, behind the three men, came another, out of the fog, who slashed at the attackers with a long wooden staff. The staffslammed into the first two men, throwing them to the ground. Then the man with the staff attacked the gunman, knocking loose his weapon.
    It was the old lighthouse keeper, there, in the thick of the battle, brandishing his long walking cane! The old man was holding back the three attackers! Simon gaped in surprise as the horse galloped past the fight.
    “Go!” the old man shouted.
    The horse galloped into the safety of the fog shroud.
    Gone into the night.
     
    When Simon finally found himself able to breathe and speak more than a whisper, he was a long, long way from the Lighthouse School for Boys. The horseman said not a word, urging his horse on through the fog. He must have gone a very long way, because Simon did not hear any sirens, and he knew the principal would have called the police