Leaning forward, he scanned the terrain that stretched ahead, and as he did he caught sight of the tiny opening in the forest, a rift in the dark ranks of the trees and the hint of green beneath.
He nudged Churchill, pointing. Churchill, looking where he pointed, nodded and moved the wheel, slowly, carefully, tentatively, as if he were feeling for some response of the craft, trying to determine if it would respond.
The flier tilted slightly, wheeled and swung, still falling slowly, but jockeying for position. For a moment it seemed to balk at the controls, then slid sidewise, losing altitude more rapidly, but gliding down toward the rift between the trees.
Now the trees rushed upward at them and, close above them, Maxwell could see the autumn color of them-no longer simply dark, but a mass of red and gold and brown. Long, slender spears of red reached up to stab them, clawlike hands of gold grasped at them with an angry clutch.
The plane brushed the topmost branches of an oak, seemed to hesitate, almost to hang there in midair, then was gliding in, mushing toward a landing on the small greensward that lay within the forest.
A fairy green, Maxwell told himself-a dancing place for fairies, but now a landing field.
He switched his head sidewise for a second, saw Churchill crouched at the controls, then switched back again and watched the green come up.
It should be smooth, he told himself. There should be no bumps or holes or hummocks, for at the time the green had been laid down, the blueprints would have called for smoothness.
The craft hit and bounced and for a terrifying moment teetered in the air. Then it was down again and running smoothly on the green. The trees at the far end of the grass were rushing at them, coming up too fast.
“Hang on!” Churchill shouted and even as he shouted, the plane swung and pivoted, skidding. It came to rest a dozen feet from the woods that rimmed the green.
They sat in deadly silence, a silence that seemed to be closing in on them from the colored forest and the rocky bluffs.
Churchill spoke out of the silence. “That was close,” he said.
He reached up and slid back the canopy and got out Maxwell followed him.
“I can’t understand what happened,” Churchill said. “This job has more fail-safe circuitry built into it than you can well imagine. Hit by lightning, sure; run into a mountain, yes, you can do that; get caught in turbulence and bounced around, all of this could happen, but the motor never quits. The only way to stop it is to turn it off.”
He lifted his arm and mopped his brow with his shirt sleeve.
“Did you know about this place?” he asked.
Maxwell shook his head. “Not this particular place. I knew there were such places. When the reservation was laid out and landscaped, the planning called for greens. Places where the fairies dance, you know. I wasn’t looking for anything, exactly, but when I saw the opening in the trees, I could guess what might be down here.”
“When you showed it to me,” said Churchill, “I just hoped you knew what you were doing. There seemed to be no place else to go, so I did some gambling…”
Maxwell raised his hand to silence him. “What was that?” he asked.
“Sounds like a horse,” said Churchill. “Who in the world would be out here with a horse? It comes from up that way.”
The clattering and the clopping was coming closer.
They stepped around the flier and when they did, they saw the trail that led up to a sharp and narrow ridge, with the massive bulk of a ruined castle perched atop the ridge.
The horse was coming down the trail at a sloppy gallop. Bestriding it was a small and dumpy figure that bounced most amazingly with each motion of its mount. It was a far from graceful rider, with its elbows thrust out on either side of it, flapping like a pair of wings.
The horse came tearing down the slope and swung out on the green. It was no more graceful than its rider, but a shaggy plow horse, and its mighty hoofs, beating like great hammers, tore up clods of turf and flung them far behind it. It came straight at the flier, almost as if intent on running over it, then at the last moment wheeled clumsily and came to a shuddering halt, to stand with its sides heaving in and out like bellows, and snorting through its flabby nostrils.
Its rider slid awkwardly off its back and when he hit the ground, exploded in a gust of wrath.
“It is them no-good bummers!” he shouted. “It is them lousy trolls. I’ve told them and I’ve told them to leave them broomsticks be. But no, they will not listen. They always make the joke. They put enchantment on them.”
“Mr. O’Toole,” Maxwell shouted. “You remember me?”
The goblin swung around and squinted at him with red-filmed, nearsighted eyes.
“The professor!” he screamed. “The good friend of all of us. Oh, what an awful shame! I tell you, Professor, the hides of them trolls I shall nail upon the door and pin their ears on trees.”
“Enchantment?” Churchill asked. “Do you say enchantment?”
“What other would it be?” Mr. O’Toole fumed. “What else would bring a broomstick down out of the sky?”
He ambled closer to Maxwell and peered anxiously at him. “Can it be really you?” he asked, with some solicitude. “In the honest flesh? We had word that you had died. We sent the wreath of mistletoe and holly to express our deepest grief.”
“It is I, most truly,” said Maxwell, slipping easily into the idiom of the Little Folk. “You heard rumor only.”
“Then for sheer joy,” cried Mr. O’Toole, “we three shall down great tankards of October ale. The new batch is ready for the running off and I invite you gentlemen most cordially to share the first of it with me.”
Other goblins, a half dozen of them, were running down the path and Mr. O’Toole waved lustily to hurry them along.
“Always late,” he lamented. “Never on the ball. Always showing up, but always somewhat slightly late. Good boys, all of them, with hearts correctly placed, but lacking the alertness that is the hallmark of true goblins such as I.”
The goblins came loping and panting down onto the green, ranged themselves expectantly in front of Mr. O’Toole.
“I have jobs for you,” he told them. “First you go down to the bridge and you tell them trolls no more enchantments they shall make. They are to cease and desist entirely. Tell them this is their one last chance. If they do such things again that bridge we shall tear apart, stone by mossy stone, and those stones we shall scatter far and wide, so there never is a chance of upbuilding that bridge yet again. And they are to uplift the enchantment from this fallen broomstick so it flies as good as new.
“And some others of you I want to seek the fairies out and explain to them the defacement of their green, being sure to lay all blame for such upon them dirty trolls and promising the turf shall be all fixed smooth and lovely for their next dancing when the moon be full.
“And yet another of you must take care of Dobbin, making sure his clumsy self does no more damage to the green, but letting him crop, perchance, a mouthful or two of the longer grass if it can be found. The poor beast does not often get the chance to regale himself with pasturage such as this.”
He turned back to Maxwell and Churchill, dusting his hands together in symbolism of a job well done.
“And now, gentlemen,” be said, “you please to climb the hill with me and we will essay what can be done with sweet October ale. I beg you, however, to go slowly in very pity of me, since this paunch of mine seems grown large of late and I suffer most exceedingly from the shortness of the breath.”