LITMIR.BIZ

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floor to a nearby wooden pole that supported the pavilion roof. There was an electrical switch lever on the pole. The little car that had just entered the “cave” was sitting on the tracks that went right. Allie came up to the pole and put her hand on the switch lever.

      “Shall we try it?” She looked at the cat and the monkey questioningly.

      “Let’s do it,” agreed Lu. “But be careful. Turn it off immediately if something goes wrong.”

      Allie hesitated a second and then pushed the lever down. They heard the familiar hum and rattle, and the car began to speed up toward the wall.

      “There’ll be a smal crash now,” the cat impishly rubbed his front paws and watched the car’s inevitable approach to the wall.

      “No, there won’t be,” retorted Allie, turning off the switch. The car screeched to a stop about three feet from the wall.

      “That’s right,” agreed Lu. “We don’t need a crash. We need to explore. Maybe there’s a secret passage there.”

      So the friends set out towards the wall with a pioneering zeal. But when they reached the car, there came a bright flash of light from behind. With a cry of surprise, Allie turned around and covered her eyes. A bright flashlight or spotlight was shining in her face, blinding her and not allowing her to see anything. Then a tall dark figure stood in front of the light. Black itself, it stood as if in a bright halo like the sun during a total eclipse. But Allie thought that it looked familiar: the long hair, the familiar cut of dress. When she heard the voice, although the manner of speech was strange, there could be no doubt. It was Corgy. Fear like a steel ring squeezed around the girl’s throat, arresting her breath.

      “So that’s who was spying on me,” Corgy was saying with a tone of slight surprise. “So it seems you didn’t get to taste the fried fish. Too bad, your Mom is an excellent cook. How naughty of you to treat her like that when she tried so hard for you. Well, who else do we have here? A cat, very well. Only makes sense, if there’s trouble, look for a cat.”

      At those words Lemonade shivered and jumped on top of the car to hide from the bright light and Corgy’s eyes.

      “And who is that scarecrow? Looks like an old friend of ours. Must be one of the transported,” Corgy said that, looking at Lu.

      While the sorceress was talking, Allie calmed down. The gripping fear was gone. The girl picked up the monkey and stepped behind the car. Corgy, in the meantime, kept talking:

      “Listen, Allie – that is your name, isn’t it? If you don’t want to end up like this monkey of yours, better hand over the viamulator. You’ve got it, I know. The pretty colorful cylinder. Be a good girl.”

      “All right,” Allie’s ringing voice sounded firm. “I will give you the viamulator, if you help Mom and Dad.”

      “Of course I will, don’t you worry,” quickly assented Corgy. “Well, give me the viamulator, just throw it to me. I’ll catch it.”

      Everything else happened so fast. Allie couldn’t explain why she acted the way she did. She just knew one thing: she didn’t have a clear plan at that moment. Allie took a step forward and stood on the car. Putting Lu down on the seat next to Lemonade, she stretched her right hand with the viamulator towards Corgy. The blinding light wasn’t hitting the girl’s face now, and Allie was able to see the sorceress clearly now. She was standing next to the switch lever pole with one hand on the switch and the other extended towards Allie. Her eyes were gleaming with victory, her lips drawn apart in a sinister grin.

      Suddenly Allie’s fingers made a subtle movement, as if on their own. There was a soft click, and a bright green beam of light burst out of the viamulator and hit Corgy’s face. Almost at the same time the car jerked forward, almost throwing Allie off. The girl held on to the seat. The last thing she saw was the tiny squirming figure of Corgy that was hanging off the switch lever and squealing.

      Then all went dark.

      ***

      The car rolled out of the dark into an enormous cave. Gigantic icicles were hanging down from the ceiling that couln’t be seen; some of them had reached the floor and turned into ice pillars. Thousands of colorful sparkles were playing on their crystal surface, and flames of cold light pierced the thick ice from time to time.

      Lu was looking around with agitation. The cave was familiar to her. It seemed like it was just yesterday when she had gone down these tracks in a similar car. Allie, judging by her face, was utterly raptured. It was one thing to hear someone else’s story and quite another to see everything with your own eyes.

      Lemonade was not moved by the beauties of the ice kingdom. He stretched out his neck and was intently looking ahead and sniffing the air with his sensitive nose.

      “It’s so beautiful,” Allie whispered, delighted. Despite the rattle of the wheels, her voice sounded very clear. It seemed to resonate and amplify against the giant ice pillars.

      “Yes it is,” muttered the cat. “But, if I remember Lu’s story correctly, there are much less pleasant and beautiful things ahead of us.”

      Allie and Lu turned their heads and looked at what Lemonade was pointing at.

      The car was on the home stretch now before a tunnel in the cave wall. Its mouth was a gaping black hole into which the rail tracks vanished.

      “Everybody, jump off now,” quickly ordered Lu and lead the way, leaping off the car. Allie and Lemonade followed her. They watched their empty carriage disappear into the dark tunnel, and then looked at each other.

      “Well, what do we do now?” inquired Allie.

      “I believe we need to go back,” Lemonade suggested half-heartedly.

      “But Corgy is there. She is probably waiting for us, unless she has set out on a chase,” said Lu.

      “I shrank her,” Allie interjected modestly.

      “You did… what?” Lemonade asked in astonishment.

      “Remember that chair in my room? That’s what I did to her.”

      Allie flung the viamulator, which she had been firmly gripping in her fist, into the air. And now she saw that all of the disks, including the blue one, were tightly pressed together and made up a solid cylinder. Therefore, there was no light coming out of it, that is, it was turned off. Allie looked at the monkey, concerned. But she was sitting on a rock, resting her head on her hands, as sound as a bell.

      “How are you feeling, Lu?”

      “Just fine, what can be wrong with me?” the monkey answered carelessly, but was suddenly suspicious: “Why are you asking?”

      “That is why!” Allie showed her the viamulator that was off.

      Lu stared at it for a few seconds, but when she realized what was going on, she yelled out happily and hugged the cat.

      “Yippee! This means something is changing in me for the better, if I can do without this thing now.”

      “Don’t be too hasty,” Lemonade reasoned with her, “it might be just the cave.”

      “It might be,” Lu the happy monkey refused to stop, “but a fact is a fact.”

      “All of this is well and good,” interrupted Allie, “but we should think what we’ll do next.”

      After a short counsel, they decided to turn back.

      They set out and made their way around the rocks and ice pillars. After a few minutes’ walk they turned a corner and saw a solid rock wall. The tracks disappeared into it, but there was no tunnel or passage in the wall.

      “I was expecting something like that,” Lemonade said with a mixed feeling of satisfaction and despair.

      “What do we do?” Allie patted the cold rough surface of the rock and looked

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