by Susan Cooper
And every single person and creature was looking at the Boy.
The Boy stared at them all. What were they doing? The Dragon would eat them!
“Saint George!” he shouted urgently.
Out of the crowd of people, Father Christmas walked forward toward the Boy, and everyone turned to watch. The old man was carrying a white tunic with a big red cross on it, and a sword, and a small round shield.
He stopped in front of the Boy, and put the tunic over the Boy’s astonished head.
Then he put the sword into the Boy’s right hand, and the shield into his left.
The signpost said softly:
“Only a child can find the way To bring Saint George back to the play.”
The Boy said, “But I’m not Saint George!” “You are now,” the signpost said.
Everyone in the clearing shouted and cheered. “Saint George!” they cried. “Hurray for Saint George!”
The Boy looked down at his tunic. It was certainly the right uniform for Saint George. He took a deep breath, and he thrust his sword up into the air and waved it.
Everyone cheered even louder.
“Dragon!” shouted the Boy. “I challenge you to fight!”
The Dragon was busily thumping his tail against the oak tree, trying to shake the Turkish Knight out of it. He looked up and saw the Boy, and gave a great angry roar. Fire shot out of his nostrils and burned some more grass.
“Go home, peanut!” roared the Dragon. “Don’t bother me!”
He turned back to the Turkish Knight, and puffed a cloud of smoke up at him. The Turkish Knight squealed, and began to cough.
The Boy wasn’t about to be called a peanut, especially now that he was Saint George. He moved quietly toward the Dragon, reached past one of the great golden claws, and jabbed the tip of his sword into the Dragon’s toe.
“Ow!” said the Dragon, and the Boy jumped back very fast before the big claw could grab at him.
“Fight, Dragon!” he shouted bravely.
“RRRROOOOOOAAAAAWWWW!” roared the Dragon, and all the blackbirds flew up into the sky in alarm. Everyone in the watching crowd moved one step backward, but they also began to cheer and shout.
“Come on, Saint George!” shouted Jack.
“Yay, Saint George!” yelled the Old Woman’s children.
“Boo to the Dragon!” called Red Riding Hood.
The Dragon snarled, and scuffed at the ground with one huge front claw. He put his head down and rushed full tilt at the Boy, roaring as he came.
The Boy held up his shield and jumped sideways, just as the great red jaws were about to swallow him up. The Dragon’s head hit the shield and sent the Boy rolling head over heels across the clearing. His shield clanged like a bell as it bounced away over the ground, and his sword went flying. But he managed to snatch up the sword before the Dragon could turn to charge again.
The Dragon huffed out a ball of fire, and the Boy dodged. He felt the flames singe the hair above his ear.
“RRRROOOOOOAAAAAWWWW!” roared the Dragon again, and he brought his enormous green tail swinging round from behind to knock the Boy off his feet.
“Jump, Saint George!” called Pinocchio.
Just in time, the Boy jumped up into the air, and the tail swished by underneath him. It was swishing so fast that it made the Dragon swing round in a circle, staggering to keep his balance.
“Boo, mean old Dragon!” shouted the Old Woman’s children. “BOO!”
The Dragon snarled and blew smoke at them.
The Boy stood tall, facing the Dragon. He had no shield now, but he held his sword firmly in front of him. “Come on, Dragon!” he yelled. “Come and fight!”
The Dragon’s eyes were gleaming like red stars. He stood there green and furious, making a hissing sound like a huge angry cat.
And then he charged.
He thundered across the clearing toward the Boy, roaring, and the ground shook, and the people of the Land of Story gazed in horror as he came. The sunlight flashed from the Dragon’s golden claws and the long white teeth in his dreadful gaping mouth.
The Boy stood there watching, waiting. He wanted to run. He was going to be killed!
But he knew he had to be Saint George. So as the enormous green Dragon came rushing toward him, with the flashing gold claws on either side, and the terrible open jaws above, he didn’t move. He stood there still and firm, with his sword held straight out in front of him.
And the Dragon ran right onto the sword, and it went into his chest, right up to the hilt. The Boy let go just in time, and dodged aside. The Dragon staggered to a halt, and let out a great shriek. Everyone in the clearing cheered and shouted and jumped up and down.
The Boy darted forward and pulled out his sword and held it up high. Everyone cheered again.
Just for a moment, something puzzled the Boy. He couldn’t see any blood on the Dragon’s chest, and his sword seemed to have gone in and come out very easily, as if it had been stuck into a sofa, or a stuffed toy.
But the Boy didn’t have any more time to think, because the Dragon had begun to die a most spectacular death. He staggered across the blackened grass, roaring, and the cheering crowd scattered out of his way. He blew an angry puff of smoke at them.
He staggered round in a circle, and gave another tremendous roar.
Then he fell over, and lay on his side. He let out three perfectly round puffs of smoke and they drifted up to the sky. The Dragon roared, more weakly. His tail thrashed to and fro over the grass.
The people in the crowd were cheering even more loudly. “Hurray for Saint George!” they shouted. “Saint George is the champion!”
The Boy waved his sword in the air. As he did it, he remembered that this was exactly what he had always made the Saint George puppet do, in his own world, when he was working the puppet play.
And he realized that the Dragon was doing exactly the same things he himself had made the puppet dragon do, when it was dying. He had always ended by having the puppet dragon heave itself up off the ground with a final terrifying roar, before falling down dead. The children in the audience had always loved that.
He moved out into the center of the clearing, and looked at the Dragon.
The Dragon thrashed his tail about some more, and then he lifted his whole body up off the ground with a huge terrifying roar—and he fell down dead.
But he grinned at the Boy as he did it, and before he closed his eyes, he winked.
The Boy stared at the dead Dragon.
All around him, people were cheering and hooting and whistling. The signpost was jumping up and down on its chunky little legs, shouting, “Well done! Well done!” The Pied Piper was playing a victory march on his pipe. All the Old Woman’s children were laughing and waving, and Jack was dancing a happy jig with Red Riding Hood.
The four and twenty blackbirds were darting to and fro round the Boy’s head, singing. Their song grew louder and louder, and they flew closer and closer, so that he could see nothing but a whirl of black feathers. Then he felt as if they were picking him up to fly with them, carrying him up, up, up, high above the trees….
And suddenly the Boy was standing behind the puppet theatre, holding puppet strings in his hands, and below him on the stage was the still shape of a little green dragon, with a little Saint George, in his white tunic with the red cross on it, waving his sword triumphantly in the air.
In a corner of the stage was a tiny signpost, its arms pointing in two directions. There were no strings attached to the signpost, but for a moment the Boy thought he saw one of its arms wave to him. He blinked.
All around him were the children at Mr. Pennywinkle’s party, cheering and clapping their hands. “Hooray!” they shouted. “Good old Saint George! He won!”
A big hand took hold of the Boy’s shoulder. He looked up.
It was the Magician, gazing down at him with his dark mysterious eyes.
“Come and take a bow, puppet master,” he said.
&nbs
p; The Boy let go of the strings and came out from behind the little theatre. The Magician took his hand, and the children shouted and cheered while they both bowed, again and again.
The Magician said in the Boy’s ear, over the sound of the cheers, “Well done. Very well done.”
“I didn’t think I could possibly be Saint George,” the Boy said.
“I know you didn’t,” said the Magician. “But you were, weren’t you? I shall stop calling you ‘Boy’ now. I shall call you ‘George, ’ to remind you.”
The Boy looked up again, into the dark eyes under the shaggy dark eyebrows. “Thank you,” he said. He took a deep breath. “And please, will you teach me magic?”
The Magician smiled. “Of course I will,” he said. “The time is right, now. We shall start your lessons tomorrow, George.”
And so they did.
• • •
