"What does that gesture mean, Moron?" Jenny Elf inquired. It seemed that now that they were working together, the elf and the centaur foal got along well enough with these four goblins. Dolph gathered that though the goblins had abducted Che, they had not really mistreated him, only hobbled him so he couldn't get away. He had been unhappy at the time, but recognized that they were just doing a job.

"Gesture?" Moron asked.

"With the finger. Like this."

Dolph hadn't realized that male goblins could blush, but this one did, for Dolph felt Moron's big feet turn burning hot. "Uh, I don't know," the goblin said.

"But you made that gesture to the goblins on the land, and they threw rocks at us," the elf persisted. "I'm glad we're out of reach of their rocks, but that certainly must have been a magic gesture, and I wonder if I could learn it."

"I don't think so," Moron said. "Girls don't use that magic."

"Oh, you mean it doesn't work for girls?"

At this point Godiva crossed over to join them. "Do you have a problem?" she inquired.

"I just wanted to know how to do this gesture," Jenny said innocently.

Godiva must have paled or at least become light-headed, because Dolph felt her weight diminish. "Don't use that gesture!" she snapped at Moron. "Don't you know this girl is underage? Do you think things are different in her tribe just because they have pointed ears? You're in violation of the Adult Conspiracy."

"But they were doing it to us first!" Moron protested. "We couldn't just let them get away with it!"

"Then answer them with this gesture," Godiva said. She faced out and made some kind of signal. Dolph couldn't see what she did, but he saw the effect. Twenty fierce goblins at the shore stiffened, and half of them fell face first into the water, where shellfish shelled them. The three male goblins on the whaleboat fainted.

"I didn't see that," Jenny Elf said. "What—?"

"You weren't meant to, dear," Godiva replied.

"But I certainly am curious what—" Dolph was curious too. Whatever it was, it had twenty times the effect of what the male goblins had been doing.

"Not until you are adult," the gobliness said firmly.

Jenny sighed. So did Dolph. The Adult Conspiracy was a terrible thing.

Later they stopped at Lake Tsoda Popka, and the passengers dipped out cups of the fizzly sweet drink to go with the cookies they had picked. Dolph snaked out his tongue, trying to latch on to a cookie from a plant by the bank, but couldn't reach it, so had to be satisfied with a drink of the pop. Then Electra caught on, and started dropping him cookies. She was often thoughtful that way, always being a good companion and friend. He liked her a lot, but of course she was hardly the shadow of the romantic figure Nada was.