Even when they finally came to a complete standstill, and cheers erupted from everyone, including his dad, Tick couldn’t let go. He scrambled around Norbert and hugged his dad’s arms and shoulders and head like he hadn’t seen him in ten years, bursting into tears. After a very long moment, his dad finally spoke up.

“Professor, do you think you could give me a push now? I’m, uh, kind of stuck.”

Chapter

25

~

The Girl with Black Hair

Frazier stood in the snow-swept graveyard, shivering and rubbing his hands together as he waited for Mistress Jane to wink him back to the Thirteenth Reality. He’d sent the nanolocator signal several minutes ago, but she often took her time about these things. She always wanted to make sure people knew the Mistress was in charge; she helped others at her convenience, not theirs.

A crunch in the snow behind him made Frazier spin around to see who had intruded on his waiting ground. He almost lost his lunch when he saw what stood there.

Where did she come from? She must be—

He didn’t have time to finish his thought before the gigantic woman covered his nose and mouth with a foul-smelling piece of cloth, gripping it in place with her huge hand.

As he faded into blackness, he couldn’t help but wonder if Mistress Jane would even miss him.

~

Tick, his journal now clasped in his right hand, stared in disbelief at what could’ve been his death.

Next to him, his dad shook his head, arms folded as he stared down into the gully. “Boy, I’m sure glad I paid ten bucks for insurance. The rental company can pay for that mess.”

They stood with Norbert on the side of the road, watching the licking flames as the once out-of-control car burned. When it ran off the road, the car had shot off a steep embankment and crashed into a rocky ditch, crumpling into a mass of metal and broken glass, consumed by gasoline fire.

Despite the cold, Tick was still sweating from the intensity of their last-second escape. As soon as their rescue car had come to a stop and they’d managed to dislodge his dad, they’d run to this spot, unable to believe that if Norbert had shown up only a few seconds later, Tick and his dad might be buried somewhere in the wreckage below.

“Norbert, I don’t know how we can ever—” Dad said.

The postal worker waved his hand like swatting at flies. “Not another word, Mr. Higginbottom, not another word. I just a-did what any good upstanding citizen would’ve done in the circumstances. You folks made me feel like myself again. That’s thanks enough.”