“Well, what did you think he wanted it for?” I wailed.

“I don’t know,” said the hermit, rubbing his forehead in frustration. “I don’t know!”

“Never mind that,” said Sina. “I’m sure you meant no harm. But now they are in harm’s way. They are very much in harm’s way. They’re going to crash somewhere over the ocean and die.”

“No! I won’t let that happen,” said the hermit quietly. “I must do something. I will do something.”

“Yes, but what? That’s why we came. What can be done? Think!” I cried.

I expected I don’t know what. I guess I expected him to think of some code to bring the plane back, but even then, how would we get the code to them?

“I can go,” I said. “I have a wish. I could bring them the news that they must land before the plane loses altitude and crashes.”

“No, Franny,” said Sina, wringing her hands.

I turned to the hermit to see if he had thought of a way to help, but instead of saying something he shot out of the cabin like lightning. He didn’t even have a flashlight but went tearing along the coastal trail by moon and starlight, as if all the world were to him now a night garden, lit and luminous with the life that exists without all our trying. As Sina and I tore down the trail after him, it was as if everything was illuminated with something our earth was reflecting back from the larger universe beyond. For a moment it was as if I knew something. And then as it always is when you think you have grasped it, it is gone, ungraspable, mysterious, untenable, a glimmer disappearing into the far larger night. I was running, trying to work this out as if it mattered. But really all that mattered to me at that moment was that Old Tom—Old Tom—was on that plane. I chased after the hermit. Sina far behind us tried to keep up, although finally she fell out of sight. Sina was never much of a runner.

“Wait!” I called as the hermit reached the fields and made for the night garden. “You need me. I can wish.”

“I’m going. I have an unused wish, too,” he called over his shoulder as I tore across the field after him. “I’m going to fly the plane back. I know how to fly it, and I know how to land it safely. Don’t come. There’s no point—you’ll just be in the way.”

Then he charged forward at twice the speed, and from afar I saw him vault over the fence into the night garden and disappear.

*   *   *

When the hermit wished himself onto the Argot, he found himself standing next to Old Tom, who was stupefied and dizzy, gazing at the children, tears streaming down his face.