Free The Secret of Platform 13 by Eva Ibbotson

came to the Island,’ said Gurkie. ‘You will come, won’t you?’
    ‘Nope,’ said Raymond. ‘I’d miss my telly and my computer games and my Scalextric set. But I’ll keep him.’
    He made a grab for the mistmaker but the animal had given off so much mist that he was less pillow-shaped now, and nimbler. Jumping off the bed he landed with a thud on his nose and began to explore the room.
    They watched him as he ran his whiskery moustache along Raymond’s toy boxes, rolled over on the rug, rubbed himself against a chest of drawers. Sometimes he disappeared into patches of mist, then reappeared with one ear turned inside out which is what happens to mistmakers who are busy.
    The wizard cleared his throat. Now was the time to come out with the truth. Such a snobby boy would surely come to the Island if he knew he would live there as a prince.
    ‘Perhaps we should tell you, Raymond, that you are really of noble—’
    He was interrupted by another and even louder shriek from Raymond.
    ‘Look! It’s lifted its leg! It’s made a puddle on the carpet. It’s dirty!’
    Odge looked at him with loathing. ‘This mist-maker is six weeks old ! They can be housetrained perfectly well but not when they are infants. You made enough puddles when you were that age and it’s a clean puddle. It isn’t the puddle of someone who guzzles shrimps and roast pork and greasy potatoes.’
    Ben had already been to the bathroom for a cloth and was mopping up. Mopping up after Raymond was something he had been doing ever since he could remember. Then he gathered up the mist-maker who was trembling all over and trying to cover his ears with his paws. You cannot be as musical as these animals are without suffering terribly from the kind of stuck-pig noises that Raymond made.
    ‘You keep him downstairs, Ben,’ ordered Raymond. ‘You can feed him and see he doesn’t mess up my room. But remember, he’s mine !’

Eight
    Odge and Gurkie spent the night curled up on the floor of the little summer house. It was a pretty place with a fretwork verandah and wooden steps but no one used it now. Years ago the roof had begun to leak and instead of mending it, the head keeper had put up a notice saying: private . no admittance . Dark privet bushes and clumps of laurel hid it from passers by. Only the animals came to it now: sparrows to preen in the lop-sided bird bath; squirrels to chatter on the roof.
    Near by, a patch of snoring grass showed where the ogre rested. Ben had smuggled the mistmaker into his cupboard of a room.
    But Cornelius could not sleep. He longed to conjure up a fire to keep his old bones warm, but he thought it might be noticed and after a while he took his stick and wandered off towards the lake. The Serpentine it was called because it was wiggly and shaped like a serpent, and he remembered it from when he had lived Up Here. Londoners were fond of it; people went boating there and caught tiddlers and brave old gentlemen broke the ice with their toes in winter and swam in it, getting goose pimples but being healthy.
    But it wasn’t just old men with goose pimples or lovers canoodling or children sailing their boats that came here. There were . . . others. There had been mermaids in the lake when Cor was a little boy, each tree had had its spirit, banshees had wailed in the bushes. And on Midsummer’s Eve they had gathered together and had a great party.
    Midsummer’s Eve was in two days’ time. Did they still come, the boggarts and the brownies, the nymphs and the nixies, the sproggans and the witches and the trolls? And if so was there an idea there? If Raymond saw real magic – saw the exciting things that happened on the Island, would that persuade him to come?
    Cor’s ancient forehead wrinkled up in thought. Then he raised his stick in the air and said some poetry – and seconds later Ernie Hobbs, who had been sleeping on a mail bag on platform thirteen of King’s Cross Station, woke up and said: ‘Ouch!’ Looking