The Dragonsitter to the Rescue

Dear Uncle Morton,

I have to tell you some bad news.

We have lost Arthur.

He's somewhere in London, but I don't know where.

Today, we went to the Natural History Museum. I've always wanted to go there, so I was really excited.

The only problem was Dad said the dragons had to stay in the hotel without us.

I said that was very unfair, but Dad said he wanted to spend some quality time with his children, not a pair of fire-breathing lizards. He said we could take them to a park later if they needed to stretch their wings.

He absolutely, definitely, no-question-about-it refused to change his mind.

So I hid Arthur in my backpack.

I knew I shouldn't have, but I couldn't stop myself.

I told him to be quiet in there. He was, on the subway. Very. And he carried on being quiet in the café where we stopped for a morning snack. I dropped some croissant through the top of the backpack, which seemed to keep him happy.

He even stayed quiet in the museum. He didn't make a squeak while we looked at the birds and the bears and the earthworms and the giraffe and the rhino and the dodo and the dolphin and the blue whale.

But when we got to the T. rex, he wriggled out of my backpack and flew off to have a look. Maybe he thought it was a long-lost cousin.

He flew the entire length of the T. rex from tail to head and landed on its nostrils. People were pointing and shouting and taking pictures.

Dad asked, "Where did that come from?"

I pretended I didn't know.

Guards came running. One of them said, "You're not allowed to have flying toys inside the museum."

I explained, "He's not a toy. He's a dragon."

The guard said he didn't care what it was, I just had to get it out of here right now, this minute, before he called the police and had us all thrown out for making a public nuisance of ourselves.

I said I would if I could catch him.

The guard got on his walkie-talkie and called for reinforcements.

Unfortunately, catching Arthur was easier said than done. He jumped off the T. rex and whooshed over our heads, waggling his wings.

I ran after him. So did Dad and Emily and lots of guards.

Arthur was faster than any of us. He flew along the corridors, looped the loop around some statues, dive-bombed a crowd of Japanese tourists, and disappeared through the revolving doors. By the time we got outside, he had vanished.

We searched for hours, but we couldn't find him anywhere.

I wanted to keep on looking all night, but Dad said we'd just be wasting our time. So we came back to the hotel.