"Kushner,.Donn.-.A.Book.DragonUC" - читать интересную книгу автора (Dragon Stories)

trees, breaking their heavy branches with sweeps of his tail.
Or he would carry huge rocks in his claws and drop them on
the stony hillsides, to see them split and prove to himself that
he was still as strong as ever. But he would look down and see,
perhaps, some humble shepherds or plowmen shaking their
heads in disbelief. Then he would fly back to his cavern,
feeling foolish and wasteful.

Often, when he returned, he found that his grandmother
had opened the way to the tunnel behind her pile of treasure.
And then, without knowing exactly when it had started, None-
such noticed that his grandmother was entering the tunnel
completely. At first she disappeared for only a few minutes;

gradually this extended to hours.

With each of her underground visits, Nonesuch's grand-
mother became more and more thoughtful. She would sit at
the mouth of the cavern afterwards, her head hanging six feet
out of its opening, her great dimmed eyes staring out at the
valley and all the signs of busy human life. From time to time
she would heave a thunderous sigh that caused the peasants
to gaze up, surprised, into the clear sky. But she did not speak.

Then, from one of her underground trips, she did not
return at all. Nonesuch waited for her anxiously. He left the
cavern as little as possible, lest she come back in his absence.
When he did leave, he piled brushwood over the tunnel mouth,
to show him if his grandmother had left the hole and entered it
again. He slept across the mouth of the tunnel in case she
decided to come back at night.

33

An in vain. His grandmother was gone. And after a week
of waiting. Nonesuch, who had never stuck so much as his
nose into the tunnel, crawled down it in search of her.

The journey was easy at first. The hole was so wide that
the edges of his folded wings barefy touched the sides. It
continued thus for some time. though Nonesuch soon realized
that his grandmother's greater bulk and wingspan could not
have passed so easily. Here and there he saw her scales dinging
to the tunnel wan. He recalled that she had started to grow
bright new scales since her first trips into the tunnel, which
gave her a speckled appearance. In no time, daylight had
vanished behind Nonesuch, and he continued by the tight of
hisowneyes. The tunnel descended through chalk and limestone
layers, the deposits ofandent seas. Surprised fossils of great
sea monsters gazed out at him from the waDs. Then came