The Shifting Sands

Jasmine shook her head. “Kree is not for sale,” she said firmly, and turned to go. The fat man clutched at the sleeve of her jacket.

“Don’t turn your back on me, little lovely,” he whined. “Don’t turn your back on poor old Ferdinand, for pity’s sake.”

Kree put his head to one side and looked at the man carefully. Then he hopped onto the table and stalked right up to him, inspecting him closely, his head darting this way and that. After a moment he squawked loudly.

Jasmine glanced at Lief and Barda, then back at Ferdinand. “Kree says, how much would you give for his help just for today?” she said.

The fat man laughed. “Talks to you, does he?” he jeered disbelievingly. “Well now, that is something you don’t see every day.”

He took a small tin from his pocket, opened it, and took out a silver coin. “Tell him from me that I’ll give him this if he turns the wheel till sunset. Would that suit him?”

Kree flew back to perch on Jasmine’s arm and squawked again. Jasmine nodded slowly. “For one silver coin, Kree will turn the wheel thirty times. If you want him to do more, you pay again.”

“That is robbery!” Ferdinand exclaimed.

“It is his price,” said Jasmine calmly.

Ferdinand’s face crumpled, and he buried it in his hands. “Ah, you are a cruel girl! Cruel to a poor unfortunate trying to make a living,” he mumbled. “My last hope is gone. I will starve, and my birds with me.” His shoulders shook as he began to sob.

Jasmine shrugged, apparently quite unmoved. Lief, glancing at Ferdinand’s crutches propped against the wall, felt very uncomfortable.

“It seems harsh, Jasmine,” he whispered in her ear. “Could you not —?”

“He is acting. He can afford ten times as much,” Jasmine hissed back. “Kree says he has a purse at his belt that is bulging with coins. It is hidden from us by the cloth that covers the table. Just wait.”

Sure enough, when after a moment the fat man peeped through his fingers and saw that Jasmine was not going to change her mind, he stopped pretending to sob and took his hands away from his face. “Very well,” he snapped, in quite a different voice. “For a bird, he drives a hard bargain. Put him on the perch.”

“The money first, if you please,” Barda put in quickly.

Ferdinand shot him an angry look, then, with much groaning and sighing, passed the silver coin he had taken from the tin to Jasmine.

Satisfied, Kree fluttered onto the perch.

“Stand aside, you three,” Ferdinand said sharply. “Make way for the customers.”

The companions did as they were told, but remained close by so that they could watch what happened. None of them trusted Ferdinand. The smell of food wafting from a nearby stall made Lief’s mouth water, but he knew that they could not buy anything with the silver coin until Kree was safely back on Jasmine’s arm.

“Roll up, roll up!” Ferdinand bellowed. “Beat the bird and win! One silver coin for a spin of the wheel! Every player wins a prize!”

A small crowd began to cluster around his table as he began pointing at the numbers on the coins painted around the wheel. “Two silver pieces for one!” he shouted. “Or would you prefer three silver pieces? Or four? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. Four silver pieces for one!”

People began feeling in their pockets for coins.

Ferdinand’s pudgy hand moved around the wheel, his finger stabbing at one number after another. “But why stop at four?” he shouted. “This is your lucky day! Why, you could win five, six, or ten silver pieces!” He tore at his hair and rolled his eyes. His voice rose to a shriek. “Ten silver coins for one! A prize for every player! Why do I do it? I must be losing my wits!”

Several people pressed forward, holding out their money. Lief moved restlessly.

“Perhaps we should use our coin on the game,” he muttered to Barda. “We could double our money. Or even better!”

Barda smiled at him pityingly. “Or, which is more likely, we could lose our coin and finish with nothing but a worthless wooden bird,” he said. “If the wheel stops at a bird instead of a coin …”

Lief was not convinced. Especially when he saw Kree spin the wheel for the first time, hitting it sharply with his beak. The wheel spun smoothly around and around. The player, an eager-looking woman with flowing hair, watched anxiously, then cried out with delight as the wheel stopped and the marker showed that she had won two coins.

“She has beaten the bird!” shrieked Ferdinand, scrabbling in his money tin and handing the woman her prize. “Oh, mercy me!” He turned to Kree and shook his fist. “Try harder!” he scolded. “You will ruin me!”

The crowd laughed. Another player stepped forward. Kree spun the wheel again. The second player was even luckier than the first, winning three coins.

“This bird is hopeless!” Ferdinand howled in despair. “Oh, what will I do?”

After that, he could not take his customers’ money fast enough. People crowded in front of his table, eager for their turn to play.

Kree spun the wheel again and again. And, somehow, no one else seemed to have the luck of the first two players. More and more often the wheel would stop at a bird picture, and the disappointed player would creep away clutching a wooden bird. Only rarely did the marker point to a picture of a coin, and when it did it was usually a coin marked “1” or “2.”

But whenever that happened Ferdinand would make an enormous fuss, congratulating the winner, saying he was ruined, shouting at Kree for playing badly, and fretting that next time the prize would be even bigger.

But the pile of silver in the money tin was growing. Every few minutes, Ferdinand would quietly take some coins and tuck them away in the purse at his belt. And still the players pressed forward, eager to try their luck.

“No wonder his purse is bulging,” Jasmine muttered in disgust. “Why do these people give him their money? Some of them are plainly very poor. Can they not see that he wins far more often than they do?”

“Ferdinand only makes noise when players win,” said Barda heavily. “The losers are ignored and quickly forgotten.”

Jasmine made a disgusted face. “Kree has made twenty-nine turns,” she said. “After one more, we can take him back. I have no wish to go on with this. I do not like Ferdinand, or his wheel. Do you agree?”

Barda nodded, and Lief did also. However much they needed money, neither of them wanted to help Ferdinand any longer.

Barda pointed to a banner fixed high to a building a little way along the road.

“We may find shelter and some food there,” he suggested. “They may let us work for our keep. At least we can try.”

Kree had spun the wheel for a final time. The player, a thin-faced man with deep shadows under his eyes, watched desperately as it slowed. When it stopped at the picture of a bird, and Ferdinand handed him the little wooden trinket, his mouth quivered and he slunk away, his bony shoulders bowed.

Jasmine stepped to the table and held out her arm for Kree. “The thirty turns have been made, Ferdinand,” she said. “We must go now.”

But Ferdinand, his plump face glistening with sweat and greed, turned his small eyes towards her and shook his head violently.

“You cannot go,” he spat. “I need the bird. He is the best I have ever had. Look at the crowd! You cannot take him!”

His arm shot out, his pudgy hand grasping at Kree’s feet. But Kree fluttered from his perch just in time, landing at the edge of the table.

“Come back here!” hissed Ferdinand, reaching for him. Kree bent his head and with his sharp beak tweaked at the red cloth that covered the table. As it was pulled aside, the crowd gasped, then began to roar with anger.

For on the ground under the table was a pedal with some wires that led up through the table top to the wheel.

“He can stop and start the wheel as he wills!” someone shouted. “He uses his feet. See? He cheats!”

The crowd pressed forward angrily. Kree hopped hastily onto Jasmine’s arm. Ferdinand swept up the wheel and leaped to his feet, tipping over the table. The wooden birds and the tin of silver coins crashed to the ground as he took to his heels, hurtling down the street with surprising speed, the wheel tucked under his arm, the remains of its cheating wires trailing. Some of his customers stopped to pick up the money which was rolling everywhere. Most sped off in pursuit of the escaping man, shouting in fury.