003
Iris closed the front door and started down the steps of her porch.
“Not so fast young lady,” her father’s voice came from the other side of the linden tree in the front yard.
“Mother said I could,” Iris responded in classic child-attorney fashion.
“I’m not interested in that.” said Thaumas as he cut her off. Iris’ father didn’t look up from behind the tree. The garden with all its plants, trees and life-giving soil was his happy place. When he was in the garden, he never looked anyone directly in the face.
Iris held up the magic eye to her face and stared back at him. Sure enough, the eye transformed her father into a statue with a monk’s hood and a long beard. She held back her laughter.
“I was speaking with Mr. Phineas the other day?”
Iris kept looking at her father through the magic eye. She wanted to touch the curls hanging from his chin.
“He told me that he was awoken from his afternoon nap by laughter coming from his garden.”
Iris started to lower the magic eye, but caught herself and quickly covered her face with it.
“Were you in Mr. Phineas’ garden yesterday?”
“That wasn’t me. It was Harpy.”
“The dog?” Her father’s sculpted eyes stared down at the dog who was snoring into his third nap of the morning.
“How do you expect me to…”
“Sorry Dad. Gotta run. I’ve got to capture the world and you’re making me late.”
Thaumas sighed as he watched his daughter jump over the dog and run out the front gate.