Mike-One's confused story of his friend Adam-Two re-echoed in my head. He says he don't think there is a Cold Side of Number One Sun. He thinks it's hot all the way around. He says he thinks Santa Claus is just pretend....
Something was wrong. Something big and important and dangerous, and I didn't know what I was going to do about it. Adam-Two, unlike some of the older Kids, had been born in Fairyland. There wasn't one single solitary thing in his life history to account for this sudden, terrifying curiosity and insight. Nothing. Not even pre-natal influence, if there is such a thing.
I wondered if Ruth had noticed anything strange about him. If so, she'd never mentioned it.
I decided I'd better have a Daddy-and-son chat with young Adam right away.
I walked through the Midway in the warm, twin-star sunshine, waving and shouting back at the Kids on the rides who shrieked "Hi, Daddy!" as they caught sight of me. Nobody had seen Adam-Two, so I escaped after a brief roller coaster ride ("Aw, come on Daddy, just once!") with a trio of husky thirty-year-olds who called themselves the "Three Bears."
Adam-Two wasn't at the Playground either, nor the Swimming Pool, nor the Tennis Courts. I decided he must be in the Recreation Hall, so I headed in that direction, taking a short cut through Pretty Park at the north end of the Midway. The park was a big place, stretching east and west from the Baseball Diamond to the Pony Stables at the edge of Camping Woods, and northward as far as the Golf Course.
This was my favorite spot in Fairyland. I always came here when I wanted to relax, or think something through without any interruptions. It had once been an oasis on this otherwise barren desert planet, and was therefore the logical site for the Fairyland Compound. An underground spring in the center of the park was our main water supply. The clear, cold fluid bubbled out of the rocks to form a lovely lake which was perhaps fifty yards across at the widest part. The lakeshore was ringed with tall, unearthly palm-like trees—strange and beautiful.
I found Adam-Two there beside the lake, sitting on a rock with his shoes and socks off, dangling his bare feet in the cold water and gazing upward into the swaying tree-tops.
"Hi, Adam-Two!"