「Why do you cut peoples daemons away?」
「What? Whos been talking to you about that?」
「This girl, I dunno her name. She said you cut peoples daemons away.」
「Nonsense...」
He was agitated, though. She went on:
「Cause you take people out one by one and they never e back. And some people re you just kill em, and other people say different, and this girl told me you cut—」
「Its not true at all. Wheake children out, its because its time for them to move on to another place. Theyre growing up. Im afraid your friend is alarming herself. Nothing of the sort! Dont even think about it. Who is your friend?」
「I only e here yesterday, I dont know anyones name.」
「What does she look like?」
「I fet. I think she had sort of brown hair...light brown, maybe...! dunno.」
The doctor went to speak quietly to the nurse. As the two of them ferred, Lyra watched their daemons. This nurses retty bird, just as and incurious as Sister Claras dog, and the doctors was a large heavy moth.
her moved. They were awake, for the birds eyes were bright and the moths feelers waved languidly, but they werent animated, as she would have expected them to be. Perhaps they werent really anxious or curious at all.
Presently the doctor came bad they went on with the examination, weighing her and Pantalaimon separately, looking at her from behind a special s, measuring her heartbeat, plag her under a little nozzle that hissed and gave off a smell like fresh air.
In the middle of one of the tests, a loud bell began t a ringing.
「The fire alarm,」 said the doctor, sighing. 「Very well. Lizzie, follow Sister Betty.」
「But all their outdoor clothes are down in the dormitory building, Doctor. She t go outside like this. Should we go there first, do you think?」
He was a having his experiments interrupted, and snapped his fingers in irritation.
「I suppose this is just the sort of thing the practice is meant to show up,」 he said. 「What a nuisance.」
「When I came yesterday,」 Lyra said helpfully, 「Sister Clara put my other clothes in a cupboard in that first room where she looked at me. The o door. I could wear them.」
「Good idea!」 said the nurse. 「Quick, then.」
With a secret glee, Lyra hurried there behind the nurse arieved her proper furs and leggings and boots, and pulled them on quickly while the nurse dressed herself in coal silk.
Then they hurried out. In the wide arena in front of the main group of buildings, a hundred or so people, adults and children, were milling about: some iement, some in irritation, many just bewildered.
「See?」 one adult was saying. 「Its worth doing this to find out what chaos wed be in with a real fire.」
Someone was blowing a whistle and waving his arms, but no one was taking muotice. Lyra saw Roger and beed. Rged Billy Costas arm and soon all three of them were together in a maelstrom of running children.
「No onell notice if we take a look around,」 said Lyra. 「Itll take em ages to t everyone, and we say we just followed someone else and got lost.」
They waited till most of the grownups were looking the other way, and then Lyra scooped up some snow and rammed it into a loose powdery snowball, and hurled it at random into the crowd. In a moment all the children were doing it, and the air was full of flying snow. Screams of laughter covered pletely the shouts of the adults trying tain trol, and thehree children were around