Tigers at Twilight

This installment in the Magic Tree House series follows eight-year-old Jack and his seven-year-old sister, Annie, on their continuing quest to free an enchanted dog from a spell. The magic tree house, which belongs to Morgan le Fay, a magical librarian from the time of King Arthur, sits in the woods of Frog Creek, Pennsylvania, and can transport anyone inside it to the places depicted in its books. In previous adventures, Jack and Annie freed Morgan from a spell and completed several missions on her behalf. Their current mission requires them to collect four special gifts to break the enchantment on a small, tan-furred dog named Teddy. They have already obtained a pocket watch from the Titanic and an eagle's feather from the Lakota Indians of the Great Plains. The third gift, according to Morgan's note, must come from "a forest far away" (7).

While walking home from the library, Jack and Annie spot Teddy near the Frog Creek woods. The little dog leads them to the magic tree house, where they reread Morgan's note and find a book titled Wildlife of India that Teddy paws at eagerly. Jack points to the cover, wishes to go there, and the tree house spins and transports them.

They arrive in a tree by a stream at the edge of a forest glowing with orange sunset light. Two small langur monkeys, a species whose name means "having a long tail," leap onto the windowsill. Annie names them Kah and Ko after the sounds they make, and the monkeys beckon the children into the forest. As they walk, Jack notices deep gashes in a tree trunk and reads in the India book that tigers sharpen their claws on bark. He also learns that tigers usually leave elephants alone and often avoid wild dogs.

The forest animals suddenly begin making alarm calls, and a deep growl surrounds them. Kah and Ko screech from above, urging the children to climb. Jack and Annie scramble up a tree as twilight settles. In the branches, they spot a massive python slithering up the trunk. Jack reads that the python kills by squeezing prey to death. Kah and Ko demonstrate an escape by grabbing thick vines and swinging to another tree, then waving for the children to follow. Jack and Annie each grab a vine and leap. Mid-swing, a tiger launches from the bushes below, its claws barely missing them. They land safely in the langurs' tree.

The tree begins to shake, and Jack fears the tiger is climbing, but Annie spots an elephant trunk waving in the air. A herd of elephants is feeding on their tree's leaves. Annie proposes they ride an elephant through the forest, since the book states tigers do not attack elephants. She climbs onto one elephant's back and names her Saba, claiming the elephant communicated the name to her. Jack follows, and Kah and Ko lead the procession through the moonlit forest. A long, mournful roar echoes through the trees, turning into steady moaning. Annie notes it sounds sad. Jack rocks to sleep on Saba's back.

He wakes at dawn on a muddy stream bank. Jack slides off Saba and washes in the stream, where he notices a horn and two ears poking out of the water. The India book identifies the creature as a one-horned rhinoceros, noting that rhinos may charge because of poor eyesight but that a loud noise will stop them. The book adds that rhinos are very endangered because poachers kill them and sell their body parts. The rhino rises and lowers its horn at Annie. Jack yells for her to make a loud noise. She claps and shouts, and the rhino sinks back into the water.

Moments later, Annie runs to Jack near tears. She and Teddy have found a tiger lying on his side at the forest edge, his front paw caught in a steel trap, exhausted from struggling all night. This was the source of the sad moaning. Jack reads that poachers illegally use steel traps to catch tigers and sell their body parts, and that both the tiger and the rhino face extinction if the killing continues. He studies a diagram of the trap and devises a plan: He will push down the lever to spring the trap open while Annie pulls the tiger's leg free. They approach the tiger. Jack opens the trap, Annie gently frees the bleeding leg and whispers for him to get well, and they begin to tiptoe away.

Kah and Ko sound a warning. The tiger is on his feet, limping toward them with glowing eyes. Jack claps and shouts, but unlike the rhino, the tiger does not back off. Teddy barks fiercely, and Annie interprets this as a signal to run and hide. She pulls Jack behind a large rock. From behind it, they hear Teddy's barks turn into thunderous growls that sound nothing like a small dog. When silence falls and they peer over the rock, Teddy stands tall while the tiger limps away into the trees. Jack speculates that Teddy may have transformed into a wild dog to scare the tiger off, since the book noted that tigers avoid wild dogs, but Teddy only pants and licks them both.

Kah and Ko lead the children downstream to an old man sitting cross-legged on a rock with his eyes closed. He has long white hair, a long white beard, and brown skin. Jack realizes the man is blind. The hermit explains that he lives alone in the forest to learn from nature by listening. He has listened so long that all the animal sounds have become "one great voice of the forest" (61), which told him about the trapped tiger. When Jack mentions that the tiger turned on them after they freed it, the hermit asks Annie to bring him a white lotus flower from the stream. Holding the blossom, he explains that the perfect lotus grows from dark, thick mud: Its beauty cannot exist without its ugliness. Saving the tiger means accepting both his graceful beauty and his fierce nature. He offers the lotus as a thank-you gift from the forest, saying the world would not be complete without the tiger. Annie recognizes it as the third gift from Morgan's riddle.

The hermit tells them not to worry about finding the tree house. The elephants walked in a large circle during the night, bringing them back to where they started. He points to the tree house in a nearby tree. Jack and Annie hug Kah and Ko and thank the hermit. When the man holds Jack's hand, Jack feels a wave of calm. They climb into the tree house and look out the window at the elephants bathing, the langurs swinging, the tiger sunbathing and licking his sore leg, and the hermit smiling in front of his cave. Annie places the lotus beside the pocket watch and the eagle's feather, three of the four gifts now collected. Jack wonders aloud how the hermit knew about the tree house and their nightlong elephant ride. Annie answers simply that the one great voice of the forest told him.

Jack wishes to go home, and the tree house returns them to Frog Creek. Before climbing down, Jack looks into Teddy's twinkling eyes and asks who Teddy really is, but the dog only wags his tail, leaving his true nature a mystery. Sitting on their front steps at dusk, Jack closes his eyes and listens: a car, a woodpecker, crickets, a screen door, their mother calling them to dinner. All the sounds blend together into one great voice, the voice of home.