Les Arnold considered this for a moment.   “In which case she could be long gone from the station?”

“Possibly, but for now let’s assume she’s hiding, disguised as a chair somewhere inside the station.   Lieutenant Smithers will be spitting chips as it is when they tell him what’s happened.   Without us unlocking again and giving her a second chance to escape.”

Right on cue the telephone on the front counter began to shrill.   The two policemen exchanged a troubled look, then Aaron reluctantly went across to speak to the lieutenant on the phone.

For nearly ten minutes the sergeant did his best to placate the angry lieutenant, while Constable Les Arnold and Dryadia both listened on.

Hanging up at last, Aaron rubbed his left ear as though it was sore.   “Okay, let’s turn this place upside down before they get here, in the hope we can find her again.”

“Okay,” agreed Les.   He went across to a grey cabinet beside the front counter and took out two copies of the equipment stock take.   Which the Victorian government required them to do once a year to list every chair, table, cabinet, calculator, hat wrack, et cetera, owned in the small station.

“I never thought these stupid annual stock takes would come in handy for anything,” said Aaron Powell as the two policemen started toward the rear of the station to begin a systematic search for the missing dryad.

*      *      *

Over the next three-quarters of an hour or so, Aaron and Les meticulously checked everything within the station that wasn’t bolted down.   In the hope of finding Dryadia in disguised.

At first Dryadia had not been overly concerned that they would find her.   She had been too relieved to be out of the claustrophobic holding cell.   But as the two men worked their way toward the front of the station, she had started to realise what they were doing.   And she knew it was only a matter of time before they tracked her down.

The dryad considered trying to become invisible again.   But she was unsure if she could fade out while in the form of a wooden object.   So, far she had only gone invisible while in human form.

So, rather than risk giving herself away, the dryad waited where she was as the two policemen took inventory in the front reception area.

Finishing behind the front counter, Les Arnold looked around the front room slowly.   Pointing right at Dryadia, he asked, “What about that small three-cornered stand?”

“Let me see,” said Aaron Powell, walking around the reception desk toward where Dryadia squatted now in terror that she was about to be discovered and locked away in the small holding cell again.   When she had first fled the cell she had thought she was home and free.   Now after barely an hour in the outer office, she might be about to be recaptured and returned to the dingy cell at the rear of the station.

The sergeant had almost reached the disguised dryad, who was on the brink of a panic attack now, only just restraining herself from squealing in terror, when there came a hammering on the outside of the front door.

“Open up in there, damn it!” came the strident voice of Lieutenant Smithers.

Aaron and Les exchanged a dismayed look.   Then they strode across to open the door for their superior from Melbourne.

Calming down slightly at this reprieve, as soon as the two policemen strode past her, Dryadia changed back to human form.   Then, before they could turn round and spot her, she quickly faded into invisibility, then levitated across toward the front door to be ready to make a bid for freedom.

“Try to ease round the door,” Aaron Powell started to advise his boss.   But before he could finish, Leonard Smithers burst into the front room of the station, almost knocking over Aaron and Les.

As the front door swung wide open — to the dismay of Aaron Powell — Dryadia floated outside and quickly soared across to the opposite side of the road.

For a moment she was content to enjoy her freedom, for the first time in two weeks feeling a cool breeze on her flesh.   The breeze reminded her of her childhood five centuries earlier in some faraway northern land.

Feeling her belly rumbling, the dryad realised she had not eaten since yesterday evening.   She wished she had waited till after her breakfast to make her escape.   Or had thought to grab the Mars bars from the floor as she fled her cell.   But after a moment she shrugged, realising there was no point grieving over lost opportunities.

*      *      *

Inside the police station Aaron Powell felt a rush of wind pass him as Dryadia zoomed out to freedom.   But not seeing any sign of her, he was confident that they had managed to keep the dryad hiding somewhere in the station.   Until turning round to look into the front room, and seeing the blank space near the wall beside the chocolate vending machine.

“Hey, what happened to the three-cornered stand?” said Les Arnold, pointing toward where the sergeant was already looking.

Groaning as he realised that they had been outsmarted, Aaron looked out at the pavement through the doorway.   “No chance!” he thought.   “We’ll never catch her now!”

“Three-cornered stand?” demanded Lieutenant Smithers.   “What is all this talk about a three-cornered stand?”

Aaron Powell exchanged a troubled look with his constable, then started to relate what had happened in the last few minutes.   Leonard Smithers quickly lost his bluster as he realised it may have been his fault that the dryad had escaped from the police station.

*      *      *

Across the road, Dryadia watched the small station for a moment, then turned away to hunt for nourishment to soothe her mounting belly pangs.

Ignoring the sound of sirens as other police cars arrived from Melbourne, Dryadia flew unhurriedly down Short Street toward the corner.   She looked both left and right for a moment uncertain which way to go next, before turning left into Ballarat Road.

Knowing she would become visible soon, she levitated four metres from the ground and flew down Ballarat Road, heading toward Melbourne.   She floated past Eleanor Street, then all the way down to the major intersection at Gordon Street, where she turned right.

As she flew down Gordon Street, her belly rumbling told her to look for a source of food.   She saw a pizza place on one side of the street and Barracuda’s fish and chip shop on the other side.   But neither tempted her to stop.   She flew past cake and pie shops until reaching Footscray Hospital, then the shops gave way to the hospital on the right-hand side, and houses on the left.

At the corner of Barkly Street she stopped again, undecided which way to continue.   But knowing she had become visible again, she realised that she had no time to ponder and started up to the right.

THE END