"No more. Please." Lucas flopped onto the bed. Lena had been going over court procedures for the last two and a half hours, and Lucas' brain felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool.

"Come on! Just one more thing!" Lena pleaded.

"Who's going to expect me to have manners after living on the street for six years?" Lucas demanded.

"You've got to show that they're still in there somewhere."

"What if they're not?" Lucas said. "What if they were eaten up by all the more important things I had to deal with, like finding a place to sleep, where to get food, where to go to get out of the rain, how to stay out of prison—"

"Whoa, whoa, Green Bean, it's ok." Gladstone walked over and put a hand on Lucas' shoulder. "It's time we start thinking about dinner, anyway." He rubbed his hands together as Lena took out her map of the city. "Where should we go? There's the Eastside Cafe, The Crystal Palace, Napa Rose…"

Lucas' eyes grew wide. He'd never even dreamed of setting foot into places so fancy. There was no way they'd even let him in.

Gladstone considered the map. Then he tossed it to Lena. "Why don't you pick, Lena?"

Lena eagerly grabbed the map. "Oooooh, this is a tough choice," she said. "How about The Crystal Palace?"

"Sounds good to me. How about you, Frog Prince?"

"They're not gonna let us in."

"Sure they are."

"Ok, let me rephrase that. They're not gonna let me in."

"Don't worry so much! You're royalty! You've got to start acting like it!"

"Gladstone, take a good look at me. A really good look. What, exactly, about my appearance makes you think that I will be allowed into The Crystal Palace?"

"Me!" Gladstone said.

"You?"

"Of course! No guest of mine has every had any trouble getting in any place I've wanted to go."

Lucas' face did some very impressive gymnastics. Then he took a deep breath.

"But have any of those guests ever been homeless street urchins from Edinburgh?"

"They have been from Edinburgh," Gladstone said. "Look, kid, why don't you leave the worrying to me? Everything will turn out fine."

Approximately half an hour later, Gladstone, Lena, and Lucas found themselves on their tail feathers on the sidewalk in front of The Crystal Palace.

"You were saying?" Lucas said.

"Relax, Frog Prince," Gladstone said. "I haven't even gotten started yet." He marched right back into the restaurant and started talking with the maitre d'. Lucas couldn't quite hear what he was saying, but he did catch a couple of snippets of what sounded like, "Do you know who I am?" which was a phrase he'd heard many times back in Edinburgh. He'd learned early on that "no" was never the correct answer, even if it was true.

The side of Lucas' face smarted just thinking about it.

A second person came out to the maitre d's stand and whispered something in his ear. The maitre d' whispered something back, and the second guy nodded, and then the maitre d' said something to Gladstone. Gladstone looked very pleased when he popped his head back out the door to say to Lucas and Lena,

"It's all settled. Come on in!"

The place was…wow. Lucas had been too busy bracing himself to be thrown out the first time they'd walked in to look around, but now…

Despite the big chandelier hanging from the ceiling high above the maitre d's stand and the huge chandelier hanging above the restaurant's patrons, it was kind of dim, but in that fancy, sophisticated way. The walls were painted a fancy, sophisticated, dark color—maroon, or brown maybe; Lucas couldn't really tell. The tables were spaced far apart so that diners had privacy, and the people sitting at them spoke in low, hushed tones.

Lucas suddenly felt very self-conscious about his ratty old coat.

The maitre d' led them to a table and pulled out Lena's chair for her while Gladstone and Lucas sat down. Then, the maitre d' handed them all menus.

"Uh, Gladstone?" Lucas said, giving him a nudge. "Have you taken a look at these prices?"

"Can I get you anything else to drink?" said a waiter, setting down glasses of ice water down in front of them. "And as our ten thousandth table served, might I recommend the tenderloin of beef?"

Lucas blanched when he found the tenderloin on the menu. "Uh, Gladstone?"

"Sounds good to me. What about you two?"

"Uhhh…" said Lena.

"I don't think—" Lucas began.

"The beef tenderloin it is!" Gladstone said, smoothly handing the menu to the waiter. "And a pink lemonade for me."

"Excellent choice, Mr. Gander," the waiter said. "Is there anything else I can get you?"

"Have either of you ever had pink lemonade? It is fantastic! You have to try it! Two more pink lemonades, my good sir!"

"Another excellent choice. I will return shortly with those lemonades," the waiter said with a smile that had to be fake, and he walked away.

"Gladstone!" Lucas said, careful to keep his voice low. "Have you seen these prices? The roast chicken probably costs more than I've made in my entire life!"

"Ten thousandth table, Green Bean. It's all on the house!"

"On the house?!"

"Free. No cost. Complimentary."

"This place gives free food?" Lucas asked doubtfully.

"It does when you're lucky enough to be their ten thousandth customer!"

Lena was looking at Gladstone. Even she was unable to keep the awe off her face. "Wow," she said. "I'd heard of your legendary luck working this way, but I'd never seen it before."

"Yep!" Gladstone said, looking very self-satisfied. "This kind of stuff used to happen every day before the Revolution."

"That's just not fair!" Lucas said. "No wonder the rest of us don't have any luck! You're taking it all!"

Gladstone shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm sharing it with you, aren't I?"

Lucas sputtered. "Well, yeah, but…but where was your luck for the last six years of my life? I certainly could have used some of it then!"

"Clearly, my luck didn't think it necessary for us to meet before now."

"Your luck 'didn't think?' It's luck! How can it think?"

"Uh, Lucas, you might want to keep it down," Lena said nervously. "I don't think Gladstone's luck is good enough to keep you from getting us kicked out if you make a scene."

Lucas immediately clammed up. This whole 'luck' thing might be crazy, and it might not make any sense, but he certainly wasn't going to jeopardize a chance at free food. Even if he wasn't entirely convinced that it was really going to be free.

Just then, a trio of waiters—none of them the one who had taken their order—appeared and slid their dinners in front of them.

"Is there anything else I can get you?" their waiter asked.

"No, no, I think we're just fine!" Gladstone said.

The waiter bowed and left.

Lucas eagerly grabbed his fork, stabbed it into his tenderloin, and started tearing into it with his beak.

"Uh uh uh," Gladstone said. "You can do better than that."

Lucas froze mid-chew and reluctantly set the tenderloin down. He set his napkin in his lap, picked up his fork and knife, and began to cut up his steak.

"Not all at once," Gladstone said, pointing his knife at Lucas warningly.

Lucas huffed, but he stopped cutting and ate the piece of tenderloin on his fork. And then he cut another piece and ate that. And another. And another.

"Who are King Scrooge's sisters?" Lena asked just as Lucas was about to give up and cut the rest of the tenderloin so he could shove it all into his beak at once.

"Matilda and Hortense—do we really have to do this now?"

"Yes. Who did Hortense marry?"

"Uh…Quackmore?"

"Good. And who are his siblings?"

"Aw, jeez. Um…Daphne…and uh…uh…"

"Come on…" Lena said under her breath much like she was watching a football match.

"Uh…Abner?"

"No!"

Every pair of eyes in the restaurant turned to look at them. Lena's cheeks turned bright red, and Lucas could feel his heating up, too.

"No! That's his son!" Lena said, now barely above a whisper as everyone slowly went back to their meals. "Quackmore's brother is Eider!"

"Who even cares?

"I'm sure Uncle Eider cares," Gladstone said, tucking into his mashed potatoes.

"Yeah, but—" Lucas had forgotten that Gladstone was part of this family, too, "—but has he ever done anything?"

"Sure. He's done lots of things," Gladstone said. "He may not be the royal type, but—"

"But will King Scrooge care?" Lucas asked.

Gladstone took his time chewing his bite of mashed potatoes. Once he swallowed, he said, "Probably not. But we've got to prepare you, just in case."

Lucas groaned.

"Eat your potatoes," Gladstone said. "They're really quite good."

Lucas stabbed his fork into his mashed potatoes. They were good.

"Who's Uncle Eider's other son?" Lena asked.

"Um…" Lucas wracked his brain. Luckily, the answer popped right in. "Fethry?"

Gladstone smiled softly, and a faraway look came into his eyes. "Ah, yes, Cousin Fethry. Really quite the character. I wonder where he's off to these days."

Lucas felt like maybe he should ask about…whatever it was Gladstone was talking about, just so he'd know for King Scrooge's benefit, but somehow, it didn't feel right to intrude.

Lena and Gladstone (well, mostly Lena) kept quizzing Lucas on his family history. They finished their meals, and more waiters returned to whisk away their empty plates and replace them with bowls of ice cream for dessert.

Gladstone sighed happily as he tucked into his. Lena looked, of all things, like she was about to explode right out of her chair.

"What…is this?" Lucas asked, eying it warily. He moved a finger to poke it, but drew it away when it encountered an aura of cold, of all things, surrounding the…whatever it was.

"Ice cream!" Gladstone said. "We used to have this all the time at the old Money Bin! Try it; maybe it'll jog your memory!"

"Yeah, but…what is it?" Lucas said again.

"I've heard it's pretty good," Lena said. "Rich people love to get it to show off how rich they are, so it's gotta be something, you know?"

"It's…frozen cream, or something. Flavored frozen cream. Look, just try it. I have never met a single person who didn't like it."

Lucas poked it with a spoon. "Wait, frozen? In May?"

"Yeah?"

"How is that even possible?"

Gladstone opened his mouth to speak, but he stopped himself before he could say anything. He thought a moment, and then he shrugged. "I don't know."

Lucas swiped a hand over his face. "For the guy who's supposed to be teaching me how to be a prince, you sure don't know a lot."

Gladstone popped a spoonful of ice cream into his beak. "I get by."

"Mmmmm!" Lena had taken her first bite of ice cream. "Hey, I'll take yours if you don't want it."

Lucas looked back at his own bowl of ice cream. Nothing could be that good, right? Unless you were starving. Lucas shuddered as he thought about some of the things he'd gladly eaten after going long days without food. It almost felt like that had all been in another lifetime.

Almost.

He picked up his spoon and dug it into the round white stuff in his bowl. It was thicker than he'd expected, and he had to hold onto the bowl with his other hand to keep it still while he scooped some onto his spoon. Then he raised it to his mouth and took the bite.

It was cold, which wasn't exactly a surprise, but it was still a weird feeling. The texture was unlike anything else he'd ever put in his mouth—he'd expected it to feel like snow, but it didn't. It was smooth and creamy, but still more solid than soup. And it was sweet, too, sweeter than anything he'd ever eaten, save for maybe the rare piece of sugar candy he was able to dig up.

"Well, Lukie, what do you think?" Gladstone asked.

Lucas made a face. "It's weird."

"Awesome weird," Lena said.

"Nothing should be this cold at this time of year. It's—it's—it's unnatural!"

Gladstone shrugged. "If you don't want it, then, I guess I'll—"

Lucas pulled his bowl of ice cream out of reach. "Oh, no, you don't!"

"I thought you said it was 'unnatural?'"

Lucas scoffed. "I've had worse."

Lucas took another bite, and he couldn't help but feel like there was a memory, just on the edges of his awareness, trying to break through—Lucas ate a few more bites, but instead of a memory, he got an intense pain in his forehead.

"Ow!" he said, spoon clattering to the table. He clutched his head.

Across from him, Lena groaned and pressed her palm to her head, too.

Oh, no.

Had they been poisoned?
But…Gladstone was laughing.

"You've got brain freeze!" he said.

That…sounded worse than poison.

"It just means you ate your ice cream too fast. Don't worry; it'll go away in a moment."

Sure enough, Lucas soon felt the pain begin to recede.

"What was that?" he demanded.

"I just told you. It's—"

"I know what it's called and why it happened, but—how?"

"Good question. I have no idea," Gladstone said. "Hey, come to think of it, your brother might know."

Lucas was taken off-guard. "My…brother?"

"Yeah. Huey was all into science when you guys were kids. I'm sure he still is." Gladstone popped another spoonful of ice cream into his mouth before flagging down a waiter.

"Huh," Lucas said.

He ate the rest of his ice cream in silence, trying to imagine his brothers as people rather than just branches on his (supposed) family tree. Gladstone asked the waiter for something in a voice too low for Lucas to hear.

Huey liked science. What exactly did that mean? Was he constantly running science experiments? Did he spew out scientific trivia like some annoying nerd? Did he spend all of his time in school and studying? Was he some sort of scientific prodigy who had already graduated from university with a lab of his own?

The waiter returned to the table with a mug of something. Gladstone took a long sip and sighed happily.

"What's that?" Lucas asked, pointing to Gladstone's rather pungent mug.

"This?" Gladstone suddenly seemed flustered. "It's, uh, nutmeg tea."

"Nutmeg tea?" Lucas said. "Isn't that what Scrooge used to drink?"

"It is," Gladstone conceded.

"And you're drinking it because…?"

"Look, sometimes you do things to stay on an old, rich man's good side," Gladstone said. Then he coughed in a way that almost sounded like he was saying, "and sometimes you like it."

"Ah. I see," Lucas nodded, a twinkle in his eye. "And of course you make sure to reuse each tea bag until you can't tell the tea from hot water?"

Gladstone stuck his tongue out at him. Then he suddenly made an odd face and turned to Lena.

"Did we tell him about the nutmeg tea?"

"I couldn't remember what type of tea it was, so I never brought it up," Lena said with a shrug. "Did you?"

"I didn't think so…" He turned to Lucas. "Did we?"

"Um, I—I thought so," Lucas said. "How else would I have known that?"

"Fair enough," Gladstone said. He drained the last of his tea before leaning back in his chair and patting his stomach. "Ah. That was the best meal I've had in years."

"Me, too," Lena agreed, mirroring him.

"That's probably the best meal I've had ever," Lucas said.

"Since the Revolution, you mean," Gladstone said with a wink. "Ah, the food they'd serve at the Money Bin. Well, when ol' Uncle Scrooge wasn't being a skinflint. Those were the days…"

Their waiter reappeared at the table. Lucas readied himself to run.

"And how was your meal?" the waiter asked.

"Excellent, my man! Truly excellent," Gladstone said.

The waiter smiled. "I'm glad to hear it," he said. "The restaurant owner asked me to tell you that you are welcome back any time. Just show this ticket and you'll be entitled to a nice discount on anything you'd like."

Gladstone took the ticket and slipped it into his breast pocket. Then he stood.

"I cannot thank you enough," he said, shaking the waiter's hand. "Please give our compliments to the chef."

The waiter nodded. "I will, sir. Enjoy your evening."

"Thank you," Gladstone said, and the trio headed out of the restaurant.

"Hey, twenty dollars!" Gladstone said, bending down to pluck the crisp bill off the ground. "Things are looking up, kids. They are looking up." He started whistling cheerfully.

Lucas looked over at Lena, who looked at him and shrugged. Then they followed Gladstone back to their hotel.