Slowly, softly she crept forward until her hand came in contact with an object upon a small round table. She did not know what it was, but in a low voice she pronounced the word “Ev.”
The rooms were quite empty of life after that. The Nome King had gained a new ornament. For upon the edge of the table rested a pretty grasshopper, that seemed to have been formed from a single emerald. It was all that remained of Ozma of Oz.
In the throne room just beyond the palace the Nome King suddenly looked up and smiled.
“Next!” he said, in his pleasant voice.
Dorothy, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman, who had been sitting in anxious silence, each gave a start of dismay and stared into one another’s eyes.
“Has she failed?” asked Tiktok.
“So it seems,” answered the little monarch, cheerfully. “But that is no reason one of you should not succeed. The next may have twelve guesses, instead of eleven, for there are now twelve persons transformed into ornaments. Well, well! Which of you goes next?”
“I’ll go,” said Dorothy.
“Not so,” replied the Tin Woodman. “As commander of Ozma’s army, it is my privilege to follow her and attempt her rescue.”
“Away you go, then,” said the Scarecrow. “But be careful, old friend.”
“I will,” promised the Tin Woodman; and then he followed the Nome King to the entrance to the palace and the rock closed behind him.
13. The Nome King Laughs
In a moment the King returned to his throne and relighted his pipe, and the rest of the little band of adventurers settled themselves for another long wait. They were greatly disheartened by the failure of their girl Ruler, and the knowledge that she was now an ornament in the Nome King’s palace—a dreadful, creepy place in spite of all its magnificence. Without their little leader they did not know what to do next, and each one, down to the trembling private of the army, began to fear he would soon be more ornamental than useful.
Suddenly the Nome King began laughing.
“Ha, ha, ha! He, he, he! Ho, ho, ho!”
“What’s happened?” asked the Scarecrow.
“Why, your friend, the Tin Woodman, has become the funniest thing you can imagine,” replied the King, wiping the tears of merriment from his eyes. “No one would ever believe he could make such an amusing ornament. Next!”
They gazed at each other with sinking hearts. One of the generals began to weep dolefully.
“What are you crying for?” asked the Scarecrow, indignant at such a display of weakness.
“He owed me six weeks back pay,” said the general, “and I hate to lose him.”
“Then you shall go and find him,” declared the Scarecrow.
“Me!” cried the general, greatly alarmed.
“Certainly. It is your duty to follow your commander. March!”
“I won’t,” said the general. “I’d like to, of course; but I just simply WON’T.”
The Scarecrow looked enquiringly at the Nome King.
“Never mind,” said the jolly monarch. “If he doesn’t care to enter the palace and make his guesses I’ll throw him into one of my fiery furnaces.”
“I’ll go!—of course I’m going,” yelled the general, as quick as scat. “Where is the entrance—where is it? Let me go at once!”
So the Nome King escorted him into the palace, and again returned to await the result. What the general did, no one can tell; but it was not long before the King called for the next victim, and a colonel was forced to try his fortune.
Thus, one after another, all of the twenty-six officers filed into the palace and made their guesses—and became ornaments.
Meantime the King ordered refreshments to be served to those waiting, and at his command a rudely shaped Nome entered, bearing a tray. This Nome was not unlike the others that Dorothy had seen, but he wore a heavy gold chain around his neck to show that he was the Chief Steward of the Nome King, and he assumed an air of much importance, and even told his majesty not to eat too much cake late at night, or he would be ill.
Dorothy, however, was hungry, and she was not afraid of being ill; so she ate several cakes and found them good, and also she drank a cup of excellent coffee made of a richly flavored clay, browned in the furnaces and then ground fine, and found it most refreshing and not at all muddy.
Of all the party which had started upon this adventure, the little Kansas girl was now left alone with the Scarecrow, Tiktok, and the private for counsellors and companions. Of course the Cowardly Lion and the Hungry Tiger were still there, but they, having also eaten some of the cakes, had gone to sleep at one side of the cave, while upon the other side stood the Sawhorse, motionless and silent, as became a mere thing of wood. Billina had quietly walked around and picked up the crumbs of cake which had been scattered, and now, as it was long after bed-time, she tried to find some dark place in which to go to sleep.
Presently the hen espied a hollow underneath the King’s rocky throne, and crept into it unnoticed. She could still hear the chattering of those around her, but it was almost dark underneath the throne, so that soon she had fallen fast asleep.
“Next!” called the King, and the private, whose turn it was to enter the fatal palace, shook hands with Dorothy and the Scarecrow and bade them a sorrowful good-bye, and passed through the rocky portal.
They waited a long time, for the private was in no hurry to become an ornament and made his guesses very slowly. The Nome King, who seemed to know, by some magical power, all that took place in his beautiful rooms of his palace, grew impatient finally and declared he would sit up no longer.
“I love ornaments,” said he, “but I can wait until tomorrow to get more of them; so, as soon as that stupid private is transformed, we will all go to bed and leave the job to be finished in the morning.”
“Is it so very late?” asked Dorothy.
“Why, it is after midnight,” said the King, “and that strikes me as being late enough. There is neither night nor day in my kingdom, because it is under the earth’s surface, where the sun does not shine. But we have to sleep, just the same as the up-stairs people do, and for my part I’m going to bed in a few minutes.”
Indeed, it was not long after this that the private made his last guess. Of course he guessed wrongly, and of course he at once became an ornament. So the King was greatly pleased, and clapped his hands to summon his Chief Steward.
“Show these guests to some of the sleeping apartments,” he commanded, “and be quick about it, too, for I’m dreadfully sleepy myself.”
“You’ve no business to sit up so late,” replied the Steward, gruffly. “You’ll be as cross as a griffin tomorrow morning.”
His Majesty made no answer to this remark, and the Chief Steward led Dorothy through another doorway into a long hall, from which several plain but comfortable sleeping rooms opened. The little girl was given the first room, and the Scarecrow and Tiktok the next—although they never slept—and the Lion and the Tiger the third. The Sawhorse hobbled after the Steward into a fourth room, to stand stiffly in the center of it until morning. Each night was rather a bore to the Scarecrow, Tiktok and the Sawhorse; but they had learned from experience to pass the time patiently and quietly, since all their friends who were made of flesh had to sleep and did not like to be disturbed.
When the Chief Steward had left them alone the Scarecrow remarked, sadly:
“I am in great sorrow over the loss of my old comrade, the Tin Woodman. We have had many dangerous adventures together, and escaped them all, and now it grieves me to know he has become an ornament, and is lost to me forever.”
“He was al-ways an or-na-ment to so-ci-e-ty,” said Tiktok.
“True; but now the Nome King laughs at him, and calls him the funniest ornament in all the palace. It will hurt my poor friend’s pride to be laughed at,” continued the Scarecrow, sadl
y.
“We will make rath-er ab-surd or-na-ments, our-selves, to-mor-row,” observed the machine, in his monotonous voice.
Just then Dorothy ran into their room, in a state of great anxiety, crying:
“Where’s Billina? Have you seen Billina? Is she here?”
“No,” answered the Scarecrow.
“Then what has become of her?” asked the girl.
“Why, I thought she was with you,” said the Scarecrow. “Yet I do not remember seeing the yellow hen since she picked up the crumbs of cake.”
“We must have left her in the room where the King’s throne is,” decided Dorothy, and at once she turned and ran down the hall to the door through which they had entered. But it was fast closed and locked on the other side, and the heavy slab of rock proved to be so thick that no sound could pass through it. So Dorothy was forced to return to her chamber.
The Cowardly Lion stuck his head into her room to try to console the girl for the loss of her feathered friend.
“The yellow hen is well able to take care of herself,” said he; “so don’t worry about her, but try to get all the sleep you can. It has been a long and weary day, and you need rest.”
“I’ll prob’ly get lots of rest tomorrow, when I become an orn’ment,” said Dorothy, sleepily. But she lay down upon her couch, nevertheless, and in spite of all her worries was soon in the land of dreams.
14. Dorothy Tries to be Brave
Meantime the Chief Steward had returned to the throne room, where he said to the King:
“You are a fool to waste so much time upon these people.”
“What!” cried his Majesty, in so enraged a voice that it awoke Billina, who was asleep under his throne. “How dare you call me a fool?”
“Because I like to speak the truth,” said the Steward. “Why didn’t you enchant them all at once, instead of allowing them to go one by one into the palace and guess which ornaments are the Queen of Ev and her children?”
“Why, you stupid rascal, it is more fun this way,” returned the King, “and it serves to keep me amused for a long time.”
“But suppose some of them happen to guess aright,” persisted the Steward; “then you would lose your old ornaments and these new ones, too.”
“There is no chance of their guessing aright,” replied the monarch, with a laugh. “How could they know that the Queen of Ev and her family are all ornaments of a royal purple color?”
“But there are no other purple ornaments in the palace,” said the Steward.
“There are many other colors, however, and the purple ones are scattered throughout the rooms, and are of many different shapes and sizes. Take my word for it, Steward, they will never think of choosing the purple ornaments.”
Billina, squatting under the throne, had listened carefully to all this talk, and now chuckled softly to herself as she heard the King disclose his secret.
“Still, you are acting foolishly by running the chance,” continued the Steward, roughly; “and it is still more foolish of you to transform all those people from Oz into green ornaments.”
“I did that because they came from the Emerald City,” replied the King; “and I had no green ornaments in my collection until now. I think they will look quite pretty, mixed with the others. Don’t you?”
The Steward gave an angry grunt.
“Have your own way, since you are the King,” he growled. “But if you come to grief through your carelessness, remember that I told you so. If I wore the magic belt which enables you to work all your transformations, and gives you so much other power, I am sure I would make a much wiser and better King than you are.”
“Oh, cease your tiresome chatter!” commanded the King, getting angry again. “Because you are my Chief Steward you have an idea you can scold me as much as you please. But the very next time you become impudent, I will send you to work in the furnaces, and get another Nome to fill your place. Now follow me to my chamber, for I am going to bed. And see that I am wakened early tomorrow morning. I want to enjoy the fun of transforming the rest of these people into ornaments.”
“What color will you make the Kansas girl?” asked the Steward.
“Gray, I think,” said his Majesty.
“And the Scarecrow and the machine man?”
“Oh, they shall be of solid gold, because they are so ugly in real life.”
Then the voices died away, and Billina knew that the King and his Steward had left the room. She fixed up some of her tail feathers that were not straight, and then tucked her head under her wing again and went to sleep.
In the morning Dorothy and the Lion and Tiger were given their breakfast in their rooms, and afterward joined the King in his throne room. The Tiger complained bitterly that he was half starved, and begged to go into the palace and become an ornament, so that he would no longer suffer the pangs of hunger.
“Haven’t you had your breakfast?” asked the Nome King.
“Oh, I had just a bite,” replied the beast. “But what good is a bite, to a hungry tiger?”
“He ate seventeen bowls of porridge, a platter full of fried sausages, eleven loaves of bread and twenty-one mince pies,” said the Steward.
“What more do you want?” demanded the King.
“A fat baby. I want a fat baby,” said the Hungry Tiger. “A nice, plump, juicy, tender, fat baby. But, of course, if I had one, my conscience would not allow me to eat it. So I’ll have to be an ornament and forget my hunger.”
“Impossible!” exclaimed the King. “I’ll have no clumsy beasts enter my palace, to overturn and break all my pretty nick-nacks. When the rest of your friends are transformed you can return to the upper world, and go about your business.”
“As for that, we have no business, when our friends are gone,” said the Lion. “So we do not care much what becomes of us.”
Dorothy begged to be allowed to go first into the palace, but Tiktok firmly maintained that the slave should face danger before the mistress. The Scarecrow agreed with him in that, so the Nome King opened the door for the machine man, who tramped into the palace to meet his fate. Then his Majesty returned to his throne and puffed his pipe so contentedly that a small cloud of smoke formed above his head.
Bye and bye he said:
“I’m sorry there are so few of you left. Very soon, now, my fun will be over, and then for amusement I shall have nothing to do but admire my new ornaments.”
“It seems to me,” said Dorothy, “that you are not so honest as you pretend to be.”
“How’s that?” asked the King.
“Why, you made us think it would be easy to guess what ornaments the people of Ev were changed into.”
“It IS easy,” declared the monarch, “if one is a good guesser. But it appears that the members of your party are all poor guessers.”
“What is Tiktok doing now?” asked the girl, uneasily.
“Nothing,” replied the King, with a frown. “He is standing perfectly still, in the middle of a room.”
“Oh, I expect he’s run down,” said Dorothy. “I forgot to wind him up this morning. How many guesses has he made?”
“All that he is allowed except one,” answered the King. “Suppose you go in and wind him up, and then you can stay there and make your own guesses.”
“All right,” said Dorothy.
“It is my turn next,” declared the Scarecrow.
“Why, you don’t want to go away and leave me all alone, do you?” asked the girl. “Besides, if I go now I can wind up Tiktok, so that he can make his last guess.”
“Very well, then,” said the Scarecrow, with a sigh. “Run along, little Dorothy, and may good luck go with you!”
So Dorothy, trying to be brave in spite of her fears, passed through the doorway into the gorgeous rooms of the palace. The stillness of the place awed her, at first, a
nd the child drew short breaths, and pressed her hand to her heart, and looked all around with wondering eyes.
Yes, it was a beautiful place; but enchantments lurked in every nook and corner, and she had not yet grown accustomed to the wizardries of these fairy countries, so different from the quiet and sensible common-places of her own native land.
Slowly she passed through several rooms until she came upon Tiktok, standing motionless. It really seemed, then, that she had found a friend in this mysterious palace, so she hastened to wind up the machine man’s action and speech and thoughts.
“Thank you, Dor-oth-y,” were his first words. “I have now one more guess to make.”
“Oh, be very careful, Tiktok; won’t you?” cried the girl.
“Yes. But the Nome King has us in his power, and he has set a trap for us. I fear we are all lost.” he answered.
“I fear so, too,” said Dorothy, sadly.
“If Smith & Tin-ker had giv-en me a guess-ing clock-work at-tach-ment,” continued Tiktok, “I might have de-fied the Nome King. But my thoughts are plain and sim-ple, and are not of much use in this case.”
“Do the best you can,” said Dorothy, encouragingly, “and if you fail I will watch and see what shape you are changed into.”
So Tiktok touched a yellow glass vase that had daisies painted on one side, and he spoke at the same time the word “Ev.”
In a flash the machine man had disappeared, and although the girl looked quickly in every direction, she could not tell which of the many ornaments the room contained had a moment before been her faithful friend and servant.
So all she could do was to accept the hopeless task set her, and make her guesses and abide by the result.
“It can’t hurt very much,” she thought, “for I haven’t heard any of them scream or cry out—not even the poor officers. Dear me! I wonder if Uncle Henry or Aunt Em will ever know I have become an orn’ment in the Nome King’s palace, and must stand forever and ever in one place and look pretty—’cept when I’m moved to be dusted. It isn’t the way I thought I’d turn out, at all; but I s’pose it can’t be helped.”
The Classic Children's Literature Collection: 39 Classic Novels Page 149