L. Frank Baum - Oz 36

by Lucky Bucky In Oz

  “I’ll take tea,” said the boy, patiently waiting for the Jack Pott to make his move. “We are in a hurry to be on our way.”

  “Now, my friend, having tea is a leisurely performance. Do you take lemon or cream?” asked King Jack and he began to boil up inside with more interest in serving tea than in playing a game of checkers.

  “If it’s all the same to you, I prefer iced tea.”

  “Oh, very well,” replied the King to Bucky with an impatient toss of his spout, noticeably cooling off while he made his next move in the game. “I suppose you came from somewhere, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, indeed,” answered the boy, jumping two of the King’s checkers, which he handed over to the Flummux. “Yes, siree! we came from somewhere and we are on our way to somewhere else!”

  “Why bother your head with going anywhere else? Why not remain here with me?”

  “Because we are in a hurry to go somewhere else.”

  “Rather strange goings-on, I should say,” replied King Jack, winning three of Bucky’s men. “Have you ever stopped to think that I may have entirely different plans for you?”

  “Indeed,” responded Bucky, taking two more of the

  King’s checkers. The Flummux picked these up and carried them quickly into the cabin, where she hid them carefully, inside the whale.

  “When I win this game, my plan is to have you remain just where you are,” the King answered with determination. “All day long you will play game after game of checkers with me. Then, all night your friends must play. Won’t that be the jolliest, grandest life from now on?” added Jack as he moved a red checker into Bucky’s king line. “King! King! Double King!!” he shrilled through his spout.

  “Okay, crown him,” said the boy quietly to the Flummux who darted into the cabin and came back bearing a red cherry pie. With this, she crowned Jack Pott’s king. All the on-lookers were so intent upon watching the game that no one noticed this little trick.

  “Please, Mr. Bucky,” she said in a pleading whisper, “please do be careful and win.” She brought out another pie to crown the other king for Jack. “It would be an awful life with nothing to do but play checkers from morning till night.”

  The game became intense, nip and tuck, with everyone so interested that no one noticed a band of creeping Thunderbugs coming close to the checker board.

  These bugs were about a foot high and against their

  folded brown wings, their breasts glowed with a soft light. Their short black legs, upon which they could stand upright, ended in red-hot toes.

  Still unnoticed they crept closer and closer until they came within reach of the pies that crowned Jack Pott’s kings.

  In a wink, they snatched all the pies and made off with them.

  Then Bucky’s kings jumped all of Jack’s checkers and won the game in two minutes.

  King Jack Pott was furious. The water in his teapot boiled over and spattered hotly across the board. Never before had he been beaten at his own game of checkers. His sputtering hid the stealthy second approach of the Thunderbugs as they returned for more pies.

  From every direction they came in great numbers, all pleading for more pies. Their appealing voices held a sincere craving that Bucky was quick to understand, but the Gabooches began to blow away the new arrivals.

  This action enraged the Thunderbugs. In an instant their soft glow had changed into a crackling fury of heat and fire as they rushed forward in a blast of thunder.

  King Jack Pott became so hysterical that he sneezed

  out most of his tea into the air and took to his heels, running swiftly over the hill, with his spout rolling from side to side and his lid jumping up and down under pressure of his steam.

  The checker board fell apart into separate blocks and, taking to their spindling legs, they followed their

  King.

  The steady blowing of the Gabooches so excited the Thunderbugs that their already fury-filled bodies became roaring furnaces. Noting this, the four wind-makers blew up into a gale which tumbled the bugs about through the grass in a deafening tempest.

  During all this excitement, the whale remained his usual calm self. His sleepy eyes were half closed. But when the flaming bugs rolled too close for safety, he used his only weapon of defense and spouted a huge stream of water over the fiery bugs, thoroughly drenching them all.

  Every spark of fury that the strong wind had stirred up was extinguished. Only a little puff of black smoke curled up here and there and all the thunder died away. A couple of faint sputters; then every Thunderbug settled down quietly in the grass, so completely squelched that hardly one of them opened his eyes.

  “What in thunder is the matter with you hot-headed

  creatures?” demanded Davy.

  One timid voice answered: “Pie!”

  “Pie?” repeated the puzzled whale.

  “Yes, pie,” the little voice squeaked. “Any kind of pie… Few people realize how we hunger for pie. how we spend most of our lives hunting for good raspberry pie. We can smell a pie for miles. We can smell pies now. We have hoped and hoped to some day have as much pie as we can eat… with a piece of cheese, if we can get it; but it’s perfectly all right without it, if we just have pie!” The leading Thunderbug came out of his hiding place in the grass and perched on the deck-rail, his great eyes filled with a sorrowful

  longing.

  “For pity’s sake!” cried Bucky. “I feel sorry for you fellows.” He looked about and on every side saw hungry eyes and heard pleading voices plaintively begging for pies. So Bucky hurried to the cupboard inside the cabin and returned with his arms filled with all kinds of pies.

  With an old cutlass, he cut them into quarters and passed the pieces around. Each Thunderbug thanked Bucky when he received his share and beamed gratefully over a second helping.

  Lowering his voice from the sharp squeal to a throaty pitch one very polite bug explained: “I must

  apologize for the rude way we acted,” he said, “Frankly, we are not the frightful fellows old Jack Teapott might lead you to think.” As he spoke, his soft glow returned. “We are only plain fire-flies … simple lightning bugs if you like, but we do object to being shoved and pushed around. And what makes us red-hot is to be blown around. That’s worse!”

  “Could anyone blame you?” asked Bucky. “I’m sure I don’t… and as for pies… you can have all you want…” The happy expression on their hungry faces Was answer enough. “We have plenty and more than plenty to satisfy you all,” the boy promised as he returned to the cabin for the third supply.

  Tom, Dick and Harry let off a warning squawk and flew upward from their perch on the rail.

  Wham-smack, back came the Teapott from over the hill, bringing with him a tall policeman. Jack was still boiling over, with tears and a runny spout, but his lid had settled down.

  “Hold these vagrants!” he ordered the policeman. “They are a menace… Officer, do your duty!”

  The policeman was a thin safety pin with a large copper badge pinned to his front. His legs were made of hairpins, and he managed to move about on them with extraordinary agility.

  “Consider yourselves pinched,” remarked the pin in a sleepy voice but looking directly at Bucky.

  “That’s only one pin’s opinion,” answered the boy, leaning over the rail and smiling. “Don’t you think you are Ozuming a little?”

  “Not at …. not at all… it’s my duty to guard the safety of the community. The High Royal Jack Pott tells me you are vagrants and must be permanently pinned down. Consequently, you are pinched.”

  “I’m warning you not to attempt anything like that. If you do, we may rip ourselves loose and you’ll have a lot of rips to look after!” Bucky spoke with a slow determination.

  “Perhaps you are right. I’m only pointing out what the King commands you to do!” said the copper, rattling his copper badge and releasing his own safety catch. The sharp point of it snapped out straight, like the blade of a sword. The policeman ste
pped forward.

  “I see the point of your jabber now,” smiled Bucky, “But don’t try to badger us with a copper’s badge!”

  “Obey me before I fill you full of pin holes, like this…” the policeman swished the safety pin as he rushed forward and sank the pin-point into the wooden nose of the whale.

  “Just cool off a little before pushing your point too far,” advised the boy.

  “Your silly talk makes me so tired,” said the pin, trying to pull his point out of the board. “I’m tired of listening to you and tired of looking at you.”

  Bucky spoke with vigor: “That’s exactly what I’ve been trying to tell you… you are very tired… oh, so tired that you need a long rest. Don’t bother to arrest us… you take a rest yourself. Lie quietly down and go to sleep. Give yourself a long rest.”

  The pin fastened his safety catch: “Promise to be very quiet and wait while I am aresting myself,” he said rather hesitantly.

  King Teapott burst into a rage: “You pinhead snoozer !” he cried. “Why let them put such notions into your bent pinhead!”

  “Don’t ask me such crack-pot questions,” snapped the policeman, wearily, folding himself up and sinking into a comfortable spot where immediately he fell asleep.

  Without another word, the whale began to swim, and they left the King fuming and sputtering on the bank.

  “Ahoy, old chum,” whispered Bucky. “I’m glad that copper didn’t get his hairpins in my hair. Our suggestion knocked him off his pins. Okay, Okay!”

  “If your suggestion hadn’t, our wind would have,”

  valiantly announced the Flummux. She stopped when she recalled that the Thunderbugs might be offended at this thought and she burst into the only tune she knew, making up the words as she went along:

  “The zip of the breeze That blew from the North Only made the whale sneeze And so forth, and so forth…”

  “Excuse me, young lady, that’s quite enough of that,” dryly remarked Davy as he plowed steadily ahead.

  Evening fell. A low whirring of wings surrounded them, bringing a thousand little lights to guide Davy on his course. They were the grateful Thunderbugs returning, filled with the hope of another treat of more pie.

  CHAPTER 15

  Slippery Going

  THEIR appeal sounded too much like hungry boys I begging for bread, so Bucky brought out many pies to satisfy them for a while at least.

  The course of the river now led them into a dense forest, but as they drifted along, the growth of trees was interrupted at intervals by gaps and gorges where the bare stone walls of towering mountains crowded them on either side.

  The whale was completely covered by the giant lightning bugs. Inside the cupboard, Bucky examined the supply of pies. Never had he seen so many pies stacked up, one on another, doing nothing. All so per-

  feetly baked, so crisp and fragrant–— no wonder the

  hungry Thunderbugs came back for more.

  With both arms loaded, Bucky returned to the deck. At sight of the generous meal in store for them, the fire-flies turned on their brightest lights. Because of this brilliance Davy was able to churn ahead through the darkness without the slightest hesitation. At first he had no suspicion of danger, but at one turn he noticed a group of outlaw sorcerers and their helpers gathered in some kind of confab. This made him nerv-oils, and his shivering threw many of the Thunderbugs into the water. They scrambled back again, and Davy made no explanation of his terror, not wanting to spoil their feasting on his deck where Bucky and the Gabooches were handing out pie after pie.

  All through the night, while the bugs ate joyously,

  the big-hearted whale often quivered with alarm, scared almost out of his seven senses by the hobgoblin fingers that darted from the deep shadows made by the overhanging trees. Of all imaginable places for travelers to come to harm, this river was the most dangerous, for here mountain sorcerers and marauding witches hid behind the rocks waiting for their victims. Time after time that night a powerful and wicked witch was about to seize them, then hesitated -and drew back. Before she could muster up enough courage to try again, the huge fire-fish had passed her hide-out

  The appearance of the wooden whale was indeed terrifying as he sped down the dark, sinister river at breakneck speed, his whole form a mass of brilliant, blinding light. Except for this, the bands of meddlesome outlaws who lived on either side of the stream would have been quick to stop the adventurers and force them into slavery but, even when the ravines were so narrow that it took all of Davy’s ability to pass over the foul rifts and tumbling falls, the hostile bands drew back in fear.

  Davy alone realized the creepy hidden danger; he alone saw the inquisitive glaring eyes of the huge prowling spy-ders waiting in their cobwebs of mystery. He saw long, protruding noses capped by metal

  hooks get ready to strike and then draw back quickly when the flaming light almost blinded the creature. Many of them were so filled with terror that all they could do was to slink away to their caldrons and ovens.

  Through all this dangerous and terrifying night, never once was Davy molested and never did he reveal, either by word or look, the anxieties he went through during the dark hours.

  The breaking of day found the Gabooches still feeding the Thunderbugs although most of the cupboards were empty now. Even the crumpets were gone; not even the hole in a doughnut remained.

  Of course this gave them more closet space and also reduced the weight of the cargo, so Bucky encouraged the bright bugs to eat all the pies that they could hold.

  “Make a clean job of it; clear up every one. It gives us twice the cabin space and Davy sits much lighter on the water,” he said.

  The sky was filled with a glow of gold. In the distance, vast fields of yellow corn could be seen. A quick examination of the map in the lining of the pirate’s coat showed them that they were deep in the land of the Winkies.

  “Thank goodness we are out of those merciless woods,” chirped the Flummux.

  “Couldn’t you and your brothers blow down a witch?” asked Davy, teasingly.

  “Never had a good chance,” she answered, blithely, “but I would gladly try, any day.”

  Davy didn’t say a word, but he skimmed lightly over the river, putting every ounce of his strength toward hastening the day when they would reach the safety and happiness awaiting them in the Emerald City.

  Every impatient snap of his tail sent them humming along. Presently he had reached his utmost speed and everyone aboard was thrilled to travel so fast, then-slap-bang-more trouble.

  Same old trick—no water in the river. Though the water was gone, Davy continued to slide along the river bed at the same terrific speed. Strangely enough, he kept on sliding.

  With the first shock, all the Thunderbugs flew away, some carrying pies under their arms.

  Davy was becoming accustomed to these sudden changes and always tried to make the best of them. But this time, he was naturally puzzled for instead of slowing up as he had always done before, now he was going faster and faster. He slipped from side to side, often nearly turning over and it takes a lot of speed to turn a whale over. Determination was written plainly on his broad face as he rocked and rolled over

  a surface as smooth as glass and as oily as the ocean before a storm. Darting down slippery rolling gulleys, Davy tottered and teetered over long stretches of space. The slightest turn unbalanced him, so rapid was the pace, but each time he managed to settle back on a level keel.

  Bucky, speechless with surprise when the first stretch hurled them along, had all he could do to keep from being thrown off the deck. Recovering his breath at last, he gasped out the one word: “Soap!”

  At the moment of his discovery, they were bounding through a slazy ravine, shut in on either side by steep cliffs of soap stone. The odor was strong and irritating, especially that of dog soap and laundry soap. The toilet soap was not quite so disagreeable. Splashing through pools of soft soap, they became coated from head to foot with the slimy
white substance. “Oh, for a nice river to wash away this stuff . . wailed Bucky, trying to wipe the soap from his eyes. “I wonder where we can find one? We need it badly.”

  “Don’t ask me?” replied Davy, using every way within his power to check his mad rush. “All I know is that we’re in Slippery Dick’s land. It’s plainly marked on the map!!”

  Sure enough. They knew the map was correct when

  they bumped into a sign which read:

  GREASED RACE TRACK

  Keep Off

  Beside the post stood Dick himself holding a stopwatch in his hand and giving it all of his attention.

  “You did it, by heliotrope!! You broke the record.” A broad grin spread across his roughly modelled soap face. He was elated and seemed about to break into a lather of suds.

  “Get into the stable and dry off,” Dick called out to the whale as he himself marched stiffly up a path that ran between rows of soap flowers to a castle made of various colors of Castile soap.

  Davy was making vain efforts to climb over a hill so that they might continue their journey. But he found it so slippery that he failed hopelessly every time he made an attempt.

  “Oh, for a river!” cried Bucky again. “Please, Mr. Jones, let us find one for you,” volunteered the Flummux and, with her brothers, she flew off toward the west where distant yellow hills were visible beyond the pathless waste.

  Bucky looked uneasily around the hollow valley of waste where they were trapped.

  “It’s plain to be seen that we must not linger here very long,” he said. “You may not know it, Davy, but I have heard that soap is sometimes made of whale