L. Frank Baum - Oz 34

by The Wonder City Of Oz

  “Yes. And now I have much to do,” said the Wizard. “Come again, sometime!”

  “That I will. Goodbye to ye!” The Leprechaun jumped to the window and, leaping into the air, vanished.

  CHAPTER 15

  The Ozoplane Soars

  WELL, Jenny, aren’t you ever going to give me a day off, as you promised in return for my vote?” Number Nine asked Jenny.

  “I don’t see why I should,” said Jenny crossly “The votes no longer count.”

  “Nevertheless,” argued the boy, “you must keep your promise. I want to take the day off and go

  gold-fishing.”

  “Oh, very well! Since I promised, I suppose I shall have to let you go,” said Jenny. The boy skipped happily out of the Style Shop. When he was gone, Jenny said, “I think it’s time Ozma declared another way to vote. If we are going to have an ozlection, there is no need to waste time.”

  Since she was alone in the shop, she decided to make herself a new dress. She went to the turn-style, studied the buttons with care, and slowly pressed several. When she went through, she came out wearing a dahlia print with long, slender petals.

  “I wonder if it’s becoming,” thought Jenny, and she stepped up to a mirror. When she saw herself, she gave an exclamation of surprise.

  “Is the mirror playing tricks on me, like that clock? Or is it my imagination? For I certainly look younger!”

  She ran to another mirror, and then to a third. Every mirror showed her the same younger-looking girl. She studied herself for a long time. The freckles were coming back to her face, her cheeks were growing rounder, and her dress, that would have fitted perfectly before the Wizard’s visit, was now two sizes too big.

  “I must make myself another dress,” she thought, and went to the turn-style. “I think I’ll make it a cool dress, and go find Whistlebreeches and spend the afternoon fishing with him. I don’t feel too old for that, now.”

  Jenny went through the turn-style and came out dressed in a dress of silver fish scales. In her hand was a rod and reel.

  Someone was coming through the door. “Oh, dear a customer, just when I feel that pleasure comes before business,” thought Jenny.

  A red Quadling man, square bodied, with a box shaped head and box-shaped hands and feet, came up to Jenny. His square shoes were covered with bright red mud, and he was spattered all over with red smears. As he walked, he left square tracks of mud on Jenny’s clean floor.

  “I am a Boxer,” he began. “I am looking for a job. Do you need any help?”

  “You have come to the wrong place,” said Jenny huffily. “This is no gymnasium! And anyway, who would hire you, looking like a mud-lark? Better get yourself some new clothes.”

  Jenny took the Boxer’s square red arm and pulled him toward the turn-style. He giggled as he stepped through it. He giggled even more when he saw

  himself wrapped in a slick, dazzling suit of cellophane. Each of his box parts was neatly wrapped. The Boxer stepped up to the mirror.

  “Say,” he said, “I look flashy enough to put on a public boxing match. Do you know where I can get someone to fight me? I fight very squarely.”

  “A boxing match? Better find someone made of match boxes. The only boxer I know is Scraps, and she’s made of patches,” said Jenny.

  “Where can I find her?”

  “She is usually over in the pumpkin patch with Jack Pumpkinhead. I was just going to the river That is beyond the pumpkin patch. You may walk along with me.”

  The Boxer backed slowly from the mirror. “I guess nobody could call me a mud-lark now, eh?” he said, admiring himself as long as Jenny’s patience held out.

  Jenny said, “There won’t be anything left of that beautiful suit when Scraps pitches into you! Now, come along.”

  She hurried out to Strawberry Street, the Quadling Boxer walking beside her. They crossed Banana Boulevard and passed the Great Crystal Banquet Hall. A sign in the window read:

  HEAD WAITER WANTED

  “There’s a job!” the Boxer said eagerly. He stopped, looked down at his cellophane suit, and added, “Did you say that Scraps girl would spoil my new clothes?”

  “She’ll punch them full of holes!” said Jenny.

  “Then goodbye!” said the Boxer. “A cellophane suit will get me the job of Head Waiter in the Crystal Banquet Hall.”

  The Boxer giggled and pranced lightly into the banquet hall. Jenny went on. Before she came to the river, she had to cross the pumpkin patch. As she came near to Jack Pumpkinhead’s ozoplane, she saw that it had been decorated with pumpkins. She could hear voices singing in the ozoplane.

  “Maybe Number Nine stopped to hear the Shoe Glee Club,” she thought. “I’ll look in.”

  She put her fishing rod against the ozoplane. Then, without hesitating, Jenny marched up to the door, opened it, and stepped inside. The singing Stopped. At first everything seemed dark. Jenny realized that she no longer had her fairy eye for she could not see clearly in the half-darkness of the ozoPlane. Then she heard a voice, “A grinner, a smiler, Here’s the turn-styler!”

  A figure sprang out of the darkness. “Put up your fists !” it challenged. At the same moment, Jenny felt a soft punch in her eye. “Round one, You’re done!”

  Then the soft punches began to fall all over Jenny’s body.

  “Stop tickling me,” said Jenny, beginning to laugh. “Jenny gets fussed When a little mussed !”

  the voice went on, as cotton hands kept tapping her.

  “Must you do that?” laughed Jenny. Her eyes were growing used to the darkness. She could now see Scraps dancing around and throwing out her fists. Jenny gave the patchwork girl a push that sent her across the ozoplane. She was as light as a feather pillow.

  “I’m sorry, but I had to do that,” Jenny apologized. “When I’m scrappy, I’m happy,”

  replied Scraps and she kept slamming and punching wildly in all directions.

  “I’m happy, too,” said Jenny. “Really, it’s oztonishing how much fun this is. You are like a punching

  bag.” She reached and pulled a handful of yarn from Scrap’s head. “A living punching bag, with fringe!” Jenny laughed.

  This made Scraps come back at her with a fury of blows. Then her long cotton fingers caught around Jenny’s neck and would not let go. At this point, a door opened, letting in more light. Jack PuInpkinhead’s face grinned at Jenny and Scraps.

  Scraps tightened her fingers on Jenny’s neck, and Jenny’s anger flared up. She caught Scraps and shook her until the stitches in her side opened and Some padding fell over the floor.

  “I just had to knock the stuffing out of you,” said

  Jenny.

  Scraps sagged a little and stuck out her red velvet tongue. “Time out for repairs, I must mend my tears,”

  she panted. She picked up a handful of cotton batting and pushed it into herself. Then she patted herself into shape. Jack Pumpkinhead came forward.

  “Scraps, will you introduce me to your lady friend?” he said. “The ‘fraidy cat? No lady, that!

  Who makes me mend, Is not a friend,”

  said Scraps, fastening herself together with pins. “Now, Scraps, that’s no way to talk,” Jack Pumpkinhead said, turning his triangular eyes to Jenny.

  “I am Jenny Jump, the new stylist,” she said.

  “Welcome to my house,” said Jack Pumpkinhead. “I’ll show you my Glee Club.” During the boxing match, the shoes had scattered all over the ozoplane. Jack Pumpkinhead gathered them into rows, talking to Jenny.

  “Poor, downtrodden soles,” he said. “I am trying to break them into a noteworthy life. This fellow here,” Jack held up a broad-toed shoe, “sings with a brogue.”

  When the shoes were in order, Jack Pumpkinhead said, “Would you like to hear some music?”

  “I don’t have much time,” said Jenny. “I am on my way to fish. But I should like to take a few minutes to explore the ozoplane.”

  “I’d be delighted to show it to you.” Jac
k Pumpkinhead sounded pleased. He gave Jenny a light pat on the head.

  Jenny followed him into the engine room. It was filled with all sorts of machinery and pipes.

  “I’ve started to build a pipe organ,” Jack Pumpkinhead explained. “But I can put all the parts back into the engine whenever I want to.”

  “Can you really?” exclaimed Jenny. “Why, you are bright! Let me see you do it.”

  At this praise, Jack Pumpkinhead quickly began to re-assemble the engine. Jenny watched it taking shape under his hands. At last he said, bolting a lever in place, “There it is! I like levers better than buttons, don’t you?”

  He backed away. Jenny caught hold of the lever and pulled it down.

  “What’s this for?” she asked.

  “Don’t touch that!” he yelled. “It’s the starter!” At that moment, the crackling thunder of the engine ripped the air. The old ozoplane soared up into the sky! CHAPTER 16

  Shoes Desert a Soaring Ship

  NOW, WHAT did I tell you?” pleaded Jack.

  “Flying is more fun than fishing!” said

  Jenny and sat down in the pilot’s seat. Taking the

  control lever in her hand, she guided the ozoplane

  in a wide circle above the pumpkin field.

  The shoes seemed nervous and hopped up to look out of the window. They lolled their tongues in fear, and their eyelets blinked when they saw how far away the Land of Oz now was. They swarmed around Jenny, and she shooed them away.

  “What’s up? What’s up?” they asked excitedly. “We are!” she said and sent the plane soaring even higher.

  Scraps was walking around with her hand to her ripped side, singing, “Let’s find a first-aid station, Where I can have my operation. Don’t let it fall, don’t let it tip, Till I find a way to stop this ship.” She began turning every valve that she could get her cotton fingers on, trying to stop the ozoplane. But the engine kept on as powerfully as ever.

  “It’s disgusting how well this engine works!” said Jack Pumpkinhead.

  Scraps turned a wheel. The ozoplane went into

  a tail-spin.

  There was a lot of activity going on around it. The cloud pushers and the sky sweepers were hard at work. The sky sweepers had feather brooms growing where their hands should be. They worked

  in a long line, stooping as they brushed the trash from the sky. This trash was mostly star dust, thunder scum, and loose links of chain lightning.

  “Hey, there!” Jack Pumpkinhead cried, as he was pitched against the ceiling and then tossed against the wall, where his coat caught on a hook. He was left hanging there. He became so excited, he lost his head. The ship lurched again, and the head went sailing out of the window!

  “Catch me!” cried the Head, as the wind carried it away. It struck a little cloud and bounced to another and went rolling down a field of sky.

  “Look where you are going!” cried a voice. It came from a cloud pusher, which looked like a windbag shaped like a man. It was almost transparent.

  “No wonder I didn’t see you. I was looking right through you!” said the Pumpkin Head.

  The sweepers were hurrying toward Jack’s Head. The Head tried to roll out of their way, but it was not fast enough. A feather-broom hand sent Jack’s head rolling into a pile of sky trash. The whole pile was pushed onto a dump star. Jack’s Head lay smothering in the dust.

  “Oh, it feels like pepper in my eyes,” said the Head. “I’ve got to get out of here!”

  When the sky sweepers had passed on, Jack’s

  Head carefully rolled out of the pile and kept rolling along a point of the dump star, until it came to the end. There it hung itself over the end.

  Far below it, squads of skyscrapers were busily clearing up the weather. They kept scraping rain, hail, and dirty mist into piles beyond the horizon. The Pumpkin Head kept turning on the star point, looking for some sign of the ozoplane.

  “There is something!” it said, seeing a black particle, no bigger than a marble, high above itself.

  The particle grew bigger. It seemed to be floating aimlessly to the left and to the right, yet drawing nearer. At last the Pumpkin Head saw that it was covered with pumpkins. It was its own house, the ozoplane.

  “I hope no one has carved another pumpkin head for Jack. I am still as good as new,” thought the

  Head.

  The ozoplane came on, and sailed directly over the Pumpkin Head. The Head could see Scraps and Jenny looking out of the window. The plane slowly described a circle, while an anchor, fastened to a long mooring line, plunged down. The anchor hit the heap of sky rubbish and sank into it, making the ozoplane fast to the dump star.

  “Hurrah!” shouted the Pumpkin Head. “I’m

  saved.”

  Down the mooring line slid Scraps. Clinging to the line, she reached over and unhooked Jack’s Head from the star point. Then, holding it under her arm, she worked herself up the line and into the cabin of the plane. As soon as Scraps was safely back with the Head, Jenny unhooked Jack’s wooden body from the wall and fastened the Head onto it.

  “Thank my lucky dump star, I’m all in one piece,” exclaimed Jack. His Pumpkin Head looked around.

  “Thanks for saving me, Scraps. It’s good to be back. You’re all looking fine. Jenny, I believe you are younger than when I left.”

  “I am younger,” said Jenny, looking down at her dress. Again it was a size too large for her. “We’ll have to go back to the Emerald City soon, so I can turn myself out another style.”

  Jenny sat down at the controls while Jack Pumpkinhead hauled up the mooring line; The ozoplane roared ahead. Scraps held her hand to her side.

  “There’s a stitch in my side

  That I can’t abide.

  I don’t know when

  I can scrap again.” Scraps looked at Jenny and stuck out her red velvet

  tongue. But Jenny was looking at a book.

  “The skyscape looks different,” Jenny said. “I’m afraid we’re lost.”

  Jack Pumpkinhead rushed anxiously to the window and looked out. The air was no longer clear and blue, but brown and thick, with a slightly sweet smell.

  “We must have crossed the horizon,” said Jack. “We certainly are lost! Dog-gone!”

  When the shoes heard this, they broke into a soleful lament, “Where, oh, where, has my little dog

  gone?”

  “Where, oh, where can we be?” continued Jenny. As the shoes finished their song, they jumped despairingly to the window of the speeding plane and leaped out.

  “It’s a bad sign,” Jack Pumpkinhead said, “when shoes desert a soaring air-ship.”

  Through the window, Jenny could see a large brown mountain directly in front of her. The plane was heading right for it, and there was nothing she could do to stop it.

  Jack grabbed hold of his head. “I won’t lose this again, no matter what happens,” he said.

  The ozoplane plunged down. Down, down, down,

  through the brown air it fell.

  “Look out, everyone !” cried Jenny. “We’re going

  to crash!” CHAPTER 17

  The Attack of the Chocolate Soldiers

  CRASH! SPLASH! The ozoplane had landed in a field of soft brown mush. The mush was splat tered up through the windows, spotting Jenny’s dress.

  “I smell chocolate,” she said. She looked down at her dress and picked off one of the spots. She smelled it and then tasted it.

  “It is chocolate! Where on Oz can we be?”

  “We must have crashed into a chocolate star,” said Jack Pumpkinhead. He straightened his head which had been jarred sidewise in the crash.

  “It looks like fudge,” said Jenny. “And it smells and tastes like it, too.”

  Jack answered, “Scraps and I have never tasted or smelled anything, and never intend to. We go entirely by looks. Let’s go out and look things over.”

  The three climbed out of the ozoplane. As soon as Jenny’s feet touched the surface, she
began to

  sink into the chocolate bog. She saw Jack sinking, too. Scraps remained on top, for she weighed only nine pounds.

  Jenny looked around. They were in a valley of cream chocolate, surrounded by towering cliffs of hard chocolate with white sugar tops.

  “We are trapped,” said Jenny. “What could be

  sweeter?”

  Just then she heard, PLOP, PLOP! Something hard was raining out of the sky into the brown ooze.

  “Why, Jack, it’s the shoes! Our plane fell faster than they!” exclaimed Jenny.

  Scraps darted here and there over the chocolate! gathering up the members of Jack’s Glee Club.

  “It’s plain to be seen’

  You’re no longer clean,” said Scraps, as she tossed the shoes into the ozoplane. The shoes at once began polishing themselves.

  Jenny had sunk deeper. “It’s lucky I have grown younger,” she thought, “or I’d be so heavy I’d go in over my head.”

  “A dry moon or a dusty star would be better than this sickening stuff,” sniffed Jack, with a glitter in the hollow of his eye.

  “I agree,” said Jenny. “Chocolate is all right in

  small amounts. But this is too much of a good

  thing!”

  Far off, Jenny saw something moving down from the sugary tops of the mountains. Some creatures were coming with alarming speed. They leaped over piles of broken chocolate and came racing into the valley.

  “Now we’re in hot chocolate!” said Jenny. “As I smell it, those are giant chocolate soldiers!”

  She began to struggle to get out of the slush, but she was held fast.

  “My fairy foot no longer has any power!” she said