The Wizard took off the conical cap and held it up like a wire cage.
“Do you see what we have here, Ozma?” he said, turning the cap.
“Yes, I see. She will be so much happier without those,” said Ozma.
The Wizard looked at Number Nine and Dorothy. “Interesting specimens, aren’t they?” he remarked, twirling the cap.
Number Nine shook his head. The wire hat looked
empty to him. “Gee, Wiz, I don’t see anything,” he said.
Princess Dorothy said, “You forget, Wizard, that we don’t have magical eyes like you and Ozma.”
The Wizard laughed. “I can remedy that.” He reached into his black bag and took out a small can labeled “Visibility Powder.” Holding the cap high, he said, “The bad temper, the envy, and ambition have no shape or substance except to magical eyes. When I sprinkle some Visibility Powder into the cap, those three will take shapes which your eyes will see.”
At this moment the door opened, and Jellia Jamb with Glinda the Good peeped into the room. Ozma beckoned to them to enter. They came on tiptoe to the foot of the bed. In her hands Jellia was holding something that was covered with a gold cloth. Glinda the Good was dressed in a long red robe of flamingo feathers, sewn about with rubies. Her beautiful hair flowed down to her shoulders.
The Wizard waved the can of Visibility Powder. “Now, watch,” he said and turned the can over the conical cap, sprinkling the powder downward. Immediately Number Nine saw an object moving within the fine mesh of the cap. Looking closer, he saw a
black wasp buzzing angrily about and darting at the mesh as if it wanted to get out and sting someone.
“That is bad temper,” said the Wizard, and shook more powder over the cage-like cap. At once, a small green snake was wriggling there. “That’s envy,” spoke the Wizard, and for the third time he sprinkled some powder.
Number Nine saw a fat red toad, with a spotted back, hopping about. “And that,” said the Wizard, “is ambition. Now Jenny is free of all these three. Interesting specimens, don’t you think?”
“What are you going to do with them, Wizard?” asked Glinda the Good.
“I’ll keep them in my laboratory for experiments, and later I’ll give them to Professor Wogglebug for his zoology classes at his College of Art and Athletic Perfection.”
The Wizard placed the cap with its three captives in his black bag and replaced the can of Visibility Powder. He turned to Ozma. ‘I turn the patient over to you.”
Ozma took Jenny’s hand, leaned over the sleeping girl, and blew softly on both her eyes. Jenny’s eyes opened. She stared around her and said, “Why, I am in the palace!” Then she sat upright, smiling and stretching her arms. “How grand I feel!” she exclaimed. “Like a new person!”
Ozma smiled. “You are a new person, Jenny. You will always be sweet tempered, modest, and kind. All the people of Oz shall love you, and this boy” —turning her eyes to Number Nine—”shall love you most of all.” Number Nine blushed a furious blue.
Glinda the Good smiled at Jenny. “Ozma has a lovely surprise for you.”
Princess Dorothy and Jellia Jamb nodded their heads, smiling at Jenny
“For me?” said Jenny. Her voice was a young girl’s voice, and her eyes had a childish wonder in them.
Ozma said, “Since the day you landed in my carriage at my Birthday Parade, Jenny, you have done many good things for my people. For this you deserve a reward.”
Ozma’s hand went to the jewelled scepter that hung from her belt. She held it over Jenny’s head.
“Jenny Jump, I bestow upon you the title of First Duchess of the Realm.”
“A Duchess!” cried Jenny. “Oh, thank you so
much!”
Ozma lowered her scepter and went on, “You shall
have the Sapphire Suite in the palace, right next to Princess Dorothy’s suite. You shall sit at High Councils of State. You shall appear, with Dorothy, at my side at public entertainments. And, in addition, you shall be Chief Stylist of the Land of Oz.”
Jenny was glowing with happiness. “Oh, Ozma, how good you are!” she said.
Number Nine unexpectedly spoke up, his voice heavy with unhappiness, “Isn’t Jenny going to live in her cottage on Strawberry Street any more?”
“Oh, certainly,” said Ozma. “She will live at the palace only when she wishes to.”
Ozma turned to Jellia and uncovered the object that Jellia had been holding. It was a dainty coronet of silver and sapphires. Taking it between her hands, Ozma placed it on Jenny’s head.
“There! You make a very sweet Duchess indeed,” said Ozma.
They all gathered at the banquet table and had a party in honor of Jenny. Suddenly she realized she had not changed her clothes.
Jenny looked down at the dress she was wearing. It was crushed and spattered with mud from the bull pen. “Oh, dear! If I am a Duchess, I had better hurry back to my Style Shop and turn out some suitable clothing.”
She slipped from the table. The other girls formed a half-circle around her and walked with her to the front stairs of the palace. Number Nine, the Scarecrow, and the Tin Woodman came behind them.
“Goodbye, good friends!” said Jenny, and Number Nine echoed, “Goodbye!”
“Goodbye, Duchess Jenny,” called the others on the palace stairs. They turned back into the palace, and Jenny went on with Number Nine.
Jenny held her head high, as she thought a Duchess ought to. The sapphires of her coronet flashed in the sun. Number Nine’s admiring blue eyes never left her.
As they walked, Jenny was thinking. Finally she said, “I believe that I shall keep the Style Shop half days, Number Nine. And I shall send for your bright Sister Six to become my assistant and keep the shop the rest of the time. From now on, you and I are going to spend half our time at the playground! Too much work isn’t good for anyone, do you think?”
“Whoopee!” cried Number Nine, throwing his cap into the air. “That’s what I’ve always wanted to hear you say, Jenny!”
Number Nine and Jenny felt so good, they broke into a run and did not stop until they reached the
shop. The Strawberry Street house looked glad to see Jenny back.
As she came to the door, she said to Number Nine, “There is a customer in the shop.”
A little bearded man was sitting on top of the turn-
style.
“Leaping Leprechauns! It’s Siko Pompus!” Jenny cried in her friendliest voice. She had completely lost her anger toward him. “Hello, Siko Pompus! Do you want a new suit?”
“No, Duchess Jenny. It’s leavin’ Oz, I am. Goin’ back to New Jersey, U.S.A., to get meself a foine piece of pepper-cheese. I’ve stopped in to be sayin’ goodbye to ye an’ to be leavin’ ye a little gift.”
“How nice of you! I am sorry to hear that you’re going,” said Jenny.
Siko Pompus took a small box out of his pocket and gave it to her. Then he hopped down from the turn-style and skipped through the door.
“Goodbye, Siko Pompus!” called Jenny and Number Nine.
When the Leprechaun was gone, Number Nine turned to Jenny. “Why don’t you open your gift box,
Jenny?”
“I wonder what it can be,” Jenny said, as she lifted off the cover. “Oh, it’s only odds and ends ofjunk,”
she exclaimed in disappointment.
She began taking the objects out of the box. They included an ivory-handled eyeglass for one eye, a pair of rose-colored gloves with only eight fingers, a gold slipper for her left foot, and a pair of thistledown ear-muffs.
“Now, what do you suppose I can do with this stuff?” Jenny said.
“Why don’t you try them on, Jenny, to see what happens?” suggested Number Nine.
“Just to please you,” said Jenny with a little laugh. She put on the eyeglass, the gloves, the slipper, and the ear-muffs. “Why!” she exclaimed, “They are my fairy gifts! I can see more brightly, hear more keenly, feel a tingling in my fingers, and-l
ook!” She stamped her fairy foot down and, in one leap, bounded across the room!
“You see?” she said. “I am part fairy again!”
Number Nine said in a pleading tone, “Won’t you please put those things away and use them only on special occasions? I don’t want you to be too different.”
Quickly Jenny took off the gifts and dropped them into the box. Going to the shelf, she hid the box behind a large bolt of cloth. “My, I’ve been made Duchess and part fairy, all in one day!”
“Aren’t you going to be my Boss any more?”
“I simply couldn’t”—Jenny hesitated, then burst out laughing-“be ANYTHING ELSE!”
Number Nine seized Jenny’s hands, and together they danced around the turn-style.
THE END
Table of Contents
CHAPTER 1
CHAPTER 2
CHAPTER 3
CHAPTER 4
CHAPTER 5
CHAPTER 6
CHAPTER 7
CHAPTER 9
Chapter 10
CHAPTER 11
CHAPTER 12
CHAPTER 13
CHAPTER 14
CHAPTER 15
CHAPTER 18
CHAPTER 19
CHAPTER 20
CHAPTER 21
CHAPTER 22
CHAPTER 23
CHAPTER 24
CHAPTER 25
CHAPTER 26
CHAPTER 27
CHAPTER 28
L. Frank Baum - Oz 34 Page 14