  Nox was asleep on a heap of white flower petals in the corner of his stall, asleep and dreaming of the Silver Mountain of Oz, when a sharp tap on the shoulder rudely awakened him. "Come!" whispered an urgent voice. "Time to start! Come, I've managed everything." Lurching to his feet and still in a daze, the Royal Ox looked askance and with no great favor at the Goat Girl. "Why, it's not even light!" he moaned feebly. "Of course not," admitted Handy Mandy guardedly, "but I poked my nose out the door a moment ago and saw all the guards were a bit drowsyish, so I tapped them on the head with this." Handy Mandy raised her iron hand and with a little grimace beckoned for Nox to hurry. "Come along now, and we can be out of here before they know what's what or who." So Nox, with a regretful look round his comfortable stall and a sigh for his morning bath and breakfast, moved quietly after her. While the Royal Creature had spent most of his time during the past two years thinking of ways to rescue his young Master, now that he was actually starting out he was filled with doubt and dismay. How could they ever find this Silver Mountain and overcome the enemies that most certainly would beset them? The sight of the twenty guards lying in a stiff row somewhat reassured the downhearted beast and in the dim light of early morning he looked thoughtfully up at the sturdy mountain lass stepping so resolutely beside him. In each hand Handy carried a different weapon, and resting on her broad shoulders was a rake, an axe, one guard's gun, another guard's sword, a spade and a long handled broom. Noting his astonished glance, the Goat Girl grinned and with her one free hand touched her fingers to her lips. So, silently and without exchanging a word, the two crossed the stable yard, the Royal Park, hurried through a little wood, and came out on a dusty blue Highway. "NOW!" said Handy, looking up and down the road to make sure no one was coming, "now we can talk and decide which direction to take." "How can we do that," objected Nox, panting a little from the unaccustomed exertion before breakfast, "when neither of us knows where this Silver Mountain is?" "Well, we have tongues, haven't we? And can ask, can't we?" Handy Mandy rattled her weapons impatiently. "But before we worry about the Silver Mountain we must get out of Keretaria. Which is the quickest way to the border?" "Oh, North," answered Nox promptly. "Keretaria is in the upper part of the Munchkin Country of Oz and once we cross the Northern branch of the Munchkin River, we'll be entirely out of the country." "Fine! Then we'll go North. And what lies beyond the Munchkin River?" inquired the Goat Girl, shifting the axe to her left shoulder. "I've never crossed myself," admitted Nox, moving along in his slow and dignified manner, "but I have heard there are many mountains and if we go far enough the Purple Land of the Gillikins." "Sounds interesting," decided Handy Mandy, "and who knows, among all those mountains we may find the one we are looking for! By the way, am I to call you Boz, Nox or Goldie Horns? But I believe I'll call you Nox, for somehow I like Nox the Ox best." "Anything you say," yawned her companion, switching his tail negligently, "but I shall always call YOU, Handy Mandy. It suits you, m'lass, and you need no longer consider yourself a slave." "Ho, ho, I never did," roared the Goat Girl, glancing cheerfully down at her lordly companion. "That was just a joke, wasn't it? You know, everything in this Land of Oz is extremely funny and peculiar. Two-armed natives, animals talking, Kings disappearing and mysterious messages and prophecies." "People always think a new country strange!" observed the Ox philosophically. "To us it seems quite right and natural. But I daresay if I were to find myself on Mt. Mern I'd consider everything there very odd and upsetting; rocks flying through the air, for instance, and landing one soft and light as a daisy in a strange King's garden." "But all of our rocks don't fly, in fact I never knew one to do such a thing before. And no wonder I landed as soft as a daisy—there was a blue daisy under me or I'd have been splintered to smithereens!" "Daisy?" Nox licked his lips hungrily. "You never said anything about a daisy." "Oh, I never tell all I know," confided Handy, "especially to Hi-qui-cockadoodlums like the King and his Counselors. But there was a daisy—growing on the rock and I picked it. As I started to fall I began pulling off the petals, and when I landed I came down on a high, huge pile of them, a heap as high as a haystack," continued Handy Mandy dreamily. "So I slid off the stack and turned to look at the castle, and when I looked again, the petals were gone, but there was the daisy itself growing up as pert as you please in this strange garden. So what did I do but pick it again and here it is!" Triumphantly Handy pulled the blue flower from her pocket. "My, what a dear little daisy!" murmured the Ox. "How delicious it would taste." "No! NO!" cried Handy, as Nox rolled his long tongue out toward the flower. "It's too pretty to eat." "Nothing's too pretty to eat," replied the Ox plaintively. "Funny it hasn't wilted, though." "Well, I believe it's magic," stated the Goat Girl, with a positive little shake of her head. As she returned the daisy to her pocket, Handy felt the hard metal object that had hit her in the forehead when she and Nox ploughed through the King's garden. "Look! What do you suppose this is?" she queried, tapping the Ox sharply on the shoulder, for he was walking sleepily along with his eyes closed. "This is what we dug up when we rushed through the garden, you know." "How should I know?" grunted the Ox indifferently, opening one eye. "Just a silver hammer, isn't it? Maybe we can trade it for a good breakfast when we cross the river." "My—y—how you talk!" scolded Handy. "We're not going to trade it at all. See, there's an initial on it. A big W. Now what would W stand for?" "Who, what, which, where, oh why worry?" mumbled the Ox, plodding resignedly along beside her. "Well, anyway, it will make a splendid potato masher," concluded the Goat Girl, returning the hammer to her pocket. "Yes, if we had any potatoes." The Ox sighed heavily as he spoke, looking off into the distance with such a mournful eye Handy Mandy laughed a little all to herself. "Oh cheer up," sniffed the Goat Girl, "you're not starved yet. And hurry up, too, the sun's going higher every moment and we'd better pass those farms before the people waken." It was against Nox's nature to hurry, but realizing the wisdom of the Goat Girl's advice, he broke into an awkward gallop. In spite of his great weight, the Royal creature was light as a daisy on his feet, and except for the faint rattle of Handy's weapons they made little noise as they ran past the dome-shaped blue houses and barns of the Munchkin farmers. "Couldn't we stop for a few greens?" puffed Nox, looking longingly over the fence at a field of cabbages. "Not here, dear—ear!" Red faced and breathless, the Goat Girl ran on. "Wait till we cross this river—iver." "But I'm not used to this—sort—of—thing," complained Nox peevishly. "Running races before breakfast on an empty stomach. No bath—no brush—no rub down!" "Well, here's your brush," gasped Handy, picking her way through a dense thicket as the highway ended in a small wood, "and yonder's your bath, Mister. My—y, what a blue river!" "Everything's blue in the Munchkin Country of Oz," Nox told her sulkily, as sharp briers and thorns reached out to scratch his satiny hide. "Even the Royal Ox of Keretaria," hinted Handy with a sly wink. "Oh the river's blue and the houses are blue and even the wind blew—Hoo Hoo! Come on." "Don't try to be funny," with heaving sides, the Ox stopped on the edge of the gleaming blue stream. "Don't try to be funny, I beg." "Oh, I don't have to try, I am!" laughed Handy, flinging the axe, the rake, the spade, the sword, the gun and the broomstick across the river. "Wait!" snorted the Ox, as Handy, having got rid of her load, raised all of her hands above her head and prepared to dive in. "Wait, can you swim?" "I don't know, but I'll soon find out," cried Handy, and before Nox could prevent it, the Goat Girl leapt off the bank and disappeared beneath the blue waters of the Munchkin River. For once, Nox forgot his dignity and Royal station and plunged frantically after his reckless companion. Swimming around with his head under water, he finally located Handy Mandy and gripping her yellow plaits firmly in his teeth, dragged her to the opposite bank. The Goat Girl was so full of water, she had little to say and lay soggily on the grass while Nox looked down at her with mingled admiration and concern. "Never do such a thing again," he wheezed severely as Handy finally sat up and began wringing the water from her voluminous skirts. "Swimming is an art and must be learned and practiced. But for oat's sake, why didn't you flap all those arms when you hit the water?" he finished irritably. "Oh, is that what you're supposed to do? This way?" Before Nox could step a step, the Goat Girl had jumped into the river again. This time instead of going down she splashed and whirled her seven arms so fast and furiously she just managed to keep her head above water. But Nox, now thoroughly annoyed and without giving her a chance to get far from shore, waded in and determinedly dragged her back to dry land. "What in skyblue onions are you trying to do?" he sputtered angrily, "Drown yourself?" "No, I'm trying to swim," coughed the Goat Girl, struggling to get away from the angry Ox. "Do you suppose I'm going to let this Munchkin River get the best of me?" "Yes, and while you are swimming or rather practicing your swimming some of these Keretarians will come and capture us," gurgled Nox. "Are we escaping or are we swimming—quick now, make up your mind." Nox's earnest words brought Handy quickly to her senses and as the Royal Ox let go her skirts, she snatched up her weapons and without waiting to wring out her clothes started briskly across the meadows. "Never mind, you'll be a fine swimmer some day," said Nox, trotting more amiably beside her. The cool river water had refreshed the Royal creature and Handy Mandy's determination and courage made him a little ashamed of his own complaints. "Takes a little practice, that's all." "Practice!" repeated Handy, dripping water from every plait and pore. "Well just wait till we come to the next river, I'll show you! But LOOK, here are more blue houses, so we must still be in the Munchkin Country." "Yes, but we're out of Keretaria," Nox reminded her cheerfully. "What's that signpost say, my girl?" Hurrying forward, Handy squinted up at the rough board nailed to a blue spruce and then began to clench and unclench her one free fist. "TURN HERE!" directed the sign. "Turn here and go straight back where you came from." "Well, I'll be buttered!" cried the Goat Girl, throwing down every one of her weapons. "I'll be churned and buttered." "But what had we butter do?" muttered the Royal Ox, so taken aback by the saucy message that even his tongue was twisted. "Why, we'll go straight on, of course," declared Handy Mandy, tossing her yellow plaits defiantly. "Who are whoever they are to tell us our business?" And recovering her weapons one by one, the Goat Girl tramped down the crooked lane directly ahead of them, the Royal Ox with lifted nose and horns, stepping warily behind her. |
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