The Mysterious Message
Scraps, the Patch Work Girl, danced crazily down the flower-bordered path in Ozma's lovely garden in the Emerald City, shouting this verse:
"Hank hankers for a hanky
To blow his funny nose,
Hank hankers for a hanky,
I hanker for a rose!"
"I do not," brayed Hank, Betsy Bobbins' little mule, flapping his ears sulkily. "You don't know what you are singing about, Scraps. Go away and stop jeering me. How could I use a hanky, you silly girl?"
"Hank, you're a crank!" shouted Scraps, and capered on down the path, stopping to chin herself on a tulip tree and dropping in a wobbly heap beside the little table where Ozma, Betsy Bobbin and Trot were having breakfast.
"You shouldn't tease Hank like that," said Ozma, looking reproachfully at Scraps over her gold breakfast cup.
"I'll tease, I'll tease, whom I please,
I'll cross my eyes and cross my knees!"
chortled Scraps, and she looked so comical doing both of these crossings at once that the little girls simply burst into laughter, while Hank, with a snort of disgust, galloped off at full speed.
"You're awful," sighed Betsy Bobbin, nearly choking on her biscuit, and Betsy was pretty nearly right, for this ridiculous maiden who lived luxuriously in Ozma's palace was made entirely of patchwork. She had been cut from an old quilt, stuffed and sewn together by a wizard's wife who intended her for a servant. But when the wizard mixed up her brains, a lot of fun and cleverness had got in, so that Scraps had refused to be a servant and had run off to the Emerald City. She was so comical and entertaining that Ozma had allowed her to remain at the capital, and Scraps is now one of the most celebrated characters in the castle.
Betsy Bobbin was a little girl from the United States. She and Hank had been ship-wrecked on the shores of a strange land near Oz and, after some terrible adventures with the old Gnome King, had reached Oz itself and been taken in by the kind-hearted little Queen. Trot also had come from America and liked Oz so well she had never returned home. These two, with Princess Dorothy, are the closest friends of the fairy ruler, for Ozma herself is only a little girl fairy, and these four together have the merriest times imaginable.
Living in a green stone castle studded with emeralds is fun enough, dear knows, but living in a green stone castle with forty-nine courtiers, thirty-nine footmen, thirty-seven handmen, twenty-six serving maids, ten cooks and a flock of pages is luxury indeed, especially in a magical land where adventures are liable to happen every few minutes. Why, it's the most fun yet!
Perhaps Dorothy is Ozma's prime favorite, for Dorothy was the first little girl to discover Oz and has been so mixed up in its magical history that Ozma would scarcely know how to rule her interesting subjects without her help. It was of Dorothy that Ozma was thinking, as she watched Scraps turning reckless handsprings under the tulip trees.
"I wonder when Dorothy will return?" sighed the little Queen, pushing back her chair and signalling for the thirty-ninth footman to remove the gold breakfast plates. Dorothy had gone on a short visit to Perhaps City and already the others were longing for her return.
"Let's ask the Scarecrow," proposed Betsy, waving to the jolly straw man who, arm-in-arm with Sir Hokus of Pokes, was coming down the path. Both these delightful fellows are great friends of Dorothy's. In fact she discovered them. The Scarecrow she had lifted down from a pole on her very first trip to Oz. He had accompanied her to the Emerald City and been given a splendid set of brains by the Wizard of Oz, so that he is one of the wittiest and most able of Ozma's courtiers. He has a cozy corn-ear castle in the Winkie Country, but prefers to spend most of his time in the capital with the girls. Sir Hokus had been rescued from Pokes by Dorothy on another of her wonderful adventures, and since the Knight had taken up his residence in the palace Ozma felt more secure than ever before, for Sir Hokus was a splendid swordsman and feared neither man nor monster. It is people like Scraps, Sir Hokus and the Scarecrow who make life in the Emerald City so jolly and so different.
"Yoo hoo! Don't you think it's time Dorothy was back?" called Betsy, as the two came nearer.
"High time! High time!" answered the Scarecrow, waving his old blue hat up at the clock in the tallest tower of the castle. "And we'll have a high time when she does come," he smiled gaily. "I've thought up a dozen new games and—. What's that?" cried the Scarecrow, interrupting himself suddenly and blinking his painted eyes so fast that Betsy bounded out of her chair.
"What's that?" echoed the little Queen of Oz, springing up in alarm. Something gold and brilliant had flashed through the air and fallen upon the walk.
"A feather!" puffed Sir Hokus. "Odds goblins and hoblins, a feather!" He stooped creakily to pick it up, but as he did the golden quill righted itself and began to move rapidly across the marble walk.
"It's writing!" gasped Trot, clutching the Scarecrow by the arm, and in dazed fascination they watched the feather tracing a sentence. When it had set down five words, it made a little gold dot and fell lifelessly at Ozma's feet.
"Danger! Go to Morrow to-day!" stuttered the Scarecrow, reading the golden message aloud.
"How now," thundered Sir Hokus, letting his visor fall with a crash, "what means this message?"
"Go to-morrow!" gulped the Scarecrow, clapping on his hat and squinting down at the golden legend on the walk.
"Not to-morrow, to-day," corrected Betsy Bobbin breathlessly.
"But if we go to-day, how can we go to-morrow?" asked Ozma, growing more bewildered every minute.
"Danger!" shuddered Trot, pointing a trembling finger at the first word.
"What's all the excitement?" demanded Scraps, dancing up on one toe. Then, seeing they were all staring down at the marble, she bent over and read the message aloud herself.
"Go to-morrow to-day. It can never be done!
Just to think of it gives me a pain in the bun."
screamed the Patch Work Girl, clapping her hand to her cotton forehead.
"Hush, Scraps!" begged Ozma. "This is serious!"
"Someone is delirious, or they'd never write such nonsense," declared Scraps defiantly. "What are you going to do about it?"
"Think!" mumbled the Scarecrow, dropping down on a gold garden bench.
"Send for the Wizard!" advised Betsy Bobbin, jumping up and down in her excitement. "Wait! I'll get him!"
"It's a goose quill," announced Sir Hokus, as Betsy ran off toward the palace. He had picked up the golden feather and was examining it carefully.
"A goose quill?" gasped Ozma. "Why what can that mean? Oh dear, I do wish Dorothy were back."
"My gooseness!" giggled Scraps. "No wonder it's a silly message. Do you know any geese?"
"None but you!" sniffed Trot, putting her arms about Ozma.
"Silence, wench!" commanded Sir Hokus, pushing Scraps aside and seating himself beside the Scarecrow. "Methinks dark deeds are brewing here. Hast thought of anything friend?"
"Not yet," sighed the Scarecrow, rubbing his forehead sadly with his wobbly finger. "Let me think some more."
All were silent until Betsy Bobbin came hurrying back, bringing with her the Wizard of Oz and Tik Tok. As everyone in Oz knows, Tik Tok is another great celebrity, a machine man of burnished copper who can talk, walk and even think when properly wound. Betsy was winding up his think key, as she ran along, for Tik Tok's brains, in spite of their wheels, worked quite as well as the Scarecrow's, and there certainly was a lot of thinking to be done.
"You say it was a golden goose feather?" panted the little Wizard of Oz, quickening his steps. "A goose feather! Humph!" Next instant he was bending over the strange inscription on the walk, while Ozma and Trot breathlessly explained just how and when it had all happened.
"To-morrow to-day!" murmured the Wizard, mopping his bald head with his green hanky. "Why that's impossible, there's some trick to it."
The Wizard drew a small green book from his pocket. It was the book of magic messages and the little company waited anxiously while he flipped over the pages. But although every other kind of message was touched upon, there was nothing at all about goose feathers. With a sigh, the Wizard returned the book to his pocket, and dropping upon his knees began to examine the letters through his smallifying glass.
Tik Tok, except for the chug and whirr of his machinery, had been perfectly quiet. Now, leaning over so far he nearly tumbled on his copper nose, he began to read the message aloud.
"Go—to-morrow—to-day! Go—to-morrow—to-day!" rasped Tik Tok, in his harsh rasping voice, over and over and over, until Ozma and Betsy clapped hands to their ears and Trot begged him to stop. "That's fun-ny—," ticked the copper man at last. "It tells us when to go—but not—where. Too many times and—no—place. Go—to-mor—"
Whirr—click! Tik Tok's voice ran down and the sentence stopped in mid air.
"Thank goodness!" cried Betsy Bobbin fervently.
"Well, you'd better thank Tik Tok," spluttered the Scarecrow, leaping off the golden bench. "Hurrah! I have it now. One's a time and one's a place. Is there a Kingdom called Morrow anywhere in Oz, my dear?"
"Morrow!" exclaimed Ozma, "Why, that does sound familiar, somehow. Morrow? Yes, I feel sure there is."
"Get a map," ordered the Scarecrow in great excitement, and all but the Wizard sat down and smiled at the cleverness of the wise straw man.
