The Old Tailor's Story
Snip was just gathering his courage for a jump down the well when Tora lifted him up and dropped him gently over the edge. Again that terrifying swoop into the darkness. "After this," gulped Snip dizzily, as he turned over and over, "I shall think nothing of falling out of a button tree, or down a flight of steps. Perhaps I'll try a fall every day just to keep in practice."
With a breathless bump, Snip landed in the padded bucket, putting an end to these curious thoughts. Before he had time for any others, he had shot through another underground passage and up and out of the well with such force that he rolled like a ball on the soft green moss. When he stopped rolling he saw Tora sitting beside him, smoothing down his long silver locks and untangling his whiskers.
"Are your ears on tight?" asked Snip anxiously, for it would certainly be a dreadful thing if the tailor's ears had been left behind. Tora put up his hand quickly to touch them and then, with a pleased nod, arose to his feet.
"You've brought me good luck, Snip," smiled the old gentleman. "I've tried a hundred times to escape from the Blanks, but never could get through that gate."
"Well, I am glad I could help you, for you helped me," said Snip. "Now that you have escaped, where will you go? Do you remember where you lived before?"
"I remember nothing," acknowledged the tailor sorrowfully, "so I'm going with you and after we find this good goose you speak of and the King, I'll just look around for another shop. A tailor has no cause to worry, and I've all my tools right with me." He chuckled, jingling his pockets cheerfully.
Snip had to smile himself, for Tora certainly did look like a walking work-shop. Around his neck were three long tape measures. Through tapes in his vest there hung a dozen pairs of scissors and shears of all sizes. Fastened to his coat was a huge pin cushion and both lapels were stuck full of needles. As for his pockets, they simply bulged with spools of silk, beeswax and thread.
Snip thought he had never seen a more interesting traveller and, feeling happier than he had since he left Kimbaloo, and quite hopeful of finding Pajuka, he began to examine the surrounding country. The Fare-well had spilled them into a large field of wheat and, from several purple barns in the distance, Snip knew they were still in the land of the Gillikens.
"You'll have to be guide, Snip," sighed the tailor, gazing around with a bewildered expression. "I've lived so long with the Blanks that I know nothing of these parts at all. As for the Emerald City, I can't remember even hearing of it."
"Well, I've never been there," admitted Snip, "but I know it is in the very center of Oz and we were going south when Mombi threw me down the well. So if we can find out which direction is south we ought to reach the Emerald City by night time. Which way do you think it is?"
The tailor squinted doubtfully up at the sun and, after a few more useless guesses, they determined to take a chance and started diagonally across the field.
"I wonder what shape Mombi did turn the King into," muttered Snip, as they hurried along through the wheat. "And I wonder whether Ozma can change Pajuka back to his own self again. He's so tired of being a goose!"
"It must be pretty tiresome," observed Tora, pushing his specs up on his forehead, "though no worse than tailoring from morning till night for a city full of invisible and ungrateful rascals. Not that I mind the tailoring," he explained hastily, looking down sideways at Snip. "I love that, and say, I'd like to make you a little suit sometime when I've set up my shop. No, it wasn't the tailoring, but the imprisonment that I minded."
"Do you 'spose they've missed you yet? What will they do when they find you're gone?" chuckled the little button boy. He looked up expectantly, but the old man was staring thoughtfully over an olive tree and did not seem to hear Snip's question.
"Bother!" exclaimed Snip. "His ears have gone off again. How awfully inconvenient!"
"I always let them off after breakfast," explained the tailor apologetically and just as if he had read Snip's thoughts. "It rests them, you know."
"But we've had no breakfast," began Snip impatiently. Then, realizing that Tora could not hear one word, he walked along in a resigned silence, thinking how annoying it must be to have butterfly ears. "And yet," mused Snip slowly, "it might be rather fun, too. One could send one's ears to places one didn't care to go—to school and to lectures and all that sort of thing, and take them off when folks scolded or the conversation grew dull." He had thought up quite a number of uses for butterfly ears, when the tailor, himself, broke the silence.
"Perhaps it would amuse you to hear a little about the Blanks," began Tora in his pleasant voice. "They were not always invisible as now, but they were always vain and haughty and trying to outshine one another in appearance. In fact," sighed the old man, with a grave nod, "they thought of nothing but dress and all of their time and money was spent for new and splendid apparel. As some of the inhabitants were handsomer than others there was always an argument as to who really looked the best.
"Shortly after I, myself, came to Blankenburg, Vanette, the Queen, walking in a small woods behind the palace, discovered a hidden pool. Looking into the water to admire her reflection, she accidentally dropped her handkerchief. Before she could snatch it out the handkerchief had disappeared and, when she reached into the pond to search for it, her hand and arm suddenly became invisible."
Tora looked down to see how Snip was taking the story and, finding him interested, continued dreamily: "For a time the Queen was exceedingly frightened, but all at once a wicked plan popped into her head. Hurrying back to the palace, she ordered her servants to carry a bucket of the magic water to everyone in the city. She then commanded them to bathe in the enchanted water and since then they have been perfectly invisible. Vanette, herself, who is old and fat and exceedingly jealous of the young girls, bathed in the water too and is now as invisible as the rest of her subjects. So now, when they dress up in their fine clothes, faces don't count at all, and the Queen always wins all the beauty prizes. That's why it's against the law to have a face in Blankenburg," continued Tora solemnly. "I'm glad we escaped before they got yours."
Snip was glad, too, but wanted to ask how Tora had managed to save his own face, and the tailor, guessing what was in the little boy's mind, finished up quickly: "For some reason or other the magic water had no effect upon me and as I was old and ugly and quite useful in my own way, they finally stopped bothering me."
Picking up a long, crooked stick and evidently thinking he had talked enough, Tora began to whistle an old Oz tune. Walking along solemnly beside him Snip could not help wondering how the old tailor had ever come to be a prisoner in Blankenburg and whether he had always had butterfly ears.
"I'll ask him as soon as they come back," decided Snip, but meantime he was growing hungrier and hungrier, for since the drink of cream in Catty Corners he had had nothing at all to eat. He kept a sharp lookout for fruit and nut trees and presently, in a small grove to the right, he caught a glimpse of a perfectly enormous breakfast bush.
Motioning for Tora to wait for him, Snip darted off. The tailor looked slightly puzzled but, making no objection, sat down on a rock and went on with his whistling. Hastening back with two steaming breakfast dishes in his hands, Snip was surprised to hear a loud, plaintive voice mingling with Tora's tune. Quickening his steps the little boy saw a tall, kingly figure waving indignant arms at the tailor.
"Are you crazy?" he shouted angrily. "I ask you once again, may I borrow a breakfast or a bite of lunch? It's for a Princess. Can't you answer me?" But Tora, fixing his eye on a fluffy cloud skimming across the sky, went calmly on with his tune. "He is deaf to my pleas," puffed the stranger, whirling round unsteadily and almost bumping into Snip. "Deaf and dumb!"
"He isn't deaf," explained the little boy breathlessly. "He has just mislaid his ears. I mean he's let them off for awhile."
"Let them off? Dorothy! Dorothy! Come at once! Here is a man with mislaid ears!" shrilled the stranger, hobbling off. Snip stared after him, open mouthed, as he wobbled wildly down the road.
