THE MYSTERIOUS CITY
There they sat upon the grass, their heads still swimming from their
dizzy flights, and looked at one another in silent bewilderment. But
presently, when assured that no one was injured, they grew more calm
and collected, and the Lion said with a sigh of relief, “Who would have
thought those Merry-Go-Round Mountains were made of rubber?”
“Are they really rubber?” asked Trot.
“They must be,” replied the Lion, “for otherwise we would not have
bounded so swiftly from one to another without getting hurt.”
“That is all guesswork,” declared the Wizard, unwinding the blankets
from his body, “for none of us stayed long enough on the mountains to
discover what they are made of. But where are we?”
“That’s guesswork,” said Scraps. “The shepherd said the Thistle-Eaters
live this side of the mountains and are waited on by giants.”
“Oh no,” said Dorothy, “it’s the Herkus who have giant slaves, and the
Thistle-Eaters hitch dragons to their chariots.”
“How could they do that?” asked the Woozy. “Dragons have long tails,
which would get in the way of the chariot wheels.”
“And if the Herkus have conquered the giants,” said Trot, “they must be
at least twice the size of giants. P’raps the Herkus are the biggest
people in all the world!”
“Perhaps they are,” assented the Wizard in a thoughtful tone of voice.
“And perhaps the shepherd didn’t know what he was talking about. Let us
travel on toward the west and discover for ourselves what the people of
this country are like.”
It seemed a pleasant enough country, and it was quite still and
peaceful when they turned their eyes away from the silently whirling
mountains. There were trees here and there and green bushes, while
throughout the thick grass were scattered brilliantly colored flowers.
About a mile away was a low hill that hid from them all the country
beyond it, so they realized they could not tell much about the country
until they had crossed the hill. The Red Wagon having been left behind,
it was now necessary to make other arrangements for traveling. The Lion
told Dorothy she could ride upon his back as she had often done before,
and the Woozy said he could easily carry both Trot and the Patchwork
Girl. Betsy still had her mule, Hank, and Button-Bright and the Wizard
could sit together upon the long, thin back of the Sawhorse, but they
took care to soften their seat with a pad of blankets before they
started. Thus mounted, the adventurers started for the hill, which was
reached after a brief journey.
As they mounted the crest and gazed beyond the hill, they discovered
not far away a walled city, from the towers and spires of which gay
banners were flying. It was not a very big city, indeed, but its walls
were very high and thick, and it appeared that the people who lived
there must have feared attack by a powerful enemy, else they would not
have surrounded their dwellings with so strong a barrier. There was no
path leading from the mountains to the city, and this proved that the
people seldom or never visited the whirling hills, but our friends
found the grass soft and agreeable to travel over, and with the city
before them they could not well lose their way. When they drew nearer
to the walls, the breeze carried to their ears the sound of music—dim
at first, but growing louder as they advanced.
“That doesn’t seem like a very terr’ble place,” remarked Dorothy.
“Well, it LOOKS all right,” replied Trot from her seat on the Woozy,
“but looks can’t always be trusted.”
“MY looks can,” said Scraps. “I LOOK patchwork, and I AM patchwork, and
no one but a blind owl could ever doubt that I’m the Patchwork Girl.”
Saying which, she turned a somersault off the Woozy and, alighting on
her feet, began wildly dancing about.
“Are owls ever blind?” asked Trot.
“Always, in the daytime,” said Button-Bright. “But Scraps can see with
her button eyes both day and night. Isn’t it queer?”
“It’s queer that buttons can see at all,” answered Trot. “But good
gracious! What’s become of the city?”
“I was going to ask that myself,” said Dorothy. “It’s gone!”
“It’s gone!”
The animals came to a sudden halt, for the city had really disappeared,
walls and all, and before them lay the clear, unbroken sweep of the
country. “Dear me!” exclaimed the Wizard. “This is rather disagreeable.
It is annoying to travel almost to a place and then find it is not
there.”
“Where can it be, then?” asked Dorothy. “It cert’nly was there a minute
ago.”
“I can hear the music yet,” declared Button-Bright, and when they all
listened, the strains of music could plainly be heard.
“Oh! There’s the city over at the left,” called Scraps, and turning
their eyes, they saw the walls and towers and fluttering banners far to
the left of them.
“We must have lost our way,” suggested Dorothy.
“Nonsense,” said the Lion.
“I, and all the other animals, have been tramping straight toward the
city ever since we first saw it.”
“Then how does it happen—”
“Never mind,” interrupted the Wizard, “we are no farther from it than
we were before. It is in a different direction, that’s all, so let us
hurry and get there before it again escapes us.”
So on they went directly toward the city, which seemed only a couple of
miles distant. But when they had traveled less than a mile, it suddenly
disappeared again. Once more they paused, somewhat discouraged, but in
a moment the button eyes of Scraps again discovered the city, only this
time it was just behind them in the direction from which they had come.
“Goodness gracious!” cried Dorothy. “There’s surely something wrong
with that city. Do you s’pose it’s on wheels, Wizard?”
“It may not be a city at all,” he replied, looking toward it with a
speculative glance.
“What COULD it be, then?”
“Just an illusion.”
“What’s that?” asked Trot.
“Something you think you see and don’t see.”
“I can’t believe that,” said Button-Bright. “If we only saw it, we
might be mistaken, but if we can see it and hear it, too, it must be
there.”
“Where?” asked the Patchwork Girl.
“Somewhere near us,” he insisted.
“We will have to go back, I suppose,” said the Woozy with a sigh.
So back they turned and headed for the walled city until it disappeared
again, only to reappear at the right of them. They were constantly
getting nearer to it, however, so they kept their faces turned toward
it as it flitted here and there to all points of the compass. Presently
the Lion, who was leading the procession, halted abruptly and cried
out, “Ouch!”
“What’s the matter?” asked Dorothy.
“Ouch—Ouch!” repeated the Lion, and leaped backward so suddenly that
Dorothy nearly tumbled from his back. At the same time Hank the Mule
yelled “Ouch!”
“Ouch! Ouch!” repeated the Lion and leaped backward so suddenly that
Dorothy nearly tumbled from his back. At the same time, Hank the Mule
yelled “Ouch!” almost as loudly as the Lion had done, and he also
pranced backward a few paces.
“It’s the thistles,” said Betsy. “They prick their legs.”
Hearing this, all looked down, and sure enough the ground was thick
with thistles, which covered the plain from the point where they stood
way up to the walls of the mysterious city. No pathways through them
could be seen at all; here the soft grass ended and the growth of
thistles began. “They’re the prickliest thistles I ever felt,” grumbled
the Lion. “My legs smart yet from their stings, though I jumped out of
them as quickly as I could.”
“Here is a new difficulty,” remarked the Wizard in a grieved tone. “The
city has stopped hopping around, it is true, but how are we to get to
it over this mass of prickers?”
“They can’t hurt ME,” said the thick-skinned Woozy, advancing
fearlessly and trampling among the thistles.
“Nor me,” said the Wooden Sawhorse.
“But the Lion and the Mule cannot stand the prickers,” asserted
Dorothy, “and we can’t leave them behind.”
“Must we all go back?” asked Trot.
“Course not!” replied Button-Bright scornfully. “Always when there’s
trouble, there’s a way out of it if you can find it.”
“I wish the Scarecrow was here,” said Scraps, standing on her head on
the Woozy’s square back. “His splendid brains would soon show us how to
conquer this field of thistles.”
“What’s the matter with YOUR brains?” asked the boy.
“Nothing,” she said, making a flip-flop into the thistles and dancing
among them without feeling their sharp points. “I could tell you in
half a minute how to get over the thistles if I wanted to.”
“Tell us, Scraps!” begged Dorothy.
“I don’t want to wear my brains out with overwork,” replied the
Patchwork Girl.
“Don’t you love Ozma? And don’t you want to find her?” asked Betsy
reproachfully.
“Yes indeed,” said Scraps, walking on her hands as an acrobat does at
the circus.
“Well, we can’t find Ozma unless we get past these thistles,” declared
Dorothy.
Scraps danced around them two or three times without reply. Then she
said, “Don’t look at me, you stupid folks. Look at those blankets.”
The Wizard’s face brightened at once.
“Why didn’t we think of those blankets before?”
“Because you haven’t magic brains,” laughed Scraps. “Such brains as you
have are of the common sort that grow in your heads, like weeds in a
garden. I’m sorry for you people who have to be born in order to be
alive.”
But the Wizard was not listening to her. He quickly removed the
blankets from the back of the Sawhorse and spread one of them upon the
thistles, just next the grass. The thick cloth rendered the prickers
harmless, so the Wizard walked over this first blanket and spread the
second one farther on, in the direction of the phantom city. “These
blankets,” said he, “are for the Lion and the Mule to walk upon. The
Sawhorse and the Woozy can walk on the thistles.”
So the Lion and the Mule walked over the first blanket and stood upon
the second one until the Wizard had picked up the one they had passed
over and spread it in front of them, when they advanced to that one and
waited while the one behind them was again spread in front. “This is
slow work,” said the Wizard, “but it will get us to the city after a
while.”
“The city is a good half mile away yet,” announced Button-Bright.
“And this is awful hard work for the Wizard,” added Trot.
“Why couldn’t the Lion ride on the Woozy’s back?” asked Dorothy. “It’s
a big, flat back, and the Woozy’s mighty strong. Perhaps the Lion
wouldn’t fall off.”
“You may try it if you like,” said the Woozy to the Lion. “I can take
you to the city in a jiffy and then come back for Hank.”
“I’m—I’m afraid,” said the Cowardly Lion. He was twice as big as the
Woozy.
“Try it,” pleaded Dorothy.
“And take a tumble among the thistles?” asked the Lion reproachfully.
But when the Woozy came close to him, the big beast suddenly bounded
upon its back and managed to balance himself there, although forced to
hold his four legs so close together that he was in danger of toppling
over. The great weight of the monster Lion did not seem to affect the
Woozy, who called to his rider, “Hold on tight!” and ran swiftly over
the thistles toward the city.
The others stood on the blanket and watched the strange sight
anxiously. Of course, the Lion couldn’t “hold on tight” because there
was nothing to hold to, and he swayed from side to side as if likely to
fall off any moment. Still, he managed to stick to the Woozy’s back
until they were close to the walls of the city, when he leaped to the
ground. Next moment the Woozy came dashing back at full speed.
“There’s a little strip of ground next the wall where there are no
thistles,” he told them when he had reached the adventurers once more.
“Now then, friend Hank, see if you can ride as well as the Lion did.”
“Take the others first,” proposed the Mule. So the Sawhorse and the
Woozy made a couple of trips over the thistles to the city walls and
carried all the people in safety, Dorothy holding little Toto in her
arms. The travelers then sat in a group on a little hillock just
outside the wall and looked at the great blocks of gray stone and
waited for the Woozy to bring Hank to them. The Mule was very awkward,
and his legs trembled so badly that more than once they thought he
would tumble off, but finally he reached them in safety, and the entire
party was now reunited. More than that, they had reached the city that
had eluded them for so long and in so strange a manner.
“The gates must be around the other side,” said the Wizard. “Let us
follow the curve of the wall until we reach an opening in it.”
“Which way?” asked Dorothy.
“We must guess that,” he replied. “Suppose we go to the left. One
direction is as good as another.” They formed in marching order and
went around the city wall to the left. It wasn’t a big city, as I have
said, but to go way around it outside the high wall was quite a walk,
as they became aware. But around it our adventurers went without
finding any sign of a gateway or other opening. When they had returned
to the little mound from which they had started, they dismounted from
the animals and again seated themselves on the grassy mound.
“It’s mighty queer, isn’t it?” asked Button-Bright.
“There must be SOME way for the people to get out and in,” declared
Dorothy. “Do you s’pose they have flying machines, Wizard?”
“No,” he replied, “for in that case they would be flying all over the
Land of Oz, and we know they have not done that. Flying machines are
unknown here. I think it more likely that the people use ladders to get
over the walls.”
“It would be an awful climb over that high stone wall,” said Betsy.
“Stone, is it?” Scraps, who was again dancing wildly around, for she
never tired and could never keep still for long.
“Course it’s stone,” answered Betsy scornfully. “Can’t you see?”
“Yes,” said Scraps, going closer. “I can SEE the wall, but I can’t FEEL
it.” And then, with her arms outstretched, she did a very queer thing.
She walked right into the wall and disappeared.
“For goodness sake!” Dorothy, amazed, as indeed they all were.