The Escape From Doorways
"What do you mean by standing there and telling us you're not a bear?"
puffed the King, as soon as he had got his breath.
"It was a mistake, I see that now," said the clown, hastily stepping
out of his disguise. "If your Highness will overlook it this once, it
will never occur again."
"Shall we overlook it?" asked the King, turning to squarely face the
Queen.
Adora was staring in amazement at the clown, and being a very curious
Queen she decided not to have the intruder slammed till she found out
all about him. "We will overlook it for the present," she answered
haughtily, waving the doormen back to their places.
The King smiled and chanted this couplet:
"She'll overlook it for the present;
Be seated, please, and both look pleasant!"
Bob sat down with a sigh of relief. What queer beings this King and
Queen were! Everything was queer, but for some reason or other Bob
rather enjoyed it. King Theodore was not nearly so fierce as Mustafa,
and his singular habit of breaking into verse simply fascinated the
little boy.
"This brings us to rule three," confided Notta in a hoarse whisper.
"Joke and run, you know!"
"When is a door not a door?" asked the Queen, pointing her finger
suddenly at the clown.
"When it's adorable, like your Majesty," replied Notta with a grin. "Or
when it's a jar of door jam, like the one your Highness has just lost!"
Before Adora had recovered from her surprise, Notta pointed his finger
at the King and shouted, "Why is a tomato like a book?"
"Because it grows on a vine," answered King Theodore sulkily, "and you
needn't scream at me like that!"
"Wrong!" said Notta triumphantly. "A tomato's like a book because it's
red through."
"Do you believe that?" asked the King, turning to squarely face the
Queen.
"No!" said her Majesty shortly, "I don't."
"But a book couldn't grow on a vine," objected Bob Up mildly.
"My books do," insisted Theodore, pursing up his lips.
"Where were you brought up?" asked the Queen, staring at Bob severely.
"You needn't answer if you don't want to," whispered the King, as Bob
squirmed uneasily around in his chair. "The main thing is, what brought
you up here?
"If it's a story, rise and speak.
What do you want? Whom do you seek?"
"It _is_ a story," said Notta, springing up quickly, and glad of this
opportunity to tell their strange adventures and to ask a few questions
about the Emerald City. "A long story, your Highness," continued
Notta. In as few words as possible he told of his former life in the
circus, of their flight to Mudge, of Mustafa's determination to have
them capture the Cowardly Lion.
As Notta paused for breath, the King said, "Shall we let them pass
through Doorways, my love?" Instead of answering the Queen leaned over
and whispered in Theodore's ear.
"Her Highness wishes to be amused," announced the King, straightening
up. "You said in this circus it your business to make people laugh.
Well, if you can make us laugh you may continue your journey. You may
begin now and you may have three trials."
The King folded his hands on his stomach and leaned back vastly pleased
with himself. Notta's forehead wrinkled anxiously, for Queen Adora
looked as if she had never laughed in her life. But with a wink at
Bob the clown began. First he let out an ear splitting screech that
so alarmed the King his crown fell off. Then he turned a complete
somersault, chair and all, ran across the room on his hands and
cartwheeled back so fast one could not have told whether he was a
person or a pinwheel. Next he bent double, seized his ankles with his
hands and jumped in this singular position entirely over Bob, finishing
with a neat bow before the Queen's throne.
"Do you think that's funny?" puffed the Queen, turning to squarely face
the King, who was mopping his brow with a silk handkerchief.
"No--no!" stuttered Theodore, in a slightly cracked voice. "It quite
upset me, my love. Slammer, where's my crown?" Slammer recovered the
King's crown and then both their Majesties stared solemnly at Notta.
The clown stared back, a puzzled expression on his round jolly face.
Then, dragging a huge handkerchief from his pocket, he whirled it over
his hand and instantly it tied itself into a foolish rag baby, which
the clown clasped to his bosom, crooning:
"I love my baby, 'deed I do,
Indeed, indeed I do!
He has no hair upon his head,
But neither, Sir, have you!
"But his will grow, it will, I know,
As soon as he is big,
But yours will never grow--and so
You'd better buy a wig!"
"Wh--at!" screamed King Theodore furiously, and Notta, dropping the
handkerchief baby, noticed for the first time that the King's head was
entirely bald. Bob Up was holding himself together and smiling into his
collar.
"Shocking!" coughed Adora, looking at the clown through her eye glasses.
"I was singing about Slammer," gulped Notta, noting in an instant that
the chief doorman was bald too. "Now just let me tell you a little
joke. There was once a triangular pig, who could dance a triangular
jig, and--"
"Do you believe that?" shrilled King Theodore, again turning to face
his Queen.
"No," snapped the Queen, shutting her lips very tight. "How could I?"
"Then, if the clouds rolled away, would they be mist?" roared Notta,
before they could continue their disagreeing. He bounced four feet into
the air and pointed playfully at the King.
"I wouldn't miss 'em," replied the King sullenly. "Do you think
_that's_ funny?" Again he turned to the Queen, who shook her head
emphatically.
"Well, I think it's funny!" said Bob, jumping out of his chair. He
looked indignantly from the King to the Queen.
"Then why don't you laugh?" asked the King accusingly. Poor Bob
couldn't explain that laughing was a hard matter for an orphan, so he
sat down rather suddenly, while Notta began looking all around as if he
were hunting something. He searched on each step of the King's throne,
then he looked into his Majesty's lap and, finally, running around to
the back peered under Theodore's collar.
"What's the matter?" asked his Majesty irritably. "What are you looking
for now?"
"My joke," sighed the clown, "I'm looking for my poor little joke. It
was lost on you. When I asked, 'If the clouds rolled away, would they
be mist,' you should have said it's according to the way you spell
'em--see?"
"No," said Theodore, sternly, "I don't,
"I only see you are a dunce;
You haven't made us laugh, not once!"
The Queen nodded emphatically at this and, glaring scornfully at the
two intruders, swept out of the throne room.
"Last rule," whispered Notta, winking at Bob--for out of the tail of
his eye, he could see the King signaling Slammer. Rushing forward
impetuously he flung up his hand. "Could your Majesty tell me a word to
rhyme with toboggan?" he asked pleadingly. Immediately King Theodore's
face lit up with pleasure. He closed his eyes and began to drum with
one hand on the arm of his throne. If there was one thing he adored it
was rhyming.
He forgot to finish his directions to Slammer and instead mumbled
hurriedly under his breath, "Choggin, foggin, doggon, noggin, loggin,
joggin. Ah, I have it--joggin!" He opened his eyes and looked around
triumphantly, but the clown and Bob Up were nowhere to be seen. In
fact they had run as soon as the King's eyes closed. For Notta, while
endeavoring to make their Majesties laugh, had discovered that one of
the doors said "Out." And out they went, bowling over doormen like ten
pins in their headlong flight. As the door slammed they slid down a
steep dark passageway and in about two minutes shot out into the middle
of a dusty road. Above them on a high hill rose the grey walls of the
singular Kingdom of Doorways.
"Toboggan was right," muttered the clown, rising stiffly. "This country
grows odder and odder, Bob. What do they call it now--Oz? But never
mind, we shall have lots to tell each other on stormy nights when we
reach the states. Lots and lots!"
Bob did not answer. Instead he clutched Notta's wide pantaloon and
pointed toward a large clump of bushes. Looking out from the leaves was
the head of a huge, shaggy lion. A shudder ran down the clown's back.
He tried to remember the procedure of Bill, the old lion tamer in the
circus. "Subdue the creature with your eye," Bill said. Yes, that was
what he had said. Notta's knees rattled like castanets, but with a
frightened gulp he stared the lion straight in the eye. For a moment
nothing happened, then with a gusty sigh the lion began to speak.
"What have they done with the rest of me?" it roared mournfully.
"Who?" stuttered Notta, getting a good hold on Bob and making ready to
run at the lion's first move.
"The Mudgers," wheezed the lion, two tears rolling down its nose. With
many gulps and sighs it told them how Tazzywaller had cut it in two and
imprisoned its back half in the lion enclosure.
"You mean to say that you were cut in half and still live to tell the
tale?" gasped Notta in astonishment.
"I don't know what you mean by telling the tail. How can I tell the
tail anything when all my connections with it are cut off? Oh, my poor
tail, how it must miss me!" moaned the half lion.
"Then you only have two legs," said Bob in a relieved tone and coming
out from behind Notta. The lion nodded gloomily. "If I had four, do you
think I'd be standing propped up against these bushes. I'd have eaten
you long ago."
"What a blessing," murmured the clown under his breath, "that it's only
half a lion."
"I'd like a little sympathy," continued the lion in its mournful voice.
"If the little fellow would pat me on the head I think, it would ease
me a bit."
"Shall I?" asked Bob Up doubtfully.
"How do we know you won't bite him?" asked Notta cautiously.
"I haven't the courage," replied the lion dolefully. "Besides my
stomach is gone and that rather takes the appetite away, you know. Oh,
my poor little empty stomach, how dreadfully it must feel! Then, to
bite a person I should have to work myself up into a rage, and that I
cannot do without a tail to lash. And half my heart is missing so I--"
"Do everything half-heartedly," finished Notta, with a wink at Bob.
"Exactly," blubbered the half lion. Two more tears rolled down its
nose, and these so affected Bob Up that he stepped bravely over and
patted its mane.
"Harder!" cried the half lion, closing its eyes. "Harder! Harder!"
Notta seized a stick and fell to patting the lion's head with this, but
it kept roaring harder until Bob Up and Notta were perfectly breathless.
"Sorry," puffed the clown at last, "but we'll have to say good-bye now.
We're on our way to the Emerald City."
"Are you?" The half lion opened its eyes and regarded them with new
interest. "There's a wonderful wizard in the Emerald City," it began
in a more cheerful roar. "Could you, would you, tell him about my sad
separation? Tell him I am pining for my better half and perhaps he
would put me together again. Promise to tell him." The poor beast was
so earnest that he almost lost his balance.
"Why, certainly we will tell him," said Notta, who was the most
obliging soul imaginable. "We'll be glad to, old fellow, but I didn't
think there were any more wizards."
"No wizards?" coughed the lion, surveying the clown in amazement. "Why,
Oz is full of wizards. Just keep going north and you'll soon find that
out. I would go along with you, but I haven't quite learned to travel
on two legs, and I'm so tired of standing."
"Why don't you sit down," asked Bob thoughtlessly. The lion groaned
and looked at him reproachfully, and seeing it was going to cry again
Notta began to move off.
"By the way," he asked, pausing suddenly, "did you come through
Doorways?"
"Yes!" sobbed the lion, sniffing with each word, "through the right
door."
"Which door was that?"
"I don't remember," sighed the half lion drearily. "I remember nothing
nowadays. When I used to forget a fact all I had to do was to scratch
my head with my hind leg and instantly it came back, but now--." The
lion began to sob heavily.
"Well, good-bye!" said Notta uneasily, taking Bob's hand. "If we see
this wizard you've mentioned we'll tell him your sad story."
"Good-bye," choked the lion, waving his paw feebly.
"I'd like to see a real wizard, Notta," said Bob Up, as they trudged
down the dusty road.
"Odder and odder!" murmured the clown, shaking his head in
bewilderment. "I declare, Bob, if you weren't along I should think I
were asleep and dreaming all this."
"Here's another sign," whispered Bob Up in a low voice so the sign
would not hear him. "Wonder if it talks too."
"I dare say they all can if they want to," replied Notta. "At any rate
a sort of sign language."
"North Road to U," said this sign, in large blue letters.
"D stood for doorways. I wonder what U stands for?" mused the little
boy, staring up at the sign with both hands in his pockets.
"Maybe it stands for us?" chuckled the clown, turning a handspring.
"You!" sneered the sign, giving itself a little shake. "Why, I wouldn't
stand for you a single minute. I'd rather--." What it would rather
Notta and Bob did not wait to hear. Seizing hands, they ran gaily down
the road toward the unknown and curious country of U.