Kabumpo in Oz, Ruth Plumly Thompson [the snowy day read aloud TXT] 📗
- Author: Ruth Plumly Thompson
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“Shall I go?” asked the Hurrah Bird, looking very crestfallen and pointing its claw at Peg Amy.
“Maybe you can tell us the way to Sun Top Mountain,” said Peg politely.
“You can see it from the other side of the hill,” replied the Hurrah Bird. “I’ll give you a few hurrahs for luck. Hurrah! Hurrah! Hur-rah!”
“Oh, go away,” grumbled Kabumpo.
“Not till you look at my nest. Did you ever see a Hurrah Bird’s nest?” he chirped brightly.
“Let’s look at it,” said Pompa, smiling in spite of himself. The Hurrah Bird preened itself proudly as they peered through the bushes. Surely it had the gayest nest ever built, for it was woven of straw of many colors, and hung all over the near-by branches were small Oz flags. In the nest three little yellow chicks were growing up into Hurrahs and they chirped faintly at the visitors.
“Remember,” called the Father Hurrah, as they bade him good-bye, “you can always be cheerful in three chirps if you think of what you might have been, what you are, and what you are going to be. Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!”
“There’s something in what you’ve said,” chuckled Wag. “Goodbye!”
The moon had come up brightly and even Kabumpo began to feel more like himself. “There’s a lot to be learned by traveling, eh, Wag?” He winked at the rabbit, who was just behind him. “Let’s see-somersaults for sums-never be gormish-and now, how to be cheerful in three chirps. Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!” The Elegant Elephant began to plow swiftly through the daisy field, so that in almost no time they reached the top of the little hill and as they did so Peg gave a little scream of delight. As for the others, they were simply speechless.
A purple mountain rose steeply ahead, and set like a crown upon its summit was a glittering gold castle, the loveliest, laciest gold castle you could imagine, with a hundred fluttering pennants. All down the mountain side spread its lovely gardens, its golden arbors and flower bordered paths.
“I’ve seen it before!” cried the Wooden Doll softly, but no one heard her. Pompa drew a deep breath, for the castle, shimmering in the moonlight, seemed almost too beautiful to believe.
“Whe-ew!” whistled Wag, breaking the silence, “The Princess of Tun Sop Wountain must be wonderful.”
“Shall we start up now?” gasped Kabumpo, swinging his trunk nervously.
“I don’t believe she’ll ever marry me. Let’s don’t go at all,” muttered the Prince of Pumperdink in a shaky voice.
“Oh, come on!” called Wag, who was curious to see the owner of so grand a castle.
“But we mustn’t go, Wag,” gasped Peg Amy. “How would it look to have a shabby old doll tagging along when he’s trying to talk to the Princess!” “
If Peg doesn’t go, I’m not going,” declared Pompa stubbornly.
“You’re just as good as any Princess,” said Kabumpo, “and I’m not going without you, either.”
As the Elegant Elephant refused to budge and there seemed no other way out of it, Peg Amy finally consented and the four adventurers started fearfully up the winding path, almost expecting the castle to disappear before they reached the top, so unreal did it seem in the moonlight. There was no one in the garden but there were lights in the castle windows. “Just as if they expected us,” said the Elegant Elephant, as they reached the tall gates. Pompa opened the gates and next instant they were standing before the great castle door.
“Shall we knock?” chattered Wag, his eyes sticking out with excitement.
“No! Wait a minute,” begged the Prince, who was becoming more agitated every minute.
“Here’s the mirror and the door knob,” quavered Kabumpo. “Didn’t the Question Box say to trust them? Why, look here, Pompa, my boy, it fits!” Clumsily, Kabumpo held up the glittering door knob he had brought all the way from Pumperdink; then he slipped it easily on the small gold bar projecting from the door.
But instead of looking joyful Pompa groaned dismally. He started to protest but Kabumpo had already turned the knob and they found themselves in a glittering gold court room.
“Now for the Princess,” puffed Kabumpo, looking around with his twinkling little eyes. “Here, take the mirror, Pompa.” The room was empty, although brilliantly lighted, and the Prince stood uncertainly in the very center. Suddenly, with a determined little cry, Pompa rushed over to Peg Amy, who stood leaning against a tall gold chair.
“Peg,” choked Pompa, dropping on his knees beside the Wooden Doll, “I’ll have to find some other way to save Pumperdink. I’m not going to marry this Princess and have you taken away from me. You’re a proper enough Princess for me and we’ll just go back to Pumperdink and be—
“The mirror! Look in the mirror!” screamed Wag, who was sitting beside Peg Amy.
Unconsciously, Pompa had held out the gold mirror and Peg, leaning over to listen, had looked directly into it. Above Peg’s pleasant reflection in the mirror they read these startling and important words:
This is Peg Amy, Princess of Sun Top Mountain.
While Pompa stared with round eyes the words faded out and this new legend formed in the glass:
The Proper Princess is Found! This is the Proper Princess.
“I always knew you were a Princess,” cried Wag, turning a somersault.
The big rabbit had just come right-side-up, when a still more amazing thing happened. The wooden body of Peg melted before their eyes and in its place stood the loveliest little Princess in the world. And yet, with all her beauty, she was strangely like the old Peg. Her eyes had the same merry twinkle and her mouth the same pleasant curve.
“Oh!” cried Princess Peg, holding her arms out to her friends. “Now I am the happiest person in Oz!”
Before Pompa had time to rise, a tall, richly clad old nobleman rushed into the room.
“Peg!” cried the old gentleman, clasping the Princess in his arms. “You are back! At last the enchantment is broken!”
For moment the two forgot all about Pompa and the others. Then, gently disengaging herself, Peg seized the Prince’s hands and drew him to his feet.
“Uncle,” she said breathlessly, holding to Pompa with one hand and waving with the other at Kabumpo and Wag, “here are the friends responsible for my release. This is my Uncle Tozzyfog,” she explained quickly, and impulsively Uncle Tozzyfog sprang to his feet and embraced each in turn-even Kabumpo.
“Sit down,” begged the old nobleman, sinking into a golden chair and mopping his head with a flowered silk kerchief.
Pompa, who could not take his eyes from his new and wonderful Peg Amy, dropped into another chair. Kabumpo leaned limply against a pillar and Wag sat where he was, his nose twitching faster than ever and his ears stuck out straight behind him.
“You are probably wondering about the change in Peg,” began Uncle Tozzyfog, as the Princess perched on the arm of his chair, “so I’ll try to tell my part of the story. Three years ago an ugly old peddler climbed the path to Sun Top Mountain. He said his name was Glegg and, forcing his way into the castle, he demanded the hand of my niece in marriage.”
Peg shuddered and Uncle Tozzyfog blew his nose violently at the distressing memory. Then, speaking rapidly and pausing every few minutes to appeal to the Princess, he continued the story of Peg’s enchantment. Naturally the old peddler had been refused and thrown out of the castle. That night as Uncle Tozzyfog prepared to carve the royal roast, there came an explosion, and when the courtiers had picked themselves up Peg Amy was nowhere to be seen, and only a threatening scroll remained to explain the mystery. Glegg, who was really a powerful magician, infuriated by Uncle Tozzyfog’s treatment, had changed the little Princess into a tree.
“Know ye,” began the scroll quite like the one that had spoiled Pompa’s birthday, “know ye that unless ye Princess of Sun Top Mountain consents to wed J. Glegg she shall remain a tree forever, or until two shall call and believe her to be a Princess.
The whole castle had been plunged into utmost gloom by this terrible happening, for Peg was the kindliest, best loved little Princess any Kingdom could wish for. Lord Tozzyfog and nearly all the Courtiers set out at once to search for the little tree and for two years they wandered over Oz, addressing every hopeful tree as Princess, but never happening on the right one. Finally they returned in despair and Sun Top Mountain, once the most cheerful Kingdom in all Oz, had become the gloomiest. There was no singing, nor dancing-no happiness of any kind. Even the flowers had drooped in the absence of their little Mistress.
“Why didn’t you appeal to Ozma?” demanded Pompa at this point in the story.
“Because in another scroll Glegg warned us that the day we told Ozma, Peg Amy would cease to even be a tree,” explained Uncle Tozzyfog hoarsely.
“Then how did she become a doll? Tell me that, Uncle Fozzytog,” gulped Wag, raising one paw.
“She’ll have to tell you that herself,” confessed Peg’s uncle, “for that’s all of the story I know.”
So here Peg took up the story herself. The morning after her transformation into a tree Glegg had appeared and asked her again to marry him. “I was a little yellow tree, in the Winkie Country, not far from the Emerald City,” explained Peg, “and every day for two months Glegg appeared and gave me the power of speech long enough to answer his question. And each time he asked me to marry him but I always said ‘No!’ ” The Princess shook her yellow curls briskly.
“One afternoon there came a one-legged sailor man and a little girl.” Even Kabumpo shuddered as Peg Amy told how Cap’n Bill had cut down the little tree, pared off all the branches and carved from the trunk a small wooden doll for Trot.
“It didn’t hurt,” Princess Peg hastened to explain as she caught Pompa’s sorrowful expression, “and being a doll was a lot better than being a tree. I could not move or speak but I knew what was going on and life in Ozma’s palace was cheerful and interesting. Only, of course, I longed to tell Ozma or Trot of my enchantment. I missed dear Uncle Tozzyfog and all the people of Sun Top Mountain. Then, as you all know, I was stolen by the old gnome and after Ruggedo carried me underground I forgot all about being a Princess and remembered nothing of this.” Peg glanced lovingly around the room. “I only felt that I had been alive before. So you!” Peg jumped up and flung one arm around Wag, “and you,” she flung the other around Pompa, “saved me by calling me a Princess and really believing I was one. And you!” Peg hastened over to Kabumpo, who was rolling his eyes sadly. “You are the darlingest old elephant in Oz! See, I still have the necklace and bracelet!” And sure enough on Peg’s round arm and white neck gleamed the jewels the Elegant Elephant had generously given when he thought her only a funny Wooden Doll.
“Oh!” groaned Kabumpo. “Why didn’t I let you look in the mirror before? No wonder you kept remembering things.”
“But why did Glegg send the threatening scroll to Pumperdink three years after he’d enchanted Peg?” asked Wag, scratching his head.
“Because!” shrilled a piercing voice, and in through the
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