Ozma of Oz, Page 2

  The Girl in the Chicken Coop

  The wind blew hard and joggled the water of the ocean, sending ripplesacross its surface. Then the wind pushed the edges of the ripples untilthey became waves, and shoved the waves around until they becamebillows. The billows rolled dreadfully high: higher even than the topsof houses. Some of them, indeed, rolled as high as the tops of talltrees, and seemed like mountains, and the gulfs between the greatbillows were like deep valleys.

  All this mad dashing and splashing of the waters of the big ocean, whichthe mischievous wind caused without any good reason whatever, resultedin a terrible storm, and a storm on the ocean is liable to cut manyqueer pranks and do a lot of damage.

  At the time the wind began to blow, a ship was sailing far out upon thewaters. When the waves began to tumble and toss and to grow bigger andbigger the ship rolled up and down, and tipped sidewise--first one wayand then the other--and was jostled around so roughly that even thesailor-men had to hold fast to the ropes and railings to keep themselvesfrom being swept away by the wind or pitched headlong into the sea.

  And the clouds were so thick in the sky that the sunlight couldn't getthrough them; so that the day grew dark as night, which added to theterrors of the storm.

  The Captain of the ship was not afraid, because he had seen stormsbefore, and had sailed his ship through them in safety; but he knew thathis passengers would be in danger if they tried to stay on deck, so heput them all into the cabin and told them to stay there until after thestorm was over, and to keep brave hearts and not be scared, and allwould be well with them.

  Now, among these passengers was a little Kansas girl named DorothyGale, who was going with her Uncle Henry to Australia, to visit somerelatives they had never before seen. Uncle Henry, you must know, wasnot very well, because he had been working so hard on his Kansas farmthat his health had given way and left him weak and nervous. So he leftAunt Em at home to watch after the hired men and to take care of thefarm, while he traveled far away to Australia to visit his cousins andhave a good rest.

  Dorothy was eager to go with him on this journey, and Uncle Henrythought she would be good company and help cheer him up; so he decidedto take her along. The little girl was quite an experienced traveller,for she had once been carried by a cyclone as far away from home as themarvelous Land of Oz, and she had met with a good many adventures inthat strange country before she managed to get back to Kansas again. Soshe wasn't easily frightened, whatever happened, and when the wind beganto howl and whistle, and the waves began to tumble and toss, our littlegirl didn't mind the uproar the least bit.

  "Of course we'll have to stay in the cabin," she said to Uncle Henry andthe other passengers, "and keep as quiet as possible until the storm isover. For the Captain says if we go on deck we may be blown overboard."

  No one wanted to risk such an accident as that, you may be sure; so allthe passengers stayed huddled up in the dark cabin, listening to theshrieking of the storm and the creaking of the masts and rigging andtrying to keep from bumping into one another when the ship tippedsidewise.

  Dorothy had almost fallen asleep when she was aroused with a start tofind that Uncle Henry was missing. She couldn't imagine where he hadgone, and as he was not very strong she began to worry about him, and tofear he might have been careless enough to go on deck. In that case hewould be in great danger unless he instantly came down again.

  The fact was that Uncle Henry had gone to lie down in his littlesleeping-berth, but Dorothy did not know that. She only remembered thatAunt Em had cautioned her to take good care of her uncle, so at once shedecided to go on deck and find him, in spite of the fact that thetempest was now worse than ever, and the ship was plunging in a reallydreadful manner. Indeed, the little girl found it was as much as shecould do to mount the stairs to the deck, and as soon as she got therethe wind struck her so fiercely that it almost tore away the skirts ofher dress. Yet Dorothy felt a sort of joyous excitement in defying thestorm, and while she held fast to the railing she peered around throughthe gloom and thought she saw the dim form of a man clinging to a mastnot far away from her. This might be her uncle, so she called as loudlyas she could:

  "Uncle Henry! Uncle Henry!"

  "UNCLE HENRY! UNCLE HENRY!" CALLED DOROTHY]

  But the wind screeched and howled so madly that she scarce heard her ownvoice, and the man certainly failed to hear her, for he did not move.

  Dorothy decided she must go to him; so she made a dash forward, during alull in the storm, to where a big square chicken-coop had been lashed tothe deck with ropes. She reached this place in safety, but no sooner hadshe seized fast hold of the slats of the big box in which the chickenswere kept than the wind, as if enraged because the little girl dared toresist its power, suddenly redoubled its fury. With a scream like thatof an angry giant it tore away the ropes that held the coop and liftedit high into the air, with Dorothy still clinging to the slats. Aroundand over it whirled, this way and that, and a few moments later thechicken-coop dropped far away into the sea, where the big waves caughtit and slid it up-hill to a foaming crest and then downhill into a deepvalley, as if it were nothing more than a plaything to keep them amused.

  Dorothy had a good ducking, you may be sure, but she didn't loose herpresence of mind even for a second. She kept tight hold of the stoutslats and as soon as she could get the water out of her eyes she sawthat the wind had ripped the cover from the coop, and the poor chickenswere fluttering away in every direction, being blown by the wind untilthey looked like feather dusters without handles. The bottom of the coopwas made of thick boards, so Dorothy found she was clinging to a sort ofraft, with sides of slats, which readily bore up her weight. Aftercoughing the water out of her throat and getting her breath again, shemanaged to climb over the slats and stand upon the firm wooden bottom ofthe coop, which supported her easily enough.

  "Why, I've got a ship of my own!" she thought, more amused thanfrightened at her sudden change of condition; and then, as the coopclimbed up to the top of a big wave, she looked eagerly around for theship from which she had been blown.

  It was far, far away, by this time. Perhaps no one on board had yetmissed her, or knew of her strange adventure. Down into a valleybetween the waves the coop swept her, and when she climbed anothercrest the ship looked like a toy boat, it was such a long way off. Soonit had entirely disappeared in the gloom, and then Dorothy gave a sighof regret at parting with Uncle Henry and began to wonder what was goingto happen to her next.

  Just now she was tossing on the bosom of a big ocean, with nothing tokeep her afloat but a miserable wooden hen-coop that had a plank bottomand slatted sides, through which the water constantly splashed andwetted her through to the skin! And there was nothing to eat when shebecame hungry--as she was sure to do before long--and no fresh water todrink and no dry clothes to put on.

  "Well, I declare!" she exclaimed, with a laugh. "You're in a pretty fix,Dorothy Gale, I can tell you! and I haven't the least idea how you'regoing to get out of it!"

  As if to add to her troubles the night was now creeping on, and the grayclouds overhead changed to inky blackness. But the wind, as if satisfiedat last with its mischievous pranks, stopped blowing this ocean andhurried away to another part of the world to blow something else; sothat the waves, not being joggled any more, began to quiet down andbehave themselves.

  DOROTHY AFLOAT IN THE HEN-COOP]

  It was lucky for Dorothy, I think, that the storm subsided; otherwise,brave though she was, I fear she might have perished. Many children, inher place, would have wept and given way to despair; but because Dorothyhad encountered so many adventures and come safely through them it didnot occur to her at this time to be especially afraid. She was wet anduncomfortable, it is true; but, after sighing that one sigh I told youof, she managed to recall some of her customary cheerfulness and decidedto patiently await whatever her fate might be.

  By and by the black clouds rolled away and showed a blue sky overhead,with a silver moon shining sweetly in the mi
ddle of it and little starswinking merrily at Dorothy when she looked their way. The coop did nottoss around any more, but rode the waves more gently--almost like acradle rocking--so that the floor upon which Dorothy stood was no longerswept by water coming through the slats. Seeing this, and being quiteexhausted by the excitement of the past few hours, the little girldecided that sleep would be the best thing to restore her strength andthe easiest way in which she could pass the time. The floor was damp andshe was herself wringing wet, but fortunately this was a warm climateand she did not feel at all cold. So she sat down in a corner of thecoop, leaned her back against the slats, nodded at the friendly starsbefore she closed her eyes, and was asleep in half a minute.