The Admiral's Caravan Part 4

"No, it's the postscription," replied the Robin, very seriously; "but, somehow, I never remember it till I come to it. I suppose it's put at the end so that I won't forget it the next time. You see, it's about the only exercise I have."

"I should think it was very good exercise," said Dorothy, trying to look serious again.

"Oh, it's _good_ enough, what there is of it," said the Robin, in an offhand way.

"But I'm sure there's _enough_ of it," said Dorothy.

"There _is_ enough of it, such as it is," replied the Robin.

"Such as it is?" repeated Dorothy, beginning to feel a little perplexed.

"Why, it's _hard_ enough, I'm sure. It's enough to drive a person quite distracted."

"Well, it's a corker till you get used to it," said the Robin, strutting about. "There's such a tremendous variety to it, you see, that it exercises you all over at once."

This was so ridiculous that Dorothy laughed outright. "I should _never_ get used to it," she said. "I don't believe I know a single one of the answers."

"_I_ do!" said Bob Scarlet, proudly; "I know 'em all. It's 'No' to everything in it."

"Dear me!" said Dorothy, feeling quite provoked at herself, "of course it is. I never thought of that."

"And when you can answer _them_," continued the Robin, with a very important air, "you can answer anything."

Now, as the Robin said this, it suddenly occurred to Dorothy that she had been lost for quite a long time, and that this was a good opportunity for getting a little information, so she said very politely: "Then I wish you'd please tell me where I am."

"Why, you're _here_," replied the Robin, promptly. "That's what _I_ call an easy one."

"But _where_ is it?" said Dorothy.

"Where is _what_?" said the Robin, looking rather puzzled.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'WHY, THE PLACE WHERE I AM,' SAID DOROTHY."]

"Why, the place where I am," said Dorothy.

"That's here, too," replied the Robin, and then, looking at her suspiciously, he added, "Come--no chaffing, you know. I won't have it."

"But I'm _not_ chaffing," said Dorothy, beginning to feel a little provoked; "it's only because you twist the things I say the wrong way."

"What do you say 'em the wrong way for, then?" said Bob Scarlet, irritably. "Why don't you get 'em straight?"

"Dear me!" exclaimed Dorothy, now quite out of patience. "How dreadfully confusing it all is! Don't you understand?--I only want to know where the place is where I am now,--whereabouts in the geography, I mean," she added in desperation.

"It isn't in there at all," said Bob Scarlet, very decidedly. "There isn't a geography going that could hold on to it for five minutes."

"Do you mean that it isn't _anywhere_?" exclaimed Dorothy, beginning to feel a little frightened.

"No, I don't," said Bob Scarlet, obstinately. "I mean that it is anywhere--anywhere that it chooses to be, you know; only it doesn't _stay_ anywhere any longer than it likes."

"Then I'm going away," said Dorothy, hastily. "I won't stay in such a place."

"Well, you'd better be quick about it," said the Robin, with a chuckle, "or there won't be any place to go away _from_. I can feel it beginning to go now," and with this remark Bob Scarlet him self hurried away.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "DOROTHY STARTED OFF AT ONCE, AS FAST AS SHE COULD RUN."]

There was something so alarming in the idea of a place going away and leaving her behind, that Dorothy started off at once, as fast as she could run, and indeed she wasn't a moment too soon. The garden itself was already beginning to be very much agitated, and the clothes on the plants were folding themselves up in a fluttering sort of a way as she ran past them; and she noticed, moreover, that the little shoes on the shoe-shrub were so withered away that they looked like a lot of raisins.

But she had no time to stop and look at such things, and she ran on and on until, to her delight, she came suddenly upon the little trap-door where she had come up. There wasn't a minute to spare, and she jumped down into the hole without so much as stopping to look back at the vanis.h.i.+ng garden, and hurried down the little stairway. It was as dark as pitch, and as she ran down, going around and around, on the winding stairs, she could hear them folding up behind her like the slats of a blind; and she had just time to rush through the door at the bottom, when the trunk of the tree flapped inward like an empty bag and then shot up into the air.

CHAPTER VI

IN THE TOY-SHOP

The first thing that Dorothy did was to draw a long breath over her narrow escape, and the next thing was to look up into the air to see what had become of the tree, and she saw the braided floor of the garden floating away, far above her head, with the flapping trunks of the trees dangling from it like a lot of one-legged trousers. This was a rather ridiculous spectacle, and when the floor presently shriveled up into a small brown patch, like a flying pancake, and then went entirely out of sight, she said "Pooh!" very contemptuously and felt quite brave again.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'IT IS A SHELF!' SHE EXCLAIMED."]

"It wasn't half so solemn as I expected," she went on, chattering to herself; "I certainly thought there would be all kinds of phenomeners, and, after all, it's precisely like nothing but a big basket of old clothes, blowing away. But it's just as well to be saved, of course, only I don't know where I am any more than I did before. It's a kind of wooden floor, I think," she added, stamping on it with her little shoe; "and, dear me! I verily believe it's nothing but a shelf. It _is_ a shelf!" she exclaimed, peeping cautiously over the edge; "and there's the real floor ever so far away. I can never jump down there in the world without being dashed to destruction!"--and she was just thinking how it would do to hang from the edge of the shelf by her hands and then let herself drop (with her eyes shut, of course) when a little party of people came tumbling down through the air and fell in a heap close beside her. She gave a scream of dismay and then stood staring at them in utter bewilderment, for, as the party scrambled to their feet, she saw they were the Caravan, dressed up in the most extraordinary fas.h.i.+on, in little frocks and long shawls, and all wearing sunbonnets. The Highlander, with his usual bad luck, had put on _his_ sunbonnet backward, with the crown over his face, and was struggling with it so helplessly that Dorothy rushed at him and got it off just in time to save him from being suffocated. In fact, he was so black in the face that she had to pound him on the back to bring him to.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "THE HIGHLANDER, WITH HIS USUAL BAD LUCK, HAD PUT ON HIS SUNBONNET BACKWARD."]

"We're disguised, you know," said the Admiral, breathlessly. "We found these things under the bed. Bob Scarlet isn't anywhere about, is he?" he added, staring around in an agitated manner through his spy-gla.s.s.

"About?" said Dorothy, trying to look serious. "I should think he was about five miles from here by this time."

"I wish it was five thousand," exclaimed Sir Walter, angrily, smoothing down his frock. "Old Peckjabber!"

"Why, what in the world is the matter?" said Dorothy, beginning to laugh in spite of herself.

"Matter!" exclaimed the Admiral, his voice fairly trembling with emotion; "why, look here! We was all shrinking away to nothing in that wanis.h.i.+ng garden. Bob Scarlet himself was no bigger than an ant when we came away."

"And we wasn't any bigger than uncles," put in the Highlander.

"_You're_ not more than three inches high this minute," said Sir Walter, surveying Dorothy with a critical air, with his head c.o.c.ked on one side.

"Goodness gracious!" exclaimed Dorothy, with a start. "It seems to me that's extremely small. I should think that I'd have felt it coming on."

"It comes on sort of sneaking, and you don't notice it," said the Admiral. "_We'd_ have been completely inwisible by this time if we hadn't jumped overboard."

"It was an awful jump!" said Dorothy, solemnly. "Didn't it hurt to fall so far?"

"Not at all," said the Admiral, cheerfully. "The falling part of it was quite agreeable--so cool and rus.h.i.+ng, you know; but the landing was tremenjious severe."

"Banged us like anything," explained the Highlander; and with this the Caravan locked arms and walked away with the tails of their shawls trailing behind them.

"What strange little things they are!" said Dorothy, reflectively, as she walked along after them, "and they're for all the world precisely like arimated dolls--movable, you know," she added, not feeling quite sure that "arimated" was the proper word,--"and speaking of dolls, here's a perfect mult.i.tude of 'em!" she exclaimed, for just then she came upon a long row of dolls beautifully dressed, and standing on their heels with their heads against the wall. They were at least five times as big as Dorothy herself, and had price-tickets tucked into their sashes, such as "2/6, CHEAP," "5_s._, REAL WAX," and so on; and Dorothy, clapping her hands in an ecstasy of delight, exclaimed: "Why, it's a monstrous, enormous toy-shop!" and then she hurried on to see what else there might be on exhibition.