The Hidden Valley of Oz Read online

  The Hidden Valley of Oz

  by

  Rachel R. Cosgrove

  Chapter 1

  Jam Builds a Collapsible Kite

  THE Collapsible Kite was almost completed. The little boy laboriously spelled out the final directions from the magazine that lay propped open, a small stone on either side to keep the breeze from disturbing the pages.

  "Make a tail," he read, "ty-ing to-geth-er pieces of cloth."

  Leaving the kite on the ground, he raced down the slope, slid under the fence, and hurried to the house.

  "Mother, mother," he called in his shrill little voice.

  "Mother, may I have some pieces of cloth?"

  His mother appeared at the kitchen door. She had been cleaning the house, and her hair was tied up in a scarf. She held a mop in her hand.

  "What kind of cloth, Jam?" She asked her son. Jam was really only his nickname. His full name was Jonathan Andrew Manley, so his initials spelled "The directions said to use pieces of cloth to make a tail," he explained.

  His mother looked puzzled. "A tail for what?" She inquired.

  "For my Collapsible Kite," he told her. "I found the directions in my How to Build It Magazine. It's a special kind of kite that folds up into a little bundle so you can carry it easily."

  Mrs. Manley knew that Jam had been building something on the hill back of the house, but she had been busy and hadn't paid much attention to her son.

  Now she went to her sewing room and found an old sheet that had worn thin in the middle.

  "Do you think you can tear this up into strips for a tail?" She asked as she showed him the sheet.

  "Oh, yes, thank you, mother," he said, taking the sheet and racing back toward the hill. He slid under the fence once more, with never a thought about getting his blue jeans and cowboy shirt dirty. In his hurry he knocked off the cowboy hat that he had bought for fifty cents and three cereal box tops. He had to stop, pick it up, and settle it securely on his head. He wanted a pair of cowboy boots, too, but his father had said, "No."

  Poring over the directions for the kite once more Jam found exactly how to attach the tail. Spread out on the ground, the kite looked very large. It was, in fact, much larger than the directions called for. Jam had decided it was easier to build the kite frame larger to fit the pieces of wood he had been able to find, than to try to cut the wood without a saw. The frame was hinged so that the whole kite would fold into a small compact bundle. This especially appealed to the little boy, for he hoped to take the kite with him the next time his father took his family with him, as he occasionally did, on a field trip to collect specimens. Jam's father was the famous Professor Manley, a biologist who spent much of his time traveling to far away places in search of rare plants and animals.

  "This kite looks big," he said to himself. "I'll bet it's big enough to fly away up into the sky and carry me with it. I wonder if it could. Maybe if I could hang a big box, or something like that, from the frame, I could sit in it and fly away up high like an airplane."

  Then he remembered the crate. It was a large wooden crate that had contained a piece of delicate apparatus that his father had ordered for the laboratory. After the instrument had been unpacked, the crate was put out behind the garage, to be disposed of later. It would be just the thing! Jam hurried back down the hill, under the fence, and back of the garage. The crate was still there. Although it was big, it was not very heavy. Jam carried it back to the fence. It wouldn't go under the wire, but he finally managed to turn it on end and dump it over the fence.

  Then he crawled under the wire and lugged the crate up the slope to the place where the kite lay. He found some rope which he used to tie the crate to the kite.

  The crate would swing below the huge paper covered wooden frame when the kite was in the air.

  "Now," he said, "I'm ready for my expedition."

  But if this were to be a scientific expedition, he'd need some equipment. Hurrying back to the house he rummaged through his closet and found his camping knapsack. On his way out through the kitchen he took some cookies from the jar on the shelf and some apples from the basket that stood in the corner.

  Then he hurried over to the long, low building that housed his father's private laboratory.

  "Father, I'm going on a scientific expedition," he announced.

  Professor Manley was very busy, so he just said "Fine, fine," without looking up from his microscope.

  "May I take some of the animals with me to see what effect a different climate has on them?" Jam asked eagerly, looking at the cages of white rats and guinea pigs that lined one side of the long room.

  "You take them with you," he continued, "and I want my expedition to be just like yours are."

  "Ummm," his father muttered. Jam took this to mean yes, so he picked up a cage that held one white rat and another in which two little guinea pigs lay sleeping. He was glad he could take them with him.

  Fully equipped, he raced back to his kite on the side of the hill. He loaded the knapsack and the animals into the crate and crawled in after them. For a moment Jam just sat there thinking about how wonderful it would be if his kite actually would take him flying high up in the clouds over lakes and forests and mountains. "Why," he said aloud, "a fine kite like this might even take me to some strange land." He looked over the edge of the crate and tried to imagine what it would be like if the ground were a mile below him. It was fun to imagine such things, but of course he never really believed a home-made kite could lift a boy off the ground.

  Suddenly a freakish gust of wind swept the hillside.

  The kite, with Jam still in its crate, was caught up and lifted a few inches into the air. In a moment it settled down on the grass again, but Jam was as excited as if it had carried him miles. "Why," he said, jumping out of the crate, "I'll bet if I took my kite up to the top of the hill where the wind is strong it would fly like an airplane!" And so up the hill he went, dragging the crate and carrying the kite in his hand. As he climbed higher the hill became more steep, but he trudged along happily. Just as he reached the top the wind howled fiercely and the kite was wrenched from his grasp. Quickly Jam caught hold of the crate with both hands. It was already rising, but he clung to it firmly as it soared up, up, up into the sky. It took all the strength he had, but at last he was able to get one leg over the side and climb in. "Whew," he said, "this kite flies even better than I imagined it would!"

  He looked down. The ground didn't look the way he had thought it would. It seemed very far away.

  As the wind increased and the kite rose higher, he began to be a little frightened because the hills and valleys were gradually fading from view. There was nothing Jam could do about it He didn't know how to make his kite take him down to earth again. He hadn't even thought about that when he was building it, but then he never really thought it would fly.

  "Golly, if only this wind would die down," he thought.

  But the wind blew harder and harder, and he wished he were safely at home instead of flying high above the clouds in his strange kite. He even wished he had never built it. "What good is a kite if I can't make it go where I want it to go?" He said sadly. The hours passed slowly and at last it was dusk, but the kite flew on and on. When night came and there was nothing but darkness all around him, Jam curled up in the bottom of the crate and closed his eyes. The wind sang and the crate rocked him gently. After a little while he fell asleep.

  Chapter 2

  The Talking Trio

  JAM was rudely awakened by a hard jolt that threw him out onto the ground. For a few moments he thought that he was at home and had fallen out of his bed. Then he remembered. The kite no longer seemed in motion. Opening his eyes, he was blinded for a moment by the sunlight. T
hen, when his eyes were accustomed to the brightness, he sat up and looked around. The kite had come to earth and the crate had been broken to pieces when it struck the ground. Luckily the ground was very grassy, and Jam had not been hurt when he was dumped out of the crate.

  He looked around to see if he could get any clue to where he was. A hill sloped down into a beautiful valley, where a river wound leisurely among trees and flowers. The plain, stretching away to a distant haze of mountains, was covered with a luxuriant growth of purple sage. Nearer at hand the ground was carpeted with large violets and pansies that looked as if they were made of royal purple velvet. Purple grackles walked over the ground, searching for food.

  "I must be in the country," said Jam aloud. "I don't see any houses at all. Where in the world am I, anyway?"

  Before trying to find out where he was Jam looked at the guinea pigs and the rat to be sure they were not hurt. He peered into one cage and saw two fat little faces looking out at him. The guinea pigs were short and chubby and had brown and white spots on their backs. Their eyes were black and snappy, and their whiskers wiggled gaily at him. They certainly Were not hurt. And the white rat seemed to be in equally good health.

  Jam pulled his knapsack and some food from the wreckage of the crate, strapped the knapsack on his back, and started to look for a house where he might be able to let his parents know that he was safe. He seemed to be miles from civilization, but he hoped he could send some sort of message. As he turned he heard a whistle behind him and a piping little cry.

  "Hey, wait for us!"

  He jumped six inches into the air and peered around looking to see who had called to him. No one was there.

  "I guess I just thought I heard someone call me,"

  he said aloud. He was a little startled by the sound of his own voice.

  "No, sir, kiddo, you really heard something,"

  squeaked a third little voice.

  Jam whirled around in terror and cried, "Who is it? Where are you hiding?"

  "Right here in the cage," came the two little voices again, one starting the sentence while the other chimed in to finish it. It was the guinea pigs!

  "Did you say something to me?" He asked in amazement.

  "Certainly we did," said the two creatures, smiling at him.

  "But guinea pigs can't talk," he cried, close to tears.

  "What's wrong with you?"

  "Nothing's wrong, kiddo," squeaked the third voice he had heard, and the white rat sat up and stuck the tip of his nose out through the wire mesh of his cage.

  "You can talk, so why shouldn't we? After all, I'm the flashiest little white rat around," and he blew on his claws and polished them on his fur. "I'm Percy the personality kid, y 'know."

  "Oh, you're stuck up," squealed the guinea pigs.

  "And you're not so important, either."

  Jam's eyes had been getting bigger and bigger during this conversation. Animals couldn't talk, he knew; however, here they were, talking away as if it were the most natural thing in the world. What ever could have happened to them, to make them behave in this strange fashion?

  While Jam stood wondering, Percy, the rat, said "Well, kiddo, why stand there like a bump on a log?

  Open the cages and let us out. We get tired of being cooped up all day."

  "Yes, please let us out," echoed the funny little pigs, racing round and round the cage in excitement.

  So, opening the cages, Jam took out the little creatures, putting one guinea pig in his pocket on the right side, one in the pocket on his left side, and setting Percy on his shoulder.

  "Can you stay there without falling off?" Asked the little boy of the white rat.

  "Sure thing, kiddo," said the white rat, sniffing the air in all directions and looking around him with his beady red eyes." This is quite the life. By the way kiddo, "he whispered into Jam's ear," those two guys are mighty stupid. Why not ditch them and stick with me? We'll go places together, kiddo."

  "We heard that remark," cried the little guinea pigs.

  "You're not so smart, you know!"

  "You're just a rat!" And they pulled their faces back into Jam's pockets to keep from associating with their flippant companion.

  "Huh," said Percy to Jam. "They're just jealous that's what they are. They don't even have classy names like mine. High tone, that's what mine is.

  Percy, the personality kid, "and he slapped Jam on the shoulder with his tiny white paw.

  "Do they have names, too?" Asked Jam.

  "Certainly we have names," came the muffled answers from the pigs.

  "I'm Pinny and I'm Gig," they squeaked.

  Chapter 3

  Jam Meets the Gillikens

  JAM decided that he might as well fold up the Collapsible Kite and take it along, even though, without the crate, it would be impossible to use it as a vehicle to carry him through the air. Even if he could fly it, he wouldn't know how to guide it back to his home. So he bent the frame at the hinged joints, and soon nothing was left of the kite but a bundle of paper and wood strips which he bound to the outside of the knapsack with the ropes that had held the crate.

  Fastening the knapsack and kite on his back and tying his cowboy hat securely under his chin, Jam prepared to explore this strange country in which he now found himself. He looked around, wondering which way to go.

  "There's a path winding round the hill," squeaked Percy.

  "We'll walk that way then," replied Jam, "for if there is a path, someone must have walked here. And right now I want to see someone."

  As if in answer to his wish, a strange group came into sight from behind the hill. They were little men no taller than Jam, and the dozen or more of them advanced slowly and cautiously, huddling together as if for protection.

  "Hello," he called, running to meet them. Percy hung on with all four feet to keep from being bounced to the ground.

  The men seemed frightened by Jam's sudden rush toward them. They turned and began to flee in confusion.

  "Wait for me," cried Jam. "Wait for me. Please don't run away."

  The men, hearing his childish voice, slowed down and finally stopped at a safe distance from Jam and his animal friends.

  "Why are they afraid?" Asked Pinny and Gig.

  "We won't hurt them."

  One of the men, bolder than his companions, advanced a few paces toward the boy. The man was dressed all in purple, with a tall pointed purple hat that had a wide round brim edged with purple bells which tinkled as he walked, a purple coat with a lavender waistcoat under it, purple velvet knee pants and high purple leather boots with long pointed toes that curled up. Coming closer to Jam, the man swept off his purple hat, making the little bells on the brim tinkle merrily, and bowed low to the little boy.

  "Oh, noble wizard, or sorcerer," he began in humble tones, "have you come to destroy us, or have you come to deliver us from Terp, the Terrible?"

  Jam looked at him in amazement. At a nudge from Percy, he spoke.

  "I'm not a wizard or anything except a boy." Then remembering his mother's admonition about what to do if he ever was lost, he added," My name is Jonathan Andrew Manley. I live at 403 Terrace Place Evansville, Ohio. I am lost and I want to go home.

  Will you please tell me where I am and how to get home again?"

  The odd little man in the purple suit bowed low a second time and replied, "Oh, noble person from the sky, I have never heard of this land of Ohio. Is it in the Land of Oz?"

  "No," answered Jam, "it's in the United States of America. Is this the Land of Oz?"

  "Yes, noble sir. You are in the country of the Gillikens, the northern province of the Land of Oz."

  "But what part of the world is this?" Cried Jam.

  "I've never heard of a place where animals can talk."

  "All animals talk here," said the Gilliken man, "for this is a fairyland, you know."

  "Fairyland!" Exclaimed Jam. "But fairies are just make-believe. They aren't real people."

  "You must be mistaken,
noble sir," and again he bowed low before Jam, "for we are all alive; and this is a fairyland."

  "He must be right, kiddo," whispered Percy. "Pinfly, Gig, and I could never talk before we hit this place."

  "And now listen to us," chimed in the guinea pigs, sticking their heads out of Jam's pockets and wiggling their whiskers furiously.

  "How do I get home from here?" Wailed Jam.

  "I do not know," said the little man. "We hoped that you were a powerful wizard, come from the sky in your strange craft, to save us from Terp, the Terrible. We thought that your magic might destroy his power and free the people of Hidden Valley from slavery."

  "Are you slaves?" Asked Jam, looking at the little men dressed in purple costumes similar to their leader's.

  "Yes," sighed one of them. "We are slaves of Terp the Terrible, and must work for him in his vineyards and jam factory."

  "Jam factory!" Exclaimed the little boy. "That's funny. My nickname is Jam."

  The little Gillikens looked at each other and nodded wisely. "A good omen," murmured one. "He is called Jam. Surely he will save us from Terp."

  "But who is Terp, the Terrible?" Asked Jam.

  "A wicked giant, noble Jam, ten times as large as any of us. He lives on muffins and grape jam; so we are kept busy growing grapes and making jam for him to eat on his magic muffins."

  "Magic muffins!" Squealed Pinny and Gig.

  "What are they?"

  Looking with curiosity at the funny little animals sticking their heads out of Jam's pockets, the man replied, "In Terp's courtyard is a muffin tree."

  "Muffin tree," interrupted Jam. "Muffins don't grow on trees. You bake them, or buy them already made at the bakery."

  "In Hidden Valley, oh noble sir, muffins grow on trees. In the castle courtyard is this muffin tree guarded by a fierce, two-headed beast that allows no one near the tree except Terp himself. These muffins must be magic, for Terp keeps the tree guarded so well."

  "We think," added another man, "that his power is derived from the muffins. If we could destroy the tree, we could escape Terp's power. But the fierce two-headed beast guards the tree constantly. One head is always awake and watching, so none of us can get close enough to the tree to chop it down."