Yankee in Oz Read online

  "Well," explained Tompy, glancing uneasily at the jinrikisha's owner, "usually it's drawn by a man."

  "Not by a man, by MAGIC!" rumbled a deep voice that seemed to come from the center of the big jug.

  "Meet the Red Jinn of EV--

  Very rich, very clev--

  There you are--Har de Har!

  And whoever you are?"

  Up rose the lid of the red jug and out popped the rosy round face of a jolly old gentleman with red hair and whiskers.

  "I'm a DOG!" squealed Yankee, so enchanted by such jollity he leapt up to lick the Jinn on the ear, knocking his lid clear off. "A hungry dog!" he added, chasing after the rolling lid.

  "Regular Arabian Night's stuff!" thought Tompy, barely able to control his laughter as Yankee retrieved the lid and handed it politely to the Jinn.

  "And YOU?" inquired the Jinn, clapping the lid on the back of his head and clasping one arm tightly around Yankee's neck.

  "Thomas P. Terry, your Highness!" announced Tompy touching his cap. "An American boy from PennsyEvania."

  "Oh, call me Jinnicky," smiled the Red Jinn, rolling his glass eyes from one to the other, "A HUNGRY boy, I presume?"

  "Oh, yes, VERY hungry," Tompy told him earnestly. "Yankee and I have eaten nothing since yesterday."

  "Come to think of it, neither have I," murmured Jinnicky reflectively. "I tell you what, we'll all have breakfast together."

  "Breakfast?" gurgled the space dog, wriggling out from under the Jinn's fat arm. "Where is any?"

  "Suppose you leave that to me," said the Jinn puttering over to his jinrikisha. Fumbling in one of the many baskets he pulled out a bright siEver bell and rang it sharply three times. Before the last clang had died away, a small black boy in a towering turban dropped down out of nowhere. Placing a well-laden tray on a flat rock beside his master, he held up two fingers, winked at the boy and dog, and then vanished. Yankee, barking hysterically, dashed over to the spot of his disappearance only to collide with the boy returning with a second tray. Without displacing a dish he set it down before the startled bull terrier. In a flash he was gone, returning almost instantly with a third breakfast for Tompy. Wordlessly Tompy took the tray and sat down beside the Jinn. This time Yankee did manage to lick the bell boy's hand before he took off. This was his way of saying "Thank you." Then afraid his breakfast would vanish before he could eat it, he began gulping down fried sausage, rare beef patties, and tiny biscuits at a furious rate.

  "No hurry," smiled the Jinn taking a small bite of a large lamb chop. "Let's take our time, shall we? Breakfast is my favorite meal. Far as I can see, only one thing is missing."

  "Nothing is missing from my tray." Lifting one siEver cover after another, Tompy simply gloated over the steaming hot cakes, bacon and eggs, buttered rolls, and strawberries and cream. As you might guess, he started right in on the hot cakes, while Yankee, suddenly remembering his manners, more slowly consumed the rest of his sausage and meat patties. Still, Jinnicky did not appear to be satisfied. Shoving back his tray, he again hurried over to his jinrikisha, coming back this time with a large striped band box. Rubbing his hands gleefully, he pried up the lid and apparently well satisfied returned to his breakfast.

  "Always like music with my meals," he observed, looking over at Tompy. With his fork in the air, Tompy's mouth fell open, as he watched a dozen smartly uniformed miniature bandsmen step out of the box. No sooner did their feet touch the ground than they expanded tallward and sideward till they were of quite normal size.

  "There, isn't that better?" beamed Jinnicky, as the band at a sharp signal from the leader struck up a lively march.

  "Man, it's crazy!" mumbled Tompy. "It's--just--" Glancing again at the bandsmen, Tompy stopped, for after all the other astonishments of the morning he had run out of adjectives. Yankee in much the same quandary barked his approval and with his tail wagging in time to the music turned his attention to his big bowl of cereal and cream. Urged on by the kindly Jinn, Tompy managed somehow to eat his own breakfast. Then unable to contain himself a minute longer, swung his drum around into position and ran over to join the musicians. The music, quite lively before, now really began to swing and bounce to the magic of Tompy's flying sticks. His face wreathed in smiles, the Red Jinn, hopped off his rock and began kicking up his heels like a pony just turned out to pasture.

  "You're hired!" he roared, thumping Tompy on the back. "You shall return with me to my red glass castle and lead all of my royal bands! And YOU, my fine funny friend--you shall be royal watch dog and keeper of the Red Gates," he panted, leaning down to tweak Yankee's ear. Too breathless and happy to answer, Tompy rattled off his rolls, press rolls, double paradiddles, and ratamaques and never before had there been such gaiety and tumult on that bleak mountain side. But, right in the middle of a lively polka, a shower of rocks hurtled down from above.

  "Stop that outrageous racket! Stop it at once!" bellowed a ferocious voice from the mountain top. "Be off, you noisy lundigans!"

  "Don't you dare stop! Keep playing, keep playing!" yelled the Red Jinn. In a perfect fury he started over to his jinrikisha. "Nobody can tell ME what to do." Snatching a huge red umbrella from the handle of his trusty jinrikisha, he came racing back. By the time he had reached the bandsmen, the umbrella had grown big enough to cover them all. Rocks continued to rain down, but the umbrella was so strong and tough that they rolled harmlessly off the sides. Tompy kept drumming, the musicians continued to play, but somehow the fun was spoiled and all the joy had gone out of the morning. Finishing the polka, the leader bowed once to the Red Jinn, once to Tompy, then ignoring the rocks and followed by his men, marched sternly back to the bank box. One after the other diminished in size and disappeared, the last man in pulling down the lid. No sooner had the music stopped than the rocks stopped falling, too.

  "Ding it! Dang it!" fumed Jinnicky plumping down and tossing the red umbrella over his shoulder. "My whole day is ruined. Never more exOZperated in my whole life!" Snatching up his siEver dinner bell he rang it sharply.

  "Tell Alibabble I'll not be home till later," he told the startled bell boy when he appeared. "I've a score to settle with a man on a mountain, three scores!" he added grimly noting the cut on Tompy's cheek, the big lump rising on Yankee's head and the wide jagged crack in his own jug.

  "Atta boy, Jinn!" yelped the bull terrier, as the bell boy, casting an alarmed glance at his master, gathered up the empty trays and vanished, forthwith!

  ________________________________________________________________

  Chapter 10: The Red Jinn Makes His Plans

  SITTING on another flat rock beside the Red Jinn, with Yankee pressed close to his knee, Tompy could not help wondering what Jinnicky had in mind. For his own part, he felt little enthusiasm for an encounter with a rock-tossing monster. Jinnicky, however, seemed quite unconcerned and restored to his former cheerfulness.

  "I did intend to fly straight home after my fine visit with Randy in Regalia," he confided, tilting his lid to keep the sun out of his eye. "Har har de har, and what a roudy down dilly that was. The Elegant Elephant came over from Pumperdink to join us--

  "You mean Kabumpo?" put in Tompy who had read a bit about this famous elephant.

  "Surely, surely, old Kaboscis himself!" chuckled the Red Jinn, "and you'd like Randy, too. Ho de humph! Quite a shock to be hit by a rock after a pleasant visit like that. But I'll settle that rock tosser if it's the last thing I do! Alibabble, my Grand Advizier, can run the place for a little longer. He manages quite well, but if I stay away too long he grows crotchety and my people will never stand for that. Know what he calls me?"

  "What?" asked Tompy, untieing his handkerchief from Yankee's harness and applying it gently to his scratched cheek.

  "A crack-pot!" roared Jinnicky. "Har de har har! And now I really am a crack-pot," he finished touching the long gash that ran from the top to the bottom of his red jugged body.

  "Crack-pot, nothing!" sputtered Yankee indignantly. "If you're a crack-pot
, I'm an itty bitty scaredy cat."

  "Can your er--er--jar be mended?" questioned Tompy looking rather worried for he did not want the jolly little Jinn to fall apart.

  "Oh, yes," sniffed Jinnicky, nodding his head. "I've some glazed glue in one of my baskets, but when I reach my castle I'll use my magic to fix myself as good as new.

  "It's a mightly good thing you had your red umbrella along, or we'd have been smashed flat," observed Tompy. "And we certainly do thank you for that, and for the super breakfast and band concert."

  "Oh, it was nothing, nothing at all," smiled the Jinn. "I never travel without taking some magic along. Red magic is my specialty, y' know."

  "We have some magic, too," volunteered Yankee, not wishing to be outdone. "Show him the Mind Reader, Tomp."

  "Mind Reader?" muttered Jinnicky, taking the yellow book Tompy was holding out to him. "Now that could be pretty useful." Flipping it open to the first page, he stared fixedly at Tompy. "It works, by jingoes, it works! Ho ho, and so you are thinking that if I know so much about magic I could use some to send you fellows home?"

  "Well--yes!" admitted Tompy, rather embarrassed to have the Red Jinn read his mind.

  "Bet a bone you could, too!" Leaping up the space dog seized the book before Jinnicky could read his mind.

  "I might, I might," murmured Jinnicky. "That is, after we settle the hash of this wild willikin on the mountain. Nobody's going to throw rocks at the Red Jinn of Ev. Here, give me back that book, you rascal," he puffed, running after the circling terrier. "Here, kitty, kitty."

  "Call me 'Yankee' and I will!" teased the space dog, backing away.

  "Oh, all right--'YANKEE'!" cried the Red Jinn winking at Tompy. "Mmn-mn! Prognostications?" he mused, opening the book at the middle.

  "What does it say?" begged Tompy edging closer, for he had not had time to examine the Mind Reader very closely.

  "It says that 'Two daring and intrepid travelers will find and rescue Princess Doffi.' So that's what you're after, a princess."

  "Well, not exactly," explained Tompy.

  "Wait, wait, don't tell me," mumbled the Red Jinn moving sideways. "Let's see what the Mind Reader says." Rapidly he turned pages till he came to one headed, "Past history of people present. Thomas P. Terry, American boy, aged eleven, fine student, outstanding tympanist, leader of school band, good at sports--blown to Oz by hurricane. Desires to return home. Yankee, two-year-old bull terrier, launched in pressurized capsule to orbit moon. Makes one orbit. Lands in Yellow Lake in Winkie Country of Oz. Desires to return to his base."

  "Well, I'll be jingled and bingled!" Slamming the book the Red Jinn regarded the two travelers with new interest.

  "Did you hear that, Tompy? It says I really made an orbit of the moon!" squealed Yankee. "Whee-eee zippity ZEE!" Round and round pranced the terrier till he fell in an exhausted heap.

  "Orbit? Orbit! What's he mean by that? Why all the Yellababo?" demanded Jinnicky seizing Tompy by the arm.

  "It means that Yankee was launched by a super rocket, went completely around the moon, and safely returned," explained Tompy leaning down to give the space dog an exuberant hug.

  "Circled the moon? Our moon?" gulped the Red Jinn holding his head with both hands. "But that's impossible! What magic did he use?"

  "The know-how and magic of American science," stated Tompy tilting his hat cockily over one eye. "That's what it means."

  "You mean, then, that American magic is more powerful than Oz magic and mine?" Completely crestfallen and looking ready to cry, Jinnicky pulled in his head and drew in his arms and legs and began rolling rapidly toward his jinrikisha. Springing after the spinning red jug, Yankee cleverly placed himself between the jinrikisha and the Red Jinn, bringing him to a quick halt.

  "Don't go! Don't leave us," he coaxed, trying to pry up Jinnicky's lid with his nose. "Come out, come out, or I'll jump right off this mountain. Here I go--"

  At Yankee's threat, Jinnicky's lid rose enough to show his eyes, eyes fairly popping with anxiety as the space dog headed lickity-split for the mountain's edge.

  "Don't stand there like a dummy, catch him--catch him!" cried Jinnicky giving Tompy a push. His fondness for the bull terrier had overcome his jealousy. "Do you want him to bash out his silly brains?" he gulped as Tompy open mouthed watched Yankee's take off. In the next second both were running and on the edge of a wicked cliff managed to catch up with their reckless pal. Yankee, underestimating the speed at which he was going and the distance to the mountain's edge, never would have been able to stop had not Tompy grabbed his harness and the Red Jinn his tail, all three falling backwards together.

  "Never--NEVER do such a thing again," scolded Jinnicky, rolling over and scrambling to his feet.

  "Might as well jump off a cliff as be mashed by a heartless giant," panted Yankee, secretly delighted that his little trick had worked. Tompy, still stunned by the terrier's narrow escape said nothing whatever.

  "I wasn't going to leave you. I just wanted to think," explained the Red Jinn looking sheepishly from one to the other.

  "And no one but no one can think faster than you, Juggins, old boy. And when it comes to magic, you're the real champ. Have we anything to compare with that red umbrella, your dinner bell, or band box and jinrikisha in America?" he asked rolling an eye up at Tompy.

  "We most certainly have not!" declared Tompy, who felt that he could agree with the space dog on three counts at least without detracting from the honor of his country."Har har de har, how right you are! No matching the magic that comes in a jar."Though I must say," conceded the Red Jinn generously, "a rocket ride 'round.the moon comes close to it. Oz magic is not bad either," went on Jinnicky as they backed away from the cliffs edge together. Picking up the Mind Reader which he had dropped when he retired into his jug, he patted it fondly. "Would not mind adding one of these to my collection."

  "It's yours if you fly us off this mountain and safely back home," promised Yankee recklessly.

  "But it's not really ours to give," objected Tompy. "Yankee stole it from the Chief Counselor of Wackajammy."

  "That old false alarm!" growled Yankee, the hair on his back rising at the thought of Yammer Jammer. "After throwing you in the guard house, what do we care about him? Would you care to hear the whole story of my rocket ride and what happened to us in this Land of Oz?" he asked, planting himself directly in the path of the Red Jinn.

  "Not now, not now," murmured Jinnicky, who by this time had reached the spot where they first encountered him. "Now I must think!"

  "Nobody will listen to our story, no ho-ho-body," wailed the terrier putting his nose in the air and howling dismally.

  "Sh-hh!" cautioned Tompy, looking at their jugged companion. "If Jinnicky can think up a way to send us back home, what does it matter? Remember it is the END of a story that counts."

  "Then I suppose all we can do is wait for the count down." Stretching out at full length at Tompy's feet, Yankee resignedly closed his eyes and began droning, "ten-nine-eight-seven-sx-five-four--"

  ________________________________________________________________

  Chapter 11: Badmannah the Terrible!

  KNOW any riddles?" The question was so unexpected, and the reappearance of the Jinn so sudden, that To mpy gasped and Yankee sprang up as if he had been stung by a bee.

  "Riddles!" yipped Yankee, the first to recover his aplomb (whatever that is?).

  "L' see--when is a bull not a bull?" he asked, wagging his tail furiously.

  "When it's a bull finch?" answered Jinnicky with his head on one side. "No, no--try again," squealed the space dog, tossing a stick into the air.

  "When it's a bull fiddle?" ventured Tompy. "But why and ever fool around with riddles when there are so many important problems to decide?" he thought with an exasperated glance at the Jinn.

  "Wait, wait! I have it," clasping his fat hands, the Red Jinn fairly beamed with satisfaction. "When it's a bull terrier, YOU, for instance!" he finished with a bounce.

&nbs
p; "Kee-rect. Now you think up one," proposed Yankee, giving him a nudge.

  "The real riddle is how we are to get off Upandup Mountain and back home," sighed Tompy, before Jinnicky had time to speak.

  "Oh, that," the Red Jinn dismissed the whole matter with a careless shrug. "We'll just fly off the mountain in my jinrikisha and in good time I'll find some way to return you boys to America. Of course, if I don't find one, you can both live with me in my red castle in Ev, and that would suit me to a Tee--Hee Hee. Whee! Wouldn't we have a time, though!"

  As the boy and dog exchanged an alarmed glance, Jinnicky padded over to his jinrikisha, hopped nimbly up on the cushioned seat, and waved for Tompy and Yankee to join him. It was a bit of a squeeze, but with Tompy and the Jinn on the seat and Yankee on the floor space between them, they did manage to fit in. Watching closely, Tompy saw the little wizard give the right arm of his odd chariot a slight twist. Next instant they were zooming straight upward.

  "Wager you boys never traveled this fast before?" shouted Jinnicky, holding on to his lid. Tompy hanging to the arm of the jinrikisha with one hand and to Yankee's harness with the other, started to explain that the space dog had gone more than 25,000 miles an hour on his rocket ride, but his words were swept off by the rush of wind and he finally gave up all further conversation. From the plateau they had left, Upandup Mountain rose in a sheer stretch of bare rock and as they sped higher and higher, Tompy realized how fortunate it was that they had met the merry little Jinn. On foot they never could have climbed the rest of the way at all. But to his dismay, when they soared over the mountain itself, the jinrikisha began to descend, coming down on the flat, mossy top.

  "Oh, why stop here?" groaned Tompy with a shuddering glance at the craggy peaks beyond the small clearing. "Those cliffs over there are probably full of caves, dangerous crevices, and Oz knows what!"

  "Well, it's a cave man we are after, is it not?" stated Jinnicky rolling off the seat and standing calmly beside the jinrikisha. "That rock tossing villain who cracked my jug, scratched your cheek, and put a lump on your dog's head."