The Magic of Oz

had transformed all these Oz folks. The forest beasts, it was true, had been

so frightened that they would now never consent to be transformed into

men, but Kiki could transform them against their will, and once they were

all in human forms, it would not be impossible to induce them to conquer

the Oz people.

So all was not lost, thought the old Nome, and the best thing for him to

do was to rejoin the Hyup boy who had the secret of the transformations.

So, having made sure the Wizard's black bag was not in the clearing, the

Goose wandered away through the trees when the others were not looking,

and when out of their hearing, he began calling, "Kiki Aru! Kiki Aru!

Quack--quack! Kiki Aru!"

The Boy and the Woman, the Fox, the Lamb, and the Rabbit, not being

able to find the bag, went back to the rock, all feeling exceedingly strange.

Where's the Goose?" asked the Wizard.

He must have run away," replied Dorothy. "I wonder who he was?"

I think," said Gugu the King, who was the fat Woman, "that the

Goose was the stranger who proposed that we make war upon the Oz

people. If so, his transformation was merely a trick to deceive us, and he

has now gone to join his comrade, that wicked Li-Mon-Eag who obeyed

all his commands."

What shall we do now?" asked Dorothy. "Shall we go back to the

Emerald City, as we are, and then visit Glinda the Good and ask her to

break the enchantments?"

I think so," replied the Wizard Fox. "And we can take Gugu the King

with us, and have Glinda restore him to his natural shape. But I hate to

leave my Bag of Magic Tools behind me, for without it I shall lose much

of my power as a Wizard. Also, if I go back to the Emerald City in the

shape of a Fox, the Oz people will think I'm a poor Wizard and will lose

their respect for me."

Let us make still another search for your tools," suggested the

Cowardly Lion, "and then, if we fail to find the Black Bag anywhere in

this forest, we must go back home as we are."

Why did you come here, anyway?" inquired Gugu.