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After a while, they came to the place where five roads branched in different

directions; Dorothy pointed to one, and said:

That's it, Shaggy Man."

I'm much obliged, miss," he said, and started along another road.

Not that one!" she cried; "you're going wrong."

He stopped.

I thought you said that other was the road to Butterfield," said he, running

his fingers through his shaggy whiskers in a puzzled way.

So it is."

But I don't want to go to Butterfield, miss."

You don't?"

Of course not. I wanted you to show me the road, so I shouldn't go there by

mistake."

Oh! Where DO you want to go, then?"

I'm not particular, miss."

This answer astonished the little girl; and it made her provoked, too, to think

she had taken all this trouble for nothing.

There are a good many roads here," observed the shaggy man, turning slowly

around, like a human windmill. "Seems to me a person could go 'most

anywhere, from this place."

Dorothy turned around too, and gazed in surprise. There WERE a good many

roads; more than she had ever seen before. She tried to count them, knowing

there ought to be five, but when she had counted seventeen she grew

bewildered and stopped, for the roads were as many as the spokes of a wheel

and ran in every direction from the place where they stood; so if she kept on

counting she was likely to count some of the roads twice.

Dear me!" she exclaimed. "There used to be only five roads, highway and all.

And now--why, where's the highway, Shaggy Man?"

Can't say, miss," he responded, sitting down upon the ground as if tired with

standing. "Wasn't it here a minute ago?"

The Road to Oz