garden with a pleased
expression, and then, turning, he beheld Ozma and the Wizard and
Dorothy regarding him curiously and the two great beasts crouching
behind them.

Kiki Aru did not know who they were, but he thought Ozma very lovely
and Dorothy very pleasant. So he smiled at them--the same innocent,
happy smile that a baby might have indulged in, and that pleased
Dorothy, who seized his hand and led him to a seat beside her on the
bench.

"Why, I thought you were a dreadful magician," she exclaimed, "and
you're only a boy!"

"What is a magician?" he asked, "and what is a boy?"

"Don't you know?" inquired the girl.

Kiki shook his head. Then he laughed.

"I do not seem to know anything," he replied.

"It's very curious," remarked the Wizard. "He wears the dress of the
Munchkins, so he must have lived at one time in the Munchkin Country.
Of course the boy can tell us nothing of his history or his family, for
he has forgotten all that he ever knew."

"He seems a nice boy, now that all the wickedness has gone from him,"
said Ozma. "So we will keep him here with us and teach him our
ways--to be true and considerate of others."

"Why, in that case, it's lucky for him he drank the Water of Oblivion,"
said Dorothy.

"It is indeed," agreed the Wizard. "But the remarkable thing, to me,
is how such a young boy ever learned the secret of the Magic Word of
Transformation. Perhaps his companion, who is at present this walnut,
was the real magician, although I seem to remember that it was this boy
in the beast's form who whispered the Magic Word into the hollow tree,
where I overheard it."

"Well, we will soon know who the other is," suggested Ozma. "He may
prove to be another Munchkin boy."

The Wizard placed the walnut near the fountain and said, as slowly and
solemnly as before:

"I want you to resume your natural form, and to be very
thirsty--Pyrzqxgl!"

Then the walnut disappeared and Ruggedo the Nome stood in its place.
He also was facing the fountain, and he reached for the cup, filled it,
and was about to drink when Dorothy exclaimed:

"Why, it's the old Nome King!"

Ruggedo swung around and faced them, the cup still in his hand.

"Yes," he said in an angry voice, "it's the old Nome King, and I'm
going to conquer all Oz and be revenged on you for kicking me out of my
throne." He looked around a moment, and then continued: "There isn't
an egg in sight, and I'm stronger than all of you people