No sooner were the Wizard of Oz and his followers well within thecastle entrance when the big gates swung to with a clang and heavybars dropped across them. They looked at one another uneasily, but noone cared to speak of the incident. If they were indeed prisoners inthe wicker castle, it was evident they must find a way to escape, buttheir first duty was to attend to the errand on which they had comeand seek the Royal Ozma, whom they believed to be a prisoner of themagician, and rescue her.

They found they had entered a square courtyard, from which an entranceled into the main building of the castle. No person had appeared togreet them so far, although a gaudy peacock perched upon the wallcackled with laughter and said in its sharp, shrill voice, "Poorfools! Poor fools!"

"I hope the peacock is mistaken," remarked the Frogman, but no oneelse paid any attention to the bird. They were a little awed by thestillness and loneliness of the place. As they entered the doors ofthe castle, which stood invitingly open, these also closed behind themand huge bolts shot into place. The animals had all accompanied theparty into the castle because they felt it would be dangerous for themto separate. They were forced to follow a zigzag passage, turningthis way and that, until finally they entered a great central hall,circular in form and with a high dome from which was suspended anenormous chandelier.

The Wizard went first, and Dorothy, Betsy and Trot followed him, Totokeeping at the heels of his little mistress. Then came the Lion, theWoozy and the Sawhorse, then Cayke the Cookie Cook and Button-Bright,then the Lavender Bear carrying the Pink Bear, and finally the Frogmanand the Patchwork Girl, with Hank the Mule tagging behind. So it wasthe Wizard who caught the first glimpse of the big, domed hall, butthe others quickly followed and gathered in a wondering group justwithin the entrance.

Upon a raised platform at one side was a heavy table on which layGlinda's Great Book of Records, but the platform was firmly fastenedto the floor and the table was fastened to the platform and the Bookwas chained fast to the table, just as it had been when it was kept inGlinda's palace. On the wall over the table hung Ozma's MagicPicture. On a row of shelves at the opposite side of the hall stoodall the chemicals and essences of magic and all the magicalinstruments that had been stolen from Glinda and Ozma and the Wizard,with glass doors covering the shelves so that no one could get atthem.

And in a far corner sat Ugu the Shoemaker, his feet lazily extended,his skinny hands clasped behind his head. He was leaning back at hisease and calmly smoking a long pipe. Around the magician was a sortof cage, seemingly made of golden bars set wide apart, and at hisfeet, also within the cage, reposed the long-sought diamond-studdeddishpan of Cayke the Cookie Cook. Princess Ozma of Oz was nowhere tobe seen.

"Well, well," said Ugu when the invaders had stood in silence for amoment, staring about them. "This visit is an unexpected pleasure, Iassure you. I knew you were coming, and I know why you are here. Youare not welcome, for I cannot use any of you to my advantage, but asyou have insisted on coming, I hope you will make the afternoon callas brief as possible. It won't take long to transact your businesswith me. You will ask me for Ozma, and my reply will be that you mayfind her--if you can."

"Sir," answered the Wizard in a tone of rebuke, "you are a very wickedand cruel person. I suppose you imagine, because you have stolen thispoor woman's dishpan and all the best magic in Oz, that you are morepowerful than we are and will be able to triumph over us."

"Yes," said Ugu the Shoemaker, slowly filling his pipe with freshtobacco from a silver bowl that stood beside him, "that is exactlywhat I imagine. It will do you no good to demand from me the girl whowas formerly the Ruler of Oz, because I will not tell you where I havehidden her, and you can't guess in a thousand years. Neither will Irestore to you any of the magic I have captured. I am not so foolish.But bear this in mind: I mean to be the Ruler of Oz myself, hereafter,so I advise you to be careful how you address your future Monarch."

"Ozma is still Ruler of Oz, wherever you may have hidden her,"declared the Wizard. "And bear this in mind, miserable Shoemaker: weintend to find her and to rescue her in time, but our first duty andpleasure will be to conquer you and then punish you for yourmisdeeds."

"Very well, go ahead and conquer," said Ugu. "I'd really like to seehow you can do it."

Now although the little Wizard had spoken so boldly, he had at themoment no idea how they might conquer the magician. He had thatmorning given the Frogman, at his request, a dose of zosozo from hisbottle, and the Frogman had promised to fight a good fight if it wasnecessary, but the Wizard knew that strength alone could not availagainst magical arts. The toy Bear King seemed to have some prettygood magic, however, and the Wizard depended to an extent on that.But something ought to be done right away, and the Wizard didn't knowwhat it was.

While he considered this perplexing question and the others stoodlooking at him as their leader, a queer thing happened. The floor ofthe great circular hall on which they were standing suddenly began totip. Instead of being flat and level, it became a slant, and theslant grew steeper and steeper until none of the party could manage tostand upon it. Presently they all slid down to the wall, which wasnow under them, and then it became evident that the whole vast roomwas slowly turning upside down! Only Ugu the Shoemaker, kept in placeby the bars of his golden cage, remained in his former position, andthe wicked magician seemed to enjoy the surprise of his victimsimmensely.

First they all slid down to the wall back of them, but as the roomcontinued to turn over, they next slid down the wall and foundthemselves at the bottom of the great dome, bumping against the bigchandelier which, like everything else, was now upside down. Theturning movement now stopped, and the room became stationary. Lookingfar up, they saw Ugu suspended in his cage at the very top, which hadonce been the floor.

"Ah," said he, grinning down at them, "the way to conquer is to act,and he who acts promptly is sure to win. This makes a very goodprison, from which I am sure you cannot escape. Please amuseyourselves in any way you like, but I must beg you to excuse me, as Ihave business in another part of my castle."

Saying this, he opened a trap door in the floor of his cage (which wasnow over his head) and climbed through it and disappeared from theirview. The diamond dishpan still remained in the cage, but the barskept it from falling down on their heads.

"Well, I declare," said the Patchwork Girl, seizing one of the bars ofthe chandelier and swinging from it, "we must peg one for theShoemaker, for he has trapped us very cleverly."

"Get off my foot, please," said the Lion to the Sawhorse.

"And oblige me, Mr. Mule," remarked the Woozy, "by taking your tailout of my left eye."

"It's rather crowded down here," explained Dorothy, "because the domeis rounding and we have all slid into the middle of it. But let uskeep as quiet as possible until we can think what's best to be done."

"Dear, dear!"wailed Cayke, "I wish I had my darling dishpan," and sheheld her arms longingly toward it.

"I wish I had the magic on those shelves up there," sighed the Wizard.

"Don't you s'pose we could get to it?" asked Trot anxiously.

"We'd have to fly," laughed the Patchwork Girl.

But the Wizard took the suggestion seriously, and so did the Frogman.They talked it over and soon planned an attempt to reach the shelveswhere the magical instruments were. First the Frogman lay against therounding dome and braced his foot on the stem of the chandelier; thenthe Wizard climbed over him and lay on the dome with his feet on theFrogman's shoulders; the Cookie Cook came next; then Button-Brightclimbed to the woman's shoulders; then Dorothy climbed up and Betsyand Trot, and finally the Patchwork Girl, and all their lengths made along line that reached far up the dome, but not far enough for Scrapsto touch the shelves.

"Wait a minute. Perhaps I can reach the magic," called the Bear King,and began scrambling up the bodies of the others. But when he came tothe Cookie Cook, his soft paws tickled her side so that she squirmedand upset the whole line. Down they came, tumbling in a heap againstthe animals, and although no one was much hurt, it was a bad mix-up,and the Frogman, who was at the bottom, almost lost his temper beforehe could get on his feet again.

Cayke positively refused to try what she called "the pyramid act"again, and as the Wizard was now convinced they could not reach themagic tools in that manner, the attempt was abandoned. "But SOMETHINGmust be done," said the Wizard, and then he turned to the LavenderBear and asked, "Cannot Your Majesty's magic help us to escape fromhere?"

"My magic powers are limited," was the reply. "When I was stuffed,the fairies stood by and slyly dropped some magic into my stuffing.Therefore I can do any of the magic that's inside me, but nothingelse. You, however, are a wizard, and a wizard should be able to doanything."

"Your Majesty forgets that my tools of magic have been stolen," saidthe Wizard sadly, "and a wizard without tools is as helpless as acarpenter without a hammer or saw."

"Don't give up," pleaded Button-Bright, "20'cause if we can't getout of this queer prison, we'll all starve to death."

"Not I!" laughed the Patchwork Girl, now standing on top of thechandelier at the place that was meant to be the bottom of it.

"Don't talk of such dreadful things," said Trot, shuddering. "We camehere to capture the Shoemaker, didn't we?"

"Yes, and to save Ozma," said Betsy.

"And here we are, captured ourselves, and my darling dishpan up therein plain sight!" wailed the Cookie Cook, wiping her eyes on the tailof the Frogman's coat.

"Hush!" called the Lion with a low, deep growl. "Give the Wizard timeto think."

"He has plenty of time," said Scraps. "What he needs is theScarecrow's brains."

After all, it was little Dorothy who came to their rescue, and herability to save them was almost as much a surprise to the girl as itwas to her friends. Dorothy had been secretly testing the powers ofher Magic Belt, which she had once captured from the Nome King, andexperimenting with it in various ways ever since she had started onthis eventful journey. At different times she had stolen away fromthe others of her party and in solitude had tried to find out what theMagic Belt could do and what it could not do. There were a lot ofthings it could not do, she discovered, but she learned some thingsabout the Belt which even her girl friends did not suspect she knew.

For one thing, she had remembered that when the Nome King owned it,the Magic Belt used to perform transformations, and by thinking hardshe had finally recalled the way in which such transformations hadbeen accomplished. Better than this, however, was the discovery thatthe Magic Belt would grant its wearer one wish a day. All she need dowas close her right eye and wiggle her left toe and then draw a longbreath and make her wish. Yesterday she had wished in secret for abox of caramels, and instantly found the box beside her. Today shehad saved her daily wish in case she might need it in an emergency,and the time had now come when she must use the wish to enable her toescape with her friends from the prison in which Ugu had caught them.

So without telling anyone what she intended to do--for she had onlyused the wish once and could not be certain how powerful the MagicBelt might be--Dorothy closed her right eye and wiggled her left bigtoe and drew a long breath and wished with all her might. The nextmoment the room began to revolve again, as slowly as before, and bydegrees they all slid to the side wall and down the wall to thefloor--all but Scraps, who was so astonished that she still clung tothe chandelier. When the big hall was in its proper position againand the others stood firmly upon the floor of it, they looked far upthe dome and saw the Patchwork girl swinging from the chandelier.

"Good gracious!" cried Dorothy."How ever will you get down?"

"Won't the room keep turning?" asked Scraps.

"I hope not. I believe it has stopped for good," said PrincessDorothy.

"Then stand from under, so you won't get hurt!" shouted the PatchworkGirl, and as soon as they had obeyed this request, she let go thechandelier and came tumbling down heels over head and twisting andturning in a very exciting manner. Plump! She fell on the tiledfloor, and they ran to her and rolled her and patted her into shapeagain.