in dismay, for the big reception room was empty. From a room
above came a shuffling of feet, and Blink, the Scarecrow's
gentlemanly housekeeper, came running down the stairs.

"Where's the Scarecrow?" asked Dorothy anxiously. "Isn't he here?"

"Here! Isn't he there? Isn't he in the Emerald City?" gasped the
little Winkie, putting his specs on upside down.

"No--at least, I don't think so. Oh, dear, I just felt that something
had happened to him!" wailed Dorothy, sinking into an ebony armchair
and fanning herself with a silk sofa cushion.

"Now don't be alarmed." The Cowardly Lion rushed to Dorothy's side
and knocked three vases and a clock off a little table, just to show
how calm he was. "Think of his brains! The Scarecrow has never come
to harm yet, and all we have to do is to return to the Emerald City
and look in Ozma's Magic Picture. Then, when we know where he is, we
can go and find him and tell him about our little adoption plan," he
added, looking hopefully at Dorothy.

"The Scarecrow himself couldn't have spoken more sensibly," observed
Blink with a great sigh of relief, and even Dorothy felt better.

In Ozma's palace, as many of you know, there is a Magic Picture, and
when Ozma or Dorothy want to see any of their friends, they have
merely to wish to see them, and instantly the picture shows the
person wished for and exactly what he is doing at that certain time.

"Of course!" sighed Dorothy. "Why didn't I think of it myself?"

"Better have some lunch before you start back," suggested Blink, and
bustling about had soon set out an appetizing repast. Dorothy was too
busy worrying about the Scarecrow to have much appetite, but the
Cowardly Lion swallowed seventeen roasts and a bucket of corn syrup.

"To give me courage!" he explained to Dorothy, licking his chops.
"There's nothing that makes me so cowardly as an empty stomach!"

It was quite late in the afternoon before they could get away. Blink
insisted on putting up a lunch, and it took some time to make enough
sandwiches for the Cowardly Lion. But at last it was ready and packed
into an old hat box belonging to Mops, the Scarecrow's cook. Then
Dorothy, balancing the box carefully on her lap, climbed on the
Cowardly Lion's back, and assuring Blink that they would return in a
few days with his master, they bade him farewell. Blink almost
spoiled things by bursting into tears, but he managed to restrain
himself long enough to say goodbye, and Dorothy a