to see what was the matter. The sight that met his eyes was
hardly what he would have expected. There before him was a huge Ox
tethered to a wagon. One wheel had fallen from the wagon, and the
wagonmaster was jumping up and down, shouting angry expletives at the
ox. "You filthy pile of oxtail soup!" shouted the young man. "You are as
able to locate the proper roads as Dorothy was in _The Road to Oz_! Now
just look what your lack of brains has caused us! You dragged us off the
road, and now we have another busted wheel to bother about! You are just
a lousy old coot!"

"Now, now," said Lambert. "You needn't speak so unkindly to this fine
animal. I'll be happy to take him off your hands if he's such a ... a
coot, I think you said?"

"Yeah!" begged the ox. "Let him have me! I can work on this big farm!"

"Not a cotton-picking chance!" blurted the human. "I need a work-horse
to pull this wagon. If I had another animal, maybe a horse or a pony,
I'd gladly unload your crummy old worthless hide in a heartbeat! But
such beasts are sure to be expensive in these parts, especially to a
stranger like me. And all I have are these forty-eight diamonds, a bag
of square emeralds, and a couple of rubies to spare."

Lambert lit up and became more alert than he had ever been before.
Standing straight up and trying to look as businesslike as a wartfrog
can possibly look, he said, "That is the exact price I planned to ask
for a very pretty unicorn that I have recently acquired by perfectly
legitimate means."

"Are there any other kind?" asked the stranger with a sly wink.

"Of course not." He ran inside to the closet and grabbed the bag with
Jeanne-Marie inside. Coming back to his customer, he handed it over and
greedily grabbed the precious gemstones. "Thank you, oh thank you!" he
squealed gleefully. "And can I get that ox, too?"

"You can get me, all right," said the ox. "But I'm not sure you want
what comes with me." Stepping toward the wartfrog and ramming his face
against one of Lambert's tough tusks (which, consequently, broke off and
fell to the ground), he broke off what became obviously a papier mache
mask. Beneath it, he was actually the owner of the whole ranch,
MacDonald Lindsay.

"Oh oh...." gasped Lambert. "Er, hi, master. I knew it was you all
along. That is why I went along with your silly little game. Had it been
anyone but you, I'd not have left my work for a moment to play such a
game. But no harm done, right? He