L. Frank Baum_Oz 12 (14 page)

"Yes; I'm rather surprised at my head, myself," replied the Tin
Woodman, thoughtfully. "I thought I had a more pleasant disposition
when I was made of meat."

But just then old Ku-Klip the Tinsmith arrived, and he seemed surprised
to find so many visitors. Ku-Klip was a stout man and a short man. He
had his sleeves rolled above his elbows, showing muscular arms, and he
wore a leathern apron that covered all the front of him, and was so
long that Woot was surprised he didn't step on it and trip whenever he
walked. And Ku-Klip had a gray beard that was almost as long as his
apron, and his head was bald on top and his ears stuck out from his
head like two fans. Over his eyes, which were bright and twinkling, he
wore big spectacles. It was easy to see that the tinsmith was a kind
hearted man, as well as a merry and agreeable one. "Oh-ho!" he cried in
a joyous bass voice; "here are both my tin men come to visit me, and
they and their friends are welcome indeed. I'm very proud of you two
characters, I assure you, for you are so perfect that you are proof
that I'm a good workman. Sit down. Sit down, all of you—if you can
find anything to sit on—and tell me why you are here."

So they found seats and told him all of their adventures that they
thought he would like to know. Ku-Klip was glad to learn that Nick
Chopper, the Tin Woodman, was now Emperor of the Winkies and a friend
of Ozma of Oz, and the tinsmith was also interested in the Scarecrow
and Polychrome.

He turned the straw man around, examining him curiously, and patted him
on all sides, and then said:

"You are certainly wonderful, but I think you would be more durable and
steady on your legs if you were made of tin. Would you like me to—"

"No, indeed!" interrupted the Scarecrow hastily; "I like myself better
as I am."

But to Polychrome the tinsmith said:

"Nothing could improve you, my dear, for you are the most beautiful
maiden I have ever seen. It is pure happiness just to look at you."

"That is praise, indeed, from so skillful a workman," returned the
Rainbow's Daughter, laughing and dancing in and out the room.

"Then it must be this boy you wish me to help," said Ku-Klip, looking
at Woot.

"No," said Woot, "we are not here to seek your skill, but have merely
come to you for information."

Then, between them, they related their search for Nimmie Amee, whom the
Tin Woodman explained he had resolved to marry, yet who had promised to
become the bride of the Tin Soldier before he unfortunately became
rusted. And when the story was told, they asked Ku-Klip if he knew what
had become of Nimmie Amee.

"Not exactly," replied the old man, "but I know that she wept bitterly
when the Tin Soldier did not come to marry her, as he had promised to
do. The old Witch was so provoked at the girl's tears that she beat
Nimmie Amee with her crooked stick and then hobbled away to gather some
magic herbs, with which she intended to transform the girl into an old
hag, so that no one would again love her or care to marry her. It was
while she was away on this errand that Dorothy's house fell on the
Wicked Witch, and she turned to dust and blew away. When I heard this
good news, I sent Nimmie Amee to find the Silver Shoes which the Witch
had worn, but Dorothy had taken them with her to the Emerald City."

"Yes, we know all about those Silver Shoes," said the Scarecrow.

"Well," continued Ku-Klip, "after that, Nimmie Amee decided to go away
from the forest and live with some people she was acquainted with who
had a house on Mount Munch. I have never seen the girl since."

"Do you know the name of the people on Mount Munch, with whom she went
to live?" asked the Tin Woodman.

"No, Nimmie Amee did not mention her friend's name, and I did not ask
her. She took with her all that she could carry of the goods that were
in the Witch's house, and she told me I could have the rest. But when I
went there I found nothing worth taking except some magic powders that
I did not know how to use, and a bottle of Magic Glue."

"What is Magic Glue?" asked Woot.

"It is a magic preparation with which to mend people when they cut
themselves. One time, long ago, I cut off one of my fingers by
accident, and I carried it to the Witch, who took down her bottle and
glued it on again for me. See!" showing them his finger, "it is as good
as ever it was. No one else that I ever heard of had this Magic Glue,
and of course when Nick Chopper cut himself to pieces with his
enchanted axe and Captain Fyter cut himself to pieces with his
enchanted sword, the Witch would not mend them, or allow me to glue
them together, because she had herself wickedly enchanted the axe and
sword. Nothing remained but for me to make them new parts out of tin;
but, as you see, tin answered the purpose very well, and I am sure
their tin bodies are a great improvement on their meat bodies."

"Very true," said the Tin Soldier.

"I quite agree with you," said the Tin Woodman. "I happened to find my
old head in your cupboard, a while ago, and certainly it is not as
desirable a head as the tin one I now wear."

"By the way," said the Tin Soldier, "what ever became of my old head,
Ku-Klip?"

"And of the different parts of our bodies?" added the Tin Woodman.

"Let me think a minute," replied Ku-Klip. "If I remember right, you two
boys used to bring me most of your parts, when they were cut off, and I
saved them in that barrel in the corner. You must not have brought me
all the parts, for when I made Chopfyt I had hard work finding enough
pieces to complete the job. I finally had to finish him with one arm."

"Who is Chopfyt?" inquired Woot.

"Oh, haven't I told you about Chopfyt?" exclaimed Ku-Klip. "Of course
not! And he's quite a curiosity, too. You'll be interested in hearing
about Chopfyt. This is how he happened:

"One day, after the Witch had been destroyed and Nimmie Amee had gone
to live with her friends on Mount Munch, I was looking around the shop
for something and came upon the bottle of Magic Glue which I had
brought from the old Witch's house. It occurred to me to piece together
the odds and ends of you two people, which of course were just as good
as ever, and see if I couldn't make a man out of them. If I succeeded,
I would have an assistant to help me with my work, and I thought it
would be a clever idea to put to some practical use the scraps of Nick
Chopper and Captain Fyter. There were two perfectly good heads in my
cupboard, and a lot of feet and legs and parts of bodies in the barrel,
so I set to work to see what I could do.

"First, I pieced together a body, gluing it with the Witch's Magic
Glue, which worked perfectly. That was the hardest part of my job,
however, because the bodies didn't match up well and some parts were
missing. But by using a piece of Captain Fyter here and a piece of Nick
Chopper there, I finally got together a very decent body, with heart
and all the trimmings complete."

"Whose heart did you use in making the body?" asked the Tin Woodman
anxiously.

"I can't tell, for the parts had no tags on them and one heart looks
much like another. After the body was completed, I glued two fine legs
and feet onto it. One leg was Nick Chopper's and one was Captain
Fyter's and, finding one leg longer than the other, I trimmed it down
to make them match. I was much disappointed to find that I had but one
arm. There was an extra leg in the barrel, but I could find only one
arm. Having glued this onto the body, I was ready for the head, and I
had some difficulty in making up my mind which head to use. Finally I
shut my eyes and reached out my hand toward the cupboard shelf, and the
first head I touched I glued upon my new man."

"It was mine!" declared the Tin Soldier, gloomily.

"No, it was mine," asserted Ku-Klip, "for I had given you another in
exchange for it—the beautiful tin head you now wear. When the glue had
dried, my man was quite an interesting fellow. I named him Chopfyt,
using a part of Nick Chopper's name and a part of Captain Fyter's name,
because he was a mixture of both your cast-off parts. Chopfyt was
interesting, as I said, but he did not prove a very agreeable
companion. He complained bitterly because I had given him but one
arm—as if it were my fault!—and he grumbled because the suit of blue
Munchkin clothes, which I got for him from a neighbor, did not fit him
perfectly."

"Ah, that was because he was wearing my old head," remarked the Tin
Soldier. "I remember that head used to be very particular about its
clothes."

"As an assistant," the old tinsmith continued, "Chopfyt was not a
success. He was awkward with tools and was always hungry. He demanded
something to eat six or eight times a day, so I wondered if I had
fitted his insides properly. Indeed, Chopfyt ate so much that little
food was left for myself; so, when he proposed, one day, to go out into
the world and seek adventures, I was delighted to be rid of him. I even
made him a tin arm to take the place of the missing one, and that
pleased him very much, so that we parted good friends."

"What became of Chopfyt after that?" the Scarecrow inquired.

"I never heard. He started off toward the east, into the plains of the
Munchkin Country, and that was the last I ever saw of him."

"It seems to me," said the Tin Woodman reflectively, "that you did
wrong in making a man out of our cast-off parts. It is evident that
Chopfyt could, with justice, claim relationship with both of us."

"Don't worry about that," advised Ku-Klip cheerfully; "it is not likely
that you will ever meet the fellow. And, if you should meet him, he
doesn't know who he is made of, for I never told him the secret of his
manufacture. Indeed, you are the only ones who know of it, and you may
keep the secret to yourselves, if you wish to."

"Never mind Chopfyt," said the Scarecrow. "Our business now is to find
poor Nimmie Amee and let her choose her tin husband. To do that, it
seems, from the information Ku-Klip has given us, we must travel to
Mount Munch."

"If that's the programme, let us start at once," suggested Woot.

So they all went outside, where they found Polychrome dancing about
among the trees and talking with the birds and laughing as merrily as
if she had not lost her Rainbow and so been separated from all her
fairy sisters.

They told her they were going to Mount Munch, and she replied:

"Very well; I am as likely to find my Rainbow there as here, and any
other place is as likely as there. It all depends on the weather. Do
you think it looks like rain?"

They shook their heads, and Polychrome laughed again and danced on
after them when they resumed their journey.

They were proceeding so easily and comfortably on their way to Mount
Munch that Woot said in a serious tone of voice:

"I'm afraid something is going to happen."

"Why?" asked Polychrome, dancing around the group of travelers.

"Because," said the boy, thoughtfully, "I've noticed that when we have
the least reason for getting into trouble, something is sure to go
wrong. Just now the weather is delightful; the grass is beautifully
blue and quite soft to our feet; the mountain we are seeking shows
clearly in the distance and there is no reason anything should happen
to delay us in getting there. Our troubles all seem to be over,
and—well, that's why I'm afraid," he added, with a sigh.

"Dear me!" remarked the Scarecrow, "what unhappy thoughts you have, to
be sure. This is proof that born brains cannot equal manufactured
brains, for my brains dwell only on facts and never borrow trouble.
When there is occasion for my brains to think, they think, but I would
be ashamed of my brains if they kept shooting out thoughts that were
merely fears and imaginings, such as do no good, but are likely to do
harm."

"For my part," said the Tin Woodman, "I do not think at all, but allow
my velvet heart to guide me at all times."

"The tinsmith filled my hollow head with scraps and clippings of tin,"
said the Soldier, "and he told me they would do nicely for brains, but
when I begin to think, the tin scraps rattle around and get so mixed
that I'm soon bewildered. So I try not to think. My tin heart is almost
as useless to me, for it is hard and cold, so I'm sure the red velvet
heart of my friend Nick Chopper is a better guide."

"Thoughtless people are not unusual," observed the Scarecrow, "but I
consider them more fortunate than those who have useless or wicked
thoughts and do not try to curb them. Your oil can, friend Woodman, is
filled with oil, but you only apply the oil to your joints, drop by
drop, as you need it, and do not keep spilling it where it will do no
good. Thoughts should be restrained in the same way as your oil, and
only applied when necessary, and for a good purpose. If used carefully,
thoughts are good things to have."

Polychrome laughed at him, for the Rainbow's Daughter knew more about
thoughts than the Scarecrow did. But the others were solemn, feeling
they had been rebuked, and tramped on in silence.

Suddenly Woot, who was in the lead, looked around and found that all
his comrades had mysteriously disappeared. But where could they have
gone to? The broad plain was all about him and there were neither trees
nor bushes that could hide even a rabbit, nor any hole for one to fall
into. Yet there he stood, alone.

Surprise had caused him to halt, and with a thoughtful and puzzled
expression on his face he looked down at his feet. It startled him anew
to discover that he had no feet. He reached out his hands, but he could
not see them. He could feel his hands and arms and body; he stamped his
feet on the grass and knew they were there, but in some strange way
they had become invisible.

While Woot stood, wondering, a crash of metal sounded in his ears and
he heard two heavy bodies tumble to the earth just beside him.