“Hank and I will help you find your brother,” said Betsy in her most cheerful voice. “I’m so far away from home now that I don’t s’pose I’ll ever find my way back; and, to tell the truth, it’s more fun traveling around and having adventures than sticking at home. Don’t you think so, Hank?”
“Hee-haw!” said Hank, and the Shaggy Man thanked them both.
“For my part,” said Princess Ozga of Roseland, with a gentle sigh, “I must remain forever exiled from my Kingdom. So I, too, will be glad to help the Shaggy Man find his lost brother.”
“That’s very kind of you, ma’am,” said Shaggy. "But unless I can find the underground cavern of Ruggedo,[A] the Metal Monarch, I shall never find poor brother."
[A] This King was formerly named “Roquat,” but after he drank of the “Waters of Oblivion” he forgot his own name and had to take another.
“Doesn’t anyone know where it is?” inquired Betsy.
“Some one must know, of course,” was Shaggy’s reply. “But we are not the ones. The only way to succeed is for us to keep going until we find a person who can direct us to Ruggedo’s cavern.”