CHAPTER 3
The King of Keretaria
The white ox in his mad dash across the throne room had run violently into a marble pillar, hurling Mandy straight into the arms of a very tall, very stern, and very blue looking monarch. Pages and courtiers tripped and fell left and right in a scramble to get out of the way, while the ox, snorting and trembling, looked balefully over his shoulder at the Goat Girl.
"Whu-what is—the—meaning of—this out-rageous in-trusion?" panted the King. "Unhand me, woman! Remove your finger from my eye and your arms—your ARMS! Hi! Hi! Hi!" The King's sentence ended in three frightened squeaks. "Is it a girl or an octopus?" he puffed, heaving up his chest in an endeavor to dislodge Mandy. "Hi! Hi! Hi! Are you going to allow this clumping savage to insult my Majesty in this—er—high-handed manner?"
As the Goat Girl, by this time scarlet from anger and mortification, jumped off the King's lap, three very high officials of the Court of Keretaria darted forward.
"The High Qui-questioner! The Imperial Persuader! And the Lord High Upper Dupper of the Realm!" bawled a page. Having delivered himself of this impressive announcement the page bolted back of a curtain and from there peered with astonished eyes at the visitor. Everyone in the grand blue throne room looked frightened and ready to run at a moment's notice. Wondering what could be the matter with them all, Mandy with many misgivings watched the counselors of Keretaria advance in a threatening row.
"Now then—not a move!" thundered the High Qui-questioner, tapping her sharply on the shoulder with a golden staff shaped like a huge interrogation point. "It is my duty to question all strangers who ride, fall, fly or break into our Kingdom, and you," the Haughty Nobleman gave Mandy a cold blue stare, "YOU are stranger than any stranger who has ever come to Keretaria."
"It is my duty to persuade you to do as his Majesty commands," stated the Imperial Persuader, raising his gold spiked club.
"And it is MY duty to put you in your place," sniffed the Lord High Upper Dupper rattling a bunch of keys that hung from his belt.
"Well if you ask me," puffed the Ox, rolling his eyes wildly round at the Goat Girl, "her place is in a museum and the sooner you lock her upper dupper, the better." Now Mandy was so astonished to hear the Ox actually speaking, she gave a loud cry and flung up her hands, every single seven of them.