“Never mind,” whispered Peg Amy, standing on her tip toes to whisper in Kabumpo’s huge ear, “it’s taking us in the right direction, and maybe, if we were very polite—?”
“Go ahead and try it,” wheezed Kabumpo, rolling his eyes. “I’m too upset.” He hugged the tree again.
So Peg climbed to the top of the little hill and, waving her wooden arms to attract the Country’s attention, called cheerfully:
“Yoho, Mr. Land! Where are you going?”
At first the Land only blinked his blue lake-eyes sulkily but, as Peg paid no attention to his ill temper and began making him pretty compliments on his mountains and trees, he gradually cheered up.
“I’m going to be an island,” he announced finally. “That’s where I’m going. I’m tired of being a hot, dry old undiscovered plateau and I don’t intend to stop till I come to the Nonestic Ocean.”
“Oh!” groaned Wag, falling over backwards. “We’re going to be cast away on a desert island.”
Peg held up a warning finger. “What made you want to run away and be an island?” she asked faintly for, even to Peg, things looked serious.
“Well,” began the Land, giving itself a hitch, “I lay patiently for years and years waiting to be discovered. Nobody came—not even one little missionary. I kept getting lonelier and lonelier. You see how broken up I am!”