"Save me! Save me, or I shall spoil!" he cried in heart-rending tones.
Notta was so moved by his evident distress that he impulsively started to jump out of the bus, forgetting the tie between himself and the Cowardly Lion. He therefore got a terrible wrench that twisted his fish head sideways, so he could not see at all. While Bob was straightening this out, the jar-men dragged their companion from beneath the feather wheels, and a simply enormous fellow came running down the street. In one hand he had a pad and in the other a pencil.
"Looks like the Prime Pickle," chattered Snorer, as the jar-man began scribbling on his pad.
"You have broken the peace," read Notta, as the angry official held up his pad. He was magnificently attired under his jar and was evidently a person of some importance. He had, however, been preserved by pickling and was of an unhealthy shade of green.
Notta leaned out of the bus and, seizing the pencil and pad, wrote back, "He broke himself, save the pieces."
The rage of the Preserves, as they read these words, increased to a perfect fury. One, evidently a relation of the broken man, snatched off his lid and cried shrilly, "You'll be minced for this!"
The Prime Preserve again scratched furiously on his pad, "You are under arrest. Come with me," directed the pad, when he held it up.
"This is because I forgot the rules," sighed Notta. "If I had been more polite this would not have happened. Shall we fly or follow?"
"Let's follow," rumbled the Cowardly Lion. "We can fly any time, and I'd like to see all the Preserves while I'm about it, for I think Dorothy will enjoy hearing about them."
Notta ran the Flyaboutabus slowly and carefully down the glass street after the solemn jar-men, the rest of the population following at a safe distance. Bob's eyes grew larger and larger and when a preserved dog ran briskly in front of the bus he gave a shout of glee.