The Hungry Tiger of Oz

by Ruth Plumly Thompson

"Don't you ever have any storms in the sky?" called Ozma over her shoulder.

Atmos shook his head solemnly. "We're above all that sort of thing," grunted the airman, trying his best to keep up with Ozma. "Dear me, how dreadfully disagreeable." The sky had grown dark by this time and the rain was falling in torrents. Blinding flashes of lightning and loud crashes of thunder added to the confusion and when large hail stones came pelting down upon their heads, Atmos stopped in positive alarm.

"Princess! Princess!" choked the airman, groping toward Ozma in the dark, "Get me out of this or I'll be punctured!"

"If I only had my magic belt!" gasped Ozma, pushing back her wet hair, "I could wish us both to the Emerald City. Oh, dear, I do wish there was a house somewhere!"

Scarcely had the words been spoken before a house sprang up at the little girl's feet—so suddenly, in fact, that it tumbled her over backwards. The morning before she left her castle, Ozma had slipped one of the Wizard's wishing powders into her pocket.

But, shoe strings and button hooks! The little girl had not been careful to say what kind of house she wanted and there, perched askew on the dripping rocks, stood a dog house. While Atmos stared at it in a daze, thinking it, too, had fallen from the sky, and Ozma picked herself up in astonishment, a cross doggie face appeared in the doorway.

"Gr—woof!" rumbled the dog threateningly. Where he had been wished from I cannot say, but the journey had been unexpected and rough, and seeing two total strangers standing outside, the dog immediately decided they were responsible for the accident. Paying no attention to the rain or hail, he dashed furiously out and tried to bury his teeth in the airman's leg. Thanks to his iron boots, Atmos was not punctured, and as the dog made a spring at Ozma, the airman snatched the little fairy up in his arms and began running in a way he had not believed possible. So swiftly did Atmos run that the barks of the dog soon died away in the distance and the storm was left far behind them.

"Stop! Stop!" begged Ozma, when she could finally make the airman hear her. "Stop, Atmos dear. Atmos Fere, you're running the wrong way. Oh! Oh! Do take care, there's something queer about this country."

With a final puff, Atmos brought himself to a stop, or at least he tried to. But the earth beneath his feet was behaving most unaccountably, moving along in big brown waves and carrying him tumbling along with it. They had unluckily run into the great rolling country of the east, mentioned by a few explorers, but seldom crossed by ordinary travellers. Standing first on one foot and then the other, Atmos tried wildly to keep his balance, but in a moment a heavy mud wave struck him behind the knees and rolled him over, so that he and the little Princess of Oz were soon being buffeted along like tiny ships on an unruly ocean. When the waves broke, which they frequently did, sticks, stones, pebbles and dust showered over their heads. In fact, a more miserable mode of travel cannot be imagined.