'That is not all, but it's quite enough,' returned Kaliko earnestly. 'On the other hand, no one can hurt a dragon, because he's the toughest creature alive. One flop of his huge tail could smash a hundred nomes to pancakes, and with teeth and claws he could tear even you or me into small bits, so that it would be almost impossible to put us together again. Once, a few hundred years ago, while wandering through some deserted caverns, I came upon a small piece of a nome lying on the rocky floor. I asked the piece of nome what had happened to it. Fortunately the mouth was a part of this piece — the mouth and the left eye — so it was able to tell me that a fierce dragon was the cause. It had attacked the poor nome and scattered him in every direction, and as there was no friend near to collect his pieces and put him together, they had been separated for a great many years. So you see, Your Majesty, it is not in good taste to sneer at a dragon.'
The King had listened attentively to Kaliko. Said he:
'It will only be necessary to chain this dragon which Tititi-Hoochoo has sent here, in order to prevent his reaching us with his claws and teeth.'
'He also breathes flames,' Kaliko reminded him.
'My nomes are not afraid of fire, nor am I,' said Ruggedo.
'Well, how about the Army of Oogaboo?'
'Sixteen cowardly officers and Tik-Tok! Why, I could defeat them single-handed; but I won't try to. I'll summon my army of nomes to drive the invaders out of my territory, and if we catch any of them I intend to stick needles into them until they hop with pain.'
'I hope you won't hurt any of the girls,' said Kaliko.
'I'll hurt 'em all!' roared the angry Metal Monarch. 'And that braying Mule I'll make into hoof-soup, and feed it to my nomes, that it may add to their strength.'
'Why not be good to the strangers and release your prisoner, the Shaggy Man's brother?' suggested Kaliko.
'Never!'
'It may save you a lot of annoyance. And you don't want the Ugly One.'
'I don't want him; that's true. But I won't allow anybody to order me around. I'm King of the Nomes and I'm the Metal Monarch, and I shall do as I please and what I please and when I please!'
With this speech Ruggedo threw his sceptre at Kaliko's head, aiming it so well that the Royal Chamberlain had to fall flat upon the floor in order to escape it. But the Hearer did not see the sceptre coming and it swept past his head so closely that it broke off the tip of one of his long ears. He gave a dreadful yell that quite startled Ruggedo, and the King was sorry for the accident because those long ears of the Hearer were really valuable to him.
So the Nome King forgot to be angry with Kaliko and ordered his Chamberlain to summon General Guph and the army of nomes and have them properly armed. They were then to march to the mouth of the Tube, where they could seize the travelers as soon as they appeared.
Chapter Fifteen
The Dragon Defies Danger
Although the journey through the Tube was longer, this time, than before, it was so much more comfortable that none of our friends minded it at all. They talked together most of the time and as they found the dragon good-natured and fond of the sound of his own voice they soon became well acquainted with him and accepted him as a companion.
'You see,' said Shaggy, in his frank way, 'Quox is on our side, and therefore the dragon is a good fellow. If he happened to be an enemy, instead of a friend, I am sure I should dislike him very much, for his breath smells of brimstone, he is very conceited and he is so strong and fierce that he would prove a dangerous foe.'
'Yes, indeed,' returned Quox, who had listened to this speech with pleasure; 'I suppose I am about as terrible as any living thing. I am glad you find me conceited, for that proves I know my good qualities. As for my breath smelling of brimstone, I really can't help it, and I once met a man whose breath smelled of onions, which I consider far worse.'
'I don't,' said Betsy; 'I love onions.
'And I love brimstone,' declared the dragon, 'so don't let us quarrel over one another's peculiarities.'
Saying this, he breathed a long breath and shot a flame fifty feet from his mouth. The brimstone made Betsy cough, but she remembered about the onions and said nothing.
They had no idea how far they had gone through the center of the earth, nor when to expect the trip to end. At one time the little girl remarked:
'I wonder when we'll reach the bottom of this hole. And isn't it funny, Shaggy Man, that what is the bottom to us now, was the top when we fell the other way?'
'What puzzles me,' said Files, 'is that we are able to fall both ways.'
'That,' announced Tik-Tok, 'is be-cause the world is round.'
'Exactly,' responded Shaggy. 'The machinery in your head is in fine working order, Tik-Tok. You know, Betsy, that there is such a thing as the Attraction of Gravitation, which draws everything toward the center of the earth. That is why we fall out of bed, and why everything clings to the surface of the earth.'
'Then why doesn't everyone go on down to the center of the earth?' inquired the little girl.
'I was afraid you were going to ask me that,' replied Shaggy in a sad tone. 'The reason, my dear, is that the earth is so solid that other solid things can't get through it. But when there's a hole, as there is in this case, we drop right down to the center of the world.'
'Why don't we stop there?' asked Betsy.
'Because we go so fast that we acquire speed enough to carry us right up to the other end.'
'I don't understand that, and it makes my head ache to try to figure it out,' she said after some thought. 'One thing draws us to the center and another thing pushes us away from it. But — '
'Don't ask me why, please,' interrupted the Shaggy Man. 'If you can't understand it, let it go at that.'
'Do you understand it?' she inquired.
'All the magic isn't in fairyland,' he said gravely. 'There's lots of magic in all Nature, and you may see it as well in the United States, where you and I once lived, as you can here.'
'I never did,' she replied.
'Because you were so used to it all that you didn't realize it was magic. Is anything more wonderful than to see a flower grow and blossom, or to get light out of the electricity in the air? The cows that manufacture milk for us must have machinery fully as remarkable as that in Tik-Tok's copper body, and perhaps you've noticed that — '
And then, before Shaggy could finish his speech, the strong light of day suddenly broke upon them, grew brighter, and completely enveloped them. The dragon's claws no longer scraped against the metal Tube, for he shot into the open air a hundred feet or more and sailed so far away from the slanting hole that when he landed it was on the peak of a mountain and just over the entrance to the many underground caverns of the Nome King.
Some of the officers tumbled off their seats when Quox struck the ground, but most of the dragon's passengers only felt a slight jar. All were glad to be on solid earth again and they at once dismounted and began to look about them. Queerly enough, as soon as they had left the dragon, the seats that were strapped to the monster's back disappeared, and this probably happened because there was no further use for them and because Quox looked far more dignified in just his silver scales. Of course he still wore the forty yards of ribbon around his neck, as well as the great locket, but these only made him look 'dressed up,' as Betsy remarked.
Now the army of nomes had gathered thickly around the mouth of the Tube, in order to be ready to capture the band of invaders as soon as they popped out. There were, indeed, hundreds of nomes assembled, and they were led by Guph, their most famous General. But they did not expect the dragon to fly so high, and he shot out of the Tube so suddenly that it took them by surprise. When the nomes had rubbed the astonishment out of their eyes and regained their wits, they discovered the dragon quietly seated on the mountainside far above their heads, while the other strangers were standing in a group and calmly looking down upon them.
General Guph was very angry at the escape, which was no one's fault but his own.
