Part 8 (1/2)

”Good morning, Mr. Presto Digi,” said the Mayor.

”Morning!” answered the magician, blinking his eyes as if he had just awakened from sleep.

Twinkle nearly laughed at this scrawny, skinny personage; but by good fortune, for she didn't wish to offend him, she kept her face straight and did not even smile.

”We have two guests here, this morning,” continued the Mayor, addressing the magician, ”who are a little too large to get into our houses. So, as they are invited to stay to luncheon, it would please us all if you would kindly reduce them to fit our underground rooms.”

”Is _that_ all you want?” asked Mr. Presto Digi, bobbing his head at the children.

”It seems to me a great deal,” answered Twinkle. ”I'm afraid you never could do it.”

”Wow!” said the magician, in a scornful voice that was almost a bark. ”I can do that with one paw. Come here to me, and don't step on any of our mounds while you're so big and clumsy.”

So Twinkle and Chubbins got up and walked slowly toward the magician, taking great care where they stepped. Teenty and Weenty were frightened, and ducked their heads with little squeals as the big children pa.s.sed their mound; but they bobbed up again the next moment, being curious to see what would happen.

When the boy and girl stopped before Mr. Presto Digi's mound, he began waving one of his thin, scraggy paws and at the same time made a gurgling noise that was deep down in his throat. And his eyes rolled and twisted around in a very odd way.

Neither Twinkle nor Chubbins felt any effect from the magic, nor any different from ordinary; but they knew they were growing smaller, because their eyes were getting closer to the magician.

”Is that enough?” asked Mr. Presto, after a while.

”Just a little more, please,” replied the Mayor; ”I don't want them to b.u.mp their heads against the doorways.”

So the magician again waved his paw and chuckled and gurgled and blinked, until Twinkle suddenly found she had to look up at him as he squatted on his mound.

”Stop!” she screamed; ”if you keep on, we won't be anything at all!”

”You're just about the right size,” said the Mayor, looking them over with much pleasure, and when the girl turned around she found Mr. Bowko and Mrs. Puff-Pudgy standing beside her, and she could easily see that Chubbins was no bigger than they, and she was no bigger than Chubbins.

”Kindly follow me,” said Mrs. Puff-Pudgy, ”for my little darlings are anxious to make your acquaintance, and as I was the first to discover you, you are to be my guests first of all, and afterward go to the Mayor's to luncheon.”

Chapter V The Home of the Puff-Pudgys

SO Twinkle and Chubbins, still holding hands, trotted along to the Puff-Pudgy mound, and it was strange how rough the ground now seemed to their tiny feet. They climbed up the slope of the mound rather clumsily, and when they came to the hole it seemed to them as big as a well. Then they saw that it wasn't a deep hole, but a sort of tunnel leading down hill into the mound, and Twinkle knew if they were careful they were not likely to slip or tumble down.

Mrs. Puff-Pudgy popped into the hole like a flash, for she was used to it, and waited just below the opening to guide them. So, Twinkle slipped down to the floor of the tunnel and Chubbins followed close after her, and then they began to go downward.

”It's a little dark right here,” said Mrs. Puff-Pudgy; ”but I've ordered the maid to light the candles for you, so you'll see well enough when you're in the rooms.”

”Thank you,” said Twinkle, walking along the hall and feeling her way by keeping her hand upon the smooth sides of the pa.s.sage. ”I hope you won't go to any trouble, or put on airs, just because we've come to visit you.”

”If I do,” replied Mrs. Puffy-Pudgy, ”it's because I know the right way to treat company. We've always belonged to the 'four hundred,' you know.

Some folks never know what to do, or how to do it, but that isn't the way with the Puff-Pudgys. Hi! you, Teenty and Weenty--get out of here and behave yourselves! You'll soon have a good look at our visitors.”

And now they came into a room so comfortable and even splendid that Twinkle's eyes opened wide with amazement.

It was big, and of a round shape, and on the walls were painted very handsome portraits of different prairie-dogs of the Puff-Pudgy family.

The furniture was made of white clay, baked hard in the sun and decorated with paints made from blue clay and red clay and yellow clay.