Read Out of Oz: The Final Volume in the Wicked Years for Free Online

suppose I should convene a coloquy among the help. Propose a common attitude toward this intrusion, and so on. What do you think?”
    “I was never good at current affairs. I preferred the arts of needlework and correspondence.”
    “Correspondence? To whomever would you write?”
    “Wel. The papers.”
    “So you took the papers. You never read the papers, surely?”
    “I found news somewhat sulying.” Miss Murth fluffed the feathers on Lady Glinda’s afternoon hat; they remained droopy. But Lady Glinda wasn’t going anywhere. “It wasn’t a wise choice, I now see,” said Miss Murth. “I might have folowed politics, but I preferred the society columns. When you were in them.”
    “Surely I’m in them stil.”
    Miss Murth sighed. “It’s a shame about the horse droppings.”
    “Miss Murth. Are you listening?”
    Miss Murth straightened her shoulders to indicate that she was indeed listening, damn it.
    “You ought to folow events, Miss Murth. You remember that skirmish by Munchkinlanders into Loyal Oz last fal? Oh, don’t look at me like that, it was west of here, near that strip of land that divides Kelswater and Restwater. You remember. Near the mauntery of Saint Glinda, where I sometimes like to go and consider my soul, my debts, my diet, and so on? Yes?”
    “Yes. With those cloistered ladies who think they’re so holy.”
    “Miss Murth. Do try to attend. Out of the goodness of my heart I’m sharing what I have picked up.”
    “The skirmish. Yes. Everyone was so vexed,” recaled Miss Murth, aiming at drolery and achieving condescension. “It completely upended the social season.” Damn the attitude of help; Glinda was talking this out to get it straight in her own head. “When by winter’s end our Munchkinlander tenants and neighbors had retreated under the superior fire of the EC
    forces, they scurried back east. I hear they’ve been beavering about, renovating some antique fortress at the easternmost end of the lake. Where the Munchkin River debouches. So I believe General Cherrystone is stopping here to wait for reinforcements before pressing farther east. If he takes the fort at the head of the lake, he’l have access to the river, which is a virtual high road of water straight into the breadbasket of Oz, straight to Bright Lettins and to the seat of the Munchkinland government at Colwen Grounds.”
    “Where the Thropp family used to live, back in the day.” Miss Murth sniffed.
    “Indeed. Wel, not Elphaba, nor her brother Shel. Oh excuse me: Emperor . But their great-grandfather the Eminent Thropp ruled from that house. A pretentious heap compared to Mockbeggar’s understated charm! But never mind al that. It’s on the strength of his bloodlines that Shel Thropp claims Colwen Grounds and, by extension, the right to rule al of Munchkinland. So he starts with Restwater, which until the secession of Munchkinland twenty-umpty years ago, or something like that, had always provided water for the Emerald City.”
    “If we’re through reviewing current events,” said Miss Murth, “the General is waiting for the list of staff. He threatens to imprison the whole lot of us if he doesn’t receive it by teatime.”
    “Very wel. Find a quil and take down this list. You can remind me of the names, if you wil. Put yourself first, Miss Murth. Have you a first name?”
    “Yes, in fact.”
    “How alarming. Next, Chef. What’s he caled?”
    “Ig Baernaeraenaesis.”
    “Write Chef. Write Puggles the Butler.”
    “ His real name is Po Understar.”
    “Oh, this is so tedious! Am I expected to remember these names? Is that the lot? Are we missing anyone? I think that’s it.”
    “You requested a chambermaid.”
    “That’s right, I did. Now whom should I pick? There’s Mirrtle. She’s a little cross-eyed but she plays a mean hand of graboge. There’s the broomgirl who does the steps. I don’t recal her name. And then sily Floxiaza. No, she steals my cologne. Not Floxiaza. What do you