L. Frank Baum Read Online Free Page B

around until it was quite battered
and tarnished. Yet, as the counselor said, it was the king's crown,
and it was quite proper he should wear it on the solemn occasion of
his auction.
    Like all boys, be they kings or paupers, his majesty had torn and
soiled his one suit of clothes, so that they were hardly
presentable; and there was no money to buy new ones. Therefore the
counselor wound the old ermine robe around the king and sat him upon
the stool in the middle of the otherwise empty audience chamber.
    And around him stood all the courtiers and politicians and
hangers-on of the kingdom, consisting of such people as were too
proud or lazy to work for a living. There was a great number of
them, you may be sure, and they made an imposing appearance.
    Then the doors of the audience chamber were thrown open, and the
wealthy ladies who aspired to being queen of Quok came trooping in.
The king looked them over with much anxiety, and decided they were
each and all old enough to be his grandmother, and ugly enough to
scare away the crows from the royal cornfields. After which he lost
interest in them.
    But the rich ladies never looked at the poor little king squatting
upon his stool. They gathered at once about the chief counselor, who
acted as auctioneer.
    "How much am I offered for the coronet of the queen of Quok?" asked
the counselor, in a loud voice.
    "Where is the coronet?" inquired a fussy old lady who had just
buried her ninth husband and was worth several millions.
    "There isn't any coronet at present," explained the chief counselor,
"but whoever bids highest will have the right to wear one, and she
can then buy it."
    "Oh," said the fussy old lady, "I see." Then she added: "I'll bid
fourteen dollars."
    "Fourteen thousand dollars!" cried a sour-looking woman who was thin
and tall and had wrinkles all over her skin—"like a frosted apple,"
the king thought.
    The bidding now became fast and furious, and the poverty-stricken
courtiers brightened up as the sum began to mount into the millions.
    "He'll bring us a very pretty fortune, after all," whispered one to
his comrade, "and then we shall have the pleasure of helping him
spend it."
    The king began to be anxious. All the women who looked at all
kind-hearted or pleasant had stopped bidding for lack of money, and
the slender old dame with the wrinkles seemed determined to get the
coronet at any price, and with it the boy husband. This ancient
creature finally became so excited that her wig got crosswise of her
head and her false teeth kept slipping out, which horrified the
little king greatly; but she would not give up.
    At last the chief counselor ended the auction by crying out:
    "Sold to Mary Ann Brodjinsky de la Porkus for three million, nine
hundred thousand, six hundred and twenty-four dollars and sixteen
cents!" And the sour-looking old woman paid the money in cash and on
the spot, which proves this is a fairy story.
    The king was so disturbed at the thought that he must marry this
hideous creature that he began to wail and weep; whereupon the woman
boxed his ears soundly. But the counselor reproved her for punishing
her future husband in public, saying:
    "You are not married yet. Wait until to-morrow, after the wedding
takes place. Then you can abuse him as much as you wish. But at
present we prefer to have people think this is a love match."
    The poor king slept but little that night, so filled was he with
terror of his future wife. Nor could he get the idea out of his head
that he preferred to marry the armorer's daughter, who was about his
own age. He tossed and tumbled around upon his hard bed until the
moonlight came in at the window and lay like a great white sheet
upon the bare floor. Finally, in turning over for the hundredth
time, his hand struck against a secret spring in the headboard of
the big mahogany bedstead, and at once, with a sharp click, a panel
flew open.
    The noise caused the king to look up, and, seeing the open panel, he
stood upon tiptoe, and,