Out of Oz: The Final Volume in the Wicked Years (43 page)

Brrr had had his brushes in court before, and always on the wrong end of the law. But that was back in the Emerald City. Were things done differently in whatever passed for Munchkin justice? Mister Mikko set Brrr straight.

“Generaly disputes in Munchkinland are settled on a case-by-case basis. The tradition of reliance on precedent isn’t deeply rooted in Munchkinland, given the rural and piecemeal settlement of the county.

Most cases are decided behind closed doors, the traveling magistrate serving as confessor and adjudicator both. I’l wager he pockets the fine, too. It’s my belief that jurisprudence in Munchkinland doesn’t exist at al except to reinforce the prejudices of the top dog. Which despite the metaphor is never an Animal, at least in Munchkinland.”

“I didn’t know you had a Dog in this fight,” said Brrr.

“Ha-ha. Wel, pay attention. This trial wil be more formal. No executive sessions here, this one wil be open to the public—you can’t be surprised at that.”

“Are there jurors? Witnesses?”

Mister Mikko elaborated. For a so-caled open trial, a five-member jury was usualy empaneled at its own cost. In this instance, it seemed Mombey was going to present the case herself, in an initial declamation, and then turn the proceedings over to a celebrity magistrate appointed to the position for this trial only. The barristers pleading the cases for the prosecution and for the defense would post their requests for witnesses on a bilboard on the door of the Grange Central. Potential witnesses only had to show up in time to get a seat. Generaly they could nominate themselves of their own free wil, or refuse to testify if they weren’t in the mood. But rules could vary case by case, so who knew.

“Nipp,” Brrr told Little Daffy back at the inn. “He’s the appointed magistrate. Does that name ring a bel?”

“Not to me,” said Little Daffy. “But don’t forget I was cloistered for al those years.”

“I know of him,” said Mr. Boss. “He was the first governor of Munchkinland after Nessarose Thropp was murdered in cold blood by that prim little Miss Dorothy, bless her little soul.” He was in a good mood.

“You’re not opinionated, I see,” said Brrr, though he was glad Mr. Boss seemed to be coming back around some.

The trial was designated for Densloe Den, a little salon theater, but for fears of crowding was soon shifted to a venue caled Neale House. A former armory now used for the spring cattle fair. Above its arches on three sides ran a galery. The Neale could sit a large number of visitors, but on the first day the interest seemed slim, so Little Daffy, Mr. Boss, and Brrr easily got tickets to attend the instructions to the jury. The room wasn’t a quarter ful. They could have had front row seats, though Brrr by dint of his size was required to recline on the floor to one side. He couldn’t have fit a single thigh in a folding chair scaled for Munchkinlanders, not for money nor love.

The day’s newsfolds, left on the seats of chairs, presented potted biographies of the trial’s dramatis personae. Brrr only had time to read about the magistrate. Nipp had begun his career as a kind of concierge at Colwen Grounds, serving Nessarose Thropp up until the day she was squished. Apparently because he’d held the keys to the actual house, Nipp had stepped in as emergency Prime Minister until the Munchkinlanders’ appetite to be governed by an Eminence reasserted itself. Mombey had emerged from a prior anonymity—the argument for her elevation wasn’t rehearsed here. Whereupon Nipp had retired with honors that included a fancy cake, a sash, and a lifetime supply of ammonia salts, which apparently had some symbolic significance no one at the city desk of the press had bothered to identify.

Brrr had hardly finished the bio when Nipp entered the chamber. Among the taler of Munchkinlanders, he wore a conical hat whose brim was sprightly with felt bals. He flung the hat onto the top of a coat stand, to a spatter of applause. That he could land it like a horseshoe, Brrr deduced, was proof of his capacity to serve with a steady hand. Then Nipp took the bench. It was supplied with the traditional gavel, the bel, a slate on which messages could be scrawled for private viewing in case the magistrate didn’t want to be overheard, and a smal pile of ham sandwiches under a net to keep off the flies. Behind him two grammar school students were ready with fans made of blue ostrich plumes in case it became too warm.

“Citizens of Munchkinland,” Nipp began, in a voice quavery with age but strengthening by the sentence, “we are here to keep our big mouths shut and to listen. To listen to what is presented. Anyone in Neale House who makes a fuss or disrupts our attention to the proceedings shal be taken out and fined, or shot, or put in the stocks. Which this time of year are very uncomfortable what with mosquito season just beginning. Are there any questions?—then let us continue. I predict this trial wil last a week—perhaps two. Those who can’t tolerate the heat should stay at home. Babies are not alowed. If there is a fire don’t everyone scream ‘Fire!’ al at once—it’s terribly muddling and only makes people nervous. Should I feel the need to cal additional witnesses I shal do so and I hereforth declare that for this trial there is no right of resistance—if you’re in the room, you’re considered fair game for service. Furthermore if you’re not in the room and you are required you shal be apprehended by deputized mobs and escorted here whether you like it or not. Tel your friends and neighbors. If you are wanted and you’re on holiday up at Mossmere or someplace, you shal be sent to prison when you return for taking a holiday thoughtlessly.

Are there any questions—speak up—no questions—I see—then let us begin by my presenting the barristers and the jurors.”

“This isn’t going to take two weeks,” whispered Brrr to Little Daffy, who was sitting in a chair on the end of her aisle.

Nipp introduced the envoy for the prosecution, a part-time barrister whose regular job was being a professional mourner. Dame Fegg. She emerged from a curtained doorway dressed in something that looked to Brrr as if it had been cut down from a choir robe—about five minutes earlier, without benefit of a seamstress. She was stil putting pins in her hair as she came through. A no-nonsense middle-aged farm frau with pockets beneath her eyes deep enough to hold tokens for an EC omnibus. “Yoiks,” muttered Brrr.

The envoy for the defense was introduced next, a certain Temper Bailey, who turned out to be a brown Fever Owl. “They couldn’t spring for a human?” muttered Little Daffy. “Guess this is what is caled an open-and-shut case.”

“Animals stil draw lower salaries, I bet,” replied Brrr.

The Owl flew to a perch and rotated his head on his neck, al the way round. Not an unusual gesture for an Owl, but unsettling in a court of law; accusatory, somehow, of them al, even the spectators.

Temper Bailey then nodded to Dame Fegg, but she was applying some sort of liquid paint to her nails and didn’t return the obeisance.

Only when the jurors had been seated did the magistrate seem to notice that the room was sparsely populated. He stood on his toes and regarded the audience with disdain, as if it were they who were skiving off. “The Eminence suggests this is a trial of interest to al Munchkinlanders,” said Nipp. “I need hardly mention that without the unprovoked invasion by Dorothy a generation ago, we wouldn’t be in the position of defending Restwater from the Emerald City. The Eminence of that day, Miss Nessarose Thropp, would likely stil be ensconced in Colwen Grounds. Or else she and her consort would have brought forth a new Eminence to take her place.”

A rude titter, quickly suppressed. Enough of the crowd was old enough to recal that Nessarose had not been thronged with suitors. She had died without benefit of spouse or spawn.

“When are we going to see Dorothy?” asked Temper Bailey. Brrr would have guessed that the defense might have had a chance to question his client before opening ceremonies, but it seemed the government was running this trial on the cheap.

Nipp made his first ruling, not with a gavel but with a bel. “I am dismissing al parties until tomorrow morning. Come back with your relatives and friends. Tel them that La Mombey herself wil be here to introduce the accused. If this hal isn’t filed to capacity word wil get back to the Emerald City that Munchkinlanders have lost al public spirit. Do as I say, in the name of justice.”

“I should think he meant ‘in the name of public relations,’ ” said Brrr.

“I heard that, you,” said Nipp. “I’l brook no backtalk from the floor, especialy from an Animal. Dismissed.”

As might have been expected, the next day saw the galery nearly ful. Munchkins en masse. Perhaps Nipp’s refusing to bring out Dorothy for the introductory session had whetted appetites. At any rate, it was a good time of the summer for a trial. Harvest was stil six weeks out. Among a bunch of farm people come to town for the fun, Brrr and Little Daffy and Mr. Boss, brandishing their tickets, took their places. Little Daffy was equipped with a sack of muffins and fruit and a thermos of potato brandy in case things got dul. A couple of teenage scowlawags nearby played a game of Hangman using the word
DOROTHY
as the clue.

Nipp marched in folowed by Dame Fegg and Temper Bailey. The Owl had been slip-covered with a tunic not unlike Dame Fegg’s. It made him look like a tea cosy with an owl head. He winced at the laughter of the crowd. Everyone settled down when Nipp clapped the gavel on its stand and introduced the Eminence of Munchkinland, La Mombey. “And rise, you dolts. This isn’t one of your talent shows!” The crowd obliged as a pair of Chimpanzees in livery swung open the double doors at the back of the bench. The Eminence flooded into the room in another tidal barrage of silks, these flowered, white petals against maroon. Brrr studied her face. It seemed different. Less chiseled, more delicate, even fragile. And the hair on her head, in a chignon so crisp it might have been a crown, looked darker, spikier. But he didn’t dare mutter in her presence. She looked ful of sorrowful dignity. He found himself lowering his head just for a moment in the presence of something he couldn’t name. Self-possession, if nothing else.

“We are Munchkinlanders,” she told the crowd. Her voice was like honey coating the knife. “We are hospitable to al, even those who arrive on our homeland to spite us and murder us. I ask you to extend the courtesy of our traditions to the accused, Dorothy Gale. I beg to remind you that there is no statute of limitations where crimes against the heart are concerned. If we must convict the accused, let us convict her justly. If we choose to decide she is not guilty of the charges of murder, let us not harbor thoughts of malfeasance when she is liberated.” Mombey turned to the five jurors, who stood to one side. They were al unrepentently human. “You five are the eyes and ears of Munchkinland, and you must be the heart and soul of justice. Bring Dorothy to trial with merciful dispatch. Whatever you recommend to the magistrate wil be taken under deepest consideration, but it is his conclusion that we wil folow. You are here as advisors only. And the public is here not to second-guess the proceedings but to witness them, so that they can tel their children and their grandchildren that justice is alive in Oz.

“For his services to our country, today I elevate our former Prime Minister to the peerage. Henceforth he shal be Lord Nipp of Dragon Cupboard. Let the constabulary bring forth the alien.” La Mombey retired behind the doors through which she’d emerged, as if to be seen in the same room as the accused would constitute an affront to her dignity. Only when the Chimpanzees had closed the double doors with a click did Brrr notice a trapdoor to one side. The Chimpanzees put their overknuckled paws to the ring, and together they puled it up. Then they retreated to the far side of the pen. The Lion leaned forward to catch a glimpse of Dorothy again, after al this time.

4.

As she emerged, clumsily, reaching for a hand to help her up the ladder, though there was no one to stretch out such a hand, the Lion realized he’d been thinking of Dorothy as about ten years old. Just about Athe age Rain was now, more or less. A few other assumptions folowed, nearly simultaneously.

His affection for Rain was related to his memory of Dorothy.

He hadn’t ever done much for Dorothy except provide a few laughs and some companionship on the road.

He’d done no better for Rain, yet he felt more implicated in Rain’s future than he had in Dorothy’s. Was this age and maturity on his part? Or sentimentality?

Or was it that Rain was less competent than Dorothy had been at that age? Needed him more?

The crime for which Dorothy was being charged had occurred fifteen, eighteen, twenty years ago. She ought to be a mature woman now, able as needed to explain away or to apologize for the accidents of her youth.

In her maturity, wil she recognize me?

He held his breath, but his tail thumped on the floor. Agitation, pleasure, and the curiosity that sometimes kiled the likes of him and his kin.

5.

Dorothy’s head rose farther out of the square in the flooring. She was facing the magistrate, who glared upon her as if he hadn’t seen her before. Maybe she’d been kept sequestered from
everyone
involved in this trial. Six times Temper Bailey rotated his head on his stem.

“This is like climbing into the hayloft back in Kansas.” Yes, it was Dorothy’s voice, her real voice, misguidedly cheerful as always. Brrr felt the muffin lurch up his throat. “Stil, you’d never see a Kansan owl dressed up in a petticoat!”

Something stronger than a titter rippled through the hal. Temper Bailey blinked balefuly. “Mind your manners,” said Lord Nipp. “That’s your representation.”

“What a hoot,” Dorothy replied. “Meaning no disrespect, of course.”

She turned to look at the crowd seated on the floor and in the galeries. Brrr knew himself to be in shadow, as he had crouched down by the wainscoting below where strong sunlight was heaving in through the windows. He doubted that she could see him, at least not at first, and that gave him a chance to study her.

Either she’d become stunted by her experience in Oz a generation ago or some perverse magic was at work. Yes, she was quite recognizably Dorothy. Those cocoa-bright eyes. The way she led with her shoulders and clavicle. Surely she ought to be middle-aged by now? But she seemed merely a few years older than he remembered her. Taler but hardly leaner. Her baby fat had only begun to reorient itself into incipient womanliness. Her face remained eager and unshuttered even after her latest travails. Proof of Dorothy.