Out of Oz: The Final Volume in the Wicked Years by Gregory Maguire Read Free Book Online

day comes! I’l be sun-bronzed and wizened and my elbows wil be raw from the dishwater! You’l think I’m the bootblack’s grandmother!”
    They liked this. They laughed with unseemly vigor. Though perhaps commoners have a different sense of humor, she thought.
    “Dear friends,” she continued. “I cherish the dedication to your tasks, your love of Mockbeggar, your sunny good natures at least whenever I came in the room. And next? None of us knows what waits down the lane for us.” She was about to refer to her own power as compromised, what with the house arrest, but caught herself. Surely they knew about it, and they wanted to remember her as being strong. She threw her shoulders back and pinched a nerve in her scapula. Ow. “As to whomever was in the habit of filching the leftover pearlfruit jely from the sideboard in the morning room, you are forgiven. You are al forgiven any such lapses. I shal miss you. I shal miss every one of you. I hardly knew there were so many … so many”—but that sounded lame—“so many brave and dedicated friends. Bless you. Ozspeed indeed. And on your way out, don’t hesitate to snub the new sentries at the gatehouse. Don’t give them the benefit of a single word. This is your home, stil. Not theirs. Never theirs.”
    “Burn the place down!” cried someone in the crowd, but he was hushed, as the emotion seemed misguided at best.
    “Don’t forget to write,” she said, before she remembered that quite likely some of them couldn’t write. She’d better get off the top step before she did more harm than good. “Farewel, and may we meet again when Ozma returns!”
    The bawling began. She had ended as poorly as she’d begun. Of course, the common people believed that Ozma was a deity, and they must have concluded that Lady Glinda was referring to the Afterlife.
    Wel, so be it, she thought grimly, hoisting her skirts to clear the puddle by the front door. The Afterlife wil have to do for a rendezvous destination. Though I suspect I shal be lodged in separate quarters, a private suite, probably. “Puggles,” she murmured, “get the yard boy to pick up the mobcaps some of that lot were trampling into the mud as they left.”
    “There’s no yard boy, Ma’am,” said Puggles gently. “He’s off with the others.”
    “It’s a new era, then. You do it. It looks a sight. And then join the rest of us in the grand foyer.”
    The others who were to remain had retreated inside and stood in a line with their hands clasped. Their uniforms dripped on the checkerboard marble. Glinda would fix each one with a dedicated personal beck. She could do this, she could. She’d been practicing al morning. This was important. “Miss Murth,” she began. “Ig Baernae…”
    “Chef’l do, Mum. Even I can’t say it unless I’m soused.”
    “Ig Baernaeraenaesis.” She was glad to see his jaw drop. Puggles slid into place in the line; Glinda nodded at him. “Mister Understar. And—” She came to the chambermaid. “And you. Rain, I think it is?
    Very lovely name. Scrub your nails, child. Civil unrest is no excuse for lapses in personal hygiene. Dear friends…” But perhaps this was too familiar a note to strike now she was inside her own home. She had to live with these people.
    “I’m grateful for your loyalty,” she continued in a brisker tone. “As far as I know my funds have not been impounded, and you shal stay on salary as usual.”
    “We don’t gets salary, if you please, Mum,” said Chef. “We gets our home and our food.”
    “Yes. Wel. Home and food are yours as long as I can manage it. I cannot pretend this is a pretty time for Mockbeggar Hal or for any of us. Murth, don’t scowl; it’s not too late to exchange you for someone out in the forecourt lingering over farewels.”
    Miss Murth slapped on an inauthentic expression of merriment.
    “A few remarks. I am stil the lady of the house. You are my staff, and according to your stations you shal maintain your