“You’re too kind,” she told him. Here came Private Zackers, looking red under the colar.

“You were nice to my sister, that time she lay in childbirth a month too long,” said the librarian softly. “You put a cloth to her brow. Don’t pretend you forget.” She turned away, confused by an accusation of charity. “How impertinent!” hissed Murth on her behalf.

I0.

Day after day as different plantings came to flower, blossoms patterned the gardens and the meadows with a shifting palette. Now the eggy fril of late forsythia, now the fringe of fern. Now the periwinkle Dmycassandrum on the hilsides, until pale daisies overtook the lavender, and then wild dusteria the daisies. The leaves on the trees flexed their palms wider. Let me in, said the sun. Let me out, said the tree.

Beyond the reflecting pool, the topiary hedges thickened into rooms again, chambers of green set round with statues, plinths, benches of marble carved to look like rural twigwork. Once the daily cloudburst had passed, Glinda often grabbed a parasol and picked her way through the maze. Miss Murth had an alergy to the mites that came out of the ivy after a downpour so she stayed inside, and Glinda got herself a little privacy. The Green Parlor, as they caled it, was considered an extension of her private chambers, so she had no cause to worry about some wayward soldier interrupting her meditations.

She was surprised, therefore, one afternoon about a week later, to come upon a dwarf with a hoary beard sitting upon the drum of an aestheticaly colapsed column.

“I beg your pardon.” Her tone was High Frost.

“No offense taken,” he told her, lighting a pipe with a long stem.

“This is a private garden.”

“You’d better take yourself off, then.” He winked at her. The nerve. “Or should I say, Al the better for a private conversation.”

“Do you know who I am?”

“Glinda, or else I made a wrong turn,” he answered. “Easy enough to do in a hedge maze. Especialy for a dwarf.”

“I’l set the dogs on you unless you leave.”

He looked up over the tops of his spectacles. “That’s a sour welcome considering you caled for me. You don’t remember we’ve met before? Or is it, Seen one dwarf, seen ’em al? They al look alike to me?”

“Forgive me. I’m not myself. I no longer have the staff to hand me notes of reference.” She peered at him sideways. “Oh. I see. You’re with that circus. That pantomime troupe. No?”

“We prefer to think of ourselves as social critics. The conscience of Oz. But we take any cash comes our way, so you can cal us dancing bears or moral vivisectionists, whatever you like. Makes no difference to me.”

He gave his name as Mr. Boss, which rang no bels with her.

“How did you know how to find me in the maze?” she asked.

He laughed. “Oh, knowing things; that’s my line of work, missy.”