“‘And as the Tinsman kept standing at attention while Ozma was still in sight down the grown up road, a small shower appeared seemingly out of nowhere, just enough to freeze him up at that spot for a very long time indeed. You see, he’d misplaced his can before painfully refinding the object by sitting on it, and so hadn’t oil himself in a while since he didn’t have time to use it before Ozma arrived. The Queen of Oz rarely passed through these here parts, and I believe she may have even forgotten about the shortcut afterwards, perhaps all part of that spell which made Tinsman what he was in the first place: completely tin, with not a bit of flesh and blood human left in his body. And so it becomes the Forgotten Road of Oz, famous for where the Woodsman stood until Dorothy stumbled upon him and oiled him back to life, like pumping blood into his dried up veins and arteries if he had any.'” She looked up from the book she was reading aloud atop the Big Sandy knob known as Rocky Comfort and into her listening audience which was also her test audience for the work-in-progress fantasy novel. “Questions?”
“I like the vein and artery part,” offered listening Vain and Artery Boyy below, which Marsha “Pink” Krakow had anticipated and why she fit the passage into the book in the first place.
“Thank you.”
Rock raised his hand. “I have a question.”
“Yes, Rock Ramby. Go ahead.”
“What is a concrete manhole? I know what a regular manhole is. You seem to be interested in concrete in the book.”
“I wish,” answered Marsha “Pink” Krakow in several ways, “to make the book sturdy and stand the test of time. And so the concrete manholes — which are a real thing — get to that later — and the concrete bugs and trees and waterfalls and so on.”
“Lots!” reinforced Rock.
“Lots,” acknowledged Marsha.
“Me now,” said wee Toddles still between them, still acting the role of their child. “What about the ball? If Tinsman didn’t show up at the ball, wouldn’t Ozma become concerned and send a search party to look for him? Is this all a part of the spell too? Maybe the ball didn’t even exist?”
Marsha made mental notes to include what the precious precocious child said in her book. Of course she’d have to give Toddles credit somewhere and somehow.
“Good points!” she said to end.
Sunklands 