while the lady of fashion and the poet were being held prisoner by the saboes, the poet very carefully listened to the wild men’s strange language and in a short time he was able to speak a few of their words.
“jinks, but it is hot in this shanty!” he said to the lady of fashion one morning as he wiped his forehead with his teenie weenie handkerchief and looked out through the tiny hole that served as a window in the house in which they were held prisoners.
“if the queen would just let us go out and take a little exercise once in a while it would help a lot,” suggested the lady of fashion fanning herself with a dry leaf. “why don’t you ask the queen? maybe she will let us take a walk now and then.”
“i’ll do it,” answered the poet, and looking out through the door he called to one of the wild men who stood near guarding the house.
“gip bah wah hoo,” said the poet, which means in sabo, “we need exercise.” “tell the queen we want to get out of this shanty and take a walk once in a while,” he continued in the wild men’s language.
the wild men attack the teenie weenies, as their raft nears the island.—chapter thirteen.
the wild man grunted a couple of times and hurried off through the long grass towards the queen’s house, while the two teenie weenies sat down near the tiny door to await his return.
presently the wild man came back and told the poet that the queen said that the teenie weenies could take a walk whenever they liked.
“well, we’ll take a walk right this minute,” announced the poet, and he quickly helped the lady of fashion down the tiny ladder.
the teenie weenies strolled along through the streets of the village while the two guards walked a few feet behind them. a great many children followed the teenie weenies about but, although the lady of fashion tried to make friends with them, they were very timid and stood off at a safe distance.
at one place two wild women were preparing dinner and the teenie weenies were much interested in what they saw. one woman was baking rice cakes on a flat stone under which a fire was burning, while a young girl was grinding wild rice into flour by pounding the rice with a small rock in a hollowed-out stone. near the house was a hollowed-out log with leaves spread over the top to keep out the dust, and one of the guards told the poet that the log was filled with salt water in which the frog hams were pickled before they were smoked.
the two teenie weenies spent a very pleasant afternoon looking about the village and it was quite late before they returned to their prison.
“oh, dear me,” said the lady of fashion as she threw herself down on one of the soft grass mats, “i wonder what is going to happen to us. do you think the general will come with the army and rescue us?”
“of course he will,” answered the poet. “all we have to do is to be patient and he’ll be here pretty soon.”
“but what if he doesn’t know that we have been captured by these wild men?” asked the lady of fashion anxiously.
“he will know all right,” said the poet. “the teenie weenies could see the footprints of the wild men in the sand where we were captured. that is enough to tell them what has happened to us.”
“oh, dear, if they would only come!” and the poor little lady began to sob.
“here! here!” said the poet anxiously, for he always felt mighty uncomfortable whenever the lady of fashion cried. “you must not cry. that won’t do a bit of good—just makes you feel bad and me worse.”
“i-i-i c-c-can’t help it,” sobbed the little lady. “i want clean clothes, my hair needs washing, i want some of the cook’s good apple butter, i want my toothbrush and i-i-i want to go home.”
the poet tried his best to comfort her and presently she cried herself to sleep.
