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The Gnome King of Oz

“What a pretty creature,” chirped the Scissor Bird, who had flov.n over Piecer’s head. “Is this the new Queen?”

Scrapper nodded.

“She knows almost as many cross words as the last one,” he chuckled admiringly. ‘But she refuses to work.”

“Oh, I think she’ll work now,” smiled Piecer. With a significant wink at his companion, he thrust a broom into Serap’s hands and, turning to the Scissor Bird, said quietly: “If her Majesty refuses to clean the castle, just cut off her head!”

"Nothing would give me more pleasure," chortled the bird, and snapping his scissor bill hungrily, he swooped down upon Scraps and snipped an inch off her yarn hair.

“Help!” screamed the Patchwork Girl. “Help! Help!” But there was no one to help her and, as the Scissor Bird took another snip at her yarn, she seized the broom and fell to sweeping for dear life.

“When you finish sweeping, you may wash the windows,” said the Chief Scrapper and, taking the arm of the Prime Piecer, passed pompously out into the garden. All day, pursued relentlessly by the Scissor Bird, Scraps flew from one task to another.

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