CHAPTER 20

The Voyage Ends

Suddenly Dot, who had also fallen asleep, awoke with a start.

The sun was just sinking in the west, and the boat had left the tunnel while they slept and was slowly floating down the middle of a big river.

The girl at once awakened Tot and they looked carefully along both sides of the river to see if they could find the place where they had come out of the tunnel. But nothing could be seen except a line of low trees growing close down to the water.

"It doesn't make any difference, anyway," said the girl; "for the Queen has closed up the end of the tunnel."

"Where are we?" asked Tot.

"I don't exactly know. But this looks very much like the river that flows past Roselawn."

"Yes!" cried the boy, nodding his head, "I 'member those trees."

"Then," rejoined Dot, slowly, "I think I know how it happened. The Valleys of Merryland are not in a straight line, but lie in the form of a half circle; so in passing through them we have come upon the same river again, only higher up the stream. We'll soon be opposite Roselawn, Tot."

The boy was staring at the bank and did not answer at once. But as the boat swept around a bend in the river he cried:

"Look!" and pointed with his finger to the shore.

Before them were the green banks of Roselawn, and someone had already seen the children, for a boat pushed out from the shore and came rapidly toward them.

A few minutes afterward Dot was closely clasped in her father's arms, while Tot was rapturously kissing the bearded face of Thompson the gardener.

"How do you happen to be at Roselawn, Papa?" Dot asked.

"Miss Bombien telegraphed me you were lost, so I came by the first train and have been searching everywhere for you. Thompson and I had both nearly despaired, for we feared our little ones had been drowned."

"Oh, no," said Dot, "we've only been on a trip to Merryland. But I'll tell you the whole story when we get home."

Mr. Freeland noticed his daughter's round, plump cheeks, slightly sunburned, but with a fresh, rosy tint showing through the skin, and saw how her eyes sparkled and danced with health. Very gratefully he pressed her again to his heart and whispered:

"Wherever you may have been, my darling, the change has restored your health, and that repays me for all my anxiety."

* * *

As they walked up the white-graveled paths of Roselawn, Dot skipped happily along by her father's side, while Tot held fast to the gardener's big finger with one hand and carried Jane in the other.

Soon they came to the place where the path branched off to the gap in the hedge beyond which Tot lived, and he called out, "Good-bye, Dot."

"Good-bye," answered the girl; "I'll see you tomorrow."

But before she had gone far Tot came running up, calling for her to stop.

"Oh, Dot!" he said, "I know what the Queen's name is!"

"Do you?" she asked eagerly. "Tell me, quick!"

"Why it's Dolly, of course," said Tot.

"Of course!" answered Dot, with a smile. "Funny we never thought of that, isn't it?"

End of Project Gutenberg's Dot and Tot of Merryland, by L. Frank Baum