"Any queen?"
There had been no queen that I knew of at our house. There might have
been one in the kitchen; but I didn't think so, or the servants would
have mentioned it.
"Any fairies?"
None that were visible.
"We had an idea among us, I think," said Alice, with a melancholy smile,
"we four, that Miss Grimmer would prove to be the wicked fairy, and
would come in at the christening with her crutch-stick, and give the
child a bad gift? Was there anything of that sort? Answer, William."
[Illustration: We had an idea among us ... that Miss Grimmer would prove
to be the wicked fairy.]
I said that Ma had said afterwards (and so she had), that great-uncle
Chopper's gift was a shabby one; but she hadn't said a bad one. She had
called it shabby, electrotyped, second-hand, and below his income.
"It must be the grown-up people who have changed all this," said Alice.
"_We_ couldn't have changed it, if we had been so inclined, and we never
should have been. Or perhaps Miss Grimmer _is_ a wicked fairy, after
all, and won't act up to it, because the grown-up people have
persuaded her not to. Either way, they would make us ridiculous if we
told them what we expected."
"Tyrants!" muttered the Pirate-Colonel.
"Nay, my Redforth," said Alice, "say not so. Call not names, my
Redforth, or they will apply to Pa."
"Let 'em," said the Colonel. "I don't care. Who's he?"
Tinkling here undertook the perilous task of remonstrating with his
lawless friend, who consented to withdraw the moody expressions above
quoted.
"What remains for us to do?" Alice went on in her mild wise way. "We
must educate, we must pretend in a new manner, we must wait."
The Colonel clenched his teeth--four out in front, and a piece off
another, and he had been twice dragged to the door of a dentist-despot,
but had escaped from his guards. "How educate? How pretend in a new
manner? How wait?"
"Educate the grown-up people," replied Alice. "We part to-night. Yes,
Redforth,"--for the Colonel tucked up his cuffs,--"part to-night! Let us
in these next Holidays, now going to begin, throw our thoughts into
something educational for the grown-up people, hinting to them how
things ought to be. Let us veil our meaning under a mask of romance;[A]
you, I, and Nettie. William Tinkling being the plainest and quickest
writer, shall copy out. Is it agreed?"
The Colonel answered, sulkily, "I don't mind." He then asked, "How about
pretending?"
"We will pretend," said Alice, "that we are children; not that we are
those grown-up people who won't help us out as they ought, and who
understand us so badly."