Clean Cup, Move Down
They were at tea.
They were always, always, at tea.
The Hatter slammed his palm down on the table in a businesslike manner, making the dishes rattle and jump. "I'm fed up!" he announced.
"Then stop eating," advised the Hare. The Hatter rewarded this piece of impertinence with a stolid, steel-tipped glare.
"We cannot go on this way," he continued, pursuing his original point. "I say we cannot!"
"Well, we could if we really wanted to," said the Hare.
The Hatter waved a hand. "Well, yes, yes, indeed," he acknowledged, and lapsed into thought for a moment. "But shortly we will run out of tea things— and what do we do then? Start supper? Start over?"
"I don't see why not." The Hare picked up his teacup and inspected it closely. "It's not as though they're worn through."
"They soon will be, however, if you keep rubbing them with sandpaper," put in Alice, glaring severely at the Dormouse. He looked up from his endeavors and blinked sleep-lidded eyes at her.
"The wafer is paper-thin," he piped, "and the paper is wafer-thin."
The Hatter snorted. "That's hardly hygienic, is it?"
"I'm trying," said the Dormouse, waving the porcelain saucer at him with one hand and the square of sandpaper with the other, "to remedy the situation."
Alice took the saucer from him and scrutinized it. "Already you've rubbed the paint off. And such a lovely pattern, too."
"Ho-hum," sighed the Dormouse, and began to sandpaper his nose, absentmindedly.
The Hatter stabbed a finger at him. "It's exactly that sort of attitude that got us into this mess," he proclaimed. "I declare a state of emergency!"
The Hare yelped, covered his head with both arms and his arms with both ears, clambered under the table and curled into a quivering lump of terror.
"Why, whatever is the matter with him?" wondered Alice.
"He never was much good in an emergency," said the Hatter, and sniffed.
Alice considered the various options open to her and ventured, "Mr. Hatter— I believe I've had an idea."
"Well, that doesn't happen very often, does it?" said the Hatter. "You'd better hold on to it. Who knows when you'll get another one."
Alice was only going to say that perhaps they should set up a dishwashing station at the end of the table and all take turns, but the Hatter's response so flustered and discombobulated her that she lapsed into confused silence instead.
"Now, I'll tell you what we'll do," said the Hatter, with another decisive rap on the table. "We'll appeal to the Queen. We'll appeal for a repeal of our appalling predicament. We'll personally prise from the preposterous personage a pretty purple-prosed pardon, pondering our passage with pleas of please."
"Please of pleas," said the Dormouse.
"That's what I said," said the Hatter.
"Pleas of peas," said the Dormouse, crossing his eyes to check on the progress of his nose erosion. "Peas of peace."
The Hatter smiled genially and nodded his head. "Quite. Quite."
"Pish posh," said Alice. The Hatter glared at her.
"No," he said.
There was a thump from below the table as the Hare bumped his head. Rubbing at his skull with one hand, he emerged from the shadows and regained his seat as though nothing had happened.
"Don't be ridiculous," he said. "You know the Queen will never listen to you. She's been out of sorts with you ever since the singing incident. You remember."
"Twinkle twinkle, little bat?" suggested Alice. The three stared at her as though she'd declared her love for jabberwockies.
"Stop being so preposterous," said the Hatter sourly. "It doesn't at all suit your complexion."
"Well, what singing incident? That's the only one I've ever heard of. And it's difficult to believe they've let you sing more than once." Alice folded her arms.
"The singing incident," said the Hare, "where he sang 'Mabel Had a Little Lamb.'"
"I wish you'd leave her out of this," said the Hatter, plaintively. But the Hare could not be stopped. Raptly, he rose from his seat and burst forth with song.
"Mabel had a little lamb, little lamb, little lamb
Mabel had a little lamb, which frequently did bleat.
One afternoon at five she said, five she said, five she said
One afternoon at five she said, 'My friends, it's time to eat.'"
"I don't see what's so bad about that," said Alice.
"Just you wait," said the Hatter, both hands over his face.
"For sandwiches they all sat down, all sat down, all sat down
For sandwiches they all sat down, and then one had a hunch.
'What was that lamb's name?' they cried, name they cried, name they cried
'What was its name?' and she replied, 'In fact, its name was Lunch.'"
"Oh!" said Alice, and thought for a moment. "Well, I can see how that would upset the Council for Ethical Treatment of Nursery Rhyme Animals—"
"CETNRA Centre," piped the Dormouse in his sleep, holding an imaginary mouthpiece up. "How may I direct your call?"
"—but I don't quite see why it would bother the Queen. Does her Majesty like sheep?"
"Like them?" The Hare snorted. "Medium rare, perhaps."
"Mayday!" shrieked the alarmed Dormouse into the imaginary mouthpiece. "Mayday!"
"Then why should she be so upset about the song?"
"Because she wasn't invited!" bellowed the Hatter. "She found Mabel— my dear, sweet, impressionable Mabel— and turned her into a frog! A dear, sweet, and very impressionable frog! Myself she re-imprisoned back in the same hour, here to wither away with only tea and crumpets to eat."
"You don't appear to have withered," commented Alice, eyeing the Hatter's robust physique.
"I hide it very well," snapped the Hatter, tugging on his waistcoat. "At any rate, we'll get out of here somehow. Supposing we hire a lawyer."
"A liar?" questioned the Hare.
"No, a lawyer."
"That's what I said," said the Hare, and sipped genteely from his cup.
The Hatter ignored him and pointed at Alice imperiously. "Take a letter to my lawyer!"
"You'll have to give it to me first," Alice objected, whereupon the Hatter stared at her and quivered in unspeakable emotion for a moment before giving up, sighing, and settling down to it himself. He scribbled away at one end of the table, and Alice turned aside to murmur to the Hare, "I can't think what good that will do."
"You can't think?" The Hare nodded. "That's hardly a surprise, Alice."
Quite put out at this reaction, Alice crossed her arms and resolved to remain silent till she saw what should come next.