CHAPTER VII: A Mad Tea-Party

There was a table set out under a tree in front of the house, and a simply dressed man with close-cropped hair and colorful woman wearing a flamboyant red wig were having tea at it. An older, scruffier man was sitting between them, fast asleep, and the other two were using him as a cushion, resting their elbows upon him, and talking over his head. As Prim neared, she recognized the Escort.

Why, I shouldn't be surprised, thought Prim; Effie certainly is ditsy—and that's being kind when people say that. When she tried to identify the two men, she failed to place either of them. Very uncomfortable for the sleeping man though, only, as he's asleep, I suppose he doesn't mind.

The table was a large one, but the three were all crowded together at one corner of it. "No room! No room!" the conscious two cried out when they saw Prim coming.

"There's plenty of room," said Prim indignantly, and she sat down in a large armchair at one end of the table.

"Have some wine," the Stylist said in an encouraging tone.

Prim looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it but tea. "I don't see any wine," she remarked.

"There isn't any," said the Stylist.

"Then it wasn't very civil of you to offer it," said Prim angrily. As she began to sulk, she thought it quite inappropriate to offer a child wine in the first place.

"It wasn't very civil of you to sit down without being invited," said the Stylist.

"I didn't know it was your table," said Prim. "It's laid for a great many more than three."

When the attractive man faintly smiled, Prim recognized the Stylist from television. "You're Cinna, my sister's stylist. Katniss said you were gentle and kind."

The sharply dressed man calmly sipped his tea and shrugged. "It doesn't mean that I don't like a bit of fun from time to time."

"Your hair wants cutting," said Effie. "You should let Cinna cut it." She had been looking at Prim for some time with great curiosity, and this was her first speech.

"You should learn not to make personal remarks," Prim said with some severity. "It's very rude."

Effie opened her eyes very wide on hearing this; but all she said was, "Why is a mockingjay like a mahogany writing-desk?"

Come, we shall have some fun now, thought Prim. I'm glad they've begun asking riddles. "I believe I can guess that," she added aloud.

"Do you mean that you think you can find out the answer to it?" asked Cinna.

"Exactly so," said Prim.

"Then you should say what you mean," Cinna went on.

"I do," Prim hastily replied; "at least...at least I mean what I say...that's the same thing, you know."

"Not the same thing a bit." said Effie. "You might just as well say that 'I see what I eat' is the same thing as 'I eat what I see'."

"You might just as well say," added Cinna, "that 'I like what I get' is the same thing as 'I get what I like'."

"You might just as well say," added scruffy man, who seemed to be talking in his sleep, "that 'I breathe when I drink' is the same thing as 'I drink when I breathe'."

When the man's breath soured Prim's face, she recognized him straight away as Haymitch Abernathy just from his smell.

"It is the same thing with you," said Effie. "When are you ever sober," and here the conversation dropped, and the party sat silent for a minute while Prim thought over all she could remember about mockingjays and mahogany writing-desks, which wasn't much.

Effie was the first to break the silence. "What day of the month is it?" she asked, turning to Prim. She had taken her watch out of her pocket, and was looking at it uneasily, shaking it every now and then, and holding it to her ear.

Prim considered a little, and then said, "The fourth."

"Two days wrong," sighed Effie. "I told you butter wouldn't suit the works," she added looking angrily at Cinna.

"It was the best butter," Cinna meekly replied.

"Yes, but some crumbs must have got in as well," Effie grumbled. "You shouldn't have put it in with the bread-knife."

Cinna took the watch and looked at it gloomily; then he dipped it into his cup of tea and looked at it again, but he could think of nothing better to say than his first remark, "It was the best butter, you know."

Prim had been looking over his shoulder with some curiosity. "What a funny watch," she remarked. "It tells the day of the month and doesn't tell what o'clock it is?"

"Why should it?" muttered Effie. "Does your watch tell you what year it is?"

"Of course not," Prim replied very readily, "but that's because it stays the same year for such a long time together."

"Which is just the case with mine," said Effie.

Prim felt dreadfully puzzled for Effie's remark seemed to have no sort of meaning in it, and yet it was certainly English. "I don't quite understand you," Prim said, as politely as she could.

"Haymitch has passed out again," said Effie, and she poured a little hot tea upon his nose.

The drunkard shook his head impatiently, and said without opening his eyes, "Of course, of course; just what I was going to remark myself."

"Have you guessed the riddle yet?" Effie asked, turning to Prim again.

"No, I give it up," Prim replied. "What's the answer?"

"I haven't the slightest idea," said Effie.

"Nor I," said Cinna.

Prim sighed wearily. "I think you might do something better with the time," she said, "than waste it in asking riddles that have no answers."

"If you knew Time as well as I do," said Effie, "you wouldn't talk about wasting it. It's him."

"I don't know what you mean," said Prim.

"Of course you don't," Effie said, tossing her head contemptuously. "I dare say you never even spoke to Time."

"Perhaps not," Prim cautiously replied, "but I know I have to beat time when I learn music."

"Ah, that accounts for it," said Effie. "He won't stand beating. Now, if you only kept on good terms with him, he'd do almost anything you liked with the clock. For instance, suppose it were nine o'clock in the morning, just time to begin lessons, you'd only have to whisper a hint to Time and round goes the clock in a twinkling: half-past one, time for dinner."

("I only wish it was," Cinna said to itself in a whisper.)

"That would be grand, certainly," said Prim thoughtfully, "but then...I shouldn't be hungry for it, you know."

"Not at first, perhaps," said Effie, "but you could keep it to half-past one as long as you liked."

"Is that the way you manage?" Prim asked.

Effie shook her head mournfully. "Not I," she replied. "We quarrelled last March—just before he went mad, you know—" (pointing with his tea spoon at Cinna) "—it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts, and I had to sing:

'Twinkle, twinkle, little bat!

How I wonder what you're at!'

You know the song, perhaps?"

"I've heard something like it," said Prim.

"It goes on, you know," Effie continued, "in this way:

'Up above the world you fly,

Like a tea-tray in the sky.

Twinkle, twinkle—'"

Here Haymitch turned his head to the side, and began singing in its sleep "Twinkle, twinkle, twinkle, twinkle..." and went on so long that they had to pinch him to make him stop.

"Well, I'd hardly finished the first verse," said Effie, "when the Queen jumped up and bawled out, 'He's murdering the time! Off with her head!'"

"How dreadfully savage," exclaimed Prim.

"And ever since that," Effie went on in a mournful tone, "he won't do a thing I ask. It's always six o'clock now."

A bright idea came into Prim's head. "Is that the reason so many tea-things are put out here?" she asked.

"Yes, that's it," said Effie with a sigh. "It's always tea-time, and we've no time to wash the things between whiles."

"Then you keep moving round, I suppose?" said Prim.

"Exactly so," said Effie, "as the things get used up."

"But what happens when you come to the beginning again?" Prim ventured to ask.

"Suppose we change the subject," Cinna interrupted, yawning. "I'm getting tired of this. I vote the young lady tells us a story."

"I'm afraid I don't know one," said Prim, rather alarmed at the proposal.

"Then Haymitch shall!" they both cried. "Wake up, Haymitch!" And they pinched the man on both sides at once.

The drunkard slowly opened his eyes. "I wasn't asleep," he said in a hoarse, feeble voice. "I heard every word you two were saying."

"Tell us a story," said Cinna.

"Yes, please do," pleaded Prim.

"And be quick about it," added Effie, "or you'll be passed out again before it's done."

"Once upon a time there were three little sisters," Haymitch began in a great hurry, "and their names were Elsie, Lacie, and Tillie, and they lived at the bottom of a well—"

"What did they live on?" asked Prim, who always took a great interest in questions of eating and drinking.

"They lived on treacle," said the Haymitch after thinking a minute or two.

"They couldn't have done that, you know," Prim gently remarked, "they'd have been ill."

"So they were," said Haymitch, "very ill."

Prim tried to fancy to herself what such an extraordinary ways of living would be like, but it puzzled her too much, so she went on, "But why did they live at the bottom of a well?"

"Take some more tea," Cinna said to Prim, very earnestly.

"I've had nothing yet," Prim replied in an offended tone, "so I can't take more."

"You mean you can't take less," said Effie. "It's very easy to take more than nothing."

"Nobody asked your opinion," said Prim.

"Who's making personal remarks now?" Effie asked triumphantly.

Prim did not quite know what to say to this, so she helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter and then turned to Haymitch and repeated her question. "Why did they live at the bottom of a well?"

Haymitch again took a minute or two to think about it, and then said, "It was a treacle-well."

"There's no such thing." Prim was beginning very angrily, but Effie and Cinna went "Sh! sh!" and Haymitch sulkily remarked, "If you can't be civil, you'd better finish the story for yourself."

"No, please go on," Prim said very humbly. "I won't interrupt again. I dare say there may be one."

"One, indeed," said Haymitch indignantly; however, he consented to go on. "And so these three little sisters; they were learning to draw, you know—"

"What did they draw?" asked Prim, quite forgetting her promise.

"Treacle," said the drunkard without considering at all this time.

"I want a clean cup," interrupted Effie. "Let's all move one place on."

She moved on as she spoke, and Haymitch followed her. Cinna moved into Haymitch's place, and Prim rather unwillingly took the place of Cinna. Effie was the only one who got any advantage from the change, and Prim was a good deal worse off than before as Cinna had just upset the milk-jug into his plate.

Prim did not wish to offend Haymitch again, so she began very cautiously, "But I don't understand. Where did they draw the treacle from?"

"You can draw water out of a water-well," said Effie; "so I should think you could draw treacle out of a treacle-well, eh, stupid?"

"But they were in the well, Prim said to Haymitch, not choosing to notice Effie's last remark.

"Of course they were," said Haymitch. "Well in."

This answer so confused poor Prim that she let Haymitch go on for some time without interrupting him.

"They were learning to draw," Haymitch went on, yawning and rubbing his eyes for he was very drunk, "and they drew all manner of things...everything that begins with an M—"

"Why with an M?" asked Prim.

"Why not?" retorted Cinna.

Prim was silent.

Haymitch had closed his eyes by this time and was going off into a doze. but on being pinched by Effie, he woke up again with some annoyance and went on, "That begins with an M, such as mockingjays, and the moon, and memory, and muchness; you know you say things are 'much of a muchness'—did you ever see such a thing as a drawing of a muchness?"

"Really, now you ask me," said Prim very much confused, "I don't think—"

"Then you shouldn't talk," interrupted Effie.

This piece of rudeness was more than Prim could bear. She got up in great disgust and walked off. Haymitch passed out instantly, and neither of the others took the least notice of her going—though she looked back once or twice, half hoping that they would call after her. The last time she saw them, they were trying to pour tea into Haymitch's mouth.

"At any rate I'll never go there again," said Prim as she picked her way through the wood. "It's the stupidest tea-party I ever was at in all my life."

Just as she said this, she noticed that one of the trees had a door leading right into it. That's very curious, she thought. But everything's curious today. I think I may as well go in at once. And in she went.

Once more she found herself in the long hall and close to the little glass table. "Now, I'll manage better this time," she said to herself and began by taking the little golden key and unlocking the door that led into the garden. Then she went to work nibbling at the mushroom (she had kept a piece of it in her pocket) till she was about a foot high. Then she walked down the little passage, and then she found herself at last in the beautiful garden among the bright flowerbeds and the cool fountains.