CHAPTER VIII: "It's my own Invention"
After a while, the noise seemed gradually to die away till all was dead silence, and Prim lifted up her head in some alarm. There was no one to be seen, and her first thought was that she must have been dreaming about the Eagle and the Mockingjay and those peculiar Messengers, Effie and Cinna. However, there was the great dish still lying at her feet on which she had tried to cut the plum-cake. "So I wasn't dreaming, after all," she said to herself. "Unless...unless we're all part of the same dream. Only I do hope it's my dream and not the Red King's. I don't like belonging to another person's dream. Prim went on in a rather complaining tone, "I've a great mind to go and wake Mr. Heavensbee to see what happens."
At this moment, her thoughts were interrupted by a loud shouting of "Ahoy! Ahoy! Check!" and a Knight dressed in crimson armour came galloping down upon her, brandishing a great club. Just as Knight reached her, the horse stopped suddenly. "You're my prisoner!" the Knight cried as he tumbled off his horse.
Startled as she was, Prim was more frightened for him than for herself at that moment and watched him with some anxiety as he mounted again. As soon as he was comfortably in the saddle, he began once more "You're my—" but here another voice broke in "Ahoy! Ahoy! Check!" and Prim looked round in some surprise to find her sister atop a horse, dressed as the White Knight.
Katniss drew up at Prim's side and tumbled off her horse just as the Red Knight had done. She then got on again, and the two Knights sat and looked at each other for some time without speaking as Prim looked from one to the other in some bewilderment.
"She's my prisoner, you know," the Red Knight said at last.
"Yes, but then I came and rescued her," Katniss replied.
"Well, we must fight for her, then," said the Red Knight as he took up his helmet (which hung from the saddle, and was something the shape of a horse's head) and put it on.
"You will observe the Rules of Battle, of course?" Katniss remarked putting on her helmet too.
"I always do," said the Red Knight, and they began banging away at each other with such fury that Prim got behind a tree to be out of the way of the blows.
"I wonder now what the Rules of Battle are," Prim said to herself as she watched the fight, timidly peeping out from her hiding-place. "One Rule seems to be that if one Knight hits the other, they knock the other off their horse, and if they miss, they tumble off themselves. Another Rule seems to be that they hold their clubs with their arms as if they were Punch and Judy. What a noise they make when they tumble, just like a whole set of fire-irons falling into the fender. And how quiet the horses are; they let them get on and off them just as if they were tables."
Another Rule of Battle that Prim had not noticed seemed to be that they always fell onto their heads, and the battle ended with their both falling off in this way, side by side. When they got up again, they shook hands, and then the Red Knight mounted and galloped off.
"It was a glorious victory, wasn't it?' said Katniss as she came up panting.
"I don't know," Prim said doubtfully. "I don't want to be anybody's prisoner. I want to be a Queen."
"So you will when you've crossed the next brook," said Katniss. "I'll see you safe to the end of the wood, and then I must go back. That's...what I have to do, I think."
"Thank you very much," said Prim. "May I help you off with your helmet?" It was evidently more than she could manage by herself; however, Prim managed to shake her sister out of it at last.
"Now, one can breathe more easily," said Katniss as she brushed back her long tangled hair with both hands, turning her gentle face and large doe eyes towards Prim.
The little girl thought she had never seen such a strange-looking soldier in all her life. Her sister was dressed in tin armour, which seemed to fit her very badly, and she had a queer-shaped little deal box fastened across her shoulder, upside-down, with the lid hanging open. Prim looked at it with great curiosity.
"I see you're admiring my little box," Katniss said in a proud tone. "It's my own invention, to keep clothes and sandwiches in. You see, I carry it upside-down so that the rain can't get in."
"But the things can get out," Prim gently remarked. "Do you know the lid's open?"
"I didn't know it," Katniss said with a shade of vexation passing over her face. "Then all the things must have fallen out! And the box is no use without them." She unfastened it as she spoke and was just going to throw it into the bushes when a sudden thought seemed to strike her. She hung it carefully on a tree. "Can you guess why I did that?" she said to little sister.
Prim shook her head.
"In hopes some bees may make a nest in it; then I should get the honey."
"But you've got a bee-hive, or something like one, fastened to the saddle," said Prim.
"Yes, it's a very good bee-hive," said Katniss in a discontented tone, "one of the best kinds. But not a single bee has come near it yet. And the other thing is a mouse-trap. I suppose the mice keep the bees out, or the bees keep the mice out, I don't know which."
"I was wondering what the mouse-trap was for," said Prim. "It isn't very likely there would be any mice on the horse's back."
"Not very likely, perhaps," said Katniss, "but if they do come, I don't choose to have them running all about." After a pause, she continued, "You see; it's as well to be provided for everything. That's the reason the horse has all those anklets round his feet."
"But what are they for?" Prim asked in a tone of great curiosity.
"To guard against the bites of sharks," replied Katniss. "It's an invention of my own. And now help me on. I'll go with you to the end of the wood. What's the dish for?"
"It's meant for plum-cake," said Prim.
"We'd better take it with us," Katniss said. "It'll come in handy if we find any plum-cake. Help me to get it into this bag."
This took a very long time to manage, though Prim held the bag open very carefully. Katniss was so very awkward in putting in the dish the first two or three times that she tried, she fell in herself instead. "It's rather a tight fit, you see," Katniss said as they got it in a last. "There are so many candlesticks in the bag." And Katniss hung it to the saddle, which was already loaded with bunches of carrots, and fire-irons, and many other things.
"I hope you've got your hair well fastened on?" Katniss continued as they set off.
"Only in the usual way," Prim said, smiling.
"That's hardly enough," Katniss said anxiously. "You see the wind is so very strong here. It's as strong as soup."
"Have you invented a plan for keeping the hair from being blown off?" Prim enquired.
"Not yet, said her big sister. "But I've got a plan for keeping it from falling off."
"I should like to hear it, very much."
"First you take an upright stick," said Katniss. "Then you make your hair creep up it like a fruit-tree. Now the reason hair falls off is because it hangs down, things never fall upwards, you know. It's a plan of my own invention. You may try it if you like."
It didn't sound like a comfortable plan Prim thought, and for a few minutes she walked on in silence, puzzling over the idea, and every now and then, stopping to help poor Katniss, who certainly was not a good rider.
Whenever the horse stopped (which it did very often), he sister fell off in front; and whenever it went on again (which it generally did rather suddenly), she fell off behind. Otherwise, Katniss kept on pretty well, except that she had a habit of now and then falling off sideways; and as she generally did this on the side on which Prim was walking, the younger sister soon found that it was the best plan not to walk quite close to the horse.
"I'm afraid you've not had much practice in riding," Prim ventured to say as she was helping her sister up from her fifth tumble.
Katniss looked very much surprised, and a little offended at the remark. "What makes you say that?" She asked as she scrambled back into the saddle, keeping hold of Prim's hair with one hand to save herself from falling over on the other side.
"Because people don't fall off quite so often when they've had much practice."
"I've had plenty of practice," Katniss said very gravely. "Plenty of practice."
Prim could think of nothing better to say than "Indeed?" but she said it as heartily as she could.
After this, they went on a little way in silence, Katniss with her eyes shut, muttering to herself, and Prim watching anxiously for the next tumble.
"The great art of riding," Katniss suddenly began in a loud voice, waving her right arm as she spoke, "is to keep—" Here the sentence ended as suddenly as it had begun as Katniss fell heavily on the top of her head, exactly in the path where Prim was walking. The little girl was quite frightened this time and said in an anxious tone as she picked her sister up, "I hope no bones are broken?"
"None to speak of," Katniss said—as if she didn't mind breaking two or three of them. "The great art of riding, as I was saying, is...to keep your balance properly. Like this, you know." She let go the bridle and stretched out both her arms to show Prim what she meant, and this time, she fell flat on her back, right under the horse's feet.
"Plenty of practice," she went on repeating all the time that Prim was getting her on her feet again. "Plenty of practice."
"It's too ridiculous," cried Prim, who was losing all her patience by this time. "You ought to have a wooden horse on wheels, that you ought."
"Does that kind go smoothly?" Katniss asked in a tone of great interest, clasping her arms round the horse's neck as she spoke—just in time to save herself from tumbling off again.
"Much more smoothly than a live horse," Prim said with a little scream of laughter, in spite of all she could do to prevent it.
"I'll get one," Katniss said thoughtfully to herself. "One or two, perhaps several."
There was a short silence after this, and then Katniss went on again. "My friend Gale isn't the only one with an inventive mind. I'm a great hand at inventing things too. Now, I daresay you noticed that last time you picked me up that I was looking rather thoughtful?"
"You were a little grave," said Prim.
"Well, just then I was inventing a new way of getting over a gate. Would you like to hear it?"
"Very much indeed," Prim said politely.
"I'll tell you how I came to think of it," said Katniss. "You see; I said to myself, 'The only difficulty is with the feet, the head is high enough already.' Now, first I put my head on the top of the gate; then I stand on my head; then the feet are high enough; you see; then I'm over; you see."
"Yes, I suppose you'd be over when that was done," Prim said thoughtfully. "But don't you think it would be rather hard?"
"I haven't tried it yet," Katniss said gravely, "so I can't tell for certain, but I'm afraid it would be a little hard."
With her sister looking so vexed at the idea, Prim changed the subject hastily. "What a curious helmet you've got," she said cheerfully. "Is that your invention too?"
Katniss looked down proudly at her helmet that hung from the saddle. "Yes," she said, "but I've invented a better one than that, like a sugar loaf. When I used to wear it, and if I fell off the horse, it always touched the ground directly, so I had a very little way to fall, you see. But there was the danger of falling into it to be sure. That happened to me once, and the worst of it was, before I could get out again, the other White Knight came and put it on. He thought it was his own helmet."
With Katniss looking so solemn about it, Prim did not dare to laugh. "I'm afraid you must have hurt him," she said in a trembling voice, "being on the top of his head."
"I had to kick him, of course," Katniss said very seriously. "And then he took the helmet off again, but it took hours and hours to get me out. I was as fast as...as lightning, you know."
"But that's a different kind of fastness," Prim objected.
Katniss shook her head. "It was all kinds of fastness with me; I can assure you," she said, raising her hands in some excitement, instantly rolling out of the saddle to fall headlong into a deep ditch.
Prim ran into the ditch to look for her. She was rather startled by the fall as for some time, her sister had kept on very well, and she was afraid that she really was hurt this time. However, though Prim could see nothing but the soles of her feet, she was much relieved to hear that she was talking on in her usual tone. "All kinds of fastness," Katniss repeated, "but it was careless of him to put another soldier's helmet on, with a soldier in it too."
"How can you go on talking so quietly, head downwards?" Prim asked as she dragged her sister out by the feet, releasing her in a heap on the bank.
Katniss looked surprised at the question. "What does it matter where my body happens to be?" she said. "My mind goes on working all the same. In fact, the more head downwards I am, the more I keep inventing new things."
Prim politely smiled at her sister, knowing well enough that beyond archery and hunting, Katniss had few talents.
"Now the cleverest thing of the sort that I ever did," Katniss went on after a pause, "was inventing a new pudding during the meat-course."
"In time to have it cooked for the next course?" asked Prim.
"Well, not the next course," Katniss said in a slow thoughtful tone. "No, certainly not the next course."
"Then it would have to be the next day. I suppose you wouldn't have two pudding-courses in one dinner?"
"Well, not the next day," Katniss repeated as before. "Not the next day. In fact," she went on, holding her head down as her voice became softer and softer, "I don't believe that pudding ever was cooked. In fact, I don't believe that pudding ever will be cooked. And yet, it was a very clever pudding to invent."
"What did you mean it to be made of?" Prim asked, hoping to cheer her up, for her sister seemed quite low-spirited about it.
"It began with blotting paper," Katniss answered with a groan.
"That wouldn't be very nice, I'm afraid—"
"Not very nice alone," Katniss interrupted quite eagerly, "but you've no idea what a difference it makes mixing it with other things, such as gunpowder and sealing-wax. And here I must leave you."
They had just come to the end of the wood.
Prim could only look puzzled; she was thinking of the pudding.
"You are sad," Katniss said in an anxious tone. "Let me sing you a song to comfort you."
"Is it very long?" Prim asked, for she had heard a good deal of poetry that day.
"It's long," said Katniss, "but very, very beautiful. Everybody that hears me sing it, either it brings tears to their eyes, or else..."
"Or else what?" asked Prim, for Katniss had made an unexpected pause.
"Or else it doesn't, you know. The name of the song is called 'Haddocks' Eyes'."
"Oh, that's the name of the song, is it?" Prim said, trying to feel interested.
"No, you don't understand," Katniss said, looking a little vexed. "That's what the name is called. The name really is 'The Aged Aged Man'."
"Then I ought to have said, 'That's what the song is called?'" Prim corrected herself.
"No, you oughtn't; that's quite another thing. The song is called 'Ways and Means', but that's only what it's called, you know."
"Well, what is the song, then?" asked Prim, who was by this time completely bewildered.
"I was coming to that," Katniss said. "The song really is 'A-Sitting On a Gate', and the tune's my own invention."
So saying, she stopped her horse and let the reins fall on its neck. Then slowly, beating time with one hand, and with a faint smile lighting up her gentle face—as if she truly enjoyed the music of her song, Katniss began.
Of all the strange things that Prim had seen during her journey Through The Looking-Glass, this was special: the mild grey eyes and kindly smile of Katniss, the setting sun gleaming through her hair, shining on her armour in a blaze of light that quite dazzled her, the horse quietly moving about with the reins hanging loose on his neck, cropping the grass at its feet with the black shadows of the forest behind. All this, Prim took in like a picture with one hand shading her eyes. She leant against a tree, watching the strange pair as she listened in a half dream to the melancholy music of the song.
But the tune isn't her own invention, she thought to herself. It's 'The Hanging Tree'. Prim stood and listened very attentively, but no tears came into her eyes.
"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where they strung up a man they say murdered three.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."
"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where the dead man called out for his love to flee.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."
"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Where I told you to run, so we'd both be free.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."
"Are you, are you
Coming to the tree
Wear a necklace of rope, side by side with me.
Strange things did happen here
No stranger would it be
If we met up at midnight in the hanging tree."
As Katniss sang the last words of the ballad, she gathered up the reins and turned her horse's head along the road by which they had come. "You've only a few yards to go," she said, "down the hill and over that little brook, and then you'll be a Queen. But you'll stay and see me off first?" As Prim turned with an eager look in the direction to which she pointed, Katniss added. "I shan't be long. You'll wait and wave your handkerchief when I get to that turn in the road? I think it'll encourage me, you see."
"Of course I'll wait," said Prim. "And thank you very much for coming so far—and for the song, I liked it very much."
"I hope so," Katniss said doubtfully. "But you didn't cry so much as I thought you would. Perhaps it was the fire."
"What do you mean?" asked Prim.
Katniss sat motionless as her gaze drifted off in thought. Gnawing her lip, her eyes slowly returned to Prim. "I guess it doesn't matter now. Thank you for listening to my song."
So they shook hands, and then the Knight rode slowly away into the forest.
"It won't take long to see her off, I expect," Prim said to herself as she stood watching her sister. "There she goes! Right on her head as usual. However, Katniss gets on again pretty easily, that comes of having so many things hung round the horse..." So she went on talking to herself as she watched the horse walking leisurely along the road and her sister tumbling off, first on one side and then on the other. After the fourth or fifth tumble, Katniss reached the turn, and then Prim waved her handkerchief and waited till she was out of sight.
"I hope it encouraged her," she said as she turned to run down the hill. "And now for the last brook and to be a Queen. How grand it sounds." A very few steps brought her to the edge of the brook, and she was just going to spring over when she heard a deep sigh, which seemed to come from the wood behind her.
There's somebody very unhappy there, she thought, looking anxiously back to see what was the matter. Something appearing like a very old man was sitting on the ground (only that his face was more like a Tracker Jacker wasp), leaning against a tree all huddled up together and shivering as if he were very cold.
I don't think I can be of any use to him, was Prim's first thought as she turned to spring over the brook. "But I'll just ask him what's the matter," she said as she checked herself on the very edge. "If I jump over, everything will change, and then I can't help him."
So she went back to the wasp like creature—rather unwillingly, for she was very anxious to be a Queen.
"Oh, my old bones, my old bones!" the Tracker Jacker was grumbling as Prim came up to him.
"It's rheumatism, I should think," Prim said to herself, and she stooped over him and said very kindly, "I hope you're not in much pain?"
The Tracker Jacker only shook his shoulders and turned his head away. "Ah, dreary me," he said to himself.
"Can I do anything for you?" Prim went on. "Aren't you rather cold here?"
"How you go on!" the Tracker Jacker said in a peevish tone. "Worrity, worrity! There never was such a child."
Prim felt rather offended at this answer and was very nearly walking on and leaving him, but she thought to herself Perhaps it's only pain that makes him so cross. So she tried once more. "Won't you let me help you round to the other side? You'll be out of the cold wind there."
The Tracker Jacker took her arm and let her help him round the tree, but when he got settled down again, he only said as before, "Worrity, worrity! Can't you leave a body alone?"
"Would you like me to read you a bit of this?" Prim went on as she picked up a newspaper that had been lying at his feet.
"You may read it if you've a mind to," the Tracker Jacker said rather sulkily. "Nobody's hindering you that I know of."
So Prim sat down by him and spread out the paper on her knees, reading aloud. "Latest News. The Exploring Party have made another tour in the Pantry and have found five new lumps of white sugar, large and in fine condition. In coming back—"
"Any brown sugar?" the Tracker Jacker interrupted.
Prim hastily ran her eye down the paper and said, "No. It says nothing about brown."
"No brown sugar," grumbled the Tracker Jacker. "A nice exploring party."
"In coming back," Prim went on reading, "they found a lake of treacle. The banks of the lake were blue and white, and looked like china. While tasting the treacle, they had a sad accident: two of their party were engulphed—"
"Were what?" the Tracker Jacker asked in a very cross voice.
"En-gulph-ed," Prim repeated, dividing the word into syllables.
"There's no such word in the language," said the Tracker Jacker.
"It's in this newspaper, though," Prim said a little timidly.
"Let it stop there," said the Tracker Jacker fretfully, turning away his head.
Prim put down the newspaper. "I'm afraid you're not well," she said in a soothing tone. "Can't I do anything for you?"
"It's all along of the wig," the Tracker Jacker said in a much gentler voice.
"Along of the wig?" Prim repeated, quite pleased to find that he was recovering his temper.
"You'd be cross too if you'd a wig like mine," the Tracker Jacker went on. "They jokes at one. And they worrits one. And then I gets cross. And I gets cold. And I gets under a tree. And I gets a yellow handkerchief. And I ties up my face—as at the present."
Prim looked pityingly at him. "Tying up the face is very good for the toothache," she said.
"And it's very good for the conceit," added the Tracker Jacker.
Prim didn't catch the word exactly. "Is that a kind of toothache?" she asked.
The Tracker Jacker considered a little. "Well, no," he said. "It's when you hold up your head...so...without bending your neck."
"Oh, you mean stiff-neck," said Prim.
The Tracker Jacker said, "That's a new-fangled name. They called it conceit in my time."
"Conceit isn't a disease at all," Prim remarked.
"It is, though," the Tracker Jacker said, untying the handkerchief as he spoke. "Wait till you have it, and then you'll know. And when you catches it, just try tying a yellow handkerchief round your face. It'll cure you in no time."
Prim looked at his exposed wig in great surprise. It was bright yellow like the handkerchief, all tangled and tumbled about like a heap of seaweed. "You could make your wig much neater," she said. "If only you had a comb."
"What, you're a Bee, are you?" the Tracker Jacker said, looking at her with more interest. "And you've got a comb. Much honey?"
"Not a honeycomb," Prim hastily explained. "It's to comb hair with. Your wig's so very rough, you know."
"I'll tell you how I came to wear it," the Tracker Jacker said. "When I was young, you know, my ringlets used to wave."
A curious idea came into Prim's head. Almost every one she had met had repeated poetry to her, and she thought she would try if the Tracker Jacker couldn't do it too. "Would you mind saying it in rhyme?" she asked very politely.
"It ain't what I'm used to," said the Tracker Jacker; "however, I'll try. Wait a bit." He was silent for a few moments and then began again:
"When I was young, my ringlets waved
And curled and crinkled on my head:
And then they said 'You should be shaved,
And wear a yellow wig instead.'
But when I followed their advice,
And they had noticed the effect,
They said I did not look so nice
As they had ventured to expect.
They said it did not fit, and so
It made me look extremely plain:
But what was I to do, you know?
My ringlets would not grow again.
So now that I am old and gray,
And all my hair is nearly gone,
They take my wig from me and say
'How can you put such rubbish on?'
And still, whenever I appear,
They hoot at me and call me 'Pig!'
And that is why they do it, dear,
Because I wear a yellow wig."
"I'm very sorry for you," Prim said heartily, "and I think if your wig fitted a little better, they wouldn't tease you quite so much."
"Your wig fits very well," the Tracker Jacker murmured, looking at her with an expression of admiration. "It's the shape of your head as does it. Your jaws ain't well shaped though; I should think you couldn't bite well?"
Prim began with a little scream of laughter, which she turned into a cough as well as she could. At last, she managed to say gravely, "I can bite anything I want."
"Not with a mouth as small as that," the Tracker Jacker persisted. "If you was a-fighting now, could you get hold of the other one by the back of the neck?"
"I'm afraid not," said Prim.
"Well, that's because your jaws are too short," the Tracker Jacker went on, "but the top of your head is nice and round." He took off his own wig as he spoke and stretched out one claw towards Prim as if he wished to do the same for her, but she kept out of reach and would not take the hint. So he went on with his criticisms. "Then your eyes, they're too much in front, no doubt. One would have done as well as two if you must have them so close."
Prim did not like having so many personal remarks made on her, and as the Tracker Jacker had quite recovered his spirits and was getting very talkative, she thought she might safely leave him. "I think I must be going on now," she said. "Good-bye."
"Good-bye, and thank-ye," said the Tracker Jacker.
And Prim tripped down the hill again, quite pleased that she had gone back and given a few minutes to making the poor old creature comfortable. "The Eighth Square at last," she cried as she bounded across.
. . . . . . .
. . . . . .
. . . . . . .
Throwing herself down, Prim took a moment to rest on a lawn, which was as soft as moss with little flower-beds dotted about here and there.
"Oh, how glad I am to get here. And what is this on my head?" she exclaimed in a tone of dismay as she put her hands up to something very heavy that fitted tight all round her head.
"But how can it have got there without my knowing it?" she said to herself as she lifted it off and set it on her lap to make out what it could possibly be.
It was a golden crown.