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Chapter XII Old Acquaintances “Oh dear, whatever can have happened?” Alice asked sleepily as she yawned herself awake. On the stage, the curtains were beginning to swish open, and the lights were fading fast over the hushed audience. “Have I missed the whole pantomime?” she asked Edith, who was sitting in the chair next to her. “Well, you have been asleep there for quite some time,” her sister whispered back. “But don’t worry, it has really only just started.” Indeed, as sure as Alice was that she had spent most of a day in search of the Rabbit’s watch, she had to admit that it seemed she had been away for only a few minutes. The curtains were now wide open, and the chorus were on-stage, singing an overture about fairy-tales and magic wands, and the large, old clock, which hung on the wall directly above the stage, showed that very little time had past at all. It said that the time was almost exactly seventeen minutes past seven. “I declare, I’ve had the strangest dream,” Alice whispered to her sister; and she proceeded to try to explain the places she had been, and the creatures she had met. However, as is the way with dreams, things were already beginning to get a little confused. “First I followed the White Rabbit, and then I met a Clarinet and a Bombay Duck . . . no, that’s not right,” she faltered, “for I’m sure the Bombay Duck came later. First there were the Author and the Artist, they I do remember; and a Pianist and a beautiful Black Rose and . . . and, oh, all sorts of other creatures.” However, their images were fading fast, so Alice decided to try to remember the places she had visited instead. She sat up straight in her seat, and started to count the places she had seen. “First was the field, and the little park of course. Then came the lake and that curious house, and then there was the airship; and I’m sure I remember a ruin, but was it on a beach or in a wood?” But it was no good; the more she tried to remember the adventure, the more it slipped away from her mind. In any case, the girl’s counting was beginning to get a little louder than is polite in a theatre, and already she was attracting Hard Stares from those seated around her. “Do be quiet, Alice,” Edith scolded. “People are trying to listen. Why, you’re almost as bad as the folk in front of us!” Alice sighed to herself, and looked at the inhabitants of the first row, who were, indeed, making a much greater commotion than she. They were singing all the pantomime songs very loudly, and occasionally getting up to dance also, and continually trying to help the cast by shouting out all kinds of things in a variety of comedy accents. “Come,” Alice said to herself, “they really are quite dreadfully behaved.” However, she had to admit that they were enjoying themselves, and certainly had made the utmost effort to enter the spirit of the occasion. Suddenly, she noticed something; one of the front row people, a tall man in dungarees, was wearing a little hat with an eye on it. “I declare!” Alice said to herself, all thought of the Pantomime gone. “I do believe that’s the Camel’s hat! Could he have turned into the Camel in my dream, do you suppose?” But this question was swept from her mind, when she saw another person she thought she recognised. “The Pianist! It’s the Pianist!” she cried (inwardly, for she did not want to disturb the rest of the audience again), as she spied a short man with untidy hair; and then, all of a sudden, the girl saw that all the other creatures were there also - the Gypsy, the Accountant, the Whether-people - and the entire dream came back to her. All the places she had been, and the creatures she had met on her quest, they were all there in her head, as large as lunch, just as if they had really existed. Edith tapped Alice’s arm and pointed to the first row again. “Look at them!” she whispered, for they were jumping up and down again. “They have been behaving like that all evening. I don’t believe I have ever seen anyone act so strangely, as that group do!” “Oh I don’t know,” Alice replied. “They don’t seem to be doing anything half so strange as the things they did when I met them earlier.” But, before Edith had a chance to find out what her sister could possibly have meant by this, the overture finished and the Pantomime began. A pantomime, a winter’s day;1 Chapter XI - Watch! Chapter XI - Watch! | Annotations Annotations |