Читать книгу Алиса в Стране чудес / Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Алиса в Зазеркалье / Through the Looking-glass, and What Alice Found There - Льюис Кэрролл, Льюїс Керролл, Furniss Harry - Страница 9

There was a table under a tree in front of the house, and the March Hare and the Hatter were having tea at it: a Dormouse[105] was sitting between them, fast asleep.[106]

The table was large, but the three[107] were all together at one corner of it: “No room![108] No room!” they cried out when they saw Alice. “There’s a LOT of room!” said Alice indignantly, and she sat down in a large arm-chair at one end of the table.

“Have some wine,” the March Hare said in an encouraging tone.

Alice looked all round the table, but there was nothing on it except tea. “I don’t see any wine,” she remarked.

“There isn’t any,” said the March Hare.

“Then it wasn’t very polite of you[109] to offer it,” said Alice angrily.

“It wasn’t very polite of you to sit down without invitation,” said the March Hare.

“I didn’t know it was YOUR table,” said Alice; “it’s laid[110] for much more than three.”

The party sat silent for a minute. The Hatter spoke first. “What day of the month is it?” he said, turning to Alice: he had taken his watch out of his pocket, and was looking at it, shaking it, and holding it to his ear.

Alice thought a little, and then said “The fourth.”

“Two days wrong![111]” noted the Hatter. “I told you butter couldn’t help!” he added looking angrily at the March Hare.

“It was the BEST butter,” the March Hare replied. He took the watch and looked at it unhappily: then he put it into his cup of tea, and looked at it again: but he could only repeat, “It was the BEST butter.”

“What a funny watch!” Alice remarked. “It tells the day of the month, and doesn’t tell the time!”

“Why should it?[112]“inquired the Hatter. “Does YOUR watch tell you what year it is?”

“Of course not,” Alice replied readily: “but that’s because it stays the same year for a long time.”

“So does MINE,[113]” said the Hatter.

“I don’t quite understand you,” Alice said, as politely as she could.

“Well, you know, we quarreled with Time last March – just before HE went mad – ” (pointing at the March Hare,) “ – it was at the great concert given by the Queen of Hearts where I had to sing.[114] I hadn’t finished the first part of the song when the Queen shouted: “He’s murdering the time! Off with his head![115]”

“Oh, how cruel!” exclaimed Alice.

“And since that,” the Hatter went on sadly, “it’s always six o’clock now.”

A bright idea came into Alice’s head. “Is that why so many tea-things are here?” she asked.

“Yes, that’s it,” said the Hatter with a sigh: “it’s always tea-time, and we’ve no time to wash the things.”

“Then you move round all the time, I suppose?” said Alice.

“Exactly so,” said the Hatter.

“But what happens when you come to the beginning again?” Alice decided to ask.

“Let’s change the subject,” the March Hare yawned. “I think the lady will tell us a story.”

“I’m afraid I don’t know any,” said Alice.

“Then take some more tea,” the March Hare told Alice very seriously.

“I’ve had no tea yet,[116]” Alice replied in an offended tone, “so I can’t take more.”

“You mean you can’t take LESS,” said the Hatter: “it’s very easy to take MORE than nothing.”

Alice helped herself to some tea and bread-and-butter.[117]

“I want a clean cup,” suddenly said the Hatter: “let’s all move one place on.[118]”

He moved on, and the Dormouse moved on too: the March Hare moved into the Dormouse’s place, and Alice unwillingly took the place of the March Hare. But only the Hatter had a clean cup. Alice got the plate and the cup after the March Hare.

She didn’t like it at all, so she stood up, and walked away; the Dormouse fell asleep, and nobody called her back. When she turned to look at them she saw that they were trying to put the Dormouse into the teapot.

“I’ll never go THERE again!” said Alice as she was walking 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 in it. “That’s very curious!” she thought. “But everything’s curious today. I think I will go in at once.” And she went in.

Once more she was in the long hall, and near the little glass table. “I’ll do better this time,” she said to herself, and first took the little golden key and unlocked the door into the garden. Then she nibbled at the mushroom a few times (a piece of it was in her pocket) till she was about a foot high: then she walked down the little corridor behind the door: and THEN – at last she was in the beautiful garden, among the bright flower-beds and the cool fountains.