Heart and Sole, Chapter 10
“What is wrong with the Hatter?” Alice asks Mally as they watch the man nearly topple into the Whotchworks well at the center of the square on his way back to the train platform.
Alice is fairly shocked to hear Mally giggle in response. “Ain’t nuthin’ wrong with him.”
“But he’s so…” Words fail her.
“It’s called twitterpated an’ it don’ happen e’ery day, but when it does…” The dormouse sighs wistfully, indicating that being twitterpated is actually a good thing, although from Alice’s point of view (as she watches the Hatter dodge a lamp post and nearly impale himself on the mayor’s horn as the unicorn straightens up from smelling the roses in front of the flower shop), this twitterpated business looks rather dangerous.
“Will he be all right?” she asks worriedly.
“Oh, sure. Don’ be worryin’ ‘bout th’Atter. Twitterpation ne’er killed nobody.”
Although it appears to generate several very close calls, Alice decides when the Hatter returns to Whotchworks the following week and nearly walks into the shop door which he’s holding open for Alice. She reaches out to steady him, but the instant her hand touches his jacket sleeve, he convulses, dropping the basket he’d arrived carrying and knocking his head against the door frame when he hurriedly tries to grab it from midair. Feeling utterly helpless, Alice leaves the Hatter to himself, hoping he hasn’t been too badly hurt. She bends down to collect the basket and its spilled contents. Unfortunately, the Hatter had apparently decided that his head is perfectly fine and their hands end up bumping over a single green apple. This action somehow makes the Hatter lose his balance and-!
“Oomph!” Alice remarks as she finds herself lying flat on her back just inside the shop with the length of the Hatter pressed against her in a very intimate and heart-racing way.
“So-so-Alice!” he stutters, trying to right himself.
She inhales reflexively as soon as he gives her the space to do so and the scent of him invades her, makes her heart throb and her insides churn with urgent heat. Had he always smelled this good and she simply hadn’t noticed or had she somehow forgotten in the intervening months? Or could this be some sort of side-effect of the twitterpation? (Whatever that is!)
“Are you all right?” she asks him when he overbalances and, arms wind-milling, lands squarely on his rear near her feet.
“The apples. Yes. I’m spilled but the apples are fine.”
“Hm,” Alice replies, not knowing what else to say. This time, she lets the Hatter lurch toward the tumbled basket alone. She glances toward the kitchen, considering which variety of tea might be the most calming for both herself and the Hatter, and spies Cordwain framed in that very doorway. The old hare wobbles frightfully on his cane yet somehow manages to keep himself upright. A strange, crooked grin twists his hairy face and a devilish gleam twinkles in his eyes. Alice braces herself for either one of the shoemaker’s echoing and aromatic belches or a thoroughly befuddling (and quite possibly brilliant) series of observations.
The shoemaker announces, “This’s nae a tea shop, Hatter.”
“Oh, yes! I’m well aware-!”
“We’re shoemakers.”
“I can see that-!”
“Sae yah’re ‘ere f’r shoes.”
Alice blinks at Cordwain’s presumptuous conclusion. The Hatter visibly flounders. This man had saved Alice’s life on several occasions. The least she can do is stand up to a shoemaker on his behalf! “Cordwain!” she protests.
Her employer ignores her. “Or be yah ‘ere f’r summat o’her than shoes, lad?” the hare challenges, glaring at the Hatter with one eye wide and the other squinting suspiciously.
The Hatter twitches, glances wildly at Alice and declares in a desperate, strangled tone, “Shoes. Of course. This is a shoe shop, after all.”
Alice’s heart sinks at his words. From what Mally had implied, she’d thought… Well, she’d begun to think that perhaps the Hatter had come to see her again today because he-
But no. He doesn’t. Of course not.
“Ar, Alishin, be a lass an’ take th’ lad’s measurements,” Cordwain commands.
“Hatter,” Alice says thickly after a long moment, during which he merely stares at her, his hands kneading the air. Ignoring Cordwain’s hare-ish glare, she begins, “You-”
“Sit ‘r skedaddle!” Cordwain hollers rudely, pointing imperiously at the man-sized bench at the center of the room.
Alice is struck by the tableau. Not so long ago, it had been the Red Queen to point in such a way and the Hatter captive in her realm. Disturbingly, the Hatter merely sinks down onto the bench, utterly silent and still gazing at Alice.
Rounding on the shoemaker, Alice barks, “Cordwain Earwicket don’t you dare-!”
“Custom’s waitin’, Alishin!” he informs her on a hiccup and then stomps into the workshop, leaving Alice and the Hatter completely alone in the shop.
Sighing heavily, Alice turns her attention back to the uncharacteristically demure Hatter. “Hatter,” she whispers. Unthinkingly, she reaches for him, intending to lay her hand on his shoulder, but a flicker of his eyes toward her hand stays the motion. She fists her hand before dropping it. “You don’t have to request new shoes if you don’t want them.”
After a long moment, he asks softly, “Will ye craft ‘em, Alice?”
“If you wish,” she allows.
He lowers his head but not in a gesture of defeat. The Hatter peers at the ankle-high boots on his feet. “Mayhap ‘tis time to consider a new path.”
Alice seats herself opposite him on the slightly smaller, badger-sized stool. “You needn’t choose today, here, or now.”
The Hatter looks up at that, his expression startled. “I fear I already have.”
Again, he watches her intently. She resists the urge to fidget. “Don’t fear, Hatter.”
“New things are frightful,” he argues.
“But they are only new for a moment, and then they’re not anymore.”
He gives her a wobbly smile.
Cordwain chooses that moment to hop-twitch-limp-stomp over to them and shove the measuring tape at Alice. “Th’ shoes go’teh c’m off firstwise,” the hare reminds her with a blink of his left eye and then his right.
With a sigh, she addresses the man who still makes her heart pound and her stomach tighten. “Hatter…”
In all honestly, Alice isn’t sure what she’d like to say. Something which would make everything all right. Something that would make him smile, reach for her, cradle her face in his damaged hands and press his lips to hers.
The Hatter leans away and hurriedly unknots the red shoestrings on his battered boots. Alice’s words - a tangle of arguments and reassurances - dry up and clog her throat as she watches his stained fingers nimbly work the laces loose. She allows herself only a brief moment - a mere blink of her eyes - to gather herself. Watching a man remove his footwear should not make her feel so flustered. It should not, but…
Her eyes startle open when a soft puff of Hatter-scented air brushes her cheek. He is sitting up straight once again and still staring at his shoes. With a deep, fortifying breath, he toes them off.
Now seated on the bench with his ankle-high boots in a heap and his magnificently bright, stockinged feet tapping against the wooden floor, he hesitates to look up at her. Her fingers tighten around the measuring tape tangled up in her grasp as she waits, breath held. She’s not sure what she’s waiting for… perhaps some indication that he wants this, that he welcomes her touch.
He squeezes his luminous eyes shut briefly and then lifts his chin with a decisive motion. When he turns his head to meet her gaze, she is startled by his wide-eyed stare. He is still afraid of something - her, perhaps? The idea would be laughable if only it weren’t a very real possibility - but his gaze is steady and his voice is clear:
“I’m ready, Alice.”
Oh dear…
She has to clear her throat twice before she can summon enough air to carry her words. “You’ll not feel a single tickle,” she promises and then kneels down and unrolls the tape.
It is surely the longest, the most arduous, and the most utterly silent foot-measuring of her career to date. The Hatter is perfectly still as she applies the tool to the side of his foot, measures over and across, and then from the floor to his ankle. Strangely enough, he doesn’t even twitch when she lifts his foot and places his heel upon her lap so that she can measure along his arch.
Measurements committed to memory, she then places his foot back on the floor and collects the second. Through it all, he says nothing, merely watches. His breaths are slow and steady. Alice would say he feels calm only that would not explain the odd, electric crackle that seems to dance just beneath her skin, as if she is sitting in the very spot where lightning is about to strike.
“There,” she rasps, replacing his left foot upon the floor. She gathers up his discarded boots and holds them out to him. “If you’ll tell me which style of footwear you’d prefer, I’ll start working on them this evening.”
“Alice,” he whispers softly.
She glances up and meets his gaze, startled by how close he is, how warm his breath is upon her cheek, how very near his lips are to hers.
He swallows visibly and, with an obvious effort, turns his attention to his shoes. He collects them with shaking hands.
“The type I would prefer,” he further explains, looking thoroughly unnerved. “An Alice design.”
“And the height?” Alice prompts. “Function?”
The Hatter merely blinks at her.
“Color?” she tries.
The Hatter doesn’t answer.
“Shall… shall I decide for you then?”
His bright, bushy brows drawn together in a mournful frown, he nods once.
“Well, tha’s settled, then!” Cordwain declares, startling Alice so badly she nearly knocks foreheads with the Hatter. “Pu’ yer boots back on, lad, an’ off yah go! Alishin ‘as work teh b’doin’!”
Alice hurriedly backs up as the Hatter lurches to his feet. He still hasn’t put his boots back on. He clutches them to his chest as if their very presence is vital for his next breath.
“Yer new boots’ll b’ready in a for’nigh’!” the hare informs him. “Thar’s th’ door.”
Alice gapes at the scene before her. She has never witnessed Cordwain behaving so rudely to a customer... or even a visitor for that matter. In fact, he’s never even behaved thusly with Hamish despite the fact that the man had most certainly deserved it on several occasions.
Cordwain waits, arms akimbo, as the Hatter merely nods in obedience and moves toward the door, feet still clad in only his stockings. The sight of his bowed shoulders rallies her; she will not allow Cordwain to get away with this injustice!
“Hatter,” she calls, hurrying toward him.
He pauses on the threshold.
There had been a time only a few months ago when she would have taken his shoes from his hands with little more than a glance and a grin of warning. Now, however, considering the terribly fragile state he appears to be in, she mutely holds out her hands for them.
After a long moment during which she feels his gaze scour her expression, he relinquishes them.
“Here,” she says, placing them on the floor, “you’ll need them until the new ones are ready.” Some imp within her rises to the fore and she hears herself tease, “It would be a shame to soil such magnificent stockings.”
When she looks up, there is a very small twinkle in his green eyes, as if a lost hope had been found and is taking shelter under a half-broken umbrella.
“I’m glad you came today,” she whispers, locking her knees to keep from leaning forward and into a kiss.
“As am I,” he squeaks softly, but his smile is genuine and nearly as bright as it had been on Griblig Day.
They stand there on the threshold of shoe shop, mutely staring and gently smiling until Cordwain noisily clears his throat. The Hatter startles as if suddenly waking from a dream. He steps into his still-unlaced boots and then gives Alice one last glance, touching his ever-bandaged fingers to the brim of his hat in farewell.
Alice watches him stumble and trip over the trailing laces as he crosses the village square, her heart pounding at his parting gesture.
Could it be…? Had he tipped his hat to her because his regard for her has deepened?
“Well, Alishin,” her employer drawls on a rabbity cackle, “looks like ye’ve shoework teh b’doin’.”
“I suppose I do,” she replies. And once the Hatter turns the corner and disappears from sight, she heads for the workshop and gets on with it.
Days later - days of naught but work, brief meals, and too little sleep - Alice regards the nearly-complete shoes on her worktable. These are not the first pair of shoes Alice has ever made, but she is determined that they will be the best. Perhaps they are not a masterpiece in art and color - although she certainly hasn’t left them bare! - but they will be shoes made by an Alice for her Hatter!
Her hands hesitate at that thought. Her Hatter? Now that is presumptuous! Simply because he’d asked for one of her designs and touched the brim of his hat in farewell that doesn’t necessarily mean-
“Tha’ Hatter’s a lucky mahn,” Cordwain declares, examining the boot Alice had just set aside to contemplate.
“Lucky?” Considering all that the man has lost, she rather thinks the opposite of that statement must be true.
“Oh, aye. A mahn’s lucky teh have anythin’ made with love. Most especially wear f’r ‘is achin’ soles.”
She turns her attention back to the nearly-finished shoes and gives them a speculative look. Is she making them with love as well as leather and laces? Perhaps she is. Well, what could be the harm?
With a smile she concurs, “Everything is better when it’s made with love.”
“Indeed,” Cordwain coughs and then staggers over to another candlelit table, leaving her to her labors.
*~*~*~*
“Well, you’re in a fine mood,” Hamish declares, seeing Alice’s hopelessly lovesick smile. The expression warms him even as it presents yet another obstacle to be overcome in his mission to convince Alice to return home. Still, he has accepted that the task will be one for the long term, so he has no qualms whatsoever in enjoying the fine spring day. He’d even arrived in Underland properly this time - on the stoop of the shoe shop with his hat atop his head and walking stick in hand.
“I adore making shoes, Hamish,” she confesses.
“Hm,” he replies, sensing quite a lot more behind the simple declaration. “And whose shoes are you making?”
Dare he hope that some other lad has caught her eye and earned her fancy? Or could it be that Alice is euphoric over a promotion of sorts?
“The Hatter’s,” she replies. Her smile dims as she glances toward him nervously.
“The... Hatter…” Hamish bites out, stopping in his tracks.
She nods, clearly bracing herself for his reaction. Hamish grits his teeth and thinks of the letter in his coat pocket. He’d finally summoned the temerity (with the aid of a bit of evening brandy) to read it.
The contents had broken his heart on Alice’s behalf. How utterly Alice of her to have chosen a man who clearly believes he can never love her in return, but who cares for her and her happiness. What a horrid mess. He had brooded over that letter for hours beside the fireplace, wondering what ought to be done with it, and he’d eventually arrived at one horrible conclusion:
Alice must be told.
Her heart must be broken so that it may mend, so that she might consider returning home to her dear mother. Reading that note, it had become clear to Hamish that there is no future here for her, only a lifetime of making other people’s (and creature’s!) colorful footwear.
He’d taken to carrying the letter with him so that he could at last deliver it, and now that he has the chance…!
“Alice,” he begins, his frustration reaching the point of boiling.
“Hamish-” she interrupts.
“No, Alice. No,” he declares imperiously, raising his voice. He lets his temper rise for there is no one nearby to witness it. Upon his arrival in Underland this time, just as he had ducked into the shop, Alice had appeared from the workshop at the back, grinned, grabbed his arm, and announced a trip to visit some cliffs of some sort.
“I’m told Grampus Bluffs are especially magnificent this season!”
Hamish couldn’t care less if these bluffs have the ability to sing and dance. His primary concern is-
“You’re in love with him again!” he accuses.
“Still,” she corrects him stubbornly.
“Despite the thorough and unforgivable way he trampled your heart, Alice!”
“I can’t help it, Hamish! He’s the right man for me!”
“How can you be so sure?”
“Because I am.”
“That is not an answer.”
Alice throws up her hands and spins around, speaking to the forest that borders the footpath. “Is he confused or conflicted about something? Yes, he is. But, Hamish, you didn’t see him fight the Red Queen’s Knave. You never heard him lie to the Red Queen herself to keep me from being discovered. He… he… he took his hat off to me once but I was too full of my own silly notions that I was dreaming all this up to pay attention and then just last week he…”
“He what?” Hamish doggedly pursues despite sensing that this inquiry will only make the delivery of the letter he carries that much more painful for both of them.
“He’s afraid of something,” she confesses. “He has faced death and horror the likes of which you cannot even imagine, Hamish, but now he fears. And yet, despite that fear, he asked me to make a pair of shoes just for him. He smiled and he tipped his hat to me. Clearly, he’s fighting whatever terrifies him. How can I not love him for that?”
Hamish sighs. Heart aching, he beseeches, “Try, Alice. Please. This will not end as you hope it will.”
He watches the breath leave her. Her stance loses its righteous indignation. “What very bad thing do you think you know that I do not?”
He hates seeing the fear in her eyes, but there can be nothing for it. The time has come. She needs to know. “The Hatter, Alice. Tarrant Hightopp is… The deaths of his entire clan…”
Alice gasps. “How could you know about-?”
How, indeed. “He explained it in his letter.”
“His letter?”
Fully resigned now, Hamish reaches into his pocket.
“He sent correspondence to you?” she whispers.
Shamed, Hamish pauses, fingers just brushing the corner of the envelope. “No, it is addressed to you. Somehow, I intercepted it and… at first I was sure it was a mistake. But now that I’ve read it properly-”
“Properly?!” she squawks indignantly.
“It was clearly intended for you,” he concludes over her outrage.
Silence descends as suddenly as the argument had erupted. Alice glares at him. Hamish clutches the letter still within his jacket pocket. A breeze ruffles Hamish’s hair and only then does he notice that both he and Alice are completely tense, every muscle locked in place as if braced for battle.
Hamish wracks his mind for something to say, some way to diffuse this situation. Although he is loathe to admit it, it appears he owes Alice an apology for not respecting her privacy. He draws a breath, opens his mouth to utter the distasteful words-
“Oomph!”
Hamish hits the dirt path with a thud! He coughs on the dust that coats his mouth, winces at the throbbing of his head, and gasps for breath.
“Get away from him!” Alice screams at his assailant.
“Can’t do that, Champion. We’s gots orders.”
“Orders from whom?” she demands.
The sounds of a scuffle reach his ears and Hamish struggles to open his eyes. A ragtag band of very unsavory and mangy creatures surrounds them. A badger with a scarred face and an eye patch is tying Alice’s hands behind her back. She struggles valiantly, but she cannot break the creature’s grip.
A grinning wolf steps forward and says, “Th’ Lord o’ th’ Outlands. Ye and yer ginger here’ll be his guests.” The creature chuckles. “’Tis quite th’ honor t’ be invited t’ th’ Tower o’ th’ Black King.”
Alice’s eyes flash. Hamish works on gathering his strength. Dear God, what had they clubbed him with? Is he bleeding?
“There is no such tower nor any such king,” she retorts furiously.
The wolf flexes his paws and sunlight gleams off of his dark, sharp claws.
“Of course there be. Th’ tower’s just o’er this ‘ere mountain an’ th’ king… Well, I guess ye’d know ‘im as Ilosovich Stayne.”
“Stayne!” Alice hisses, utterly enraged. For an instant, she seems to be on the verge of apoplexy, but then she simply stops… and then she looks at Hamish. “Can you stand up, Hamish?”
Gritting his teeth, he pushes himself up from the road. His suit is ruined, he’s sure. “Yes. As you can see, Alice, I’m fine,” he asserts for the sake of his pride.
“Good,” she replies. “Remember this: the tower over the Whotchworks mountain and Ilosovich Stayne.”
Rather than nod and upset his still aching head, Hamish asks, “Whatever for?”
“Remember it!” She glances at the wolf, who gestures toward one of his equally repugnant fellows.
“Tie ‘im up!”
Alice continues in a rush, “Find the Hatter and tell him where I am! Now get out of here, Hamish! Go back to where you came from and find the Hatter!”
In an instant, he understands what Alice is about. He steps forward and angrily accuses, “You can’t expect that just because you order me to go that I will. Besides, I’m not leaving you at the mercy of these-!”
A rock suddenly appears in front of Hamish’s toe, catching his shoe and sending him toppling forward. As the road rushes up toward him for a second time, Hamish closes his eyes, braces himself for, at worst, a broken nose and then…
“Ack!” he sputters, flailing against the garments pressing against his face.
“Sir! Sir, please allow me to fetch your coat.”
Running footsteps herald the approach of his butler. Hamish permits the man to pull him upright and out of the tiny hall closet. He blinks stupidly as the fellow apologizes profusely for the untidy assortment of shoes upon which Hamish had tripped when he’d reached for his raincoat.
His raincoat. Yes, he’d been about to head out to the trade office but, noticing the dark clouds looming on the horizon, he’d thought to grab his coat. He’d opened the closet door and found himself on the threshold of the shoe shop in Whotchworks.
Whotchworks, Alice, the woodland path to the bluffs, the brigands and…!
“The tower over the Wotchworks mountain and Ilosovich Stayne!” Hamish growls, his heart pounding anew. Those beasts had taken Alice and she’d kicked him out of Underland to fetch help!
“Sir?” the butler inquires as Hamish pushes past him, ignoring the offered coat.
He charges up the stairs in the small house, crashes into his room, dives for the bureau beside his bed, and fumbles for the handgun he keeps in the drawer. The cylinder is already loaded, but it slips out of his sweaty hands when he tries to fit it into place and bounces off his shoe before rolling under the bed. With a growl, he gets down on his hands and knees and reaches for it.
“Sir?” he hears the befuddled butler call once more. Hamish can only imagine the picture he makes with his head and shoulders wedged beneath the bed and his rear sticking up in the air. How undignified!
He hurriedly snaps the cylinder in place and wiggles out from under the bedframe. The quilt catches on his head and he reaches up with his free hand to bat the blasted thing aside. This, of course, further destroys his careful hair style but, given the circumstances, he can’t spare the time to be vain about it.
He braces himself against the bed, preparing to stand, and that is when he notices the very timely but mortifying fact that he is not in his bedroom in Hong Kong. He is in an exquisitely white tearoom and the furniture he’d just squiggled out from under is a table set for tea. His empty hand is resting on its cloth-covered surface. In his opposite hand, the gun feels suddenly heavy and horridly conspicuous.
“Sir?” the butler calls again. Hamish swallows against the rising suspicion that he had passed into Underland the very moment he’d squeezed under his bed.
“Oh, blast,” he mutters. Hamish squeezes his eyes shut for a moment before forcing himself to face the music.
Whom he faces however…
“Good afternoon, sir. Would you care for tea?” a luminously white woman asks with a delicate gesture of her small, pale hands.
He gapes, gawks, and stutteringly recovers, “I… no. No, thank you, ah, madam. I am on rather urgent business. I must find the Hatter posthaste.”
“Oh? Well, in that case... Mister Swims?”
“Yes, your Majesty?” a large fish inquires, swishing forward.
“Please help our guest to his feet.”
“I’m fine,” Hamish grunts, standing and sliding the loaded revolver into his pocket. And then, be-lately adds, “Your Majesty.”
The White Queen - for really, who else could so white a woman be in this place? - sets aside her napkin and Mister Swims pulls out her chair for her. She rounds the tea table with mesmerizing grace and offers Hamish her hand.
“I shall take you to him.”
Discombobulated by this woman’s magnificence, Hamish clumsily accepts her hand and places it upon his arm. He waits for her to take the lead, but she doesn’t budge. He glances at her questioningly.
She arches a single black brow playfully. “If I might have the name of the gentleman whom I am escorting to the Royal Hat Workshop?”
Oh, bugger all. “It’s Hamish, your Majesty. Hamish-”
“Hamish,” she repeats, evidently uncaring of his proper title and distinctions. “A pleasure. We shall have to have tea when your business with the Hatter is concluded.”
“I look forward to it, your Majesty,” he replies automatically, but with sincerity.
“Call me Mirana,” she whispers back with a wink and then floats toward the door.
Feeling utterly ungainly, Hamish stumbles along at her side as best he can. Truly, the woman makes him feel as if he is a boy again. If she weren’t so utterly enthralling, he would be beside himself in mortification at his own clumsiness.
“How is it you found yourself under my tea table, sir?” she asks as they stride down a breathtakingly lovely corridor.
“Oh, I was fetching the pistol’s cylinder from under my bed, your Majestly.”
“I see,” she drawls. “I trust your pistol is now assembled and… at the ready?”
He blinks at the playful tone. “Er…”
Her smile is wickedly female. Before Hamish can break out in a sweat, she continues, sobering somewhat, “I’m afraid this may not be a good time to speak with the Hatter. Twitterpation, while a blessing to the recipient, is often a curse for all those who must deal with him.”
“Er, is he still twitterpated?”
She nods. “And he will remain so until the one who is his perfect match proves her love for him.”
“The one-? His perfect-!” Mind racing, Hamish thinks of the letter, of the heartbreaking explanation and refusal of Alice’s affections. “But he already refused Alice once…”
“Hastily,” the queen acknowledges. “I cautioned him against acting rashly.” That devastatingly teasing grin reappears on her dark lips. “Which is why I asked a cat of my acquaintance to waylay any correspondence between the Hatter and our Alice.”
“You-!” he sputters.
“Yes. But let us save that topic for tea later. Here we are,” she announces gently, turning him toward the workshop door. With a subtle nod of her lovely head, she indicates that Hamish must be the one to knock.
He does so and then, when no response is forthcoming, he glances at Mirana for encouragement - which she delivers with a kind smile - and he opens the door.
The room is utterly pristine. Every button and thread has been put in its proper place. Every hat stand is vacant of headwear and arranged with military precision.
“Oh, dear,” the queen sighs, seeing this.
Hamish cares only for the fact that the Hatter is present… and clearly ignoring them. He sits at his own tea table which has been carefully arranged and yet appears to be untouched. The Hatter slumps in his chair, grasping his jacket lapels tightly. His chin is tucked down as if in slumber. He is not sleeping, however. Despite the fact that his hat is tilted low over his eyes, Hamish glimpses the slight quivering of the man’s mouth and dried tear streaks upon his pale cheeks.
“Oh, Tarrant. Must you pine for her so?” the queen asks with a note of exasperation.
“Mae twine weeks’r no’up yet,” he brogues thickly.
“Stuff whatever time limit you’re under,” Hamish declares, striding over to the man. “Alice needs you now!”
The Hatter turns his face away. “No, no. The shoes… I mustn’t before my feet are ready to be shod.”
“Sodding hell,” Hamish mutters. He grasps the Hatter’s shoulders and pulls him up from his chair. “They’ve taken Alice, you mope. Brigands and beasts have taken her over the Whotchworks mountain to some tower or other on the command of the Black King, Ilosovich Stayne!”
The white queen gasps.
The Hatter’s chin comes up slowly. As it does, Hamish glimpses the glittering orange of the man’s eyes.
“Stayne ‘as mae Alice?”
“Yes,” Hamish manages.
“Yer Majesty!” the Hatter barks, his tone dark and nine varieties of rage.
Hamish shivers as a premonition comes to him: a premonition of him accompanying the Hatter on this quest to fetch Alice back from the fiend who has taken her. It is a premonition which fills him with dread, which makes his stomach cramp and his palms sweat. The Hatter’s next words do nothing to assuage his anxieties:
“Where b’mae claymore?”
NOTES:
+ For the last 75 years, the Bannrock Device has been popular for measuring the length and width of a person’s feet. Alice doesn’t have one of those, obviously, as they hadn’t been invented in the Victorian Era. (I’m just really impressed that those things have an Official Name.) Here’s their homepage: http://www.brannock.com
+ Hamish isn't very gun savvy so he uses the terms "pistol" and "revolver" interchangeably when speaking to the queen even though they are actually very different weapons. Admit it, the innuendo is priceless. (^__~)b
+ And YES THIS PLOT TWIST IS SO CLICHÉ. (Admit how much you’re loving it. Go on. I’ll wait until you’re done.) I’ve never written a Stayne-kidnaps-Alice fic before and figured, what the hell, I’ll give it a try. And, guys, GUYS! This is waaay more fun than I expected it would be. OMG. YOU’RE GOING TO LOVE THIS!