A Plague of Hearts Read online

  The sound of urgent footsteps broke into the awkwardness that sat between the March Hare and the Mad Hatter. They both turned to be greeted by the sight of the White Rabbit sprinting across the lawn. He was dressed in a formal suit that may have been a distant cousin of the one loosely adorning the Mad Hatter.

  As he ran, the White Rabbit slapped a pocket watch against his forehead. ‘Foreign rubbish!’ he cried. ‘Bloody digital rubbish. I never had this problem with my old timepiece. Handmade it was. Didn’t lose a second in all the time I had it.’

  The Hare and the Hatter watched wordlessly as this fluffy apparition sped by and disappeared through a gap in the hedge without so much as a hello or a by your leave.

  ‘The trouble with you talkies,’ said the Mad Hatter after a while, ‘is that you tend to take life too seriously.’

  ‘The trouble with us what?’

  ‘Talkies. Surely you’ve heard that term before?’

  ‘No, I haven’t. But I guess it’s an improvement on stuffed toys.’

  ‘Some of my best friends are stuffed toys.’

  ‘They’re not stuffed,’ said the March Hare. ‘They’re inflatable.’

  ‘Whatever.’

  ‘And I think it’s very sad they way you treat them as if they were real.’

  ‘Why shouldn’t I? I treat you as real.’

  ‘But I am real.’

  ‘How do you know? Who’s to say what is and isn’t real? Could all that we know - or think we know - be no more than a dream, or a dream within a dream?’

  ‘I take it you’re referring to the Creed of the Red King?’

  ‘Of course. You must be aware of my attachment to the Creed.’

  ‘It sometimes seems to be all you ever talk about.’

  ‘It’s very important to me. Have you ever been to Looking Glass Land?’

  ‘No. With the exception of the Albatross, no talking animal is allowed to leave the kingdom. We’re all wards of the King and he won’t let us travel. Thinks once we cross the border, we’ll be shot, stuffed and mounted. He’s probably right too.’

  ‘A shame. Looking Glass Land is a beautiful country, full of many wonders.’ A look of nostalgia crept across the Hatter’s face. It conveyed a sense of something lost. ‘In my youth, I traveled the whole of the North Continent, visiting not only Clubs and Diamonds, but also a lot of countries most people around here don’t seem to have heard of. I had adventures you would not believe, and I met many wonderful people.

  ‘But my favourite place of all was Looking Glass Land. It was there that I first heard of the Creed of the Red King. Fascinating stuff. I spent two years in a monastery studying ancient writings on the subject. That’s where I invented rock’n’roll.’

  ‘You invented rock’n’roll?’

  ‘Sure. I just took anger and angst and mixed in some blues. Then I added energy and optimism. An old monk lent me his electric guitar and I would play it for hours while contemplating the mysteries of the world. Basically rock’n’roll is a very spiritual thing, a reflection of inner space.’

  ‘I’d never thought of it that way before.’

  The Hatter drummed his fingers on the table as if to tap out the beat of some almost-forgotten tune. Suddenly he stopped and pointed to a figure running in the footsteps of the White Rabbit. ‘Now what,’ he demanded, ‘is that?’

  The March Hare looked up. ‘It’s a little girl. She must be lost or something.’

  ‘Well, get her off my lawn. Little girls are all well and fine but I won’t stand for them trampling on my grass.’

  The girl looked as if the past few weeks of summer had passed her by. Her face was pale; her arms were a network of highly visible veins and arteries. From the style of her frock, she was either foreign or lumbered with a mother woefully out of touch with the latest fashions.

  Without asking if she might, the little girl came to the table and sat down opposite the March Hare. If she had been chasing the White Rabbit, the matter must have suddenly lost its urgency. Perhaps it was forgotten entirely.

  ‘Good day,’ she said, panting loudly and speaking in an odd accent. ‘My name is Alice and I’m very pleased to meet you all.’

  ‘Sod off,’ said the Mad Hatter. ‘There’s no room for you here.’

  ‘Besides which,’ said the March Hare, ‘you’re ugly.’

  Alice sniffed haughtily. ‘There’s plenty of room. And only a very stupid person would consider me to be ugly. I’m actually quite pretty in an unorthodox sort of way.’

  ‘Well, have some wine then,’ said the Hatter who thought it might be fun to get the girl drunk. ‘As much as you like.’

  ‘There isn’t any wine,’ replied the girl. ‘And I’ve just had some strange mushrooms that probably don’t mix with alcohol.’

  ‘Mushrooms, you say? You ought to be careful what you eat, my dear. Some of the fungi around here are even more potent than LSD. Children your age should stick to hashish or sniffing glue.’

  ‘I hope we aren’t going to get involved in a discussion on drug abuse,’ said Alice. ‘I find the subject somewhat boring. Besides, it’s not polite to talk about such things at a meal table.’

  ‘And it’s not polite to sit down without being asked,’ countered the Mad Hatter.

  ‘I didn’t know it was your table. And anyway, it’s laid out for a good deal more than three.’

  The Hatter decided to try a different tack. ‘I’ll let you stay if you can answer my riddle.’

  ‘That should be no problem. I’m by far the cleverest girl I know. Mater says I’m something of a genius.’

  ‘Good. Then try this for size: why is a writing desk like a raven?’

  ‘A raven idiot?’

  ‘A raven bird.’

  ‘Is this a trick question?’

  ‘No. But it has a trick answer.’

  ‘Do you mind if I think about it for a while?’

  ‘You have two minutes,’ said the Hatter. He picked up one of his many tea pots and aimed its spout at a dirty cup. ‘Would you care for a cup of entropy?’

  ‘That depends,’ said Alice. ‘Is it Indian entropy or Chinese?’

  ‘Does it matter?’

  ‘Not really. I don’t want it anyway. Too much entropy is bad for you.’

  ‘Then perhaps I could tempt you with a tea bag?’

  ‘No thank you.’

  ‘It’s a very special tea bag.’

  ‘A tea bag is a tea bag,’ insisted Alice, despite having no idea what a tea bag might be. ‘Once you’ve seen one tea bag, you’ve seen them all.’

  ‘Not one like this,’ said the Hatter, pulling a silver case from his pocket. He opened it to reveal a tea bag set upon a silk cushion. ‘There are only five of these in existence and they all belong to me.’

  Alice sniffed. She was not impressed. ‘Do you by chance have any coffee?’

  ‘Not one bean of it. Not even the merest whisper of a hint of a speck of it. No man in history has ever been more devoid of coffee than the man you see before you. In fact, it’s fair to say that you have entered a coffee-free environment.’

  ‘In that case, I will have your tea bag.’ Alice took the bag and held it in her hand. ‘What should I do with it? Put it in water?’

  ‘Oh deary me, no. One does not add water to a tea bag of such calibre as this.’

  ‘Then how does one drink it?’

  ‘One pulls the string. How else?’

  ‘Like this?’

  ‘A bit harder. You have to be firm with these things.’

  Alice tugged and tugged again. The tea bag spoke. ‘This tea bag,’ it said, ‘will self-destruct in five seconds… ’

  With a squeal, Alice threw the tea bag away. It hit the oak and fell straight onto the table.

  ‘Only kidding,’ it spluttered, its voice bubbling with merriment. ‘You think I’m suicidal or what?’

  The tea bag exploded.

  ‘Shit,’ said Alice, wiping tea leaves from the side of her face. ‘You could have killed m
e.’

  ‘Let that be a lesson to you,’ said the Mad Hatter with a chuckle. ‘Never accept a tea bag from a stranger.’

  ‘Tea kills,’ muttered the Dormouse. ‘But carrots care.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said Alice, slapping the slumbering rodent on his head. ‘Or I’ll set my cat on you.’

  ‘Time’s up,’ said the Hatter. ‘I insist you answer my riddle straight away.’

  ‘I can’t,’ said Alice. ‘It’s a stupid riddle.’

  ‘It is not.’

  ‘It is.’

  ‘In that case, I shan’t tell you the answer.’

  ‘Because you don’t have the answer.’

  ‘I do.’

  ‘I don’t believe you.’

  ‘Fish.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Fish. That’s the answer.’

  ‘Why fish?’

  ‘Some people do it for sport. Some people do it for a living.’

  ‘I meant, why is fish the answer?’

  ‘Because it’s a joke.’

  Alice frowned. ‘I don’t get it.’

  ‘That’s all right. Neither do I.’

  ‘What’s the point of telling a joke you don’t understand?’

  ‘I give up. What is the point of telling a joke you don’t understand?’

  ‘There isn’t one.’

  ‘That,’ said the March Hare, ‘is the worst joke I’ve ever heard.’

  ‘It wasn’t meant to be a joke.’

  ‘Oh. It was an unjoke then?’

  ‘Of course it was an unjoke!’

  ‘Then why did it have a punch line? Unjokes aren’t meant to have punch lines. It’s against the rules of grammar.’

  ‘Oh shut up!’ snapped Alice. ‘You two are mad!’

  ‘And you’re ugly,’ said the Hatter. ‘But at least in the morning we’ll still be mad.’

  ‘More tea?’ said the March Hare.

  ‘I’d rather not,’ said Alice, her anger turning to quiet resignation.

  ‘How about a poem then?’ suggested the Mad Hatter. ‘With your kind permission, I would be delighted to recite for you the very verse for which I gained first prize in last year’s Royal Poetry Competition.’

  Alice was impressed. ‘Don’t tell me you’re a poet!’

  ‘If you insist. But I am.’

  ‘Oh do recite your poem for me. I would so love to hear it.’

  ‘Very well then. It goes like this:

  ‘Twinkle, twinkle Cadillac!

  ‘What has made your piston crack?

  ‘Along the motorway you cruise,

  ‘Like an ugly, metal bruise.

  ‘Twinkle, twinkle Cadillac,

  ‘What has made your piston crack?’

  The March Hare was profoundly moved. To him the motor car symbolized all that was transient in the world; to hear it compared to blemish skin was to be witness to a profound revelation, a marriage between the Material and the Spiritual.

  ‘My heart is like a sports car!’ he declared, slamming his paw on the table. A startled tea cup took to the air only to be caught up in the fact that it was profoundly unaerodynamic. It crashed into an empty jug and bled cold tea.

  ‘What,’ asked Alice, ‘is a sports car? Or a Cadillac or a motorway for that matter?’

  The Hatter smiled a fatherly smile at her. ‘That was nicely put, my dear. Though you have the face of a warthog and the eyes of a myopic piglet, you undoubtedly have the heart of a poet.’

  ‘That’s no answer.’

  ‘So young, so young! And oh so impetuous. In time, little girl, you will learn that answers are unimportant. It is enough merely to understand the question and to know that a question has been asked. Can you not see this?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘My brain,’ said the March Hare, still in the heady embrace of inspiration, ‘is a motorbike gleaming crimson in a sunset that unites the sea with the sky.’

  ‘Shut up,’ said the Mad Hatter. ‘Or I’ll tweak your nipples.’

  The March Hare shut up.

  ‘By the way,’ said Alice. ‘Is this a birthday party?’

  ‘Not exactly,’ said the Mad Hatter.’

  ‘An anniversary party?’

  ‘As of today, yes. It’s been a year since this party began.’

  ‘You mean you’ve been partying for a whole year? How fab!’

  ‘Of course, it’s starting to wind down now, but at its peak I had over three hundred people and animals here. Even the Queen popped by.’

  ‘It’s a shame they didn’t all stay.’

  ‘Shame? Not really. The essence of a good party is that folks be allowed to come and go as they please. No man should be a prisoner to plum pudding, a slave to strawberry fool, a martyr to meringue.

  ‘Mind you, there’ve been times when I’ve noticed a distinct lack of atmosphere. But that only seems to happen when I’m on my own, so I guess I’ve got no-one to blame but myself. If it wasn’t for my old buddy the March Hare popping by now and then, I think I might have finished the party months ago. There’s nothing like a year long party for finding out who your true friends are.’

  ‘What about the Dormouse?’ asked Alice. ‘He looks to have been here for a long time.’

  ‘Oh, he doesn’t count,’ explained the Mad Hatter. ‘He just turned up one day, asked if I was interested in double glazing and then fell asleep.’

  ‘Have you tried waking him?’

  ‘Not terribly hard. He makes a good pillow.’

  ‘You stay here during the night?’

  ‘My dear, a good host never abandons his guests. That’s one of the first Laws of Etiquette.’

  ‘Etiquette?’ said Alice, looking around. ‘Is that where I am? Someone told me it was Wonderland.’

  The March Hare checked his pocket watch. ‘In another two hours and forty minutes, the year will be up and it will be time to end the party.’

  The Hatter was greatly saddened by this observation. It sat on his heart like a dazed bullfrog. ‘Just when things were beginning to liven up!’

  Being unable to provide consolation, the March Hare offered food instead. ‘Have some trifle, old chap. That’s what you need - sherry and banana trifle.’

  ‘There isn’t any,’ said Alice.

  ‘That’s hardly the point,’ said the Mad Hatter. Three crooked lines formed chevrons on his brow; they pointed down to where his spirits lay. ‘You should always look on the bright side. Be an optimist.’

  ‘Like me,’ said the March Hare. ‘If I see a glass half-filled with water, I don’t say, "There’s a half-empty glass". I say, "If things get really bad, at least I can break the glass and slash my wrists". It makes all the difference.’

  Before Alice could answer this point, the Mad Hatter pointed to a silver bowl filled with small, brightly-wrapped parcels. ‘Have a go at the lucky dip. Every one a winner.’

  ‘Thank you,’ said Alice, picking out a likely-looking package. Her eyes shone with excitement. She was in her element here - all girlish and awash with innocence and greed. The paper disintegrated beneath the onslaught of her nimble fingers. Finally, a blue capsule about the size of an aniseed ball sat in the palm of her hand.

  ‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘It’s not poisonous or hallucinogenic, is it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ said the Mad Hatter. ‘You’re not supposed to eat it.’

  ‘Then what - ’

  ‘That, young lady, is the latest breakthrough in medical science.’

  ‘It’s gone.’

  ‘Not for very long, my dear. Can’t you feel something crawling up your legs?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Well, you jolly well - .’ The Mad Hatter broke off in mid-phrase. A very peculiar look came over his face. ‘Ah,’ he said. ‘It’s going the wrong way. Oooh.’ He sighed serenely. ‘Wonderful. The world’s first self-guided suppository.’

  Alice was alarmed. ‘You’re a very strange person. You’ll be hearing from my mater about this!’

  And with that, sh
e got up and left.

  ‘What an ugly girl,’ said the March Hare. ‘What an ugly, ugly girl.’

  Chapter 3

  Conversation with a Caterpillar

  Thanking the Mad Hatter for his hospitality, the March Hare set off on his way once more. Although aware that the message he had been asked to deliver to Doctor Ormus was important, he could not bring himself to be spurred by any sense of urgency. He knew the Knave was doomed. It was not something he could deny either consciously or subconsciously.

  The Secret Police always got their man. And when they did…

  But why the Knave? What was the nature of his crime? Treason? Subversion? It had to be something serious for it to interest the Secret Police. But the Knave was a harmless fool who neither understood nor cared for politics. It just didn’t make sense.

  And why had the Knave dispatched him to Doctor Ormus? Certainly the Doctor was a brilliant man, but his domain was science. What the Knave needed now was a good lawyer, not a cranky old scientist.

  If the March Hare had not been so lost in thought, he might have turned his head and been treated to the sight of the Mad Hatter whispering furtively into the spout of a tea pot.

  ‘Number 12 calling Base. Do you copy?’

  ‘Base to Number 12,’ replied the tea pot’s hidden speaker. ‘We copy you all right. Where’s the arrow?’

  ‘The arrow has just left. It is flying in the desired direction. Nigel and out.’

  ‘That’s Roger, Number 12.’

  ‘Roger who?’

  ‘Roger and out.’

  ‘Roger Andout? Never heard of him.’

  *

  A half mile beyond his own cottage with its fur roof and ear-shaped chimneys, the March Hare came to the Pleasure Garden, a small part of the Royal Estate set aside for the cultivation of exotic flora. Lulled by the warmth of the sun and the soothing caress of a hundred different odours, he stopped to admire the snapdragons. He recalled how, at the height of spring, their blooms had burned day and night, dancing red and yellow to lure curious insects to an incendiary death. Now only tiny sparks flickered between their petals, delicate reminders of a dormant majesty.

  A nearby signed urged, ‘Please do not feed the flowers’; it was covered in poison ivy.

  Beyond the sign stood a forest of giant fungi. The March Hare dawdled amongst the redcaps and toadstools, losing himself in shaded nooks. A nearby stream laughed itself silly through the living parasols before recklessly flinging itself over a grass verge into the calm comfort of an ornamental lake.