Alice in Zombieland

deserved to be beheaded!’

‘What for?’ said the one who had spoken first.

‘That’s none of your business, Two!’ said Seven.

‘Yes, it is his business!’ said Five, ‘and I’ll tell him—it was for bringing the cook tulip-roots instead of onions.’

Seven flung down his brush, and had just begun ‘Well, of all the unjust things—’ when his eye chanced to fall upon Alice, as she stood watching them, and he checked himself suddenly: the others looked round also, and all of them bowed low, their loose collars clinking in unison like small out-of-tune bells.

‘Would you tell me,’ said Alice, a little timidly, ‘why you are painting those roses?’

Five and Seven said nothing, but looked at Two. Two began in a low voice, ‘Why the fact is, you see, Miss, this here tomb ought to have been covered with red roses, and we put black ones on it by mistake; and if the Queen was to find it out, we should all have our heads cut off, you know. So you see, Miss, we’re doing our best, afore she comes, to—’ At this moment Five, who had been anxiously looking across the windswept cemetery, called out ‘The Queen! The Queen!’ and the three gardeners instantly threw themselves flat upon their faces. There was a sound of many footsteps, and Alice looked round, eager to see the Queen.

First came ten soldiers carrying clubs; these were all shaped like the three gardeners, oblong and flat, with their hands and feet at the corners: next the ten courtiers; these were ornamented all over with diamonds, and walked two and two, as the soldiers did. And they, too, wore the jeweled collars round their stiff necks. After these came the royal children; there were ten of them, and the little dears came jumping merrily along hand in hand, in couples: they were all ornamented with hearts. Next came the guests, mostly Kings and Queens, and among them Alice recognized the Black Rat: it was talking in a hurried nervous manner, smiling at everything that was said, and went by without noticing her. Then followed the Knave of Hearts, carrying the King’s crown on a crimson velvet cushion; and, last of all this grand procession, came the King and Queen of Hearts.

The King was a small man, hardly much taller than Alice herself. He tried to carry himself with greater height and dignity than he actually possessed, which made him rather funny to watch as he hurried to keep up with the Red Queen, who was striding along as if on massive elephant legs.

And it was the Red Queen who Alice found most strangely frightening. Even if she had heard no stories about her cruelty and bloody mindedness, Alice still would have found plenty to be scared of. The Red Queen was an older woman, her dark hair shining with great strands of gray, and her face was broad and unfriendly. Two thin lips seemed to be compressed forcefully at her long mouth. Two beady dark eyes looked out upon the world from narrow peepholes of displeasure. And her broad, horse-like nose, flared open with each angry inhalation. She looked down upon those smaller than herself with a sure sense of arrogant power. And in the crook of her left arm, she carried a small metal box, clutched closely to her wide bosom. In her other hand she carried a long wooden stick. It was notched and stained dark along the thick head, as if it had been used in the past for some bloody violence.

Alice was rather doubtful whether she ought not to lie down on her face like the three undead gardeners, but she could not remember ever having heard of such a rule at processions; ‘and besides, what would be the use of a procession,’ thought she, ‘if people had all to lie down upon their faces, so that they couldn’t see it?’

So she stood still where she was, and waited.

When the procession came opposite to Alice, they all stopped and looked at her, and the Queen said severely ‘Who is this?’ She said it to the Knave of Hearts, who only bowed and smiled in reply.

‘Idiot!’ said the Queen, tossing her head impatiently; and, turning to Alice, she went on, ‘What’s your name, child?’

‘My name is Alice, so please your Majesty,’ said Alice very politely; but she added, to herself, ‘Why, they’re only a bunch of dead cards, after all. I needn’t be afraid of them!’

‘And who are these?’ said the Queen, pointing to the three shivering gardeners who were lying round the tomb; for, you see, as they were lying on their faces, and the pattern on their backs was the same as the rest of the pack, she could not tell whether they were gardeners, or soldiers, or courtiers, or three of her own children.

‘How should I know?’ said Alice, surprised at her own courage. ‘It’s no business of mine.’

The Queen turned crimson with fury, and, after glaring at her for a moment like a wild beast, screamed ‘Off with her head! Off—’

‘Nonsense!’ said Alice, very loudly and decidedly, and the Queen was silent.

The King laid his hand upon her arm, and timidly said ‘Consider, my dear: she is only a child!’

The Queen turned angrily away from him, and said to the Knave ‘Turn them over!’

The Knave did so, very carefully, with one foot.

‘Get up!’ said the Queen, in a shrill, loud voice, and the three gardeners instantly jumped up, and began bowing to the King, the Queen, the royal children, and everybody else.

‘Leave off that!’ screamed the Queen. ‘You make me giddy.’ And then, turning to the black roses she went on, ‘What have you been doing here?’

‘May it please your Majesty,’ said Two, in a very humble tone, going down on one knee as he spoke, ‘we were trying—’

‘I see!’ said the Queen, who had meanwhile been examining the roses. ‘Off with their heads!’ and the procession moved on, three of the soldiers remaining behind to execute the unfortunate dead gardeners, who ran to Alice for protection.

‘You shan’t be beheaded!’ said Alice, and she put them behind a large weed covered gravestone that stood near. The three dead soldiers wandered about for a minute or two, moaning and rolling their eyes, looking for them, and then quietly marched off after the others.

‘Are their heads off?’ shouted the Queen.

‘Their heads are gone, if it please your Majesty!’ the soldiers groaned in reply.

‘That’s right!’ shouted the Queen. ‘Can you play croquet?’

The dead soldiers were silent, and looked at Alice, as the question was evidently meant for her.

‘Yes!’ shouted Alice.

‘Come on, then!’ roared the Queen, and Alice joined the procession, wondering very much what would happen next.

‘It’s—it’s a very fine day!’ said a timid voice at her side.

She was walking by the Black Rat, who was peeping anxiously into her face, gnashing his teeth and twitching his long black tail nervously.

‘Very,’ said Alice: ‘—where’s the Duchess?’

‘Hush! Hush!’ said the Rat in a low, hurried tone. He looked anxiously over his shoulder as he spoke, and then raised himself upon tiptoe, put his mouth close to her ear, and whispered ‘She’s under sentence of execution.’

‘What for?’ said Alice.

‘Did you say “What a pity!”?’ the Rat asked.

‘No, I didn’t,’ said Alice: ‘I don’t think it’s at all a pity. I said “What for?”’

‘She boxed the Queen’s ears—’ the Rat began. Alice gave a little scream of laughter.

‘Oh, hush!’ the Rat whispered in a frightened tone. ‘The Queen will hear you! You see, she came rather late, and the Queen said—’

‘Get to your places!’ shouted the Queen in a voice of thunder, and people began running about in all directions, tumbling up against each other; however, they got settled down in a minute or two, and the game began. Alice thought she had never seen such a curious croquet-ground in her life; it was all ridges and furrows and tombstones; the balls were zombie heads, the mallets made up of severed human limbs and parts of skeletons, and the dead soldiers had to double themselves up and to stand on their hands and feet, to make the arches.

The chief difficulty Alice found at first was in managing her leg mallet: she succeeded in getting it tucked away, comfortably enough, under her arm, but generally, just as she had got it nicely straightened out, and was going to give the gape-mouthed zombie head a blow with its bony ankle, it would twist