Faster, faster! ALICE Everything's black before my eyes! [_There is music, and the sound of rushing wind, and in the darkness the WHITE QUEEN cries: "Faster, faster"; ALICE gasps: "I can't--please stop"; and the QUEEN replies: "Then you can't stay in the same place. I'll have to drop you behind. Faster--faster, good-bye."_] SCENE THREE _When the curtain rises one sees nothing but odd black lanterns with orange lights, hanging, presumably, from the sky. The scene lights up slowly revealing ALICE seated on two large cushions. She has been "dropped behind" by the WHITE QUEEN and is dazed to find herself in a strange hall with many peculiar doors and knobs too high to reach._ ALICE Oh! my head! Where am I? Oh dear, Oh dear! [_She staggers up and to her amazement finds herself smaller than the table._] I've never been smaller than any table before! I've always been able to reach the knobs! What a curious feeling. Oh! I'm shrinking. It's the fan--the gloves! [_She throws them away, feels her head and measures herself against table and doors._] Oh! saved in time! But I never--never-- WHITE RABBIT Oh! my fan and gloves! Where _are_ my-- ALICE Oh! Mr. Rabbit--please help me out--I want to go home--I want to go home-- WHITE RABBIT Oh! the Duchess! Oh! my fur and whiskers! She'll get me executed, as sure as ferrets are ferrets! Oh! _you_ have them! ALICE I'm sorry--you dropped them, you know-- WHITE RABBIT [_Picks up fan and gloves and patters off._] She'll chop off your head! ALICE If you please sir--where am I?--won't you please--tell me how to get out--I want to get out-- WHITE RABBIT [_Looking at his watch._] Oh! my ears and whiskers, how late it's getting. [_A trap door gives way and RABBIT disappears. ALICE dashes after only in time to have the trap door bang in her face._] ALICE [_Amazed._] It's a rabbit-hole--I'm small enough to fit it too! If I shrink any more it might end in my going out altogether like a candle. I wonder what I would be like then! What does the flame of a candle look like after the candle is blown out? I've never seen such a thing! HUMPTY DUMPTY [_Sits on the wall._] Don't stand chattering to yourself like that, but tell me your name and your business. ALICE My _name_ is Alice, but-- HUMPTY DUMPTY It's a stupid name enough, what does it mean? ALICE _Must_ a name mean something? HUMPTY DUMPTY Of course it must; _my_ name means the shape I am--and a good, handsome shape it is, too. With a name like yours, you might be any shape, almost. ALICE You're Humpty Dumpty! Just like an egg. HUMPTY DUMPTY It's _very_ provoking, to be called an egg--_very_. ALICE I said you _looked_ like an egg, Sir, and some eggs are very pretty, you know. HUMPTY DUMPTY Some people have no more sense than a baby. ALICE Why do you sit here all alone? HUMPTY DUMPTY Why, because there's nobody with me. Did you think I didn't know the answer to _that_? Ask another. ALICE