David studied this for a minute or two. He did not want to go in, but he wanted to know how. He hadn’t got a calling-card—at least he never had before he came through the blue door, but so many odd things had happened since, that he was not in the least surprised when he put his hand in his pocket to find it quite full of calling-cards, on which was printed his name, only it was upside down. So he naturally turned the card upside down to get the name un-upside-down, but, however he turned it, his name was still upside down. If he looked at it very closely as he turned it, he could see the letters spin round like wheels, and it always remained like this: [Illustration] The other trouser-pocket was also quite full of something, and he drew out of it hundreds of other calling-cards. On one was printed ‘The Elegant Elephant, R.S.V.P.,’ on another ‘Master Ham, P.P.C.,’ on another ‘The Duke of Wellington, W.P.,’ on another ‘The Engine Driver, R.A.M.C.,’ on another ‘Miss Battledore, W.A.A.C.’ Everybody had been calling on him. ‘Whatever am I to do?’ thought David. ‘Shall I have to return all these calls? It will take me all my time, and I shall see nothing. Besides’—and he looked round and saw that the passage was completely empty, and had shrunk to its usual size again—‘Besides, I don’t know where they’ve all gone.’ He looked at the cupboard doors again, and found that they had changed while he had been looking at the cards. They were now exactly like the big front door at home, which opened in the middle, and had a hinge at each side. In front of it was a doormat, in the bristles of which was written GO AWAY. Now David was the sort of boy who often wanted to do something, chiefly because he was told not to, in order to see what happened, and this doormat made him quite determined to go in. It was no use trying the left-hand side of the door, partly because neither bottles nor followers nor anything was admitted, and partly because you had to ring also, and there wasn’t any bell. But there seemed just a chance of getting in by the right-hand part of the door, and he went up to it and knocked. To his great surprise he heard a bell ring inside as soon as he had knocked, which seemed to explain ‘ring also.’ The bell did not sound like an electric bell, but was like the servants’ dinner bell. As soon as it had stopped, he heard a voice inside the door say very angrily: ‘Give me my tuffet at once.’ There was a pause, and David heard the noise of some furniture being moved, and the door flew open. ‘What’s your name?’ said the butler. ‘And have you got a calling-card?’ David gave him one of his cards, and he looked at it and turned it upside down. ‘It’s one of them dratted upside-downers,’ he said, ‘and it sends the blood to the head something awful.’ He gave a heavy sigh, and bent down and stood on his head.