Stranica 142 [142]
126 THE QUEENS
“T’ll fetch the executioner myself,” said the
King eagerly, and he hurried off.
Alice thought she might as well go back and
see how the game was going on, as she heard
the Queen's voice in the distanée, screaming
with passion. She had already heard her sen¬
tence three of the players to be executed . for
having missed their turns, and she did not like
the look of things at all, as the game was in
such confusion that she never knew whether it
was her turn or not. So she went off in search
of her hedgehog.
The hedgehog was engaged in a fight with
another hedgehog, which seemed to Alice an ex¬
cellent opportunity for croqueting one of them
with the other: the only difhculty was, that her
flamingo was gone across to the other side of
the garden, where Alice could see it trying in a
helpless sort of way to fly up into a tree.
By the time she had caught the flamingo
and brought it back, the fight was over, and
both the hedgehogs were out of sight: "but it