Racketty-Packetty House, as Told by Queen Crosspatch — Edition Insights

n’t the beauty any more she became the useful one, and did all the kitchen work, and sat up and made poultices and beef tea when any of the rest were ill. And the Newfoundland puppy saw she was right, for the whole family simply adored Ridiklis and could not possibly have done without her. Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg could have married any minute if they had liked. There were two cock sparrows and a gentleman mouse, who proposed to them over and over again. They all three said they did not want fashionable wives but cheerful dispositions and a happy, home. But Meg and Peg were like Ridiklis and could not bear to leave their families--besides not wanting to live in nests, and hatch eggs--and Kilmanskeg said she would die of a broken heart if she could not be with Ridiklis, and Ridiklis did not like cheese and crumbs and mousy things, so they could never live together in a mouse hole. But neither the gentleman mouse nor the sparrows were offended because the news was broken to them so sweetly and they went on visiting just as before. Everything was as shabby and disrespectable and as gay and happy as it could be until Tidy Castle was brought into the nursery and then the whole family had rather a fright.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture mouse.jpg]

It happened in this way:

When the dolls’ house was lifted by the nurse and carried into the corner behind the door, of course it was rather an exciting and shaky thing for Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg and Gustibus and Peter Piper (Ridiklis was out shopping). The furniture tumbled about and everybody had to hold on to anything they could catch hold of. As it was, Kilmanskeg slid under a table and Peter Piper sat down in the coal-box; but notwithstanding all this, they did not lose their tempers and when the nurse sat their house down on the floor with a bump, they all got up and began to laugh. Then they ran and peeped out of the windows and then they ran back and laughed again.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture fashionable_wives.jpg]

“Well,” said Peter Piper, “we have been called Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg and Gustibus and Peter Piper instead of our grand names, and now we live in a place called Racketty-Packetty House. Who cares! Let’s join hands and have a dance.”

And they joined hands and danced round and round and kicked up their heels, and their rags and tatters flew about and they laughed until they fell down; one on top of the other.

It was just at this minute that Ridiklis came back. The nurse had found her under a chair and stuck her in through a window. She sat on the drawing-room sofa which had holes in its covering and the stuffing coming out, and her one whole leg stuck out straight in front of her, and her bonnet and shawl were on one side and her basket was on her left arm full of things she had got cheap at market. She was out of breath and rather pale through being lifted up and swished through the air so suddenly, but her saucer eyes and her funny mouth looked as cheerful as ever.

“Good gracious, if you knew what I have just heard!” she said. They all scrambled up and called out together.

“The nurse said the most awful thing,” she answered them. “When Cynthia asked what she should do with this old Racketty-Packetty House, she said, ‘Oh! I’ll put it behind the door for the present and then it shall be carried down-stairs and burned. It’s too disgraceful to be kept in any decent nursery.’”

“Oh!” cried out Peter Piper.

“Oh! Oh! Oh!” said Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg. “Will they burn our dear old shabby house? Do you think they will?” And actually tears began to run down their cheeks.

Peter Piper sat down on the floor all at once with his hands stuffed in his pockets.

“I don’t care how shabby it is,” he said. “It’s a jolly nice old place and it’s the only house we’ve ever had.”

“I never want to have any other,” said Meg.

Gustibus leaned against the wall with his hands stuffed in his pockets.

“I wouldn’t move if I was made King of England,” he said. “Buckingham Palace wouldn’t be half as nice.”

“We’ve had such fun here,” said Peg. And Kilmanskeg shook her head from side to side and wiped her eyes on her ragged pocket-handkerchief. There is no knowing what would have happened to them if Peter Piper hadn’t cheered up as he always did.

“I say,” he said, “do you hear that noise?” They all listened and heard a rumbling. Peter Piper ran to the window and looked out and then ran back grinning.

“It’s the nurse rolling up the arm-chair before the house to hide it, so that it won’t disgrace the castle. Hooray! Hooray! If they don’t see us they will forget all about us and we shall not be burned up at all. Our nice old Racketty-Packetty House will be left alone and we can enjoy ourselves more than ever--because we sha’n’t be bothered with Cynthia--Hello! let’s all join hands and have a dance.”

So they all joined hands and danced round in a ring again and they were so relieved that they laughed and laughed until they all tumbled down in a heap just as they had done before, and rolled about giggling and squealing. It certainly seemed as if they were quite safe for some time at least. The big easy chair hid them and both the nurse and Cynthia seemed to forget that there was such a thing as a Racketty-Packetty House in the neighborhood. Cynthia was so delighted with Tidy Castle that she played with nothing else for days and days. And instead of being jealous of their grand neighbors the Racketty-Packetty House people began to get all sorts of fun out of watching them from their own windows. Several of their windows were broken and some had rags and paper stuffed into the broken panes, but Meg and Peg and Peter Piper would go and peep out of one, and Gustibus and Kilmanskeg would peep out of another, and Ridiklis could scarcely get her dishes washed and her potatoes pared because she could see the Castle kitchen from her scullery window. It was _so_ exciting!

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture ridiklis_cooking.jpg]

The Castle dolls were grand beyond words, and they were all lords and ladies. These were their names. There was Lady Gwendolen Vere de Vere. She was haughty and had dark eyes and hair and carried her head thrown back and her nose in the air. There was Lady Muriel Vere de Vere, and she was cold and lovely and indifferent and looked down the bridge of her delicate nose. And there was Lady Doris, who had fluffy golden hair and laughed mockingly at everybody. And there was Lord Hubert and Lord Rupert and Lord Francis, who were all handsome enough to make you feel as if you could faint. And there was their mother, the Duchess of Tidyshire; and of course there were all sorts of maids and footmen and cooks and scullery maids and even gardeners.

“We never thought of living to see such grand society,” said Peter Piper to his brother and sisters. “It’s quite a kind of blessing.”

“It’s almost like being grand ourselves, just to be able to watch them,” said Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg, squeezing together and flattening their noses against the attic windows.

They could see bits of the sumptuous white and gold drawing-room with the Duchess sitting reading near the fire, her golden glasses upon her nose, and Lady Gwendolen playing haughtily upon the harp, and Lady Muriel coldly listening to her. Lady Doris was having her golden hair dressed by her maid in her bed-room and Lord Hubert was reading the newspaper with a high-bred air, while Lord Francis was writing letters to noblemen of his acquaintance, and Lord Rupert was--in an aristocratic manner--glancing over his love letters from ladies of title.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture duchess.jpg]

Kilmanskeg and Peter Piper just pinched each other with glee and squealed with delight.

“Isn’t it fun,” said Peter Piper. “I say; aren’t they awful swells! But Lord Francis can’t kick about in his trousers as I can in mine, and neither can the others. I’ll like to see them try to do this,”-- and he turned three summersaults in the middle of the room and stood on his head on the biggest hole in the carpet--and wiggled his legs and wiggled his toes at them until they shouted so with laughing that Ridiklis ran in with a saucepan in her hand and perspiration on her forehead, because she was cooking turnips, which was all they had for dinner.

“You mustn’t laugh so loud,” she cried out. “If we make so much noise the Tidy Castle people will begin to complain of this being a low neighborhood and they might insist on moving away.”

“Oh! scrump!” said Peter Piper, who sometimes invented doll slang-- though there wasn’t really a bit of harm in him. “I wouldn’t have them move away for anything. They are meat and drink to me.”

“They are going to have a dinner of ten courses,” sighed Ridiklis, “I can see them cooking it from my scullery window. And I have nothing but turnips to give you.”

“Who cares!” said Peter Piper, “Let’s have ten courses of turnips and pretend each course is exactly like the one they are having at the Castle.”

“I like turnips almost better than anything--almost--perhaps not quite,” said Gustibus. “I can eat ten courses of turnips like a shot.”

“Let’s go and find out what their courses are,” said Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg, “and then we will write a menu on a piece of pink tissue paper.”

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture peter_piper.jpg]

And if you’ll believe it, that was what they did. They divided their turnips into ten courses and they called the first one--“Hors d’oeuvres,” and the last one “Ices,” with a French name, and Peter Piper kept jumping up from the table and pretending he was a footman and flourishing about in his flapping rags of trousers and announcing the names of the dishes in such a grand way that they laughed till they nearly died, and said they never had had such a splendid dinner in their lives, and that they would rather live behind the door and watch the Tidy Castle people than be the Tidy Castle people themselves.

And then of course they all joined hands and danced round and round and kicked up their heels for joy, because they always did that whenever there was the least excuse for it--and quite often when there wasn’t any at all, just because it was such good exercise and worked off their high spirits so that they could settle down for a while.

This was the way things went on day after day. They almost lived at their windows. They watched the Tidy Castle family get up and be dressed by their maids and valets in different clothes almost every day. They saw them drive out in their carriages, and have parties, and go to balls. They all nearly had brain fever with delight the day they watched Lady Gwendolen and Lady Muriel and Lady Doris, dressed in their Court trains and feathers, going to be presented at the first Drawing-Room.

After the lovely creatures had gone the whole family sat down in a circle round the Racketty-Packetty House library fire, and Ridiklis read aloud to them about Drawing-Rooms, out of a scrap of the Lady’s Pictorial she had found, and after that they had a Court Drawing-Room of their own, and they made tissue-paper trains and glass bead crowns for diamond tiaras, and sometimes Gustibus pretended to be the Royal family, and the others were presented to him and kissed his hand, and then the others took turns and he was presented. And suddenly the most delightful thing occurred to Peter Piper. He thought it would be rather nice to make them all into lords and ladies and he did it by touching them on the shoulder with the drawing-room poker which he straightened because it was so crooked that it was almost bent double. It is not exactly the way such things are done at Court, but Peter Piper thought it would do-- and at any rate it was great fun. So he made them all kneel down in a row and he touched each on the shoulder with the poker and said:

“Rise up, Lady Meg and Lady Peg and Lady Kilmanskeg and Lady Ridiklis of Racketty-Packetty House-and also the Right Honorable Lord Gustibus Rags!” And they all jumped up at once and made bows and curtsied to each other. But they made Peter Piper into a Duke, and he was called the Duke of Tags. He knelt down on the big hole in the carpet and each one of them gave him a little thump on the shoulder with the poker, because it took more thumps to make a Duke than a common or garden Lord.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture duke.jpg]

The day after this another much more exciting thing took place. The nurse was in a bad temper and when she was tidying the nursery she pushed the easy chair aside and saw Racketty-Packetty House.

“Oh!” she said, “there is that Racketty-Packetty old thing still. I had forgotten it. It must be carried down-stairs and burned. I will go and tell one of the footmen to come for it.”

Meg and Peg and Kilmanskeg were in their attic and they all rushed out in such a hurry to get down-stairs that they rolled all the way down the staircase, and Peter Piper and Gustibus had to dart out of the drawing-room and pick them up, Ridiklis came staggering up from the kitchen quite out of breath.

“Oh! our house is going to be burned! Our house is going to be burned!” cried Meg and Peg clutching their brothers.

“Let us go and throw ourselves out of the window!” cried Kilmanskeg.

“I don’t see how they can have the heart to burn a person’s home!” said Ridiklis, wiping her eyes with her kitchen duster.

Peter Piper was rather pale, but he was extremely brave and remembered that he was the head of the family.

“Now, Lady Meg and Lady Peg and Lady Kilmanskeg,” he said, “let us all keep cool.”

“We shan’t keep cool when they set our house on fire,” said Gustibus. Peter Piper just snapped his fingers.

“Pooh!” he said. “We are only made of wood and it won’t hurt a bit. We shall just snap and crackle and go off almost like fireworks and then we shall be ashes and fly away into the air and see all sorts of things. Perhaps it may be more fun than anything we have done yet.”

“But our nice old house! Our nice old Racketty-Packetty House,” said Ridiklis. “I do so love it. The kitchen is so convenient--even though the oven won’t bake any more.”

And things looked most serious because the nurse really was beginning to push the arm-chair away. But it would not move and I will tell you why. One of my Fairies, who had come down the chimney when they were talking, had called me and I had come in a second with a whole army of my Workers, and though the nurse couldn’t see them, they were all holding the chair tight down on the carpet so that it would not stir.

And I--Queen Crosspatch--myself--flew downstairs and made the footman remember that minute that a box had come for Cynthia and that he must take it upstairs to her nursery. If I had not been on the spot he would have forgotten it until it was too late. But just in the very nick of time up he came, and Cynthia sprang up as soon as she saw him.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture footman.jpg]

“Oh!” she cried out, “It must be the doll who broke her little leg and was sent to the hospital. It must be Lady Patsy.”

And she opened the box and gave a little scream of joy for there lay Lady Patsy (her whole name was Patricia) in a lace-frilled nightgown, with her lovely leg in bandages and a pair of tiny crutches and a trained nurse by her side.

That was how I saved them that time. There was such excitement over Lady Patsy and her little crutches and her nurse that nothing else was thought of and my Fairies pushed the arm-chair back and Racketty-Packetty House was hidden and forgotten once more.

The whole Racketty-Packetty family gave a great gasp of joy and sat down in a ring all at once, on the floor, mopping their foreheads with anything they could get hold of. Peter Piper used an antimacassar.

“Oh! we are obliged to you, Queen B-bell--Patch,” he panted out, “But these alarms of fire are upsetting.”

“You leave them to me,” I said, “and I’ll attend to them. Tip!” I commanded the Fairy nearest me. “You will have to stay about here and be ready to give the alarm when anything threatens to happen.” And I flew away, feeling I had done a good morning’s work.

Well, that was the beginning of a great many things, and many of them were connected with Lady Patsy; and but for me there might have been unpleasantness.

Of course the Racketty-Packetty dolls forgot about their fright directly, and began to enjoy themselves again as usual. That was their way. They never sat up all night with Trouble, Peter Piper used to say. And I told him they were quite right. If you make a fuss over trouble and put it to bed and nurse it and give it beef tea and gruel, you can never get rid of it.

Their great delight now was Lady Patsy. They thought she was prettier than any of the other Tidy Castle dolls. She neither turned her nose up, nor looked down the bridge of it, nor laughed mockingly. She had dimples in the corners of her mouth and long curly lashes and her nose was saucy and her eyes were bright and full of laughs.

[Transcriber’s Note: See picture house.jpg]

“She’s the clever one of the family,” said Peter Piper. “I am sure of that.”

She was treated as an invalid at first, of course, and kept in her room; but they could see her sitting up in her frilled nightgown. After a few days she was carried to a soft chair lay the window and there she used to sit and look out; and the Racketty-Packetty House dolls crowded round their window and adored her.

After a few days, they noticed that Peter Piper was often missing and one morning Ridiklis went up into the attic and found him sitting at a window all by himself and staring and staring.

“Oh! Duke,” she said (you see they always tried to remember each other’s titles). “Dear me, Duke, what are you doing here?”

“I am looking at her,” he answered. “I’m in love. I fell in love with her the minute Cynthia took her out of her box. I am going to marry her.”

“But she’s a lady of high degree,” said Ridiklis quite alarmed.

“That’s why she’ll have me,” said Peter Piper in his most cheerful manner. “Ladies of high degree always marry the good looking ones in rags and tatters. If I had a whole suit of clothes on, she wouldn’t look at me. I’m very good-looking, you know,” and he turned round and winked at Ridiklis in such a delightful saucy way that she suddenly felt as if he _was_ very good-looking, though she had not thought of it before.

“Hello,” he said all at once. “I’ve just thought of something to attract her attention. Where’s the ball of string?”