"I'm sure I don't care a bit," the Queen retorted. "It doesn't make any difference to me. They all give me things to sign, and they all say I'm very beautiful."
"That's because they want to marry you," the bat said.
And the Queen answered, "I suppose it is; but I shan't marry them. And I wish all my attendants weren't deaf and dumb; it makes it so awfully dull for me."
"That's so that they shan't abuse the Regent behind his back," the bat said. "Well, I shall take a fly." The truth was, he felt insulted that the Queen should say she was dull when she had him to talk to.
But the Queen was quite frightened when he whizzed past her head and out into the dusky evening, where she could see him flitting about jerkily, and squeaking shrilly to paralyze the flies with fright.
After a while he got over his fit of sulks, and came back again to hang in his accustomed bough.
"Why—you can fly!" the Queen said breathlessly. It gave her a new idea of the importance of the bat.
The bat said, "I can." He was flattered by her admiration.
"I wish I could fly," the Queen said. "It would be so much more exciting than being boxed up here."
The bat said, "Why don't you?"