Carbonel and Calidor

11. ‘May The Best Witch Win!’

‘SUPPOSE we meet Miss Dibdin?’ said Rosemary, as they walked up the long weedy drive, which was dark with overhanging trees and jostling rhododendron bushes.

‘Even if we do, she can’t stop us shoving the leaflet in the letter-box and coming away again,’ said John.

Presently they emerged from the gloom of the drive, on to what had once been a wide carriage sweep in front of the steps leading to the front door.

‘I say, what a grand house!’ said Rosemary, standing still to admire it. ‘All those rows of windows, and the tower, and the up-and-down edge to the roof. Just like a castle!’

‘It really was grand once, Uncle Zack says; but most of it’s shut up now.’

‘I suppose that’s why the curtains are drawn in nearly all the windows. It makes it look ... sort of blind and sad. Look, there’s Mrs Witherspoon’s tricycle!’

It stood at the bottom of the flight of steps. They walked across the carriage sweep to look at it, rather wishing their feet didn’t scrunch so loudly on the gravel.

‘Gosh!’ said John. ‘Do you see what’s sitting in the basket on the handlebars? A great warty toad!’

They peered at it in astonishment, and the toad, squat and unmoving, stared back with unblinking yellow eyes.

‘I suppose it is alive?’ said Rosemary. ‘It’s so still it might be stuffed.’

‘Must be alive. Look at that pulse thing beating in its throat,’ said John. And as if to prove it, the creature’s long tongue suddenly whipped out and caught an unwary fly that had settled on the edge of the basket.

‘Ugh! What a horrid-looking creature!’ said Rosemary. ‘Not my idea of a cosy sort of pet. Come on, let’s get rid of the leaflets and go home.’

When they reached the front door, which was large and heavy, and studded with nails, they found it was not quite closed, and the sound of arguing voices could be heard on the other side.

‘I keep telling you, Dulcie,’ said a voice they recognized as Miss Dibdin’s. ‘It must be black. A grey cat won’t do. You can’t use Mattins. Unless you keep to the rules, nothing will work properly.’

‘My dear Dorothy,’ replied a high commanding voice. ‘I no longer need your advice. I told you. Yesterday I discovered a treasure in Sprules’s book shop in Broomhurst, in the bargain tray. Half the cover is missing, and unfortunately some of the pages, but even so it will teach me far more than you are ever likely to know. What with Gullion sitting on my pillow every night. ...’

‘You mean to say you let that horrid toad sleep on your pillow?’ interrupted Miss Dibdin.

‘My precious Gullion, horrid? Rubbish! He is invaluable. All night long he whispers delicious wicked schemes in my ear. I can hear them in my dreams. As for Mattins, I dare say I shall use him to run a few simple errands now and then, but I have discovered the perfect cat. Black as ebony, and with dignity that would do credit to any broomstick turn-out!’

‘I’m sure I’m glad to hear it,’ said Miss Dibdin coldly, in the sort of voice that showed she was not really glad at all. ‘And where is this precious perfect animal, I should like to know? I haven’t seen him about the house.’

‘Well, there I must admit I am in a small difficulty. The ungrateful creature says that nothing will make it become a witch’s cat. On Gullion’s advice I have shut it up until it comes to its senses, and I keep the key of its prison on a string round my neck.’

‘You’ll need eyes back and front, to keep a cat prisoner that means to escape,’ said Miss Dibdin.

‘I might even manage that,’ said Mrs Witherspoon, and she laughed harshly. ‘At least, I have set a day-and-night guard over it who might have been made for the job. I met them wandering about in Sheepshank Lane. He won’t escape! And if the cat persists in disobliging me, Gullion has suggested a number of ways to ... shall we say ... persuade it; such as plaiting its whiskers, which are remarkably fine.’

‘But how will you know when it has come to its senses?’ asked Miss Dibdin.

‘Ah ha!’ said Mrs Witherspoon triumphantly. ‘It so happens that I have succeeded in making a magic by which I can hold a conversation with any cat I choose.’ There was a gasp from Miss Dibdin, but Mrs Witherspoon swept on. ‘The instructions were in the book. A special purple brew it was, chanting the right words while you mix it — in rhyme, of course.’

By this time John and Rosemary had quite forgotten that they had no business to be listening, and had pushed the door open wide enough to peer inside. It opened on to a large hall, which was high and raftered, with a number of doors leading from it, each with a pair of stag’s antlers above it. A wide staircase mounted to a gallery at the far end.

‘Dulcie, dear!’ pleaded Miss Dibdin in a wheedling voice. ‘Couldn’t you spare me a teeny weeny drop of the mixture for hearing cats? Just enough for one ear perhaps?’

‘Certainly not,’ said Mrs Witherspoon coldly. ‘Anyway it boiled over. There’s none left. Perhaps I should have brewed it in something bigger than the egg saucepan. You chose to experiment in secret in the Ladies’ Waiting Room at the station. Well, Gullion and I shall experiment in secret at Tucket Towers; and may the best witch win!’

‘Very well,’ said Miss Dibdin angrily. ‘When my parcel comes ...’

‘You and your parcel! I don’t believe the silly thing exists!’

Miss Dibdin drew herself up. ‘Well, there is something that even I have managed to do. I don’t think I can have got the proportions quite right, or else I stirred it in the wrong direction, so that the result is not quite perfect, but it nearly works. How do you think I came from the station just now?’

‘Walked by the field path as usual, I suppose,’ said Mrs Witherspoon impatiently.

‘That’s just where you’re wrong!’ said Miss Dibdin triumphantly. ‘I came by broom!’

‘You mean you flew by broomstick?’ Mrs Witherspoon laughed scornfully. ‘I shall believe that when I see it!’

‘Very well, you shall see it!’ said Miss Dibdin defiantly.

She strutted to the umbrella stand. In it, beside a very baggy old umbrella, was the broom they had seen in the station waiting room. She straddled the handle. Then, with her head held high, she cried in a shrill, sing-song voice: ‘To the Ladies’ Waiting Room. Kindly take me, faithful broom!’

For a moment nothing happened, then the broom gave a quiver, and very slowly rose from the floor. When it reached a height of about three feet it lurched sharply down again, and bumped on the ground with such force that she nearly fell off; then up it rose again, rising and falling, gaining no more height but gathering speed. Up and down, up and down it flew towards the door, in a series of hops — Miss Dibdin, hair coming down, tall black hat crooked and legs straight in front of her, laughing triumphantly. As the broom headed for the hall door John and Rosemary pushed it wide open, just in time for it to sweep through. As they watched it plummet down the steps, pick itself up and bounce towards the drive, they heard the sound of striding footsteps crossing the hall, and hurriedly flattened themselves against the outside wall, on either side of the door. Mrs Witherspoon, as many old people do who live by themselves, was talking aloud to herself.

‘Just what I should expect,’ she said with a sniff. ‘She’s muddled her magic!’

All three watched Miss Dibdin’s strange progress down the drive; the broom sending up a small bow wave of gravel every time it swished along the ground, until it disappeared among the shadows of the trees, and Miss Dibdin’s wild laughter faded into silence. The last thing they heard was her distant voice calling shrilly: ‘May the best witch win!’ Then there was silence.

‘Well,’ said Mrs Witherspoon. ‘This is the last time I let lodgings! I shall certainly give her notice to leave!’ She slammed the door, and there was the grinding, grating sound of the turning of a key in a rusty lock.

For a few moments John and Rosemary stood pressed against the wall, not daring to move, then John whispered: ‘I don’t think she saw us.’

‘Thank goodness!’ said Rosemary. ‘Let’s stick the leaflet in the letter-box and run!’

And that is exactly what they did. But as they slowed down before reaching the gate, John suddenly stopped dead.

‘I say, I’ve suddenly thought of something. Do you think that cat Mrs Witherspoon has made a prisoner could possibly be Carbonel? She said it was “black as ebony” ...’

‘And would do credit to any broomstick turn-out ...’ went on Rosemary. ‘With exceptionally fine whiskers.’

‘That describes him exactly!’

‘And explains why he hasn’t shown up as he said he would.’

‘John, how awful!’ said Rosemary. ‘What are we to do?’

‘First we’d better make quite sure it really is Carbonel, and find out where he is hidden. But we’ve got to pick up Dumpsie from the station, then let’s go home and think like mad.’

But when they reached Roundels at last they had something else to think about.