I Shall Wear Midnight

every time Tiffany helped a young mother with her first baby, or smoothed an old man’s path to his grave. Nevertheless, old stories, old rumours and old picture books still seemed to have their own hold on the memory of the world.
    What made it more difficult was that there was no tradition of witches on the Chalk – none would ever have settled there when Granny Aching had been alive. Granny Aching, as everybody knew, was a wise woman, and wise enough not to be a witch. Nothing ever happened on the Chalk that Granny Aching disapproved of, at least not for more than about ten minutes.
    So Tiffany was a witch alone.
    And not only was there no longer any support from the mountain witches like Nanny Ogg, Granny Weatherwax and Miss Level, but the people of the Chalk weren’t very familiar with witches. Other witches would probably come and help if she asked, of course , but although they wouldn’t say so, this might mean that you couldn’t cope with responsibility, weren’t up to the task, weren’t sure, weren’t good enough .
    ‘Excuse me, miss?’ There was a nervous giggle. Tiffany looked round and there were two little girls in their best new frocks and straw hats. They were looking at her eagerly, with perhaps just a hint of mischief in their eyes. She thought quickly and smiled at them.
    ‘Oh yes, Becky Pardon and Nancy Upright, yes? What can I do for the two of you?’
    Becky Pardon shyly produced a small bouquet from behind her back and held it out. Tiffany recognized it, of course. She had made them herself for the older girls when she was younger, simply because it was what you did, it was part of the scouring: a little bunch of wild flowers picked from the downland, tied in a bunch with – and this was the important bit, the magic bit – some of the grass pulled up as the fresh chalk was exposed.
    ‘If you put this under your pillow tonight, you will dream of your beau,’ said Becky Pardon, her face quite serious now.
    Tiffany took the slightly wilting bunch of flowers with care. ‘Let me see …’ she said. ‘We have here sweet mumbles, ladies’ pillows, seven-leaf clover – very lucky – a sprig of old man’s trousers, jack-in-the-wall, oh – love-lies-bleeding and …’ She stared at the little white and red flowers.
    The girls said, ‘Are you all right, miss?’
    ‘Forget-me-lots!’ 7 said Tiffany, more sharply than she had intended. But the girls hadn’t noticed, so she continued to say, brightly, ‘Quite unusual to see it here. It must be a garden escapee. And, as I’m sure you both know, you have bound them all together with strips of candle rush, which once upon a time people used to make into rush lights. What a lovely surprise. Thank you both very much. I hope you have a lovely time at the fair …’
    Becky raised her hand. ‘Excuse me, miss?’
    ‘Was there something else, Becky?’
    Becky went pink, and had a hurried conversation with her friend. She turned back to Tiffany, looking slightly more pink but nevertheless determined to see things through.
    ‘You can’t get into trouble for asking a question, can you, miss? I mean, just asking a question?’
    It’s going to be ‘How can I be a witch when I’m grown up?’ Tiffany thought, because it generally was. The young girls saw her on her broomstick and thought that was what being a witch was. Out loud she said, ‘Not from me, at least. Do ask your question.’
    Becky Pardon looked down at her boots. ‘Do you have any passionate parts, miss?’
    Another talent needful in a witch is the ability not to let your face show what you’re thinking, and especially not allowing it, no matter what, to go as stiff as a board. Tiffany managed to say, without a single wobble in her voice and no trace of an embarrassed smirk, ‘That is a very interesting question, Becky. Can I ask you why you want to know?’
    The girl looked a lot happier now that the question was, as it were, out in the public domain.
    ‘Well, miss, I asked my granny if I could be a witch when I was older, and she said I shouldn’t want to, because witches have no passionate parts, miss.’
    Tiffany thought quickly in the face of the two solemn owlish stares. These are farm girls, she thought, so they had certainly seen a cat have kittens and a dog have puppies. They’d have seen the birth of lambs, and probably a cow have a calf, which is always a noisy affair that you can hardly miss. They know what they are asking me about.
    At this point Nancy