Maskerade

that’s just an ole legend, I expect…”
    “She could do it all right,” said Granny. “But you can’t go round messin’ with cause and effect. That’s what sent her mad, come the finish. She thought she could put herself outside of things like cause and effect. Well, you can’t. You grab a sharp sword by the blade, you get hurt. World’d be a terrible place if people forgot that.”
    “ You weren’t hurt.”
    “Not my fault. I didn’t have time.”
    Nanny blew on her hands. “One good thing, though,” she said. “It’s a blessing the chandelier never came down. I was worried about that soon as I saw it. Looks too dramatic for its own good, I thought. First thing I’d smash, if I was a loony.”
    “Yes.”
    “Haven’t been able to find Greebo since last night.”
    “Good.”
    “He always turns up, though.”
    “Unfortunately.”
    There was a clatter as the coach swung around the corner.
    It stopped.
    Then the coachman tugged on the reins and it did a U-turn and disappeared again.
    “Esme?” said Nanny, after a while.
    “Yes?”
    “There’s a man and two horses peering at us around the corner.” She raised her voice. “Come on, I know you’re there! Seven o’clock, this coach is supposed to leave! Did you get the tickets, Esme?”
    “Me?”
    “Ah,” said Nanny uncertainly. “So…we haven’t got eighty dollars for the tickets, then?”
    “What’ve you got stuffed up your elastic?” said Granny as the coach advanced cautiously.
    “Nothin’ that is legal tender for travelin’ purposes, I fear.”
    “Then…no, we can’t afford tickets.”
    Nanny sighed. “Oh, well, I’ll just have to use charm.”
    “It’s going to be a long walk,” said Granny.
    The coach pulled up. Nanny looked up at the driver, and smiled innocently. “Good morning, my good sir!”
    He gave her a slightly frightened but mainly suspicious look. “Is it?”
    “We are desirous of traveling to Lancre but unfortunately we find ourselves a bit embarrassed in the knicker department.”
    “You are?”
    “But we are witches and could prob’ly pay for our travel by, e.g., curing any embarrassing little ailments you may have.”
    The coachman frowned. “I ain’t carrying you for nothing, old crone. And I haven’t got any embarrassing little ailments!”
    Granny stepped forward.
    “How many would you like?” she said.

    Rain rolled over the plains. It wasn’t an impressive Ramtops thunderstorm but a lazy, persistent, low-cloud rain, like a fat fog. It had been following them all day.
    The witches had the coach to themselves. Several people had opened the door while it had been waiting to leave, but for some reason had suddenly decided that today’s travel plans didn’t include a coach ride.
    “Making good time,” said Nanny, opening the curtains and peering out of the window.
    “I expect the driver’s in a hurry.”
    “Yes, I ’spect he is.”
    “Shut the window, though. It’s getting wet in here.”
    “Righty-ho.”
    Nanny grabbed the strap and then suddenly poked her head out into the rain.
    “Stop! Stop! Tell the man to stop!”
    The coach slewed to a halt in a sheet of mud.
    Nanny threw open the door. “I don’t know, trying to walk home, and in this weather, too! You’ll catch your death!”
    Rain and fog rolled in through the open doorway. Then a bedraggled shape pulled itself over the sill and slunk under the seats, leaving small puddles behind it.
    “Tryin’ to be independent,” said Nanny. “Bless ’im.”
    The coach got under way again. Granny stared out at the endless darkening fields and the relentless drizzle, and saw another figure toiling along in the mud by the road that would, eventually, reach Lancre. As the coach swept past, it drenched the walker in thin slurry.
    “Yes, indeed. Being independent’s a fine ambition,” she said, drawing the curtains.

    The trees were bare when Granny Weatherwax got back to her cottage.
    Twigs and seeds had blown in under the door. Soot had fallen down the chimney. Her home, always somewhat organic, had grown a little closer to its roots in the clay.
    There were things to do, so she did them. There were leaves to be swept, and the woodpile to be built up under the eaves. The wind sock behind the beehives, tattered by autumn storms, needed to be darned. Hay had to be got in for the goats. Apples had to be stored in the loft. The walls could do with another coat of whitewash.
    But there was something that had to be done first.