‘Well, not now,’ said Letitia, setting off along the corridor. ‘The screaming skeleton stopped screaming when I gave him an old teddy bear, although I’m not certain why that worked and, oh yes, the ghost of the first duke now sticks to haunting the lavatory next to the dining room, which we don’t use very often. He has a habit of pulling the chain at inconvenient moments, but that’s better than the rains of blood we used to have.’
‘You are a witch.’ The words came out of Tiffany’s mouth all by themselves, unable to stay in the privacy of her mind.
The girl looked at her in astonishment. ‘Don’t be silly,’ she said. ‘We both know how it goes, don’t we? Long blonde hair, milk-white skin, noble – well, a reasonably noble birth – and rich, at least technically. I’m officially a lady.’
‘You know,’ said Tiffany, ‘maybe it’s wrong to base one’s future on a book of fairy stories. Normally, girls of the princess persuasion don’t help out distressed headless ghosts by giving them a pumpkin to carry. As for stopping the screaming skeleton screaming by giving it a teddy bear, I have to say I am impressed. That is what Granny Weatherwax calls headology. Most of the craft is headology, when you get right down to it: headology and boffo.’
Letitia looked flustered and gratified at the same time, making her face blotch white and pink. It was, Tiffany had to agree, the kind of face that peered out of tower windows, waiting for a knight with nothing better to do with his time than save its owner from dragons, monsters and, if all else failed, boredom.
‘You don’t have to do anything about it,’ Tiffany added. ‘The pointy hat is optional. But if Miss Tick was here, she would definitely suggest a career. It is not good to be a witch alone.’
They had reached the end of the corridor. Letitia turned another creaky doorknob, which complained as the door opened, and so did the door. ‘I’ve certainly found that out,’ said Letitia. ‘And Miss Tick is … ?’
‘She travels around the country finding girls who have the talent for the craft,’ said Tiffany. ‘They say that you don’t find witchcraft, it finds you, and generally it’s Miss Tick who taps you on the shoulder. She’s a witchfinder, but I don’t suppose she goes into many big houses. They make witches nervous. Oh my!’ And this was because Letitia had lit an oil lamp. The room was full of bookcases, and the books on them gleamed. These weren’t cheap modern books; these were books bound in leather, and not just leather, but leather from clever cows who had given their lives for literature after a happy existence in the very best pastures. The books gleamed as Letitia moved around the large room lighting other lamps. She hauled them up towards the ceiling on their long chains, which swung gently as she pulled so that the shine from the books mixed with the gleam from the brasswork until the room seemed to be full of rich, ripe gold.
Letitia was clearly pleased by the way Tiffany stood and stared. ‘My great-grandfather was a huge collector,’ she said. ‘Do you see all the polished brass? That’s not for show, that’s for the point-three-0-three bookworm, which can move so fast that it can bore a hole all the way through an entire shelf of books in a fraction of a second. Hah, but not when they run into solid brass at the speed of sound! The library used to be bigger, but my uncle Charlie ran away with all the books on … I think it was called erotica? I’m not sure, but I can’t find it on any map. I may be the only one who comes in here now, anyway. Mother thinks that reading makes people restless. Pardon me, but why are you sniffing? I hope another mouse hasn’t died in here.’
There is something very wrong about this place, thought Tiffany. Something … strained … straining. Maybe it’s all the knowledge in the books, just bursting to get out. She had heard talk of the library at Unseen University – of the soulful books all pressed together in space and time so that at night, it was said, they spoke to one another and a kind of lightning flashed from book to book. Too many books in one place, who knew what they could do? Miss Tick had told her one day: ‘Knowledge is power, power is energy, energy is matter, matter is mass, and mass changes time and space.’ But Letitia looked so happy among the shelves and desks that Tiffany hadn’t got the heart to object.
The girl beckoned her over. ‘And this is where I do my little bits of magic,’ she said, as if she was telling Tiffany this was where she played with her dollies.
Tiffany was sweating now; all the little hairs on her skin were trembling, a signal to herself that she should turn and run, but Letitia was chattering away, quite oblivious to the fact that Tiffany was trying not to throw up.
His stink was terrible. It rose in the cheery library like a long-dead whale rising again to the surface, full of gas and corruption.
Tiffany looked around desperately for something to take her mind off that image. Mrs Proust and Derek had certainly benefited from Letitia Keepsake. She had bought the whole range, warts and all.
‘But I only use warts at the moment. I think they have the right feel, without going overboard, don’t you?’ she was saying.
‘I’ve never bothered with them,’ said Tiffany weakly.
Letitia sniffed. ‘Oh dear, I am so sorry about the smell; it’s the mice, I think. They eat the glue out of the books, although I’d say that they must have found a particularly unpleasant book.’
The library was really beginning to upset Tiffany. It was like, well, waking up and finding a family of tigers had wandered in during the night and were fast asleep on the end of the bed: everything was peaceful at the moment, but at any minute now, somebody was going to lose an arm. There was the Boffo stuff, which was sort of witchcraft-for-show. It impressed people, and maybe helped a novice get into the mood, but surely Mrs Proust wasn’t sending out stuff that actually worked, was she?
There was a clank of a bucket handle behind her as Letitia came round a bookcase, holding the bucket in both hands. Sand tipped out of it as she dropped it on the floor and she scrabbled in it for a moment. ‘Ah, there you are,’ she said, pulling out something that looked like a carrot which had been chewed by a mouse that wasn’t really very hungry.
‘Is that supposed to be me?’ said Tiffany.
‘I’m afraid I’m not very good at woodcarving,’ said Letitia, ‘but the book says it’s what you’re thinking that counts?’ It was a nervous statement with a wiry little question clinging to the end of it, waiting to burst into tears.
‘Sorry,’ said Tiffany. ‘The book has got that wrong. It’s not as nice as that. It’s what you do that counts. If you want to put a hex on someone, you need something that has belonged to them – hair, a tooth maybe? And you shouldn’t mess about with it, because it’s not nice and it’s very easy to get wrong.’ She looked closely at the very badly carved witch. ‘And I see you’ve written the word “witch” on it in pencil. Er … you know I said it’s easy to get it wrong? Well, there are times when “getting it wrong” just doesn’t cover messing up somebody else’s life.’
Her lower lip trembling, Letitia nodded.
The pressure on Tiffany’s head was getting worse and the horrible stench was now so powerful that it felt like a physical thing. She tried to concentrate on the little pile of books on the library table. They were sad little volumes, of the sort that Nanny Ogg, who could be uncharacteristically scathing when she felt like it, called ‘Tiddly Twinkle-Poo’ for girls who played at being witches for fun.
But at least Letitia had been thorough; there were a couple of notebooks on the lectern which dominated the table. Tiffany turned to say something to the girl, but somehow her head did not want to stay turned. Her Second Sight was dragging it back. And her hand rose slowly, almost automatically, and moved aside the little pile of silly books. What she had thought was the top of the lectern was in fact a much larger book, so thick and dark it seemed to merge with the wood itself. Dread trickled into her brain like black syrup, telling her to run and … No, that was all. Just run, and go on running, and not stop. Ever.
She tried to keep her voice level. ‘Do you know anything about this book?’
Letitia looked over her shoulder. ‘It’s very ancient. I don’t even recognize the writing. Wonderful binding, though, and the funny thing is, it’s always slightly warm.’
Here and now, thought Tiffany, it’s facing me here and now. Eskarina said that there was a book of his. Could this possibly be a copy? But a book can’t hurt, can it? Except that books contain ideas, and ideas can be dangerous.
At this point, the book on the lectern opened itself with a leathery creak and a little flap noise as the cover turned over. The pages rustled like a lot of pigeons taking flight, and then there it was, one page filling the midnight room with brilliant, eye-watering sun-light. And in that sunlight, running towards her, across the scorching desert, was a figure in black …
Automatically, Tiffany slammed the book shut and held it shut in both hands, clutching it like a schoolgirl. He saw me, she thought. I know he did. The book jumped in her arms as something heavy hit it, and she could hear … words, words she was glad she couldn’t understand. Another blow struck the book, and the cover bulged, nearly knocking her over. When the next thump came, she fell forward, landing with the cover under her and all her weight on the book.
Fire, she thought. He hates fire! But I don’t think I could carry this very far and, well, you don’t set fire to libraries, you just don’t. And besides, this whole place is as dry as a bone.
‘Is something trying to get out of the book?’ said Letitia.
Tiffany looked up at her pink and white face. ‘Yes,’ she managed, and slammed the book down on the table as it jumped again in her arms.
‘It’s not going to be like that goblin in the fairytale book, is it? I was always so scared that it would squeeze itself out between the pages.’
The book sprang up into the air and slammed back down again on the table, knocking the wind out of Tiffany. She managed to grunt, ‘I think this is a lot worse than the goblin!’ Which was our goblin, she remembered inconveniently. They had the same book, after all. It wasn’t a good book in many respects, but then you grow up and it’s just a silly picture, but part of you never forgets.
It seemed to be something that happened to everybody. When she had mentioned to Petulia about being frightened by a picture in a book, the girl confessed that she had been hugely frightened by a happy-looking skeleton in a picture book when she was young. And it turned out all the other girls remembered something like that too. It was as if it was a fact of life. A book would start out by scaring you.
‘I think I know what to do,’ said Letitia. ‘Can you keep it occupied for a while? I won’t be a moment.’ And with that she disappeared from view, and after a few seconds Tiffany, still straining to keep the book closed, heard a squeaking noise. She did not take much notice, because her arms, clinging tightly to the bouncing book, felt redhot. Then, behind her, Letitia said quietly, ‘Look, I’m going to guide you to the book press. When I say so, push the book in and get your hands out of the way really, really quickly. It is quite important that you do it quickly!’
Tiffany felt the girl help her turn, and together they edged along to something metallic waiting in the gloom, while all the time the book rocked with anger and thumped on her chest; it was like holding an elephant’s heart while it was still beating.
She hardly heard Letitia’s voice above the pounding as she shouted, ‘Put the book down on the metal plate, push it a little way forward and get your fingers out of the way – right now!’
Something spun. In one pants-wetting moment Tiffany saw a hand thrust its way through the book’s cover before a metal plate slammed down on it, clipping the ends of Tiffany’s fingernails.
‘Help me with this bar, will you? Let’s tighten it down as far as we can.’ That was from Letitia, who was leaning on … what? ‘It’s the old book press,’ she said. ‘My grandfather used to use it all the time when he was tidying up old books that got damaged. It helps when you have to glue a page back in, for example. We hardly use it except at Hogswatch. Very good for the precision cracking of walnuts, you see? Just wind the handle until you hear them start to crack. They look like tiny little human brains.’
Tiffany risked a look at the press, the top and bottom plates of which were now pressed tightly together, to see if any human brains were dripping down the outside. They weren’t, but it didn’t help very much at this point, as a small human skeleton walked out of the wall, through the library shelves as though they were smoke, and disappeared. It had been holding a teddy bear. It was one of those things that the brain files under ‘something I would rather not have seen’.
‘Was that some kind of ghost?’ said Letitia. ‘Not the skeleton – I told you about him, didn’t I? Poor little thing. I mean, the other one. The one in the book …’
‘He is, well, I suppose you could say that he is something like a disease, and also something like a nightmare that turns out to be standing in your bedroom when you wake up. And I think you may have called him. Summoned him, if you like.’
‘I don’t like either of those! All I did was a simple little spell out of a book that cost one dollar! All right, I know I must’ve been a silly girl, but I didn’t mean anything like … that!’ She pointed to the press, which was still creaking.
‘Stupid woman,’ said Tiffany.
Letitia blinked. ‘What did you say?’
‘Stupid woman! Or silly woman, if you prefer. You’re going to get married in a few days, remember? And you tried to do a spell on somebody out of jealousy. Did you see the title of that book? I did. It was right in front of me! It was The Bonfire of the Witches! It was dictated by an Omnian priest who was so mad that he wouldn’t have been able to see sanity with a telescope. And you know what? Books live. The pages remember! Have you heard about the library at the Unseen University? They have books in there that have to be chained down, or kept in darkness or even under water! And you, miss, played at magic a matter of inches away from a book that boils with evil, vindictive magic. No wonder you got a result! I woke him up and ever since then he’s been searching, hunting me. And you – with your little spell – have shown him where I was! You helped him! He’s come back, and he’s found me now! The witch-burner. And he is infectious, just as I told you, a kind of disease.’
She paused for breath, which came, and the torrent of tears, which didn’t. Letitia just stood there as if she was thinking deeply. Then she said, ‘I suppose that “sorry” isn’t enough, right?’
‘As a matter of fact, it would be rather a good start,’ said Tiffany, but she thought: This young woman, who has never realized it’s time to stop wearing girly dresses, gave a headless ghost a pumpkin to carry under its arm so that it would feel better and presented a screaming little skeleton with a teddy bear. Would I have thought to do that? It’s absolutely something that a witch would do.
‘Look,’ she said, ‘you have definitely got some magical talent, I really mean it. But you’ll get into a terrible amount of trouble if you start mucking about when you don’t know what you are doing. Although giving the teddy bear to the poor little skeleton was a stroke of genius. Build on that thought and get some training, and you might have quite a magical future. You will have to go and spend some time with an old witch, just like I did.’
‘Well, that’s wonderful, Tiffany,’ Letitia said. ‘But I have to go and spend some time getting married! Shall we get back now? And what do you suggest we do with the book? I don’t like the idea of him being in there. Supposing he gets out!’
‘He is out, already. But the book is … well, a kind of window that makes it easy for him to come through. To reach me. You get that sort of thing occasionally. It’s a sort of way into another world, or perhaps somewhere else in this world.’
Tiffany had felt rather lofty when she explained this, and so was somewhat chastened when Letitia said, ‘Oh yes, the bluebell wood with the cottage that sometimes has smoke coming out of the chimney and sometimes does not; and the girl feeding the ducks on the pond, where the pigeons on the house behind her are
sometimes flying and sometimes perched. They are mentioned in H.J. Toadbinder’s book Floating Worlds. Would you like it? I know where it is.’ And before Tiffany could say a word, the girl hurried off among the bookshelves. She came back within a minute, much to Tiffany’s relief, and she was carrying a large, shiny leather volume which was suddenly dropped into Tiffany’s hands.
‘It’s a present. You’ve been kinder to me than I was to you.’
‘You can’t give me that! It’s part of the library! It’ll leave a gap!’
‘No, I insist,’ said Letitia. ‘I’m the only one who comes in here now, in any case. My mother keeps all the books of family history, genealogy and heraldry in her own room, and she’s the only one who is interested in them. Apart from me, the only other person who ever comes in here these days is Mr Tyler, and I think I hear him now, making his last round of the night. Well,’ she added, ‘he’s very old and very slow and it takes him about a week to go about his night watching, bearing in mind he sleeps through the day. Let’s go. He’ll have a heart attack if he actually finds anybody.’
There was indeed a creaking sound of a distant doorknob.
Letitia lowered her voice. ‘Do you mind if we sneak out the other way? He might have a nasty turn if he actually discovers anybody.’
A light was coming down the long corridor, although you needed to watch it for quite some time to see that it was moving. Letitia opened the door to the outer world and they hurried onto what would have been the lawn if anyone had mown it in the past ten years. Tiffany got the impression that lawn mowing here went at the same decrepit speed as Mr Tyler. There was dew on the grass, and a certain sense that daylight was a distinct possibility sometime in the future. As soon as they reached the broomstick, Letitia made yet another muttered apology and hurried back into the sleeping house via another door, coming out again five minutes later carrying a large bag. ‘My mourning clothes,’ she said as the broomstick rose into the soft air. ‘It will be the old Baron’s funeral tomorrow, the poor man. My mother always travels with her funeral clothes. She says you never know when someone is going to drop down dead.’