“Who is Hagar?”
In that second Holly realized what she had done. But why could she talk about it now and not before? she wondered fleetingly. That was not important, anyway. What was important was that Judy must understand how well her plan, this part of it, had worked.
“She’s Tamar’s own sister. Only she knows a lot more than Tamar—” she began when Judy interrupted her.
Now Judy’s expression was one of fear. “We—then we did find the house—but Tamar wasn’t there. That other was. She—she’s bad, Holly—bad!”
“No, she isn’t!” Holly’s long-restrained impatience broke free at last. “You’re just a silly little girl, a baby, Judy Wade. That’s what you are!”
Judy was retreating, her eyes on Holly. She looked—Holly refused to believe that Judy was really watching her as she had watched the brush monsters in the maze.
“She’s bad,” Judy repeated, “and somehow—somehow she’s making you bad, too, Holly.”
“Judy!” Holly got to her feet but not in time. For her sister flung herself at the shelves, was snatching at the green pots, smashing them violently to the floor, so that the dirt flew all over.
Holly jumped to stop her. But her boot went down hard on one of the young plants and she skidded and fell again, bumping her head against the table leg in a way which made her feel very queer. Somehow, though she struggled, she could not get up again in time to stop Judy. One by one the pots thudded to the floor. Now Judy was trampling fiercely on the soil that spilled from them, stamping again and again at the plants, until they were just a mash.
With the aid of the table leg Holly pulled herself to her feet. She felt so queer, perhaps it was the bump on her head. Then, suddenly, when she looked at the mashed plants in the mess on the floor, it was as if something other lay there—nasty things, but mashed and helpless now. Judy was crying, but she still hunched down and reached under the table to jerk out the final pot. She upended it in the middle of the floor and then jumped with all her might on that crooked root and the small stem that had grown from it. When she had done, she stood, panting.
“Bad,” she repeated. “All bad. And they killed Grandma’s plants and Tamar’s, too!”
Holly’s head felt light and queer. She was dizzy and weak, as she had been once after she had the flu and got up and tried to walk and her legs were wobbly and had no really stiff bones in them. And—she felt empty. Not empty the way one does when one is hungry, but another kind of emptiness. She was crying, and she never knew she had started to, the tears just were there. While a choke in her throat hurt.
“You were helping the witch,” Judy said slowly. “You really were, Holly. I can remember now. We weren’t just lost in that maze, we found Tamar’s house all right. Only Tamar wasn’t there. That other one, she was. She’s—she’s the witch, Holly. Don’t you see, those people—Sexton Dimsdale, the others—they thought Tamar was the witch. I’ll bet that other one made them think so. And she made you believe it, too!”
Holly was shaking. She was sick at her stomach and her head was so funny. When she tried to see Judy, the room began to swing around.
“Hey, what’re you doing in here? What a mess! And what’s wrong with Holly?” Crock had somehow appeared.
“The witch got her,” Judy said solemnly. “We did go through the maze, Crock, I remember it all now. Don’t you? And that other one, she was a witch, a real one. She’s got Holly and—”
“I’m going to be sick,” Holly quavered.
“Come on!” Crock caught her by the arm. “Let’s get out of here. I’ll take you to Grandma. Judy, you’d better see if you can clean up this mess some before Grandma sees it.”
Holly was sick, very sick, right outside the door of the shed. And her head was still swimming. She was hardly aware of Crock’s steering her into the barn-house.
It was dark when she awoke again, to find she was on a cot near the fire. She was warm and then she was cold; her throat hurt, but her head did not feel so floaty anymore. Grandma brought a cup of something which smelled like herbs and had her drink it all. Then she went back to sleep.
There were dreams. She thought once she saw Hagar, only she wasn’t smiling, she looked old and ugly, and Holly was afraid. Afterward Tamar stood there, nodding, as if all were well again. Following that, Holly did not dream, at least not that she could remember.
Grandma said she had the flu, but somehow Holly did not quite believe that. Though she had been sick and now she was getting better, much better. Privately she thought deep down inside that she had been sick ever since she took the pillow by cheating and everything started going wrong.
As soon as she had a chance to be alone with Judy, she asked: “The plants?”
“I cleaned up.” Judy talked fast for fear Grandma would come back and hear. “Crock helped me later. We got rid of the bad ones. Now the rest are growing all right. Those others were poison, I guess, those you planted.”
Holly moved restlessly in the nest of sheets and blankets. “She told me I was like her, a witch,” she said in a low voice. “I guess I was acting like one. But I kept thinking what I could do with the witch wishes—help Grandpa and Grandma and Dimsdale. But mostly I was thinking about using those wishes to hurt people, too.” It was hard for her to admit that. “Judy, what about Tamar—and Halloween?”
“We have been thinking about that. Crock and me,” Judy replied. “I just bet that Hagar, she never told Tamar trouble was coming. We have to get back—”
“I can’t go, not if I’m sick,” said Holly from the depths of dark disappointment.
“Halloween comes on Saturday.” Judy stated what Holly already knew. “The party isn’t until four in the afternoon. Mom isn’t coming that weekend again. If you used the pillow the night before—”
Holly shook her head. “No, I spoiled things when I cheated. You or Crock, you do it.”
She was sure she would be well by Halloween, a whole week and two days away. And she set herself to the task of getting well. Nor would she agree that she would take the pillow again. Even if it came to her fair and square, she would be afraid—afraid that what Hagar had said was the truth and that there was something way inside her which would lead her the wrong way again.
Holly had a lot of time for thinking during the next few days. Judy came home twice with cards Holly’s class had signed as cheer-ups. She studied these, picturing the person behind each name. They wouldn’t have sent cards if they had really not wanted her in the class. It was hard to have to change ideas about people and things. But see how wrong she had been about Hagar. More and more she wondered how she could have been so very wrong. And what would have happened if Judy had not found and destroyed those plants? Yes, she had a lot to think about.
When Holly went back to school, she was shy at first. It was hard to change all around and try to talk to people. However, she could thank them for the cards. And, since everyone was talking about the Halloween party, that was something she could eagerly listen to. Also Mrs. Finch took them for a second visit to the library to work on their projects. This time Holly had a chance to ask about the journal of Seth Elkins. When she said she was living at Dimsdale and was writing about that, Miss Noyes allowed her to read the typewritten copy of that part of the journal which covered Seth Elkins’s connection with the Dimsdales. Halfway through, Holly found a part that made her shiver:
This woman did give unto my good father that which she swore would heal the pains within his stomach. For a space did he seem the better, and arose from his bed and went cheerily about his business. But the second time she did make a potion for him, his pain did not ease, but became the greater, so that he suffered much. Master Dimsdale, chancing to come to sit with him one night, did question him closely. When my father did say he had the potion from the healing woman, Master Dimsdale became wroth, telling my father that he had dealt with a witch. He took up the bottle of medicine. Some he poured upon a piece of meat and this he threw to our old mastiff. The
dog did eat, and shortly afterwards it had a fit, so that it was as if mad. Master Dimsdale did then take my father’s pistol which was nigh to hand, and did shoot the dog dead. Having thus proven, as he said, that the witch did deal death to those she held in hatred, he summoned those of substance in Sussex, telling the tale and showing them the dead dog. He did say to them that the following night being that one of evil repute known as All Hallows’ Eve, that be the time to burn out this witch, destroying with her all which was hers, lest something of her fearful powers linger to plague us. So it was decided among the elders that this was right and proper for the preservation of all of us.
When it came to the next night we did gather, each man with a torch well aflame, and we went to that house where she dwelt. But I, knowing what was to be, had sent to H. a warning, for why must she suffer for that which was not of her doing. But T. was there, and she faced our company boldly, being doubtless strengthened by her lord, the Devil. They would have taken her and bound her, thrust her back into her den and set that to the flames. Only then there sprang out of the house devils such as make a man fearful to remember. And being afeard, all fled.
Master Dimsdale was not minded to be so frightened off, and at a later hour he returned, this time well-armed, having run forth silver bullets such as all devilish creatures cannot face. But when he came, and those others with him, there was no house there. But they did say that out of nowhere sounded a voice to curse the Dimsdales root and branch, saying that all would waste and perish until that which they had taken would be returned. But of the meaning of the latter words, none knew.
I did wait many days for H. to come to me as she had sworn, but she did not. Now I believe that that foul witch, who was no true sister to her, did so reft her from me. And thereafter I fell into a dire wasting sickness which Doctor Ashby could not understand. Nor have I ever been the same man since. H. being gone, I did follow my father’s command and wed with Patience, though I have had no joy of that, nor ever will in this world, of that I am certain.
Slowly Holly copied it word for word. But this was wrong. Maybe Tamar had given the medicine, but Hagar had added something to it. And Seth Elkins had known that, only he did not mention it. Was that because he could not—just as Holly herself had not been able to talk about Hagar until Judy found the plants? What had happened to Tamar and the house? Halloween—it had happened on Halloween. If they could get there first—warn her! They must! But this time they must go the right way, reach Tamar and not Hagar.
ALL HALLOWS’ EVE
Grandma was busy most of Friday baking. She made doughnuts, and cookies cut out with cutters Mrs. Pigot lent her. These were in the form of bats with outstretched wings, pumpkins, and cat heads. Holly and Judy helped her finish after they got home from school, setting raisins in for the cats’ eyes and using yellow frosting to cover the pumpkins.
Judy’s cat costume was finished. Grandpa had wired the tail so it did not flop limply, but stood up the way Tomkit’s did when he was setting out on his own affairs. Crock’s costume was even more unusual. When he was fitted into it, and the square “robot” head placed over his own, he looked like something out of a TV program about outer space. He had to walk jerkily, too, because the pieces around his legs were stiff, and that made him seem even more a robot. There were curled wires standing up from his head, and he had small lights (red ones) for eyes (his own seeing through little holes beneath), which lighted up red, run on a little battery above them. Mr. Lem Granger, who came to the dump for electrical throwouts, had become quite interested in what Crock and Grandpa were fixing up and put in those eyes, showing Crock how to turn them on and off.
Though Holly wanted very much to cut her hair and brush it out into a regular Afro, she did not quite dare. But she unbraided and combed and brushed, using a small bottle of hair spray, until it stood out in a big fluff. Her robe was of the brightest colors: red, orange, green. With it she wore big hoop earrings and a lot of long necklaces. Some were made of painted pieces of macaroni, others of beads. After all, no one in Sussex had ever seen a real African princess, and Holly thought she looked like one.
She was smoothing out the djellaba as Judy came in. When Holly saw what her sister held, she sat down a little hurriedly on the bed. Judy had the pillow, and behind her came Tomkit, mewing and making small jumps at her feet.
“Crock and me, we’re willing for you to take it”—Judy held out the pillow.
Holly jerked back. “No! I don’t want it. Maybe Hagar was right, maybe I’m like a witch. If I take it we’ll go the wrong way again. You or Crock—you take it.”
“Crock says ’No,’” said Judy slowly. “He says he feels like he shouldn’t try it. He’s been keeping it an’ when I asked just now, did he want a chance, he said ‘No.’ So—so I guess I’ll have to do it.”
She smoothed the upper side of the pillow. “I just noticed something, Holly. These funny lines, they’re really like the path through the maze, with the breaks in them coming where you make a turn. They’re different, one side from the other. On this side”—she traced a way with a fingertip—“they go with the openings to the right, just like we went to find Tamar. But over here”—she flopped the pillow over—“see here? These open to the left, like when you went to Hagar. Maybe you had the pillow wrong side up when you slept on it.”
Holly took the pillow very reluctantly into her own hands to study those lines of stitching. It was true, she could see, as she reversed it once and then back again. Two ways through the maze. But she did not believe that it mattered which side was up when you slept upon it. What did—Holly had been thinking about this for a long time and was now sure—what mattered was how you felt your ownself. And she could not trust herself as she trusted Judy now.
“It’s yours.” She dropped it hastily on Judy’s bed. “Are—are you afraid, Judy?”
“Maybe, a little. But we’ve got to go, to help Tamar. I know that is true, Holly. I don’t know how we can help, but I keep believing that we can.” She picked up the pillow, turning it carefully to the side where the paths all ran to the right, and settled it against her regular one.
Tomkit was purring so loudly they could hear him. He jumped to the bed, sniffed long and luxuriously at the pillow, and curled beside it, so his black nose just touched the very old and yellowed linen.
The girls climbed into bed as Grandma came for the lamp. “Big day tomorrow,” she said. “You get a good sleep now, you hear?”
Maybe Judy did go to sleep. However, Holly twisted and turned under her blankets and the big comforter. Tomorrow morning they were going to clear out three of the stalls, Grandma said, move cots down there. It was getting too cold to use the rooms above. Holly listened to the queer creaks and groans which were always a part of the barn-house, and thought once she could still hear Tomkit purring. But there was no sound from Judy, and Holly did not want to wake her if she was already asleep.
Perhaps it was because Holly was awake so long that she overslept the next morning. It was Grandma’s bell ringing which brought her entirely awake. Judy’s bed was empty, the covers neatly spread up. Holly hurried to dress and to fix her own bed. She could see no sign of the pillow. Had it worked again? Could they go into the maze before they left for the party? Time—would there be enough time?
“Holly, you feelin’ all right, child?” Grandma greeted her. She was frying sausages this morning. The good smell of these made Holly know she was empty.
“Just fine, Grandma. And that smells so good!” She sniffed. As Grandma turned back to watching the sausages, Holly had a chance to meet Judy’s gaze. Judy nodded. Which meant that the pillow had worked! Only how soon could they try the maze? Not this morning, with Grandma already lining up what each must do to help in the cleaning out of the stalls.
She and Grandpa had already done a lot, little by little, during the week. But there was still enough left for a busy morning. Grandpa had to go out several times when horns honked and people came to the dump.
&
nbsp; The last time he came in he said to Grandma, “Looks like you’d better plan to take off for town a little earlier, Mercy—”
When Holly heard that, her heart sank. Would they have no time for the maze at all?
“Mrs. Winton,” Grandpa continued, “she sent a message by her boy Alex. They need extra hands to get things ready. Mrs. Pigot and Mrs. Eames, they is down with the flu. Mrs. Winton, she’s going in ’bout one-thirty an’ she’ll pick you up—”
“But that’s too early for the young’uns,” Grandma said. “ ’Course I’ll go an’ lend a hand. But they won’t want to go so early to jus’ hang around.”
“They can ride in with the Hawkinses. Mrs. Winton, she thought of that. Hawkinses’ll come by ’bout a quarter to four an’ pick ’em up.”
“All right. You be ready, don’t keep Mr. Hawkins waitin’ none. But then I don’t think you will, the party’s too special.”
Holly could hardly eat her lunch. Grandma said it was amazing how young’uns could get so excited about a party. However, she laughed when she said it. Holly wondered what she would think if she knew that it was not the party at all, but the chance to get to the maze, that made Holly feel as if she were perched on pins and needles and not her proper chair.
Grandma, with the boxes of cookies and doughnuts, left at a quarter to two. As soon as she had driven off, Holly turned to the twins. “We won’t have much time later, and getting into those costumes takes time. Suppose we dress up now, and then go to the maze.”
Crock nodded. “Maybe you’ve got the right idea. I know it takes a lot of fixing to get into my robot suit.”
Grandpa had gone to the fix-it shed, to work on a table he was repairing, so they were free until the Hawkins family would arrive to pick them up. Judy seemed ready to accept Holly’s suggestion also, and she did need some help in zippering up her cat costume. That had a pointed eared head with a cat mask that fitted in neatly over her face. The mask was black and Judy had decided not to try to paint it. She thought she looked like a mixture of Tomkit and a blue-point Siamese. Her tail swung jauntily behind her, and she slipped her hands into the attached paw-mittens, which could be as easily pulled off when she needed the use of her own ten fingers.