Aunt Dimity and the Village Witch (9 page)

“I’ll answer it,” I said promptly.

I placed my jam jar on the silver tray and hastened to the door, wondering if the infamous Myron Brocklehurst had already solved the riddle of Amelia Thistle. I heaved a sigh of relief when I saw Sally Pyne and Henry Cook peering at me through the rain, holding an oversized wicker hamper between them.

“Good morning, Lori,” Sally said brightly. “Henry was convinced he’d seen you here earlier. I told him he must have been mistaken, because you of all people would know better than to
bother a new neighbor on her first day in the village, but I can see now that he was right.”

It required very little effort on my part to translate Sally’s words into Finch-speak.
If you can break a village tradition
, she was saying,
so can I
. I suspected that a good many others would feel the same way.

“Is Mrs. Thistle at home?” Sally asked.

“Yes,” said Amelia, appearing at my elbow. “Won’t you come in?”

Sally accepted the invitation with alacrity and let Henry make the introductions while her head swiveled this way and that, taking in every detail of the front room. Henry had to nudge her with his elbow to get her to stop gawking long enough to offer the hamper to Amelia.

“Henry and I made up some sandwiches and a few other tidbits to tide you over until you’ve stocked your pantry,” she explained. “And Henry’s taken the rest of the day off.”

“I’m under orders from my Sally to get you settled in.” Henry patted his broad chest. “If you need help with the heavy lifting, I’m your man.”

“You’re on,” I said, clapping Henry on the shoulder.

“Is he?” said Amelia.

“Of course he is.” I turned to Sally and Henry. “Why don’t you bring the hamper through to the kitchen? Amelia and I will join you in a minute.”

I expected Sally and Henry to leap at the chance to inspect Amelia’s kitchen and they didn’t disappoint me. They sped down the narrow passageway as if they were on rocket-propelled roller skates, leaving me and my hostess alone in the front room.

“Amelia,” I said quietly. “Unless I’m very much mistaken, you’re about to get an influx of visitors.”

“N-not…,” she faltered.

“No, not Bowenists,” I said hastily. “Just your normal, everyday neighbors. Don’t mention Mistress Meg or Uncle Gamaliel to them
just yet. They might think you’re a little crazy. But
use
them,” I urged. “Send Sally to the Emporium with a shopping list. Let
her
stock your pantry. Put everyone else to work unpacking your boxes and organizing your new home. I promise you, they’ll be willing to oblige.”

“Such a
friendly
village,” she said with a contented sigh. “One question, though: Why must we do everything at once?”

“Because you won’t be able to think straight until you tame your cottage,” I said. “And you’ll need to think straight while we’re searching for Uncle Gamaliel’s forbidden memoir.”

“We?” she said hopefully. “You mean, you’ll help me?”

“Try stopping me,” I said, grinning. “Put your house in order today, Amelia. Tomorrow you and I launch a witch hunt!”

Eight

W 
hile Sally and Henry exchanged views on the kitchen’s decor, Amelia and I exchanged telephone numbers. I promised to call her as soon as I’d devised a plan of action, left her to make the most of her volunteer work force, and headed for home.

As I drove over the humpbacked bridge, I spotted Millicent Scroggins, Opal Taylor, Elspeth Binney, and Selena Buxton in my rearview mirror, bobbing along under a cluster of black umbrellas, toting a covered casserole dish apiece. I didn’t have to be clairvoyant to figure out where those casserole dishes would end up. Having watched Sally Pyne, Henry Cook, and me enter Pussywillows, the ladies had plainly decided that it was their turn to shatter a time-honored village tradition by paying a premature call on their newest neighbor.

“Reinforcements are on their way, Amelia,” I muttered. “Let
them
find your pots and pans!”

I had no doubt whatsoever that the Handmaidens would regard pawing through Amelia’s possessions as a golden opportunity to gauge her chances in the Willis, Sr., marriage sweepstakes. In return for allowing them to gather vital information about her furnishings, finances, and fashion sense, Amelia would gain four energetic helpers and a week’s worth of nutritious nosh. It seemed like a fair trade to me.

I would have turned back to give Amelia a few pointers on how to handle the Handmaidens, but I had other fish to fry. I wanted to squeeze in an hour or so of historical research before I sat down to lunch. Fortunately, I knew exactly where to find an expert on local history.

Rain was streaming from the slate roof when I reached the cottage. Rivulets raced down the graveled drive, the flagstone path was strewn with soggy leaves, and fat drops dripped from the rose trellis onto my head as I opened the front door. It was such a great day for playing in puddles that I made a mental note to bring a few bath towels with me when I went to pick up the boys.

I shed my wet parka and sneakers in the front hall, said hello to Stanley, who was keeping Bill’s armchair warm in the living room, and padded damply up the hallway to the study. My cold feet compelled me to stoke a blazing fire in the hearth before sharing the morning’s headlines with Reginald.

“Miranda Morrow isn’t the first witch to live in Finch,” I told my pink bunny. “Her predecessor was called Mistress Meg, but whether Mistress Meg was a good witch or a bad witch remains to be seen.”

I could tell by the glimmer in Reginald’s eyes that he was riveted. Smiling, I touched a fingertip to his snout, reached for the blue journal, and sat with it in one of the tall leather armchairs near the hearth.

“Dimity?” I said. “I have met Amelia Thistle!”

The fluid lines of royal-blue ink began to scroll across the page, but they didn’t get very far.

And?

“And I asked her if she was Mae Bowen,” I said.

And?

“No shouting, no slapping, no demands for my departure,” I replied.

I repeat, somewhat impatiently: AND?

“And, yes, Amelia Thistle is Mae Bowen,” I said. “Or, to put it another way, Mae Bowen is Amelia Thistle.”

Ah-ha! She’s using her maiden name.

“Bingo,” I said, nodding.

It’s not what I would call an impenetrable disguise.

“She claims she’s not very clever,” I said, “but I think she’s underselling herself. I don’t know how, but she knew I’d been through hard times, Dimity. She looked into my eyes and stated flat out that I knew what it was to be hungry.”

She may be sensitive rather than clever. They’re two very different traits, and I know which one I prefer. Do you still believe she poses a threat to Finch?

“I’m more concerned with protecting her than the village,” I admitted. “I like her, Dimity, and I think she could do with some serious TLC.”

Why?

“She’s had a lot on her plate lately,” I said. “Not just selling her old house and buying a new one, but dealing with her brother Alfred’s death. He lived with her and her late husband, Walter Thistle, at Highburn, the estate they bought to keep the Bowenists at bay. Amelia and Alfred were very close and he died less than a year ago. To lose him so soon after losing her husband must have knocked the wind out of her sails. If you ask me, she simply didn’t have the energy to create a completely false identity.”

The poor woman. Did she leave Highburn because it was filled with so many painful memories?

“Not exactly,” I said. “It sounds to me as though she still loves the place. She called it her safe haven.”

Why did she trade her safe haven for Pussywillows?

“You told me last night that some things are more important than safety,” I said. “Amelia came to Finch to do one of those things….” I settled back in the armchair, stretched my chilled toes toward the fire, and recounted everything Amelia had told me about John Jacob’s purchase, Alfred’s research, Gamaliel Gowland’s forbidden memoir, and the as-yet unfinished story of Mistress Meg. “Alfred’s disabilities kept him from following the clue Gamaliel drew on the memoir’s first page,” I concluded, “so Amelia intends to follow it for him, once she figures it out.”

A treasure hunt! How wonderful! What a pity Alfred couldn’t participate in it. Did Amelia describe the nature of his handicap?

“No,” I said, “but he was housebound, so he must have had mobility issues.” I shook my head. “Thank heavens his mind was unaffected. If his notebook is anything to go by, he was a first-rate scholar.”

He was certainly devoted to his subject. I find it very interesting that the memoir’s first page was found in Plover Cottage. I need hardly point out that the house next door belongs to Finch’s current witch-in-residence, Miranda Morrow.

“It’s quite a coincidence,” I agreed. “Miranda picked the wrong time to go to Spain. She’ll kick herself when she finds out that we’ve been hunting for Mistress Meg without her. And if one of Gamaliel’s clues points to Briar Cottage, I’ll be in there like a shot, whether she’s home or not.”

Your treasure hunt may still be in progress when Miranda returns. I suspect it will be rather challenging to find documents that have remained hidden for centuries.

“Did any of your neighbors discover an odd bit of parchment stuffed up a chimney when you were, um, around?” I asked awkwardly. Aunt Dimity was so vibrantly present that it seemed impolite to speak of her in the past tense, but she responded without hesitation.

Not to my knowledge. It’s possible that someone found a page and kept mum about it, but I think it highly unlikely. As you know, secrets don’t last long in Finch. If a neighbor had made such a discovery, I’m sure I would have heard about it.

“I’m sure you would have, too,” I said confidently. “Since you didn’t, I think it’s safe to assume that the rest of the memoir’s pages are still in their original hiding places. Are all of the buildings in Finch as old as Plover Cottage?”

There are a few exceptions—the schoolhouse, for example, is Victorian and Fairworth House is Georgian—but generally speaking, Finch’s building boom ended in the first decade of the seventeenth century.

“Well, you’ve reduced the search area a tiny bit,” I allowed. “If a building wasn’t here in Gamaliel’s day, he couldn’t have hidden anything in it, so we can eliminate the schoolhouse and Fairworth from our inquiries. What about Mistress Meg? Do you know anything about her?”

In an odd way, I may. When I was a small child, I lived in dread of a loathsome creature called Mad Maggie. I envisioned her quite clearly as a snaggletoothed, warty old hag who prowled the shadows in my bedroom with a bloodstained axe.

“Good grief,” I said, wincing. “And you accuse
me
of having a wild imagination.”

I was a child, Lori. You are an adult. There is a difference.

“So I’ve been told.” I hunkered down more comfortably in the chair, glad that I’d lit the fire. It seemed to me that a story starring an axe-wielding hag deserved to be told by firelight. “Tell me more about Mad Maggie.”

Mad Maggie was a bogeyman—a bogeywoman, to be more precise—conjured by adults trying to frighten unruly children into good behavior. If, for example, one failed to wash one’s hands before tea, one was told that Mad Maggie would chop them off.

“How quaint,” I said weakly.

Parents were more demanding in those days, Lori, and children were tougher. If we were naughty, we expected to be spanked, to have our ears boxed, or to be sent to bed without our suppers. If all else failed, we knew we would be threatened with Mad Maggie. Most of us were bright enough to realize by the age of six that Mad Maggie was nothing more than a make-believe monster used by tired grown-ups to keep peace in the home. I can assure you that no one in Finch ever amputated a child’s soiled hands.

“I’m relieved to hear it,” I said, casting an appalled grimace at Reginald.

What interests me is that Mad Maggie belonged exclusively to Finch. I never heard her mentioned beyond the bounds of St. George’s parish, not even in Upper Deeping. Since Mistress Meg once lived in Finch, and since she was regarded as a witch, it seems reasonable to ask: Was Mad Maggie a latter-day version of Mistress Meg?

“The names are related,” I said. “Both Maggie and Meg come from Margaret, and Mistress Meg was also known as Margaret Redfearn.”

My thoughts exactly. Furthermore, myths often have a basis in reality. If the villagers in Gamaliel’s time feared their local witch, they’d invent horror stories about her. The stories could have traveled down through the ages until they reached my tender ears.

“Gamaliel describes Mistress Meg as
fearsome
and you point out a possible link between her and the horrible hag of your childhood.” I gazed into the fire reflectively. “Do you know what, Dimity? I’m beginning to think that Mistress Meg must have been a wicked witch. Gamaliel wrote his memoir at night, in his private study, because he was afraid of what she’d do to him if she found out about it.” I shrugged and looked down at the journal. “Who wants to be turned into a toad?”

It would be a disconcerting experience, I’ll grant you, but I’m not yet convinced that Gamaliel was afraid of Mistress Meg or that Mistress Meg was wicked. We don’t know enough about their relationship to describe it accurately. If we’re to do so, we must first read the rest of the memoir. Thankfully, the second page will be relatively easy to locate.

“Will it?” I said dubiously.

Of course it will. The first glyph isn’t very subtle. You must have deciphered it by now.

“I haven’t given it much thought,” I admitted. I closed my eyes for a moment and pictured the glyph. “A cross in a shield-shaped lozenge…Now that you mention it, it does seem
vaguely
familiar.” I opened my eyes in time to see the next line of fine copperplate zip speedily across the page.