The Witches

  The witches spread out as they were told. They advanced towards me, some from one end, some from the other, and some came down the middle between the rows of empty chairs. They were bound to get me now. They had me cornered.

  From sheer and absolute terror, I began to scream. 'Help!' I screamed, turning my head towards the doors in the hope that somebody outside might hear me. 'Help! Help! Hel-l-l-lp!'

  'Get it!' shouted The Grand High Witch. 'Grrrab hold of it! Stop it yelling!'

  They rushed at me then, and about five of them grabbed me by the arms and legs and lifted me clear off the ground. I went on screaming, but one of them clapped a gloved hand over my mouth and that stopped me.

  'Brrring it here!' shouted The Grand High Witch. 'Brrring the spying little vurm up here to me!'

  I was carried on to the platform with my arms and legs held tight by many hands, and I lay there suspended in the air, facing the ceiling. I saw The Grand High Witch standing over me, grinning at me in the most horrible way. She held up the small blue bottle of Mouse-Maker and she said, 'Now for a little medicine! Hold his nose to make him open his mouth!'

  Strong fingers pinched my nose. I kept my mouth closed tight and held my breath. But I couldn't do it for long. My chest was bursting. I opened my mouth to get one big quick breath of air and as I did so, The Grand High Witch poured the entire contents of the little bottle down my throat!

  Oh, the pain and the fire! It felt as though a kettleful of boiling water had been poured into my mouth. My throat was going up in flames! Then very quickly the frightful burning searing scorching feeling started spreading down into my chest and into my tummy and on and on into my arms and legs and all over my body! I screamed and screamed but once again the gloved hand was clapped over my lips. The next thing I felt was my skin beginning to tighten. How else can I describe it? It was quite literally a tightening and a shrinking of the skin all over my body from the top of my head to the tips of my fingers to the ends of my toes! I felt as though I was a balloon and somebody was twisting the top of the balloon and twisting and twisting and the balloon was getting smaller and smaller and the skin was getting tighter and tighter and soon it was going to burst.

  Then the squeezing began. This time I was inside a suit of iron and somebody was turning a screw, and with each turn of the screw the iron suit became smaller and smaller so that I was squeezed like an orange into a pulpy mess with the juice running out of my sides.

  After that there came a fierce prickling sensation all over my skin (or what was left of my skin) as though tiny needles were forcing their way out through the surface of the skin from the inside, and this, I realize now, was the growing of the mouse-fur.

  Far away in the distance, I heard the voice of The Grand High Witch yelling, 'Five hundred doses! This stinking little carbuncle has had five hundred doses and the alarm-clock has been smashed and now vee are having instantaneous action!' I heard clapping and cheering and I remember thinking: I am not myself any longer! I have gone clear out of my own skin!

  I noticed that the floor was only an inch from my nose.

  I noticed also a pair of little furry front paws resting on the floor. I was able to move those paws. They were mine!

  At that moment, I realized that I was not a little boy any longer. I was A MOUSE.

  'Now for the mouse-trrrap!' I heard The Grand High Witch yelling. 'I've got it right here! And here's a piece of cheese!'

  But I wasn't going to wait for that. I was off across the platform like a streak of lightning! I was astonished at my own speed! I leapt over witches' feet right and left, and in no time at all I was down the steps and on to the floor of the Ballroom itself and skittering off among the rows of chairs. What I especially liked was the fact that I made no sound at all as I ran. I was a swift and silent mover. And quite amazingly, the pain had all gone now. I was feeling quite remarkably well. It is not a bad thing after all, I thought to myself, to be tiny as well as speedy when there is a bunch of dangerous females after your blood. I selected the back leg of a chair and squeezed up against it and kept very still.

  In the distance, The Grand High Witch was shouting, 'Leave the little stinkpot alone! It is not vurth bothering about! It is only a mouse now! Somebody else vill soon catch it! Let us get out of here! The meeting is over! Unlock the doors and shove off to the Sunshine Terrace to have tea vith that idiotic Manager!'

  Bruno

  I peeped round the leg of the chair and watched the hundreds of witches' feet walking out through the doors of the Ballroom. When they had all gone and the place was absolutely silent, I began to move cautiously about on the floor. Suddenly I remembered Bruno. He must surely be around here somewhere, too. 'Bruno!' I called out.

  I wasn't seriously expecting that I would be able to speak at all now that I had become a mouse, so I got the shock of my life when I heard my own voice, my own perfectly normal rather loud voice, coming out of my tiny mouth.

  It was wonderful. I was thrilled. I tried it again. 'Bruno Jenkins, where are you?' I called out. 'If you can hear me, give a shout!'

  My voice was exactly the same and just as loud as it had been when I was a boy. 'Hey there, Bruno Jenkins!' I called. 'Where are you?'

  There was no answer.

  I pottered about between the seat-legs trying to get used to being so close to the ground. I decided I rather liked it. You are probably wondering why I wasn't depressed at all. I found myself thinking, What's so wonderful about being a little boy anyway? Why is that necessarily any better than being a mouse? I know that mice get hunted and they sometimes get poisoned or caught in traps. But little boys sometimes get killed, too. Little boys can be run over by motor-cars or they can die of some awful illness. Little boys have to go to school. Mice don't. Mice don't have to pass exams. Mice don't have to worry about money. Mice, as far as I can see, have only two enemies, humans and cats. My grandmother is a human, but I know for certain that she will always love me whoever I am. And she never, thank goodness, keeps a cat. When mice grow up, they don't ever have to go to war and fight against other mice. Mice, I felt pretty certain, all like each other. People don't.

  Yes, I told myself, I don't think it is at all a bad thing to be a mouse.

  I was wandering around the Ballroom floor thinking about all this when I spotted another mouse. It was crouching on the floor holding a piece of bread in its front paws and nibbling away at it with great gusto.

  It had to be Bruno. 'Hello, Bruno,' I said.

  He glanced up at me for about two seconds, then went right on guzzling.

  'What have you found?' I asked him.

  'One of them dropped it,' he answered. 'It's a fish-paste sandwich. Pretty good.'

  He too spoke with a perfectly normal voice. One would have expected that a mouse (if it was going to talk at all) would do so with the smallest and squeakiest voice you could imagine. It was terrifically funny to hear the voice of the rather loud-mouthed Bruno coming out of that tiny mouse's throat.

  'Listen, Bruno,' I said. 'Now that we are both mice, I think we ought to start thinking a bit about the future.'

  He stopped eating and stared at me with small black eyes. 'What do you mean we?' he said. 'The fact that you're a mouse has nothing to do with me.'

  'But you're a mouse, too, Bruno.'

  'Don't be a fool,' he said. 'I'm not a mouse.'

  'I'm afraid you are, Bruno.'

  'I most certainly am not!' he shouted. 'Why are you insulting me? I haven't been rude to you! Why do you call me a mouse?'

  'Don't you know what's happened to you?' I said.

  'What on earth are you talking about?' Bruno said.

  'I have to inform you,' I said, 'that not very long ago the witches turned you into a mouse. Then they did it to me.'

  'You're lying!' he cried. 'I'm not a mouse!'

  'If you hadn't been so busy guzzling that sandwich,' I said, 'you would have noticed your hairy paws. Take a look at them.'

  Bruno looked down at his paws. He jumpe
d. 'Good grief!' he cried. 'I am a mouse! You wait till my father hears about this!'

  'He may think it's an improvement,' I said.

  'I don't want to be a mouse!' Bruno shouted, jumping up and down. 'I refuse to be a mouse! I'm Bruno Jenkins!'

  'There are worse things than being a mouse,' I said. 'You can live in a hole.'

  'I don't want to live in a hole!' Bruno shouted.

  'And you can creep into the larder at night,' I said, 'and nibble through all the packets of raisins and cornflakes and chocolate biscuits and everything else you can find. You can stay there all night eating yourself silly. That's what mice do.'

  'Now that's a thought,' Bruno said, perking up a bit. 'But how am I going to open the door of the fridge to get at the cold chicken and all the leftovers? That's something I do every evening at home.'

  'Maybe your rich father will get you a special little mouse-fridge all to yourself,' I said. 'One that you can open.'

  'You say a witch did this to me?' Bruno said. 'Which witch?'

  'The one who gave you the chocolate bar in the hotel lobby yesterday,' I told him. 'Don't you remember?'

  'The filthy old cow!' he shouted. 'I'll get her for this! Where is she? Who is she?'

  'Forget it,' I said. 'You don't have a hope. Your biggest problem at the moment is your parents. How are they going to take this? Will they treat you with sympathy and kindness?'

  Bruno considered this for a moment. 'I think,' he said, 'that my father is going to be a bit put out.'

  'And your mother?'

  'She's terrified of mice,' Bruno said.

  'Then you've got a problem, haven't you?'

  'Why only me?' he said. 'What about you?'

  'My grandmother will understand perfectly,' I said. 'She knows all about witches.'

  Bruno took another bite of his sandwich. 'What do you suggest?' he said.

  'I suggest we both go first of all and consult my grandmother,' I said. 'She'll know exactly what to do.'

  I moved towards the doors, which were standing open. Bruno, still grasping part of the sandwich in one paw, followed after me.

  'When we get out into the corridor,' I said, 'we're going to run like mad. Stick close to the wall all the way and follow me. Do not talk and do not let anyone see you. Don't forget that just about anyone who catches sight of you will try to kill you.'

  I snatched the sandwich out of his paw and threw it away. 'Here goes,' I said. 'Keep behind me.'

  Hello, Grandmamma

  As soon as I was out of the Ballroom, I took off like a flash. I streaked down the corridor, went through the Lounge and the Reading-Room and the Library and the Drawing-Room and came to the stairs. Up the stairs I went, jumping quite easily from one to the other, keeping well in against the wall all the time. 'Are you with me, Bruno?' I whispered.

  'Right here,' he said.

  My grandmother's room and my own were on the fifth floor. It was quite a climb, but we made it without meeting a single person on the way because everyone was using the lift. On the fifth floor, I raced along the corridor to the door of my grandmother's room. A pair of her shoes was standing outside the door to the cleaned. Bruno was alongside me. 'What do we do now?' he said.

  Suddenly, I caught sight of a chambermaid coming along the corridor towards us. I saw at once that she was the one who had reported me to the Manager for keeping white mice. Not, therefore, the sort of person I wanted to meet in my present condition. 'Quick!' I said to Bruno. 'Hide in one of those shoes!' I hopped into one shoe and Bruno hopped into the other. I waited for the maid to walk past us. She didn't. When she came to the shoes, she bent down and picked them up. In doing this, she put her hand right inside the one I was hiding in. When one of her fingers touched me, I bit it. It was a silly thing to do, but I did it instinctively, without thinking. The maid let out a scream that must have been heard by ships far out in the English Channel, and she dropped the shoes and ran like the wind down the corridor.

  My grandmother's door opened. 'What on earth is going on out here?' she said. I darted between her legs into her room and Bruno followed me.

  'Close the door, Grandmamma!' I cried. 'Please hurry!'

  She looked around and saw two small brown mice on the carpet. 'Please close it,' I said, and this time she actually saw me talking and recognized my voice. She froze and became absolutely motionless. Every part of her body, her fingers and hands and arms and head, became suddenly as stiff as a marble statue. Her face turned even paler than marble and her eyes were stretched so wide I could see the whites all around them. Then she started to tremble. I thought she was going to faint and fall over.

  'Please close the door quickly, Grandmamma,' I said. 'That awful maid might come in.'

  She somehow managed to gather herself together enough to close the door. She leaned against it, staring down at me white-faced and shaking all over. I saw tears beginning to come out of her eyes and go dribbling down her cheeks.

  'Don't cry, Grandmamma,' I said. 'Things could be a lot worse. I did get away from them. I'm still alive. So is Bruno.'

  Very slowly, she bent down and picked me up with one hand. Then she picked Bruno up with the other hand and put us both on the table. There was a bowl of bananas in the centre of the table and Bruno jumped straight into it and began tearing away with his teeth at one of the banana skins to get at the fruit inside.

  My grandmother grasped the arm of her chair to steady herself, but her eyes never left me.

  'Sit down, dear Grandmamma,' I said.

  She collapsed into her chair.

  'Oh, my darling,' she murmured and now the tears were really streaming down her cheeks. 'Oh, my poor sweet darling. What have they done to you?'

  'I know what they've done, Grandmamma, and I know what I am, but the funny thing is that I don't honestly feel especially bad about it. I don't even feel angry. In fact, I feel rather good. I know I'm not a boy any longer and I never will be again, but I'll be quite all right as long as there's always you to look after me.' I was not just trying to console her. I was being absolutely honest about the way I felt. You may think it odd that I wasn't weeping myself. It was odd. I simply can't explain it.

  'Of course I'll look after you,' my grandmother murmured. 'Who is the other one?'

  'That was a boy called Bruno Jenkins,' I told her. 'They got him first.'

  My grandmother took a new long black cigar out of a case in her handbag and put it in her mouth. Then she got out a box of matches. She struck a match but her fingers were shaking so much that the flame kept missing the end of the cigar. When she got it lit at last, she took a long pull and sucked in the smoke. That seemed to calm her down a bit.

  'Where did it happen?' she whispered. 'Where is the witch now? Is she in the hotel?'

  'Grandmamma,' I said. 'It wasn't just one. It was hundreds! They're all over the place! They're right here in the hotel this very moment!'

  She leaned forward and stared at me. 'You don't mean... you don't actually mean... you don't mean to tell me they're holding the Annual Meeting right here in the hotel?'

  'They've held it, Grandmamma! It's finished! I heard it all! And all of them including The Grand High Witch herself are downstairs now! They're pretending they're the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children! They're all having tea with the Manager!'

  'And they caught you?'

  'They smelt me out,' I said.

  'Dogs' droppings, was it?' she said, sighing.

  'I'm afraid so. But it wasn't strong. They very nearly didn't smell me because I hadn't had a bath for ages.'

  'Children should never have baths,' my grandmother said. 'It's a dangerous habit.'

  'I agree, Grandmamma.'

  She paused, sucking at her cigar.

  'Do you really mean to tell me that they are now all downstairs having tea?' she said.

  'I'm certain of it, Grandmamma.'

  There was another pause. I could see the old glint of excitement slowly coming back into my grandmot
her's eyes, and all of a sudden she sat up very straight in her chair and said sharply, 'Tell me everything, right from the beginning. And please hurry.'

  I took a deep breath and began to talk. I told about going to the Ballroom and hiding behind the screen to do my mouse-training. I told about the notice saying Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. I told her all about the women coming in and sitting down and about the small woman who appeared on the stage and took off her mask. But when it came to describing what her face looked like underneath the mask, I simply couldn't find the right words. 'It was horrible, Grandmamma!' I said. 'Oh, it was so horrible! It was... it was like something that was going rotten!'

  'Go on,' my grandmother said. 'Don't stop.'

  Then I told her about all the others taking off their wigs and their gloves and their shoes, and how I saw before me a sea of bald pimply heads and how the women's fingers had little claws and how their feet had no toes.

  My grandmother had come forward now in her armchair so that she was sitting right on the edge of it. Both her hands were cupped over the gold knob of the stick that she always used when walking, and she was staring at me with eyes as bright as two stars.

  Then I told her how The Grand High Witch had shot out the fiery white-hot sparks and how they had turned one of the other witches into a puff of smoke.

  'I've heard about that!' my grandmother cried out excitedly. 'But I never quite believed it! You are the first non-witch ever to see it happening! It is The Grand High Witch's most famous punishment! It is known as "getting fried", and all the other witches are petrified of having it done to them! I am told that The Grand High Witch makes it a rule to fry at least one witch at each Annual Meeting. She does it in order to keep the rest of them on their toes.'

  'But they don't have any toes, Grandmamma.'

  'I know they don't, my darling, but please go on.'

  So then I told my grandmother about the Delayed Action Mouse-Maker, and when I came to the bit about turning all the children of England into mice, she actually leapt out of her chair shouting, 'I knew it! I knew they were brewing up something tremendous!'