A Hat Full Of Sky

But I nearly became evil, I think. Mother died not long after I was born, my father was at sea and never came back—’

‘Worse things happen at sea,’ said Tiffany. It was something Granny Aching had told her.

‘Yes, right, and probably they did, or possibly he never wanted to come back in any case,’ said Miss Level dryly. ‘And I was put in a charity home, bad food, horrible teachers, blah, blah, and I fell into the worst company possible, which was my own. It’s amazing the tricks you can get up to when you’ve got two bodies. Of course, everyone thought I was twins. In the end I ran away to join the circus. Me! Can you imagine that?’

‘Topsy and Tipsy, The Astounding Mind-Reading Act?’ said Tiffany.

Miss Level stood stock still, her mouth open.

‘It was on the posters over the stairs,’ Tiffany added.

Now Miss Level relaxed.

‘Oh, yes. Of course. Very… quick of you, Tiffany. Yes. You do notice things, don’t you…’

‘I know I wouldn’t pay money to see the egress,’ said Tiffany. ‘It just means “the way out”.’3

‘Clever!’ said Miss Level. ‘Monty put that on a sign to keep people moving though the Believe-It-or-Not tent. “This way to the Egress!” Of course, people thought it was a female eagle or something, so Monty had a big man with a dictionary outside to show them they got exactly what they paid for! Have you ever been to a circus?’

‘Once,’ Tiffany admitted. ‘It hadn’t been much fun. Things that try too hard to be funny often aren’t. There had been a moth-eaten lion with practically no teeth, a tight-rope walker who was never more than a few feet above the ground, and a knife-thrower who threw a lot of knives at an elderly woman in pink tights on a big spinning wooden disc and completely failed to hit her every time. The only real amusement was afterwards, when a cart ran over the clown.’

‘My circus was a lot bigger,’ said Miss Level when Tiffany mentioned this. ‘Although as I recall our knife- thrower was also very bad at aiming. We had elephants and camels and a lion so fierce it bit a man’s arm nearly off.’

Tiffany had to admit that this sounded a lot more entertaining.

‘And what did you do?’ she said.

‘Well, I just bandaged him up while I shoo’d the lion off him—’

‘Yes, Miss Level, but I meant in the circus. Just reading your own mind?’

Miss Level beamed at Tiffany. ‘That, yes, and nearly everything else, too,’ she said. ‘With different wigs on I was the Stupendous Bohunkus Sisters. I juggled plates, you know, and wore costumes covered in sequins. And I helped with the high wire act. Not walking the wire, of course, but generally smiling and glittering at the audience. Everyone assumed I was twins, and circus people don’t ask too many personal questions in any case. And then what with one thing and another, this and that… I came up here and became a witch.’

Both of Miss Level watched Tiffany carefully.

‘That was quite a long sentence, that last sentence,’ said Tiffany.

‘Yes, it was, wasn’t it,’ said Miss Level. ‘I can’t tell you everything. Do you still want to stay? The last three girls didn’t. Some people find me slightly… odd.’

‘Um… I’ll stay,’ said Tiffany, slowly. ‘The thing that moves things about is a bit strange, though.’

Miss Level looked surprised, and then said, ‘Oh, do you mean Oswald?’

‘There’s an invisible man called Oswald who can get into my bedroom?’ said Tiffany, horrified.

‘Oh, no. That’s just a name. Oswald isn’t a man, he’s an ondageist. Have you heard of poltergeists?’

‘Er… invisible spirits that throw things around?’

‘Good,’ said Miss Level. ‘Well, an ondageist is the opposite. They’re obsessive about tidiness. He’s quite handy around the house but he’s absolutely dreadful if he’s in the kitchen when I’m cooking. He keeps putting things away. I think it makes him happy. Sorry, I should have warned you, but he normally hides if anyone comes to the cottage. He’s shy.’

‘And he’s a man? I mean, a male spirit?’

‘How would you tell? He’s got no body and he doesn’t speak. I just called him Oswald because I always picture him as a worried little man with a dustpan and brush.’ The left Miss Level giggled when the right Miss Level said this. The effect was odd and, if you thought that way, also creepy.

‘Well, we are getting on well,’ said the right Miss Level nervously. ‘Is there anything more you want to know, Tiffany?’

‘Yes, please,’ said Tiffany. ‘What do you want me to do? What do you do?’

And mostly, it turned out, what Miss Level did was chores. Endless chores. You could look in vain for much broomstick tuition, spelling lessons or pointy-hat management. They were, mostly, the kind of chores that are just… chores.

There was a small flock of goats, technically led by Stinky Sam who had a shed of his own and was kept on a chain, but really led by Black Meg, the senior nanny, who patiently allowed Tiffany to milk her and then, carefully and deliberately, put a hoof in the milk bucket. That’s a goat’s idea of getting to know you. A goat is a worrying thing if you’re used to sheep, because a goat is a sheep with brains. But Tiffany had met goats before, because a few people in the village kept them for their milk, which was very nourishing. And she knew that with goats you had to use persykology.4 If you got excited, and shouted, and hit them (hurting your hand, because it’s like slapping a sack full of coat hangers) then they had Won and sniggered at you in goat language, which is almost all sniggering anyway.

By day two, Tiffany learned that the thing to do was reach out and grab Black Meg’s hind leg just as she lifted it up to kick the bucket, and lift it up further. That made her unbalanced and nervous and the other goats sniggered at her and Tiffany had Won.

Next there were the bees. Miss Level kept a dozen hives, for the wax as much as the honey, in a little clearing that was loud with buzzing. She made Tiffany wear a veil and gloves before she opened a hive. She wore some, too.

‘Of course,’ she observed, ‘if you are careful and sober and well centred in your life the bees won’t sting. Unfortunately, not all the bees have heard about this theory. Good morning, Hive Three, this is Tiffany, she will be staying with us for a while…’

Tiffany half expected the whole hive to pipe up, in some horrible high-pitched buzz, ‘Good morning, Tiffany!’ It didn’t.

‘Why did you tell them that?’ she asked.

‘Oh, you have to talk to your bees,’ said Miss Level. ‘It’s very bad luck not to. I generally have a little chat with them most evenings. News and gossip, that sort of thing. Every beekeeper knows about “Telling the Bees”.’

‘And who do the bees tell?’ asked Tiffany.

Both of Miss Level smiled at her.

‘Other bees, I suppose,’ she said.

‘So… if you knew how to listen to the bees, you’d know everything that was going on, yes?’ Tiffany persisted.

‘You know, it’s funny you should say that,’ said Miss Level. ‘There have been a few rumours… But you’d have to learn to think like a swarm of bees. One mind with thousands of little bodies. Much too hard to do, even for me.’ She exchanged a thoughtful glance with herself. ‘Maybe not impossible, though.’

Then there were the herbs. The cottage had a big herb garden, although it contained very little that you’d stuff a turkey with, and at this time of year there was still a lot of work to be done collecting and drying, especially the ones with important roots. Tiffany quite enjoyed that. Miss Level was big on herbs.

There is something called the Doctrine of Signatures. It works like this: when the Creator of the Universe made helpful plants for the use of people, he (or in some versions, she) put little clues on them to give people hints.