A Hat Full Of Sky

carter fellow my ol’ fellowy fellow! If ye’ll gie us—me a lift as far as ye are goin’, we—I’ll gie ye this fine shiny golden coin!’

The figure lurched forward and thrust its hand in front of Mr Crabber’s face.

It was quite a large coin. And it was certainly gold. It had come from the treasure of the old dead king who was buried in the main part of the Feegles’ mound. Oddly enough, the Feegles weren’t hugely interested in gold once they’d stolen it, because you couldn’t drink it and it was difficult to eat. In the mound, they mostly used the old coins and plates to reflect candlelight and give the place a nice glow. It was no hardship to give some away.

The carter stared at it. It was more money than he had ever seen in his life.

‘If… sir… would like to… hop on the back of the cart, sir,’ he said, carefully taking it.

‘Ach, right you are, then,’ said the bearded mystery man after a pause. ‘Just a moment, this needs a wee bitty organizin’… OK, youse hands, you just grab the side o’ the cart, and’ you leftie leg, ye gotta kinda sidle along… ach, crivens! Ye gotta bend! Bend! C’mon, get it right!’ The hairy face turned to the carter. ‘Sorry aboot this,’ it said. ‘I talk to my knees, but they dinnae listen to me.’

‘Is that right?’ said the carter weakly. ‘I have trouble with my knees in the wet weather. Goose grease works.’

‘Ah, weel, these knees is gonna get more’n a greasin’ if I ha’ to get doon there an’ sort them oot!’ snarled the hairy man.

The carter heard various bangs and grunts behind him as the man hauled himself onto the tail of the cart.

‘OK, let’s gae,’ said a voice. ‘We’ hav enae got all day. And youse knees, you’re sacked! Crivens, I’m walkin’ like I got a big touch of the stoppies! You gae up to the stomach and send doon a couple of good knee men!’

The carter bit the coin thoughtfully as he urged the horse into a walk. It was such pure gold that he left toothmarks. That meant his passenger was very, very rich. That was becoming very important at this point.

‘Can ye no’ go a wee bitty faster, my good man, my good man?’ said the voice behind him, after they had gone a little way.

‘Ah, well, sir,’ said the carter, ‘see them boxes and crates? I’ve got a load of eggs, and those apples mustn’t be bruised, sir, and then there’s those jugs of—’

There were some bangs and crashes behind him, including the sploosh that a large crate of eggs makes when it hits a road.

‘Ye can gae faster noo, eh?’ said the voice.

‘Hey, that was my—’ Mr Crabber began.

‘I’ve got another one o’ they big wee gold coins for ye!’ And a heavy and smelly arm landed on the carter’s shoulder. Dangling from the glove on the end of it was, indeed, another coin. It was ten times what the load had been worth.

‘Oh, well…’ said the carter, carefully taking the coin. ‘Accidents do happen, eh, sir?’

‘Aye, especially if I dinnae think I’m goin’ fast enough,’ said the voice behind him. ‘We—I mean I’m in a big hurry tae get tae yon mountains, ye ken!’

‘But I’m not a stagecoach, sir,’ said the carter reproachfully as he urged his old horse into a trot.

‘Stagecoach, eh? What’s one o’ them things?’

‘That’s what you’ll need to catch to take you up into the mountains, sir. You can catch one in Twoshirts, sir. I never go any further than Twoshirts, sir. But you won’t be able to get the stage today, sir.’

‘Why not?’

‘I’ve got to make stops at the other villages, sir, and it’s a long way, and on Wednesdays it runs early, sir, and this cart can only go so fast, sir, and—’

‘If we—I dinnae catch yon coach today I’ll gi’e ye the hidin’ o’ yer life,’ growled the passenger. ‘But if I do catch yon coach today, I’ll gie ye five o’ them gold coins.’

Mr Crabber took a deep breath, and yelled:

‘Hi! Hyah! Giddyup, Henry!’

All in all, it seemed to Tiffany, most of what witches did really was very similar to work. Dull work. Miss Level didn’t even use her broomstick very much.

That was a bit depressing. It was all a bit… well, goody-goody. Obviously that was better than being baddy-baddy, but a little more… excitement would be nice. Tiffany wouldn’t like anyone to think she’d expected to be issued with a magic wand on Day One but, well, the way Miss Level talked about magic, the whole point of witchcraft lay in not using any.

Mind you, Tiffany thought she would be depressingly good at not using any. It was doing the simplest magic that was hard.

Miss Level patiently showed her how to make a shamble, which could more or less be made of anything that seemed a good idea at the time provided it also contained something alive, like a beetle or a fresh egg.

Tiffany couldn’t even get the hang of it. That was… annoying. Didn’t she have the virtual hat? Didn’t she have First Sight and Second Thoughts? Miss Tick and Miss Level could throw a shamble together in seconds, but Tiffany just got a tangle, dripping with egg. Over and over again.

‘I know I’m doing it right but it just twists up!’ Tiffany complained. ‘What can I do?’

‘We could make an omelette?’ said Miss Level cheerfully.

‘Oh, please, Miss Level!’ Tiffany wailed.

Miss Level patted her on the back. ‘It’ll happen. Perhaps you’re trying too hard. One day it’ll come. The power does come, you know. You just have to put yourself in its path.’

‘Couldn’t you make one that I could use for a while, to get the hang of it?’

‘I’m afraid I can’t,’ said Miss Level. ‘A shamble is a very tricky thing. You can’t even carry one around, except as an ornament. You have to make it for yourself, there and then, right where and when you want to use it.’

‘Why?’ said Tiffany.

‘To catch the moment,’ said the other part of Miss Level, coming in. ‘The way you tie the knots, the way the string runs—’

‘—the freshness of the egg, perhaps, and the moisture in the air—’ said the first Miss Level.

‘—the tension of the twigs and the kinds of things that you just happen to have in your pocket at that moment—’

‘—even the way the wind is blowing,’ the first Miss Level concluded. ‘All these things make a kind of… of picture of the here and now when you move them right. And I can’t tell you how to move them, because I don’t know.’

‘But you do move them,’ said Tiffany, getting lost. ‘I saw you—’

‘I do it but I don’t know how I do,’ said Miss Level, picking up a couple of twigs and taking a length of thread. Miss Level sat down at the table opposite Miss Level, and all four hands started to put a shamble together.

‘This reminds me of when I was in the circus,’ she said. ‘I was—’

‘—walking out for a while with Marco and Falco, the Flying Pastrami Brothers,’ the other part of Miss Level went on. ‘They would do—’

‘—triple somersaults fifty feet up with no safety net. What lads they were! As alike as two—’

‘—peas, and Marco could catch Falco blindfolded. Why, for a moment I wondered if they were just like me —’

She stopped, went a bit red on both faces and coughed. ‘Anyway,’ she went on, ‘one day I asked them how they managed to stay on the high wire and Falco said, “Never ask the tight-rope walker how he keeps his balance. If he stops to think about it, he falls off.” Although actually—’

‘—he said it like this, “Nev-ah aska tightaroper walkerer…” because the lads pretended they were from Brindisi, you see, because that sounds foreign and impressive and they thought no one would want to watch acrobats called The Flying Sidney and Frank Cartwright. Good advice, though, wherever it came from.’

The hands worked. This was not a lone Miss Level, a bit flustered, but the full Miss Level, all twenty fingers working together.