‘But Grandmamma,’ I said, ‘if nobody has ever seen The Grand High Witch, how can you be so sure she exists?’
My grandmother gave me a long and very severe look. ‘Nobody has ever seen the Devil,’ she said, ‘but we know he exists.’
The next morning, we sailed for England and soon I was back in the old family house in Kent, but this time with only my grandmother to look after me. Then the Easter Term began and every weekday I went to school and everything seemed to have come back to normal again.
Now at the bottom of our garden there was an enormous conker tree, and high up in its branches Timmy (my best friend) and I had started to build a magnificent tree-house. We were able to work on it only at the weekends, but we were getting along fine. We had begun with the floor, which we built by laying wide planks between two quite far-apart branches and nailing them down. Within a month, we had finished the floor. Then we constructed a wooden railing around the floor and that left only the roof to be built. The roof was the difficult bit.
One Saturday afternoon when Timmy was in bed with flu, I decided to make a start on the roof all by myself. It was lovely being high up there in that conker tree, all alone with the pale young leaves coming out everywhere around me. It was like being in a big green cave. And the height made it extra exciting. My grandmother had told me that if I fell I would break a leg, and every time I looked down, I got a tingle along my spine.
I worked away, nailing the first plank on the roof. Then suddenly, out of the corner of my eye, I caught sight of a woman standing immediately below me. She was looking up at me and smiling in the most peculiar way. When most people smile, their lips go out sideways. This woman's lips went upwards and downwards, showing all her front teeth and gums. The gums were like raw meat.
It is always a shock to discover that you are being watched when you think you are alone.
And what was this strange woman doing in our garden anyway?
I noticed that she was wearing a small black hat and she had black gloves on her hands and the gloves came nearly up to her elbows.
Gloves! She was wearing gloves!
I froze all over.
‘I have a present for you,’ she said, still staring at me, still smiling, still showing her teeth
and gums.
I didn't answer.
‘Come down out of that tree, little boy,’ she said, ‘and I shall give you the most exciting present you've ever had.’ Her voice had a curious rasping quality. It made a sort of metallic sound, as though her throat was full of drawing-pins.
Without taking her eyes from my face, she very slowly put one of those gloved hands into her purse and drew out a small green snake. She held it up for me to see.
‘It's tame,’ she said.
The snake began to coil itself around her forearm. It was brilliant green.
‘If you come down here, I shall give him to you,’ she said.
Oh Grandmamma, I thought, come and help me!
Then I panicked. I dropped the hammer and shot up that enormous tree like a monkey. I didn't stop until I was as high as I could possibly go, and there I stayed, quivering with fear. I couldn't see the woman now. There were layers and layers of leaves between her and me.
I stayed up there for hours and I kept very still. It began to grow dark. At last, I heard my grandmother calling my name.
‘I'm up here,’ I shouted back.
‘Come down at once!’ she called out. ‘It's past your suppertime.’
‘Grandmamma!’ I shouted. ‘Has that woman gone?’
‘What woman?’ My grandmother called back.
‘The woman in the black gloves!’
There was silence from below. It was the silence of somebody who was too stunned to speak.
‘Grandmamma!’ I shouted again. ‘Has she gone?’
‘Yes,’ my grandmother answered at last. ‘She's gone. I'm here, my darling. I'll look after you. You can come down now.’