brimstone witch 09 - witch is dead Page 14

  Neville scowled. “What do you two troublemakers want? Have you come to upset Mr Flashwings again? He said you stole something from him last time. That’s not right. You should give it back. Stealing is a bad thing.”

  I pointed out, “Mr Flashwings’ business is built on stealing. Anyway, I didn’t steal from him, I took something which didn’t belong to him. There’s a difference.”

  Neville’s rocky face moved this way and that as he tried to make sense of my words. After a few seconds, he gave up. He stood up and cast a big shadow over us. “Don’t try to confuse me with your fancy words. You’re not welcome here so clear off!”

  “We’re not going anywhere,” I told him. “I want to talk to you about Henrietta Whitmore.”

  Neville’s flint-coloured eyes narrowed. “What about her?”

  “You were spotted at her house a few hours before she died.”

  “Who spotted me? Give me their name.” He cracked his knuckles in a menacing fashion.

  “It doesn’t matter who told me. Why were you there? What did you say to Henrietta?”

  “It’s got nothing to do with you. You’d better leave before I make you leave. If Mr Flashwings sees you here, it’ll upset him. I don’t want to see him upset. I don’t like it.”

  I took up a defiant stand. “If you don’t answer me, I’ll go into the warehouse and tell Mr Flashwings about you going to Henrietta’s house. He won’t like that either.” It was a childish threat, but it worked on Neville.

  He said, “I only went there to tell her off. Mr Flashwings told me what she’d done to Peanut and that it had stopped her stealing stuff. I saw how upset it made Mr Flashwings. I was going to tell that witch to leave Peanut alone.” His head dropped. “Please don’t tell Mr Flashwings what I did.”

  “What did you do?” I asked gently. I prepared myself for Neville’s confession.

  “When I knocked at her door, she answered it and tried to talk to me. Her voice came out all funny. It was like she was drunk. She kept staggering from side to side and her words didn’t make any sense. She fell over. I went inside her house and shut the door. If she was drunk, I didn’t want her neighbours to see her like that. I sat her in a chair and tried to talk to her again. She said she didn’t feel well and had been having strange dreams which didn’t make any sense.”

  “What sort of dreams?” I asked.

  Neville shrugged. “She wasn’t making any sense. She said she’d dreamt about helping those vampires, but that couldn’t be true as she would never help them. She said she didn’t know if she was asleep or awake. Everything was messed up in her head. I tried talking to her about Mr Flashwings but she started to fall asleep. I took her upstairs and put her on her bed. I thought I’d go back later when she wasn’t drunk anymore. Then I left.”

  “What did Henrietta look like when you went to her house?”

  Neville’s rocky face moved into a frown. “What do you mean? She looked like she always looked. Like a witch with a big nose and a big chin and green skin.”

  I asked, “Was there anything unusual about her that morning?”

  Neville gazed at the sky while he thought about that. I could almost hear the cogs in his brain moving. His head snapped back to us and he declared, “Yeah! There was something. That wart on the end of her nose wasn’t green. It was bright red. When I took her upstairs it was blue. I thought it had something to do with what she’d been drinking. Are you going to tell Mr Flashwings about me? Are you going to get me into trouble?”

  “No. You’ve been very helpful, Neville. Thank you for talking to us.”

  Neville didn’t know what to do with my thanks and glowered at us. “You still can’t go in the warehouse. I won’t let you.”

  “That’s okay. Thank you again.” I gave him a wave before getting back on my broomstick.

  Stanley got on the front and said, “That was interesting about Henrietta’s wart. Do you think it had poison in it? Was Henrietta poisoned by her wart?”

  “It’s a possibility. There’s only one place we can go now to confirm that.”

  We left Dingy Skipper and headed over to Brimstone. I told Stanley where we were going and what I was going to do.

  Dr Morgan was delighted to see us. “Thank goodness you’re both in one piece,” she said. “I’ve had your gran around here every five minutes to see if I’ve heard from you. I told her to fly over to Dingy Skipper and check on you herself, but she said she was leaving you to get on with your job without her interference. She’ll be relieved to know you’re still alive.”

  Stanley announced, “We have been in danger a few times, but we’re okay.”

  “I’m glad to hear that, Stanley. Take a seat. You’re here about Henrietta, I presume.”

  We sat opposite Dr Morgan and I looked in dismay at the sheets of paper which almost covered her desk. I asked, “Are those results all to do with Henrietta?”

  “I’m afraid so. I’ve run every possible test I can on her. For the life of me, I can’t find out what killed her.”

  “We might be able to help you with that,” I said. I told her about the colour-changing wart and concluded, “Whoever killed her knew about the enchantment. They knew her wart would disappear as the enchantment wore off. As the wart vanished, so did the poison which killed her.”

  Dr Morgan nodded. “That’s quite ingenious. But how can we prove that? Have you found a way to enchant Henrietta in her deceased state? Can you change her back into her green-skinned self complete with wart?”

  “Erm, sort of. You’re not going to like this,” I said.

  Stanley made a huffing sound. “That’s an understatement. I know Dr Morgan won’t like it because I don’t. I think it’s a terrible idea.”

  Dr Morgan gave me a studied look. “I know what you’re planning to do. You’re going to take on Henrietta’s memories. You’ve done that before with living creatures. Didn’t you once do it with that murdered goblin you dealt with?”

  “She did!” Stanley answered for me. “She almost died! It’s a highly dangerous spell and I won’t have her doing it again.”

  I reached out to Stanley and stroked his back. “I have to, Stanley. It’s the only way. I don’t even know if it will work. Henrietta’s been dead a few days now. I might not be able to connect with her. But if I do, I could try to make sense of those confused memories of hers.”

  Dr Morgan said, “What’s the poisoned wart got to do with her memories? Are you hoping to see the creature who poisoned her?”

  “That would be great,” I said. “But there is a variation on the spell I can use. It will change me physically into the other being minutes before they died. If I can achieve that, I will be in Henrietta’s enchanted state. With a bit of luck, you could take a sample of her wart. Or my wart. You know what I mean.”

  “Now just a minute!” Dr Morgan cried out. “Are you suggesting that I lop a bit of your nose off while you’re under this spell? That’s out of the question!”

  “It wouldn’t be my nose. It’s only a temporary transformation.”

  Dr Morgan folded her arms. “I refuse to take any part in this. It’s far too dangerous.”

  “I agree,” Stanley said as he attempted to fold his front legs.

  I looked at the doctor. “You don’t have to chop my nose off, but you could take a swab.” I pulled a face. “There could be oozing from the wart.”

  “Yuk!” Stanley said.

  Dr Morgan unfolded her arms. “Oozing? Yes, I could do something with oozing. How dangerous is this spell exactly?”

  “Let’s put it this way; don’t tell Gran about it for a few weeks. Or Blythe.” I gave her a big smile. “You and Stanley are here to watch me carefully while I perform the spell. If anything weird happens to me, you can sort me out.”

  “By ‘weird,’ do you mean dying? And by ‘sort me out,’ do you mean bring you back to life?” Dr Morgan asked.

  I nodded. “We’re on the same wavelength. Let’s get started. For the spell to work,
I need to be lying next to Henrietta. Where is she?”

  Chapter 29

  I didn’t feel at all queasy as Dr Morgan took me into the room where Henrietta’s body was lying. As the doctor pulled the cover back from Henrietta’s face, I felt deep sympathy for her and silently vowed I’d catch her killer.

  I pulled up a long table and put it next to Henrietta. Stanley paced up and down in front of the table and muttered to himself about this being a bad idea. I got a chair, put it next to my table and put Stanley on it.

  I said to him, “I want you to keep an eye on me. If you think I’m in trouble, bring me out of the spell.”

  “How do I do that?” Stanley fretted. “I’m not a witch.”

  “Hit me around the face with your paws. Jump up and down on me. You’ll think of a way.” I turned to the doctor. “You can do the same.”

  Dr Morgan gave me a tight-lipped smile and went over to Stanley’s side.

  I lay on the table and reached out for Henrietta’s cold hand. I concentrated on the words of the spell and closed my eyes. I still had no idea if this would work.

  I felt myself becoming sleepy. My limbs felt pleasantly heavy. A feeling of happiness flowed over me. Life was good. I felt content.

  I saw myself in Henrietta’s house. I was talking to someone and they were smiling and nodding. I went to the stockroom and found a bottle for them. I handed it over and the creature thanked me. My happy feeling intensified.

  Another customer. Another trip to the stockroom. It took me a while to find the bottle this time as my attention went to something else. What was it? I couldn’t focus.

  Back to the customer. More thanks. More happy feelings.

  Then tiredness. Extreme tiredness. Followed by confusion. What was that I heard? Who was in my house? What did they say? Am I dreaming? This doesn’t make sense.

  Fear trickled down my spine. A shadowy figure was waiting for me near the stockroom. Why are they looking at me like that? What are they doing with my bottles?

  The fear increased. I shivered and my stomach clenched. I had to tell someone. I had to warn them. Tobias. Where was he?

  More fear. More confusion. I felt sick and light-headed. This couldn’t be happening. My heart hurt. Pain shot through my nose and up and down my body. I couldn’t breathe. Panic. Horror.

  I screamed ‘No! I don’t want to die!’

  A cold voice replied, ‘You have to. It’s the only way.’

  Silence.

  Then someone was hitting me in the face. Someone else was slapping my hand.

  “Cassia! Wake up! Come back to us!” Stanley yelled as he patted my cheek.

  Dr Morgan’s voice was calmer, “Time to come back to us, Cassia. Take some deep breaths. That’s it. Let’s get that heart rate back to normal. Good girl.”

  I opened my eyes to find Stanley’s nose pressed against mine. His whiskers were tickling my cheeks.

  “Hey, Stanley. I’m fine. You can move away from me now,” I said.

  Stanley put his head on my cheek and whimpered, “You’re not fine. You screamed and cried. It was awful to watch.”

  I took my hand from Henrietta’s and wrapped my arm around Stanley. “I’m sorry you had to see that.”

  Dr Morgan had my other arm and was checking my pulse. Her face was white.

  I said to her, “Are you okay?”

  “No, I’m not. That was a terrible thing to witness, young lady. If I wasn’t so grateful you’re still alive, I’d be furious with you.” She released my arm and gave me a hard look.

  “What did I do? Did I call anyone’s name out?” I pulled myself into a sitting position.

  Stanley said, “You kept smiling and saying ‘You’re welcome,’ to begin with. Then you started mumbling something about unwanted visitors and bottles. Then you started to shake and cry. You screamed out and your body went all stiff and still. I thought you were dead.” He stopped talking.

  “Oh, Stanley. I really am sorry. When I perform this spell again, I’ll ask someone else to watch over me.”

  Dr Morgan shrieked, “Perform this spell again! Are you kidding me? Cassia, you almost died. Your heart was pounding like a racehorse, then it abruptly stopped. It was the action of Stanley and me slapping you which brought you back.”

  “But I’m fine now.” My hand went to my nose. “Did I change? Did I get a wart on the end of my nose?”

  “No, you didn’t change,” Dr Morgan said.

  I looked at Henrietta and my heart sank. “Oh, she looks just the same. She didn’t change either.”

  “She did change,” Dr Morgan advised. “Just for a minute, but it was enough time for me to take swabs from her nose and around her face.”

  Stanley shuddered. “There was purple stuff coming out of her wart. It was disgusting.”

  I gave them a firm nod. “Then my spell was worth it.”

  Stanley and Dr Morgan glowered at me and didn’t reply.

  I ignored their hostile looks and continued, “I did discover something interesting. Henrietta knew who killed her. And she knew they were going to do it. Her death has something to do with those bottles in her stockroom. I’m going to go back there and have a closer look at them.” I smiled at the doctor. “When will you know what was in Henrietta’s wart?”

  Dr Morgan shook her head at me. “Would it hurt you to rest for a minute? Don’t answer that. For your information, I’ve bought a very expensive machine which will break down the components within minutes. With all the murders going on around here, I thought we could use some high-tech equipment.”

  “Ooo, fancy. Did you get it from the human world?” I asked. Just like Gran’s cellar door in the human world led to Brimstone, Dr Morgan had a door in her office which led into the human world.

  Dr Morgan nodded. “I had to. We don’t even have the internet in Brimstone, let alone anything high-tech. I’ll put the sample in now and we’ll have a result soon.” She gave me another hard look. “While we’re waiting for that, you will have a drink of strong coffee and something to eat. I’ve got some bananas in my office. You need to keep your strength up. Come into my office.”

  “Okay. I’ll be with you in a minute. Thanks for all your help.”

  “Hmm,” was the doctor’s reply as she left the room with some sample jars.

  As soon as she’d gone, Stanley said, “Cassia, I can feel you trembling. What did you experience while you were under that spell?”

  “Pure fear, Stanley. Heart-stopping fear. As soon as my legs have stopped shaking, we’ll get on with our investigation.”

  I didn’t tell Stanley the worst part. As Henrietta took her final breaths, her killer stood over her and laughed.

  Chapter 30

  Dr Morgan gave us the results of the substance which had come from Henrietta’s wart. A mixture of plants and herbs had been used. I recognised one of the plants. It had been part of Selena’s transforming potion.

  Stanley and I headed back to Gran’s apartment and I busied myself making notes of the things I’d experienced while under my spell. They didn’t make sense once I’d written them down, but I was confident they would when I had all the facts.

  Stanley said, “I’m worried about Tobias. I know he’s with Vera, but do you think he’s okay?”

  “We can soon find out. Let’s send a butterfly message to him.”

  I opened the window and summoned a Brimstone butterfly. A green one flew in. It was a female butterfly. Stanley gave her a message and added Vera Gilligot’s name.

  “I’m sorry,” Stanley said to the butterfly, “but I don’t know Vera’s address.”

  “The butterfly will find her,” I assured him.

  The butterfly left through the open window.

  Stanley jumped onto the chair next to me and said, “What are your thoughts? Do you have any idea who killed Henrietta yet?”

  I tapped the notes in front of me. “Selena is my main suspect. She’s a shapeshifter and could be the fake Elf who’s been following us. She cou
ld be working for herself or on behalf of Gethin. But I can’t think of a reason why Selena would kill Henrietta.”

  “Perhaps Henrietta refused to make that vampire potion for her anymore. Henrietta might have been concerned about what the vampires were doing in the town and decided she wasn’t going to play any part in that. And even though Henrietta was making potions for Gethin, he could have killed her just for the fun of it.”

  I nodded. “That’s possible. Peanut Flashwings is also a suspect. She knew where those plants grew. She could have taken some of the plants to another witch to make a poisonous potion for Henrietta. She’s small enough to fly up to Henrietta’s nose and inject her. But why would she do that? I know she was angry when Henrietta’s anti-theft potion stopped working for her, but was that a reason to kill her?”

  “The stealing part of her personality could have been too strong. She might have seen many valuable things in Henrietta’s house and wanted them for herself and her dad.” Stanley raised his paw. “That could have been Peanut’s plan all along. She tricked Henrietta into making that anti-thieving potion for her when all the time she was sizing up Henrietta’s belongings. Alf Flashwings could be involved too.”

  “That’s another possibility. Good thinking, Stanley.” I pointed to the large pile of books in front of me. “I’m going to have a look through Gran’s spell books to see what other spells those ingredients from the wart poison can be used for. Then we’ll go back to Dingy Skipper and look at those bottles in the stockroom. When I was under my spell, I got the strong impression Henrietta was confused when she looked at those bottles. Why was that?”

  A green butterfly came through the window. She landed in front of Stanley and opened her wings. Vera’s voice boomed out:

  “Hello! This is Vera Gilligot from Dingy Skipper. Am I talking to Stanley the cat? I hope so. I don’t know how these butterfly things work. I haven’t used one for years, not with all the trouble that’s been going on in this town. My mum used the butterflies all the time, especially when it came to getting Dad home from the pub. He might as well have lived at that pub! He was there more than he was at home. I remember one time when Mum went storming down to the pub with Dad’s pyjamas in her hands. She threw them at him and said he might as well sleep at the pub! Ha! And do you know what? He did! He slept next to the barrels in the cellar. Anyway, I can’t stand here chatting to this butterfly all day, I’ve got my delicates on the washing line outside and I want to check on them. I saw how her next door was looking at them when I hung them out. If she as much as lays one grubby finger on them, I’ll tell her husband where she goes on a Tuesday night. And it’s not the bingo! Anyway, Tobias is fine. He’s having a nap upstairs on my bed. See you soon. Signing off now. This was Vera Gilligot.”