Witches incorporated

CHAPTER SIX

Once the shouting and squawking had died down, and Monk had picked himself up and brushed the leaf mould off his sober blue suit and rubbed the bits that Reg had poked with her beak, Melissande clapped her hands for order.

“All right,” she said sharply. “If everyone can just calm down? Good. Now, Monk. Do you have any idea what it is you think we’ve got?”

“Well,” said Monk, frowning, “after a lot of careful consideration and by a comprehensive process of elimination I’m pretty sure it’s a concatetanic conglomeration of uber-parallel-dimensional antietheretic particles supercharged with extraneous thaumaturgical emissions on a scale of seventeen to the eleventh power, cubed.”

Melissande blinked at him. “I see,” she said, after a pause. “Ah-let me put that another way. Would you have any idea what it was if you weren’t a thaumaturgical genius working in a secret government Research and Development facility?”

“Of course,” said Monk, as though surprised she’d even ask. “It’s a sprite.”

“A sprite?” Bibbie’s eyes lit up yet again. The wretched girl really was as bad as her equally wretched brother. “Really, Monk? You’re positive? Because according to Herbert and Lowe-”

“Sprites are just another postulation of theoretical thaumaturgical metaphysics,” said Monk eagerly. “I know, I know. But now I’m not so sure!”

Melissande groaned. “Well, I’m sure. I’m sure I don’t understand a word the two of you are saying. Now start talking Ottish or I swear I’ll walk away and let Reg do her worst!”

“Sorry,” Monk said, sheepish. “Basically, what it means is I seem to have proven the actual existence of a theoretical construct, which when you think about it is pretty bloody exciting, really, even if it’s proving a trifle inconvenient, because-”

Melissande grabbed him by both ears and pulled his face towards hers until their noses were touching. “Dearest Monk, I don’t care if it’s the most exciting thing since the invention of expanding corsets. As far as I’m concerned this sprite of yours is nothing more than a pain in the bu-” She glanced at Reg, who’d perched herself on a handy low-slung palm branch, and smoothly changed tracks. “Nothing more than a huge inconvenience. Incidentally, is it alive?”

With enormous care, Monk disengaged her fingers from his ears then inched himself away from the Botchaki Silk Tree. “I suppose that depends on how you define ‘alive’.”

“Does it have thoughts? Feelings? Can it communicate?”

“Mel, I don’t know,” he said. “Honestly. It exists, I know that much. But until I can study it that’s all I’m prepared to say.”

“And how is it you’re so sure we’ve got it?”

“ Oh!” said Bibbie suddenly, and danced a little on the spot. “Of course! Great-uncle Throgmorton’s ghost! The sprite’s incompatible with our dimension’s etheretic vibrations so it’s causing physical manifestations on our plane. The housemaids being tossed out of bed and the exploding strawberry syllabub and-”

Monk nodded vigorously. “Exactly!”

“And the ink, Mel,” Bibbie added, still dancing. “This explains your debacle with the tamper-proof ink!”

“What debacle with the tamper-proof ink?” said Monk.

Melissande sighed. “I tried to brew up some tamper-proof ink this morning,” she muttered, cheeks heating. “And it went kablooey. Three times.”

“But now we know it wasn’t your fault!” said Bibbie.

“Perhaps if you could manage not to sound quite so surprised?” she said, teeth gritted again. “That would be nice.”

“Heh,” said Reg, flapping back to her shoulder. “Fat chance of that, ducky.”

Bibbie ignored both of them. “It’s the only explanation that makes sense. Assuming a sprite is an agitation of super-charged inverse etheretic particles with a cohesive substructure in direct reverse proportion to our dimension’s thaumaturgical vibrations. Monk?”

“That’s the idea, more or less,” he said, nodding.

Bibbie slitted her eyes. “Can you come up with a better definition?”

“Ah…” He shook his head. “No.”

“ Right, then,” said Bibbie, and dusted her hands. “That means the sprite’s likely to have a particularly deleterious effect on any ambient thaumaturgic processes. In other words-the ink!”

“So I was right,” said Monk, vastly relieved. “I knew you had the rotten thing because it’s not in the house any more and it’s not at work, either, and when I called Mother nothing untoward was happening there so it didn’t go home with Dodsworth and the others.”

“But why would it have left with us?” said Melissande.

“Well, if my theory on the nature of interdimensional sprites is correct, they’re attracted to the corporeal essence of something substantial in their immediate vicinity.”

Reg snorted. “Are you quite sure you don’t want me to show you those buttock-reducing exercises, ducky?”

“ Amazing, Monk,” said Bibbie, forestalling an imminent outbreak of hostilities. Her eyes were burning with a resurgence of thaumaturgical fervour. “And it’s all because you accidentally shifted the polarities of your portable portal prototype.”

“ Precisely!”

Bibbie threw her arms around her brother and kissed him enthusiastically on both cheeks. “ Monk, you’re a genius!”

He hugged her back, laughing. “Yeah, well, I dunno-”

“You are, you are! This’ll be your second article in The Golden Staff. Oh, I’m so proud of you!”

“ Proud of him?” Reg snorted, and gave her tail feathers a peevish rattle. “He’s a menace to society, that’s what he is.” More rattling of tail feathers, and a pointed glare. “And only you could fall arse over teakettle for him, Princess Pushy. I’m starting to think you should’ve fallen for Gerald after all.”

Melissande heaved another sigh. There was no point holding a grudge against the horrible bird: Reg made a warthog look thin-skinned. Besides, she had a point. Not about falling for Gerald, but about Monk.

I care for him a great deal, I truly do, but…

“ It does sound as though you’re playing with fire, you know,” she told him. “You really ought to be more careful.”

Sometimes he reminded her of a helium-filled balloon: impossible to repress for longer than a few moments. “Mel, trust me, it’s perfectly safe,” he insisted. “We’re not in a skerrick of danger. Not from the sprite, and not from the portal opener. I promise.”

How could she doubt him? He was a thaumaturgical genius, after all. “Fine. If you say so.”

“I say so,” he said, that anarchic grin lighting up his face.

“Yes, well,” she muttered, trying in vain to smother her own answering smile. “Only the thing is, aren’t you talking theoretically? I mean, I don’t suppose you can actually prove any of it, can you? Because if you’re right and this sprite creature did leave your place with us last night, I’d like to know for sure.”

“And so would I,” Bibbie added. “Because I’ve got some hexes to put together and I don’t want them going kablooey.”

“As a matter of fact I can prove it,” said Monk. “Hold on.” He rummaged in the nearby lush tropical undergrowth and pulled out a large, shabby carpetbag. “I threw this together over breakfast. It’s a bit rough and ready but I’m pretty sure it’ll do the trick.”

Melissande frowned as he opened the bag and took out an eye-boggling contraption consisting of a metal rod wrapped in copper wire and attached to some kind of needle-and-gauge arrangement.

“What is it?” she said, suspicious.

His eyebrows shot up. “A portable etheretic sprite detector, of course.”

Which he’d invented while eating scrambled eggs and bacon. Of course. She shook her head. “How does it work?”

Monk opened his mouth to answer, then closed it again. “Ah… do you really want me to explain or should I just show you?”

She sniffed. “Good point.”

Flicking a switch, he passed the wire-wrapped rod down his front. Nothing happened. “See?” he said, grinning again. So ridiculously pleased with himself. Take away his inventions and Monk would go into a decline, she was sure. Just like a baby deprived of its rattle. “No reaction. That means no sprite activity for the last ten hours at least.”

Bibbie clapped her hands like a child at a party. “Ooooh, test me, test me!”

Her brother obliged. The needle flickered a couple of times, and the gauge emitted a squeak.

“Ha!” he said. “Contact… but only minimally. You’ve been in the vicinity of a sprite recently but you haven’t had a significant encounter.”

“All right then,” said Melissande, bracing herself. “Test me.”

As Monk ran the sprite detector over her the gauge screeched like a long-tailed cat in a roomful of rocking chairs. Reg let out a shriek and erupted into the humid air, shedding feathers and curses in equal measure.

“Bullseye!” Monk said, practically chortling with satisfaction. “That’s excellent. It’s always nice to see a theory proven out. You, Melissande, are covered in etheretic spores.”

She took a step back. “ Etheretic spores? What do you mean etheretic spores? What are etheretic spores? ”

“Oh, you know,” he said vaguely, checking the readings on the gauge. “Randomly excreted thaumaturgical particles.”

Still squawking, Reg landed on a branch of the Botchaki Silk Tree and started a complicated little foot-wiping dance on its pale yellow bark. Horrified, Melissande stared at her outstretched hands.

“Monk, I don’t like this!” she said, mortified to hear a quaver in her voice. “I don’t like this at-”

“Oh, don’t worry,” he said blithely, glancing up from his equipment. “I’m pretty sure the spores are harmless.”

“ Pretty sure? Monk, you raving lunatic, you irresponsible bird brain, you-”

“Oy!” said Reg. “Mind who you’re calling a bird brain, madam!”

Monk looked up, surprised. “You’re fine, Mel. Really.”

“Says you,” she retorted. “Forgive me if I’d like a second opinion. After all, you’re the one who thought sprites were mythical!”

His face split in another wide grin. “And now we know they’re not! Isn’t it great? I had no idea that humming three bars of descending cyclonic harmonics in B-flat minor while holding the portal key would get me into other dimensions! If I had I would’ve gone looking for the one with the voluptuous can-can girls!”

If she’d had a parasol handy she would have poked him in the buttocks with it. “Monk Markham, I swear, either you start taking this seriously or-”

“I am taking this seriously!” he protested. “This is a major thaumaturgical breakthrough, Mel, and they don’t come along every day. It’s fantastic!”

“ Fantastic?” Breathless with outrage, she came perilously close to snatching up the carpetbag and throwing it at him. “It’s not fantastic, you-you turnip, it’s disgusting! I’m covered in interdimensional sprite shit! Where’s the nearest tap? Has anybody got a clean hanky? How much of the stuff is on me, I can’t see a bloody thing!”

Monk stared at her, bemused. “Of course you can’t. We’re dealing with a basic visual incompatibility between dimensional vibrations, remember?”

“No, not really!” she shouted. “I’m a bit too busy being covered in interdimensional sprite shit! Where’s the wretched thing now, Monk? Is it in my hair?” She began frantically patting her head. “Oh, Saint Snodgress preserve me, don’t let there be a sprite in my hair!”

He ran the sprite detector over her again. This time the volume was appreciably lower, more beeping than screeching. “It’s okay, it’s okay, it’s not in your hair, Mel,” he said, trying to appease. “It’s not anywhere. You’re one hundred percent sprite-free, I promise.”

“And yet still covered in sprite shit, yes?” she demanded.

“Um… well… yes. Sorry about that. But the rate of decay is accelerating,” he added encouragingly. “That’s good, isn’t it?”

She goggled at him. “ Decay? You mean I’m covered in decomposing sprite shit? How is that good, Monk? ”

“It’s all right, Mel,” said Bibbie, trying to be helpful. “We’ll get you cleaned up somehow.”

“We certainly will,” said Reg from her safely distant tree branch. “The Department’s bound to have a decontamination chamber they can spare for a week or two. In the meantime, Mad Miss Markham and I can mind the agency. She’ll even remember to collect the mail without being reminded, won’t you, ducky?”

“Absolutely,” Bibbie agreed. “I promise.”

Breathing heavily, Melissande glared at the pair of them. “Strange as it may seem, I don’t consider that particularly comforting. In fact I won’t be comfortable until we track down this inconvenient creature and send it back where it belongs!” She rounded on Monk. “So if it’s not stuck on me, where is it?”

“Still at the agency,” said Bibbie. “It must be.”

Raising her eyebrows, Melissande flicked a glance at Monk’s unhelpful sister. “Must it? How do we know it’s not rampaging around town even as we speak?”

“Because there’s nothing registering on the Department’s monitors,” said Monk. “Believe me, I’ve checked. Besides, if the sprite was loose in town we’d have heard about it by now. Exploding tamper-proof ink would be the least of our worries.”

“Then what are you waiting for?” she demanded. “Let’s get back to the office so you can catch the little bugger and send it packing!”

He winced. “Sorry. I’d love to, only I can’t. I’ve got a secret briefing with Uncle Ralph. But after I invented the portable sprite detector I invented a sprite trap to catch it in. See?”

She stared as he opened the carpetbag again and pulled out what looked like a birdcage for a stunted canary. “It’s not very big.”

He shrugged. “Neither’s the sprite.”

“How do you know, Monk? The sprite’s invisible!”

“I know,” he insisted. “I’m a thaumaturgist, remember?” When she didn’t say anything, he adopted a wounded expression. “What? Don’t you trust me?”

She gave him an incendiary look. And to think he nagged Gerald for turning Tavistock into a lion… “ Of course I do, Monk. When it comes to inventing new ways of getting into trouble I trust you implicitly.”

Reg sniggered. “You tell him, ducky.”

“And speaking of invisible,” she added, “since we can’t see this wretched sprite, how exactly are we supposed to catch it?”

“Easy,” said Monk, so effortlessly confident. So completely unmoved by her righteous indignation. He was the most infuriating man… “There’s an etheretic normaliser built into the trap. You activate it with this switch here, see?” He pointed. “If the sprite’s within range the multi-phase thaumaturgic agitation will render it visible.”

“For how long?”

“Long enough, I promise.”

“And how do you define “within range”?”

“A few feet.”

“Is that all?” she said, dismayed. “Monk-”

“I know, I know,” he said, carelessly apologetic. Infuriating? He was impossible. “Sorry, Mel. What can I say? It was a rush job.”

As solutions went it was far from perfect, but with time and circumstances against them it would have to do. “Fine. And what happens once we’ve caught our uninvited guest?”

“You can leave me a message at the Department and I’ll drop by the agency and pick it up,” said Monk. “Better yet, come to dinner tonight and bring it with you.”

She stared at him. He was serious. He was actually, deadly, serious. If I wasn’t in lo-quite fond of him, I really would punch him in the nose. “ Monk-”

“Oh, save your breath, ducky,” said Reg, and flapped down from the tree branch to take up her favoured shoulder-perch. “Let’s just take care of this, shall we? I don’t know about you but I want a bath!”

“ One bath?” Melissande stared down at her invisible-sprite-shit-covered self. “I won’t be getting out of the tub for a week! I don’t care how many times I have to tramp up and down those stairs with kettlefuls of hot water!”

“Does that mean you’ll do it?” her infuriating, impossible young man asked hopefully.

Yes, indeed. She so wanted to punch him. “Do I have a choice?”

Beaming, Monk kissed her swiftly and chastely on the cheek. “Terrific!” He shoved the sprite detector and sprite trap into the carpetbag then thrust the bag at her. “Knew I could count on you, Mel.”

“And me,” said Bibbie, offended.

“Yes, yes, you too,” he added hastily.

“Oh? And what am I, then?” demanded Reg. “A bowl of chopped chicken liver?”

“Of course not!” said Monk. “I can count on all of you.” He fished out his fob watch and flicked it open. “Only I’m going to have to count on you from afar, because-”

“Not so fast!” said Melissande. “You have to show us how this sprite trap works.”

“I wrote down some instructions,” he said. “They’re in the bag. Honestly, Mel, you’ll be fine.”

“You hope,” she retorted. “I mean, what if your precious sprite does have a mind of its own and doesn’t want to be caught? What if it fights back? What if-”

“It won’t. I doubt it’s aware of what’s going on. To be honest, Mel, I don’t even think it’s intelligent.”

“Well, that makes two of you,” she snapped. And to think that an hour ago she’d thought the darkest clouds in her sky were shaped like sagging buttocks. “Honestly, Monk. Why does your problem have to become my problem?”

He winced. “I am sorry. Truly.”

And he was, she didn’t doubt it. The trouble was, being sorry this time wouldn’t stop him next time. When metaphysical madness struck again, and it would, he’d not be strong enough to resist it. Asking Monk to turn his back on a new discovery was as futile as expecting Reg to be ladylike.

The only question is am I strong enough to endure the consequences? Because any moth fluttering around Monk Markham’s flame is going to get its wings singed, sooner or later.

The thought must have shown on her face, because Monk took an alarmed step towards her. “Melissande? I mean it. You’re not in any danger. I wouldn’t put you in harm’s way. Not any of you.”

She let out a gusty sigh. “Not on purpose, no.”

“Not ever,” he insisted. “Look-if you don’t want to do this-”

“No, no, I’ll do it,” she said. She glanced at Bibbie and Reg. “ We’ll do it. But you owe us a tin of tamper-proof ink.”

“A big tin,” added Bibbie.

Reg snorted. “ Three big tins.”

“Three big tins of tamper-proof ink,” said Monk, a relieved smile lighting his face. “Absolutely. I’ll make it myself.”

“All right then, girls,” said Melissande, watching Monk beat a hasty retreat. “Let’s go catch ourselves an invisible sight-seeing interdimensional sprite, shall we?”

As they hurried back to the agency, still on foot unfortunately, given the parlous state of their finances, she could only hope the stares they attracted were the usual ones on account of the tweed trousers, and had nothing to do with the invisible sprite shit becoming inconveniently visible.

Clustered with Bibbie and Reg in the dingy corridor outside their office-Saint Snodgrass be praised the other two offices on their floor were empty-she stared at the agency’s locked door. “So… how do we know the sprite’s still in there?”

Bibbie shrugged. “There’s only one way to find out.” She grabbed her brother’s carpetbag and took out the portable sprite detector. “Stand back,” she added, turning it on. “This could get interesting.”

Melissande flattened herself against the corridor’s far wall and watched Bibbie pass the sprite detector’s copper wire-wrapped rod over their recently painted door.

“Does that answer your question?” Bibbie shouted above the detector’s hysterical shrieking.

Melissande nodded, hands clapped over her ears. “Yes! Yes! Now turn it off before we have everyone in the building up here asking inconvenient questions and calling the landladies!”

Bibbie turned off the detector then unhexed the agency door’s lock. Not that it needed hexing and a key. It barely needed the key, since there wasn’t anything in there worth stealing. But they were a witching locum agency. It was a matter of professional pride.

“Right,” said Bibbie, as the hum from the unhexing faded. “Got your key, Mel? I left mine at the boarding house.”

Of course she did. When it came to “scatty,” Bibbie was a dictionary listing all by herself. She fished out her key, unlocked the door-then hesitated. “Wait. We need a plan first.”

“We’ve got a plan,” said Reg. “Find the sprite, catch the sprite, make that Markham boy eat the sprite for dinner, without mustard. That’s the plan.”

Melissande frowned. “That’s not a very specific plan, Reg. For starters I think that before we go charging in there we’d better make sure we know how to work Monk’s sprite trap.”

“Oh, well, if you’re going to insist on being all sensible about things,” said Bibbie, grinning.

“I don’t know,” she said, suddenly uncertain, while Bibbie read Monk’s hastily scrawled operating instructions. “Perhaps we should wait until Monk’s finished his meeting at the Department. I mean, this isn’t ordinary thaumaturgy we’re dealing with, is it, it’s uncharted territory, and-”

“Bollocks to that,” said Reg, nipping her on the ear. “Since when do we need a man to do our dirty work? We’re Witches Incorporated, ducky, and it’ll take more than some cheeky sod of a sprite on an interdimensional sightseeing safari to get the better of us! Perhaps we should wait for Monk.” She snorted. “I’m surprised at you, madam. And not in a good way!”

“All right, all right,” she muttered. “It was just a suggestion.”

In truth, she was a little surprised at herself. It seemed her confidence had taken more of a battering lately than she’d been willing to admit, even in the privacy of her own thoughts.

Get a grip, woman. You’re a royal princess and a former prime minister. This is no time to be going to pieces.

She turned to Bibbie. “Well? What do you think? Will Monk’s sprite trap work?”

“It ought to,” said Bibbie, thoughtfully. “I mean, his theory’s sound enough-as far as I can tell.” Then she rolled her eyes with sisterly scorn. “Although if he’d bothered to ask me I’d have told him you get much better etheretic cohesion if you use two parts powdered shloss-root to one part dried dragon-tongue, not three. But did he ask? Of course not. Just because he works for the Department he think he knows every-”

“ Excellent,” she said briskly. “So let’s get this over with, shall we? When I open the door, Reg, you fly left. I’ll dart right. And Bibbie, you forge straight ahead with the trap activated. As soon as we spot the sprite, Reg, you play sheepdog and herd it into a corner so Bibbie can get it into the trap.”

“And what are you going to do?” said Reg.

“Take notes for the post-mortem.” She took hold of the door handle. “Right, girls. On three. One-two-”

There was a click and a brief, high-pitched buzz as Bibbie activated Monk’s invention.

“ Three!”

She flung the door wide and they charged into the office like a very small herd of maddened wildebeest.

“There it is!” shouted Bibbie, as the sprite trap’s flux capacitor illuminated the sprite. “Oh look-it’s so pretty!”

Kicking the door shut behind them, Melissande stared at the creature. Bibbie was right, drat her. The sprite was pretty, beautiful even, all dancing blue etheretic particles. Not much bigger than one of Rupert’s late lamented butterflies, it shimmered with an incandescent brilliance as it perched on the test tube of ruined tamper-proof ink. And floating deep within the blue sparkles, a face. Or something that maybe, possibly, looked like a face…

No. No. It’s my imagination. And I am not about to get attached or feel sorry for it just because it’s a long way from home.

“ Ha!” she said. “A pretty big pain in the arse, you mean.” Abandoning her plan, she snatched the sprite trap from Bibbie and advanced. “Come here, you horrible little creature! I’ll teach you to cover me in interdimensional sprite shit!”

“No! Wait!” chorused Reg and Bibbie, for once in perfect harmony. “Don’t do that, you’ll fri-”

Too late. Temporarily brought into dimensional phase by Monk’s sprite trap, the startled sprite emitted a shrill squeak and launched itself into the air.

“After it, Reg!” cried Bibbie. “Melissande, you raving nutter, give me the trap!”

Shamed by her loss of control, Melissande surrendered the sprite trap and stood back as Reg and Bibbie ran and flew to and fro beneath the agitated blue sprite. Cries of “ Go left-watch out for the armchair-go right-higher-mind the umbrella stand-lower-it’s on the curtain rail-no, no, now it’s behind the curtain-yes, ducky, I can see it. I’m old and ensorcelled but I’m not blind yet!” bounced from window to wall and back again as they pursued the agitated escapee from the dimension-next-door.

“Yes! Yes!” shouted Bibbie as Reg, panting like an antiquated racehorse, chased the sprite into the drooping embrace of the potted Weeping Fireblossom Monk had given them as an office-warming present.

With a shout of triumph Bibbie leapt at the sprite, the trap’s door open wide to swallow the creature. “ Gotcha!”

Too late, Melissande realised she was standing in precisely the wrong place. Bibbie’s spectacular leap carried her clear over the potted Fireblossom and “ Ow!” she cried as Bibbie sent her sprawling. “Get off me, get off me!”

“Shut the trap door, shut the trap door!” shrieked Reg, hovering above them. “I’m too old for all this excitement!”

As Melissande and Bibbie both dived for the trap their heads collided with a resounding thwack.

“Ow!” said Melissande. “Bibbie, you idiot!”

“ I’m not the idiot,” moaned Bibbie, clutching her forehead. “ You’re the idiot, you idiot!”

“Oh, Saint Snodgrass preserve me!” said Reg. “It’s getting away!”

On a string of colourful curses Melissande threw herself over Bibbie and slammed the trap’s door shut just as the sprite made a swoop for freedom. “Oh no, you don’t!” she snarled. “You stay in there, you disgusting little horror!”

“Oh do get off me you lump!” said Bibbie, sounding squashed.

Melissande shoved Bibbie sideways. “ Lump? Who do you think you’re calling a-”

“I’m sorry,” said a clipped and disapproving voice above them. “Have we come at a bad time?”

“Bugger,” said Reg, under her breath, and strategically retreated to her ram skull.

Gasping for air, red-faced from more than exertion, Melissande staggered to her feet. Standing in the open office doorway were two astonished middle-aged ladies. One was short and comfortably plump, her walking-dress an eye-searing combination of mandarin and peacock blue. Her flat-brimmed bonnet was also blue, adorned with a bedraggled mandarin-dyed feather. Her companion, unfashionably tall and uncomfortably spare, was swathed in deepest black silk; a high-brimmed black hat with a sheer half-veil completed her mourning ensemble. Decorating each woman’s buttressed breast was a brightly enamelled pin shaped like a chocolate eclair. The thin woman’s pin was edged with gold.

Clients? Botheration. “Bad time, ladies?” she echoed, painfully aware of her tousled appearance. “Ah. No. Not as such. We were just-ah-”

“Concluding a very important assignment,” said Bibbie, on her feet again. Naturally, though she’d been rolling on the floor with equal abandon, she looked immaculate even while clutching Monk’s doctored birdcage in front of her. Unfortunately she hadn’t thought to deactivate the sprite-revealer, so the blue buzzing creature was in plain, inconvenient sight.

The plump woman squeaked and pointed. “Gracious me, what’s that?”

Bibbie dropped sprite trap and sprite on the desk, neatly flicking the off-switch. There was a high-pitched hum and the sprite promptly vanished. “I’m sorry? What’s what?”

“That, in there,” said the plump woman, quaking. “It looked positively unnatural.” She squinted. “But how strange… it seems to have disappeared.”

Bibbie smiled her most dazzling smile. “I’m afraid I don’t quite follow you. As you can see, the cage is empty. Must’ve been a trick of the light.”

“No, I don’t think so,” said the plump woman. “I definitely saw-”

Melissande cleared her throat. Time to nip this in the bud. “I’m so sorry, but we’re not at liberty to discuss it. Strict orders from the Department of Thaumaturgy, actually.”

“That’s right,” chimed in Bibbie with a dazzling smile. “They trust us implicitly. We have the closest relationship, you’ve no idea. But… top secret, hush-hush, you know how it is.”

“No,” said the tall, thin lady-she of the clipped and disapproving voice. Despite being attired for a longstanding bereavement, everything about her suggested wealth. The cameo pinned beside the gold-trimmed eclair pin was just that little bit larger than her companion’s. The stones in her tasteful gold necklace were real rubies, not garnets. An aura of old money surrounded her, impervious to youthful, upstart charm. “I’m afraid we don’t.”

“You don’t?” said Bibbie, taken aback. “Oh. Well, I’m sorry to hear that. I’d explain, you know, except-hush-hush-top secret-”

“And, as my colleague has pointed out, concluded!” Melissande added firmly, because Saint Snodgrass knew she wasn’t about to let these women or their money get away without a fight. “So… how might we assist you, madam?”

Their unimpressed visitor looked down her high-arched nose. Clearly she was too well-bred to comment on the trousers, but her expression was as eloquent as a politician’s speech. “Young… lady, I doubt very much that you can. In fact, it would appear we have come to the wrong establishment. So if you’ll excuse us-”

“Which establishment were you looking for?” said Bibbie gamely, still trying to dazzle them with her best smile.

“Witches Incorporated,” said their plump visitor, before her disapproving friend could speak.

“Then you’re in the right place!” said Bibbie. “That’s us. Witches Inc. I’m Miss Markham and these are my colleagues Miss Cadwallader and Reg. Reg is the one with the feathers.”

The haughty spokeswoman silenced her companion with a severe look then smiled at Bibbie, not at all dazzlingly. In fact her expression was positively unpleasant. “You have a bird for a colleague? How… quaint.” Her voice could have stripped paint.

“Actually, she’s more of a pet,” said Bibbie, doughtily undaunted. “But we like to humour her. It saves hurt feelings.”

As Reg made a noise like an exploding tea kettle, the disapproving woman looked Bibbie up and down. “I’m sure. However, as I said, we appear to have the wrong-”

“Oh please, Permelia, no!” said the other lady anxiously, plump fingers plucking at her friend’s leg-of-mutton sleeve. “Please, can’t we at least explain what we need? I mean, we can’t leave. We’ve nowhere else to turn and there’s no more time!”

“ Hush, Eudora,” her companion snapped. “Kindly restrain yourself. I hardly think we’re so desperate we must throw ourselves upon the mercy of these two hoydens.”

The chastened Eudora shrank. “Of course not, Permelia,” she whispered. “Only-”

“ No, Eudora. There is no ‘ only ’,” said Permelia, magnificently magisterial. “Obviously the Times has made a grave error. You can be assured I shall have Ambrose speak to its editor in the strongest possible terms. Now I suggest that we withdraw immediately and-”

“Excuse me,” said Melissande, heart sinking. Reg is never going to let me hear the end of this. “ I’m sorry, I don’t wish to be impolite, or-or unbecomingly forward, but by any chance are you referring to this morning’s edition of the Ottosland Times?”

Before the formidable Permelia could speak, her companion stepped forward with a puppyish eagerness. “That’s right, Miss Cadwallader! In the society pages. There was a photograph-and a mention of your agency-”

“Which is clearly a case of misrepresentation!” said icily unimpressed Permelia. “Now hold your tongue, Eudora Telford! I will not have the sterling reputation of our organisation tarnished by an unfortunate-”

“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m sorry, Permelia!” Eudora Telford exclaimed, pinkly penitent. “It’s dreadful of me to contradict you, I know, but I simply can’t stay silent, not when such an injustice is being perpetrated upon you!”

“Forgive me, ladies,” said Melissande, very carefully not looking at Reg. “I really don’t mean to be rude, truly, but-” She picked up the agency’s copy of the Times from the rickety occasional table where she’d earlier dropped it, and opened it to the despised social gossip pages. “-did you mean this photograph?”

Courageously ignoring the irate Permelia, Eudora joined her. “Why, yes! That’s the one! Her Royal Highness Princess Melissande of New Ottosland, proprietor of Witches Inc., attending the opera.” She peered at the newspaper, then frowned sideways. “Oh. Dear. My gracious. I’m sorry, Miss Cadwallader, are you quite sure-I mean to say-”

“Of course,” said Bibbie, with a grin as lunatic as her mad brother’s, “when I introduce my esteemed colleague as Miss Cadwallader, really that’s just her name of convenience. Really she’s Her Royal Highness Princess Melissande of New Ottosland. Don’t let the tweed trousers fool you. Go on, Mel. Don’t be shy. Show ’em your tiara.”

It was almost worth Reg’s evil chuckling to see the look of unbearable snobbery congeal on the awful Permelia woman’s face.

“Her Royal Highness?” Permelia said in a strangled voice. “Princess Melissande?”

“Well, yes,” said Melissande. “I’m afraid so.”

“I see,” said Permelia faintly. “Of course. Well. Do forgive me, it appears I–I didn’t recognise you without your bustle.”

“Oh, Your Highness!” cried Eudora, snatching up Melissande’s hand and hanging onto it like a life preserver. “Oh, please, please, you have to help us! Please. It’s ever so important! In fact it’s a matter of life and death!’