It didn’t take me long to realize that Ellie had disappeared. Panting, fear and anger still coursing through me, I stopped and looked around into the clear dark evening.
“Where’d she go?” I cried.
Ellie was nowhere to be seen, either in the back yard or in the edges of the woods that bordered it. I looked around again, but she seemed to have disappeared into thin air.
We all exchanged shocked looks. I couldn’t believe that had just happened.
Slowly we all made our way back toward the house, where I expected to get some answers from Betty and Possy about what had just happened. They were the experienced witches, after all. But before I could say a word, Betty dashed my expectations.
“We must be going, but thank you so much for tea. We’ll be seeing you again soon,” she said, backing out the front door with her sister. They were moving so fast they bumped into the doorframe in their haste to run away, clearly spooked by what had just taken place and trying to leave the farmhouse as quickly as possible.
“Are you alright?” I called after them as I walked up onto the porch
Barely turning around and not stopping for a moment, they just waved, got into the bright red car, and hurried down the drive and out of sight.
Once I was back inside I said to my roommates, “Are you two at least okay?”
They both said that they were.
“They left pretty quickly,” commented Charlie. “I don’t think they liked running into Ellie.”
“Now do you think Paws will tell us who she was?” I said.
“It probably depends on his mood,” Charlie said.
We sat back down, trying to calm down and process what had just happened. The living room was the same, but different somehow. There were two steaming mugs of tea that I had recently refilled, but now there was no one to drink them.
“Possy was probably scared,” Charlie observed into the silence.
“She went running after Ellie, though,” I said. “In fact, she was the one who tripped her.”
Charlie, Greer, and I all paused. Had Possy gone running after Ellie?
“Betty did . . . and we did . . . what did Possy do?” Charlie reviewed the events of the last hour with a frown.
“She was probably too scared of Ellie to go running after her,” said Greer.
“Possy tripped Ellie, though. She didn’t really act that scared,” mused Charlie.
We all paused for a second time, and then I felt a chill run down my spine.
“We ran away from the house, but Possy didn’t come with us,” I said.
Charlie’s eyes went wide, and then the reporter sprang to her feet. “We left her alone in the house. She intentionally stayed behind while we were all distracted!”
Greer stood up as well. “We need to figure out if anything is missing!” she cried.
“We just had to check the house after it was robbed,” I muttered. “Now we have to do it again?”
The three of us got up and started looking around, but before we got far I remembered the other thing that was bothering me.
Paws was still not at his post. This was so rare that it had become worrying.
“Where could he be?” I wondered out loud.
“Maybe we should look for him, too,” said Greer.
We wandered around the house again for a while, but it didn’t look any like anything was missing, except of course Paws.
“Maybe they really were just scared and ran away,” said Charlie.
“Yeah, maybe,” I said.
A lot had shifted in the last few hours, and once the uproar died down and we reassured ourselves that nothing was missing, I started to realize that the biggest change would probably turn out to be Betty’s revelation that witch hunters existed, and that the best of them came from a family named Wolf.
My grandmother’s animosity toward the family was suddenly a lot more understandable. What I was going to do about it, I had no idea.
“I’m just going to check Grandmother’s room one more time,” I said, having had one last thought about what might be going on. “Maybe she has some proof about the Wolfs being witch hunters, or at least something that will shed some light on the truth.”
My grandmother had a photo album tucked away under the seat cushion of the chair in her room. I didn’t know why she’d hidden it, but I had left it there when I searched her things the other day. Now I drew it out and took it back downstairs to where my friends were waiting for me. The three of us sat on the couch and looked through the album.
We hadn’t turned two pages when a cry erupted from all three of us at once. Although it wasn’t what I’d been looking for, it was still monumental.
Charlie pointed at the page we were looking at, a picture of three young women, all smiling, all in summer dresses and surrounded by trees. I leaned forward to get a better look.
“That’s Ellie and my grandmother,” I whispered.
“And that’s Betty,” breathed Charlie. “The three of them grew up together.”
I stared at the picture for a long time, my mind churning over this new information. “They look happy.”
Ellie was standing in the middle, her arm around the other two.
“The caption says it’s Ellie, Betty, and Even, all on the coast, forty-two years ago,” said Charlie.
And suddenly, as if on cue, there was Paws standing at the window with his tail erect and his yellow eyes angry. I pushed the photo album onto Greer’s lap and raced to the window. “What happened to you?” I asked.
“All of the ghosts were drawn away,” he panted.
“By what?” I said.
“A dark ghost,” he said. “I think it was Hank Smith.”
“Did you catch him?” I said.
“No, they’re very hard to catch. He had a witch helping him,” he said.
“Could you have caught them if you’d had a witch helping you?” I said.
“One never knows,” he said reluctantly. But he did know, and he knew I knew it too.
“We’ve had visitors all night,” I said. I quickly told him about Ellie, and how Betty and her sister had helped us fight her off. Paws only looked more upset.
“You let witches into the house?” he said.
“I told you we were going to be friendly to them. They want to settle in Mintwood,” I said.
“You’re so difficult, you could drive me to distraction,” he said.
“What’s driving you there all the other times?” I said.
“Witches,” he said.
“I really think you’re worrying for nothing,” I said.
“At least you’re here. Just don’t ever leave them alone in the house,” he said.
I exchanged looks with my friends, and Paws’ face fell.
“You didn’t . . .” He said.
“Ellie took off, and we chased after her. I didn’t realize Possy had gone back in without us until, well, just a couple minutes ago,” I said.
“Did you check the house?” he demanded.
“Yes, and it doesn’t look like she took anything,” I said.
Paws was gone before I could finish the sentence. He jump off his box and raced around the outside of the house so fast I couldn’t even follow him with my eyes.
My friends and I hurried after him as best we could. “I really don’t see why he’s being so dramatic,” I said.
We found Paws at the shed where the canoe was kept. The other ghosts had realized something was wrong and started to drift round the house after us.
“What’s going on?” Karen demanded.
“Lemmi had witch visitors,” Paws called out.
My, the undercarriage of a bus looked mighty nice from that spot where Paws threw me under it.
“She did WHAT!” Karen squawked. She was still holding her cup of tea, and I had to squash the urge to break the china over her head.
“What are you doing?” I asked the cat as he disappeared into the shed.
For a few seconds th
ere was silence except for the sound of Paws rummaging around and complaining about all the stuff in the way.
Meanwhile, my friends and I stood there without a clue as to what was going on.
“Here it is! It’s still here,” Paws yelled triumphantly.
“What’s still here?” I demanded.
The cat reappeared, this time holding something between his teeth.
Did I know he could do that?
“That’s a wand,” I gasped. The wand Paws was carrying was much prettier than my grandmother’s. There was a set of jewels at its base, and it tapered in a far more beautiful line than the wand I’d been using.
“Yes, you didn’t think I’d give you a real wand to practice with, did you?” said Paws. “Your grandmother’s wand is beautiful and precious.”
“Thanks for your faith in me,” I muttered. “Not.”
“He’s never been one to have a lot of faith in anyone who wasn’t named Evenlyn,” said a dry voice behind us.
We all whirled around in unison. The woman standing there was wearing at least three coats, one red, one purple, and another burgundy. She had a witch’s hat on and a bright smile that looked a lot like her mother’s. We had the same eyes.
“Aunt Harriet,” I cried, “you’re here!” I raced forward to give her a big hug.
“Didn’t I say I would be?” She smiled as she looked at Greer and Charlie, clearly wondering who they were.
“We have a lot to discuss,” she smiled.
We sure did.
The End
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By Addison Creek
Witch of Mintwood Mysteries
Witch Way to Mintwood
Witch Some Win Some
Spell by Midnight
Spell by Midnight (Witch of Mintwood Book 3) Page 19