by Nina Jon
Although Johnny found Felix’s rant quite enjoyable, he couldn’t help wondering where he came in.
“In case you’re wondering where you come in, I want someone to try it out, by loitering around the church yard with it concealed on their person. If it works, I’m having one fitted in the Belfry. In for it?”
“Seems you’re not the only one with a vermin problem, Jane,” Johnny said, when off the phone.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
The Whine of the Mosquito
Johnny arrived at the churchyard at about ten in the evening with the Mosquito in his jacket pocket. It was deserted. He started with a nonchalant stroll around the graveyard, his hands in his jeans’ pocket. He crossed the churchyard intending to walk through the wooden, thatched lych gate, and down the lych gate steps at the rear of the churchyard, which lead to a bridle path below.
When he reached the top of the gate, he saw a group of youngsters congregated at the bottom of the steps, clutching bottles of cider. He’d heard them complaining about the whine before he’d seen them. One of them said: “What the…!” and thrust his hands to his ears. The complaining and bewilderment as to the source of the ear piercing shriek, worsened as Johnny walked down the steps towards them. They instinctively moved away from the steps. Johnny nodded in their direction and walked towards them. Some in the group started swearing loudly, the whine clearly making the whole group feel very uncomfortable and disorientated. When Johnny bent down to do up an undone shoelace, someone said, “Let’s get the hell out of here!” and the group slouched away.
Johnny turned right and walked along the bridle path which ran from behind Jane’s cottage to the end of Rectory Road. At its end, he turned right into North Road, and from there took a sharp right into Rectory Road. He walked past the Rectory and back into the church, where he took another turn of the church yard. Next to visit it was a young couple. They must both have been over twenty-one, as they appeared more troubled by Johnny’s unexpected presence than by any noise.
When they chanced upon him there, they immediately slowed their pace to a standstill. He knew they wanted him to leave them alone in the churchyard. He tried to keep a straight face as he leant against the church to light up a cigarette. He felt them look in his direction, but didn’t return their gaze. The couple quickly left the churchyard.
A second group of youngsters turned up minutes later, only to turn on their heels and walk away quickly, moaning: ‘What’s that noise?’ and ‘It’s doing my head in!’
Johnny hung around the graveyard for a while longer, but when no one else appeared, he walked down the steps again and back along the bridle path. He repeated the walk which returned him to the church. For the third time that evening he walked around it, but there was no one else in sight. He kept this up for some time, but word must have got around because no one else paid a visit to the churchyard while he was in it.
Rather enjoying his new-found power, he decided to go after the second group of youngsters he’d driven out of the churchyard. Although none of them had recognised him, he’d recognised them all right, because the day he’d been an advertising hoarding for the Fig Leaf wine bar, the same group of youngsters had followed him around Failsham for the best part of two hours, wolf-whistling and jeering at him. One of the girls had even tried to take a peep under his sandwich board. He was convinced it was one of them who’d stolen the board that day.
If they couldn’t congregate in the churchyard, he reckoned they’d go to the next best place, the Market Square. There he found them, stood idly around, passing a bottle of cider back and forth between themselves.
The minute Johnny came into the square, he saw them look around frantically and start complaining about the noise. Realising they hadn’t seen him, he decided to have a bit of fun. He stepped into an alleyway and hid from view.
“What is it? Where’s it coming from?” he heard them say. “First the church – now here! What’s going on? It’s doing my head in!”
Johnny sniggered to himself on hearing this. One of the group suggested they go to the supermarket car park and the others agreed. Johnny stepped out of his hiding place to see the group move off. He knew a shortcut. He’d cut them off. He ran out of the square in the opposite direction to that taken by the youngsters. He took the road which ran diagonally to the Market Square, and at its end took a sharp left and sprinted along the road, at the end of which was the supermarket. It was closed for the night. Johnny jumped behind a row of recycling containers and waited for the group to appear. He heard them before he saw them, when they all began speaking at once:
“It’s that noise again!” “Where’s it coming from?” “It’s following us!”
Johnny had to put his hand in his mouth to stop himself from laughing out loud when one of the girls said, “You don’t think we’ve upset a ghost do you? I’m never going back to the graveyard again!”
Felix roared with laughter when Johnny rang him to tell him this. “That does it. I don’t care what Mirabella and the Curate say. I’m definitely getting one fitted – I don’t care if it alienates the young people or not!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
That Old White Magick
I
Johnny, Jack and Charity turned up at Jane’s back door just moments after Maria had called to say that she and Lena (the white witch) were on their way. The evening had been chosen by Lena herself due to the configuration of the moon and the stars. Jane glanced at the night sky as she showed her guests indoors, and saw there a Cheshire-Cat moon.
The evening wasn’t a warm one, and her guests were all wrapped up snugly in thick fleeces, sheepskin snow boots, woollen hats and gloves. Jane poured Johnny and Charity a cup of warm mulled wine from the stove, and Jack a warm apple juice – drinks she thought befitted the occasion.
“If this doesn’t work, there’s someone on the internet who says he get can rid of mice by asking them to leave. He says he can talk the language of mice,” Jack said.
“Bearing in mind how many mice there are in the world, that must be one of the world’s most commonly spoken languages,” Jane said.
Another knock on the door told her Maria and Lena had arrived. Maria, Jane couldn’t help noticing, was looking rather jubilant. For reasons not yet explained, she was holding a folded up card table. She too was dressed warmly against the cold. Lena, on the other hand, wore only a long, skin-tight, sleeveless, low-cut, scarlet silk dress, as though she was stopping off to perform a spot of witchcraft, before going to a dinner dance. Maybe she was, Jane thought to herself. In some ways, Lena reminded Jane of Lucy Erpingham. Somewhat plump, it had to be said, yet with enough youthful self-confidence to feel no qualms about squeezing herself uncomfortably into clothes which emphasised every bulging inch.
Lena’s long hair was the brightest red, and in keeping with the spectacle, she wore a great deal of jewellery: rings on each finger, numerous bracelets on each arm, a long three-chained earring in one ear, and a simple jet ball in the other. The large rucksack on her back somewhat spoiled the effect, but the forked willow stick in her hand more than made up for it.
Just as Jane was thinking, “Very witchy,” Lena spoke.
With a sweep of her hair back across her shoulders, and the armful of silver bracelets jangling together noisily, she announced: “To the summerhouse!” She pointed the willow branch in its direction, and swept out of the kitchen towards it, followed by the others.
Lena placed her rucksack on the summerhouse’s floor and knelt down. Just as Jane was wondering whether they were all meant to kneel before the rucksack and worship it, Lena removed from it a small copper bowl, a plastic box containing dried sage, and to the surprise of everyone in the room, a sugar mouse.
“An effigy of the creature is essential. The spirits need to know what they’re to banish,” she explained, dropping the sage into the bowl. This and the sugar mouse were placed in the centre of the floor, and the sage lit. “Now we must move outside and locate the best plac
e for us to cast our spell,” Lena said earnestly. She got to her feet, put on her rucksack and went outside.
Everyone followed her in single file. Maria, still holding the card table came last, leaving the door open. The sage was left to burn, its smoke suffusing the small room.
Lena held the forked willow stick horizontally in front of her with her right hand as she led the party across the garden. She stopped about halfway across, and holding the willow stick with both hands, moved it to the left and the right. Jane was surprised when it acted as a dowsing rod and appeared to jolt slightly. When it did, Lena said, “This is it! This will be our sacred space. Maria please put up the altar, while I make our magick circle.”
Maria opened the trestle card table while Lena removed a salt cellar from her rucksack and used it to pour a white salt circle on the lawn, leaving Jane to pray that salt didn’t irreparably damage grass.
“We are now ready. Because it is your house, Jane, you must stand there, just inside the circle, facing your home,” Lena said, pointing to a spot immediately inside the salt circle, which put Jane staring at her house. “Jack, Johnny, Charity and Maria, you will form the four squares of the circle.” No one asked how a circle could have four squares. Instead, they solemnly moved into position. Johnny stood a few feet away from Jane, at a slight angle to the house. Jack a few feet from him, Charity came next, her back to the house, and Maria stood next to her. “Now please all hold hands.”
This they all did, even though it involved each of them stretching their arms out as far as they could. While Jane was beginning to wonder if this wasn’t some practical joke on Maria’s behalf, along the lines of the emperor’s new clothes, Lena laid four plastic containers out on the card table altar. One of these she carried with her over to Johnny.
“You are North,” she informed him, opening the box on which was written North. She removed some items from it, which she stood on the upturned empty box at Johnny’s feet. Jane glanced at the objects. There was a brown candle, some cloves and an incense burner. Without warning, Lena walked over to one of Jane’s flowerbeds and helped herself to a handful of soil. She also tugged at a tuft of moss from the lawn. She returned to lay these on the box by Johnny’s feet. Out of the corner of her eye, Jane saw Lena light the candle and the incense burner, which she waved in the air. If Jane wasn’t mistaken, she could smell Acacia.
“Beings of the earth, feeders of life,” Lena said, “welcome to our sacred space. We ask you to banish from Jane’s life the beings which have entered it. We ask you to banish them and stand firm and protect Jane and her home from more like them.”
She made a circle in the air with the incense burner, and repeated it three times. She placed it onto the ground, next to the flickering candle then returned to the altar for her next box. This was marked West. She took it over to Jack and placed it at his feet. Inside it was an amber candle, a sea shell, coral and some nettles. Lena looked embarrassed. “I forgot to say you must bring with you a glass of water from the house.”
“Okay,” Jack said, in his usual good-natured way. As he ran towards the house, Lena called out to him, “Also bring parsley.”
He glanced at Jane, who said, “There’s a box in the cupboard next to the fridge, it’s dried, which I hope is okay.”
Jack disappeared into the kitchen, to appear moments later with a box of dried parsley in one hand and a glass of water in the other. Lena took both from him and placed the glass of water alongside the other objects on the box. As before, she lit both candle and the incense, then began her incantation.
“Beings of water, bringers of rains of life, welcome to our sacred space. We ask you to banish from Jane’s life the beings which have entered it. We ask you to banish them and to stand firm and protect Jane and her home from more like them.”
As before, she moved the incense burner around in a circle three times. It was now Charity’s turn.
“You are South,” Lena informed her.
This time a golden candle, some amber beads and the dried parsley were used. The candle was lit, so too some eucalyptus essence. This time the incantation was said to the bringers of fire. Jane glanced up at the sky. There wasn’t a cloud in it – the bright crescent moon, and the stars – were all perfectly visible in the night sky. This Jane viewed as a good sign.
At Maria’s feet Lena laid some aniseed seeds, some lava and a yellow candle. The spell this time was repeated to the bringers of the air, the bringers of the breath of life. Just as Jane had thought it was all over, Lena stood behind the altar. On it she placed a black candle and some fur. Jane assumed this was some of the mouse’s fur, retrieved by Maria, but did not ask. Lena lit the candle. She dropped the fur into it. This immediately caught fire and burnt until it was all gone. While Lena chanted to the elements of the earth, air, fire and water and asked them to hear her words, Jane allowed herself a quick glance across the field next door, to make sure there wasn’t anyone filming the spectacle. She still wasn’t convinced that this whole thing wasn’t just a practical joke. Thankfully the field was empty.
“Help our friends leave the little house where they are trapped and return to the wild to their brothers and sisters, to their family and friends,” Lena chanted. “So mote it be! Keep the creatures away from here now and forever more.”
There was one more “So mote it be!” before Lena was bidding goodbye to the spirits. At Maria’s feet she blew both candle and incense out. “Eastern spirit, thank you for your presence and your powers! Blow strongly! Hail and farewell!”
Eastern spirit duly addressed, she walked round to each of the party in reverse and repeated her spell for each of the elements, bidding them farewell in turn. “Burn brightly,” she said to fire. “Flow powerfully,” she said to water. “Nurture well,” she instructed earth, finally telling the group, “the space is released. You can now let go of each other’s hands.”
It was over. Jane was pleased. She was rather cold and was looking forward to another glass of mulled wine.
“What happens now?” Johnny asked.
“What happens is that I’ll warm up the mulled wine,” Jane said, glad of an excuse to go inside. As she walked indoors, she hoped her cynicism didn’t lesson the power of Lena’s spells.
II
“Give it twenty-four hours,” Lena explained once everybody was back in Jane’s living room. Everyone apart from Jack (who had gone home to bed) held a cup of the warm mulled wine.
“If the mice are still here, you’ll need to perform a daytime spell,” she instructed. “You must return to the same spot, but this time at midday, where under the light of the midday sun, you must hold up a mirror to the sun and chant,
‘Mice, be you away.
Banished by the light of day.
So mote it be!’
Say that three times, and I promise you they’ll all go.”
Jane wasn’t quite sure she would be prepared to do this. In fact she was quite certain she wouldn’t. If the mice weren’t gone by tomorrow, she wouldn’t be standing in her garden casting spells by sunbeam, she’d be in a hardware shop buying a few traps and some poison. Nonetheless, she nodded at Lena’s words and repeated the spell.
“Mice be you away
Banished by the light of day.
So Mote it be!”
As she spoke these words, something that had been niggling her since Lena had cast her spell in the garden, came to the forefront of her mind and she realised what it was.
“Lena, if I were to list a collection of objects, apparently random, but which were found together, would you be able to tell me whether or not they could have been used for black magick?”
The objects Jane was referring to were those found by Felix in the graveyard. She listed them: “A twenty pound note, torn in half; a china Ganesa, the Hindu goddess of prosperity, with her elephant head broken off; an empty bubble-making bottle, and a yellow caper candle.”
“Did the candle have scratch marks?” Lena asked.
Jan
e thought back. She pictured it lying in the box held by Felix, and saw on it arrows pointing downwards. She’d noticed them at the time, but thought the scratcher bored, not malevolent. She said so.
“Classic black magick.”
“Crikey!” Charity said.
“Even the bubble bottle?” Jane asked.
Lena nodded. “Any halfway competent witch can incant a spell and put it inside a bubble, be it good or bad, and send it off in the direction of the person for whom it’s intended. Please list the items for me again.”
Jane repeated them. Lena thought awhile, then pronounced,
“Our witch is trying to bring financial ruin to someone.”
“Crikey!” Charity repeated.
“You think someone is practising black magick in the churchyard, Jane?” Johnny said.
“Not just in the churchyard, and not just financial ruin either,” she replied. “I also think I know who the culprit may be.”
She recalled the words she’d overheard at the bikers’ rally – “It’s the old green-eyed monster, mate. It makes people go stir crazy, look what happened to old Kenny!” –then thought back to the upside-down horseshoe she’d come across at the roadside the day she’d released the mouse, and the tiny play-dough models she’d stood on. She’d thought them the work of local children, and maybe they were, but now she thought about it, the play-dough she’d peeled from her sole looked as though it was moulded into the shape of a woman, and there’d been a stick, causing her to wonder if what she actually stood on had been the model of a solitary woman, with a stick through her heart, lying next to a man and woman, holding hands. Three stick people deliberately left by the side of the route taken every day by a happy young couple, by someone not so happy.