‘Miss Tiffany, you need a rest, a proper rest in a proper bed. What kind of witch can look after everybody if she’s not sensible enough to look after herself? Quis custodiet ipsos custodes. That means: Who guards the guards, that does,’ Preston went on. ‘So who watches the witches? Who cares for the people who care for the people? Right now, it looks like it needs to be me.’
She gave in.
* * *
The fog of the city was as thick as curtains when Mrs Proust hurried towards the dark, brooding shape of the Tanty, but the billows obediently separated as she approached and closed again after her.
The warden was waiting at the main gate, a lantern in his hand. ‘Sorry, missus, but we thought you ought to see this one before it gets all official. I know witches seem a bit unpopular right now, but we’ve always thought of you as family, if you know what I mean. Everyone remembers your dad. What a craftsman! He could hang a man in seven and a quarter seconds! Never been beat. We shall never see his likes again.’ He went solemn. ‘And may I say, missus, I hope I never see again the like of what you will be seeing now. It’s got us rattled, and no mistake. It’s right up your street, I reckon.’
Mrs Proust shook the water droplets off her cloak in the prison office and could smell the fear in the air. There was the general clanging and distant yelling that you always got when things were going bad in a prison: a prison, by definition, being a lot of people all crammed together and every fear and hatred and worry and dread and rumour all sitting on top of one another, choking for space. She hung the cloak on a nail by the door and rubbed her hands together. ‘The lad you sent said something about a breakout?’
‘D wing,’ said the warder. ‘Macintosh. You remember? Been in here about a year.’
‘Oh yes, I recall,’ said the witch. ‘They had to stop the trial because the jury kept throwing up. Very nasty indeed. But no one has ever escaped from D wing, right? The window bars are steel?’
‘Bent,’ said the warder flatly. ‘You’d better come and see. It’s giving us the heebie-jeebies, I don’t mind telling you.’
‘Macintosh wasn’t a particularly big man, as I recall,’ said the witch as they hurried along the dank corridors.
‘That’s right, Mrs Proust. Short and nasty, that was him. Due to hang next week too. Tore out bars that a strong man wouldn’t have been able to shift with a crowbar and dropped thirty feet to the ground. That’s not natural, that’s not right. But it was the other thing he did – oh my word, it makes me sick thinking about it.’
A warder was waiting outside the cell recently vacated by the absent Macintosh, but for no reason that Mrs Proust could recognize, given that the man had definitely gone. He touched the brim of his hat respectfully when he saw her.
‘Good morning, Mrs Proust,’ he said. ‘May I say it’s an honour to meet the daughter of the finest hangman in history. Fifty-one years before the lever, and never a client down. Mr Trooper now, decent bloke, but sometimes they bounce a bit and I don’t consider that professional. And your dad wouldn’t forego a well-deserved hanging out of the fear that fires of evil and demons of dread would haunt him afterwards. You mark my words; he’d go after them and hang them too! Seven and a quarter seconds, what a gentleman.’
But Mrs Proust was staring down at the floor.
‘Terrible thing for a lady to have to see,’ the warder went on. Almost absentmindedly Mrs Proust said, ‘Witches are not ladies when on business, Frank,’ and then she sniffed the air and swore an oath that made Frank’s eyes water.
‘It makes you wonder what got into him, aye?’
Mrs Proust straightened up. ‘I don’t have to wonder, my lad,’ she said grimly. ‘I know.’
The fog piled up against the buildings in its effort to get out of the way of Mrs Proust as she hurried back to Tenth Egg Street, leaving behind her a Mrs Proust-shaped tunnel in the gloom.
Derek was drinking a peaceful mug of cocoa when his mother burst in to the strains, as it were, of a large fart. He looked up, his brow wrinkling. ‘Did that sound like B-flat to you? It didn’t sound like B-flat to me.’ He reached into the drawer under the counter for his tuning fork, but his mother rushed past him.
‘Where’s my broomstick?’
Derek sighed. ‘In the basement, remember? When the dwarfs told you last month how much it would cost to repair, you told them they were a bunch of chiselling little lawn ornaments, remember? Anyway, you never use it.’
‘I’ve got to go into the … country,’ said Mrs Proust, looking around the crowded shelves in case there was another working broomstick there.
Her son stared. ‘Are you sure, Mother? You’ve always said it’s bad for your health.’
‘Matter of life or death,’ Mrs Pr
oust mumbled. ‘What about Long Tall Short Fat Sally?’
‘Oh, Mother, you really shouldn’t call her that,’ said Derek reproachfully. ‘She can’t help being allergic to tides.’
‘She’s got a stick, though! Hah! If it’s not one thing it’s another. Make me some sandwiches, will you?’
‘Is this about that girl who was in here last week?’ said Derek suspiciously. ‘I don’t think she had much of a sense of humour.’
His mother ignored him and rummaged under the counter, coming back with a large leather cosh. The small traders of Tenth Egg Street worked on narrow margins, and had a very direct approach to shoplifting. ‘I don’t know, I really don’t,’ she moaned. ‘Me? Doing good at my time of life? I must be going soft in the head. And I’m not even going to get paid! I don’t know, I really don’t. Next thing you know, I’ll start giving people three wishes, and if I start doing that, Derek, I would like you to hit me very hard on the head.’ She handed him the cosh. ‘I’m leaving you in charge. Try to shift some of the rubber chocolate and the humorous fake fried eggs, will you? Tell people they are novelty bookmarks or something.’
And with that, Mrs Proust ran out into the night. The lanes and alleyways of the city were very dangerous at night, what with muggers, thieves and similar unpleasantnesses. But they disappeared back into the gloom as she passed. Mrs Proust was bad news, and best left undisturbed if you wanted to keep all the bones in your fingers pointing the right way.