The Witches of Worm

by Zilpha Keatley Snyder

  Even his looks were weird. He was thick and slow-moving, with a face that seemed to slant in too many directions. But his hands and eyes were different, as if they belonged to somebody else. His eyes were dark blue with bushy gold-colored lashes, and they were always changing flickering shades of blue, as if a blue fire burned inside. And his hands were long and narrow and good at everything from digging holes to drawing pictures.

  His likes were weird, too. He liked a lot of crazy things: book games, or “plays” as he called them, instead of real games like baseball or checkers. He liked music, even old-fashioned symphony stuff, and strange people: Mrs. Fortune for example. And sometimes he disliked things for crazy reasons. You could count on Brandon to be crazy and unpredictable and exciting. Jessica had counted on it, for more than five years.

  The faint liquid sound of the trumpet died away at last, and she turned back to her book. It was a new one that she had just checked out of the library. It was called The Witches of Salem Town, and it was not really a story at all. Instead it was a true account of events that happened a long time ago. As a rule Jessica preferred fiction, but there had recently been an article about witches in one of the women’s magazines that Joy subscribed to, and Jessica had been fascinated. Afterward she had gone looking for more information at the library. In the children’s section she had found only cutesy stories about Halloween-type witches with cats and broomsticks; but when she discovered where the adult books on magic were kept, she found what she was looking for. The book she had taken was a brand-new one that told the story of the witches of Salem.

  The first few chapters of the book turned out to be mostly about a girl who had lived in Salem and who, at the time of the witches, was just twelve years old. Her name was Ann, which was Jessica’s own middle name. Ann had become the most famous of the people who accused the witches. She had been so important that many famous people came to talk to her, and everyone pitied or feared or admired her. Afterward many books and papers were written about her and the Salem witch trials.

  As Jessica read, she kept turning back to look at a picture in the front of the book. It was a picture of a dim, old-fashioned drawing that showed a girl lying on the floor and reaching up with one hand. Many people were gathered around, looking down at her. The girl’s face was only partly visible, but it seemed to be thin and rather dark.

  By the time Jessica finished reading the first three chapters, the light in the cave had become very dim, and the print seemed to squirm before her eyes. She was reading about the demons who had tormented Ann and the other girls, and she wanted desperately to find out what happened next, but at last her eyes ached so badly from straining to make out the words in the failing light that she was forced to stop. She closed her eyes to rest them only for a moment, and although she did not remember feeling at all sleepy, she was almost instantly asleep and dreaming.

  It was almost dark in the cave when Jessica awoke. She lay still, feeling the dream seeping away into the dark parts of her mind. Keeping her eyes closed, she tried desperately to push her thoughts backward to grasp the fluttering fragments of the dreams and hold them. But they continued to fade, tantalizingly close to the edge of consciousness, until nothing was left but a vague shadowy scene and the memory of a fierce and frightening excitement. There had been a room in the dream, an enormous room glowing darkly with shining wood. And there had been people, many strangers with blurred faces, and some who were vaguely familiar, except that they seemed to be wearing masks carved from ice, which had frozen their faces into exaggerated expressions of fear. The rest of the dream was gone, except for an echo of violent noises and the feeling of fierce excitement.

  When she finally gave up trying to remember more, Jessica sat up and peered out and down at the apartment house. Windows were lighted now in all the apartments, including her own on the third floor. Joy would be gone on her date with Alan, but the lights had been left on, and undoubtedly Mrs. Post had been notified that Jessica would be home alone. Sometime during the evening Mrs. Post would be up to find out how Jessica was doing, and to gather any other information she could possibly uncover.

  What would happen, Jessica wondered, if she should decide to spend the whole night in the secret cave? Mrs. Post would arrive, pushing her heavy way up the two flights of stairs, to find no sign of Jessica. What would she do? What would Joy do when she came home to find her “believe-it-or-not” daughter had completely disappeared? Perhaps it was a good night to find out.

  It would be a cold night though, cold and damp. The wind had died down, but the fog had settled in, deeper and more chill. The air smelled, now, of wet stones and moldy earth, as if it had come oozing up from caves and graveyards instead of blowing in from the open sea. Above, the sky was a sooty gray, but near the earth a layer of dusky light lingered, as if the day were trying desperately to stay alive.

  In the thick muffling fog there was a strange difference in the quality of sound. All the usual sounds that could be heard from the secret cave, city sounds of horns and traffic, seemed distant and indistinct, fragmented by hollow echoes.

  Jessica was leaning forward, listening intently, when a lull came in the flow of city sounds, a trough of silence between waves of noise, and into the silence another sound intruded. It was a soft and secret sound of movement, a crawling scrabbling noise, and it was very, very near. Jessica jumped to her feet and whirled to face the back of the cave.

  Chapter Two

  THE BACK OF THE CAVE WAS IN DEEP SHADOW, AND for the first few seconds Jessica could see nothing at all. Then, as she inched forward, she saw a deeper shadow that moved slowly and fitfully on the stony floor. At first she thought it was a snake, but as she edged closer, she could make out tiny feet reaching out to scratch helplessly at the hard stone.

  At last, her fright dwindling, Jessica squatted directly above the squirming object, but even then she was not entirely sure that it was only a kitten. For one thing, it was much smaller than any kitten she had ever seen before, and for another, it did not meow or make any sort of cry. Even when she finally brought herself to poke it gingerly in the side with one finger, it made no sound at all.

  “It’s almost dead, I guess,” she told herself, but as she went on watching, it continued to move, trying to pull itself forward over the hard bare ground. It occurred to Jessica that its mother must have brought it to the cave and abandoned it, since no one else knew about the secret cave and very few people could climb to it even if they knew. Jessica had heard of a mother cat refusing to accept a kitten. Perhaps, in such cases, the mother carried it away and left it in a hidden place to die. She reached out and touched the kitten tentatively on its tiny back.

  She had never liked cats. There were a number of reasons why. One was, of course, that she had had to live so long at the Regency, where Mrs. Fortune’s cats smelled up the back yard and half the building. All the tenants talked about the cat smell, but no one could do anything about it because the apartment house really belonged to Mrs. Fortune. Mr. Post took care of things and served as landlord, but that was only because Mrs. Fortune was too old and too busy with her cats.

  But Mrs. Fortune’s cats were not the only reason Jessica had never liked cats. Actually she had always much preferred dogs, but Joy wouldn’t let her have one. Joy was afraid of dogs, although she wouldn’t admit it, and insisted that cats were better for apartment living. Joy often said that Jessica should have a kitten to keep her company when she was home alone. But Jessica had made it clear, time after time, that a cat was not what she wanted.

  Now, however, like it or not, Jessica knew something had to be done about the tiny abandoned kitten. Even if for no other reason than to keep it from dying there and smelling up the cave. Eventually she reached out gingerly and picked it up.

  It felt strange in her hands, unlike any kitten she had touched before. Its tiny body was firm and supple with very little of the fluffy softness a kitten is supposed to have. It writhed in her hands with surprising strength, and t
urned its incredibly small face up to hers. As she moved with it to the mouth of the cave, she saw with horror that it had no eyes. For an instant she came very close to throwing it down the cliff, but instead she quickly shoved it into the pocket of her coat, put her book in the other pocket, and began the downward climb. When she reached the apartment house, she went directly to the door of Mrs. Fortune’s apartment.

  To be knocking on that door again seemed strange. For a long time, she’d knocked there almost every day, by herself at first and then with Brandon. In those days, a visit to Mrs. Fortune’s had been a favorite thing to do. But she hadn’t been there much lately.

  Joy had never liked it. “Spending so much time with that weird old woman,” she said. “I don’t understand it. What does she have in that smelly apartment of hers—a gingerbread house?”

  There had never been a gingerbread house, but there had been reasons. One was simply that Mrs. Fortune was often the only person home in the whole apartment building, except for Mrs. Post—and no one who didn’t have to, would ever visit Mrs. Post. But there were other reasons, too. There was the Treasure Chest, full of dozens of interesting old things, some of them so old that Mrs. Fortune had played with them herself as a child. There was an old crank-up phonograph and a stock of scratchy-voiced records; and there were hundreds of strange old books, stacked and crammed onto dusty shelves. And then, too, there was Mrs. Fortune herself.

  Mrs. Fortune had always been pleased to have visitors, even when she was having one of the strange spells that made people say she was losing her mind. At those times she would not answer questions, but would sit with her head nodding gently, talking to herself or to one of her white cats. At other times she was quite different, lively and talkative and very interested in everything that Brandon and Jessica said and did. Once in a while she would even tell them stories.

  Mrs. Fortune’s stories were as strange as she was. They were always about impossible things like talking animals or magical objects, and she told them as if they really happened—and to her. When Jessica was very young, she had really believed in Mrs. Fortune’s stories, and Brandon had, too. In fact, Brandon had never stopped believing them, or at least pretending to. Right up until a year ago, when Jessica had stopped speaking to him, Brandon had still talked as if he believed that Mrs. Fortune could do all sorts of supernatural things. He probably still believed it. At least he still visited Mrs. Fortune now and then.

  The door opened, and Mrs. Fortune, smiling her old face into a network of wrinkles, said, “Well, Jessica. What a surprise. Won’t you come in?”

  She looked terribly old, older than forever, and her faded dress of heavy brown material hung loosely on her thin body. Her long gray hair was tied at the back of her neck with a piece of string. People had always talked about Mrs. Fortune’s strange appearance, but Jessica had never paid much attention to it. Now, suddenly, she found herself thinking, She does look weird. It’s a good thing for her she doesn’t live in Salem in the olden days. But out loud she only said, “Hello, Mrs. Fortune. I’ve come about this.”

  She pulled the kitten out of her pocket and held it out. “I thought maybe you might want it.”

  Mrs. Fortune leaned forward, peering. “Good gracious, child. It’s a newborn kitten. Where on earth did you get it?”

  “Out by the hill,” Jessica said. “It was abandoned. I thought maybe you could raise it.”

  Mrs. Fortune reached out and took the kitten. Her thin, crooked old fingers closed around it like the claws of a huge bird. “But it’s much too young to be taken from its mother,” she said. “It’s very difficult to raise a kitten this young by hand. If I had a nursing mother, I could try to get her to accept it, but none of my cats have kittens now.”

  She moved back out of the dimly lighted doorway to hold the kitten under the glow of the table lamp.

  “My word,” she said. “It’s an ugly little thing, isn’t it? And such a strange color.”

  In the strong light the kitten had become a chalky gray, the color of dead ashes. Its fur was so short and fine that its wiry body seemed to be almost hairless.

  “It’s blind, too.” Jessica could hardly bear to look at the kitten’s blank unfinished face.

  “Yes, but of course that’s only temporary,” Mrs. Fortune said. “Its eyes will open when it is about ten days old.”

  “Oh, yeah,” Jessica said. Actually she’d forgotten, if she’d ever known, that kittens were born blind. She had been thinking of the kitten’s eyelessness as some horrible abnormality.

  “Come, my dear,” Mrs. Fortune said. “Let’s see if we can get it to eat.” In her crowded little kitchen that smelled strongly of cat food, Mrs. Fortune got out a small can of milk and a tiny doll’s bottle. She heated the milk and added a drop of liquid vitamins. Then she poured the warm milk into the bottle.

  But the kitten refused to eat. It didn’t cry or struggle, just turned its blind face determinedly away from the bottle, time after time. At last the phone rang, and Mrs. Fortune put the kitten in Jessica’s lap and went to answer it. Jessica sat and watched it squirming there for a while, but finally she picked up the bottle and held it to the kitten’s mouth. Immediately it opened its mouth, took the nipple, and began to suck. By the time Mrs. Fortune had returned, the bottle was half empty.

  “Ahh,” she said. “Good for you. I’m glad you decided to try. This may well be your last chance.”

  It was the kind of weird thing Mrs. Fortune sometimes said. In the midst of an ordinary conversation, she would suddenly make a remark that sounded as if it were meant for an entirely different person. Mrs. Post was always telling people about the strange things Mrs. Fortune said, and how she, herself, always pretended she hadn’t heard so as not to embarrass the poor old soul. But Jessica had always been too curious to pretend.

  “What do you mean—‘your last chance’?” she asked. “Are you talking to the kitten, or to me?”

  Mrs. Fortune chuckled appreciatively, as if Jessica had said something very witty. “Perhaps the kitten,” she said. “Perhaps it hasn’t very many lives left.”

  “Oh, you mean like a cat having nine lives? Do you really think they do?”

  “Ahh,” Mrs. Fortune said, chuckling again, “sometimes I’m sure of it. Now this kitten, for instance, has surely lived before. He’s much too wise, I think, for only a few days of life. Don’t you agree?” She picked up the kitten and began to rub under its tail with a wet cloth.

  “He doesn’t look very wise to me,” Jessica said. “What are you doing to him?”

  “I’m helping him to eliminate. The mother cat does this by washing. Many people who try to raise very young kittens allow them to die because they don’t know this is necessary. It must be done until their eyes are open and they begin to walk.”

  “Ugh,” Jessica said when Mrs. Fortune had finished. “I’m glad that’s over.”

  Mrs. Fortune smiled. “But it is only over for the moment. It will all have to be done again in two hours, and every two hours for two weeks. After that the time between feedings can be lengthened.”

  “Every two hours,” Jessica said. “That’s impossible.”

  “Not impossible, but very difficult. I have raised kittens that way several times in the past, but I was younger and stronger then. I wouldn’t be able to do it now. If I were awakened every two hours now, I wouldn’t be able to sleep at all.”

  “What am I supposed to do then,” Jessica said. “I don’t want a kitten. I don’t even like cats.”

  Mrs. Fortune nodded her shaky old head. “Then perhaps you can find someone who has a nursing mother cat who might accept this poor orphan. Surely among your school friends someone would know of a cat with kittens.”

  “Well, I don’t know.”

  “Why don’t you try? I’ll give you the bottle and some milk, and you can take the kitten up to your apartment while you call your friends. Then perhaps tomorrow you can take him to his new home.”

  There wasn’t anything more
for Jessica to say. Mrs. Fortune obviously didn’t want the kitten, and Jessica wasn’t going to explain that there wasn’t anyone she could call to ask about mother cats. Reluctantly she took the padded box that Mrs. Fortune had prepared with the kitten tucked in beside a quart jar of warm water, and returned to her own apartment.

  It wasn’t until she was through eating her TV dinner, a tasteless veal cutlet, that she discovered that the new book about Salem was no longer in her pocket. It must have fallen out, she decided, while she was climbing down the hill, or else in Mrs. Fortune’s apartment. Wherever it was, it would have to stay there until morning, and that meant that she had nothing to read. She shuffled through the stack of magazines on the end table without any luck. She had already finished everything of interest in them. That left only television. But that seldom appealed to her, particularly when she was home alone. She turned on the set and threw herself angrily onto the couch.

  Not long afterward, Mrs. Post arrived to “look in” on Jessica. “Looking in” on everybody and everything was Mrs. Post’s favorite occupation. When Jessica had gotten too old to need a baby-sitter, Joy had started letting the Posts know when Jessica was going to be home alone, just in case of an emergency. But the “looking in” part was Mrs. Post’s own idea.

  Jessica yelled “come in” without getting up off the couch; and Mrs. Post lumbered in and lowered herself onto her favorite chair, the little ladder-backed one by the telephone. Jessica guessed she liked it because she could get off it again a little easier than she could the lower and softer ones. But the little chair did a lot of creaking whenever Mrs. Post sat on it, and Jessica always expected it to collapse in splinters.