More Pongwiffy Stories

by Kaye Umansky

  CONTENTS

  THE SPELL OF THE YEAR

  THE HOLIDAY OF DOOM

  THE PONGWIFFY STORIES Ad

  CHAPTER ONE

  An Interesting Find

  ‘Well now, just look at this! Hey, Hugo, look what I’ve found!’ called Witch Pongwiffy from the murky depths of an ancient chest.

  At the time, they were in the middle of spring-cleaning – yes, spring-cleaning – Number One, Dump Edge, which is the name of Pongwiffy’s hovel. Well, if you want to be strictly accurate, Hugo and the Broom were spring-cleaning and Pongwiffy was getting in the way.

  ‘Oh my. Now vat she got? Old bird’s nest? Anuzzer overdue library book?’ sighed Hugo to the Broom, who was wildly rooting about under the kitchen table.

  The Broom gave a disinterested shrug. It had never been allowed to sweep up before, and was terribly over-excited. It had just built its first ever pile of dirt, and right now all it could think about was adding to it.

  ‘No, really!’ insisted Pongwiffy. ‘This is interesting! Come on down and see for yourself.’

  ‘No. I spring-cleanink,’ said Hugo firmly.

  He was standing on the top step of a rickety stepladder, swiping at cobwebs with a feather duster. He had declared war on the Spiders, and nothing was going to stop him.

  ‘Spring-cleaning, my foot! I’m talking Magic here. Look at this! It might well be the discovery of the century!’

  Pongwiffy emerged red-faced from the chest and scuttled across the hovel, scattering the Broom’s beautiful dirt-pile in all directions. In her hand, she held a large, mouldering book.

  ‘Look! Granny Malodour’s old Spell Book! I’ve often wondered where it got to. She gave it to me for my eighty-first birthday. Of course, I was just a youngster then. Thought it was old-fashioned sort of stuff, never really bothered to look at it. And it’s been at the bottom of the chest all these years. Oh, stop it, Broom!’

  The Broom was enthusiastically trying to sweep her out of the door. Being so new to this spring-cleaning business, it hadn’t quite got the hang of things yet. Pongwiffy gave it a brisk kick which sent it zooming off into a sordid corner, where it worked away humming to itself, not being the type to bear a grudge.

  ‘Well, well, well. Just fancy. Old Granny Malodour. It’s ages since I thought of her.’

  ‘Who Granny Malodour?’ asked Hugo.

  ‘You’ve never heard me talk of Granny Malodour? If you think I’m smelly, you should have got a whiff of Granny. Lived by herself in an underground cave. Shared it with a skunk for a while, but even he had to come up for air eventually. She was an expert on cave fungus, you know. There were at least six varieties growing on her sofa. And as for Magic! There was no one to touch her. She kept at it, you see, down in that old cave of hers. She only came up for important family gatherings. When there was cake. She was a Serious Witch. You wouldn’t catch her wasting time doing stupid spring-cleaning!’

  Pongwiffy glared scornfully at Hugo, who shrugged and continued with his dusting.

  ‘I’ll never forget her famous Wishing Water,’ went on Pongwiffy nostalgically. ‘Wonderful stuff, that was. She used to send up a bottle every Hallowe’en, I remember, and we’d all get a sip, even us little kids. Tasted disgusting, but it was worth it.’

  ‘Vy? Vat ’appen?’

  ‘Why, we’d all get a wish, of course. And it always came true. Granny’s potions were like that. Very reliable.’

  ‘Vat you vish for?’ asked Hugo.

  ‘A little Sweet House all of my own,’ said Pongwiffy dreamily.

  ‘Vat ’appen to it?’

  ‘It melted in the heat and flies got stuck to it. In the end I had to throw it away. But it was lovely when it was new. I can taste that chocolate guttering now.’

  ‘Vishing Vater sound good stuff,’ said Hugo. ‘Vy ve not make some?’

  ‘I wish we could,’ said Pongwiffy regretfully. ‘Granny Malodour always kept the recipe a secret. Probably thought it wasn’t good for us to get too much of a good thing. Oh, do stop flicking that duster about, Hugo, you’re driving me mad. Leave the stupid old spring-cleaning. So what if there’s a crumb or two on the floor? I couldn’t care less.’

  ‘That because you not ’Amster,’ Hugo pointed out. ‘Me, I live close to ze ground. It awful down zere.’

  It was true. For anyone hamster-sized, the hovel floor was a minefield. If the toast crumbs didn’t get you, the smelly socks would. If by some miracle you avoided both, the chances were you’d slip and drown in a puddle of skunk stew.

  But if it was bad at ground level, it was even worse higher up – because higher up were the Spiders.

  Ooh, those cocky Spiders. They were really getting above themselves these days, acting as though the place belonged to them. Just recently they’d taken to practising daredevil trapeze acts on the trailing cobwebs looping from the ceiling.

  ‘Hoop-la!’ they yelled to each other in Spider language. ‘OK, Stan, now the triple roll, after three! Don’t worry, I’ll catch yer!’

  Hugo had put up with it all for as long as he could. But when high-diving into his bedside glass of water became the latest Spider craze, he had dug his paws in and declared that Pongwiffy must choose between him and the dirt, for one of them had to go.

  After careful thought, Pongwiffy had decided to part with the dirt. After all, dirt could be replaced, whereas a good Familiar was hard to find. Besides, he owed her eleven pence.

  ‘You’re supposed to be my Familiar, remember?’ Pongwiffy reminded him, picking bits of cobweb from her mouth. ‘I do think you could show a bit more interest. After all, it is a family heirloom.’

  Crossly, she opened the ancient book and gave a wail of disappointment.

  ‘Oh no! The bookworms have been at it. Look, they’ve chewed up nearly every page!’

  ‘Typical,’ said Hugo. ‘All zat fuss about nussink. Typical.’

  ‘Oh, wait a minute! There’s something written on the inside of the cover. It looks like Granny Malodour’s writing. It’s faded, but I think I can make it out. Where are my reading glasses?’

  ‘Zem I sling out.’

  ‘You threw out my reading glasses? How dare you!’ Pongwiffy was outraged.

  ‘Zey got no glass. Zey not glasses, zey frameses.’

  ‘I know, but that’s beside the point. I always saw better with them.’

  Huffily, Pongwiffy carried the disintegrating book to a window so that she could see better. Hugo was still concentrating on cobwebs and hadn’t got to the window-cleaning stage yet. The cracked pane was so encrusted with dirt that it let in marginally less light than the wall. Pongwiffy briefly considered cleaning it, then smashed it with a poker to save time.

  The Broom did a double take at the sound of falling glass and came rushing up, keen as mustard. The sun, long a stranger to the inside of Pongwiffy’s hovel, burst in curiously, lighting first on the opened book with Granny Malodour’s spidery writing scrawled mysteriously all over the inside cover.

  ‘Well, I never did! Would you believe it! Just fancy that. Hugo, guess what Granny’s written inside the cover?’

  ‘’Ow I know?’ said Hugo with a shrug. ‘Vat?’

  ‘The recipe! The recipe, Hugo! For Wishing Water! Oh, this is the most amazing piece of luck! Just think, Hugo, Granny’s secret recipe, and it’s been passed down to me! Ooh, I simply can’t wait to try it out. You don’t get spells like this nowadays. There are some very interesting ingredients. It’ll be quite a challenge getting hold of some of these, I can tell you. Hey! I’ve just had a thought! I could enter it for the Spell of the Year Competition!’

  ‘Ze vat?’ asked Hugo.

  ‘Spell of the Year Competition. As advertised in The Daily Miracle. The winner get
s a big silver cup, and all sorts of brilliant prizes. Where’s yesterday’s paper?’

  ‘I sling out. I sling out all ze papers.’

  ‘You threw it out? Idiot!’

  Furiously, Pongwiffy ran out of the hovel. There was a scrabbling noise, followed by the sort of slithering crash that might be made by a very tall pile of old newspapers falling from a very great height. Then she was back.

  ‘Found it. Look!’

  Eagerly, she waved The Daily Miracle under Hugo’s nose. Hugo looked. Sure enough, the Spell of the Year Competition took up most of the front page.

  ‘Vat make you sink ve vin?’ said Hugo.

  ‘Win? Of course we’ll win. What chance has a common old Cure For Warts or a stupid old Frog Transformation Spell against a bottle of Granny Malodour’s Wishing Water? I tell you, Hugo, with a superior potion like this, we can’t fail. Anyway, it’s time a Witch won for a change. Last year it was won by some daft conjuror with pigeons up his jumper. Batty Bob and his Boring Birds or something. We’ll have to keep it terribly secret, of course. I don’t want the other Witches knowing. If they know I’ve got Granny’s recipe, they’ll all want it. We’ll have to work undercover. Ooh, I simply can’t wait to get started, can you?’

  ‘Ya,’ said Hugo firmly. ‘I can. Right now, I do spring-cleanink. You vanna do Magic? Get your Vand and mend zat broken vindow.’

  ‘I shall do no such thing,’ said Pongwiffy. She snatched up her Wand, threw it on a chair and sat on it, sulking. Hugo and the Broom ignored her, and quite right too.

  CHAPTER TWO

  The Spell

  Late that night, sitting in her rocking chair in a spanking-clean hovel, nose buried in a hanky, Pongwiffy brooded over Granny Malodour’s spell.

  All was quiet. Hugo had flaked out on top of a pile of ironing. His cheek pouches sagged with exhaustion and he was snoring loudly.

  Outside the hovel, the Broom was soaking its sore bristles in a bucket of water. On the doorstep, a multitude of evicted Spiders were preparing to leave with bitter little cries of ‘Come on, boys, we know when we’re not wanted’, ‘Don’t forget the flies, Gerald, we’ll be peckish later’, and things like that.

  Pongwiffy peered at the ancient writing by the light of a single candle. She couldn’t stand it any brighter in the hovel, because everywhere was so blindingly clean it hurt her eyes.

  She hated it. She loathed the way the pots and pans glittered and the way the floor winked at her, daring her to walk on it in muddy boots. She liked her cardigans how they were before, all comfortably matted up and dirty brown with those special holes for her elbows. Pink and blue they were now, with a sissy smell that came from something that Hugo had poured in the water.

  In fact, everything smelt all wrong, even the air, which Hugo had sprayed with something out of a can called Reeka Reeka Roses. The only way she could breathe was with a hanky over her nose. The hovel just didn’t feel like home any more. Pongwiffy hardly dared move without the Broom following her about in case she dropped a crumb. And the fuss Hugo had made when she attempted to climb into bed without washing her feet!

  ‘Oi! Vat zis you do?’

  ‘I’m going to bed, if you must know.’

  ‘Not vizzout vashink ze foots.’

  ‘Wash my feet? Me? Have you gone mad? Why?’

  ‘Cos zose is clean sheets.’

  ‘Uggh! So they are!’

  Pongwiffy jumped away from the bed as if scalded. ‘You don’t expect me to sleep in those, do you? They’re – they’re white! Yuck, I nearly touched one. Where are my old grey ones?’

  ‘Zem I sling out.’

  ‘You threw out my sheets?’

  ‘Ya. Zey not nice. Zey got ’oles. Zey got crumbs. Zey like bottom of ze birdcage.’

  ‘I know. It took years to get them like that, you interfering Hamster. Well, if you think I’m getting in between those, you can think again. I’d sooner stay up all night.’

  ‘OK,’ said Hugo, yawning. ‘Me, I go sleep.’

  So that’s why we find Pongwiffy in her rocking chair in the small hours of the morning, brooding over Granny Malodour’s spell.

  And this is what it said.

  METHOD

  On ye night of ye fulle moone, place ye quicksande to simmere in cauldron over a low fyre. Using thy left hand only, take thou a sharpe knyfe and finely chop dry ingredients (hayre, whisker, bobble, feathere and stars). Mix. Add gradually to ye hot quicksande, stirring all ye time. Pour in skunke stocke. Add beetle doos. Season to taste. Bring to boyle. Sit with thy nose pointing due north and thy boots on ye wrong feet. Recite thou ye following chant:

  Snap and crackle, scream and cackle,

  Can’t catch cows with fishing tackle.

  Bubble, brew, the way thou oughter,

  Then turn into Wishing Water!

  Continue chanting until thou hearest ye cockerel crowe five times. Remove cauldron from heat and allow to cool. Then say ye Magick Words (Bottoms Up!), drink thou of the potion and make thy wish. Best with a side salade.

  ‘Hmm. Sounds easy enough,’ muttered Pongwiffy. ‘Mind you, some of these ingredients could be a bit tricky. Best have a look to see what I’ve got.’

  Candle in hand, she marched to her Magic cupboard. Now, usually her Magic cupboard was stuffed so full that the doors exploded outwards the moment they were touched. Jars of frogs’ legs, packets of beetle eggs, old Wands, cracked crystal balls and paper bags of mysterious powders marked DONT NO WOT THIS IS would all come tumbling out in a huge, satisfying jumble.

  Not now, though. Now it was empty. Hugo was nothing if not thorough.

  ‘Right,’ said Pongwiffy grimly, surveying the bare shelves. ‘Time to make a list and go shopping, I think.’

  The next half an hour involved the back of an old envelope, the stub of a pencil, a great deal of head-scratching and a fair amount of scribbling. As soon as the list was finished, she seized her basket and rammed on her hat.

  ‘I’M OFF, THEN,’ she announced in an unnecessarily loud voice. ‘OFF TO THE SHOPS. STOCKING UP.’

  She needn’t have bothered. Hugo merely snored even louder. Scowling, she kicked the door open with an almighty crash and stomped out into the moonlit night.

  Outside the hovel, the Broom slept in its bucket. All around the front garden, tall piles of beloved junk teetered under the moon, doomed to be returned to the rubbish dump the following morning.

  There was her favourite battered old sofa, the one that had nearly got stolen by two Mummies last Hallowe’en. And there was her photograph album with those irreplaceable snaps of Witch Gaga running amok at last year’s Coven outing to the Haunted Show House!

  Ah! There was her framed letter from Scott Sinister, the famous film star! And there, scattered about all over the place, lay her collection of rude notes to the milkman, which went back seven years. And there were her oldest, smelliest, comfiest cardigans, the ones which Hugo considered a health hazard and refused to wash. There was her first tall hat, a bit battered to be sure but bringing back fond memories. And there was her box of old Wands and her first chemistry set and a pile of crumbling books with titles like Know Your Omens and Portents and My First Little Book of Curses. And there was her favourite hot-water bottle, and her dead poison plant and her second worst cauldron . . .

  Pongwiffy’s eyes misted over. But not before she became aware of the accusing stares of a hundred or more exiled Spiders, who muttered and pointed resentfully.

  ‘Huh. Some landlady.’

  ‘After all we done for her.’

  ‘Never got behind with the rent, did we, Mother?’

  ‘Oh Dad! Never to dangle from me own little rafter again. Webless, at my age.’

  ‘Never you mind, Ma, we’ll look after you. We’ll find you a little nook where you’ll be made welcome, see if we don’t. Right, boys?’

  ‘I don’t think me poor old legs’ll get me there. I got terrible rheumatism in all eight knees. Anyway, it won’t be home. I’ll die of a broken heart,
I know I will. If somebody don’t step on me first. Or a bird don’t get me.’

  All of this made Pongwiffy feel even worse. With a guilty flush and a heavy heart she slunk away, heading for the Magic shop. A shopping trip might take her mind off things.

  CHAPTER THREE

  Dunfer Malpractiss

  ‘Ear yer bin spring-cleanin’ dahn your place,’ remarked the man behind the counter with an unpleasant leer. His name was Dunfer Malpractiss and he was the owner of Malpractiss Magic Ltd, where all the Witches went to buy ingredients for their spells.

  Malpractiss Magic Ltd was, as is usually the case with these sorts of places, a wandering shop which came and went as it pleased. You could never be absolutely sure, if you ran out of eye of newt on a Saturday night, that the shop would even be there to sell you any, let alone have it in stock.

  However, Dunfer Malpractiss wasn’t stupid. He had a lot of regular customers in Witchway Wood, and the likelihood was that Malpractiss Magic Ltd would be found in the usual place (by the stream under the old oak tree) most nights between the traditional opening hours of midnight and dawn.

  ‘None of your business what I’ve been doing,’ snarled Pongwiffy.

  ‘Yer. Not before time, eh? I’m told it’s a bit of a tip, your place,’ mused Dunfer, sucking his moustache. It was one of those unpleasant wet ones which droop into cups of coffee and always get covered in froth.

  ‘So? I like it like that. Are you serving or what?’

  ‘Keep yer ’air on. Only sayin’. What were it you wanted again?’

  ‘I’ve told you!’ Irritably, Pongwiffy waved her shopping list under his nose. ‘I need a Wilde Cat’s Whisker, some Beste Quicksande, a Vulture’s Feathere, a . . .’

  ‘’Old on, ’old on. One fing at a time. Wilde Cat’s Whisker, were it?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Dunfer Malpractiss pulled at his nose with dirty fingers.

  ‘Nah. Fresh out. What were the next?’

  ‘Quicksande.’

  ‘Nah. No call fer it these days. There’s a pool of it in the Wood somewhere – go an’ ’elp yerself.’