Potions and Puzzles

by Agnes Lester Brown

  She took out her cell phone and looked up her star calendar. Tomorrow night was going to be a full moon, and she’d be meeting the one man who’d know the answer to that.

  Grandpa Randolph.

  Chapter Two

  An hour after Nick left, Lori locked up the shop and walked the two blocks back to Whitewood Manor. The last rays of the sun shone yellow and gold through the lines of trees along Clove Street. She smiled and waved at the residents watering and trimming their gardens in the late afternoon, even stopping for a chat or two. She got so engrossed in talking to her neighbors that it was a little before dinnertime when she finally entered the house.

  “I have a major announcement to make,” Lori said, breaking up the chitchat that was going on around the Whitewood dinner table. “Nick came by at the shop and asked us to help out with a crossword tournament he’s hosting in a few weeks’ time.” She added a clincher to help avoid dissension. “He insists that we’re the best help ever, and the bee’s knees when it comes to providing food and managing the floor at these sorts of things.”

  But the compliment she’d hoped would instantly convince everyone to agree to her proposal didn’t work.

  The twins shook their heads right away. “Sorry, I can’t do it,” Jasmine apologized. “I’m attending a class next week on how to write blog posts. The mayor insists I go as part of my on-the-job training.”

  “Same here,” said Rosie, looking up briefly from her phone. “I’m working through an online computer hacking course.”

  Hazel looked skeptical. “Crosswords? What sort of competition is that?”

  Lori hoped that if she convinced Hazel, her twin daughters would be a little more flexible about helping. So she kicked her persuasive powers into high gear.

  “It’s called the World Champion Crossword Tournament, and it offers huge, huge prize money. Nick knows the organizer and convinced him to bring the competition to Fennelmoore. He’s so convinced of this being good for business, he’s even added a presidential suite to the Misty Hills Inn. And he’s offering us a cut of his percentage, so we’ll be making good money, too.”

  Hazel didn’t get fired up by the money, but another light went on in her mind.

  “Wait a minute, isn’t that Kermit Greenstone’s event? I dated a crossword fanatic years ago, guy called Flynn. The only thing Flynn lived for was to be selected for Kermit’s tournament. Getting a chance to take part in it is every crossword devotee’s lifelong dream.” She looked at Fae. “Remember, Mom? We went to Houston with Flynn to watch the World Championship tournament. We met a few very, very colorful characters there.”

  Fae chortled with mirth. “Yes, yes, you’ve just jogged my fading memory. Didn’t we stay over at witch Regina’s house? Yes, we got up to a few shenanigans while we were in Houston. Remember the potion we mixed into the pen ink of the contestant with the pink hair, and the words kept disappearing as she wrote? And the other one wearing that huge, silly panama hat that flew into the air like a saucer when we cast a spell on it? I can’t remember the kind of spell we used, but it sure worked well!” Fae laughed so exuberantly she started coughing, and Rosie had to hastily fetch her a drink of water to calm her down.

  “Well, yes. Though the joke was on us,” Hazel lamented. “That was the point when Flynn decided this Whitewood woman’s mother was a bit too much for him, and he up and left without a word.” She grew stern. “Promise me if Flynn’s around this time, you won’t misbehave, okay?”

  By now, Lori had even bigger doubts than before about this whole thing.

  “All right, all right.” Lori brought the table to order. “How about this? In two hours’ time, we’re meeting with Grandpa Randolph, so let’s hear what he has to say about this.”

  Her reminder deflated the conversation somewhat. “Oh yeah, I forgot that it’s that time of the year again,” Rosie mumbled, and Jasmine let out an extra-long sigh.

  Granny Fae muttered something about “What does that old fool know?” and Hazel went off into the kitchen to start cleaning up. The only one who seemed to be looking forward to the event was Trixi, the family’s black cat, who, on hearing the name Randolph, jumped up from where she had been lying fast asleep and sat down right at the back door.

  At exactly a quarter to midnight, the Whitewoods filed out the back door of the manor and started along a path running through their lush organic vegetable garden, which filled most of the backyard. It was Rosie’s turn to lead the procession, walking in front and carrying a huge candelabra with twelve lit candles. Granny Fae followed her, then Hazel, followed by Jasmine and Lori, with Trixi bringing up the rear. They stopped at a large opening in the vegetable garden, where five chairs were arranged in a circle. Each member of the family went to her usual chair and sat down. A sixth chair stood in the center, and Rosie placed the chandelier next to it.

  Hazel lifted her hand ceremonially, and everyone closed their eyes. There were a few moments of silence, and then she spoke in a soft, solemn tone.

  “We gather here, as we do at each cycle of the solstice, to speak to our dearly departed Grandfather Randolph.”

  A minute went by. The distant, lone police siren was the only sound disturbing the silence.

  “Focus, everyone,” Hazel said.

  “The man’s not exactly a star timekeeper,” Jasmine whispered, and Rosie started giggling, stopping only when Lori gave her a well-aimed kick in the shin.

  Rosie didn’t have time to bend down and rub her injury, though. At that very moment, there was a loud pop, and a brightly lit cloud of orange smoke billowed up. It enveloped the chair standing in the center and cast long shadows inside the circle. As the smoke slowly settled, the familiar figure of Grandpa Randolph appeared, sitting in the chair.

  “Evening all,” Randolph greeted them cheerily. He wore his customary outfit of a tall pointed wizard’s hat painted silver and decorated with purple and green glitter, and a flowing purple velvet overcoat.

  Poor guy must be suffering in this summer heat. Lori wondered whether she should offer to hold his coat.

  “Grandfather Randolph, wise one, we welcome you once again into our midst,” Hazel intoned her usual welcoming line. “Please share your wisdom and insight for the forthcoming year with us, so we can be prepared and ready to be of service as witches.”

  “All right, let’s see.” Randolph wrestled an iPad from the inside of his coat, turned it on and swiped with his forefinger across the screen a few times.

  “Hmmm… yes, here I have the predictions for the next few months.” He studied the screen for a few seconds and then shook his head slowly. “It seems the princess is not as innocent as she makes herself out to be. And now the prince must suffer for that.”

  Lori pricked up her ears. The rest of the family thought Randolph’s mystical babbling was mostly hogwash, but she knew they had to read between the lines. One had to listen carefully to him and save the thought. What he said often only started making sense much later.

  Fae was much less subtle that Lori. She lifted her walking stick and shoved it impatiently in Randolph’s direction. “Randolph, you old good-for-nothing wizard, quit the fairy-tale nonsense! Is it a good time to get involved in this crossword thing, or not?”

  Randolph’s face turned dark for a second, but then he regained his jovial composure and launched into a long monologue about how he missed Fennelmoore and its balmy summers. The weather in the Afterlife tended to be too hot and dry for his liking. He cut himself short midsentence after a few minutes, when he noticed everyone looking bored and shifting around in their chairs.

  “Oh, don’t worry, you’ll all be fine,” Randolph said and put his iPad away. “But,” he added, waving a bony ringed finger in the air, “let’s be careful out there.”

  “Hill Street Blues, 1988,” Rosie said under her breath. Lori recalled Grandpa Randolph sitting in front of the television with baby Rosie on his lap, watching reruns of the old police series. It seemed to have rubbed off on her.

 
“It’s good to see Grandpa Randolph hasn’t lost his sense for the theatrical,” Lori whispered to Hazel as her grandfather disappeared behind another oversized column of Technicolor smoke and everyone got up to leave. She wished he was still alive. She missed his insights, and she knew he would have enjoyed the tournament and its over-the-top participants. As the family walked back to the house, she thought back on the cryptic words he’d spoken. What on earth could he have meant by them? She made a mental note to write down his words in her diary tonight before she went to sleep. Randolph might still be a clown even in death, but he never spoke in vain.

  Back in the house, the family gathered around the kitchen table for a last cup of tea before going to bed. Having obtained Randolph’s blessing seemed to have worked. Everyone was suddenly available and enthusiastic about the tournament. Being a first-class cook, Hazel was ready to jump at the opportunity to cater for the participants. Already, she was busily writing down menus for each day of the event.

  “Should I include some brain food for them, something protein-rich to help them think more clearly?” she pondered as she searched through a pile of recipe books.

  “We’re going to see Fennelmoore’s name up there with the places celebrities go to,” Jasmine enthused, her blogging class now forgotten. “This is going to be so good for the town!”

  “It’s just a get-rich-quick scheme,” Fae said, still skeptical as she poured everyone another cup of tea. “Always take what that crazy old man says with a pinch of salt.”

  “Oh, come look at this!” Rosie exclaimed suddenly. While everyone was discussing the event, she’d opened her laptop and, ever the researcher, browsed around for information on the tournament.

  The family moved closer together and huddled around the dim light of her laptop screen, where a video was about to start playing. In the first scene, Alvin Parkinson, wearing a fancy bow tie and black velvet jacket, stood on a stage in front of a large whiteboard in the shape of a blank crossword. He held a marker in his left hand and a sheet of paper in the right, and stared expressionless straight ahead of him. An oversized pair of black headphones covered his ears, and he wore reflective dark glasses. In the corner of the screen, a red digital display flashed “World Record: 6 Minutes 16.5 Seconds.”

  “Turn down the volume, I’m about to go deaf,” Hazel complained, covering her ears against the hip-hop soundtrack and the staccato sound of the audience counting down to the start.

  “Three… two… one… go!”

  At the word go, a bell clanged and the audience began to cheer and whistle. Alvin glanced at the sheet of paper in his hand for a second and then turned to the blank crossword on the whiteboard. Almost instantaneously, he started scribbling letters into the open spaces, only occasionally pausing to glance at the clue sheet. He hardly stopped as the words flowing from his pen filled the spaces. In the background a commentator’s voice droned on, recounting on his progress.

  The enthusiasm of the audience in the video was contagious. As Alvin got nearer to completing the entire crossword puzzle and the onscreen clock ticked closer to the world record, the Whitewoods started cheering him on too.

  The applause reached a crescendo as Alvin completed the final word, spun around on his heel and threw the silver baseball cap he was wearing in the air, revealing his clean-shaven head. His face, until a moment ago a mask of concentration, broke into a massive smile showing two rows of shiny, perfectly white teeth.

  “Ladies and gentlemen, a record-breaking time of six minutes, fourteen point three seconds,” the announcer’s voice droned, hardly audible above the noise. “This is a new world record for Alvin Parkinson.” The camera panned to show the massive hall filled to the brim with people clapping and cheering and waving signs with “Go, Alvin!” written in large, bold letters. Around the table, everyone clapped, shaking their heads at Alvin’s amazing feat.

  “Wow,” said Jasmine, knocked out by what she’d just seen. “This guy’s a rock star!”

  “Crossword rock star Alvin Parkinson,” Lori said, linking the photo Nick had shown her at the shop to what she’d just witnessed. She pointed at the screen. “Rosie, just rewind to the last audience part, please?”

  Rosie clicked her mouse, and the video rewound until it showed the audience cheering the moment Alvin had won. Everyone in the hall was going wild, except for two women in the front row, who sat stony-faced while everyone cheered.

  “That’s strange,” Lori said, pointing at the women in the video. “I wonder who those people with the long faces are.”

  “Most definitely the losers,” Hazel said. “I’d have a long face too if I’d missed out on five million dollars.”

  “They sort of look like witches, don’t they?” Fae said. “I’ll have to introduce them to a few spells that’ll give them a little bit of an edge,” she added with a wicked look.

  “Mother, there’ll be no tomfoolery, okay?” Hazel said, trying to sound strict, but like Jasmine, Rosie and Lori, she was struggling to hide her amusement.

  “No doubt these crossword celebs will bring a bit of much-needed action to sleepy Fennelmoore,” Rosie said as she closed her laptop and leaned forward. “So when do we get busy working on this thing?”

  Chapter Three

  Old Mrs. Barkley’s next door’s cock crowed at exactly six, just as a sliver of sun peeked over the rooftops of Fennelmoore. Lori lazily opened one eye just as Trixi, who’d slept by her feet the whole night, stretched out and yawned. Lori peered out the window towards the Emerald Forest beckoning in the hazy distance. She struggled past Trixi, stumbled to the bathroom to wash up and get dressed. She desperately needed an hour of me time to help her make a few decisions, and a short hike to the forest was just the way to make that happen.

  Half an hour later, she’d packed her backpack in the still-deserted kitchen of Whitewood Manor and was braving the chilly morning breeze along Cumin Lane towards the footpath that led into the flower-covered fields. She walked briskly to beat the cold, and soon she came to the wooden bridge across the Driftwood River. Stepping gingerly onto the bridge, she had to tread carefully as several of the wooden slats across the bridge were broken. The bridge creaked as she crossed. She hopped off the far end of the bridge, which had been damaged by torrential rainstorms. Just as well Nick wasn’t here with her. There was no way the bridge would’ve held under his considerable weight.

  At the edge of the forest, she stopped and sighed, fists at her sides. Someone had dumped several bags filled with garbage near the path. Wild animals had been scavenging around and ripped the bags apart to get to the morsels of food inside. Plastic bottles, empty cans and rotting food from the torn bags were strewn all over. A foul smell wafted in the air. She hastily covered her nose and hurried along.

  Lori hadn’t been to Emerald Forest for more than a year and was shocked at how it had deteriorated. Before, the path had been pristine and well marked, but now it was overgrown with nettles, and the direction signs were faded or missing. Fortunately, she knew her way through the forest, and after having to take a few detours, she found her favorite spot at the bottom of a small waterfall where she always rested. Her mouth watering, she took out the small juice canister and salad bowl she’d brought with her. The forest provided protection against the cold, and the walk had warmed her up. It felt good to be among the lush green undergrowth and rocks covered in moss and lichens.

  The silence around her was peaceful, and she felt in tune with nature surrounding her. She furtively glanced around to see whether she could spot any magical creatures. Faeries and dwarves were known to show themselves to witches on occasion, and it was here she had first been introduced to them by Granny Fae when she was little. But after looking around carefully and seeing none, she wondered whether they’d moved on due to the neglect of the forest path. Around her, cigarette butts and scraps of paper showed human presence. While the forest was still a haven of peace and stillness, it clearly needed urgent attention to maintain its beauty.

&n
bsp; Lori packed up and started walking home with a firm resolve to pay Mayor Riley’s office a visit and complain about the state of the forest. Surely the municipality had a budget to fix the bridge, remove the trash and maintain the forest signage. She could probably ask Jasmine to bring this to his attention; after all, he was her boss. But she had a feeling that to get this done, there’d have to be a bit of arm twisting, and Jasmine was too soft for that sort of thing. She’d have to do go to his office directly and argue her case to him.

  Lori entered Fennelmoore’s town hall building, breathed in deeply and walked up the stairs to Mayor Riley’s section of the building. She walked down a long corridor and paused outside his office door, listening to the clackity-clack of his secretary Meredith’s ancient typewriter. After a few seconds, she pushed the door open and stepped inside.

  Meredith’s desk was deliberately placed in the room so that it blocked access to the mayor’s office. She sat straight as a broomstick behind it, looking disapprovingly over her glasses at Lori.

  “Morning, Meredith, how are you today?” Lori breezily greeted her while eyeing the mayor’s closed door behind her.

  “Morning, Ms. Whitewood,” Meredith said without looking up from her typewriter. “Can I help you?”

  “I would like to see the mayor, please,” Lori said in her best businesslike tone. “It’s an urgent matter that affects us all.”

  Meredith glanced over at an open book lying next to her. “Do you have an appointment, Ms. Whitewood?”

  “No, I don’t.” Lori looked at the mayor’s door again. She raised her voice a few decibels. “But I’d like to speak to him about the bad state of the Emerald Forest.”

  “I’m afraid the mayor’s not taking any appointments—” Meredith began.

  A deep voice boomed from the other side of the door.

  “Meredith!”

  Meredith gave Lori a venomous look.