Melissande sighed. “Don’t tell me, let me guess. He’s not happy.”
“Who cares?” said Reg. “Bibbie’s right. This is about saving the agency. So, Miss Markham. About this crazy plan of yours…”
“It’s mad,” said Melissande much later, getting ready for bed. “And
I’m
mad for agreeing to it. Honestly, Reg, if something goes wrong…”
Reg swallowed the last of her supper mouse, burped genteelly, then fluffed out her feathers. “Most likely it won’t. But
if
it does we’ll deal with it, ducky. Now put a sock in it and turn out the light. I’m not the only one around here who needs her beauty sleep.”
Melissande concentrated on doing up her nightdress buttons. The trick with Reg was to just…
not react
. No matter what she said, no matter how rude she was, reacting only made things worse.
Besides. It only hurts because she tells the unvarnished truth.
Swathed in sensible pink flannel she padded across to the sprite trap on her lone bookcase, lifted up the blouse covering it, then flicked on the activation switch. Metaphysically revealed, the doleful sprite moped in the corner of the modified birdcage, its blue brightness dimmed.
She frowned. “It doesn’t look very happy, Reg.”
“Well, don’t you go trying to cheer it up,” Reg replied, cosily settled on the bedsit’s sole rickety chair. “No joyful ditties, for example. I’m still emotionally scarred from the last time I heard you sing.”
The last time she sang she’d been three-quarters full of Orpington whiskey, which was totally understandable given the dire prevailing circumstances. She glowered at the bird. “That’s not very nice, Reg.”
“Neither is your singing, ducky.”
Ah—ah—ah! No reacting, remember?
With teeth-gritted forbearance she turned off the sprite-revealer, dropped her blouse back over the cage and retreated to bed. “I still say this is a bad idea,” she said, putting her glasses on the bedside table then turning down the oil lamp’s wick until the bedsit was plunged into darkness.
“Only because you didn’t think of it,” said Reg. “That Markham girl may be scatty but she’s also inventive. And she’s not scared to give things a go.”
Melissande sat upright. “And you’re saying I am?”
Reg fluffed her feathers again, the soft sound loud in the late night silence. “I’m saying it’s easy to let yourself get timid when life’s not behaving itself.”
Stung, she felt her fingers tangle in the blankets. “I am not
timid
, Reg. I’m
cautious
.”
Reg sniffed. “If you say so.”
“I
do
say so!
Somebody’s
got to be. Between them, Monk and Bibbie are reckless enough to tip the whole world upside down and then shake its pockets so a few more bright ideas can fall out.”
“It’s perfectly understandable,” said Reg, ignoring that. “Being timid. You had your whole life planned, didn’t you? Thanks to that charlatan Rinky Tinky woman, you thought you were a genuine witch-inthe-making. You thought Bibbie’s Madam Olliphant was going to proclaim you a star. But that’s what these Rinky Tinky hussies do, ducky. They tell you what you want to hear so you’ll give them money, and so long as you keep on paying they’ll keep on fertilising your false hopes.”
Slowly, she lowered herself back to the mattress.
Do I want to talk about this? Let me think… “
Yes, well, my beauty sleep beckons. Night-night, Reg, I’ll see you in the morning.”
“No need to be ashamed,” said Reg, oblivious. “You were bamboozled by a line of hokum, madam, but that’s not a crime. You’re not the first and you won’t be the last.”
“It seems to be about the only thing I’ve got a talent for,” she muttered. “Getting bamboozled. I’ve been hoodwinked twice now. By Madam Ravatinka… and by Lional.”
“You can’t go blaming yourself for Lional,” said Reg, gruffly. “Nobody can help being related to an insane thaumaturgical criminal. I mean, it’s not as though you
weren’t
related and fell in love with him, is it? And it’s not as though he was some bugger you met and fell in love with, and married, even though everyone was telling.”
Melissande blinked in the bedsit’s faintly illuminated gloom. “Is that how you ended up an immortal bird?”
“I’m not immortal,” said Reg, with another sniff. “Not exactly. I can get run over, shot, stabbed, starved or beheaded like the next careless clot. But provided I don’t do anything silly, the only way I’ll die is if someone tries to lift the hex my hus—that got put on me.”
“That’s good to know,” she said, after a moment. “But it’s not what I asked.”
“Yes, Melissande,” said Reg, so quietly. “That’s how I ended up an immortal bird.”
There was
such
a wealth of sadness in Reg’s funny, scratchy little voice that Melissande felt her eyes prickle. “
Anyway
,” she said, clearing her throat and blinking hard at the hazy ceiling. “I’m
not
being timid. I’m simply expressing a perfectly reasonable concern about Bibbie’s plan.”
Another soft rustling sound as Reg fluffed out her feathers yet again. “Then think of another one if you’re so convinced hers is going to go kablooey.”
She felt her face scrunch into another frown. “I can’t.”
“I suppose we could have a word with Mister Clever Clogs,” said Reg idly. “He must know all there is to know about black market thaumaturgy. Maybe—”
“
No
, Reg,” she said. “This is none of Monk’s business. This is Witches Inc. business and we’re going to solve the case without his help.”
Reg snorted. “Except for the sprite, you mean.”
“The sprite doesn’t count.”
“If you say so, ducky.”
Well, it
didn’t
count. It was an accident. A case of serendipity. It wasn’t as if they’d
asked
Monk to give them an interdimensional sprite.
Besides. He owes me. I’m still not sure I scrubbed off all the sprite shit
.
“You know, Reg,” she said, snuggling beneath her blankets, “this whole affair is so hard to believe. And all those stories Bibbie told us… pastry brushes at forty paces and the rest of it. Grown women! They ought to be ashamed of themselves.”
“Ah well,” said Reg, around a yawn. “Everyone needs a hobby. Besides. Do you really want to tell that Wycliffe woman to bugger off back to her cake tins and take her money with her?”
“Of course I don’t,” she murmured, eyes drifting closed. “I just hope we’re not biting off more than we can chew.”
“Ha,” said Reg, stifling another yawn. “From the size of your buttocks, ducky, I’d say there’s nothing you can’t chew through.”
If she hadn’t needed her pillow, Melissande would’ve thrown it at the wretched bird.
She and Reg met Bibbie outside the Town Hall at half-past ten the following morning. From the number of well-to-do ladies crowding the footpath and jostling their way up the Town Hall steps to go inside, the annual Golden Whisk competition was something of a highlight on Ottosland’s social calendar.
“Blimey!” said Bibbie, staggering back a few paces. “Do my eyes deceive me, Mel, or are you wearing a
dress
?”
Melissande glowered at her. “No, actually. I’m wearing a blouse-waist and a walking skirt.”
“Never mind the pettifogging details,” said Bibbie, waving them away with a flick of her fingers. “The salient point is that you’re not wearing
trousers
.”
“Oh, shut up. Your brother’s carpetbag didn’t go with my tweeds.”
“It doesn’t go with the blouse-waist and walking skirt, either,” said Reg, under her breath in case a passer-by was listening. “But let’s not try to run before we can crawl.”
“And you can shut up too,” said Melissande, twitching her shoulder. She still hadn’t quite forgiven that last crack about butt—muscles one sits on. “Now, are we going to get this done or would you two prefer to stand out here critiquing my sartorial efforts while Millicent Grimwade gets away with metaphorical murder?”
Bibbie was still grinning at the change of attire. “Really, a princess dress would’ve been more appropriate, Mel.”
“A princess dress is what they’ll bury you in, Bibbie, if you don’t shut up so we can get this over with!”
Bibbie rolled her eyes. “Tetchy, isn’t she?” she asked Reg, conversationally. “Did you remember the sprite?”
“No,” said Melissande. “I just brought the carpetbag as a fashion accessory.”
“Where you’re concerned, Mel, anything is possible,” said Bibbie, then hastily raised her hands. “All right, all right. Truce. Let’s go inside shall we, girls, and save the day.”
The Town Hall chamber set aside for the Baking and Pastry Guild’s prestigious annual Golden Whisk competition was crowded with women of varying shapes, sizes, ages, wealth and rabid intensity. Silks and muslins whispered and rustled, sweeping the richly parqueted floor… or flirted above it as some daring young ladies risked censure by lifting their hems dangerously towards their mid-calves. The warm trapped air beneath the convolutedly decorated ceiling was redolent of lavender, patchouli, rose-water, musk, attar of roses and lily of the valley, combined into a heady perfume soup.
“Blimey,” Reg muttered, wheezing. “We’ve come to the asphyxia convention by mistake. I hope these cake-obsessed biddies have got first-aid officers standing by.”
Melissande twitched her shoulder again. “If you don’t shut up,” she muttered under her breath, “I’m going to find a hat and pin you to it.”
“Oh no you won’t,” said Reg. “Last thing you want to do is make yourself conspicuous.”
“Given there’s a woman in the corner wearing a stuffed monkey on her head, I doubt anyone would turn a hair. Now be quiet and pretend you’re an exotic shoulder ornament just like we agreed, Reg,
please
.”
“Look,” said Bibbie, pointing over the hats and bonnets of the women crowding round them. “There’s Permelia.”
And indeed, there she was. Permelia Wycliffe, faithful Eudora Telford in tow, stood ramrod-stiff at her display table, which was cordoned off from the hoi polloi behind a scarlet rope. All in all it appeared there were twelve finalists vying for the Golden Whisk. The grand prize itself stood in the centre of the room on a pedestal, protected by a glass case and its own scarlet cordon. Shafts of sunlight struck golden sparks from the coveted kitchen implement.
Melissande shook her head.
Surely these women have something better to do with their time than sweat blood and shed tears over baking the perfect date scone?
Except clearly they didn’t. Clearly they believed that winning a stupid egg beater meant they’d reached some lofty pinnacle of success. What was the
point
? It wasn’t as if they could
use
the wretched Golden Whisk—all the gold would peel off in the omelette and give the dinner guests heavy-metal poisoning.
But practicality, or the lack thereof, didn’t seem to bother Permelia Wycliffe or the other eleven women standing guard over their culinary offerings. If they weren’t darting furious glances at each other’s Rum Balls they were feasting their avaricious gazes on the prize. It was a wonder the organisers hadn’t provided silver drool-salvers.
“Wait a minute,” Melissande said, frowning. “Why is Permelia a finalist? Didn’t she say she hadn’t won a single regional contest thanks to Millicent Grimwade?”
Bibbie grinned. “Perks of the presidency,” she whispered. “But don’t tell her I told you.”
Permelia was pulling extraordinary faces, eyebrows shooting up and down, nose twitching, head minutely jerking sideways.
“Don’t look now,” said Reg, “but I think the pressure’s finally got to her. Any moment she’ll start foaming at the mouth.”
“I
think
,” said Bibbie, “she’s trying to tell us which one’s Millicent Grimwade.” She nodded at a woman third from the end along the row of wound-up, waiting contestants. “There.
Her
.”
“Right,” said Melissande. “Then let’s prove she’s a rotten cheater and get out of here, shall we? Because if I have to stay in this room for much longer I’ll never be able to look a cake in the face and smile again.”
“Not a bad idea, ducky,” Reg muttered. “Your buttocks’ll thank you for it, believe me.”
Ignoring that, Melissande hefted Monk’s carpetbag and got to work.
T
hey fought their way through the growing crowd, past the other contestants’ cake and pastry-laden tables, until they found themselves standing in front of Permelia Wycliffe’s nemesis, usefully camouflaged by two shifting rows of gossiping spectators.
Glimpsed between feather-crowned hats and silk-shawled shoulders, Millicent Grimwade lived up to her name. She was a tall, thin, hatchet-faced woman dressed head-to-toe in deep purple silk and basking in a premature aura of victory. A delicate lace cloth covered her display table right down to floor level, pinned in place by a cream-slathered gooseberry sponge, a primrose-yellow iced pound cake and a seductively glistening chocolate log.
Melissande considered the offerings, then sidled a little closer to Bibbie. “I’m sorry,” she murmured, mindful of eavesdroppers. “But I don’t see what’s so terrible about those cakes. They look like cakes you’d buy in a shop. In fact, they make Per—” She darted a glance around the jostling crowd. “
You-know-who
look like a sore loser. Which means we’re in grave danger of making
ourselves
look like idiots if we start throwing about unsubstantiated accusations.”