AND NOW, WITH A CHARM too powerful to resist, Miss Bone guided the little group up her dim staircase. She drew them like flies into the webby depths of her witch’s chambers. Poco’s heart had never beat so hard. Walter’s hand was frozen in a sort of salute near the brim of his cap. Even Georgina had to catch her breath when she stepped into Miss Bone’s kitchen and saw with her own eyes everything that Poco had described over the phone.
There were the aprons and the yellowed lace, the baskets and the tea and coffee jars, the herbs and grasses and—oh! (Georgina jumped in spite of herself)—the same tall stool that Poco had climbed upon to peer over the edge of the big pot.
And there was the stove! Georgina turned toward it, ready to gasp if the pot should still be there. It wasn’t. A blackened teakettle squatted on one of the burners instead. It was to this that Miss Bone now turned her attention.
“Of course, you must have some tea,” she said, grasping the handle with a faint smile. Or was she frowning? Her face was so wrinkly it was hard to tell. “You look raw and cold as polar penguins!”
She filled the kettle at the sink and set it back on the stove. “Not that polar penguins really are cold, since they are born on ice and live on ice and have never known anything else. Only we who look at them think they must be cold,” Miss Bone went on, turning up the gas burner, “because we would be cold if we were in their shoes. Or should I say ‘in their flippers’? We so often misunderstand the ways of creatures different from us.”
The investigators stared at her with unblinking eyes. Their minds were a perfect blank. Whether this was a result of their own fright at being so close to the enemy, or of Miss Bone’s terrible magic, there was no telling. She gave them a sharp-toothed smile, opened a cupboard, and looked inside.
“Ladyfingers,” she announced. “I’m afraid that’s all I have for sweets.”
Poco chose this moment to sag toward the floor. Walter caught her just in time.
“Heavens, child!” Miss Bone cried out. “Go into the living room and lie down on the couch.”
“N-n-no, thank you,” Walter said. “We’ll just stay here, all together, if you don’t mind. We have to be leaving in a minute, anyway.” He glanced at the door, as if he were afraid it might seal over and disappear.
“Well, suit yourselves,” Miss Bone said. She gestured toward several chairs surrounding the tiny kitchen table. “But I must tell you that I have no intention of letting you go home just yet. No one who enters my kitchen gets away so easily as that!”
Georgina and Walter exchanged terrified looks, and Poco’s legs gave out completely at this. Walter lowered her carefully into one of the kitchen chairs and sank down beside her. Georgina sat across from them, perched in the upright position of a rocket ship waiting to be launched.
It was now time that somebody in the group should speak up and begin to question Miss Bone. No one seemed able to utter a word, though. The old teacher had boiled the tea water, poured it into a china teapot, brought cups and saucers and spoons and napkins and sugar and milk to the table, and sat down herself before the silence was broken. Then it was she who spoke.
“Well!” She opened her vein-choked hands as if to conjure another spell. “I’m so pleased you’ve come to visit me at last! I’ve been watching you, you know. Oh yes, I’ve had my eye on you …”
Poco felt ill. A queer white mist kept rising around the edges of her vision. She wondered if she would faint and decided she must not. The danger was too great. She clung dizzily to her chair and stared at Miss Bone. The old witch was chattering away, pretending to be a normal person as she poured out the tea. It reminded Poco of Walter’s spirits.
“That’s how they make it look so I can’t pin it on them,” he’d told Georgina about the accidents that were always happening around him.
Poco knew that Miss Bone was playing the same game.
The old woman handed her a cup of tea. She had been round to all three of them, asking their names and what families they came from. She remembered Poco’s brother in her English class. She and Walter’s grandmother had known each other years ago.
“So you are Walter Kew,” she said, gazing at him curiously. “I remember you as a baby. You arrived in a most unexpected way.”
“I did?” Walter said. No one had ever told him this before.
Miss Bone shook her head and went back to pouring tea.
“At first, I couldn’t imagine what you children were doing out there in the bushes,” she said, handing Georgina and Walter their cups. “Do you take sugar? Milk?” Her eyes darted back and forth over them.
“Then I understood. You were looking for the lost cat. I heard it had run away. Perhaps you thought I’d given it shelter? I suppose I should have come right out and told you I hadn’t, but … truthfully, I rather liked having you there.”
Miss Bone gave them a small smile. “I kept hoping you’d decide to come inside and visit me. And now you have!” She chuckled with pleasure. “I don’t get many young visitors anymore. This is such a treat for an old teacher!”
Miss Bone looked brightly at the investigators, as if she expected them to believe her.
“So you haven’t seen Juliette at all—is that what you’re saying?” Georgina said, speaking at last in a high, nervous voice.
“Is that the kitty’s name?” Miss Bone shrugged her shoulders. “No, not a whisker!”
“And you haven’t done anything with her all this time she’s been lost?”
“Done anything with her? What would I have done?” Miss Bone looked confused, then offended. “Did you think I’d hurt her?”
“We weren’t sure,” Georgina said.
Miss Bone’s expression turned serious. “I see. Well, there was one evening when I thought something might have been about. I came out for a breath of air and found some little dead mice and moles lying on my front stoop. ‘Aha!’ I said. ‘What else but a cat would make such a collection?’ I brought the poor little bodies inside and put out a bowl of milk in exchange. But nothing came to drink it, that night or the next. Whatever had been here must have gone off somewhere else.”
Poco scowled, but Georgina’s chin lifted a bit. She leaned forward to ask another question.
“What did you do with the mice and moles?”
An embarrassed look came over Miss Bone’s face. “If you must know, I wrapped them in little napkins and put them in the refrigerator. Then the next morning I took them outside and tucked them down in the dirt under the hedge. I suppose it’s silly, but I’ve always believed in proper burials. Mice, moles, or men—everyone’s entitled to respect in the end, I always say.”
Georgina’s expression softened after this, as did Walter’s. Even Poco glanced up in surprise. But a moment later her eyes narrowed again.
“A large pot?” Miss Bone was saying, in answer to Georgina’s next question. “Here? Goodness, what an investigation this is. You make me feel like a criminal.”
She glanced at them nervously. “I cook soups from time to time in such a pot as you’ve described. I’m not fond of canned soup, especially the chowders. Why pay all that money for ready-made when it’s so easy to boil up a few fish heads and carcasses into good fish stock? Add cream, potatoes, and onions, and you’re on your way. Is that a good-enough answer?”
“Fish heads!” Georgina exclaimed. She turned toward Walter. “Good grief, we never thought of that!”
“Thought of what!” Miss Bone exclaimed. “I demand to know what I am being accused of.”
Walter cleared his throat. “Ahem … do these fish heads ever happen to have … um … open eyes?”
“They always have them,” Miss Bone said. “That’s how they come. Why?”
“Oh, dear,” Walter muttered. He looked at her unhappily over Poco’s head.
“You cooked up a fish chowder not too long ago, didn’t you?” Georgina asked. “A week ago last Tuesday, I think it might have been.”
Miss Bone was astonished. “Why, yes, I did,” she said. “But how would you know? Or perhaps I see.” Her face sagged suddenly. “Your investigation.”
Georgina nodded.
Miss Bone looked away. There was a pause while she groped first in one pocket, then more desperately in another.
“Well!” she said finally, with a brave attempt at brightness. “And here I’d managed to convince myself that you’d come to make friends. My goodness, how a fool can fool herself when she wants to. Of course, you needn’t stay a minute longer, any of you. What a horror I must seem to you. Off you go. It’s quite all right. Don’t worry about the teacups. I’ll clear them up later.”
She fumbled in yet another pocket and this time drew out a rumpled bit of tissue. “Don’t mind me,” cried Miss Bone, pressing her nose into the tissue. “I believe I’m coming down with a terrible cold!”
Georgina sat still for a moment, watching the old woman. Then, to Poco’s fright, she leaned forward and took Miss Bone’s leathery hand in hers.
“Oh, Miss Bone, don’t be upset. We’ve been wrong about you. We are so sorry. Somehow we got the idea that you’d kidnapped Juliette.”
“Kidnapped her! Good gracious. What would the Harralls think!” Miss Bone turned around and glared at them.
“And that you were controlling things in an evil way. Walter’s Ouija board gave us false information.”
Even Walter nodded to this.
“Did you say Ouija board?” Miss Bone sniffed. “I used to have one of those. It always seemed to tell me exactly what I suspected.”
“We got off on a strange track, all right,” Georgina agreed. “Poco sneaked into your apartment once while you were out. She was absolutely sure you were a w—”
Miss Bone glanced toward Poco. “Good heavens!” she cried out, before Georgina could finish. “The child has turned as white as a sheet. Quick, help me carry her into the living room.”
Together they all reached for Poco, whose head was listing dangerously to one side. They caught her body just as it was about to collapse onto the floor and lifted her and carried her in to the couch.
“Put her legs up on cushions!” Miss Bone ordered. “We must get the blood running back into her head. Walter, fill a glass with water and bring it here. Georgina, dampen a dish towel under the faucet and lay it on her forehead. We’ll bring her around.”
Miss Bone mopped her own wrinkled forehead and gazed at Poco in real distress.
“The poor little thing is so skinny and exhausted. She’s been sick, if I am not mistaken. She should have been in a bed all this time, not gallivanting about in the cold. I certainly will not allow her to go back home with you,” she told the others.
“You won’t?” Walter asked.
“No!”
“But … she’ll want to go!”
“So she will, but I won’t allow it.”
“But you can’t keep her here forever!” cried Walter, his worst suspicions about Miss Bone rising up again.
“Of course not,” she said with a teacherish snap. “I am going to call Mrs. Lambert and tell her to come get this poor child right now in her car. I would drive her home myself if my old broomstick weren’t having one of its evil spells. The blasted thing wouldn’t start for anything this morning!”
Miss Bone gave the friends such an accusing stare that Walter blushed and Georgina lowered her head in shame. Then the old lady rose and strode nobly into the kitchen toward the telephone.