Colin felt most uncomfortable. They could not just walk off and leave this peculiar woman in the middle of the road, yet her manner was so embarrassing that he wanted to hurry away, to disassociate himself from her strangeness.
“Omptator,” said the woman.
“I … beg your pardon.”
“Lapidator.”
“I’m sorry …”
“Somniator.”
“Are you …?”
“Qui libertar opera facitis …”
“I’m not much good at Latin …”
Colin wanted to run now. She must be mad. He could not cope. His brow was damp with sweat, and pins and needles were taking all awareness out of his body.
Then, close at hand, a dog barked loudly. The woman gave a suppressed cry of rage and spun round. The tension broke; and Colin saw that his fingers were round the handle of the car door, and the door was half-open.
“Howd thy noise, Scamp,” said Gowther sharply.
He was crossing the road opposite the farm gate, and Scamp stood a little way up the hill nearer the car, snarling nastily.
“Come on! Heel!”
Scamp slunk unwillingly back towards Gowther, who waved to the children and pointed to the house to show that tea was ready.
“Th – that’s Mr Mossock,” said Colin. “He’ll be able to tell you the way to Macclesfield.”
“No doubt!” snapped the woman. And, without another word, she threw herself into the car, and drove away.
“Well!” said Colin. “What was all that about? She must be off her head! I thought she was having a fit! What do you think was up with her?”
Susan made no comment. She gave a wan smile and shrugged her shoulders, but it was not until Colin and she were at the farm gate that she spoke.
“I don’t know,” she said. “It may be the heat, or because we’ve walked so far, but all the time you were talking to her I thought I was going to faint. But what’s so strange is that my Tear has gone all misty.”
Susan was fond of her Tear. It was a small piece of crystal, shaped like a raindrop, and had been given to her by her mother, who had had it mounted in a socket fastened to a silver chain bracelet which Susan always wore. It was a flawless stone, but, when she was very young, Susan had discovered that if she held it in a certain way, so that it caught the light just … so, she could see, deep in the heart of the crystal, miles away, or so it seemed, a twisting column of blue fire, always moving, never ending, alive, and very beautiful.
Bess Mossock clapped her hands in delight when she saw the Tear on Susan’s wrist. “Oh, if it inner the Bridestone! And after all these years!”
Susan was mystified, but Bess went on to explain that “yon pretty dewdrop” had been given to her by her mother, who had had it from her mother, and so on, till its origin and the meaning of the name had become lost among the distant generations. She had given it to the children’s mother because “it always used to catch the childer’s eyes, and thy mother were no exception!”
At this, Susan’s face fell. “Well then,” she said, “it must go back to you now, because it’s obviously a family heirloom and …”
“Nay, nay, lass! Thee keep it. I’ve no childer of my own, and thy mother was the same as a daughter to me. I con see as how it’s in good hands.”
So Susan’s Tear had continued to sparkle at her wrist until that moment at the car, when it had suddenly clouded over, the colour of whey.
“Oh, hurry up, Sue!” said Colin over his shoulder. “You’ll feel better after a meal. Let’s go and find Gowther.”
“But Colin!” cried Susan, holding up her wrist. She was about to say, “Do look!” but the words died in her throat, for the crystal now winked at her as pure as it had ever been.
“And what did owd Selina Place want with you?” said Gowther at tea.
“Selina Place?” said Colin. “Who’s she?”
“You were talking to her just before you came in, and it’s not often you see her bothering with folks.”
“But how do you know her? She seemed to be a stranger round here, because she stopped to ask the way to Macclesfield.”
“She did what? But that’s daft! Selina Place has lived in Alderley for as long as I con remember.”
“She has?”
“Ay, hers is one of the big houses on the back hill – a rambling barn of a place it is, stuck on the edge of a cliff. She lives alone theer with what are supposed to be three dogs, but they’re more like wolves, to my way of thinking, though I conner rightly say as I’ve ever seen them. She never takes them out with her. But I’ve heard them howling of a winter’s night, and it’s a noise I shanner forget in a hurry!
“And was that all she wanted? Just to know how to get to Macclesfield?”
“Yes. Oh, and she seemed to think that because we’d only recently come to live here we’d want a lift. But as soon as she saw you she jumped into the car and drove away. I think she’s not quite all there.”
“Happen you’d best have a word with yon,” said Bess. “It all sounds a bit rum to me. I think she’s up to summat.”
“Get away with your bother! Dick Thornicroft’s always said as she’s a bit cracked, and it looks as though he’s reet. Still, it’s as well to keep clear of the likes of her, and I shouldner accept ony lifts, if I were you.
“Now then, from what you tell me, I con see as how you’ve been a tidy step this afternoon, so let’s start near the beginning and then we shanner get ourselves lost. Well, you place wheer you say theer was such a grand view is Stormy Point, and the cave with the hole in the roof is the Devil’s Grave. If you run round theer three times widdershins Owd Nick’s supposed to come up and fetch you.”
And so, all through their meal, Gowther entertained Colin and Susan with stories and explanations of the things they had seen in their wanderings, and at last, after frequent badgering, he turned to the subject of the wizard.
“I’ve been saving the wizard till the end. Yon’s quite a long story, and now tea’s finished I con talk and you con listen and we needner bother about owt else.”
And Gowther told Colin and Susan the legend of Alderley.
“Well, it seems as how theer was once a farmer from Mobberley as had a milk-white mare …
“… and from that day to this no one has ever seen the gates of the wizard again.”
“Is that a true story?” said Colin.
“Theer’s some as reckons it is. But if it did happen it was so long ago that even the place wheer the iron gates are supposed to be has been forgotten. I say yon’s nobbut a legend; but it makes fair telling after a good meal.”
“Yes,” said Susan, “but you know, our father has always said that there’s no smoke without a fire.”
“Ay, happen he’s