Egg, thread and fingers blurred for a few seconds and there was the egg, hanging from Miss Tick’s fingers in a neat little black net.

Tiffany was impressed.

But Miss Tick hadn’t finished. She began to draw things from her pockets, and a witch generally has a lot of pockets. There were some beads, a couple of feathers, a glass lens and one or two strips of coloured paper. These all got threaded into the tangle of wood and cotton.

‘What is that?’ said Tiffany.

‘It’s a shamble,’ said Miss Tick, concentrating.

‘Is it magic?’

‘Not exactly. It’s trickery.’

Miss Tick lifted her left hand. Feathers and beads and egg and pocket junk spun in the web of threads.

‘Hmm,’ she said. ‘Now let me see what I can see…’

She pushed the fingers of her right hand into the spiderwork of threads and pulled…

Egg and glass and beads and feathers danced through the tangle, and Tiffany was sure that at one point one thread had passed straight through another.

‘Oh,’ she said. ‘It’s like Cat’s Cradle!’

‘You’ve played that, have you?’ said Miss Tick vaguely, still concentrating.

‘I can do all the common shapes,’ said Tiffany. ‘The Jewels and The Cradle and The House and The Flock and The Three Old Ladies, One With A Squint, Carrying The Bucket Of Fish To Market When They Meet The Donkey… although you need two people for that one, and I only ever did it once, and Betsy Tupper scratched her nose at the wrong moment and I had to get some scissors to cut her loose…’

Miss Tick’s fingers worked like a loom.

‘Funny it should be a children’s toy now,’ she said. ‘Aha…’ She stared into the complex web she had created.

‘Can you see anything?’ said Tiffany.

‘If I may be allowed to concentrate, child? Thank you…’

Out in the road the sleeping dog woke, yawned and pulled itself to its feet. It ambled over to the bench the two of them were sitting on, gave Tiffany a reproachful look and then curled up by her feet. It smelled of old damp carpets.

‘There’s… something…’ said Miss Tick, very quietly.

Panic gripped Tiffany.

Sunlight reflected off the white dust of the road and the stone wall opposite. Bees hummed between the little yellow flowers that grew on top of the wall. By Tiffany’s feet, the spaniel snorted and farted occasionally.

But it was all wrong. She could feel the pressure bearing down on her, pushing at her, pushing at the landscape, squeezing it under the bright light of day. Miss Tick and her cradle of threads were motionless beside her, frozen in the moment of bright horror.

Only the threads moved, by themselves. The egg danced, the glass glinted, the beads slid and jumped from string to string—

The egg burst.

The coach rolled in.

It arrived dragging the world behind it, in a cloud of dust and noise and hooves. It blotted out the sun. Doors opened. Harness jingled. Horses steamed. The spaniel sat up and wagged its tail hopefully.

The pressure went—no, it fled.

Beside Tiffany, Miss Tick pulled out a handkerchief and started to wipe egg off her dress. The rest of the shamble had disappeared into a pocket with remarkable speed.

She smiled at Tiffany, and kept the smile as she spoke, making herself look slightly mad.

‘Don’t get up, don’t do anything, just be as quiet as a little mouse,’ she said.

Tiffany felt in no state to do anything but sit still; she felt like you feel when you wake up after a nightmare.

The richer passengers got out of the coach, and the poorer ones climbed down from the roof. Grumbling and stamping their feet, trailing road dust behind them, they disappeared.

‘Now,’ said Miss Tick, when the inn door had swung shut, ‘we’re… we’re going to go for a—a stroll. See that little wood up there? That’s where we’re heading. And when Mr Crabber the carter sees your father tomorrow he’ll say he—he dropped you off here just before the coach arrived and—and—and everyone will be happy and no one will have lied. That’s important.’

‘Miss Tick?’ said Tiffany, picking up the suitcase.

‘Yes?’

‘What happened just now?’

‘I don’t know,’ said the witch. ‘Do you feel all right?’

‘Er… yes. You’ve got some yolk on your hat.’ And you’re very nervous, Tiffany thought. That was the most worrying part. ‘I’m sorry about your dress,’ she added.

‘It’s seen a lot worse,’ said Miss Tick. ‘Let’s go.’

‘Miss Tick?’ said Tiffany again as they trudged away.

‘Er, yes?’

‘You are very nervous,’ said Tiffany. ‘If you told me why, that means there’s two of us, which is only half the nervousness each.’

Miss Tick sighed. ‘It was probably nothing,’ she said.

‘Miss Tick, the egg exploded!’

‘Yes. Um. A shamble, you see, can be used as a simple magic detector and amplifier. It’s actually very crude, but it’s always useful to make one in times of distress and confusion. I think I… probably didn’t make it right. And sometimes you do get big discharges of random magic’

‘You made it because you were worried,’ said Tiffany.

‘Worried? Certainly not. I am never worried!’ snapped Miss Tick. ‘However, since you raise the subject, I was concerned. Something was making me uneasy. Something close, I think. It was probably nothing. In fact I feel a lot better now we’re leaving.’

But you don’t look it, Tiffany thought. And I was wrong. Two people means twice as much nervousness each.

But she was sure there was nothing magical about Twoshirts. It was just a bend in the road.

* * *

Twenty minutes later the passengers came out to get into the coach. The coachman did notice that the horses were sweating, and wondered why he could hear a swarm of flies when there were no flies to be seen.

The dog that had been lying in the road was found later cowering in one of the inn’s stables, whimpering.

The wood was about half an hour’s walk away, with Miss Tick and Tiffany taking turns to carry the suitcase. It was nothing special, as woods go, being mostly full-grown beech, although once you know that beech drips unpleasant poisons on the ground beneath it to keep it clear it’s not quite the timber you thought it was.

They sat on a log and waited for sunset. Miss Tick told Tiffany about shambles.

‘They’re not magical then?’ said Tiffany.

‘No. They’re something to be magical through.’

‘You mean like spectacles help you see but don’t see for you?’

‘That’s right, well done! Is a telescope magical? Certainly not. It’s just glass in a tube, but with one you could count the dragons on the moon. And… well, have you ever used a bow? No, probably not. But a shamble can act like a bow, too. A bow stores up muscle power as the archer draws it, and sends a heavy arrow much further than the archer could actually throw it. You can make one out of anything, so long as it… looks right.’

‘And then you can tell if magic is happening?’

‘Yes, if that’s what you’re looking for. When you’re good at it you can use it to help you do magic yourself, to really focus on what you have to do. You can use it for protection, like a curse-net, or to send a spell, or… well, it’s like those expensive penknives, you know? The ones with the tiny saw and the scissors and the toothpick? Except that I don’t think any witch has ever used a shamble as a toothpick, ha ha. All young witches should learn how to make a shamble. Miss Level will help you.’

Tiffany looked around the wood. The shadows were growing longer, but they didn’t worry her. Bits of Miss Tick’s teachings floated through her head: Always face what you fear. Have just enough money, never too much, and some string. Even if it’s not your fault it’s your responsibility. Witches deal with things. Never stand between two mirrors. Never cackle. Do what you must do. Never lie, but you don’t always have to be honest. Never wish. Especially don’t wish upon a star, which is astronomically stupid. Open your eyes, and then open your eyes again.