Jody Richards and The Secret Potion (5 page)

Jody kept herself hidden in the shadow of the passageway as she listened to their conversation.

Bodger was now saying: “Yes, it would be worth a fortune. As soon as our master has mixed it we should steal some of it from him and sell it. What do you think, Enoch?”

“I agree,” said his friend who then became the victim of a sneezing fit. He sneezed five times before he was able to carry on. “Blast that cold of mine. Never mind. The fact is, my dear Bodger, I am several steps ahead of you. I have already spoken to one of the witches who live on the far side of the island where they practice all sorts of evil sorcery. I have arranged for her to come and see me here this very afternoon to discuss whether she would be interested in buying the formula.

“I have told her that so far I have only been able to locate the main two ingredients, which are in the master’s storeroom in the castle. He has yet to mix them with another potion, which he has hidden in a secret hiding place.

“But the witch thinks the other ingredient is most likely to be one from a certain range of potions, and she is bringing a few concoctions with her. I can then take them and try mixing each of them with the ingredients in the storeroom.”

“So,” mused Bodger. “We might be able to discover the formula ourselves.”

“That’s right,” Enoch confirmed, excitedly. “If we can it will save us searching for the master’s secret hiding place. Instead, all we’ll have to do is go into the storeroom and help ourselves from the barrels containing the main two ingredients.

“But we’ll have to be very careful. We must not take too much – otherwise our master will know we have stolen it. And then he would put a terrible spell on us like he did with his last guard, Stinky. He turned Stinky into a skunk and drowned him!”

“What did Stinky do to warrant such a dreadful fate?” asked Bodger, his eyes wide open in fright

“Nothing,” said Enoch, supping his glass of ale. “He just stunk, that’s all.

“The master told him to stop smelling and when he didn’t the master said ‘If you are going to smell like a skunk you can be a skunk’.

“Unfortunately, he then smelt even worse because he wet himself with fear, so the master drowned him in gallons of perfume. At least in death he smelt better than he had ever done in life.”

Bodger gulped incredulously. “Perhaps it’s not worth the risk of us stealing the ingredients,” he spluttered, beads of sweat coming from his bald head.

“Don’t be silly,” Enoch told him with a scowl that caused his squinting eyes to almost close. “This formula could make us rich beyond belief. Providing we only take some of the ingredients the master will be none the wiser. Then we could sell the formula to the witches – they would reward us handsomely.”

“In that case count me in,” said Bodger. “But I can’t stay here talking to you much longer. I’m supposed to be patrolling the castle grounds and the forest. If the master should find I’m not on duty there will be hell to pay.”

“Don’t worry,” Enoch assured him, looking at his watch. “It’s almost mid-day and the master will be about to eat his lunch. Let’s go to the bar and order another drink.”

“Just one,” said Bodger. “But I must go to the toilet first.”

With that he got up and walked towards the passageway in which Jody was standing. At first she was gripped by fear and unable to move. The two goblins would be furious to find she had overheard their plans.

She wondered whether she should blow the silver whistle Heatherbelle had given her and summons the fairy to help her. Jody actually pulled it out of her pocket. But she did not know how long it would take the fairy to arrive, and if she blew the whistle it would only attract the attention of everyone in the bar.

So Jody quickly dismissed the idea and put the whistle back again. Instead, she forced herself to retreat down the passage and, to her relief, found a door on the right through which she quickly disappeared just as the goblin approached.

The frantic girl prayed that he had not seen her double back as she entered a gloomy room and quickly crossed to another door on the far side of it. She was delighted to find that it opened on to a yard behind the kitchen.

She couldn’t bring herself to go into the kitchen again, but at the end of the yard was a wall that was not too high for her to climb.

At last she could escape from this wretched tavern.

Chapter Seven

JODY raced across the yard and climbed on a beer crate to get to the top of the wall without too much difficulty.

The wind blew Jody’s gleaming golden-brown hair into her face, slightly blurring her vision and distracting her. But she ignored it. She was so thankful to get away from the tavern and the horrid goblins that, without looking, she allowed herself to drop down the other side of the wall – right on top of an old woman!

“Aahh,” yelled the woman, toppling over and rolling on the ground, causing her grey coat to be covered in dirt from the side road along which she had been walking.

“I’m so sorry,” said Jody, aghast. She got to her feet and quickly bent down to help up the dishevelled woman, whose stern-looking, wrinkled face suggested she was not just old – she was ancient!

The hag, whose stand-out features were an extended chin and misshapen nose, had wrinkles on top of wrinkles – except where there were warts.

But what was more disturbing for Jody was that, in leaning over, she caused the magic whistle to fall out of her dress pocket – and watched in dismay as it dropped straight into a drain by the roadside.

“Oh, no!” she cried. “I’ve lost my whistle.”

“You wicked, wicked girl,” the woman shrieked. “You’ve knocked me over and all you can think of is your whistle.” She stood up slowly and rose to her full height – all five foot two inches of it.

Jody, finding herself staring at the woman’s wrinkles and warts, became embarrassed and racked with guilt. Her beauty spot swelled as her cheeks went bright red.

“I didn’t mean to be unfeeling,” she explained. “It was just that the whistle was given to me to summons help if I needed it while searching for my brother James.”

“How careless of you to lose him,” chided the old dear, chuckling.

“No, you don’t understand,” said Jody.

This met with more displeasure from the woman, who knocked Jody’s hand away when the girl tried to brush the dirt off her coat.

“Does looking for your brother entitle you to jump off walls? she demanded.

“There was a good reason why I did that, but it’s a long story,” Jody began. “Perhaps I should give you a full explanation.

“My name is Jody Richards and I’m from a country called England. My brother James disappeared from our home and I came here to look for him. He’s been gone three weeks now.”

“I’m not interested in your brother or your whistle,” the woman snapped. She then checked her coat pocket and withdrew from it three glass tubes. They had clearly been broken by Jody falling on top of her and the liquid they contained had dripped all over the inside of the old dear’s coat.

“A million curses,” uttered the hag. “You have caused these tubes to break and all the potions I spent hours mixing have drained away.”

She glared at the frightened young girl in front of her, fixing Jody with the meanest of stares from her steely grey eyes.

Jody was terrified. “You...” she stuttered. “You’re a witch aren’t you?”

“That’s right, dear” said the woman, gleefully. “There’s no fooling you is there? I might as well dispense with my disguise.”

With that she clapped her bony hands together and a blue mist engulfed her, followed by a red glow. It cleared in an instant to reveal that the old lady’s grey coat had been replaced by a black cape, and a pointed hat had suddenly appeared on her head.

Adjusting her hat, the woman demanded: “Just because I’m a witch does that excuse you from jumping on top of me?”

“No,” said Jody, full of guilt.

“And does it give you the right to break the glass tubes in which I was carrying special potions?”

“No,” answered Jody, sorrowfully. “I’m sorry. Were they very valuable?”

“I’ll never know now how valuable they might have been,” the witch snapped. “I was about to deliver them to a goblin so that he could mix them with special ingredients he has to see if the two together produced the right formula. Now I’ll have to start again.

“You need to be taught a lesson young lady. I’m going to place a curse on you.”

“Please don’t,” pleaded Jody.

But her protest was to no avail. The witch drew out a black wand from her cape and waved it menacingly.

“Just so that you don’t think I’m being mean I’ll even give you a choice of curses,” the old woman said, smiling, which caused the sagging skin around her mouth to fold into a dozen creases. “Let nobody say that Huffy Haggard is unfair.”

“Huffy Haggard? Is that your name?” asked Jody.

“Yes, it is,” growled the witch, the smile disappearing from her wrinkled face, the condition of which proved she was aptly named. “Are you suggesting that there is something wrong with it?”

“No, not at all,” Jody said, not seeking to offend the witch any further. “It’s just that it’s a little unusual.”

“Well,” Huffy Haggard replied. “If you want to know what ‘unusual’ really is I’ll show you.

‘Oh, dear,’ thought Jody. ‘I’ve spoken out of turn again.’ What was it Mrs. Parker-Smythe had said?

“Only open your month when it is absolutely necessary. It’s better that people merely think of you as ignorant – rather than you remove any trace of doubt.”

The witch was now uttering some magic chant that sounded like “Inca, Inca, Inca – Alzibar, Alzibar, Alzibar” and waving her wand in a large circle

Then she added words that caused Jody’s blood to go cold. “I call upon the spirits to make this girl’s big toes turn into snails.”

Jody looked down at her opened-toed sandals and recoiled in terror at the sight of her big toes, which were now no longer toes – but large, slimy snails.

“No, no,” she yelled, a feeling of utter revulsion sweeping over her.

“No?” the old lady questioned, chuckling. “Very well, then, let’s try something else.”

Huffy waved her wand and said: “Instead of snails on her toes, let me turn the end of every hair on her head into a worm.”

Jody was petrified. She could see her big toes had been restored to normal, but she dared not put her hands up to her head to confirm worms were now there. Jody quickly found she didn’t need to do so because she could feel the creatures wriggling as if she had been given live hair extensions.

“Take them away! Please take them away!” she shouted hysterically.

“I presume you don’t like that spell, either,” said the witch as Jody continued to scream. “My, you are a fuss pot, aren’t you? All right, all right, keep your hair on! I’ll cancel that spell, too. But you’ve run out of choices so you’ll be stuck with the next one.”

“Please just get them off my head,” screamed Jody, frantically trying to remove the worms herself with her hands.

Huffy swished the wand again and said: “Restore her hair to normal.” Instantly, the worms were gone.

Jody ran her hands through her hair to make quite sure the worms were no longer there. A feeling of relief swept over her.

“Now,” the witch mused. “What shall I make the final spell?”

“Please don’t let it be anything crawly or slimy,” Jody begged, the worms on her hair having made her feel quite sick.

“Very well,” Huffy replied, obviously enjoying herself. “We’ll simply settle for a nose job just like Pinocchio’s. I call upon the spirits to make this girl’s nose grow half and inch. And to cause it to grow a further half inch every time she does not carry out my instructions.”

Jody felt her nose and, to her horror, found it had become half an inch longer.

The witch told her: “From now on every time you meet someone you will tell them: ‘I am a very naughty girl who cannot be trusted.’

“If you fail to do so your nose will grow another half inch. And if you ever jump off another wall your nose will become twice as big.”

“Oh, no,” cried Jody, unable to stop herself from crying.

But Huffy took no notice. Instead, she scurried away towards the main entrance to the tavern, calling over her shoulder: “Let that be a lesson to you.”

Chapter Eight

JODY walked around in a trance, repeatedly feeling her extended nose and crying uncontrollably. Eventually, she came across a large blue fountain and peered into the clear water it was sprinkling on to a stone bowl so that she could study her reflection.

Even an extra half an inch made an enormous difference and her nose felt massive every time she touched it.

As she inspected it for the umpteenth time she couldn’t prevent herself bursting out crying again. She didn’t notice that she was being watched by a large, jovial man, sitting on a stone wall next to the fountain, eating a pie. He had long whiskers growing from under his nostrils like a giant moustache, but no beard. Beside him were three carrier bags. “Are you all right?” he asked.