questioning!”
“What do you mean by that?” Mr. Longville
was aghast. He turned to me in desperation.
“What does she mean by that?”
The Witch leapt forward, grasping Mr.
Longville's jaw, prying his mouth open, and
attempting to abort yet another question—but
still he would continue!
“What are you doing? Are you crazy?”
She raised her hatchet, but before she could
add another skull to her collection, I seized the
back of his collar and pulled. He made a strangled
squawk, and several collar buttons snapped as the
hatchet slammed into the table, missing him by
an inch. I pulled him toward the cottage door. "I
think it is time we left," I said.
Once outside, there were only a few
steps between us and freedom, but
then... there was a violent lurch, and
the house stood up!
Leaning over the railing, I
saw what resembled some sort of
mechanical, steam-powered feet
attached to the foundation. The
house began to walk on those feet,
jolting us about in a most unpleasant
manner.
With a splintering crash, the witch burst
through the door and out onto the porch.
It was too late for us to jump, of course, for we
would have broken one or more of our essential
bones. Fortunately, the porch was one of those
which wrapped around the entirety cottage, and I
pried Mr. Longville's hands from the railing and
pulled him stumbling after me around the porch
to the opposite side.
The house ran past several much smaller
huts, and to my horrified amazement, these
huts also stood up on mechanical chicken feet
and began to follow after us, screaming. I could
not understand why they were screaming, but it
unnerved me to no end.
I had not enough time to get a closer glimpse;
the witch was close upon our heels.
The house leaped over a fallen log, landing
with a particularly jarring jolt, then turned to race
along the edge of a very steep cliff.
As we once more lapped the back porch, the
witch stepped around the house, catching up with
us. Mr. Longville clutched the veil of my hat to
his chest as if it would protect him, pulling it quite
off.
“Why are you trying to kill us? What have
we ever done to you? Why? Why? Why?” Percy
yelled.
The witch staggered, and though I would not
say so myself, others have since commented on
the flash of genius that overcame me then.
"How old are you?" I asked. It was not
only a question; it was the rudest question I could think to ask an old woman. "More than a hundred? More
than that, even?"
The house shuddered. The
hatchet dropped from her hand.
“Does every question age you?
Are we doing quite the number on
you?”
The mask tore from her face with a
sound like ripping cobwebs, and I saw her true
face revealed. The skin on her face moved, her
wrinkles deepening visibly. The wrinkles, and
shrinking of age, had caused her mask to drop!
“Do you fancy you are elderly enough?”
She was ancient; her skin spotted and deformed
as though with disease,