She unhooked the ladle, picked up a bowl, and helped herself.
A moment later she pushed aside the tent flap and looked into the blackness of the interior.
A figure was seated cross-legged in the gloom, smoking a pipe.
‘Mind if I step inside?’ said Nanny.
The figure nodded.
Nanny sat down. After a decent interval she pulled out her own pipe.
‘Mrs Pleasant’s a friend of yours, I expect.’
‘She knows me.’
‘Ah.’
From outside, there was the occasional clink as customers helped themselves.
Blue smoke coiled from Nanny Ogg’s pipe.
‘I don’t reckon,’ she said, ‘that many people goes away without paying.’
‘No.’
After another pause Nanny Ogg said: ‘I ‘spects some of ‘em tries to pay with gold and jewels and scented ungulants and stuff like that?’
‘No.’
‘Amazin’.’
Nanny Ogg sat in silence for a while, listening to the distant noises of the market and summoning her powers.
‘What’s it called?’
‘Gumbo.’
‘It’s good.’
‘I know.’
‘I reckon anyone who could cook like that could do anything’ – Nanny Ogg concentrated – ‘Mrs … Gogol.’
She waited.
‘Pretty near, Mrs Ogg.’
The two women stared at one another’s shadowy outline, like plotters who had given the sign and countersign and were waiting to see what would happen next.
‘Where I come from, we call it witchcraft,’ said Nanny, under her breath.
‘Where I come from, we call it voodoo,’ said Mrs Gogol.
Nanny’s wrinkled forehead wrinkled still further.
‘Ain’t that all messin’ with dolls and dead people and stuff?’ she said.
‘Ain’t witchcraft all runnin’ around with no clothes on and stickin’ pins in people?’ said Mrs Gogol levelly.
‘Ah,’ said Nanny. ‘I sees what you mean.’
She shifted uneasily. She was a fundamentally honest woman.
‘I got to admit, though …’ she added, ‘sometimes … maybe just one pin …’
Mrs Gogol nodded gravely. ‘Okay. Sometimes … maybe just one zombie,’ she said.
‘But only when there ain’t no alternative.’
‘Sure. When there ain’t no alternative.’
‘When … you know … people ain’t showing respect, like.’
‘When the house needs paintin’.’
Nanny grinned, toothily. Airs Gogol grinned, outnumbering her in teeth by a factor of thirty.
‘My full name’s Gytha Ogg,’ she said. ‘People calls me Nanny.’
‘My full name’s Erzulie Gogol,’ said Mrs Gogol. ‘People call me Mrs Gogol.’
“The way I saw it,’ said Nanny, ‘this is foreign parts, so maybe there’s a different kind of magic. Stands to reason. The trees is different, the people is different, the drinks is different and has got banana in ‘em, so the magic’d be different too. Then I thought … Gytha, my girl, you’re never too old to learn.’
‘Sure thing.’
‘There’s something wrong with this city. Felt it as soon as we set foot here.’
Mrs Gogol nodded.
There was no sound for a while but the occasional puffing of a pipe.
Then there was a clink from outside, followed by a thoughtful pause.
A voice said, ‘Gytha Ogg? I know you’re in there.’
The outline of Mrs Gogol took its pipe out of its mouth.
‘That’s good,’ she said. ‘Good sense of taste there.’
The tent flap opened.
‘Hallo, Esme,’ said Nanny Ogg.
‘Blessings be on this … tent,’ said Granny Weatherwax, peering into the gloom.
‘This here’s Mrs Gogol,’ said Nanny. ‘She’s by way of bein’ a voodoo lady. That’s what witches are in these parts.’
‘They ain’t the only witches in these parts,’ said Granny.
‘Mrs Gogol was very impressed at you detecting me in here,’ said Nanny.
‘It wasn’t hard,’ said Granny. ‘Once I’d spotted that Greebo washing himself outside, the rest was all deduction.’
In the gloom of the tent Nanny had formed a mental picture of Mrs Gogol as being old. What she hadn’t expected, when the voodoo lady stepped out into the open air, was a handsome middle-aged woman taller than Granny. Mrs Gogol wore heavy gold earrings, a white blouse and a full red skirt with flounces. Nanny could feel Granny Weatherwax’s disapproval. What they said about women with red skirts was even worse than whatever they said about women with red shoes, whatever that was.
Mrs Gogol stopped and raised an arm. There was a flurry of wings.
Greebo, who had been rubbing obsequiously against Nanny’s leg, looked up and hissed. The largest and blackest cockerel Nanny had ever seen had settled on Mrs Gogol’s shoulder. It turned on her the most intelligent stare she had ever seen on a bird.
‘My word,’ she said, taken aback. ‘That’s the biggest cock I’ve ever seen, and I’ve seen a few in my time.’
Mrs Gogol raised one disapproving eyebrow.
‘She never had no proper upbringing,’ said Granny.
‘What with living next to a chicken farm and all, is what I was going to say next,’ said Nanny.
‘This is Legba, a dark and dangerous spirit,’ said Mrs Gogol. She leaned closer and spoke out of the corner of
her mouth. ‘Between you and me, he just a big black cockerel. But you know how it is.’
‘It pays to advertise,’ Nanny agreed. ‘This is Greebo. Between you and me, he’s a fiend from hell.’
‘Well, he’s a cat,’ said Mrs Gogol, generously. ‘It’s only to be expected.’
Dear Jason and everyone,
Isn’t it amazing the things what happen when you dont expect it, for example we met Mrs Gogol who works as a coke by day but is a Voodoo witch, you mustnt bekive all the stuff about black magic, exetra, this is a Blind, shes just like us only different. Its true about the zombies though but its not what you think …
Genua was a strange city, Nanny decided. You got off the main streets, walked along a side road, went through a little gate and suddenly there were trees everywhere, with moss and them llamas hanging from them, and the ground began to wobble underfoot and become swamp. On either side of the track there were dark pools in which, here and there, among the lilies, were the kind of logs the witches had never seen before.
‘Them’s bloody big newts,’ she said.
‘They’re alligators.’
‘By gods. They must get good grub.’
‘Yeah!’
Mrs Gogol’s house itself looked a simple affair of driftwood from the river, roofed with moss and built out over the swamp itself on four stout poles. It was close enough to the centre of the city that Nanny could hear street cries and the clip-clop of hooves, but the shack in its little swamp was wreathed in silence.
‘Don’t people bother you here?’ said Nanny.
‘Not them as I don’t want to meet.’ The lily pads moved. A v-shaped ripple drifted across the nearest pool.
‘Self-reliance,’ said Granny approvingly. ‘That’s always very important.’
Nanny regarded the reptiles with a calculating stare. They tried to match it, and gave up when their eyes started watering.
‘I reckon I could just do with a couple of them at home,’ she said thoughtfully, as they slid away again. ‘Our Jason could dig another pond, no problem. What was it you said they et?’
‘Anything they want to.’
‘I knows a joke about alligators,’ said Granny, in the tones of one announcing a great and solemn truth.
‘You never!’ said Nanny Ogg. ‘I never heard you tell a joke in your whole life!’
‘Just because I don’t tell ‘em don’t mean I don’t know ‘em,’ said Granny haughtily. ‘It’s about this man – ‘
‘What man?’ said Nanny.
‘This man went into an inn. Yes. It was an inn. And he saw a sign. The sign said “We serve every kind of sandwich.” So he said “Get me an alligator sandwich -and make it quick!” ‘
They looked at her.
Nanny Ogg turned to Mrs Gogol.
‘So … you live alone here, then?’ she said brightly. ‘Not a living soul around?’
‘In a manner of speakin’,’ said Mrs Gogol.
‘You see, the point is, alligators are – ‘ Granny began, in a loud voice, and then stopped.
The shack’s door had opened.
This was another big kitchen.* Once upon a time it had provided employment for half a dozen cooks. Now it was a cave, its far corners shadowy, its hanging saucepans and tureens dulled by dust. The big tables had been pushed to one side and stacked almost ceiling high with ancient crockery; the stoves, which looked big enough to take
* As Desiderata said, fairy godmothers tend to get heavily involved with kitchens.
whole cows and cook for an army, stood cold.
In the middle of the grey desolation someone had set up a small table by the fireplace. It was on a square of bright carpet. A jam-jar contained flowers that had been arranged by the simple method of grabbing a handful of them and ramming them in. The effect was a little area of slightly soppy brightness in the general gloom.
Ella shuffled a few things around desperately and then stood looking at Magrat with a sort of defensively shy smile.