‘Stand up, Walter Plinge,’ she said.
Walter stood up, staring straight ahead of him. ‘It’s stopped! It’s stopped! It’s bad luck to stop the show!’ he said hoarsely.
‘Someone better start it again,’ said Granny.
‘You can’t stop the show! It’s the show!’
‘Yes. Someone better start it again, Walter Plinge.’
Walter didn’t appear to notice her. He pawed aimlessly through his stack of music and ran his hands through the drifts of old programmes. One hand touched the keyboard of the harmonium and played a few neurotic notes.
‘Wrong to stop. Show must go on. . .’
‘Mr Salzella is trying to stop the show, isn’t he, Walter?’
Walter’s head shot up. He stared straight ahead of him.
‘You haven’t seen anything, Walter Plinge!’ he said, in a voice so like Salzella’s that even Granny raised an eyebrow. ‘And if you tell lies, you will be locked up and I’ll see to it that there’s big trouble for your mother!’
Granny nodded.
‘He found out about the Ghost, didn’t he?’ she said. ‘The Ghost who comes out when he has a mask on. . . doesn’t he, Walter Plinge? And the man thought: I can use that. And when it’s time for the Ghost to be caught. . . well, there is a Ghost that can be caught. And the best thing is that everyone will believe it. They’ll feel bad about themselves, maybe, but they’ll believe it. Even Walter Plinge won’t be certain, ‘cos his mind’s all tangled up.’
Granny took a deep breath. ‘It’s tangled, but it ain’t twisted.’ There was a sigh. ‘Well, matters will have to resolve themselves. There’s nothing else for it.’
She removed her hat and fished around in the point. ‘I don’t mind tellin’ you this, Walter,’ she said, ‘because you won’t understand and you won’t remember. There was a wicked ole witch once called Black Aliss. She was an unholy terror. There’s never been one worse or more powerful. Until now. Because I could spit in her eye and steal her teeth, see. Because she didn’t know Right from Wrong, so she got all twisted up and that was the end of her.
‘The trouble is, you see, that if you do know Right from Wrong you can’t choose Wrong. You just can’t do it and live. So. . . if I was a bad witch I could make Mister Salzella’s muscles turn against his bones and break them where he stood. . . if I was bad. I could do things inside his head, change the shape he thinks he is, and he’d be down on what’d been his knees and begging to be turned into a frog. . . if I was bad. I could leave him with a mind like a scrambled egg, listening to colours and hearing smells. . . if I was bad. Oh, yes.’ There was another sigh, deeper and more heartfelt. ‘But I can’t do none of that stuff: That wouldn’t be Right.’
She gave a deprecating little chuckle. And if Nanny Ogg had been listening, she would have resolved as follows: that no maddened cackle from Black Aliss of infamous memory, no evil little giggle from some crazed vampyre whose morals were worse than his spelling, no sidesplitting guffaw from the most inventive torturer, was quite so unnerving as a happy little chuckle from a Granny Weatherwax about to do what’s best.
From the point of her hat Granny withdrew a paper-thin mask. It was a simple face-smooth, white, basic. There were semi-circular holes for the eyes. It was neither happy nor sad.
She turned it over in her hands. Walter seemed to stop breathing.
‘Simple thing, ain’t it?’ said Granny. ‘Looks beautiful, but it’s really just a simple bit of stuff, just like any other mask. Wizards could poke at this for a year and still say there was nothing magic about it, eh? Which just shows how much they know, Walter Plinge. ‘
She tossed it to him. He caught it hungrily and pulled it over his face.
Then he stood up in one flowing movement, moving like a dancer.
‘I don’t know what you are when you’re behind the mask,’ said Granny, ‘but “ghost” is just another word for “spirit” and “spirit” is just another word for “soul”. Off you go, Walter Plinge.’
The masked figure did not move.
‘I meant. . . off you go, Ghost. The show must go on.’
The mask nodded, and darted away.
Granny slapped her hands together like the crack of doom.
‘Right! Let’s do some good!’ she said, to the universe at large.
Everyone was looking at her.
This was a moment in time, a little point between the past and future, when a second could stretch out and out. . .
Agnes felt the blush begin. It was heading for her face like the revenge of the volcano god. When it got there, she knew, it would be all over for her.
You’ll apologize, Perdita jeered.
‘Shut up!’ shouted Agnes.
She strode forward before the echo had had time to come back from the further ends of the auditorium, and wrenched at the red mask.
The entire chorus came in on cue. This was opera, after all. The show had stopped, but opera continued. . .
‘Salzella!’
He grabbed Agnes, clamping his hand over her mouth. His other hand flew to his belt and drew his sword.
It wasn’t a stage prop. The blade hissed through the air as he spun to face the chorus.
‘Oh dear oh dear oh dear,’ he said. ‘How extremely operatic of me. And now, I fear, I shall have to take this poor girl hostage. It’s the appropriate thing to do, isn’t it?’
He looked around triumphantly. The audience watched in fascinated silence.
‘Isn’t anyone going to say “You won’t get away with this”?’ he said.
‘You won’t get away with this,’ said Andr�, from the wings.
‘You have the place surrounded, I have no doubt?’ said Salzella brightly.
‘Yes, we have the place surrounded.’
Christine screamed and fainted.
Salzella smiled even more brightly.
‘Ah, now there’s someone operatic!’ he said. ‘But, you see, I am going to get away with it, because I don’t think operatically. Myself and this young lady here are going to go down to the cellars where I may, possibly, leave her unharmed. I doubt very much that you have the cellars surrounded. Even I don’t know everywhere they go, and believe me my knowledge is really rather extensive’
He paused. Agnes tried to break free, but his grip tightened around her neck.
‘By now,’ he said, ‘someone should have said: “But why, Salzella?” Honestly, do I have to do everything around here?’
Bucket realized he had his mouth open. ‘That’s what I was going to say!’ he said.
‘Ah, good. Well, in that case, I should say something like: Because I wanted to. Because I rather like money, you see. But more than that’- he took a deep breath-‘I really hate opera. I don’t want to get needlessly excited about this, but opera, I am afraid, really is dreadful. And I have had enough. So, while I have the stage, let me tell you what a wretched, selfadoring, totally unrealistic, worthless artform it is, what a terrible waste of fine music, what a-‘
There was a whirr off on one side of the stage. The skirts of costumes began to flap. Dust flew up.
Andr� looked around. Beside him, the wind machine had started up. The handle was turning by itself.
Salzella turned to see what everyone was staring at.
The Ghost had dropped lightly on to the stage. His opera cloak billowed around him. . . operatically.
He bowed slightly, and drew his sword.
‘But you’re dea-‘ Salzella began. ‘Oh, yes! A ghost of a Ghost! Totally unbelievable and an offence against common sense, in the best operatic tradition! This was really too much to hope for!’
He thrust Agnes away, and nodded happily.
‘That’s what opera does to a man,’ he said. ‘It rots the brain, you see, and I doubt whether he had too much of that to begin with. It drives people mad. Mad, d’you hear me, mad!! Ahem. They act irrationally. Don’t you think I’ve watched you, over the years? It’s like a hothouse for insanity!! D’you hear me? Insanity!!’
He and the Ghost began to circle one another.
‘You don’t know what it has been like, I assure you, being the only sane man in this madhouse!! You believe anything!! You’d prefer to believe a ghost can be in two places at once than that there might simply be two people!! Even Pounder thought he could blackmail me!! Poking around in places that he shouldn’t!! Well, of course, I had to kill him for his own good. This place sends even rat catchers mad!! And Undershaft. . . well, why couldn’t he have forgotten his glasses like he usually did, eh?’
He lashed out with his sword. The Ghost parried.