She was calling him, he without acquaintances, he who walked alone. The smiling girl in the home-made dress was
gesturing for him to return to his own. It was a designation he'd entombed in the overgrown lea so long ago next to Pa...
the name escaped him for a moment and then it came, Pasher's Pond. Yes -that's it, there were water lilies and a pair
of glowing eyes watching him from beneath the... No, that wasn't right, he was laid among breeze-nodding bluebells
and the straw-haired lassie was still waving for him to join in on their game.
The warm sun was dappling the place where he lay, his Pa had gone to the village again and his mother had told him
that today she was making an apple pie. He was Jasper Windle and far away from the gruesome deeds and the wily
voice back there in the forest.
"Steel your mind from this illusion..." the vague hump hissed from across the dark attic and watched for the door handle
beginning to turn. "...You are the manumitter of those who fawn around the new church and allow their desires to exude
upon the innocent". The deteriorating Nixiehob faded for a moment and then releasing a gasp of exertion, became almost
solid again. For a few quiet moments during the fevered delusions from the man on the blood-stained mattress, the water
-incubus hunkered in the shadowy loft felt felt a rare pang of fear. There was a design afoot to halt the creature's grody
purpose by unknown actors and the Nixiehob needed to escape.
Windle's body was useless to him now, it was true that the spiteful creature that had watched the inculpable lad from its
fetid bottle-green haunt and with tentative guile, had steered him into a world where power was obtained by blunt violence
and the promise of harrowing dread. But the fever-wracked vehicle that had served the Nixiehob for all those seasons was
now profitless to serve its purpose and any future appropriate conveyance seemed precarious right now.
Thameston's river wasn't too far away and from there, the vital waters of the Great Sea. But in his present state, the true
instigator of the Cold Caller's killings knew it was too weak to get their via his own horsepower. The stale aroma of body
waste was pungent in this small room and with the bottled saline life-blood the Nixiehob required was dwindling, another
healthier host would be preferable around now. The paling creature had endured the stinking duckpond until it had found
an ideal candidate for its murdering lust, but saltwater was its true element.
"We've been ran to earth..." the voice croaked faintly in the gloom, but the once warden of Jasper Windle was too weak
to finish his advice. The room became quiet once more.
.................................................................
Madge Burrows looked fearfully at her husband, George Abernethy and the little unshod woman before turning her gaze
back to the lair of their lodger. Gathering herself, Madge called the name again and this time, followed the spellbinder's
instructions to mention Weathercote. Whatever horror lay beyond the paint-peeled barrier kept its own counsel and said
nothing.
It had been some time since Peggy Powler had laid out the reality of what was lurking in the space at the top of the
Burrows' residence and Madge's mind was still reeling with what the little wandering Witch had explained. It could well
be that the man on the other side of this door had killed her mother all those seasons ago, but Peggy had enlarged on
the Cold Caller's motive with a confusing account of some type of water-demon that liked salt being the true murderer.
Peggy Powler now nodded her approval at the words of the frightened woman and then nudged the sizable Inspector
breathing heavily beside her, "tis thy turn now, George" she whispered. Scraping his top teeth against the hair beneath
his bottom lip, he nodded at Jim Burrows and both men raised a booted foot in unison.
With a backdrop of a chair skidding across an uncarpeted floor, the wood of the door splintered loudly and the precious
lock that had kept the world out of Mister Fawkes' temporary sanctum became nothing but a carapace of tarnished brass
and a quartet of twisted flying screws. "You are under arrest" Inspector Abernethy boomed and with his Sergeant beside
him, rushed into the gloomy and foul-smelling attic.
Unlabeled bottles lay strewn across a gouged and grease-stained table, the chair that had once seconded no entry to the
tenant and his urine-contaminated alchemy now lay like a dead dog beneath the dormer window and a heavily-breathing
man on the untidy bed stared up at the cobwebs of the ceiling with a faint smile on his face. "Yes Marjorie" he wheezed
to the dust-sprinkled moths long dead among the fibres.
But it was the shuddering shape on the far-side of the filthy room that Peggy was more interested in, the killer from
Weathercote was badly injured and the Last Witch of Underhill glimpsed that whatever the damage he was dealing
with, the carriage of the Nixiehob was enduring it alone. "Take him downstairs and keep an eye on him" Inspector
Abernethy growled at Jim Burrows and pointed to the sweat-coated figure mumbling to himself on the sagging cot.
"Ah' think it'd be a grand idea te' follow him..." the bantam sorceress advised the tall Policeman without taking her
eyes of the vaporous form avoiding the daylight in the corner. "...Ah've got business te' do that would be better done
alone" she supplemented and reached into the canvas bag hanging from her shoulder. George didn't move as he
repeated the words said -what seemed to the Inspector, like a thousand summers ago. "I want both of them".
.................................................................
A light-of-foot Commissioner Bowles left Bishopsgate Police Station and believed dinner at The Savoy was in order.
The wintry day was already waning and Whyte Chapel's proletariat will be soon out on the streets in search of their
nightly intoxication. The cheery Head of the new Constabulary felt his euphoria shrink for a moment as he recalled
the Doctor's decision to have the butcher known as The Cold Caller transferred to Hammersmith Asylum. But since
the senseless and drooling man slumped on the floor of his cell seemed to be away with the fairies, Jason Bowles
felt little of importance would be gleaned from their incarcerated killer.
The borough of Whyte Chapel could breathe easier again thanks to his men and musing on what the newspapers
will be begrudgingly publishing tomorrow, the spring in Commissioner Bowles' step returned as he briskly strode
off to a better side of Thameston.
.................................................................
Epilogue.
"It's getting late, me-girl..." the merry Inspector said good-humouredly as he topped the sorceress' tankard up with
more ale. "...You can spend the night here before young Eckles will take you back to the boondocks" he advised
and amiably ruffled the hair of the Constable recently from Blackfriars. The Police Station was quiet as it seemed
the cold wind outside strongly recommended the sots, streetwalkers and visiting thaumaturges of the metropolis
to go about their nightly business indoors.
Peggy Powler offered a dispassionate face to George Abernethy from under her wide-rimmed hat and then with
a nod, acknowledged Jim Eckles' willingness to take her back to the realms she missed. "Me-bones are nay a
friend te' the elements, but they're clickin' te' get on their way" she replied calmly and with a hint of glumness.
To capture the Nixiehob had been the spell-worker's goal for coming to the dirty streets Thameston and if not for
a simple distraction, the dastardly water-demon would be safely contained in a special jar and awaiting Peggy's
interrogation. The badly-injured hysterical man called Windle had tried to escape the parlour of the Burrows and
in the all the commotion, the little Witch had let her guard down.
With incantations, the weak hater of humans had been easily subdued and taken. Inspector Abernethy had been
the one to hold the container and quickly incarcerated the parasitic demon into its cramped glass prison. During
this act and not realised until later, George's obsidian beard took on two wide streaks of white. The diminutive
half-Fae's objective was achieved until the scuffling pandemonium downstairs allowed the Fates to bring their
own kind of confiscation to take place.
Taking a sip of her beer, Peggy could only guess that Madge Burrows must have been waiting somewhere in
the shadows of the attic to make her play. When George had hurried down the stairs to assist in thwarting the
delirious man's limping escape, the little Witch had stepped to the door to hear what was going on.
Within just a few shakes of a Badger's tail, the daughter of a woman forever bound in the roots of a woodland
Hosta stepped over to the large salt-encrusted vessel holding the agent of her mother's killing and dumped a
small sack of sugar onto its pulsing contents.
"Yer' knaw' Ah think Ah'll empty this brew..." the wandering Witch notified her small audience with a sigh and
winked at the young man in the unbuttoned tunic. "...Then we'll gan' and see if awld' man Pincher has a donkey
who likes a midnight ride, eh?" she furthered and gulping down a large draught of her beverage, Peggy recalled
the hissed words of the woman with the aching joints and an empty pouch in her hand.
"Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven...Amen".
The End.
gesturing for him to return to his own. It was a designation he'd entombed in the overgrown lea so long ago next to Pa...
the name escaped him for a moment and then it came, Pasher's Pond. Yes -that's it, there were water lilies and a pair
of glowing eyes watching him from beneath the... No, that wasn't right, he was laid among breeze-nodding bluebells
and the straw-haired lassie was still waving for him to join in on their game.
The warm sun was dappling the place where he lay, his Pa had gone to the village again and his mother had told him
that today she was making an apple pie. He was Jasper Windle and far away from the gruesome deeds and the wily
voice back there in the forest.
"Steel your mind from this illusion..." the vague hump hissed from across the dark attic and watched for the door handle
beginning to turn. "...You are the manumitter of those who fawn around the new church and allow their desires to exude
upon the innocent". The deteriorating Nixiehob faded for a moment and then releasing a gasp of exertion, became almost
solid again. For a few quiet moments during the fevered delusions from the man on the blood-stained mattress, the water
-incubus hunkered in the shadowy loft felt felt a rare pang of fear. There was a design afoot to halt the creature's grody
purpose by unknown actors and the Nixiehob needed to escape.
Windle's body was useless to him now, it was true that the spiteful creature that had watched the inculpable lad from its
fetid bottle-green haunt and with tentative guile, had steered him into a world where power was obtained by blunt violence
and the promise of harrowing dread. But the fever-wracked vehicle that had served the Nixiehob for all those seasons was
now profitless to serve its purpose and any future appropriate conveyance seemed precarious right now.
Thameston's river wasn't too far away and from there, the vital waters of the Great Sea. But in his present state, the true
instigator of the Cold Caller's killings knew it was too weak to get their via his own horsepower. The stale aroma of body
waste was pungent in this small room and with the bottled saline life-blood the Nixiehob required was dwindling, another
healthier host would be preferable around now. The paling creature had endured the stinking duckpond until it had found
an ideal candidate for its murdering lust, but saltwater was its true element.
"We've been ran to earth..." the voice croaked faintly in the gloom, but the once warden of Jasper Windle was too weak
to finish his advice. The room became quiet once more.
.................................................................
Madge Burrows looked fearfully at her husband, George Abernethy and the little unshod woman before turning her gaze
back to the lair of their lodger. Gathering herself, Madge called the name again and this time, followed the spellbinder's
instructions to mention Weathercote. Whatever horror lay beyond the paint-peeled barrier kept its own counsel and said
nothing.
It had been some time since Peggy Powler had laid out the reality of what was lurking in the space at the top of the
Burrows' residence and Madge's mind was still reeling with what the little wandering Witch had explained. It could well
be that the man on the other side of this door had killed her mother all those seasons ago, but Peggy had enlarged on
the Cold Caller's motive with a confusing account of some type of water-demon that liked salt being the true murderer.
Peggy Powler now nodded her approval at the words of the frightened woman and then nudged the sizable Inspector
breathing heavily beside her, "tis thy turn now, George" she whispered. Scraping his top teeth against the hair beneath
his bottom lip, he nodded at Jim Burrows and both men raised a booted foot in unison.
With a backdrop of a chair skidding across an uncarpeted floor, the wood of the door splintered loudly and the precious
lock that had kept the world out of Mister Fawkes' temporary sanctum became nothing but a carapace of tarnished brass
and a quartet of twisted flying screws. "You are under arrest" Inspector Abernethy boomed and with his Sergeant beside
him, rushed into the gloomy and foul-smelling attic.
Unlabeled bottles lay strewn across a gouged and grease-stained table, the chair that had once seconded no entry to the
tenant and his urine-contaminated alchemy now lay like a dead dog beneath the dormer window and a heavily-breathing
man on the untidy bed stared up at the cobwebs of the ceiling with a faint smile on his face. "Yes Marjorie" he wheezed
to the dust-sprinkled moths long dead among the fibres.
But it was the shuddering shape on the far-side of the filthy room that Peggy was more interested in, the killer from
Weathercote was badly injured and the Last Witch of Underhill glimpsed that whatever the damage he was dealing
with, the carriage of the Nixiehob was enduring it alone. "Take him downstairs and keep an eye on him" Inspector
Abernethy growled at Jim Burrows and pointed to the sweat-coated figure mumbling to himself on the sagging cot.
"Ah' think it'd be a grand idea te' follow him..." the bantam sorceress advised the tall Policeman without taking her
eyes of the vaporous form avoiding the daylight in the corner. "...Ah've got business te' do that would be better done
alone" she supplemented and reached into the canvas bag hanging from her shoulder. George didn't move as he
repeated the words said -what seemed to the Inspector, like a thousand summers ago. "I want both of them".
.................................................................
A light-of-foot Commissioner Bowles left Bishopsgate Police Station and believed dinner at The Savoy was in order.
The wintry day was already waning and Whyte Chapel's proletariat will be soon out on the streets in search of their
nightly intoxication. The cheery Head of the new Constabulary felt his euphoria shrink for a moment as he recalled
the Doctor's decision to have the butcher known as The Cold Caller transferred to Hammersmith Asylum. But since
the senseless and drooling man slumped on the floor of his cell seemed to be away with the fairies, Jason Bowles
felt little of importance would be gleaned from their incarcerated killer.
The borough of Whyte Chapel could breathe easier again thanks to his men and musing on what the newspapers
will be begrudgingly publishing tomorrow, the spring in Commissioner Bowles' step returned as he briskly strode
off to a better side of Thameston.
.................................................................
Epilogue.
"It's getting late, me-girl..." the merry Inspector said good-humouredly as he topped the sorceress' tankard up with
more ale. "...You can spend the night here before young Eckles will take you back to the boondocks" he advised
and amiably ruffled the hair of the Constable recently from Blackfriars. The Police Station was quiet as it seemed
the cold wind outside strongly recommended the sots, streetwalkers and visiting thaumaturges of the metropolis
to go about their nightly business indoors.
Peggy Powler offered a dispassionate face to George Abernethy from under her wide-rimmed hat and then with
a nod, acknowledged Jim Eckles' willingness to take her back to the realms she missed. "Me-bones are nay a
friend te' the elements, but they're clickin' te' get on their way" she replied calmly and with a hint of glumness.
To capture the Nixiehob had been the spell-worker's goal for coming to the dirty streets Thameston and if not for
a simple distraction, the dastardly water-demon would be safely contained in a special jar and awaiting Peggy's
interrogation. The badly-injured hysterical man called Windle had tried to escape the parlour of the Burrows and
in the all the commotion, the little Witch had let her guard down.
With incantations, the weak hater of humans had been easily subdued and taken. Inspector Abernethy had been
the one to hold the container and quickly incarcerated the parasitic demon into its cramped glass prison. During
this act and not realised until later, George's obsidian beard took on two wide streaks of white. The diminutive
half-Fae's objective was achieved until the scuffling pandemonium downstairs allowed the Fates to bring their
own kind of confiscation to take place.
Taking a sip of her beer, Peggy could only guess that Madge Burrows must have been waiting somewhere in
the shadows of the attic to make her play. When George had hurried down the stairs to assist in thwarting the
delirious man's limping escape, the little Witch had stepped to the door to hear what was going on.
Within just a few shakes of a Badger's tail, the daughter of a woman forever bound in the roots of a woodland
Hosta stepped over to the large salt-encrusted vessel holding the agent of her mother's killing and dumped a
small sack of sugar onto its pulsing contents.
"Yer' knaw' Ah think Ah'll empty this brew..." the wandering Witch notified her small audience with a sigh and
winked at the young man in the unbuttoned tunic. "...Then we'll gan' and see if awld' man Pincher has a donkey
who likes a midnight ride, eh?" she furthered and gulping down a large draught of her beverage, Peggy recalled
the hissed words of the woman with the aching joints and an empty pouch in her hand.
"Thy will be done on Earth as it is in Heaven...Amen".
The End.
Read The TV Guide, yer' don't need a TV.