The Alchemaster's Apprentice - By Walter Moers Page 0,73

at him with her hands fluttering nervously. Then she hurried over to a saucepan on the stove. Having put the lid on, she flapped her hands as if shooing away a swarm of midges.

‘Oh dear,’ she exclaimed, ‘I must have left the lid off my soup by mistake. How silly of me! Its fumes arouse an urge to buy my wares, which is, of course, strictly prohibited - and rightly so.’ She favoured Echo with a smile that almost sent him scampering out into the street. Her teeth might have been sculpted by a dentist anxious to promote dental hygiene in his patients by showing them examples of every dental disease known to science.

‘But only by mistake, as I said,’ she went on. ‘No need to report me to the Alchemaster, is there? Besides, you must have lost the urge to buy anything by now.’

Echo shook his head to clear it. He was feeling rather bemused. It was true: his urge to buy some Placebo Wart Ointment had vanished, like the curious aroma.

‘No, no,’ he said soothingly, ‘I’ve no wish to report anyone.’

Tearing his eyes away from the Uggly at last, he turned his attention to the interior. It looked more like a cave than a house - somewhere suited more to a bear than a civilised being, though it did contain various amenities such as a big iron stove, a kitchen cupboard, a table and chairs, and a shelf filled with books. Visible between them were some thick, dark-brown protuberances reminiscent of roots. More such rootlike excrescences were protruding from the damp mud walls and dangling from the ceiling. If Echo hadn’t known better, he would have thought the room was situated in the bowels of a forest.

‘So what do you want?’ the Uggly demanded, very suspiciously now. ‘Why should you be roaming around Uggly Lane in the middle of the night? Are you spying for Ghoolion?’

Echo decided to come straight to the point. The Uggly looked as if she could stand the truth.

‘My name is Echo,’ he said, ‘and I’ve made a contract with the Alchemaster. It’s a very unfavourable contract from my point of view, so I came to ask if you can help me to break it.’

A long silence ensued. The Uggly subjected him to a long, unabashed stare. He didn’t know what to make of it. Was she surprised? Annoyed? Amused?

‘Let me get this straight,’ she said at length. ‘Did you just ask me to help you break a contract with the Alchemaster?’

‘Yes,’ Echo said softly. He dropped his gaze, ashamed of his own presumption. What right had he to turn up at a complete stranger’s house in the middle of the night and make such a request? Looking up again, he just had time to see a bundle of twigs come whooshing towards him before he was struck and sent flying through the air. He crashed into the front door and fell to the floor. Before he could say anything, or even utter a cry of pain, the Uggly made an imperious gesture with her right hand. At this, the door swung inwards and hit him hard in the back. He went rolling across the floor and ended up at the old crone’s feet, whereupon she swung her besom once more and swept him out on to the veranda. Then the door slammed shut.

With a groan, he scrambled to his feet. How idiotic of him to pin his hopes on an Uggly, of all creatures! He could think himself lucky to have got off so lightly. He drew several deep breaths, made his way slowly down the veranda steps and went a little way back along the lane in the direction he’d come from. Then, in obedience to a sudden impulse, he turned and looked back.

Hypnotic music was once more issuing from the Uggly’s house. Dark and forbidding, it lay at the end of the lane like the severed head of a giant in whose eyes the last spark of life was being extinguished. Then the windows, too, went dark. A fluffy skein of mist came drifting along and enveloped the Uggly’s house like a shroud.

Echo looked up at the moon, which was floating, thinly veiled in clouds, above the Alchemaster’s castle. It was now half full.

Mortal Friends

When Echo got back to the castle, exhausted and depressed by his futile excursion, he sensed the Alchemaster’s presence as soon as he entered. Ghoolion had undoubtedly returned, even though Echo could neither see nor hear nor