Living Alone

orstep. London was a still Switzerland in silver and star-grey, unblotted by people. There was a hint of pal

with supernatural speed, and flashed across it. The sound of people singing desultorily while taking shelter in the Tube floated up to them. Here the witch

ndon, she heard quite distinctly the approach of London's guests

ey wander along shining and changing valleys under a most ardent sky; they climb the purple thunderclouds, or launch the first snowflake of a blizzard; they spring from pink stepping-stone to pink stepping-stone of clouds each no bigger than a baby's hand, across great sunsets. Often when in L

had chosen, and looked down through a little hole in it. It was practically the only cloud present that

. The witch could hear a deep bass-voiced machine, a baritone, a quavering tenor, and-thi

hy the Huns hadn't got their magic organised by now

ly designed to squirt unpleasant enchantments downward. This contrivance was apparently giving some trouble, for the German was so busy attending to it that at first she did not see or hear the approach of Harold and his rider. She was aroused to her danger by a heavy chunk of magic which struck and nearly unseated her. In a second, however, she was ready with a parrying enchantment, and the fight began. The two broomsticks reared and circled round each other, and

ently once or twice, he gave a wild high cry that was like the wind howling through the fierce forest past of his race, and fell upon the other broomstick, fixing his bristles into its throat. The shock of the coll

ber the blue ground, dimpled and starred with sunlight, and the way the bees pulled over the bluebells and swung on them to the tune of cuckoos in a May mist; she had time to think of the green globe gho

cept for its colour, which was German field-grey instead of red, was spread out like a

ke a sheep suffering from the lack of other sheep to follow, had not yet quitted the scene. The witches' battle had tended upward, and it had ended several hundred feet above the level of the cloud, which was ap

arachute cloak of yours is a great dodge. I wish I'd thought of it. I always keep my full-dress togs put

feeling that one could have done it better oneself, or at least that one could have taken more trouble. It seemed moulded-even kneaded-carelessly, in very soft material. Beneath her open cloak her dress was of the ordinary German Reform-Kleid type, and

ted down between the witches, and our witch recognised it as coming from her poor Harold's mane. As, for this purpose, she brought her eyes to her immediate surroundings, it seemed to her suddenly that the sky was growing larger, and then she realised that this was because their refuge was growing smaller. The edges of the cloud were dissolving. She saw at last her peril and her disadvantage. If Haro

aloft this fragile delusion that is our world. There is no power that can mock at space, there is no enchantment that is not lost between us and the moon, and all magic people know-and tremble to know-that in a breath, between one second and another, that Hand may close, and the shell of time fi

h felt secretly sick, and at the same time she tore fear from her mind, and knew that death was b

's natural tongue. But when our witch noticed several large ferocious tears rolling down her opponent's

one tear of mine to fall upon and water one possible grain of wh

'you mean-accursed? This is England, you know. England hasn't

on was fresh. "Throughout the ages she has been the Robber State, crushing the weaker nations, adding t

happened? You've been reading the Daily Mail and misunderstanding it. The whole of that quotation applied to

s. The past three years had made

h narrow officialdom, I have come-and this is the result. I am separated from my broomstick, which has all the germ-bombs hanging from its collar-th

d through the breathless air, amidst the dream-like firing of the guns below, she could hear the dif

ng in of tides. It seemed that all her life she had been living on a narrowing shore. She remembered all her dawns as precarious footholds of peace on a threatene

and it broke off in her hand. She recal

hat she is right and we are wrong? I suppose, when you come to think of it, a man-eating

id the German. "Crusad

very peculiar that two Crusaders should apparently be figh

ly, "because England is the World Enemy. T

, and the cloud reeled and shook. About a foot of

," said our witch, looking down

gid-looking cloak round her. She seemed to be sinking herself to a certain extent; perhaps the warmth of her emotions was me

rprising clearness the rhythmic whispering of the trains and the scanty traffic could be heard, and once even the shrill characteristic voice of an ambulance. Somehow space did not seem disturbed by these sounds; its quietness pressed upon the listeners' minds like a heavy dream, and there was no real believing i

he war against Evil to drop bombs on people in their homes? After all, ever

still perched on the surface of the cloud. "It is at home that Evil is originated, it is at home that English women conceive and bear a new generation of enemies

me home when they are hurt or hungry, and women when they are lonely or tired. Nobody is taught anything stupid or international at home. You can bring deat

ng like the seaweed frill of a rock in the sea. The witch kept her eyes on her op

le-fields. Indeed, even on battle-fields-ah, what are we about, what ar

e German witch. "My wizar

against Evil to blow up another? How can two people be righteously scourging each other at the same time? It is like the old problem of

gland is Evil. England is the World Enemy. Throughou

ver her, smothering her, and a super-pain in her shoulder. After a second or two as long as death, she realised dimly that she was all tensely strung to an attitude, like a marionette. Her hands were up trying to shield her head, her chin was pressed down to her drawn-up knees. Her

ate on one of the less stable parts of the fabric, had fallen through. Her parachute cloak, in passing through the hole in the cloud, had been turned inside

ith a hissing sound. The witch's feet hung now over space, she dared not move; she had difficulty in steadying herself with her unwounded

he cloud's edge, and insinuated itself pathetically under her arm. Very carefully and very painfully the witch reached a kneeling position, damaging her refuge with every movement in spite of her care. She gasped with pain, and Harold tried to look very

led as he flew, sometimes he dropped a score

h magic there. Wherever there are children who pretend, there grows a little magic in the air, and therefore the wind of Kensington Gardens thrills with enchantment, and th

elt its healing quality at once, for after the first minute of immersion,

keys all round the ear's horizon; the

secret and ungardened daffodils grow in springtime, a place where all the mice and birds play unafraid, because no cat can find the way thithe

packets of magic. All this she boiled over her fire for many hours, sitting beside it in the silver darkness, with her knees drawn up and her hands clasped in front of them. The trees sprang up into the moonlight like dark fountains from the pools of their own shadows. Little shreds of cloud flowed wonderfully across the sky. There was no sound except the sound of the water, like an uncertain player upon a little instrument. The charm was still unfinished when the dawn pa

odils. She was the most beautifully alone person in the world that morning; nobody could have found her. A thin string of very blue smoke went up from her faint fire and was tangled among the boughs of a flowering tree, but the coarse eye of a park-keeper c