Free Catweazle and the Magic Zodiac by Richard Carpenter Page B

told him. His book of magic had said that a
hidden spring would lead him to the Sign of the Maiden, he explained, and while
he had been dowsing for water in the woods, he had fallen into a deep pit. He
was sure it had been dug to catch him, especially when several men with picks
and shovels had hauled him out, so he had run away from them and was now
preparing for a siege.
    Cedric
tried to explain about the trial holes and the estate Jack Victor intended to
build. ‘They’re going to pull this place down,’ he said.
    ‘I
shall not go from hence, till I have all the Signs,’ said Catweazle grimly.
    ‘They’ll
make you,’ said Cedric.
    ‘Make me? I that escaped from the Normans?’
    ‘I
wouldn’t go bragging about that if I were you,’ said Cedric. ‘I mean it’s not really your place, is it? And if they catch you here, they might make you live
somewhere else.’ A dreadful vision of Catweazle in an old people’s home flashed
into his mind. ‘Somewhere... well... not nice.’
    ‘Not
nice?’
    ‘So we’ve
got to stop them.’
    ‘We
will, my brother. By magic.’
    ‘What
magic?’
    Catweazle’s
eyes glittered. ‘The power of the wogle-stone,’ he said, with quiet menace.
    ‘The
what stone?’
    ‘Dost
thou not know of the wogle-stone?’
    Cedric
shook his head. Catweazle sighed at the young sorcerer’s lack of knowledge.
‘Set one in thy fields,’ he said. ‘Call on Hecate, and no one will come near.’
    ‘What
does it look like?’
    ‘Like .
. like...’ Catweazle made boulder-like gestures in the air, ‘like a
wogle-stone, thou gowk!’
    Cedric
polished his glasses. ‘You mean we just plonk down a great lump of stone in the
middle of nowhere and all the builders and bricklayers pack up and go home?’
    ‘ “No
man can build where stands the wogle-stone,” ’ quoted Catweazle.
    ‘But
suppose they don’t know that,’ said Cedric. Catweazle called Touchwood forth
from his rubber boot and put him in his pocket. Then he picked up the divining
rod.
    ‘I
thought that was for water,’ said Cedric.
    ‘Water,
ay... and wogle-stones,’ said Catweazle mysteriously.
    Cedric
felt that it would take more than magic, even Catweazle’s magic, to stop Jack
Victor, but anything was worth trying, so he followed Catweazle in his search
for the special stone.
    The
divining rod eventually led them to the rockery at Kings Farthing. Although
they couldn’t be seen from the house, there was always a chance Groome might be
pottering about, and this made Cedric very uneasy.
    ‘The
whole idea’s crazy,’ he said, ‘how can a stone stop a housing estate?’
    Catweazle
didn’t answer but the forked stick in his hands began twitching again, so he
put it down and ad-vanced on the rockery with Touchwood in his out-stretched
hand. The toad began to croak and Catweazle fizzed with excitement. ‘ ’Tis
here! ’Tis here! I feel it s power,’ he cried, and put his gnarled
hands on one of the rocks.
    ‘But
it’s just like all the others,’ said Cedric, a little disappointed.
    ‘Goggle-eyed
gall-fly! Canst thou not feel its power?’ snapped Catweazle. He started tugging
furiously at the stone and Cedric reluctantly began to help him.
    They
lifted it for a moment, but its weight was too much for them and they were
forced to drop it. It rolled towards Catweazle, who leapt out of the way with a
frightened shriek. ‘You nearly felt its power then,’ grinned Cedric.
    Groome’s
old wheelbarrow stood near by, so they put it as close as they could to the
wogle-stone, and managed to lift it in. Then Catweazle put Touchwood on the
stone and they began to trundle the wheelbarrow towards the future building
site.
    It was
hard work and progress was extremely slow. The wogle-stone seemed to weigh a
ton and the wheel of the wheelbarrow dug quite deeply into the ground, making
it even harder to push. On and on they went, stopping every few yards to rest
and get back their breath. Cedric began to think that they would never