GRISELDA RAISES AN ALARM

At the Whitehouse and ready to be fed....

“Well, here we are,” cackled Griselda as she hovered over the extensive grounds of America’s foremost dwelling, the world renowned Whitehouse. There it was spread out below them, a huge and pristine building in a splendid setting, and somewhere a fountain gushed its watery melody to the day.

“What are we going to do?” asked Bumptious Tiddles weakly.

“Get invited in, of course,” replied Griselda. “The great President won’t be back yet … broomsticks travel faster than even Presidential charabancs, so he’ll be moaning about traffic while we settle down for a bite to eat in his dining room.”

“They won’t let us in!” exclaimed Bumpy, “they’ll shoot us first! They’re very careful to make sure that the President’s in no actual danger from anyone and their motto is to shoot if in any doubt at all!”

“A crone might knock at a Presidential door, and anything might happen,” Griselda told him firmly.

“And that crone might be splattered with bullets,” replied Bumpy. “I know a thing or two about how the political mind works because I’m in politics back home, and you can be quite certain that it’s easier to shoot first and ask questions afterwards than take a risk, even if the risk is a frail old woman with a broomstick!”

“Watch and learn, sonny,” grinned Griselda, “watch and learn!”

And at that she made her way towards the elaborate front entrance to the Whitehouse, dwarfed by its magnificence and clearly out of her mind, or so Bumpy thought. And in truth any observer might have thought her a grotesque figure to be in such magnificent surroundings and in quite the wrong place for her own personal safety, but she was quite clearly overflowing with confidence as she turned to Bumpy and said,

“I’d have thought a house like this deserved a much grander front door than that thing,” pointing at what she assumed must be the main entrance.

He shook his head in despair. He was following her, walking in her footprints, and at the same time terrified that any moment they would be greeted by a death-spraying hail of bullets to be followed by the question who are you?

They were still some distance from what she considered to be an inadequate front door when she paused, and grinned at Bumptious.

“Now it’s time to be clever,” she whispered, “now’s the time for a little trick or two.”

Bumpy actually felt himself becoming invisible. It was as if every molecule of his body was being adjusted differently so that the light shone through him, and afterwards he couldn’t help explaining that the feeling was perfectly exquisite. But when he noticed the way Griselda herself was fading he was awestruck. Within moments she had changed from a crotchety old woman to an empty space, and yet, empty as the space was he knew she was there. He couldn’t so much see or hear her as sense her, and that was a spooky experience.

Before they were anywhere near the entrance an automatic alarm made them almost jump out of their skins as it sounded deep within the building.

“That’s a good idea,” hissed Griselda, “better than plebs like us having to push a button or pull a chain, let’s make the doorbell automatic! I’ll remember that when we get back home!”

“Who’s there?” barked a fresh voice before Bumpy could respond as negatively as his cynicism allowed, and the door swung open.

A smartly dressed man in a butler’s outfit stood gazing left and right and frowning, for in his considered opinion there was nobody anywhere near enough to have set the alarm off yet set off it had been. Something must have triggered it, and he didn’t like puzzles. Or maybe it was somebody, and he was so well trained that he pulled an automatic pistol from a hidden pocket or holster and waved it menacingly at nobody.

“I’ll count to three, then fire,” he said. This was his training coming into play, and he took several steps away from the open door in order to get a better view of what might be a desperate enemy intent on massacring one and all in that noble building.

He knew that the world was awash with American enemies. The President had told him.

Griselda, unseen by man though eerily noticed by a cat that was sauntering across a lawn, grabbed Bumpy by one hand and pulled him with her behind the butler and into the building.

“That’s it, fella, that’s it!” grated that well trained individual, and he shot the cat. Intentionally, it must be said, because he concluded that it must have been the cat who had set off the alarm and anyway, who knew that it was a cat? The enemy, he wasn’t sure who the enemy might be but was fully aware that he existed because he’d heard the President explaining in no uncertain terms about him, could easily disguise himself as a cat. Foreigners like that just couldn’t be trusted. Foreigners like that were the biggest danger to the American way.

The cat yowled in pain and scampered off, not quite dead yet certainly no longer happy to be alive. Griselda, feeling sorry for the creature, muttered something silently under her breath and the wounded cat lay down when it was out of sight of the house and quietly recovered its full health whilst wondering what on Earth had happened to it.

Then she kept Bumpy’s hand firmly grasped in her own and pulled him away from the door, entering the building and keeping as much as she could to the shadows. Her problem, she knew, was that although she was invisible she had yet to master the skills involved in preventing an invisible being from casting a very visible shadow. It had long been a conundrum that she’d failed to solve, and as she failed in the solving of very few conundrums it irked her.

“It’s a bit like a labyrinth in here,” she whispered to Bumpy, “but you stick with me and we’ll be in the dining room in time for lunch!”

She’s always thinking of food, complained Bumpy to himself.

Griselda’s summing up of the building was far from being inaccurate when she mentioned its labyrinthine qualities. There were several rooms with doors that needed to be opened and peered round if the two interlopers were to know where danger might be lurking. They had witnessed the ease with which the butler had fired his gun at an innocent cat, and they knew there were guns aplenty not so far from where they were lurking and that the owners of those guns were perfectly happy to fire when they perceived danger. After all, theirs was a responsible job. They had to protect the most powerful man on Earth and they were not gong to be found wanting.

Griselda and Bumpy had explored very little of the ground floor of the building when a second alarm sounded. Suddenly a handful of servants (Griselda hoped they were servants and not marksmen) appeared and, like creatures in an ant’s-nest, started going about their business, brushing, dusting, checking that ornaments were properly aligned and generally making what was already neat and tidy look neater and tidier.

“The President,” whispered Griselda into Bumpy’s ear. “He must be back.”

“What was that?” shouted one of the servants, “I heard something!”

“Maybe it was the cat,” hissed another.

“Jed shot it,” explained a third, “poor devil.”

Griselda pulled Bumpy along and into a smallish sitting room. At least, she assumed it was a sitting room because there were chairs in there and chairs were for sitting on.

The fuss, the polishing and dusting and sweeping and straightening of already straight things came to a sudden end and they heard the familiar voice of the President.

“I want a thousand broomsticks, and I want them yesterday!” he shouted at one and all, “that’s the last time I’m riding a charabanc when I can fly in comfort! And get me the cat! I need a p***y to stroke!”

© Peter Rogerson 23.02 18