‘I’m sorry.’

‘Not good enough, Mr Petty, not good enough at all. Go away and become a better person and then, maybe, when you come back as a changed man, people here might find it in their hearts to say hello to you, or at least to nod.’

She had been watching his eyes, and she knew the man. Something inside him was boiling up. He was ashamed, bewildered and resentful, and in those circumstances the Pettys of the world struck out.

‘Please don’t, Mr Petty,’ she said. ‘Do you have any idea what would happen to you if you hit a witch?’

She thought to herself, With those fists, you could probably kill me with a punch and that is why I intend to keep you scared.

‘You set the rough music on me, didn’t ya?’

She sighed. ‘No one controls the music, Mr Petty, you know that. It just turns up when people have had enough. No one knows where it starts. People look around, and catch one another’s eye, and give each other a little nod, and other people see that. Other people catch their eye and so, very slowly, the music starts and somebody picks up a spoon and bangs it on a plate, and then somebody else bangs a jug on the table and boots start to stamp on the floor, louder and louder. It is the sound of anger, it is the sound of people who have had enough. Do you want to face the music?’

‘You think you’re so clever, don’t ya?’ Petty snarled. ‘With your broomstick and your black magic, ordering ordin-ery folks about.’

She almost admired him. There he was, with no friends in the world, covered in his own sick and – she sniffed: yes, there was urine dripping from the bottom of his nightshirt – yet he was stupid enough to talk back like that. ‘Not clever, Mr Petty, just cleverer than you. And that’s not hard.’

‘Yeah? But clever gets you into trouble. Slip of a gel like you, pokin’ about in other people’s business … What are you going to do when the music comes for you, eh?’