TE19 Iberian Adventure

Gabi Csutak

permitted to speak for no more than a total of an hour a week. This meant that, nearly every weekend, from Friday to Sunday, poor Florin had to keep quiet because he had already used up all his allowance. On that day, our meeting was almost over when, out of the dark there came a clattering and a knocking. It got closer and closer andwas accompanied byelaborate swearing.We all froze, and someone even blew out the candle in their alarm. Suddenly, therestoodbeforeusahunchbackedwitch bundled up in a black shawl. In one hand she had awalking stick, in the other a paraffin lamp. This shed enough light, for us to see that, on her hooked nose, she had a purple wart just where it was in the story book pictures. As her shadow crept along the wall, it resembled a dragon. She cursed and flailed her stick around until we fled shrieking out of the cellar. Our parents had been at warwith thewitch since beforewe wereborn. Thefirst battle theyhadwonwhen theyknocked down her house and made her move into the smallest, darkest apartment in the new building. I was already around when the residents’ committee punished her for her wickedness by building garages where her garden had been. The building controller had gathered together the men who lived in the house, and they had all marched out, arm in arm towards the plants, brandishing garden tools. The women and children had watched from the windows as theycutdown the redcurrant and gooseberry bushes and dug up first the herbs, then the onions, the tulip beds and the rose bower. The witch had cursed then, too, and had 242