She was gone, and the little wooden horse was left alone on the mountain path, terrified by the thought of what might happen to Gobbolino if either of them were seen by the witch.
He decided to do as Sootica suggested, and wait in the cave below until midday. It was not so long, after all, and yet it seemed a thousand years ahead.
10 IN THE WITCH’S CAVE
If IT SEEMED A LONG TIME to the little wooden horse it seemed ten times as long to Gobbolino, curled up in a dark corner of the witch’s cave beside the ugly old woman whose face he remembered so well. He shrank into the shadows among the cobwebs and dust, hoping she would not notice him if she woke up. Sootica had assured him that she would sleep till sunset, but his heart beat so loudly he was afraid it might rouse her, and the harder he tried to suppress it the louder it beat.
There next to her was the same cauldron he had been forced to stir, and beside which he had fallen asleep in the middle of making the witch’s most important spell. He wondered what the cauldron contained today.
There too were the spiders, and one or two lazy bats, hanging in the rocks above the cauldron. It was all so familiar he began to feel he had never left it, and yet how different it all was from his happy farmyard home!
He tried to imagine his sister Sootica at the farm, but he could not. It was much more natural to think of her in this shadowy cave beside the snoring witch. Gobbolino tried not to look at the witch, but her snoring made him very nervous, especially when it stopped for a little and then went on again.
He pictured Sootica tearing down the mountainside, past the little wooden horse, who he hoped was now starting for home, but he knew his loyal little friend was more likely to be waiting for him in the cave below.
He hoped Sootica would remember to stop and tell the bats that by evening their caves would be free for them. And suddenly he remembered how the bats had carried them to the mountain. Perhaps they would help them again! In gratitude for the caves they might even carry them back to the river! This thought was so hopeful and comforting that his heart actually settled down and began to beat less noisily but that only made the witch’s snores the louder.
Through the open doorway he could see the sun painting the crags with gold.
"When it reaches that one…" Sootica had told him, pointing with her paw, "it will be midday, and I shall be safely across the river, so you can leave the cave and come after me. You will have arrived there yourself by the time my mistress wakes up, so you have nothing to fear!"
The long morning crawled by. Outside, Gobbolino could see that the view from the mountain top was very beautiful. The sun warmed the rocks below and beyond, slowly spreading a flush of colour higher and higher like the sweep of a gigantic paintbrush. Yet it moved so slowly Gobbolino wondered if it would ever reach the rock Sootica had pointed out to him, and allow him to go free.
What would happen, he asked himself, if he left the cave early, before the sun reached midday?
For one thing, the witch could easily awake early herself, and find her cat gone. Searching and calling, she might fly down the mountainside and overtake him, or she might soar very high into the sky on her broomstick and see, not only himself, but Sootica making her way to the river across the plain. And when she had pounced down on her cat, and brought her back to the cave the bats would be forbidden the caves below, and things would be just as bad as they had been before. What his own punishment would be Gobbolino did not dare to think. At the moment he was more concerned about Sootica and the bats.
One thing consoled him. The witch had nothing against the little wooden horse. She did not even know he was there, and provided he kept himself out of her sight he was quite safe, whether plodding home across the plain, or hiding in the cave where they had passed the night. Gobbolino preferred to think that he was on his way back to the forest, and that by nightfall they might be there together.
The bats and the spiders in the witch’s cave took no notice of him, and a wrinkled old toad in the corner merely stared at him for a while and then shut its eyes again and went back to sleep.
Gobbolino was very thirsty. He was hungry too, for he had not eaten since the tasty dinner brought to them in the church by the old priest the day before, but he dared not touch the strange-looking food in the witch’s cooking pan, nor take a drink from the cauldron, for fear of the magic it might hold. Presently, above the snores of the witch, he noticed the steady drip of water not far from him, and saw a tiny spring far above his head, that spattered a drop or so of crystal clear water on to the stones at every minute.
Very thankfully and carefully Gobbolino moved towards it and held out a grateful tongue to the drops of water. They tasted very cold and sweet. Some of the water had formed a tiny pool in the hollow of a rock, and this he drank too, but very quietly, in case the witch should hear his lapping.
He felt better now, and told himself that at least three hours must have passed since Sootica went away, for the sun had moved quite a distance across the rocks.
Presently he noticed that the witch’s snoring had changed a little. It was no longer so loud and regular as it had been in the early morning, when it had been rather like listening to a clock ticking. Even the short pauses that had frightened him so much had become part of a rhythm that seemed set to go on for ever. But now the snoring became lighter, and rather quicker, as if the witch were dreaming… as if her dreams were disturbing her… as if they were waking her up..
She gave a little shriek… a cough… a hiccup.. and then the snoring stopped altogether.
Gobbolino froze with terror. He was in the darkest, most shadowy corner of the cave, but who could tell how much witches were able to see in the dark?
He listened, hoping that she would settle down and begin to snore again, but meanwhile she was moving, and clearing her throat… yes, and muttering.. the witch was awake Silence fell. Gobbolino could hear her shuffling her feet, and then — horror of horrors! — she was getting up!
Gobbolino froze with terror.
He shut his eyes as tightly as possible, so that the gleam in them should not catch her attention, and heard her shuffling across the floor to the doorway.
She stood there for a while, looking out at the morning, but it seemed that the sunshine was not to her liking, for she came back grumbling, and began to move round the cavern looking for her stick.
"Sootica!" she muttered, and then louder, "Sootica! Puss! Puss! Where are you? I’m calling you, Sootica!"
Gobbolino froze.
Perhaps if he did not move she would think her cat had gone outside on to the mountain. She might even fall asleep again, waiting for Sootica to come back.
But the witch did not seem inclined to settle down and go to sleep. She walked round and round the cave grumbling and calling for her cat in a louder and louder voice till Gobbolino cringed with fear. Once she passed so close to him that she scuffed him with her shoe, but she did not know what she had touched.
Gobbolino remembered that his sister had told him that her mistress was getting rather blind.
At last she found her stick, and now the search for Sootica began in earnest, as if the witch knew by instinct that her cat was not far away. The stick went tap tap tap across the floor as she poked and prodded in the corners, and in the holes behind the rocks. Now and then she went to the doorway and yelled Sootica’s name in louder and louder tones, but she always came back into the cave, looking very puzzled and dissatisfied.