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old monk!’ he
finally managed to gasp.
    ‘Eh?’ said Theda, turning to him with a clothes peg in her mouth.
    ‘The old monk! The old monk!’
    Theda stared at him with alarm. She had never seen him so excited.
    ‘He didn’t have anythin’ on!’ Sam continued, gesticulating wildly in the
direction of the gooseberry bushes. Theda, convinced that Sam had gone mad,
dropped the washing and ran off round the house calling to Mr Bennet.
    Sam sat down shakily on an old box and tried to recover. He glanced
round nervously. He had seen something, he was sure of that, and nothing
anyone could say was going to change his mind.
    Carrot watched from the bushes as Theda came running back with his
father.
    ‘Now Sam,’ said Mr Bennet, hurrying up, ‘what’s the matter? Been at the
cider again?’
    Sam sighed. ‘Look Mr Bennet,’ he said, ‘I ain’t makin’ of it up. There’s
an old feller runnin’ round this here farm stark naked.’
    ‘All right Sam,’ said Mr Bennet. ‘If I see him, I’ll tell him to go
away.’
    ‘You think I’m seein’ things, don’t you?’ said Sam angrily.
    ‘I’m sure of it.’
    ‘But you was with me, Theda,’ he pleaded, looking up at her.
    Theda and Mr Bennet exchanged a glance.
    ‘Listen, Sam, you’ve had some sort of hallucination if you ask me. Now
you don’t want to worry about it. Just try to forget it. Lots of people see
things.’
    Sam stared at him. ‘But he looked so real!’ he said.
    ‘Oh, he would,’ agreed Mr Bennet. There was a silence while Sam thought
about it. A hallucination? Was that what he’d seen? One in the yard with
clothes on, and one on the lawn with no clothes on?
    ‘I’m sorry I’ve held things up, boss,’ he said finally-‘But I ain’t
never seen a hallucination before.’ He got to his feet. ‘I’ll go an’ work it
off on somethin’. Nothin’ like hard work for clearin’ yer head.’
    ‘Good man,’ said Mr Bennet with considerable relief.
    ‘What
about knocking that old hen-house down?’
    ‘Right, boss,’ said Sam with determination.
    From the bushes, Carrot watched with horror as Sam set off with a large
axe over his shoulder. There was nothing the boy could do to stop him so,
keeping out of sight, he followed Sam up to the hen house which stood rotting
away in the corner of Top Field.
    Sam tried the door but it wouldn’t open because Catweazle had tied it
shut with a piece of twine. ‘That’s funny,’ muttered Sam, tugging at the handle.
Hearing Sam outside, Catweazle struggled into his damp robe as quickly as he
could. Sam pulled harder and as the twine finally snapped, he staggered back
and sat down.
    Catweazle poked his head out of the door and the two of them stared at
each other.
    ‘I’m nuts,’ muttered Sam unhappily. ‘I ought to be locked up.’
    ‘I am invisible, invisible,’ quavered Catweazle, waving Adamcos.
    ‘I wish you was,’ groaned Sam getting unsteadily to his feet.
    ‘Sator, Arepo, Tenet, Opera, Rotas,’ Catweazle went on but Sam suddenly
leant forward and touched him. At this Catweazle’s nerve deserted him, and he
ran back into the shed and shut the door.
    ‘You’re real,’ roared Sam. ‘You ain’t no hallucination!’ and he shook
the hen-coop furiously. Catweazle held grimly to the handle as the shed began
to disintegrate around him. Finally in the face of Sam’s onslaught the whole
thing collapsed like a pack of cards. For a moment Catweazle stood amidst the
wreckage, still clutching the handle, while Sam thrashed about under the door,
then with a howl he turned and ran into the wood behind him.
    ‘I’ll
get you, you old devil,’ said Sam, as he crawled out from under the door.
Brandishing his axe, he set off in pursuit, with Carrot once again following
some way behind, but Catweazle just melted into the wood and search as he might
Sam couldn’t find him. He searched with less and less hope till eventually he
gave up, satisfied at least that he had frightened the