The village straggled up the side of a hill, and the Witch's cottage was at the top of it.
It was a queer-looking, tumble-down place, but people said that from it there were trap doors and passages leading to all sorts of caves and cellars dug out of the ground underneath. It was surrounded by very high branching palings with skull-shaped knobs on the top of them.
The people in the village hardly ever saw the old Witch, except during thunderstorms and after late winter parties; but everyone who had seen her, declared that she was very ugly, and beyond a doubt very wicked. She had an uncomfortable way, too, of sometimes appearing suddenly when she was not wanted, and granting people's wishes. This sounds very nice, but it may be horribly inconvenient. The villagers realised this, and it had become the fashion never to wish for anything; and so, despite the presence of the Witch, the village was a happy and contended place enough.
Jack was certainly not thinking about the old Witch when he said, "Oh dear, how I hate the rain," on that particular afternoon.
And Jill was certainly not thinking about the old Witch, when, a few minutes later, she heard a "tap-tap" on the door, louder and more insistent than the pattering of the raindrops on the window-pane.
So they were both of them distinctly frightened when they went to the door and saw—who but the old Witch herself, on the doorstep!
"Oh dear," said Jack.
"Won't you come in?" said Jill.
And in she came.
She was certainly very ugly. She had a hooked nose and pointed chin. Grey wisps of hair straggled out from beneath her poke bonnet. Her eyes were like two snakes, and when she opened her mouth to speak she showed her long pointed iron teeth. She was dressed in a black cloak, from which protruded her long skinny arms and claw-like hands. She carried a broom-stick, and behind her slunk her cat, all draggled with the wet, and mewing frightfully. She sat down on the chair Jill offered her.