Summary

The very first line of Chapter 1: “A Clang Well Done” is that "Some things start before other things" (1), before describing a summer shower which was more like a winter shower. The third-person narrator then describes a witch, Miss Perspicacia Tick, taking shelter in a hedge, and "exploring the universe" (1) with what little she had in her possession. Several items, including string, twigs, a stone, and an egg were tied together to make a device, and the witch detected another world trying to communicate. A voice near the witch told her whoever was on that world would sort it out on her own but Miss Tick said that a good witch cannot be grown from the chalk world from whence the message was coming. They agreed that it was worth looking into anyway and decided to travel...