Charmed Life - Diana Wynne Jones [42]
“But you waited to say so until Euphemia goes missing and leaves me all on my own!” Mary said, getting very put-upon.
“She never does anything anyway,” Cat said in surprise.
Mary flounced crossly to the speaking tube and ordered a pot of coffee and a pot of tea. “For Her Highness and His Nibs,” she said to it. “He seems to have caught it now. What wouldn’t I give for a nice normal child in this place, Nancy!”
“But I am a nice normal child!” Janet and Cat protested in unison.
“And so are we—nice, anyhow,” Julia said comfortably.
“How can you be normal?” Mary demanded as she let down the lift. “All four of you are Chants. And when was a Chant ever normal? Answer me that.”
Janet looked questioningly at Cat, but Cat was as puzzled as she was. “I thought your name was Chrestomanci,” he said to Roger and Julia.
“That’s just Daddy’s title,” said Julia.
“You’re some kind of cousin of ours,” said Roger. “Didn’t you know? I always thought that was why Daddy had you to live here.”
As they started breakfast, Cat thought that this, if anything, made the situation more difficult than ever.
10
C AT WATCHED his moment and, when Mr. Saunders called them to lessons, he caught Roger’s arm and whispered, “Look, Gwendolen’s turned Euphemia into a frog and—”
Roger gave a great snore of laughter. Cat had to wait for him to stop.
“And she won’t turn her back. Can you?”
Roger tried to look serious, but laughter kept breaking through. “I don’t know. Probably not, unless she’ll tell you what spell she used. Finding out which spell without knowing is Advanced Magic, and I’m not on that yet. Oh, how funny!” He bent over the table and yelled with laughter.
Naturally, Mr. Saunders appeared at the door, remarking that the time for telling jokes was after lessons. They had to go through to the schoolroom. Naturally, Cat found Janet had sat in his desk by mistake. He got her out as quietly as he could and sat in it himself, distractedly wondering how he could find out which spell Gwendolen had used.
It was the most uncomfortable morning Cat had ever known. He had forgotten to tell Janet that the only thing Gwendolen knew about was witchcraft. Janet, as he had rather suspected, knew a lot, about a lot of things. But it all applied to her own world. About the only subject she would have been safe in was simple arithmetic. And Mr. Saunders chose that morning to give her a History test. Cat, as he scratched away left-handed at an English essay, could see the panic growing on Janet’s face.
“What do you mean, Henry the Fifth?” barked Mr. Saunders. “Richard the Second was on the throne until long after Agincourt. What was his greatest magical achievement?”
“Defeating the French,” Janet guessed. Mr. Saunders looked so exasperated that she babbled, “Well, I think it was. He hampered the French with iron underwear, and the English wore wool, so they didn’t stick in the mud, and probably their longbows were enchanted too. That would account for them not missing.”
“Who,” said Mr. Saunders, “do you imagine won the Battle of Agincourt?”
“The English,” said Janet. This of course was true for her world, but the panic-stricken look on her face as she said it suggested that she suspected the opposite was true in this world. Which, of course, it was.
Mr. Saunders put his hands to his head. “No, no, no! The French! Don’t you know anything, girl?”
Janet looked to be near tears. Cat was terrified. She was going to break down any second and tell Mr. Saunders she was not Gwendolen. She did not have Cat’s reasons for keeping quiet. “Gwendolen never knows anything,” he remarked loudly, hoping Janet would take the hint. She did. She sighed with relief and relaxed.
“I’m aware of that,” said Mr. Saunders. “But somewhere, somewhere inside that marble head there must be a little cell of gray matter. So I keep looking.”
Unfortunately, Janet, in her relief, became almost jolly. “Would you like to take my head apart and look?” she asked.
“Don’t tempt me!” cried Mr. Saunders. He hid his eyes with one knobby hand and fended at Janet with the other.