Charmed Life - Diana Wynne Jones [50]
“You’ll need that on Sunday if it turns cold,” Cat said drearily. “I’ll go and see what I’ve got—only promise me to stay here until I come back.”
“Sho’ ting,” said Janet. “I daren’t move widdout you, bwana. But hurry up.”
There were fewer things in Cat’s room, but he collected what he could find, and added the great sponge from the bathroom. He felt like a criminal. Janet and he wrapped their finds in two towels and crept downstairs with their chinking bundles, expecting someone to discover them any minute.
“I feel like a thief with the swag,” Janet whispered. “Someone’s going to shine a searchlight any second, and then the police will close in. Are there police here?”
“Yes,” said Cat. “Do shut up.”
But, as usual, there was no one about near the private door. They crept down the shiny passage and peeped outside. The space by the rhododendrons was empty. They crept out towards them. Trees that would hide Mr. Baslam would hide them and their loot.
They were three steps outside the door when a massed choir burst into song. Janet and Cat nearly jumped out of their skins. “We belong to Chrestomanci Castle! We belong to Chrestomanci Castle!” thundered forty voices. Some were deep, some were shrill, but all were very loud. They made a shattering noise. It took them a second or so to realize that the voices were coming from their bundles.
“Creeping antimacassars!” said Janet.
They turned around and ran for the door again, with the forty voices bawling in their ears.
Miss Bessemer opened the door. She stood tall and narrow and purple, waiting for them to come through it. There was nothing Janet and Cat could do but scuttle guiltily past her into the passage, where they put their suddenly silent bundles down on the floor and steeled themselves for trouble.
“What an awful noise, my loves!” said Miss Bessemer. “I haven’t heard the like since a silly warlock tried to burgle us. What were you doing?”
Janet did not know who the stately purple lady was. She was too scared to speak. Cat had to say something. “We were wanting to play houses in the tree house,” he said. “We needed some things for it.” He was surprised how likely he made it sound.
“You should have told me, sillies!” said Miss Bessemer. “I could have given you some things that don’t mind being taken outside. Run and put those back, and I’ll look you out some nice furnishings for tomorrow.”
They crept dismally back to Janet’s room. “I just can’t get used to the way everything’s magic here,” Janet moaned. “It’s getting me down. Who was that long purple lady? I’m offering even money she’s a sorceress.”
“Miss Bessemer. The housekeeper,” said Cat.
“Any hope that she’ll give us splendid castoffs that will fetch twenty quid in the open market?” Janet asked. They both knew that was unlikely. They were no nearer thinking of another way to earn twenty pounds when the dressing gong went.
Cat had warned Janet what dinner was like. She had promised not to jump when footmen passed things over her shoulder, and sworn not to try and talk about statues with Mr. Saunders. She assured Cat she would not mind hearing Bernard talk of stocks and shares. So Cat thought that for once he could be easy. He helped Janet dress and even had a shower himself, and when they went into the drawing room, he thought that they both did him credit.
But Mr. Saunders proved at last to have worn out his craze for statues. Instead, everyone began to talk about identical twins, and then about exact doubles who were no relation. Even Bernard for-got to talk about shares in his interest in this new subject.
“The really difficult point,” he boomed, leaning forward with his eyebrows working up and down his forehead, “is how such people fit in with a series of other worlds.”
And, to Cat’s dismay, the talk turned to other worlds. He might have been interested at any other time. Now he dared not look at Janet, and could only wish that everyone would stop. But they talked eagerly, all of them, particularly