Charmed Life - Diana Wynne Jones [83]
“My love, it was just that no one was sure,” said Millie.
“Well, be sure now!” said Cat. “The only things I did were by mistake, like coming here in this garden—and turning Euphemia into a frog, I suppose, but I didn’t know it was me.”
“You’re not to worry about that, Eric,” said Euphemia from the hillside, where she was sitting with Will Suggins. “It was the shock upset me. I know enchanters are different from us witches. And I’ll speak to Mary. I promise.”
“Speak to Will Suggins too, while you’re at it,” said Janet. “Because he’s going to turn Cat into a frog in revenge any minute now.”
Euphemia bounced around on the hillside to look at Will. “What?” she said.
“What is this, Will?” Chrestomanci asked.
“I laid it on him—for three o’clock, sir,” Will Suggins said apprehensively, “if he didn’t meet me as a tiger.”
Chrestomanci took out a large gold watch. “Hm. It’s about due now. If you don’t mind my saying so, that was a little foolish of you, Will. Suppose you carry on. Turn Cat into a frog, or yourself into a tiger, or both. I shan’t interfere.”
Will Suggins climbed heavily to his feet and stood facing Cat, looking as if he would prefer to be several miles away. “Let the dough work, then,” he said.
Cat was still feeling so upset and tearful that he wondered whether to oblige Will Suggins and become a frog. Or he could try being a flea instead. But it all seemed rather silly. “Why don’t you be a tiger?” he said.
As Cat expected, Will Suggins made a beautiful tiger, long-backed and sleek and sharply striped. He was heavy as he padded up and down the slope, but his legs slid so easily in the silky folds of his hide that he almost seemed light. But Will Suggins himself spoiled the effect by rubbing a distressed paw over his huge cat face and staring appealingly at Chrestomanci. Chrestomanci simply laughed. The dragon trotted up the hill to investigate this new beast. Will Suggins was so alarmed that he reared up on his great hind legs to get away from it. It looked so ungainly for a tiger to be doing that, that Cat turned him back to Will Suggins on the spot.
“It wasn’t real?” asked the dragon.
“No!” said Will Suggins, mopping his face with his sleeve. “All right, lad, you win. How did you do it so quick?”
“I don’t know,” Cat said apologetically. “I’ve really no idea. Shall I learn when you teach me magic?” he asked Mr. Saunders.
Mr. Saunders looked a little blank. “Well—”
“No, Michael,” said Chrestomanci, “is the right answer. It’s quite clear Elementary Magic isn’t going to mean much to Cat. I’ll have to teach you myself, Cat, and we’ll be starting on Advanced Theory, I think, by the look of it. You seem to start where most people leave off.”
“But why didn’t he know?” Janet demanded. “It always makes me angry not to know things, and I feel especially angry about this, because it seems so hard on Cat.”
“It is, I agree,” said Chrestomanci. “But it’s something in the nature of enchanters’ magic, I think. Something the same happened to me. I couldn’t do magic either. I couldn’t do anything. But they found I had nine lives—I lost them at such a rate that it soon became obvious—and they told me I had to be the next Chrestomanci when I grew up, which absolutely appalled me, because I couldn’t work the simplest spell. So they sent me to a tutor, the most terrifying old person, who was supposed to find what the trouble was. And he took one look at me and snarled, ‘Empty your pockets, Chant!’ Which I did. I was too scared not to. I took out my silver watch, and one and sixpence, and a silver charm from my godmother, and a silver tiepin I had forgotten to wear, and a silver brace