Диана Джонс - Wizard's Castle - Omnibus

Half an hour later the doorknob turned sharply to black-down. The door began to bounce about. Michael clutched at Sophie. “Don’t be afraid,” he said shakily. “I’ll keep you safe.”

The door bounced powerfully for a while. Then it stopped. Michael had just let go of Sophie in great relief when there came a violent explosion. The planks clattered to the floor. Calcifer plunged to the bottom of the grate and Michael plunged into the broom cupboard, leaving Sophie standing there as the door burst open and Howl stormed in.

“This is a bit much, Sophie!” he said. “I do live here.” He was soaking wet. The gray-and-scarlet suit was black-and-brown. His sleeves and the ends of his hair were dripping.

Sophie looked at the doorknob, still turned to black-down. Miss Angorian, she thought. And he went to see her in that charmed suit. “Where have you been?” she said.

Howl sneezed. “Standing in the rain. None of your business,” he. said hoarsely. “What were those planks in aid of?”

“I did them,” Michael said, edging out of the broom cupboard. “The Witch—”

“You must think I don’t know my business,” Howl said irritably. “I have so many misdirection spells out that most people wouldn’t find us at all. I give even the Witch three days. Calcifer, I need a hot drink.”

Calcifer had been climbing up among his logs, but as Howl went over to the fireplace, he plunged down again. “Don’t come near me like that! You’re wet!” he hissed.

“Sophie,” Howl said pleadingly.

Sophie folded her arms pitilessly. “What about Lettie?” she said.

“I’m soaked through,” said Howl. “I should have a hot drink.”

“And I said, What about Lettie Hatter?” Sophie said.

“Bother you, then!” said Howl. He shook himself. The water fell off him in a neat ring on the floor. Howl stepped out of it with his hair gleaming dry and his suit gray-and-scarlet and not even damp, and went to fetch the saucepan. “The world is full of hard-hearted women, Michael,” he said. “I can name three without stopping to think.”

“One of them being Miss Angorian?” asked Sophie.

Howl did not answer. He ignored Sophie grandly for the rest of the morning while he discussed moving the castle with Michael and Calcifer. Howl really was going to run away, just as she had warned the King he would, Sophie thought as she sat and sewed more triangles of blue-and-silver suit together. She knew she must get Howl out of that gray-and-scarlet suit as soon as possible.

“I don’t think we need move the Porthaven entrance,” Howl said. He conjured himself a handkerchief out of the air and blew his nose with a hoot which made Calcifer flicker uneasily. “But I want the moving castle well away from anywhere it’s been before and the Kingsbury entrance shut down.”

Someone knocked on the door then. Sophie noticed that Howl jumped and looked round as nervously as Michael. Neither of them answered the door. Coward! Sophie thought scornfully. She wondered why she had gone to all that trouble for Howl yesterday. “I must have been mad!” she muttered to the blue-and-silver suit.

“What about the black-down entrance?” Michael asked when the person knocking seemed to have gone away.

“That stays,” Howl said, and conjured himself another handkerchief with a final sort of flick.

It would! Sophie thought. Miss Angorian is outside it. Poor Lettie!

By the middle of the morning Howl was conjuring handkerchiefs in twos and threes. They were floppy squares of paper really, Sophie saw. He kept sneezing. His voice grew hoarser. He was conjuring handkerchiefs by the half-dozen soon. Ashes from the used ones were piled all round Calcifer.

“Oh, why is it that whenever I go to Wales I always come back with a cold!” Howl croaked, and conjured himself a whole wad of tissues.

Sophie snorted.

“Did you say something?” Howl croaked.

“No, but I was thinking that people who run away from everything deserve every cold they get,” Sophie said. “People who are appointed to do something by the King and go courting in the rain instead have only themselves to blame.”

“You don’t know everything I do, Mrs. Moralizer,” Howl said. “Want me to write out a list before I go out another time? I have looked for Prince Justin. Courting isn’t the only thing I do when I go out.”

“When have you looked?” said Sophie.

“Oh, how your ears flap and your long nose twitches!” Howl croaked. “I looked when he first disappeared, of course. I was curious to know what Prince Justin was doing up this way, when everyone knew Suliman had gone to the Waste. I think someone must have sold him a dud finding spell, because he went right over into the Folding Valley and bought another from Mrs. Fairfax. And that fetched him back this way, fairly naturally, where he stopped at the castle and Michael sold him another finding spell and a disguise spell—”

Michael’s hand went over his mouth. “Was that man in the green uniform Prince Justin ?”

“Yes, but I didn’t mention the matter before,” said Howl, “because the King might have thought you should have had the sense to sell him another dud. I had a conscience about it. Conscience. Notice that word, Mrs. Longnose. I had a conscience.” Howl conjured another wad of handkerchiefs and glowered at Sophie over them out of eyes that were now red-rimmed and watery. Then he stood up. “I feel ill,” he announced. “I’m going to bed, where I may die.” He tottered piteously to the stairs. “Bury me beside Mrs. Pentstemmon,” he croaked as he went up them to bed.

Sophie applied herself to her sewing harder than ever. Here was her chance to get the gray-and-scarlet suit off Howl before it did more damage to Miss Angorian’s heart—unless, of course, Howl went to bed in his clothes, which she did not put past him. So Howl must have been looking for Prince Justin when he went to Upper Folding and met Lettie. Poor Lettie! Sophie thought, putting brisk, tiny stitches round her fifty-seventh blue triangle. Only another forty or so to go.

Howl’s voice was presently heard shouting weakly, “Help me, someone! I’m dying from neglect up here!”

Sophie snorted. Michael left off working on his new spell and ran up and down stairs. Things became very restless. In the time it took Sophie to sew ten more blue triangles Michael ran upstairs with lemon and honey, with a particular book, with cough mixture, with a spoon to take the cough mixture with, and then with nose drops, throat pastilles, gargle, pen, paper, three more books, and an infusion of willow bark. People kept knocking at the door too, making Sophie jump and Calcifer flicker uneasily. When no one opened the door, some of the people went on hammering for five minutes or so, rightly thinking they were being ignored.

By this time Sophie was becoming worried about the blue-and-silver suit. It was getting smaller and smaller. One cannot sew in that number of triangles without taking up quite a lot of cloth in the seams. “Michael,” she said when Michael came rushing downstairs again because Howl fancied a bacon sandwich for lunch. “Michael, is there a way of making small clothes larger?”

“Oh, yes,” said Michael. “That’s just what my new spell is—when I get a chance to work on it. He wants six slices of bacon in the sandwich. Could you ask Calcifer?”

Sophie and Calcifer exchanged speaking looks. “I don’t think he’s dying,” Calcifer said.

“I’ll give you the rinds to eat if you bend your head down,” Sophie said, laying down her sewing. It was easier to bribe Calcifer than bully him.

They had bacon sandwiches for lunch, but Michael had to rush upstairs in the middle of eating his. He came down with the news that Howl wanted him to go into Market Chipping now, to get some things he needed for moving the castle.