The Worst Witch All at Sea (15 page)

bit dangerous on these steps, so I thought you might need some assistance with whatever it is. You know how clumsy you are!’

Ethel managed to say all this in a light, sincere tone of voice. If you hadn’t known her, you would have thought she was genuinely concerned, instead of nosily trying to find out something secret.

‘I was just going for a stroll on the beach,’ Mildred improvised. ‘I’ve got a bit of a headache, that’s all.’

‘Then why didn’t you go to Miss Hardbroom?’ asked Ethel. ‘She’d have given you an aspirin or something. No, I think you’re
up
to something Mildred Hubble and I’m going to get Miss Hardbroom and tell her, before it’s too late and you get us
all
into trouble.’

They had reached the bottom of the steps by this time.

‘Look, Ethel,’ said Mildred. ‘If I tell you, will you
promise
not to let on? Even Maud and Enid don’t know.’

Ethel considered the matter. She felt quite pleased at being let in on a secret which even Mildred’s best friends didn’t know about.

‘All right,’ she said. ‘I promise.’

‘OK…’ said Mildred, racking her brains for a good story. ‘You remember the story about the treasure out on Cat’s Head Rock? Well, I was going to go out there, on the boat, and have a little look around to see if I could find it. It’s a nice calm evening and it seemed a good idea. I thought the magician would be really pleased to have the treasure to buy things for the castle. I wasn’t going to go
now
, maybe a bit later when everyone’s asleep. I was just going to have a look to see if the boat’s seaworthy.’

Ethel stared at Mildred.

‘Well,
I
think it’s a dreadful idea,’ she said. ‘The magician
told
us not to use the boat, and you’d probably wreck it or something – anyway, there probably isn’t any treasure at all. I say, Mildred, you do smell
awful
. Don’t you think it would be more to the point if you went back to the castle and had a bath? You smell like a crate of rotting fish.’

‘Actually,’ said Mildred, ‘I sat on a kipper this morning and haven’t had time to wash my clothes. Perhaps you’re right about the plan to get the treasure. I think I’ll go back to the dorm and forget all about it.’

They set off on the long climb back up the steps, Ethel leading the way. While Ethel’s back was turned, Mildred took the kippers from her pocket and lobbed them on to the deck of the boat, meaning to come back after dark

and give them to Tabby in the shelter. The window was just too narrow for him to squeeze out, though Mildred had seen him looking out during the day. Amazingly, no one else had noticed, and any mewing had been drowned by the sound of the waves and seagulls and the shouts of the girls.

Miss Hardbroom looked out of her window at the perfect evening sky and decided to take a broomstick ride. She rarely felt quite so pleased with life as she did today. For some reason, the warm weather and the delights of sea-bathing had made her feel completely relaxed. Even the girls did not irritate her quite as much as usual – except for Mildred Hubble of course. Mildred would have irritated Miss Hardbroom whatever the weather was like. There was something about the girl that just
got
to Miss Hardbroom, like a scratchy label sewn into the neck of a dress. It even annoyed Miss Hardbroom that they were only invited on the holiday in the first place because of Mildred’s action in saving Mr Rowan-Webb from the pond. However, putting all irritation aside, Miss Hardbroom swirled her cape around her shoulders, commanded her broom to hover outside the window, and the cat, which was a particularly beautiful, smooth, black one with olive-green eyes, named Morgana, to sit on the end, and lowered herself on to it gracefully.

‘Away!’ she commanded. ‘To the cave.’

Mildred and Ethel had just reached the top of the steps and they both ducked as Miss Hardbroom zoomed over their heads, rather like one of those low-flying fighter planes that sometimes appear from nowhere when you’re out walking in the country. Miss Hardbroom did not see the two girls as she nosedived down the cliff-face and pulled up to a perfect landing next to the breakwater where the boat was tied.

A chilly breeze was coming from the sea and Miss Hardbroom wrapped her cloak around her as she put the broomstick into the cave to keep it from getting wet.

At once, Morgana sprang purposefully on to the breakwater and ran along to the boat. She had smelt the kippers and couldn’t wait to investigate. Miss Hardbroom was intrigued to see the cat disappear into the boat. She was even more intrigued when she heard a desperate yowling and saw the scruffy-looking Tabby madly trying to squeeze himself out of the few inches of open window in the shelter. Poor Tabby was frantic with hunger and the sight of Morgana eating his evening meal was too much to bear.

Miss Hardbroom climbed aboard the boat to investigate. She recognized Tabby immediately, and her eyebrows knitted together like storm-clouds as she made her way through the boat to the shelter. A slight breeze had come up and the boat was bobbing and swaying, making it difficult to keep her balance. Miss Hardbroom had forgotten her own cat, now crouched underneath one of the benches wolfing down the kippers as fast as possible.

The boat lurched and Miss Hardbroom unfortunately braced her foot on an unexpected piece of fish skin, which zipped her over backwards, banging her head on the seat as she fell. A shower of stars and exploding lights cascaded past her eyes as she lost consciousness. Then there was no sound, except for Tabby’s pitiful mewing, Morgana’s munching and the sea slapping at the sides of the boat.

f course, Ethel hadn’t believed Mildred when she said that she had given up her plan to visit the rock. She felt quite sure that Mildred would go back again, perhaps after dark. Mildred was such a bad liar and schemer, that she always gave herself away. Ethel could tell, by the way Mildred kept glancing out of the window and wandering up and down the dormitory. Even Maud and Enid had noticed something was wrong.

‘What’s the matter, Mil?’ asked Maud. ‘You look so jumpy all the time.’

‘Nothing!’ exclaimed Mildred in a falsely bright voice. ‘Nothing at all!’

Ethel smiled secretly to herself. She had been a little worried in case Mildred actually did manage to take the boat to Cat’s Head Rock and find the treasure. The thought of everyone praising Mildred’s cleverness was just too upsetting for words. Of course, it was more likely that Mildred would sink the boat than find the treasure, but she might just do it.

Well, thought Ethel, there’s one sure-fire way to make sure she doesn’t get the chance.

Mildred decided to abandon Tabby’s dinner for the night. She couldn’t face another trip down the cliff, either by broomstick or on foot, so the best thing to do seemed to be to go to sleep and sneak out at the crack of dawn. She had completely forgotten the story she had made up to Ethel about the boat trip to Cat’s Head Rock. In fact, she had completely forgotten Ethel until she saw her come back into the dormitory with an ‘I-know-something-you-don’t-know’ look all over her face.