Charmed Life (UK)

by Diana Wynne Jones

  “No,” Cat said dubiously. “But I don’t think Mr Nostrum was telling quite the truth. All sorts of things could be wrong.”

  “Don’t I know it!” said Janet. “Specially after Mrs Sharp. Mum and Dad would be another difficulty too – though I’m sure they’d like you when they understood. They must be fearfully puzzled by my Dear Replacement by now, as it is. And I did have a brother, who died when he was born, so perhaps they’d think you were his Dear Replacement.”

  “That’s funny!” said Cat. “I nearly died being born too.”

  “Then you must be him,” said Janet, swinging round at the end of her march. “They’d be delighted – I hope. And the best of it would have been that Gwendolen would have been dragged back here to face the music – and serve her right! This is all her fault.”

  “No, it isn’t,” said Cat.

  “Yes, it is!” said Janet. “She did magic when she was forbidden to, and gave Mr Blastoff dud earrings for something she wasn’t supposed to have anyway, and dragged me here, and turned Euphemia into a frog, and got you into an even worse mess than I’m in. Will you stop being so loyal for a moment and notice!”

  “It’s no good getting angry,” said Cat, and he sighed. He missed Gwendolen even more than he had missed Mrs Sharp.

  Janet sighed too, but with exasperation. She sat down at the dressing-table with a thump and stared into her own cross face. She pushed its nose up and crossed her eyes. She had been doing this every spare minute. It relieved her feelings about Gwendolen a little.

  Cat had been thinking. “I think it’s a good idea,” he said dolefully. “We’d better go to the garden. But I think you need some kind of magic to go to another world.”

  “Thus we find ourselves stumped,” said Janet. “It’s dangerous, and we can’t anyway. But they’d taken Gwendolen’s witchcraft away, and she did it. How? That’s been puzzling me a lot.”

  “I expect she used dragon’s blood,” said Cat. “She still had that. Mr Saunders has a whole jar of dragon’s blood up in his workshop.”

  “Why didn’t you say so?” Janet yelled, jumping round on her stool.

  She really might have been Gwendolen. At the sight of her fierce face Cat missed Gwendolen more than ever. He resented Janet. She had been ordering him about all day. Then she tried to make out it was all Gwendolen’s fault. He shrugged mulishly and went very unhelpful. “You didn’t ask.”

  “But can you get some?”

  “Maybe. But,” Cat added, “I don’t want to go to another world really.”

  Janet drew a long, quiet breath and managed not to tell him to stay and be turned into a frog then. She made a very ingenious face at the mirror and counted up to ten. “Cat,” she said carefully, “we really are in such a mess here that I can’t see any other way out. Can you?”

  “No,” Cat admitted grudgingly. “I said I’d go.”

  “And thank you, dear Janet, for your kind invitation, I notice,” Janet said. To her relief, Cat grinned. “But we’ll have to be hideously careful about going,” she said, “because I suspect that if Chrestomanci doesn’t know what we’re doing, Millie will.”

  “Millie?” said Cat.

  “Millie,” said Janet. “I think she’s a witch.” She ducked her head down and fiddled with the gold-backed hairbrush. “I know you think I go around seeing sorcery everywhere with my nasty suspicious mind, like you did about Chrestomanci, but I really am sure, Cat. A sweet, kind honey of a witch if you like. But she is one. How else did she know we were running away this afternoon?”

  “Because Mrs Sharp came and they wanted us,” Cat said, puzzled.

  “But we’d only been gone for an hour or so, and we could have been just going blackberrying. We hadn’t even taken our nightclothes,” Janet explained. “Now do you see?”

  Though Cat was indeed sure that Janet had an obsession about witchcraft, and he was still feeling sulky and unhelpful, he could not help seeing that Janet had a point. “A very nice witch, then,” he conceded. “I don’t mind.”

  “But, Cat, you do see how difficult she’s going to make it,” Janet said. “Do you? You know, you should be called Mule, not Cat. If you don’t want to know a thing, you don’t. How did you get to be called Cat anyway?”

  “That was just a joke Gwendolen made,” said Cat. “She always said I’d got nine lives.”

  “Gwendolen made jokes?” Janet asked unbelievingly. She stopped, with an arrested look, and turned stiffly away from the mirror.

  “Not usually,” said Cat.

  “Great heavens! I wonder!” said Janet. “In this place, where every other thing turns out to be enchanted, it almost must be! In which case, how horrible!” She pushed the mirror up until the glass faced the ceiling, jumped off the stool and raced to the wardrobe. She dragged Gwendolen’s box out of it and sorted fiercely through it. “Oh, I do hope I’m wrong! But I’m almost sure there were nine.”

  “Nine what?” asked Cat.

  Janet had found the bundle of letters addressed to Miss Caroline Chant. The red book of matches was tucked in front of it. Janet took the little book carefully out and chucked the letters back in the box. “Nine matches,” she said, as she opened the book. “And there are, too! Oh, good Lord, Cat! Five of them are burnt. Look.”

  She held the book out to Cat. He saw there were indeed nine matches in it. The heads of the first two were black. The third was charred right down to the base. The fourth had a black head again. But the fifth had burnt so fiercely that the paper behind was singed and there was a hole in the sandpaper beneath it. It was a wonder the whole book had not caught fire – or at least the last four matches. They were as new, however. Their heads were bright red, with yellowish oily paper below, and bright white cardboard below that.

  “It does look like a charm of some kind,” Cat said.

  “I know it is,” said Janet. “These are your nine lives, Cat. How did you come to lose so many?”

  Cat simply could not believe her. He was feeling surly and resistant anyway, and this was too much. “They can’t be,” he said. Even if he had nine lives, he knew he could only have lost three, and that was counting the time Gwendolen gave him cramps. The other two would be when he was born and on the paddle boat. But, as he thought this, Cat found he was remembering those four apparitions coming from the flaming bowl to join Gwendolen’s gruesome procession. One had been a baby, one wet. The crippled one had seemed to have cramps. But why had there been four of them, when five matches were burnt?

  Cat began shivering, and this made him all the more determined to prove Janet wrong.

  “You couldn’t have died in the night once or twice without noticing?” Janet wondered.

  “Of course I didn’t.” Cat reached down and took the book. “Look, I’ll prove it to you.” He tore the sixth match off and dragged it along the sandpaper.

  Janet leapt up, shrieking to him to stop. The match burst into flame.

  So, almost at the same instant, did Cat himself.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  Cat screamed. Flames burst out of him all over. He screamed again, and beat at himself with flaming hands, and went on screaming. They were pale, shimmering, transparent flames. They burst out through his clothes, and his shoes, his hair, across his face, so that, in seconds, he was wrapped in pale flame from head to foot. He fell to the floor, still screaming, and rolled there, blazing.

  Janet kept her presence of mind. She dragged up the nearest corner of the carpet and threw it over Cat. She had heard that this smothered flames. But it did not smother these. To Janet’s horror, the pale ghostly flames came straight through the carpet as if it was not there, and played on the black underside of it more fiercely than ever. They did not burn the carpet, nor did they burn Janet’s hands as she frantically rolled Cat over in the carpet, and then over again. But no matter how much carpet she wrapped round Cat, the flames still came through, and Cat went on blazing and screaming. His head was half outside the flaming bundle she had made of him, and it w
as a sheaf of flames. She could see his screaming face inside the fire.

  Janet did the only thing she could think of. She jumped up and screamed herself. “Chrestomanci, Chrestomanci! Come quickly!”

  The door burst open while she was still screaming. Janet had forgotten it was locked, but the lock did not bother Chrestomanci. She could see it sticking out from the edge of the door as he flung it open. She had forgotten there were guests to dinner too. She remembered when she saw Chrestomanci’s lace ruffles, and his black velvet suit which glimmered all over like an opal, blue, crimson, yellow and green. But that did not seem to bother Chrestomanci either. He took one look at the flaming bundle on the floor and said “Good God!” Then he was down on his elegant knees unwrapping the carpet as frantically as Janet had wrapped it.

  “I’m awfully sorry. I thought that would help,” Janet stammered.

  “It ought to have done,” said Chrestomanci, rolling Cat over, with flames whirling through, over and along his velvet arms. “How did he do it?”

  “He struck one of the matches. I told him—”

  “You stupid child!” Chrestomanci was so angry that Janet burst into tears. He lugged at the last of the carpet and Cat rolled free, flaming like a straw faggot. He was not really screaming any more. He was making a long thin noise that had Janet covering her ears. Chrestomanci dived into the heart of the flames and found the book of matches. It was tightly clasped in Cat’s right hand. “Thank God he didn’t have it in the left one,” he said. “Go and turn your shower on. Quick!”

  “Of course. Of course,” Janet sobbed, and raced to do it.

  She fumbled with the taps and had just got a strong spray of cold water hissing into the sunken blue bath as Chrestomanci hurried in carrying Cat, in a ball of roaring flame. He dumped Cat down into the bath and held him there, turning him this way and that to get him wet all over.

  Cat steamed and hissed. The water coming from the sprayhead shone like water against the sun, golden as the sun itself. It came down like a beam of light. And, as the bath began to fill up, Cat seemed to be turning and threshing in a pool of sunshine. He boiled it into golden bubbles. The room filled with steam. Coils of smoke drifted up from the bath, smelling thick and sweet. It was the same smell that Janet remembered from the morning she had first found herself there. As far as she could see through the smoke, Cat seemed to be turning black in the golden pool. But the water was wet. Chrestomanci was getting soaked.

  “Don’t you understand?” he said to Janet over his shoulder while he heaved at Cat to keep his head under the spray. “You shouldn’t go telling him things like this until the Castle has had time to work on him. He wasn’t ready to understand. You’ve given him the most appalling shock.”

  “I’m truly enormously sorry,” Janet said, crying heavily.

  “We’ll just have to make the best of it,” said Chrestomanci. “I’ll try and explain to him. Run along to the speaking tube at the end of the corridor and tell them to send me some brandy and a pot of strong tea.”

  As Janet raced away, Cat found himself soaking wet, with water hissing down on him. He tried to roll away from it. Someone held him in it. A voice said insistently in his ear, “Cat. Cat, will you listen to me. Do you understand? Cat, you’ve only got three lives left now.”

  Cat knew that voice. “You told me I’d got five when you spoke to me through Miss Larkins,” he grumbled.

  “Yes, but you’ve only got three now. You’ll have to be more careful,” said Chrestomanci.

  Cat opened his eyes and looked up at him. Chrestomanci was fearfully wet. The usually smooth black hair was hanging over his forehead in wriggles, with drips on the ends. “Oh. Was it you?” he said.

  “Yes. You took a long time recognising me, didn’t you?” said Chrestomanci. “But then I didn’t know you straight away when I saw you, either. I think you can come out of this water now.”

  Cat was too weak to get out of the bath alone. But Chrestomanci heaved him out, stripped off his wet clothes, dried him and wrapped him in another towel in no time at all. Cat’s legs kept folding. “Up you come,” said Chrestomanci, and carried him again, to the blue velvet bed, and tucked him in it. “Better now, Cat?”

  Cat lay back, limp but luxurious, and nodded. “Thanks. You’ve never called me Cat before.”

  “Perhaps I should have done. You just might have understood.” Chrestomanci sat beside the bed, looking very serious. “You do understand now?”

  “The book of matches was my nine lives,” Cat said. “And I’ve just burnt one. I know it was stupid, but I didn’t believe it. How can I have nine lives?”

  “You have three,” said Chrestomanci. “Get that into your head. You did have nine. In some manner and by someone, they were put into that book of matches, and that book I am now going to put in my secret safe, sealed with the strongest enchantments I know. But that will only stop people using them. It won’t stop you losing them yourself.”

  Janet came hurrying in, still tearful, but very thankful to be of use. “It’s coming,” she said.

  “Thank you,” said Chrestomanci, and he gave her a long, thoughtful look. Janet was sure he was going to accuse her of not being Gwendolen, but what he said was, “You may as well hear this too, in order to prevent more accidents.”

  “Can I get you a towel first?” Janet said humbly. “You’re so wet.”

  “I’m drying out, thank you,” he said, smiling at her. “Now listen. People with nine lives are very important and very rare. They only happen when, for one reason or another, there are no counterparts of them living in any other world. Then the lives that would have been spread out over a whole set of worlds get concentrated in one person. And so do all the talents that those other eight people might have had.”

  Cat said, “But I haven’t any talents,” and Janet said at the same time, “How rare are these people?”

  “Extremely rare,” said Chrestomanci. “Apart from Cat, the only other person with nine lives that I know of on this world is myself.”

  “Really?” Cat was pleased and interested. “Nine?”

  “I did have nine. I’ve only got two now. I was even more careless than Cat,” Chrestomanci said. He sounded a little ashamed. “Now I have to take care to keep each life separately in the safest place I can think of. I advise Cat to do the same.”

  Janet’s ready brain promptly got to work on this. “Is one life here, and the other downstairs having supper at this moment?”

  Chrestomanci laughed. “It doesn’t work like that. I—”

  To Janet’s disappointment, Euphemia hurried in with a tray and prevented Chrestomanci explaining how it did work. Mr Saunders came in on Euphemia’s heels, still unable to find evening clothes that covered his wrists and ankles.

  “Is he all right?” Euphemia asked anxiously. “My Will was uttering threats, but if it was him I’ll never speak to him again. And whatever happened to this carpet?”

  Mr Saunders was looking at the wrinkled and heaped up carpet too. “What did it?” he said. “There were surely enough charms in this carpet to stop any kind of accident.”

  “I know,” said Chrestomanci. “But this was amazingly strong.” The two of them looked at one another significantly.

  Then everyone fussed over Cat. He had a most enjoyable time. Mr Saunders sat him up on pillows, and Euphemia put him in a nightshirt and then stroked Cat’s head, just as if he had never confessed to turning her into a frog. “It wasn’t Will,” Cat said to her. “It was me.” Chrestomanci gave him a fierce swig of brandy and then made him drink a cup of sweet tea. Janet had a cup of tea too, and felt much better for it. Mr Saunders helped Euphemia straighten the carpet, and then asked if he should strengthen the charms in it.

  “Dragon’s blood might do the trick,” he suggested.

  “Frankly, I don’t think anything will,” said Chrestomanci. “Leave it.” He got up and turned the mirror straight. “Do you mind sleeping tonight in Cat’s room?” he asked Janet. “I want to be a
ble to keep an eye on Cat.”

  Janet looked from the mirror to Chrestomanci, and her face became very pink. “Er,” she said. “I’ve been making faces—”

  Chrestomanci laughed. Mr Saunders was so amused that he had to sit on the blue velvet stool. “I suppose it serves me right,” said Chrestomanci. “Some of the faces were highly original.”

  Janet laughed too, a little foolishly.

  Cat lay, feeling comfortable and almost cheerful. For a while, everyone was there, settling him in. Then there seemed only to be Janet, talking as usual.

  “I’m so glad you’re all right,” she said. “Why did I open my big mouth about those matches? I had the dreaded umjams when you suddenly flared up, and when the carpet didn’t work, the only thing I could think of was to yell for Chrestomanci. I was right. He came before the words were out of my mouth, even though the door was locked. It was still locked when he opened it, but the lock isn’t broken, because I tried it. So he is an enchanter. And he ruined a suit over you, Cat, and didn’t seem to mind, so I think that when he isn’t being like freezing fog over the Grampians, he’s really very nice. This isn’t for the benefit of the mirror. I mean it. I suppose that mirror is the magic equivalent of—”

  Cat thought he had been meaning to say something about freezing fog in the Grampians, but he drifted away to sleep while Janet talked, feeling snug and cared-for.

  He woke on Sunday morning, quite the opposite: cold and quivering. This afternoon, he was due to be turned into a frog or face a tiger – and a rather heavy strong tiger Will Suggins would make too, he thought. Beyond the tiger – if there was a beyond – lay the horrors of Monday without magic. Julia and Roger might help there, except that it would be no use when Mr Baslam came on Wednesday and demanded twenty pounds Cat knew he could not get. Mr Nostrum was no help. Mrs Sharp was even less. The only hope seemed to be to take Janet and some dragon’s blood to the forbidden garden and try to get away.