about the difficulties the trees were causing. She told Cat that the yew trees from the formal garden were packed so tight by the kitchen door that the men had to hack a path for the milk to come through. There were three oak trees against the main front door, and no one could budge it. “And the apples are all underfoot among the yew trees, so it smells like a cider-press in the kitchen,” Mary said.
When Cat arrived wearily in the playroom, it was even darker there. In the deep greenish light, he could see that Gwendolen was, understandably, white and tired. But she looked satisfied enough.
“I don’t think I like these trees,” Cat whispered to her, when Roger and Julia had gone through to the schoolroom. “Why couldn’t you do something smaller and funnier?”
“Because I’m not a laughing stock!” Gwendolen hissed back. “And I needed to do it. I had to know how much power I could draw on.”
“Quite a lot, I should think,” Cat said, looking at the mass of horse-chestnut leaves pressed against the window.
Gwendolen smiled. “Better still when I’ve got my dragon’s blood.”
Cat nearly blurted out that he had seen dragon’s blood in Mr Saunders’s workshop. But he stopped himself in time. He did not care for mighty works like this.
They spent another morning with the lights on, and at lunch time, Cat, Julia and Roger went out to have a look at the trees. They were disappointed to find that it was quite easy to get out of their private door. The rhododendrons were three feet away from it. Cat thought Gwendolen must intentionally have left them a way out, until he looked up and saw, from their bent branches and mashed leaves, that the bushes had indeed been squashed against the door earlier. It looked as if the trees were retreating.
Beyond the rhododendrons, they had to fight their way through something like a jungle. The trees were rammed so tight that, not only had twigs and leaves broken off by cartloads, but great branches had been torn away too, and fallen tangled with smashed roses, broken clematis and mangled grapes. When the children tore themselves out on the other side of the jungle, blank daylight hit them like a hammer blow. They blinked. The gardens, the village, and even the hills beyond were bald. The only place where they could still see trees was above the old grey ruined wall of Chrestomanci’s garden.
“It must have been a strong spell,” said Roger.
“It’s like a desert,” said Julia. “I never thought I’d miss the trees so much!”
But, halfway through the afternoon, it became clear that the trees were going back to their proper places. They could see sky through the schoolroom window. A little later, the trees had spread out and retreated so much that Mr Saunders turned the light off. Shortly after that, Cat and Roger noticed the ruins of the tree-house, smashed to bits in the crowding, dangling out of a chestnut tree.
“Now what are you staring at?” said Mr Saunders.
“The tree-house is broken,” Roger said, looking moodily at Gwendolen.
“Perhaps Gwendolen would be kind enough to mend it again,” Mr Saunders suggested sarcastically.
If he was trying to goad Gwendolen into doing a kindly act, he failed. Gwendolen tossed her head. “Tree-houses are stupid babyish things,” she said coldly. She was very annoyed at the way the trees were retreating. “It’s too bad!” she told Cat just before dinner. By that time the trees were almost back to their usual places. The only ones nearer than they should be were those on the hill opposite. The view looked smaller, somehow. “I hoped it would do for tomorrow, too,” Gwendolen said discontentedly. “Now I shall have to think of something else.”
“Who sent them back? The garden warlocks?” Cat asked.
“I wish you wouldn’t talk nonsense,” said Gwendolen. “It’s obvious who did it.”
“You mean Mr Saunders?” said Cat. “But couldn’t the spell have been used up just pulling all the trees here?”
“You don’t know a thing about it,” said Gwendolen.
Cat knew he knew nothing of magic, but he found it queer all the same. The next day, when he went to see, there were no fallen twigs, torn-off branches or squashed grapes anywhere. The yew trees in the formal garden did not seem to have been hacked at all. And though there was not a trace of an apple underfoot round the kitchen, there were boxes of firm round apples in the courtyard. In the orchard, the apples were either hanging on the trees or being picked and put in more boxes.
While Cat was finding this out, he had to flatten himself hastily against one of the hedge-like apple-trees to make way for a galloping Jersey cow pursued by two gardeners and a farm boy. There were cows galloping in the wood, when Cat went hopefully to look at the tree-house. Alas, that was still a ruin. And the cows were doing their best to ruin the flowerbeds and not making much impression.
“Did you do the cows?” he asked Gwendolen.
“Yes. But it was just something to show them I’m not giving up,” said Gwendolen. “I shall get my dragon’s blood tomorrow and then I can do something really impressive.”
Gwendolen went down to the village to get her dragon’s blood on Wednesday afternoon. She was in high glee. There were to be guests that night at the Castle and a big dinner party. Cat knew that everyone had carefully not mentioned it before, for fear Gwendolen would take advantage of it. But she had to be told on Wednesday morning, because there were special arrangements for the children. They were to have their supper in the playroom, and they were supposed to keep out of the way after that.
“I’ll keep out of the way all right,” Gwendolen promised. “But that won’t make any difference.” She chuckled about it all the way to the village.
Cat was embarrassed when they got to the village. Everyone avoided Gwendolen. Mothers dragged their children indoors and snatched babies out of her way. Gwendolen hardly noticed. She was too intent on getting to Mr Baslam and getting her dragon’s blood. Cat did not fancy Mr Baslam, or the decaying pickle smell among his stuffed animals. He let Gwendolen go there on her own, and went to post his postcard to Mrs Sharp in the sweet shop. The people there were rather cool with him, even though he spent nearly two shillings on sweets, and they were positively cold in the cake shop next door. When Cat came out on to the green with his parcels, he found that children were being snatched out of his way, too.
This so shamed Cat that he fled back to the Castle grounds and did not wait for Gwendolen. There he wandered moodily, eating toffees and penny buns, and wishing he was back with Mrs Sharp. From time to time he saw Gwendolen in the distance. Sometimes she was dashing about. Sometimes she was squatting under a tree, carefully doing something. Cat did not go near her. If they were back with Mrs Sharp, he thought, Gwendolen would not need to do whatever impressive thing she was planning. He found himself wishing she was not quite such a strong and determined witch. He tried to imagine a Gwendolen who was not a witch, but he found himself quite unable to. She just would not be Gwendolen.
