Millie had obviously expected him to poke about the Castle more than he had done. So he set off to explore, feeling rather daring.
The Castle seemed strange at night. There were dim little electric lights at regular intervals. The green carpet glowed gently, and things were reflected in the polished floor and walls even more strongly than they were by day. Cat walked softly along, accompanied by several reflected ghosts of himself, until he hardly felt real. All the doors he saw were closed. Cat listened at one or two and heard nothing. He had not quite the courage to open any of them. He went on and on.
After a while, he found he had somehow worked round to the older part of the Castle. Here the walls were whitewashed stone, and all the windows went in nearly three feet before there was any glass. Then Cat came to a staircase which was the twin of the one that twisted up to his room, except that it twisted in the opposite direction. Cat went cautiously up it.
He was just on the last bend, when a door at the top opened. A brighter square of light shone on the wall at the head of the stairs, and a shadow stood in it that could only belong to Chrestomanci. No one else’s shadow could be so tall, with such a smooth head and such a lot of ruffles on its shirt-front. Cat stopped.
“And let’s hope the wretched girl won’t try that again,” Chrestomanci said, out of sight above. He sounded a good deal more alert than usual, and rather angry.
Mr Saunders’s voice, from further away, said, “I’ve had about enough of her already, frankly. I suppose she’ll come to her senses soon. What possessed her to give away the source of her power like that?”
“Ignorance,” said Chrestomanci. “If I thought she had the least idea what she was doing, it would be the last thing she ever did in that line – or any other.”
“My back was to it,” said Mr Saunders. “Which was it? Number five?”
“No. Number three by the look of its hair. A revenant,” said Chrestomanci. “For which we must be thankful.” He began to come down the stairs. Cat was too scared to move. “I’ll have to get the Examining Board to revise their Elementary Magic Courses,” Chrestomanci called back as he came downstairs, “to include more theory. These hedge-wizards push their good pupils straight on to advanced work without any proper grounding at all.” Saying this, Chrestomanci came down round the corner and saw Cat. “Oh hallo,” he said. “I’d no idea you were here. Like to come up and have a look at Michael’s workshop?”
Cat nodded. He did not dare do otherwise.
Chrestomanci seemed quite friendly, however, and so did Mr Saunders when Chrestomanci ushered Cat into the room at the top of the stairs. “Hallo, Eric,” he said in his cheerful way. “Have a look round. Does any of this mean anything to you?”
Cat shook his head. The room was round, like his own, but larger, and it was a regular magician’s workshop. That much he could see. He recognised the five-pointed star painted on the floor. The smell coming from the burning cresset hanging from the ceiling was the same smell that had hung about Coven Street, back in Wolvercote. But he had no idea of the use of the things set out on the various trestle tables. One table was crowded with torts and limbecks, some bubbling, some empty. A second was piled with books and scrolls. The third bench had signs chalked all over it and a mummified creature of some sort lying among the signs.
Cat’s eyes travelled over all this, and over more books crammed into shelves round the walls, and more shelves filled with jars of ingredients – big jars, like the ones in sweet shops. He realised Mr Saunders worked in a big way. His scudding eyes raced over some of the labels on the huge jars: Newts’ Eyes, Gum Arabic, Elixir St John’s Wort, Dragon’s Blood (dried). This last jar was almost full of dark brown powder. Cat’s eyes went back to the mummified animal stretched among the signs chalked on the third table. Its feet had claws like a dog’s. It looked like a large lizard. But there seemed to be wings on its back. Cat was almost sure it had once been a small dragon.
“Means nothing, eh?” said Mr Saunders.
Cat turned round and found that Chrestomanci had gone. That made him a little easier. “This must have cost a lot,” he said.
“The taxpayer pays, fortunately,” said Mr Saunders. “Would you like to learn what all this is about?”
“You mean, learn witchcraft?” Cat asked. “No. No thanks. I wouldn’t be any good at it.”
“Well, I had at least two other things in mind besides witchcraft.” Mr Saunders said. “But what makes you think you’d be no good?”
“Because I can’t do it,” Cat explained. “Spells just don’t work for me.”
“Are you sure you went about them in the right way?” Mr Saunders asked. He wandered up to the mummified dragon – or whatever – and gave it an absent-minded flick. To Cat’s disgust, the thing twitched all over. Filmy wings jerked and spread on its back. Then it went lifeless again. The sight sent Cat backing towards the door. He was almost as alarmed as he was the time Miss Larkins suddenly spoke with a man’s voice. And, come to think of it, the voice had been not so unlike Mr Saunders’s.
“I went about it every way I could think,” Cat said, backing. “And I couldn’t even turn buttons into gold. And that was simple.”
Mr Saunders laughed. “Perhaps you weren’t greedy enough. All right. Cut along, if you want to go.”
Cat fled, in great relief. As he ran through the strange corridors, he thought he ought to let Gwendolen know that Chrestomanci had, after all, been interested in her apparition, and even angry. But Gwendolen had locked her door and would not answer when he called to her.
He tried again next morning. But, before he had a chance to speak to Gwendolen, Euphemia came in, carrying a letter. As Gwendolen snatched it eagerly from Euphemia, Cat recognised Mr Nostrum’s jagged writing on the envelope.
The next moment, Gwendolen was raging again. “Who did this? When did this come?” The envelope had been neatly cut open along the top.
“This morning, by the postmark,” said Euphemia. “And don’t look at me like that. Miss Bessemer gave it to me open.”
“How dare she!” said Gwendolen. “How dare she read my letters! I’m going straight to Chrestomanci about this!”
“You’ll regret it if you do,” said Euphemia, as Gwendolen pushed past her to the door.
Gwendolen whirled round on her. “Oh, shut up, you stupid frog-faced girl!” Cat thought that was a little unfair. Euphemia, though she did have rather goggling eyes, was actually quite pretty. “Come on, Cat!” Gwendolen shouted at him, and she ran away along the corridor with her letter. Cat panted behind her and, once again, did not catch up with her till they were beside the marble staircase. “Chrestomanci!” bawled Gwendolen, thin and small and unechoing.
Chrestomanci was coming up the marble staircase in a wide, flowing dressing-gown that was partly orange and partly bright pink. He looked like the Emperor of Peru. By the suave, vague look on his face, he had not noticed Gwendolen and Cat.
Gwendolen shouted down at him. “Here, you! Come here at once!” Chrestomanci’s face turned upwards and his eyebrows went up. “Someone’s been opening my letters,” said Gwendolen. “And I don’t care who it is, but I’m not having it! Do you hear?”
Cat gasped at the way she spoke. Chrestomanci seemed
