The moon hung like a spotlight, as if some helpful person had decided to give Mildred a few clues, then, just as suddenly, the clouds closed over and it was dark again, though not as utterly dark as before. The clouds were not quite so dense this time and Mildred could still see the rock, as well as Miss Hardbroom stretched out at her feet.
Mildred groped her way to the prow of the boat and hauled in the long rope that had been untied and left trailing in the sea. There was only one thing to do. In the few seconds that the moon had floodlit the scene, Mildred had noticed that the rock was full of jagged promontories and crevices. If she could somehow wedge the boat into a crevice and tie it to a projecting piece of rock, they could stay there until daylight. Perhaps by then Miss Hardbroom might be awake and full of bright ideas.
However, right now the wind was getting stronger by the minute and the waves higher, so Mildred had to think fast. In fact, it was amazing how sensibly she behaved on this occasion, bearing in mind how ghastly everything seemed and how scatterbrained she was most of the time.
‘Come on, broom,’ she said. ‘The rescue isn’t over yet.’
She tied the rope as securely as possible on to the back of the broomstick, then held the broomstick up as high as possible.
‘Off you go, broom!’ she commanded. ‘Straight above the rock! Now! Fast as you can!’
The broom shot away like a missile, towing the boat along behind it with surprising ease.
‘Stop now!’ called Mildred desperately, a little too late, as the boat slammed into the rock, wedging itself perfectly into a boat-shaped crevice.
She was thrown several feet down the boat, head first into the cabin door, where she very nearly joined Miss Hardbroom unconscious on the floor.
Mildred staggered to her feet and hauled the broomstick back into the
boat. She untied the rope and retied it several times around a large barnacled
piece of rock, just in case the boat relaunched itself. In fact, it was quite a sheltered crevice, the wind being in the opposite direction and blowing the waves away from them.
Mildred opened the cabin door so that she could perhaps drag Miss Hardbroom inside, out of the cold, but the formidable form-mistress was too heavy to move, so Mildred took off her sodden cloak, wrung it out, and draped it over Miss Hardbroom to keep out the wind. She sat hunched up next to her teacher, rubbing the long, bony hands in a useless attempt to warm them up.
Tabby escaped at last through the open door and wrapped himself around Mildred’s shoulders. Mildred
found him wonderfully warm and dry in the middle of all the wet clothes and breaking waves. She suddenly realized that Tabby could help to keep Miss Hardbroom warm, so she draped him around Miss Hardbroom’s neck and told him to stay there.
She was so tired that she couldn’t think any more, so she leaned half against the cabin and half against Miss Hardbroom to help with keeping her warm, and closed her eyes, hoping that perhaps it really was a nightmare and any minute now the rising bell would clang through the dormitory and wake her up.
ildred awoke to the sound of her name being shouted very loudly by several voices. For a moment she thought she was on her mat at the castle, where she had woken up so stiff and aching from the draught at the window. However, this stiffness was a hundred times worse and her eyes felt puffy as she prized them open and looked around at the extraordinary sight. Miss Hardbroom was still in exactly the same position on the floor
of the boat, Tabby was asleep, purring, on Mildred’s lap, the broomstick was lying across the two bench seats, and all around was a cloudless blue sky and a perfectly calm, innocent-looking sea. Mildred’s clothes were so thoroughly wet that she couldn’t imagine ever feeling warm again.
‘Mildred! Mildred Hubble!’ called a voice from the other side of the rock.
‘Over here!’ croaked Mildred. ‘I’m on the other side; over here!’
To Mildred’s eternal delight, Maud and Enid zoomed into sight on their broomsticks and landed on the rock just above the boat. They couldn’t believe their eyes when they saw Miss Hardbroom.
‘Gosh, Mil!’ said Maud. ‘I know you and Miss Hardbroom don’t quite see eye to eye about things, but what on earth’s happened?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Mildred. ‘I came to rescue Tabby, that’s all, and Miss Hardbroom was in the boat when I found it. She’s still breathing, but she’s been unconscious for ages. We must get her back.’
‘What’s Tabby doing here?’ asked Enid. ‘He’s supposed to be at the Academy!’
‘Oh I’ll explain all that later,’ said Mildred. ‘I can’t tell you how pleased I am to see you. It was really grim last night. I didn’t think I’d make it.’
‘Everyone’s out looking for you,’ explained Maud. ‘Poor Miss Cackle’s nearly gone out of her mind with worry, although when she discovered that Miss Hardbroom was missing, she thought perhaps you might be all right together. Anyway, this morning we all broke up into groups and set off to find you.’
‘I know,’ said Mildred. ‘Let’s tie the rope on to one of the broomsticks and let it fly us home. This one —’ she patted Miss Hardbroom’s recumbent broomstick – ‘was quite fantastic last night. I found it in the cave on the beach and it seemed to know where the boat was.’
‘That’s because it’s Miss Hardbroom’s broomstick, silly!’ said Maud. ‘Miss Cackle found her cat, Morgana, on the beach, so she must have left her broomstick in the cave… I say, Mil – Ethel must be having kittens. I mean, we all heard her say she’d let the boat out. Do you think she knew that Miss Hardbroom was in it?’
‘Perhaps she knocked her out and pushed the boat out on purpose!’ exclaimed Enid.
‘Even Ethel’s not that bad,’ said Mildred. ‘No, she pushed the boat out because I’d told her that I was taking it out to get the supposed treasure off this rock. I wasn’t really. I was only going down the steps to feed Tab – I’d hidden him in the boat for the holiday. I made up the story to put Ethel off the scent. I suppose she couldn’t bear the thought of me possibly finding the treasure. She didn’t know about Tabby being on the boat and probably not about Miss Hardbroom either. She really did think it was just a boat. Anyway, let’s get H.B. back to the castle as fast as possible. It can’t be doing her any good lying here in those damp clothes. Ethel is an idiot – fancy doing all that just in case I upstaged her by finding some mythical treasure chest!’
Mildred began untying the rope from the projecting piece of rock and, as she did so, she noticed that the rock was a rather odd shape, not jagged or pointed, but with neat, sheared-off sides almost hidden beneath barnacles and fronds of seaweed. She scraped at the seaweed and a large, unmistakable hinge appeared. More scraping
revealed a stout wooden plank and another and another.
‘It’s a chest!’ gasped Mildred. ‘Look! It really is a chest!’
‘We’ll never get it free from the rock,’ said Enid. ‘It’s practically grown into it, look.’
‘We could see if one of the broomsticks could pull it free,’ said Mildred. ‘Miss Hardbroom’s broomstick seems to be as strong as an ox.’
‘Let’s try!’ said Maud.
So they untied the boat end of the rope and tied it firmly on to Miss Hardbroom’s broomstick.
‘Pull, broom!’ said Mildred. ‘Pull as hard as you can and stop when I tell you.’
The broomstick set off very fast, several feet above the water, until the rope was taut and the chest was wrenched with a sudden ripping of barnacles, years of sea and salt and swollen wood, clean out of the rock-face, where it fell conveniently into the boat, narrowly missing Miss Hard-broom by a few inches.
‘Stop!’ yelled Mildred. The broom was still pulling as firmly as possible, nearly turning the boat on its side. ‘Down and rest.’
‘Shall we try to open it?’ asked Maud.
‘It’s very rusty,’ said Enid. ‘I think we’ll need a crowbar.’
‘Or dynamite!’ suggested Mildred. ‘No, f
irst and foremost we must get H.B. back to the castle. Let’s tie the rope on to the front of the boat again and see if H.B.’s broomstick can get us home. Perhaps you can both fly alongside to make the boat lighter.’
‘You and Tab can ride on the back of my broom if you like,’ said Maud. ‘Then there’d just be H.B. and the chest for it to pull.’
‘Good idea,’ said Mildred.
‘And we ought to both take off our capes and cover H.B. with them,’ said Enid. ‘She must be half frozen. I don’t know why we didn’t think of it before.’
Maud and Enid both took off their capes. Maud laid hers gently over their form-mistress and Enid rolled hers up to make a pillow. Tabby, who had heard the conversation about taking him on Maud’s broomstick, made a dive for the cabin and refused to come out.
‘Never mind,’ said Mildred, scrambling on to the back of Maud’s broom, which was hovering patiently with Maud already on it. ‘He doesn’t weigh much; he might as well stay on board.’
Miss Cackle was on the beach with various members of Form Two, who had come to report after making trips to search for Mildred and Miss Hardbroom.
‘Look over there, girls!’ exclaimed Miss Cackle. ‘Isn’t that a boat in the distance with some of our girls flying above it?’
Everyone craned their necks and screwed up their eyes against the sun to get a clearer view, and as the boat came nearer they could see Mildred on the back of Maud’s broom, Enid next to Maud, and the spare broomstick pulling the boat along. They all let out a rousing cheer of delight.
‘Mildred Hubble!’ called Miss Cackle, not sure whether to be thrilled or angry. ‘Come here at once and explain where on earth you have been, worrying us all senseless.’
The boat coasted alongside the breakwater, expertly steered by the broomstick under Mildred’s orders. Everyone ran to help and stopped in their tracks when they saw Miss Hard-broom lying in the boat wrapped in the cloaks. Tabby chose this moment to come miaowing out of the cabin and jump on to the chest.
Miss Cackle stood and stared in complete bewilderment. So did all the other members of Form Two.
‘Oh dear,’ said Mildred. ‘This is all going to be very difficult to explain.’
he magician arrived back early when he received word of Miss Hardbroom’s accident. He materialized in a swirl of brilliant-coloured smoke in the middle of the courtyard, dusted himself down and strode indoors, watched from the windows of their dormitory by the members of Form Two.
Mildred, Maud and Enid climbed down from the window and sat in a row on Mildred’s mat, each of them cuddling their cat.
‘At least I’ve got Tabby back for the day,’ said Mildred gloomily. ‘Though they’re bound to be absolutely raving after last night. Goodness knows what’ll happen.’
Ethel looked very nervous too, which was most unusual for her.
‘If any of you say anything about me pushing the boat out,’ said Ethel, ‘I’ll – I’ll –’
‘Oh it’s all right, bossy boots,’ said Maud. ‘No one’s going to sneak on you. You’re the sneak around here, remember.’
Maud could be quite withering when she wanted to.
Suddenly, there was a knock on the door. They all leaped to their feet and stood by their assorted beds, thinking that it must be Miss Cackle, as Miss Hardbroom was in bed tucked up with a hot-water bottle, a bandaged head and a pile of warm blankets.
But it wasn’t Miss Cackle. It was the magician and, to everyone’s surprise, he was smiling and looking just as genial as the day they had arrived.
‘Mildred, my dear,’ he said. ‘Come with me.’ He led Mildred through the maze of passages to Miss Hardbroom’s room where, to Mildred’s relief mingled with terror, Miss Hardbroom was wide awake, sitting propped up in bed with a huge white bandage around
her head. Miss Cackle was perched on a chair on the other side of the bed. Miss Cackle smiled in welcome, but Miss Hardbroom looked grim.
‘Come in, Mildred,’ said Miss Cackle. ‘You’ll be relieved to hear that Miss Hardbroom is perfectly all right after her terrible ordeal in the boat. I’m afraid she’ll have to spend the rest of the holiday in bed after such a nasty knock on the head, but I’m sure you girls will be able to cope for a few days away from the firm guidance of your form-mistress.’
‘Oh yes, Miss Cackle!’ agreed Mildred, sounding a little too eager.
Miss Hardbroom shot a menacing glance in her direction.
‘I mean —’ contrived Mildred hastily – ‘of course we’ll soldier on and do our best, but it will all be much more difficult without Miss Hardbroom at the helm.’
‘All right, Mildred,’ muttered Miss Hardbroom. ‘There’s no need to overdo it.’
‘Now then, Mildred,’ said Miss Cackle, rising from her chair and pushing her glasses on top of her head. ‘About yesterday’s little escapade.’
Oh dear, thought Mildred. Here we go.
‘If you hadn’t disobeyed orders and brought that dreadful cat, which should have been in the kitchen catching mice,’ said Miss Cackle, looking serious, ‘Miss Hardbroom would not have climbed into the boat to investigate when she saw it at the window, thereby avoiding the fall which knocked her out.’
‘No, Miss Cackle,’ agreed Mildred, looking at the floor.
‘However,’ continued Miss Cackle, ‘neither would you have discovered the chest which you brought back from the rock, which is after all the very same treasure chest described to you by the magician in the folk-tale about the shipwrecked sailor. Yes, Mildred, the chest is packed with gold coins and the most gorgeous jewellery.’
Mildred didn’t know how to react. She looked around the room, first at Miss Cackle, who was looking thrilled and excited, then at the magician, who was smiling at her with a vaguely fond expression, and finally at Miss Hardbroom, who looked as if she would like to expel her worst pupil on the spot.
‘What will happen to Tabby?’ she asked.
The magician stepped forward and put an arm around Mildred’s shoulders.
‘You must be so proud of this child, Miss Cackle,’ he said. ‘And especially you, Miss Hardbroom, after she saved your life. Most girls would want to know if they could have the treasure, but not this girl. The only thing she wants in the world is her little cat, and I can’t see any reason why she shouldn’t have it, can you?’
‘Well, I really don’t think —’ began Miss Hardbroom, but the magician cut across her.
‘I mean to say, Miss Hardbroom, the cat actually wrapped itself around your neck to keep you warm all night. It’s the least reward we can give to Mildred to let her keep her little lifesaver.’
‘If you think so, your Honour,’ said Miss Hardbroom, trying to look gracious.
‘And as for the treasure,’ said the magician, ‘there’s enough to do all the repairs to the castle here and to give you a substantial amount for Miss Cackle’s Academy.’
‘Oh, Mr Rowan-Webb!’ exclaimed Miss Cackle. ‘How simply wonderful. I’ve been wondering how we were going to pay for the new roof on the west wing – perhaps there’ll even be enough left for a swimming-pool!’
‘Could I go and tell Tabby the good news?’ asked Mildred, anxious to leave the room before any more questions were asked.
‘Of course,’ said Miss Cackle.
‘I’ll escort you back to your dormitory,’ said the magician.
Just outside the dormitory door, the magician handed a small package to Mildred.
‘This is a little present from the treasure chest,’ he said. ‘I thought you ought to have a memento, and it seemed rather appropriate. I still haven’t forgotten how you rescued me last year. Enjoy the rest of your stay, my dear. It’s bound to be a little easier with your form-mistress recovering in her room.’
The dormitory was empty, except for the cats. Everyone had been called to the hall for a late breakfast. Mildred could hardly wait to join them and share the wonderful news about Miss Hardbroom being out of action for the rest of the holiday. Before she left the room,
she curled up for a quick hug of Tabby and to find out what was in the magician’s package.
It was a gold chain with a delightful pendant composed of two golden frogs, one with emeralds for eyes, the other with rubies. They were sitting solemnly facing each other, shaking hands. Mildred put it on and slipped
it out of sight beneath her shirt as a secret good-luck charm, where she kept it for ever, even when she grew up. Certainly that day, as she raced down the sunlit stairs to find her friends and tell them all her news, she felt like the luckiest girl in the world instead of the worst witch in the school.
The Worst Witch All at Sea Page 6
