"Diana Wynne Jones - Witch Week" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jones Diana Wynne)

scrambling across the wall at the end of the garden and stumbled down the rockery to the lawn, carrying
her smart shoes in one hand. Charles had been nine years old then, and he was minding his little brother on
the lawn. Luckily for the witch, his parents were out.
Charles knew she was a witch. She was out of breath and obviously frightened. He could hear the
yells and police whistles in the house behind. Besides, who else but a witch would run away from the police
in the middle of the afternoon in a tight skirt? But he made quite sure. He said, "Why are you running away
in our garden?"
The witch rather desperately hopped on one foot. She had a large blister on the other foot, and both
her stockings were laddered. "I'm a witch," she panted. "Please help me, little boy!"
"Why can't you magic yourself safe?" Charles asked.
 "Because I can't when I'm this frightened!" gasped the witch. "I tried, but it just went wrong! Please,
little boy- sneak me out through your house and don't say a word, and I'll give you luck for the rest of your
life. I promise."
Charles looked at her in that intent way of his which most people found blank and nasty. He saw she
was speaking the truth. He saw, too, that she understood the look as very few people seemed to. "Come in
through the kitchen," he said. And he led the witch, hobbling on her blister in her laddered stockings, through
the kitchen and down the hall to the front door.
"Thanks," she said. "You're a love." She smiled at him while she put her hair right in the hall mirror,
and after she had done something to her skirt that may have been witchcraft to make it seem untorn again,
she bent down and kissed Charles. "If I get away, I'll bring you luck," she said. Then she put her smart
shoes on again and went away down the front garden, trying hard not to limp. At the front gate, she waved
and smiled at Charles.
That was the end of the part Charles liked. That was why he wrote but not for long next. He never
saw the witch again, or heard what had happened to her. He ordered his little brother never to say a word
about her-and Graham obeyed, because he always did everything Charles said-and then he watched and
waited for any sign of the witch or any sign of luck. None came. It was next to impossible for Charles to
find out what might have happened to the witch, because there had been new laws since he glimpsed the
first witch burning. There were no more public burnings. The bonfires were lit inside the walls of jails
instead, and the radio would simply announce: "Two witches were burned this morning inside Holloway
Jail." Every time Charles heard this kind of announcement he thought it was his witch. It gave him a blunt,
hurtful feeling inside. He thought of the way she had kissed him, and he was fairly sure it made you wicked
too, to be kissed by a witch. He gave up expecting to be lucky. In fact, to judge from the amount of bad
luck he had had, he thought the witch must have been caught almost straight-away. For the blunt, hurtful
feeling he had when the radio announced a burning made him refuse to do anything his parents told him to
do. He just gave them his steady stare instead. And each time he stared, he knew they thought he was
being nasty. They did not understand it the way the witch did. And, since Graham imitated everything
Charles did, Charles's parents very soon decided Charles was a problem child and leading Graham astray.
They arranged for him to be sent to Larwood House, because it was quite near.
When Charles wrote games, he meant bad luck. Like everyone else in 6B, he had seen Mr. Crossley
had found a note. He did not know what was in the note, but when he looked up and caught Mr. Crossley's
eye, he knew it meant bad luck coming.
Mr. Crossley still could not decide what to do about the note. If what it said was true, that meant
inquisitors coming to the school. And that was a thoroughly frightening thought. Mr. Crossley sighed and put
the note in his pocket. "Right, everyone," he said. "Put away your journals and get into line for music."
As soon as 6B had shuffled away to the school hall, Mr. Crossley sped to the staff room, hoping to
find someone he could consult about the note.
He was lucky enough to find Miss Hodge there. As Theresa Mullett and Estelle Green had observed,
Mr. Crossley was in love with Miss Hodge. But of course he never let it show. Probably the one person in
the school who did not seem to know was Miss Hodge herself. Miss Hodge was a small neat person who
wore neat gray skirts and blouses and her hair was even neater and smoother than Theresa Mullett's. She