Conrad's Fate by Diana Wynne Jones Page B

at once—didn’t seem to work. I cut the pile down to five, to two, and then to just one, which promptly turned yellowish and smelled. Christopher kept muttering, “I don’t seem to be living up to Mrs. Baldock’s high opinion of me—not at all !” until he startled me by crying out, “Great heavens! A church window ! Look!”
    I looked. He had a dark brown iron shape burned into the middle of his sheet.
    â€œI wonder if it will do that again,” he said.
    He tried, and it did. I watched, fascinated, while Christopher printed a whole row of church windows right across the sheet. Then he went on to make a daisy shape in the lower half of it.
    But at this point I was recalled to my own work by a cloud of black smoke and a very strong smell. I looked down to find that my iron had burned a neckcloth right in two and then gone on to burn its way into the ironing table beneath. I had a very deep black church window there. I found red cinders in it when I snatched the iron up.
    â€œOh, help!” I said.
    â€œPanic ye not, Grant,” Christopher said.
    â€œI can’t help it!” I said, trying to fan away rolls of brown smoke. “We’re going to get into awful trouble.”
    â€œOnly if things stay like this,” Christopher said. He came across and looked at my disaster. “Grant,” he said, “this is too deep for a church window. What you have here is probably a dugout canoe.” He switched his own iron off and wagged it in my face. “I congratulate you,” he said.
    I nearly screamed at him. “It’s not funny !”
    â€œYes, it is,” he said. “Look.”
    I looked, and I gaped. The smoke had gone. The black boat shape was not there anymore. The ironing table was flat and complete, with its brown-blotched surface quite smooth, and on top of it lay a plain, white, badly ironed neckcloth. “How …?” I said.
    â€œNo questions,” Christopher said. “I shall just get rid of my own artwork.” He picked up a corner of his ruined sheet and shook it. And all the church windows simply disappeared. He turned to me, looking very serious. “Grant,” he said, “you didn’t see me do this. Promise me you didn’t, or your dugout canoe comes back deeper and blacker and smokier than ever.”
    I looked from him to the restored ironing table. “If I promise,” I said, “can I ask you how you did it?”
    â€œNo,” he said. “Just promise.”
    â€œAll right. I promise,” I said. “It’s obvious anyway. You’re a magician.”
    â€œA magician,” Christopher said, “is someone who sets out ritual candles round a pentangle and then mutters words of power. Did you see me do that?”
    â€œNo,” I said. “You must be a very advanced kind.”
    Then I was half frightened, half pleased, because I thought I had made Christopher annoyed enough to tell me about himself. “ Piffle! Pigheaded piffle !” he began. “Grant—”
    To my great disappointment, Miss Semple hurried in and interrupted him. “You have to stop this now, boys,” she said. “Make sure the irons are switched off. Mr. Avenloch has just brought in the produce for today, and Mr. Maxim wants you to start your cookery course by learning to pick out the best.”
    So off we hurried once more, to a chilly stone storeroom that opened off the yard, where Mr. Avenloch was standing watching a gang of lower gardeners carry in baskets of fruit and boxes of vegetables. One of the gang was the boy with the handmade boots. He grinned at us, and we grinned back, but I didn’t envy him. Mr. Avenloch was one of those tall, thin, eagle-faced types. He looked a total tyrant.
    â€œWipe that smile off your face, Smedley,” he said, “and get you gone back to that hoeing.”
    When the whole gang had gone scurrying out again, Mr. Maxim pranced