Granny by Anthony Horowitz Page B

before going into politics. She was a communist and had run for Parliament seven times. At the last election she had gotten four votes against the winner’s twenty-six thousand five hundred and eighty. Even so, she had demanded a recount. Ms. Whipsnade was also a strict vegetarian and actually wept when she saw Joe’s leather shoes. Neither Mr. Warden nor his wife were entirely sure about the new arrival, but as Granny had already offered her the job, there wasn’t much they could do. And so Ms. Whipsnade was shown to her room—which she promptly declared a nuclear-free zone. She also tore off all the wallpaper in the mistaken belief that it had been printed in South Africa.
    On the following Monday, much to his relief, Joe went back to school. He had hardly slept at all since that night in Bideford and there were dark rings around his eyes. It wasn’t just the horror of the Grannymatic Enzyme Extractor. That had almost faded in his mind. Much, much worse was his last encounter with Granny, outside in the wreckage. Her words seemed to hang like cobwebs in the darkness and her beady eyes and twisted mouth were somehow always there—just out of sight. He realized now that he was more afraid of Granny dead than he was of her alive.
    And that of course was exactly what she had intended. Alone in his room, Joe counted the hours until daylight and the days until he would be back at school. There at least he would be surrounded by young, happy, normal people. He felt safer with other children. Other children were all right. Anybody old—the headmaster, the dinner lady, the caretaker, the lollipop lady —now belonged to another, twilight world. Joe looked at them and he was afraid.
    Time passed and for a while everything was all right.
    Then Granny fell ill.
    Joe first heard the news one afternoon at school. After lunch he was called into the headmaster’s study. The headmaster, a white-haired man of about sixty, was called Mr. Ellis. He had been a teacher for forty-four years even though he was allergic to children. He was sitting in a large leather chair when Joe came in. “Do sit down, Warden,” he said. “Sit down.”
    That was when Joe knew it had to be bad news.
    Mr. Ellis sneezed. “I’m afraid I have some bad news for you, Warden. It’s your grandmother…”
    â€œShe’s not dead, is she?” Joe exclaimed.
    â€œNo! No!” The headmaster was surprised by the boy’s alarm. He sneezed twice more and tried to shrink into his chair. “No. But it is quite serious. Pneumonia.”
    â€œShe can’t die!” Joe whispered. “She can’t!”
    Mr. Ellis blinked. “I have to say, it’s rare to find a boy so fond of his granny,” he muttered. He pulled out a handkerchief and dabbed at his eye. “It does you credit, Warden. I’m sure she’ll be all right. But in the meantime, perhaps it would be better if you went home.”
    Joe returned home that afternoon. The new nanny was in his room, painting pink triangles on his walls to show her support for the gay-rights movement. She had also donated his bed and all his books to the Cuban miners.
    â€œHow’s Granny?” Joe asked.
    Ms. Whipsnade blinked. “Her name is Ms. Kettle,” she snapped. “As a term, granny is both sexist and, worse, ageist.”
    â€œHow is she?”
    â€œI haven’t heard. For some reason your parents refuse to speak to me.”
    For the next few days there were a lot of comings and goings at Thattlebee Hall. Car doors slammed at all times of the day and night and Mr. and Mrs. Warden seemed to speak permanently in whispers. Nobody told Joe anything and the first inkling he had that things were really serious was when he saw his uncles David and Kurt arrive at the front door. The relatives never came to the house unless it was for Christmas or a funeral and Christmas had been over long ago. Listening at the