Groosham Grange Read Free Page B

north of Scotland and his parents had sent him there in the hope of toughening him up. It had certainly been tough. Cold showers, twenty mile runs, porridge fourteen times a week – and that was just for the staff. At Godlesston, the pupils had been expected to do fifty press-ups before morning chapel and twenty-one more during it. The headmaster had come to classes wearing a leopard skin and the gym teacher had bicycled to the school every day, which was all the more remarkable as he lived in the Midlands.
    Poor Jeffrey had been completely unable to keep up and for him the last day of term really had been the last. The morning after he had been expelled, his father had received a prospectus from Groosham Grange. The letter that went with it had been rather different from David’s. It had made the school sound like a sports complex, a massage parlour and an army training camp all rolled into one.
    “My dad also got a letter from them,” Jill said. “But they told him that Groosham Grange was a really classy place. They said I’d learn table manners, and embroidery and all that sort of stuff.”
    Jill’s father was a diplomat, working in South America. Her mother was an actress. Neither of them were ever at home and the only time she spoke to them was on the telephone. Once her mother had bumped into her in the street and had been unable to remember who she was. But like David’s parents, they were determined to give her a good education and had sent her to no less than three private schools.
    “I ran away from the first two,” she explained. “The third was a sort of finishing school in Switzerland. I had to learn flower arranging and cookery, but I was hopeless. My flowers died before I could arrange them and I gave the cookery teacher food poisoning.”
    “What happened then?” David asked.
    “The finishing school said they were finished with me. They sent me back home. That was when the letter arrived.”
    Jill’s father had jumped at the opportunity. Actually, he had jumped on an aeroplane and gone back to South America. Her mother hadn’t even come home. She’d just been given two parts in a Christmas pantomime – playing both halves of the horse – and she was too busy to care. Her German nanny had made all the arrangements without really understanding any of them. And that was that.
    By the time they had finished telling their stories, David realized that they all had one thing in common. One way or another they were “difficult” children. But even so, they had no idea what to expect at Groosham Grange. In his parents’ letter it had been described as old-fashioned, and for boys only. Jeffrey’s parents had been told it was some sort of educational assault course. And Jill’s parents thought they were sending their daughter to a posh ladies’ college.
    “They could be three completely different places,” David said. “But it’s the same school.”
    “And there’s something else p-p-peculiar,” Jeffrey added. “It’s meant to be on an island next to N-N-Norfolk. But I looked on the map and there are no islands. Not one.”
    They thought about this for a while without speaking. The train had stopped at a station and there was a bustle in the corridor as people got on and off. Then David spoke.
    “Listen,” he said. “However bad this Groosham Grange is, at least we’re all going there together. So we ought to make a pact. We’ll stick together … us against them.”
    “Like the Three M-M-Musketeers?” Jeffrey asked.
    “Sort of. We won’t tell anybody. It’ll be like a secret society. And whatever happens, we’ll always have two people we can trust.”
    “I’m still going to run away,” Jill muttered.
    “Maybe we’ll go with you. At least we’ll be able to help you.”
    “I’ll lend you my swimming trunks,” Jeffrey said.
    Jill glanced at his bulging waist, thinking they would probably be more helpful if she used them in a parachute jump. But she kept the thought to