Matilda

'You know' she said, 'I've been thinking very hard about what you did with that glass. It is a great power you have been given, my child, you know that'

'Yes, Miss Honey, I do' Matilda said, chewing her bread and margarine.

'So far as I know,' Miss Honey went on, 'nobody else in the history of the world has been able to compel an object to move without touching it or blowing on it or using any outside he

lp at all.'

Matilda nodded but said nothing.

'The fascinating thing' Miss Honey said, 'would be to find out the real limit of this power of yours. Oh, I know you think you can move just about anything there is, but I have my doubts about that.'

'I'd love to try something really huge,' Matilda said.

'What about distance?' Miss Honey asked. 'Would you always have to be close to the thing you were pushing?'

'I simply don't know,' Matilda said. 'But it would be fun to find out.'

Miss Honey's Story

'We mustn't hurry this,' Miss Honey said, 'so let's have another cup of tea. And do eat that other slice of bread. You must be hungry.'

Matilda took the second slice and started eating it slowly. The margarine wasn't at all bad. She doubted whether she could have told the difference if she hadn't known. 'Miss Honey,' she said suddenly, 'do they pay you very badly at our school?'

Miss Honey looked up sharply. 'Not too badly,' she said. 'I get about the same as the others.'

'But it must still be very little if you are so dreadfully poor,' Matilda said. 'Do all the teachers live like this, with no furniture and no kitchen stove and no bathroom?'

'No, they don't,' Miss Honey said rather stiffly. 'I just happen to be the exception.'

'I expect you just happen to like living in a very simple way,' Matilda said, probing a little further. 'It must make house cleaning an awful lot easier and you don't have furniture to polish or any of those silly little ornaments lying around that have to be dusted every day. And I suppose if you don't have a fridge you don't have to go out and buy all sorts of junky things like eggs and mayonnaise and ice-cream to fill it up with. It must save a terrific lot of shopping.'

At this point Matilda noticed that Miss Honey's face had gone all tight and peculiar-looking. Her whole body had become rigid. Her shoulders were hunched up high and her lips were pressed together tight and she sat there gripping her mug of tea in both hands and staring down into it as though searching for a way to answer these not-quite-so-innocent questions.

There followed a rather long and embarrassing silence. In the space of thirty seconds the atmosphere in the tiny room had changed completely and now it was vibrating with awkwardness and secrets. Matilda said, 'I am very sorry I asked you those questions, Miss Honey. It is not any of my business.'

At this, Miss Honey seemed to rouse herself. She gave a shake of her shoulders and then very carefully she placed her mug on the tray.

'Why shouldn't you ask?' she said. 'You were bound to ask in the end. You are much too bright not to have wondered. Perhaps I even wanted you to ask. Maybe that is why I invited you here after all. As a matter of fact you are the first visitor to come to the cottage since I moved in two years ago.'

Matilda said nothing. She could feel the tension growing and growing in the room.

'You are so much wiser than your years, my dear,' Miss Honey went on, 'that it quite staggers me. Although you look like a child, you are not really a child at all because your mind and your powers of reasoning seem to be fully grown-up. So I suppose we might call you a grown-up child, if you see what I mean.'

Matilda still did not say anything. She was waiting for what was coming next.

'Up to now,' Miss Honey went on, 'I have found it impossible to talk to anyone about my problems. I couldn't face the embarrassment, and anyway I lack the courage. Any courage I had was knocked out of me when I was young. But now, all of a sudden I have a sort of desperate wish to tell everything to somebody I know you are only a tiny little girl, but there is some kind of magic in you somewhere. I've seen it with my own eyes.'

Matilda became very alert. The voice she was hearing was surely crying out for help. It must be. It had to be.

Then the voice spoke again. 'Have some more tea' it said. 'I think there's still a drop left.'

Matilda nodded.

Miss Honey poured tea into both mugs and added milk. Again she cupped her own mug in both hands and sat there sipping.

There was quite a long silence before she said, 'May I tell you a story?'

'Of course,' Matilda said.