'Almost certainly the three-times table,' Miss Honey said. 'That's what you are all meant to have learnt this past week. Make sure you know it.'
Lunch came and went.
After lunch, the class reassembled. Miss Honey stood at one side of the room. They all sat silent, apprehensive, waiting. And then, like some giant of doom, the enormous Trunchbull strode into the room in her green breeches and cotton smock. She went straight to her jug of water and lifted it up by the handle and peered inside.
'I am glad to see,' she said, 'that there are no slimy creatures in my drinking-water this time. If there had been, then something exceptionally unpleasant would have happened to every single member of this class. And that includes you, Miss Honey'
The class remained silent and very tense. They had learnt a bit about this tigress by now and nobody was about to take any chances.
'Very well,' boomed the Trunchbull. 'Let us see how well you know your three-times table. Or to put it another way, let us see how badly Miss Honey has taught you the three-times table,' The Trunchbull was standing in front of the class, legs apart, hands on hips, scowling at Miss Honey, who stood silent to one side.
Matilda, sitting motionless at her desk in the second row, was watching things very closely
'You!' the Trunchbull shouted, pointing a finger the size of a rolling-pin at a boy called Wilfred. Wilfred was on the extreme right of the front row. 'Stand up, you!' she shouted at him.
Wilfred stood up.
'Recite the three-times table backwards!' the Trunchbull barked.
'Backwards?' stammered Wilfred. 'But I haven't learnt it backwards.'
'There you are!' cried the Trunchbull, triumphant. 'She's taught you nothing! Miss Honey, why have you taught them absolutely nothing at all in the last week?'
'That is not true, Headmistress' Miss Honey said. 'They have all learnt their three-times table. But I see no point in teaching it to them backwards. There is little point in teaching anything backwards. The whole object of life, Headmistress, is to go forwards. I venture to ask whether even you, for example, can spell a simple word like wrong backwards straight away. I very much doubt it.'
'Don't you get impertinent with me, Miss Honey!' the Trunchbull snapped, then she turned back to the unfortunate Wilfred. 'Very well, boyy' she said. 'Answer me this. I have seven apples, seven oranges and seven bananas. How many pieces of fruit do I have altogether? Hurry up! Get on with it! Give me the answer!'
'That's adding up!' Wilfred cried. 'That isn't the three-times table!'
'You blithering idiot!' shouted the Trunchbull. 'You festering gumboil! You fleabitten fungus! That is the three-times table! You have three separate lots of fruit and each lot has seven pieces. Three sevens are twenty-one. Can't you see that, you stagnant cesspool! I'll give you one more chance. I have eight coconuts, eight monkey-nuts and eight nutty little idiots like you. How many nuts do I have altogether? Answer me quickly.'
Poor Wilfred was properly flustered. 'Wait!' he cried. 'Please wait! I've got to add up eight coconuts and eight monkey-nuts ...' He started counting on his fingers.
'You bursting blister!' yelled the Trunchbull. 'You moth-eaten maggot! This is not adding up! This is multiplication! The answer is three eights! Or is it eight threes? What is the difference between three eights and eight threes? Tell me that, you mangled little wurzel, and look sharp about it!'
By now Wilfred was far too frightened and bewildered even to speak.
In two strides the Trunchbull was beside him, and by some amazing gymnastic trick, it may have been judo or karate, she flipped the back of Wilfred's legs with one of her feet so that the boy shot up off the ground and turned a somersault in the air. But halfway through the somersault she caught him by an ankle and held him dangling upside-down like a plucked chicken in a shop-window.
'Eight threes,' the Trunchbull shouted, swinging Wilfred from side to side by his ankle, 'eight threes is the same as three eights and three eights are twenty-four! Repeat that!'
At exactly that moment Nigel, at the other end of the room, jumped to his feet and started pointing excitedly at the blackboard and screaming, 'The chalk! The chalk! Look at the chalk! It's moving all on its own!'
So hysterical and shrill was Nigel's scream that everyone in the place, including the Trunchbull, looked up at the blackboard. And there, sure enough, a brand-new piece of chalk was hovering near the grey-black writing surface of the blackboard.
'It's writing something!' screamed Nigel. 'The chalk is writing something!'
And indeed it
was.
'What the blazes is this?' yelled the Trunchbull. It had shaken her to see her own first name being written like that by an invisible hand. She dropped Wilfred on to the floor. Then she yelled at nobody in particular, 'Who's doing this? Who's writing it?'
The chalk continued to write.
Everyone in the place heard the gasp that came from the Trunchbull's throat. 'No!' she cried. 'It can't be! It can't be Magnus!'
Miss Honey, at the side of the room glanced swiftly at Matilda. The child was sitting very straight at her desk, the head held high, the mouth compressed, the eyes glittering like two stars.