[Part 2] "Matilda" by Roald Dahl

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CHAPTER VII. MISS HONEY

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Matilda was a little late in starting school.

Most children begin Primary School at five or even just before, but Matilda's parents, who weren't very concerned one way or the other about their daughter's education, had forgotten to make the proper arrangements in advance.

She was five and a half when she entered school for the first time.

The village school for younger children was a bleak brick building called Crunchem Hall Primary School.

It had about two hundred and fifty pupils aged from five to just under twelve years old.

The head teacher, the boss, the supreme commander of this establishment was a formidable middle-aged lady whose name was Miss Trunchbull.

Naturally Matilda was put in the bottom class, where there were eighteen other small boys and girls about the same age as her.

Their teacher was called Miss Honey, and she could not have been more than twenty-three or twenty-four.

She had a lovely pale oval madonna face with blue eyes and her hair was light-brown.

Her body was so slim and fragile one got the feeling that if she fell over she would smash into a thousand pieces, like a porcelain figure.

Miss Jennifer Honey was a mild and quiet person who never raised her voice and was seldom seen to smile, but there is no doubt she possessed that rare gift for being adored by every small child under her care.

She seemed to understand totally the bewilderment and fear that so often overwhelms young children who for the first time in their lives are herded into a classroom and told to obey orders.

Some curious warmth that was almost tangible shone out of Miss Honey's face when she spoke to a confused and homesick newcomer to the class.

Miss Trunchbull, the Headmistress, was something else altogether.

She was a gigantic holy terror, a fierce tyrannical monster who frightened the life out of the pupils and teachers alike.

There was an aura of menace about her even at a distance, and when she came up close you could almost feel the dangerous heat radiating from her as from a red-hot rod of metal.

When she marched — Miss Trunchbull never walked, she always marched like a storm-trooper with long strides and arms aswinging — when she marched along a corridor you could actually hear her snorting as she went, and if a group of children happened to be in her path, she ploughed right on through them like a tank, with small people bouncing off her to left and right.

Thank goodness we don't meet many people like her in this world, although they do exist and all of us are likely to come across at least one of them in a lifetime.

If you ever do, you should behave as you would if you met an enraged rhinoceros out in the bush — climb up the nearest tree and stay there until it has gone away.

This woman, in all her eccentricities and in her appearance, is almost impossible to describe, but I shall make some attempt to do so a little later on.

Let us leave her for the moment and go back to Matilda and her first day in Miss Honey's class.

After the usual business of going through all the names of the children, Miss Honey handed out a brand-new exercise-book to each pupil.

"You have all brought your own pencils, I hope," she said.

"Yes, Miss Honey," they chanted.

"Good.

Now this is the very first day of school for each one of you.

It is the beginning of at least eleven long years of schooling that all of you are going to have to go through.

And six of those years will be spent right here at Crunchem Hall where, as you know, your Headmistress is Miss Trunchbull.

Let me for your own good tell you something about Miss Trunchbull.

She insists upon strict discipline throughout the school, and if you take my advice you will do your very best to behave yourselves in her presence.

Never argue with her.

Never answer her back.

Always do as she says.

If you get on the wrong side of Miss Trunchbull she can liquidise you like a carrot in a kitchen blender.

It's nothing to laugh about, Lavender.

Take that grin off your face.

All of you will be wise to remember that Miss Trunchbull deals very very severely with anyone who gets out of line in this school.

Have you got the message?"

"Yes, Miss Honey," chirruped eighteen eager little voices.

"I myself", Miss Honey went on, "want to help you to learn as much as possible while you are in this class.

That is because I know it will make things easier for you later on.

For example, by the end of this week I shall expect every one of you to know the two-times table by heart.

And in a year's time I hope you will know all the multiplication tables up to twelve.

It will help you enormously if you do.

Now then, do any of you happen to have learnt the two-times table already?"

Matilda put up her hand.

She was the only one.

Miss Honey looked carefully at the tiny girl with dark hair and a round serious face sitting in the second row.

"Wonderful," she said.

"Please stand up and recite as much of it as you can."

Matilda stood up and began to say the two-times table.

When she got to twice twelve is twenty-four she didn't stop.

She went right on with twice thirteen is twenty-six, twice fourteen is twenty-eight, twice fifteen is thirty, twice sixteen is . . ."

"Stop!" Miss Honey said.

She had been listening slightly spellbound to this smooth recital, and now she said, "How far can you go?"

"How far?" Matilda said.

"Well, I don't really know, Miss Honey.

For quite a long way, I think."

Miss Honey took a few moments to let this curious statement sink in.

"You mean", she said, "that you could tell me what two times twenty-eight is?"

"Yes, Miss Honey."

"What is it?"

"Fifty-six, Miss Honey."

"What about something much harder, like two times four hundred and eighty-seven?

Could you tell me that?"

"I think so, yes," Matilda said.

"Are you sure?"

"Why yes, Miss Honey, I'm fairly sure."

"What is it then, two times four hundred and eighty-seven?"

"Nine hundred and seventy-four," Matilda said immediately.

She spoke quietly and politely and without any sign of showing off.

Miss Honey gazed at Matilda with absolute amazement, but when next she spoke she kept her voice level.

"That is really splendid," she said.

"But of course multiplying by two is a lot easier than some of the bigger numbers.

What about the other multiplication tables?

Do you know any of those?"

"I think so, Miss Honey.

I think I do."

"Which ones, Matilda?

How far have you got?"

"I . . . I don't quite know," Matilda said.

"I don't know what you mean."

"What I mean is do you for instance know the three-times table?"

"Yes, Miss Honey."

"And the four-times?"

"Yes, Miss Honey."

"Well, how many do you know, Matilda?

Do you know all the way up to the twelve-times table?"

"Yes, Miss Honey."

"What are twelve sevens?"

"Eighty-four," Matilda said.

Miss Honey paused and leaned back in her chair behind the plain table that stood in the middle of the floor in front of the class.

She was considerably shaken by this exchange but took care not to show it.

She had never come across a five-year-old before, or indeed a ten-year-old, who could multiply with such facility.

"I hope the rest of you are listening to this," she said to the class.

"Matilda is a very lucky girl.

She has wonderful parents who have already taught her to multiply lots of numbers.

Was it your mother, Matilda, who taught you?"

"No, Miss Honey, it wasn't."

"You must have a great father then.

He must be a brilliant teacher."

"No, Miss Honey," Matilda said quietly.

"My father did not teach me."

"You mean you taught yourself?"

"I don't quite know," Matilda said truthfully.

"It's just that I don't find it very difficult to multiply one number by another."

Miss Honey took a deep breath and let it out slowly.

She looked again at the small girl with bright eyes standing beside her desk so sensible and solemn.

"You say you don't find it difficult to multiply one number by another," Miss Honey said.

"Could you try to explain that a little bit."

"Oh dear," Matilda said.

"I'm not really sure."

Miss Honey waited.

The class was silent, all listening.

"For instance," Miss Honey said, "if I asked you to multiply fourteen by nineteen . . . No, that's too difficult . . ."

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"It's two hundred and sixty-six," Matilda said softly.

Miss Honey stared at her.

Then she picked up a pencil and quickly worked out the sum on a piece of paper.

"What did you say it was?" she said, looking up.

"Two hundred and sixty-six," Matilda said.

Miss Honey put down her pencil and removed her spectacles and began to polish the lenses with a piece of tissue.

The class remained quiet, watching her and waiting for what was coming next.

Matilda was still standing up beside her desk.

"Now tell me, Matilda," Miss Honey said, still polishing, "try to tell me exactly what goes on inside your head when you get a multiplication like that to do.

You obviously have to work it out in some way, but you seem able to arrive at the answer almost instantly.

Take the one you've just done, fourteen multiplied by nineteen."

"I . . . I . . . I simply put the fourteen down in my head and multiply it by nineteen," Matilda said.

"I'm afraid I don't know how else to explain it.

I've always said to myself that if a little pocket calculator can do it why shouldn't I?"

"Why not indeed," Miss Honey said.

"The human brain is an amazing thing."

"I think it's a lot better than a lump of metal," Matilda said.

"That's all a calculator is."

"How right you are," Miss Honey said.

"Pocket calculators are not allowed in this school anyway."

Miss Honey was feeling quite quivery.

There was no doubt in her mind that she had met a truly extraordinary mathematical brain, and words like child-genius and prodigy went flitting through her head.

She knew that these sort of wonders do pop up in the world from time to time, but only once or twice in a hundred years.

After all, Mozart was only five when he started composing for the piano and look what happened to him.

"It's not fair," Lavender said.

"How can she do it and we can't?"

"Don't worry, Lavender, you'll soon catch up," Miss Honey said, lying through her teeth.

At this point Miss Honey could not resist the temptation of exploring still further the mind of this astonishing child.

She knew that she ought to be paying some attention to the rest of the class but she was altogether too excited to let the matter rest.

"Well," she said, pretending to address the whole class, "let us leave sums for the moment and see if any of you have begun to learn to spell.

Hands up anyone who can spell cat."

Three hands went up.

They belonged to Lavender, a small boy called Nigel and to Matilda.

"Spell cat, Nigel."

Nigel spelled it.

Miss Honey now decided to ask a question that normally she would not have dreamed of asking the class on its first day.

"I wonder", she said, "whether any of you three who know how to spell cat have learned how to read a whole group of words when they are strung together in a sentence?"

"I have," Nigel said.

"So have I," Lavender said.

Miss Honey went to the blackboard and wrote with her white chalk the sentence, I have already begun to learn how to read long sentences.

She had purposely made it difficult and she knew that there were precious few five-year-olds around who would be able to manage it.

"Can you tell me what that says, Nigel?" she asked.

"That's too hard," Nigel said.

"Lavender?"

"The first word is I," Lavender said.

"Can any of you read the whole sentence?" Miss Honey asked, waiting for the "yes" that she felt certain was going to come from Matilda.

"Yes," Matilda said.

"Go ahead," Miss Honey said.

Matilda read the sentence without any hesitation at all.

"That really is very good indeed," Miss Honey said, making the understatement of her life.

"How much can you read, Matilda?"

"I think I can read most things, Miss Honey," Matilda said, "although I'm afraid I can't always understand the meanings."

Miss Honey got to her feet and walked smartly out of the room, but was back in thirty seconds carrying a thick book.

She opened it at random and placed it on Matilda's desk.

"This is a book of humorous poetry," she said.

"See if you can read that one aloud."

Smoothly, without a pause and at a nice speed, Matilda began to read:

"An epicure dining at Crewe

Found a rather large mouse in his stew.

Cried the waiter, "Don't shout

And wave it about

Or the rest will be wanting one too."

Several children saw the funny side of the rhyme and laughed.

Miss Honey said, "Do you know what an epicure is, Matilda?"

"It is someone who is dainty with his eating," Matilda said.

"That is correct," Miss Honey said.

"And do you happen to know what that particular type of poetry is called?"

"It's called a limerick," Matilda said.

"That's a lovely one.

It's so funny."

"It's a famous one," Miss Honey said, picking up the book and returning to her table in front of the class.

"A witty limerick is very hard to write," she added.

"They look easy but they most certainly are not."

"I know," Matilda said.

"I've tried quite a few times but mine are never any good."

"You have, have you?" Miss Honey said, more startled than ever.

"Well Matilda, I would very much like to hear one of these limericks you say you have written.

Could you try to remember one for us?"

"Well," Matilda said, hesitating.

"I've actually been trying to make up one about you, Miss Honey, while we've been sitting here."

"About me!" Miss Honey cried.

"Well, we've certainly got to hear that one, haven't we?"

"I don't think I want to say it, Miss Honey."

"Please tell it," Miss Honey said.

"I promise I won't mind."

"I think you will, Miss Honey, because I have to use your first name to make things rhyme and that's why I don't want to say it."

"How do you know my first name?" Miss Honey asked.

"I heard another teacher calling you by it just before we came in," Matilda said.

"She called you Jenny."

"I insist upon hearing this limerick," Miss Honey said, smiling one of her rare smiles.

"Stand up and recite it."

Reluctantly Matilda stood up and very slowly, very nervously, she recited her limerick:

"The thing we all ask about Jenny

Is, 'Surely there cannot be many

Young girls in the place

With so lovely a face?'

The answer to that is, 'Not any!' "

The whole of Miss Honey's pale and pleasant face blushed a brilliant scarlet.

Then once again she smiled.

It was a much broader one this time, a smile of pure pleasure.

"Why, thank you, Matilda," she said, still smiling.

"Although it is not true, it is really a very good limerick.

Oh dear, oh dear, I must try to remember that one."

From the third row of desks, Lavender said, "It's good.

I like it."

"It's true as well," a small boy called Rupert said.

"Of course it's true," Nigel said.

Already the whole class had begun to warm towards Miss Honey, although as yet she had hardly taken any notice of any of them except Matilda.

"Who taught you to read, Matilda?" Miss Honey asked.

"I just sort of taught myself, Miss Honey."

"And have you read any books all by yourself, any children's books, I mean?"

"I've read all the ones that are in the public library in the High Street, Miss Honey."

"And did you like them?"

"I liked some of them very much indeed," Matilda said, "but I thought others were fairly dull."

"Tell me one that you liked."

"I liked The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe," Matilda said.

"I think Mr C. S. Lewis is a very good writer.

But he has one failing.

There are no funny bits in his books."

"You are right there," Miss Honey said.

"There aren't many funny bits in Mr Tolkien either," Matilda said.

"Do you think that all children's books ought to have funny bits in them?" Miss Honey asked.

"I do," Matilda said.

"Children are not so serious as grown-ups and they love to laugh."

Miss Honey was astounded by the wisdom of this tiny girl.

She said, "And what are you going to do now that you've read all the children's books?"

"I am reading other books," Matilda said.

"I borrow them from the library.

Mrs Phelps is very kind to me.

She helps me to choose them."

Miss Honey was leaning far forward over her work-table and gazing in wonder at the child.

She had completely forgotten now about the rest of the class.

"What other books?" she murmured.

"I am very fond of Charles Dickens," Matilda said.

"He makes me laugh a lot.

Especially Mr Pickwick."

At that moment the bell in the corridor sounded for the end of class.

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CHAPTER VIII. THE TRUNCHBULL

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In the interval, Miss Honey left the classroom and headed straight for the Headmistress's study.

She felt wildly excited.

She had just met a small girl who possessed, or so it seemed to her, quite extraordinary qualities of brilliance.

There had not been time yet to find out exactly how brilliant the child was, but Miss Honey had learned enough to realise that something had to be done about it as soon as possible.

It would be ridiculous to leave a child like that stuck in the bottom form.

Normally Miss Honey was terrified of the Headmistress and kept well away from her, but at this moment she felt ready to take on anybody.

She knocked on the door of the dreaded private study.

"Enter!" boomed the deep and dangerous voice of Miss Trunchbull.

Miss Honey went in.

Now most head teachers are chosen because they possess a number of fine qualities.

They understand children and they have the children's best interests at heart.

They are sympathetic.

They are fair and they are deeply interested in education.

Miss Trunchbull possessed none of these qualities and how she ever got her present job was a mystery.

She was above all a most formidable female.

She had once been a famous athlete, and even now the muscles were still clearly in evidence.

You could see them in the bull-neck, in the big shoulders, in the thick arms, in the sinewy wrists and in the powerful legs.

Looking at her, you got the feeling that this was someone who could bend iron bars and tear telephone directories in half.

Her face, I'm afraid, was neither a thing of beauty nor a joy for ever.

She had an obstinate chin, a cruel mouth and small arrogant eyes.

And as for her clothes . . . they were, to say the least, extremely odd.

She always had on a brown cotton smock which was pinched in around the waist with a wide leather belt.

The belt was fastened in front with an enormous silver buckle.

The massive thighs which emerged from out of the smock were encased in a pair of extraordinary breeches, bottle-green in colour and made of coarse twill.

These breeches reached to just below the knees and from there on down she sported green stockings with turn-up tops, which displayed her calf muscles to perfection.

On her feet she wore flat-heeled brown brogues with leather flaps.

She looked, in short, more like a rather eccentric and bloodthirsty follower of the stag-hounds than the headmistress of a nice school for children.

When Miss Honey entered the study, Miss Trunchbull was standing beside her huge desk with a look of scowling impatience on her face.

"Yes, Miss Honey," she said.

"What is it you want?

You're looking very flushed and flustered this morning.

What's the matter with you?

Have those little stinkers been flicking spitballs at you?"

"No, Headmistress.

Nothing like that."

"Well, what is it then?

Get on with it.

I'm a busy woman."

As she spoke, she reached out and poured herself a glass of water from a jug that was always on her desk.

"There is a little girl in my class called Matilda Wormwood . . ." Miss Honey began.

"That's the daughter of the man who owns Wormwood Motors in the village," Miss Trunchbull barked.

She hardly ever spoke in a normal voice.

She either barked or shouted.

"An excellent person, Wormwood," she went on.

"I was in there only yesterday.

He sold me a car.

Almost new.

Only done ten thousand miles.

Previous owner was an old lady who took it out once a year at the most.

A terrific bargain.

Yes, I liked Wormwood.

A real pillar of our society.

He told me the daughter was a bad lot though.

He said to watch her.

He said if anything bad ever happened in the school, it was certain to be his daughter who did it.

I haven't met the little brat yet, but she'll know about it when I do.

Her father said she's a real wart."

"Oh no, Headmistress, that can't be right!" Miss Honey cried.

"Oh yes, Miss Honey, it darn well is right!

In fact, now I come to think of it, I'll bet it was she who put that stink-bomb under my desk here first thing this morning.

The place stank like a sewer!

Of course it was her!

I shall have her for that, you see if I don't!

What's she look like?

Nasty little worm, I'll be bound.

I have discovered, Miss Honey, during my long career as a teacher that a bad girl is a far more dangerous creature than a bad boy.

What's more, they're much harder to squash.

Squashing a bad girl is like trying to squash a bluebottle.

You bang down on it and the darn thing isn't there.

Nasty dirty things, little girls are.

Glad I never was one."

"Oh, but you must have been a little girl once, Headmistress.

Surely you were."

"Not for long anyway," Miss Trunchbull barked, grinning.

"I became a woman very quickly."

She's completely off her rocker, Miss Honey told herself.

She's barmy as a bedbug.

Miss Honey stood resolutely before the Headmistress.

For once she was not going to be browbeaten.

"I must tell you, Headmistress," she said, "that you are completely mistaken about Matilda putting a stink-bomb under your desk."

"I am never mistaken, Miss Honey!"

"But Headmistress, the child only arrived in school this morning and came straight to the classroom . . ."

"Don't argue with me, for heaven's sake, woman!

This little brute Matilda or whatever her name is has stink-bombed my study!

There's no doubt about it!

Thank you for suggesting it."

"But I didn't suggest it, Headmistress."

"Of course you did!

Now what is it you want, Miss Honey?

Why are you wasting my time?"

"I came to you to talk about Matilda, Headmistress.

I have extraordinary things to report about the child.

May I please tell you what happened in class just now?"

"I suppose she set fire to your skirt and scorched your knickers!" Miss Trunchbull snorted.

"No, no!" Miss Honey cried out.

"Matilda is a genius."

At the mention of this word, Miss Trunchbull's face turned purple and her whole body seemed to swell up like a bullfrog's.

"A genius!" she shouted.

"What piffle is this you are talking, madam?

You must be out of your mind!

I have her father's word for it that the child is a gangster!"

"Her father is wrong, Headmistress."

"Don't be a twerp, Miss Honey!

You have met the little beast for only half an hour and her father has known her all her life!"

But Miss Honey was determined to have her say and she now began to describe some of the amazing things Matilda had done with arithmetic.

"So she's learnt a few tables by heart, has she?" Miss Trunchbull barked.

"My dear woman, that doesn't make her a genius!

It makes her a parrot!"

"But Headmistress she can read."

"So can I," Miss Trunchbull snapped.

"It is my opinion", Miss Honey said, "that Matilda should be taken out of my form and placed immediately in the top form with the eleven-year-olds."

"Ha!" snorted Miss Trunchbull.

"So you want to get rid of her, do you?

So you can't handle her?

So now you want to unload her on to the wretched Miss Plimsoll in the top form where she will cause even more chaos?"

"No, no!" cried Miss Honey.

"That is not my reason at all!"

"Oh, yes it is!" shouted Miss Trunchbull.

"I can see right through your little plot, madam!

And my answer is no!

Matilda stays where she is and it is up to you to see that she behaves herself."

"But Headmistress, please . . ."

"Not another word!" shouted Miss Trunchbull.

"And in any case, I have a rule in this school that all children remain in their own age groups regardless of ability.

Great Scott, I'm not having a little five-year-old brigand sitting with the senior girls and boys in the top form.

Whoever heard of such a thing!"

Miss Honey stood there helpless before this great red-necked giant.

There was a lot more she would like to have said but she knew it was useless.

She said softly, "Very well, then.

It's up to you, Headmistress."

"You're darn right it's up to me!" Miss Trunchbull bellowed.

"And don't forget, madam, that we are dealing here with a little viper who put a stink-bomb under my desk . . ."

"She did not do that, Headmistress!"

"Of course she did it," Miss Trunchbull boomed.

"And I'll tell you what.

I wish to heavens I was still allowed to use the birch and belt as I did in the good old days!

I'd have roasted Matilda's bottom for her so she couldn't sit down for a month!"

Miss Honey turned and walked out of the study feeling depressed but by no means defeated.

I am going to do something about this child, she told herself.

I don't know what it will be, but I shall find a way to help her in the end.

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CHAPTER IX. THE PARENTS

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When Miss Honey emerged from the Headmistress's study, most of the children were outside in the playground.

Her first move was to go round to the various teachers who taught the senior class and borrow from them a number of text-books, books on algebra, geometry, French, English Literature and the like.

Then she sought out Matilda and called her into the classroom.

"There is no point", she said, "in you sitting in class doing nothing while I am teaching the rest of the form the two-times table and how to spell cat and rat and mouse.

So during each lesson I shall give you one of these text-books to study.

At the end of the lesson you can come up to me with your questions if you have any and I shall try to help you.

How does that sound?"

"Thank you, Miss Honey," Matilda said.

"That sounds fine."

"I am sure," Miss Honey said, "that we'll be able to get you moved into a much higher form later on, but for the moment the Headmistress wishes you to stay where you are."

"Very well, Miss Honey," Matilda said.

"Thank you so much for getting those books for me."

What a nice child she is, Miss Honey thought.

I don't care what her father said about her, she seems very quiet and gentle to me.

And not a bit stuck up in spite of her brilliance.

In fact she hardly seems aware of it.

So when the class reassembled, Matilda went to her desk and began to study a text-book on geometry which Miss Honey had given her.

The teacher kept half an eye on her all the time and noticed that the child very soon became deeply absorbed in the book.

She never glanced up once during the entire lesson.

Miss Honey, meanwhile, was making another decision.

She was deciding that she would go herself and have a secret talk with Matilda's mother and father as soon as possible.

She simply refused to let the matter rest where it was.

The whole thing was ridiculous.

She couldn't believe that the parents were totally unaware of their daughter's remarkable talents.

After all, Mr Wormwood was a successful motor-car dealer so she presumed that he was a fairly intelligent man himself.

In any event, parents never underestimated the abilities of their own children.

Quite the reverse.

Sometimes it was well nigh impossible for a teacher to convince the proud father or mother that their beloved offspring was a complete nitwit.

Miss Honey felt confident that she would have no difficulty in convincing Mr and Mrs Wormwood that Matilda was something very special indeed.

The trouble was going to be to stop them from getting over-enthusiastic.

And now Miss Honey's hopes began to expand even further.

She started wondering whether permission might not be sought from the parents for her to give private tuition to Matilda after school.

The prospect of coaching a child as bright as this appealed enormously to her professional instinct as a teacher.

And suddenly she decided that she would go and call on Mr and Mrs Wormwood that very evening.

She would go fairly late, between nine and ten o'clock, when Matilda was sure to be in bed.

And that is precisely what she did.

Having got the address from the school records, Miss Honey set out to walk from her own home to the Wormwood's house shortly after nine.

She found the house in a pleasant street where each smallish building was separated from its neighbours by a bit of garden.

It was a modern brick house that could not have been cheap to buy and the name on the gate said COSY NOOK.

Nosey cook might have been better, Miss Honey thought.

She was given to playing with words in that way.

She walked up the path and rang the bell, and while she stood waiting she could hear the television blaring inside.

The door was opened by a small ratty-looking man with a thin ratty moustache who was wearing a sports-coat that had an orange and red stripe in the material.

"Yes?" he said, peering out at Miss Honey.

"If you're selling raffle tickets I don't want any."

"I'm not," Miss Honey said.

"And please forgive me for butting in on you like this.

I am Matilda's teacher at school and it is important I have a word with you and your wife."

"Got into trouble already, has she?" Mr Wormwood said, blocking the doorway.

"Well, she's your responsibility from now on.

You'll have to deal with her."

"She is in no trouble at all," Miss Honey said.

"I have come with good news about her.

Quite startling news, Mr Wormwood.

Do you think I might come in for a few minutes and talk to you about Matilda?"

"We are right in the middle of watching one of our favourite programmes," Mr Wormwood said.

"This is most inconvenient.

Why don't you come back some other time."

Miss Honey began to lose patience.

"Mr Wormwood," she said, "if you think some rotten TV programme is more important than your daughter's future, then you ought not to be a parent!

Why don't you switch the darn thing off and listen to me!"

That shook Mr Wormwood.

He was not used to being spoken to in this way.

He peered carefully at the slim frail woman who stood so resolutely out on the porch.

"Oh very well then," he snapped.

"Come on in and let's get it over with."

Miss Honey stepped briskly inside.

"Mrs Wormwood isn't going to thank you for this," the man said as he led her into the sitting-room where a large platinum-blonde woman was gazing rapturously at the TV screen.

"Who is it?" the woman said, not looking round.

"Some school teacher," Mr Wormwood said.

"She says she's got to talk to us about Matilda."

He crossed to the TV set and turned down the sound but left the picture on the screen.

"Don't do that, Harry!" Mrs Wormwood cried out.

"Willard is just about to propose to Angelica!"

"You can still watch it while we're talking," Mr Wormwood said.

"This is Matilda's teacher.

She says she's got some sort of news to give us."

"My name is Jennifer Honey," Miss Honey said.

"How do you do, Mrs Wormwood."

Mrs Wormwood glared at her and said, "What's the trouble then?"

Nobody invited Miss Honey to sit down so she chose a chair and sat down anyway.

"This", she said, "was your daughter's first day at school."

"We know that," Mrs Wormwood said, ratty about missing her programme.

"Is that all you came to tell us?"

Miss Honey stared hard into the other woman's wet grey eyes, and she allowed the silence to hang in the air until Mrs Wormwood became uncomfortable.

"Do you wish me to explain why I came?" she said.

"Get on with it then," Mrs Wormwood said.

"I'm sure you know", Miss Honey said, "that children in the bottom class at school are not expected to be able to read or spell or juggle with numbers when they first arrive.

Five-year-olds cannot do that.

But Matilda can do it all.

And if I am to believe her . . ."

"I wouldn't," Mrs Wormwood said.

She was still ratty at losing the sound on the TV.

"Was she lying, then," Miss Honey said, "when she told me that nobody taught her to multiply or to read?

Did either of you teach her?"

"Teach her what?" Mr Wormwood said.

"To read.

To read books," Miss Honey said.

"Perhaps you did teach her.

Perhaps she was lying.

Perhaps you have shelves full of books all over the house.

I wouldn't know.

Perhaps you are both great readers."

"Of course we read," Mr Wormwood said.

"Don't be so daft.

I read the Autocar and the Motor from cover to cover every week."

"This child has already read an astonishing number of books," Miss Honey said.

"I was simply trying to find out if she came from a family that loved good literature."

"We don't hold with book-reading," Mr Wormwood said.

"You can't make a living from sitting on your fanny and reading story-books.

We don't keep them in the house."

"I see," Miss Honey said.

"Well, all I came to tell you was that Matilda has a brilliant mind.

But I expect you knew that already."

"Of course I knew she could read," the mother said.

"She spends her life up in her room buried in some silly book."

"But does it not intrigue you", Miss Honey said, "that a little five-year-old child is reading long adult novels by Dickens and Hemingway?

Doesn't that make you jump up and down with excitement?"

"Not particularly," the mother said.

"I'm not in favour of blue-stocking girls.

A girl should think about making herself look attractive so she can get a good husband later on.

Looks is more important than books, Miss Hunky . . ."

"The name is Honey," Miss Honey said.

"Now look at me," Mrs Wormwood said.

"Then look at you.

You chose books.

I chose looks."

Miss Honey looked at the plain plump person with the smug suet-pudding face who was sitting across the room.

"What did you say?" she asked.

"I said you chose books and I chose looks," Mrs Wormwood said.

"And who's finished up the better off?

Me, of course.

I'm sitting pretty in a nice house with a successful businessman and you're left slaving away teaching a lot of nasty little children the ABC."

"Quite right, sugar-plum," Mr Wormwood said, casting a look of such simpering sloppiness at his wife it would have made a cat sick.

Miss Honey decided that if she was going to get anywhere with these people she must not lose her temper.

"I haven't told you all of it yet," she said.

"Matilda, so far as I can gather at this early stage, is also a kind of mathematical genius.

She can multiply complicated figures in her head like lightning."

"What's the point of that when you can buy a calculator?" Mr Wormwood said.

"A girl doesn't get a man by being brainy," Mrs Wormwood said.

"Look at that film-star for instance," she added, pointing at the silent TV screen where a bosomy female was being embraced by a craggy actor in the moonlight.

"You don't think she got him to do that by multiplying figures at him, do you?

Not likely.

And now he's going to marry her, you see if he doesn't, and she's going to live in a mansion with a butler and lots of maids."

Miss Honey could hardly believe what she was hearing.

She had heard that parents like this existed all over the place and that their children turned out to be delinquents and drop-outs, but it was still a shock to meet a pair of them in the flesh.

"Matilda's trouble", she said, trying once again, "is that she is so far ahead of everyone else around her that it might be worth thinking about some extra kind of private tuition.

I seriously believe that she could be brought up to university standard in two or three years with the proper coaching."

"University?" Mr Wormwood shouted, bouncing up in his chair.

"Who wants to go to university for heaven's sake!

All they learn there is bad habits!"

"That is not true," Miss Honey said.

"If you had a heart attack this minute and had to call a doctor, that doctor would be a university graduate.

If you got sued for selling someone a rotten second-hand car, you'd have to get a lawyer and he'd be a university graduate, too.

Do not despise clever people, Mr Wormwood.

But I can see we're not going to agree.

I'm sorry I burst in on you like this."

Miss Honey rose from her chair and walked out of the room.

Mr Wormwood followed her to the front-door and said, "Good of you to come, Miss Hawkes, or is it Miss Harris?"

"It's neither," Miss Honey said, "but let it go."

And away she went.

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CHAPTER X. THROWING THE HAMMER

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The nice thing about Matilda was that if you had met her casually and talked to her you would have thought she was a perfectly normal five-and-a-half-year-old child.

She displayed almost no outward signs of her brilliance and she never showed off.

"This is a very sensible and quiet little girl," you would have said to yourself.

And unless for some reason you had started a discussion with her about literature or mathematics, you would never have known the extent of her brain-power.

It was therefore easy for Matilda to make friends with other children.

All those in her class liked her.

They knew of course that she was "clever" because they had heard her being questioned by Miss Honey on the first day of term.

And they knew also that she was allowed to sit quietly with a book during lessons and not pay attention to the teacher.

But children of their age do not search deeply for reasons.

They are far too wrapped up in their own small struggles to worry overmuch about what others are doing and why.

Among Matilda's new-found friends was the girl called Lavender.

Right from the first day of term the two of them started wandering round together during the morning-break and in the lunch-hour.

Lavender was exceptionally small for her age, a skinny little nymph with deep-brown eyes and with dark hair that was cut in a fringe across her forehead.

Matilda liked her because she was gutsy and adventurous.

She liked Matilda for exactly the same reasons.

Before the first week of term was up, awesome tales about the Headmistress, Miss Trunchbull, began to filter through to the newcomers.

Matilda and Lavender, standing in a corner of the playground during morning-break on the third day, were approached by a rugged ten-year-old with a boil on her nose, called Hortensia.

"New scum, I suppose," Hortensia said to them, looking down from her great height.

She was eating from an extra large bag of potato crisps and digging the stuff out in handfuls.

"Welcome to borstal," she added, spraying bits of crisp out of her mouth like snow-flakes.

The two tiny ones, confronted by this giant, kept a watchful silence.

"Have you met the Trunchbull yet?" Hortensia asked.

"We've seen her at prayers," Lavender said, "but we haven't met her."

"You've got a treat coming to you," Hortensia said.

"She hates very small children.

She therefore loathes the bottom class and everyone in it.

She thinks five-year-olds are grubs that haven't yet hatched out."

In went another fistful of crisps and when she spoke again, out sprayed the crumbs.

"If you survive your first year you may just manage to live through the rest of your time here.

But many don't survive.

They get carried out on stretchers screaming.

I've seen it often."

Hortensia paused to observe the effect these remarks were having on the two titchy ones.

Not very much.

They seemed pretty cool.

So the large one decided to regale them with further information.

"I suppose you know the Trunchbull has a lockup cupboard in her private quarters called The Chokey?

Have you heard about The Chokey?"

Matilda and Lavender shook their heads and continued to gaze up at the giant.

Being very small, they were inclined to mistrust any creature that was larger than they were, especially senior girls.

"The Chokey", Hortensia went on, "is a very tall but very narrow cupboard.

The floor is only ten inches square so you can't sit down or squat in it.

You have to stand.

And three of the walls are made of cement with bits of broken glass sticking out all over, so you can't lean against them.

You have to stand more or less at attention all the time when you get locked up in there.

It's terrible."

"Can't you lean against the door?" Matilda asked.

"Don't be daft," Hortensia said.

"The door's got thousands of sharp spikey nails sticking out of it.

They've been hammered through from the outside, probably by the Trunchbull herself."

"Have you ever been in there?" Lavender asked.

"My first term I was in there six times," Hortensia said.

"Twice for a whole day and the other times for two hours each.

But two hours is quite bad enough.

It's pitch dark and you have to stand up dead straight and if you wobble at all you get spiked either by the glass on the walls or the nails on the door.

"Why were you put in?" Matilda asked.

"What had you done?"

"The first time", Hortensia said, "I poured half a tin of Golden Syrup on to the seat of the chair the Trunchbull was going to sit on at prayers.

It was wonderful.

When she lowered herself into the chair, there was a loud squelching noise similar to that made by a hippopotamus when lowering its foot into the mud on the banks of the Limpopo River.

But you're too small and stupid to have read the Just So Stories, aren't you?"

"I've read them," Matilda said.

"You're a liar," Hortensia said amiably.

"You can't even read yet.

But no matter.

So when the Trunchbull sat down on the Golden Syrup, the squelch was beautiful.

And when she jumped up again, the chair sort of stuck to the seat of those awful green breeches she wears and came up with her for a few seconds until the thick syrup slowly came unstuck.

Then she clasped her hands to the seat of her breeches and both hands got covered in the muck.

You should have heard her bellow."

"But how did she know it was you?" Lavender asked.

"A little squirt called Ollie Bogwhistle sneaked on me," Hortensia said.

"I knocked his front teeth out."

"And the Trunchbull put you in The Chokey for a whole day?" Matilda asked, gulping.

"All day long," Hortensia said.

"I was off my rocker when she let me out.

I was babbling like an idiot."

"What were the other things you did to get put in The Chokey?" Lavender asked.

"Oh I can't remember them all now," Hortensia said.

She spoke with the air of an old warrior who has been in so many battles that bravery has become commonplace.

"It's all so long ago," she added, stuffing more crisps into her mouth.

"Ah yes, I can remember one.

Here's what happened.

I chose a time when I knew the Trunchbull was out of the way teaching the sixth-formers, and I put up my hand and asked to go to the bogs.

But instead of going there, I sneaked into the Trunchbull's room.

And after a speedy search I found the drawer where she kept all her gym knickers.''

"Go on," Matilda said, spellbound.

"What happened next?"

"I had sent away by post, you see, for this very powerful itching-powder," Hortensia said.

"It cost 50p a packet and was called The Skin-Scorcher.

The label said it was made from the powdered teeth of deadly snakes, and it was guaranteed to raise welts the size of walnuts on your skin.

So I sprinkled this stuff inside every pair of knickers in the drawer and then folded them all up again carefully."

Hortensia paused to cram more crisps into her mouth.

"Did it work?" Lavender asked.

"Well," Hortensia said, "a few days later, during prayers, the Trunchbull suddenly started scratching herself like mad down below.

A-ha, I said to myself.

Here we go.

She's changed for gym already.

It was pretty wonderful to be sitting there watching it all and knowing that I was the only person in the whole school who realised exactly what was going on inside the Trunchbull's pants.

And I felt safe, too.

I knew I couldn't be caught.

Then the scratching got worse.

She couldn't stop.

She must have thought she had a wasp's nest down there.

And then, right in the middle of the Lord's Prayer, she leapt up and grabbed her bottom and rushed out of the room."

Both Matilda and Lavender were enthralled.

It was quite clear to them that they were at this moment standing in the presence of a master.

Here was somebody who had brought the art of skulduggery to the highest point of perfection, somebody, moreover, who was willing to risk life and limb in pursuit of her calling.

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They gazed in wonder at this goddess, and suddenly even the boil on her nose was no longer a blemish but a badge of courage.

"But how did she catch you that time?" Lavender asked, breathless with wonder.

"She didn't," Hortensia said.

"But I got a day in The Chokey just the same."

"Why?" they both asked.

"The Trunchbull", Hortensia said, "has a nasty habit of guessing.

When she doesn't know who the culprit is, she makes a guess at it, and the trouble is she's often right.

I was the prime suspect this time because of the Golden Syrup job, and although I knew she didn't have any proof, nothing I said made any difference.

I kept shouting, 'How could I have done it, Miss Trunchbull?

I didn't even know you kept any spare knickers at school!

I don't even know what itching-powder is!

I've never heard of it!'

But the lying didn't help me in spite of the great performance I put on.

The Trunchbull simply grabbed me by one ear and rushed me to The Chokey at the double and threw me inside and locked the door.

That was my second all-day stretch.

It was absolute torture.

I was spiked and cut all over when I came out."

"It's like a war," Matilda said, overawed.

"You're darn right it's like a war," Hortensia cried.

"And the casualties are terrific.

We are the crusaders, the gallant army fighting for our lives with hardly any weapons at all and the Trunchbull is the Prince of Darkness, the Foul Serpent, the Fiery Dragon with all the weapons at her command.

It's a tough life.

We all try to support each other."

"You can rely on us," Lavender said, making her height of three feet two inches stretch as tall as possible.

"No, I can't," Hortensia said.

"You're only shrimps.

But you never know.

We may find a use for you one day in some undercover job."

"Tell us just a little bit more about what she does," Matilda said.

"Please do."

"I mustn't frighten you before you've been here a week," Hortensia said.

"You won't," Lavender said.

"We may be small but we're quite tough."

"Listen to this then," Hortensia said.

"Only yesterday the Trunchbull caught a boy called Julius Rottwinkle eating Liquorice Allsorts during the scripture lesson and she simply picked him up by one arm and flung him clear out of the open classroom window.

Our classroom is one floor up and we saw Julius Rottwinkle go sailing out over the garden like a Frisbee and landing with a thump in the middle of the lettuces.

Then the Trunchbull turned to us and said, "From now on, anybody caught eating in class goes straight out the window."

"Did this Julius Rottwinkle break any bones?" Lavender asked.

"Only a few," Hortensia said.

"You've got to remember that the Trunchbull once threw the hammer for Britain in the Olympics so she's very proud of her right arm."

"What's throwing the hammer?" Lavender asked.

"The hammer", Hortensia said, "is actually a ruddy great cannon-ball on the end of a long bit of wire, and the thrower whisks it round and round his or her head faster and faster and then lets it go.

You have to be terrifically strong.

The Trunchbull will throw anything around just to keep her arm in, especially children."

"Good heavens," Lavender said.

"I once heard her say", Hortensia went on, "that a large boy is about the same weight as an Olympic hammer and therefore he's very useful for practising with."

At that point something strange happened.

The playground, which up to then had been filled with shrieks and the shouting of children at play, all at once became silent as the grave.

"Watch out," Hortensia whispered.

Matilda and Lavender glanced round and saw the gigantic figure of Miss Trunchbull advancing through the crowd of boys and girls with menacing strides.

The children drew back hastily to let her through and her progress across the asphalt was like that of Moses going through the Red Sea when the waters parted.

A formidable figure she was too, in her belted smock and green breeches.

Below the knees her calf muscles stood out like grapefruits inside her stockings.

"Amanda Thripp!" she was shouting.

"You, Amanda Thripp, come here!"

"Hold your hats," Hortensia whispered.

"What's going to happen?" Lavender whispered back.

"That idiot Amanda", Hortensia said, "has let her long hair grow even longer during the hols and her mother has plaited it into pigtails.

Silly thing to do."

"Why silly?" Matilda asked.

"If there's one thing the Trunchbull can't stand it's pigtails," Hortensia said.

Matilda and Lavender saw the giant in green breeches advancing upon a girl of about ten who had a pair of plaited golden pigtails hanging over her shoulders.

Each pigtail had a blue satin bow at the end of it and it all looked very pretty.

The girl wearing the pigtails, Amanda Thripp, stood quite still, watching the advancing giant, and the expression on her face was one that you might find on the face of a person who is trapped in a small field with an enraged bull which is charging flat-out towards her.

The girl was glued to the spot, terror-struck, pop-eyed, quivering, knowing for certain that the Day of Judgment had come for her at last.

Miss Trunchbull had now reached the victim and stood towering over her.

"I want those filthy pigtails off before you come back to school tomorrow!" she barked.

"Chop 'em off and throw 'em in the dustbin, you understand?"

Amanda, paralysed with fright, managed to stutter, "My m-m-mummy likes them.

She p-p-plaits them for me every morning."

"Your mummy's a twit!" the Trunchbull bellowed.

She pointed a finger the size of a salami at the child's head and shouted, "You look like a rat with a tail coming out of its head!"

"My m-m-mummy thinks I look lovely, Miss T-T-Trunchbull," Amanda stuttered, shaking like a blancmange.

"I don't give a tinker's toot what your mummy thinks!" the Trunchbull yelled, and with that she lunged forward and grabbed hold of Amanda's pigtails in her right fist and lifted the girl clear off the ground.

Then she started swinging her round and round her head, faster and faster and Amanda was screaming blue murder and the Trunchbull was yelling, "I'll give you pigtails, you little rat!"

"Shades of the Olympics," Hortensia murmured.

"She's getting up speed now just like she does with the hammer.

Ten to one she's going to throw her."

And now the Trunchbull was leaning back against the weight of the whirling girl and pivoting expertly on her toes, spinning round and round, and soon Amanda Thripp was travelling so fast she became a blur, and suddenly, with a mighty grunt, the Trunchbull let go of the pigtails and Amanda went sailing like a rocket right over the wire fence of the playground and high up into the sky.

"Well thrown, sir!" someone shouted from across the playground, and Matilda, who was mesmerised by the whole crazy affair, saw Amanda Thripp descending in a long graceful parabola on to the playing-field beyond.

She landed on the grass and bounced three times and finally came to rest.

Then, amazingly, she sat up.

She looked a trifle dazed and who could blame her, but after a minute or so she was on her feet again and tottering back towards the playground.

The Trunchbull stood in the playground dusting off her hands.

"Not bad," she said, "considering I'm not in strict training.

Not bad at all."

Then she strode away.

"She's mad," Hortensia said.

"But don't the parents complain?" Matilda asked.

"Would yours?" Hortensia asked.

"I know mine wouldn't.

She treats the mothers and fathers just the same as the children and they're all scared to death of her.

I'll be seeing you some time, you two."

And with that she sauntered away.