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“Chief pleasure of gardening.”
    Charmain, who had never thought about gardening in her life, considered this. “No,” she said. “Great-Uncle William wouldn’t have them if he didn’t like them. He’s coming back before long, and I think he might be upset to find them all chopped down. Why don’t you just do your usual night’s work and see what he says when he’s back?”
    “Oh, he’ll say no, of course,” the kobold said gloomily. “He’s a spoilsport, the wizard is. Usual fee, then?”
    “What is your usual fee?” Charmain asked.
    The kobold said promptly, “I’ll take a crock of gold and a dozen new eggs.”
    Fortunately, Great-Uncle William’s voice spoke out of the air at the same time. “I pay Rollo a pintof milk nightly, my dear, magically delivered. No need to concern yourself.”
    The kobold spat disgustedly on the path. “What did I say? Didn’t I say spoilsport? And a fat lot of work I can do, if you’re going to sit in this path all night.”
    Charmain said, with dignity, “I was just resting. I’m going now.” She got to her feet, feeling surprisingly heavy, not to speak of weak about the knees, and plodded up the path to the front door. It’ll be locked, she thought. I shall look awfully silly if I can’t get in.
    The door burst open before she reached it, letting out a surprising blaze of light and with the light Waif’s small scampering shape, squeaking and wagging and wriggling with delight at seeing Charmain again. Charmain was so glad to be home and welcomed that she scooped Waif up and carried him indoors, while Waif writhed and wriggled and reached up to lick Charmain’s chin.
    Indoors, the light seemed to follow you about magically. “Good,” Charmain said aloud. “Then I don’t need to hunt for candles.” But her innerthoughts were saying frantically, I left that window open! The lubbock can get in! She dumped Waif on the kitchen floor and then rushed left through the door. Light blazed in the corridor as she raced along to the end and slammed the window shut. Unfortunately, the light made it seem so dark in the meadow that, no matter how hard she peered through the glass, she could not tell if the lubbock was out there or not. She consoled herself with the thought that she had not been able to see the window once she was in the meadow, but she still found she was shivering.
    After that, she could not seem to stop shivering. She shivered her way back to the kitchen and shivered while she shared a pork pie with Waif, and shivered more because the pool of tea had spread out under the table, making the underside of Waif wet and brown. Whenever Waif came near her, parts of Charmain became clammy with tea too. In the end, Charmain took off her blouse, which was flapping open because of the missing buttons anyway, and wiped up the tea with it. This of coursemade her shiver more. She went and fetched herself the thick woollen sweater Mrs. Baker had packed for her and huddled into it, but she still shivered. The threatened rain started. It beat on the window and pattered down the kitchen chimney, and Charmain shivered even more. She supposed it was shock, really, but she still felt cold.
    “Oh!” she cried out. “How do I light a fire, Great-Uncle William?”
    “I believe I left the spell in place,” the kindly voice said out of the air. “Simply throw into the grate one thing that will burn and say aloud, ‘Fire, light,’ and you should have your fire.”
    Charmain looked round for one thing that would burn. There was the bag beside her on the table, but it still had another pork pie and an apple tart in it, and besides, it was a nice bag, with flowers that Mrs. Baker had embroidered on it. There was paper in Great-Uncle William’s study, of course, but that meant getting up and fetching it. There was the laundry in the bags by the sink, but Charmain was fairly sure that Great-Uncle William would notappreciate having his dirty clothes burned. On the other hand,