Read Online The Time of the Ghost by Diana Wynne Jones - Free Book Online Page A

Fenella. You’re like a starved savage in a famine poster! Savage indeed. She recalled Fenella worshiping Monigan and Fenella’s letter: “Dear Parents, We have killed Sally…” I think I shall start haunting you now , Sally announced.
    There was, Sally knew, a kind of ghost which threw things about. After her success with the wastepaper basket she was sure she could do that. She reached for the salt cellar. To her surprise and exasperation, nothing happened. She reached for it again. Still nothing. She could make no impression on it at all. She could not seem even to move Imogen’s handkerchief, which Imogen had prudently crumpled beside her place in case she cried again.
    Oh, bother! Sally cried out. I’ve forgotten how! Oliver responded to that with a sudden growl. He seemed to have resigned himself to Sally, but he did not like her shouting. I hate you all! Sally shouted, and flounced off, bobbing and whirling, to perch on the draining board.
    â€œYou know,” remarked Cart, “if Sally was here, she’d just have got to the part where she shouts out that she hates us all.”
    Sally glowered at Cart from the draining board. You wait , she said. People can see me. Mrs. Gill did, and I can move things. Just wait till Mother and Himself come in, and then I’ll shrivel you all with guilt!
    She was certain both parents would come and see them as soon as School was over for the evening. Hopefully she watched the big wall clock for nearly an hour. There was a bell and distant shrill bustling from School. Now , she thought.
    However, no parents appeared. Sally had to move from the draining board then because Imogen cleared the table. Even bodiless, Sally did not fancy sitting on dirty dishes. She thought it might be a hopeful sign that Imogen was clearing up. Himself got very irritable if he saw the mess they lived in. But Imogen was not behaving as if she was expecting Himself. None of the sisters was. Imogen was tidying in a vexed, restless way, as if she felt more grieving coming on. Cart was reading. Fenella was lying on her bulging stomach under the table, spitting chewed-up pieces of paper at Cart’s feet. She missed every time.
    The latch of the outside door clacked. Sally sprang up. So did Oliver. Imogen turned round from the sink, and Cart laid down her book.
    â€œHallo,” Cart said cheerfully. “Come on in.”
    Ned Jenkins slid round the door, clutching a paper bag, grinning rather guiltily. “We brought the jar of coffee,” he said. “Have you any spare food?”
    â€œBecause,” said Will Howard, sliding in after Ned, “there was practically nothing for supper again, and we’re starving.”
    â€œDrat you!” Fenella exclaimed from under the table.
    â€œWhy?” asked Ned Jenkins, bending down to look at her.
    Fenella looked accusingly up at him. “You made me jump, opening the door, and I swallowed the piece of paper I was chewing.”
    â€œPaper doesn’t kill you,” said Ned Jenkins.
    â€œYes, it does,” Howard said cheerfully. “It wraps itself round your appendix and you die in agonies.”
    Fenella gave him the look which had defeated Mrs. Gill. It had no effect on Will Howard at all. “How many more of you are coming?” she said witheringly. “I’m not going to chew any more paper until you’ve all arrived.”
    â€œStinker’s up to his ears in physics,” Ned said, rubbing Oliver’s back with his paper bag. “Greer, Wrenn, and Shepperson are all prancing around in wire helmets, waving swords. And Howard told Nutty Filbert we weren’t coming here tonight—”
    â€œWhy?” said Fenella.
    â€œBecause Filbert’s mad,” Howard said blandly.
    â€œBut we’re pleased to see you two,” Imogen said kindly.
    She said it so grandly that Howard bent down under the table and whispered to Fenella, “Is your sister saying