Class Six and the Nits of Doom Read Online Free

we could have some water...’
    Miss Broom got up in a hurry.
    ‘Of course,’ she said. ‘I won’t be long, Class Six. Do try to stay alive until I get back!’
    And she hurried out of the room.
    Class Six stopped coughing and looked at each other.
    ‘Right,’ said Winsome, getting up. ‘We’ve got about three minutes to get Rodney out of the cupboard.’
    Serise went and banged on the door. ‘Rodney!’ she called. ‘Rodney, you idiot!’
    Pause.
    Then:
    ‘Mum?’ a voice said sleepily. ‘Is it daytime?’
    Everyone groaned.
    ‘Rodney?’ called Winsome. ‘Can you hear me?’
    ‘Yes, Mum,’ said Rodney’s voice through the woodwork. ‘But I think my eyes have stopped working. And why is my bed standing up on end?’
    Serise rolled her eyes.
    ‘It’s no good expecting Rodney to be any help,’ she muttered. She tugged sharply on the door handle. Nothing happened, so she tried again. And again.
    ‘I can’t shift it at all,’ she said. ‘It must have a really good lock.’
    Behind them, Anil frowned.
    ‘Locked?’ he echoed. ‘But it can’t be locked. Look, there’s no keyhole.’
    Everyone looked and saw that Anil was quite right.
    ‘But...’ said Winsome.
    ‘But...’ said Emily.
    Anil began walking up and down, his fingers to his forehead in his best mad-professor way.
    ‘So how do you get the door open?’ he asked. ‘Perhaps you need a magic spell.’
    ‘Well, that old book Miss Broom was reading looked like a spell book,’ Jack said. ‘She put it back in her drawer.’
    ‘Yes, with Algernon,’ snapped Serise. ‘Do you feel like putting your hands into Miss Broom’s drawer to get it out, Jack?’
    Jack didn’t.
    ‘Does anyone know any magic words?’ asked Emily timidly.
    ‘Abracadabra,’ suggested someone.
    ‘Hey presto?’
    ‘Sesame!’
    ‘Please,’ suggested Slacker thoughtfully. ‘Thank you. And pardon.’
    There was a sudden clatter from inside the cupboard, and a voice said:
ouch! Ouch! OUCH!
    ‘Are you all right?’ called Winsome anxiously.
    ‘Yes,’ said Rodney.
    Emily began jumping up and down as if she was about to wet herself. ‘Miss Broom will be back any minute. And then she’ll turn us into rats or something. We’ve got to get him
out! We’ve got to get him out!’
    ‘I don’t think she’d turn us
all
into rats,’ objected Anil. ‘I mean, she’d get into trouble if her
whole
class disappeared. I don’t think
she could really disappear more than one or two of us.’
    Serise snorted.
    ‘Well, that’s all right, then, if only one or two of us disappear. Hey, do you remember Wayne Mitchell? Because he disappeared last year, didn’t he?’
    ‘Yes,’ agreed Winsome. ‘But only because he moved to Watford.’
    Emily looked more frightened than ever.
    Anil was still pacing up and down, scowling. ‘There must be some spell or word that opens it. Something special...’
    ‘Oh, I
wish
we had an ordinary teacher!’ wailed Emily. ‘I wish our teacher was just an ordinary human, and the most exciting thing that ever happened was getting a go on
the computer!’
    Anil stopped dead.
    ‘
That’s it!
’ he said.
    ‘That’s what?’ asked everyone, but Anil was striding up to the door of the cupboard.
    ‘
That’s
the magic word,’ he said. ‘The one that gets you in to almost anything. The one people use all the time even though you’re never supposed to use
it.’
    Jack made a puzzled face.
    ‘Do you mean...
bum
?’ he asked.
    Anil tutted, and put his hand on the cupboard door. Then he said, in a loud commanding voice:
    ‘PASSWORD!’
    And instantly the door swung open.
    Rodney had been in the dark so long the daylight dazzled him. He rubbed his knuckles into his eyes.
    ‘Look at the state of him!’ said Serise, whisking the witch’s hat off his head. It must have fallen there off the coat hook. ‘He’s all over cobwebs!’

    He was all over spiders, too—big juicy-looking ones with a skull-and-crossbones design on their backs—but