The Ogre of Oglefort Read Online Free Page A

the corridor.
    â€œThe charge this year will be half a crown, but you will get value for your money, I promise you.”
    Ivo turned his head as the Hag gave a small squeak of annoyance. “I’ve forgotten my purse,” she whispered. “I must have left it on the kitchen table.”
    No one else from Whipple Road had any money. They would have to do without refreshments when the time came.
    On the stage, Nellie shuffled her papers and cleared her throat. At the same time an assistant witch pulled down a screen and set up the Magic Lantern.
    â€œYou will want to know about the Summer Task,” Nellie said, “and I’m happy to tell you that this year we have been asked to go to Mr. Barber’s Holiday Camp in the New Forest and rid the camp—and in particular the Fun Fair which is attached to the camp—of a plague of mice.”
    Murmurs of pleasure spread through the audience. A Fun Fair sounded good, and the New Forest was very beautiful. A picture of the camp now came on the screen. It looked really nice, with colored chalets and well-kept flower beds. A picture of the fair came next—swings and merry-go-rounds and a giant slide under a sunny sky—and then came one of the Barber family: Mr. and Mrs. Barber, and Penelope and Timothy Barber, nicely dressed children smiling into the camera.
    â€œYou may ask why the Barbers don’t just bring in a lot of cats, and the answer is that the family is allergic to cats. Cat fur brings them out in terrible bumps. So Mr. Barber has invited us to spend a week, as guests in his camp, and concentrate in particular on the Fun Fair, where the mice are breeding at a terrifying rate. He leaves it to us how we get rid of the mice—shape-changing . . . luring . . . the evil eye. . . . Leading them on a hill like in the Pied Piper of Hamelin is of course a possibility.”
    She waited for a moment while the tired creatures who had worked all summer in the city talked delightedly among themselves. This was going to be the best Summer Task ever!
    â€œNow we come to the arrangements for the journey,” began Mrs. Arbuthnot. “We will travel from—”
    But at that moment something extraordinary happened. The curtains swished together. The lights flickered and went out. An icy draught crept through the room—there was a single roar of thunder, followed by complete silence.
    And then . . . from behind the curtains . . . came a slow and eerie noise.
    Creak . . . creak . . . creak.
    The lights came on again. The curtains parted, but there was no sign of Nellie Arbuthnot or her parrot. Instead, on the stage was a most extraordinary contraption. A gigantic circular bed on wheels. A movable hospital bed? A deathbed? Nobody knew . . .
    And on the bed crouched three women.
    But what women! They were older than time with cracked and hideous faces, tangles of long white hair, and ghastly stares.
    Panic spread through the audience. The Hag took Ivo’s hand; she was clammy with fear.
    â€œNorns!” The terrified whisper could be heard all over the room. “It’s the Norns!
    â€œIt’s the Old Ones!”
    Norns are the eldest beings in the world. They were there at the beginning of time and they never quite die. Anyone who sees them feels an unstoppable dread because the Norns are the Fates; they spin the threads of the future and foretell what is to come.
    The frightful things crouched on the bed, peering at the rows of people watching them. At the same time, on the screen behind them, the cheerful faces of the Barber family vanished, and instead there appeared a landscape of towering black cliffs, lashed by a stormy sea. White spray dashed against the rocks; they could hear the howling of the wind.
    The picture moved inland through a cleft in the cliffs and stopped in front of an enormous castle with turrets and towers and places for pouring