Mr Majeika and the Haunted Hotel Read online

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE

  HAUNTED HOTEL

  Humphrey Carpenter (1946–2005), the author and creator of Mr Majeika, was born and educated in Oxford. He went to a school called the Dragon School where exciting things often happened and there were some very odd teachers – you could even call it magical! He became a full-time writer in 1975 and was the author of many award-winning biographies. As well as the Mr Majeika titles, his children’s books also included Shakespeare Without the Boring Bits and More Shakespeare Without the Boring Bits. He wrote plays for radio and theatre and founded the children’s drama group The Mushy Pea Theatre Company. He played the tuba, double bass, bass saxophone and keyboard.

  Humphrey once said, “The nice thing about being a writer is that you can make magic happen without learning tricks. Words are the only tricks you need. I can write: ‘He floated up to the ceiling, and a baby rabbit came out of his pocket, grew wings, and flew away.’ And you will believe that it really happened! That’s magic, isn’t it?”

  Books by Humphrey Carpenter

  MR MAJEIKA

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE DINNER LADY

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE GHOST TRAIN

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE HAUNTED HOTEL

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE LOST SPELL BOOK

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE MUSIC TEACHER

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE SCHOOL BOOK WEEK

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE SCHOOL CARETAKER

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE SCHOOL INSPECTOR

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE SCHOOL PLAY

  MR MAJEIKA AND THE SCHOOL TRIP

  MR MAJEIKA ON THE INTERNET

  MR MAJEIKA VANISHES

  THE PUFFIN BOOK OF CLASSIC

  CHILDREN’S STORIES (Ed.)

  SHAKESPEARE WITHOUT THE BORING BITS

  MORE SHAKESPEARE WITHOUT THE

  BORING BITS

  HUMPHREY CARPENTER

  Mr Majeika and the

  Haunted Hotel

  Illustrated by Frank Rodgers

  PUFFIN

  For Clare and Kate who helped me with this one

  PUFFIN BOOKS

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

  Penguin Group (Canada), 90 Eglinton Avenue East, Suite 700, Toronto, Ontario, Canada M4P 2Y3

  (a division of Pearson Penguin Canada Inc.)

  Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a division of Penguin Books Ltd)

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  Victoria 3124, Australia (a division of Pearson Australia Group Pty Ltd)

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  Panchsheel Park, New Delhi – 110 017, India

  Penguin Group (NZ), cnr Airborne and Rosedale Roads, Albany,

  Auckland 1310, New Zealand (a division of Pearson New Zealand Ltd)

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  Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South Africa

  Penguin Books Ltd, Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  www.penguin.com

  First published by Viking Kestrel 1987

  Published in Puffin Books 1988

  39

  This edition published 2006 for Index Books Ltd

  Text copyright © Humphrey Carpenter, 1987

  Illustrations copyright © Frank Rodgers, 1987

  All rights reserved

  The moral right of the author and illustrator has been asserted

  Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data

  A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

  ISBN: 978-0-14-194447-0

  Contents

  1. The lollipop lady

  2. Miss Worlock asks for help

  3. Hamish and the Romans

  4. The Green Banana

  5. Send for the police

  6. Miss Worlock meets Miss Worlock

  7. A visit to Rome

  1. The lollipop lady

  It was Monday morning at St Barty’s School and, as usual, four people from Class Three were late.

  Hamish Bigmore was late because he had overslept. This was because he had stayed up very late to watch a film on television. The film was called The Deadly Slime. At breakfast, Hamish upset his parents by pretending to be the Deadly Slime. He pretended to be the Deadly Slime all over the breakfast table. The Deadly Slime crawled all over the butter and the Corn Flakes and the milk jug until Mrs Bigmore came over faint, and Mr Bigmore hurried Hamish off to school.

  Jody was late because she couldn’t make up her mind which dress to wear, or should it be her dungarees, and which shirt went best with them? She changed her clothes six times before breakfast.

  Thomas and Pete were late because Thomas couldn’t find his right shoe, and Pete couldn’t find his left shoe. In the end Thomas’s right shoe was discovered inside Pete’s left wellington boot, and Pete’s left shoe was discovered on the right foot of Thomas’s old teddy.

  Hamish Bigmore, Jody, Thomas and Pete all came hurrying down the lane about five minutes after school had started. An old lady stepped out from behind a tree.

  ‘Wait a minute, my little chicks!’ she called. ‘Auntie Mina will help you little toddlers across the road. She’ll stop the dangerous cars and lorries from running into you.’

  She was wearing a rather grubby looking

  raincoat and hat, and was holding a traffic sign shaped like a lollipop, with the word STOP! painted on it.

  ‘Dangerous cars and lorries?’ laughed Thomas. ‘Don’t be silly! The only thing that ever comes down this lane is the Vicar on his bicycle.’

  ‘And anyway,’ said Pete crossly, ‘we’re not toddlers. We can look after ourselves.’

  ‘Don’t be rude,’ whispered Jody. ‘I’m sure she means well, even if she is a bit cracked.’

  Hamish Bigmore said nothing. He was having a careful look at the lollipop lady, as if he recognized her.

  The old lady took their arms (Thomas noticed that she had a strong grip) and led them across the road. ‘Thank you,’ said Jody politely.

  ‘Not at all, my little dears,’ said the lollipop lady. ‘Now, off you go to your playgroup, and have a lovely time in the sand-pit, and playing with your toys.’

  ‘It isn’t a playgroup,’ said Thomas angrily. ‘We’re Class Three, and we’re learning a lot of important things with our teacher, Mr Majeika. This term he’s teaching us all about the Romans in Britain, and next week we’re going on a trip to see Hadrian’s Wall, which is a very old wall that a Roman Emperor built in the north of England.’

  ‘Is that so, my little chick?’ said the lollipop lady. ‘Tell Auntie Mina all about it.’

  ‘Ssh,’ whispered Jody to Thomas. ‘It’s none of her business. Come on, we’re late.’ They hurried across the playground to Mr Majeika’s classroom.

  ‘Come back, little chickies,’ called the lollipop lady. ‘You didn’t wait for one of Auntie Mina’s lovely juicy sweets!’

  ‘We never take sweets from strangers,’ answered Pete.

  ‘There’s something peculiar about her,’ said Jody. ‘Don’t you think so, Hamish?’

  Hamish Bigmore shrugged his shoulders. ‘She looked all right to me. Rather a nice old lady, in fact.’

  Pete and Thomas looked at each other. It wasn’t like Hamish Bigmore to say that somebody was nice.

  *

  At the end of the morning, Jody told Mr Majeika all about the lollipop lady. ‘She certainly sounds odd,’ he said. ‘Let’s go and take a look at her.’

  But the lollipop lady had disappeared.

  ‘I wonder…’ said Mr Majeika. ‘You say she was very interested in Class Three?’

  Jody nodded.

  ‘And she called herself “Auntie Mina”?’

  ‘That’s right,’ said Jody.

  ‘Well, what name does “Auntie Mina” remind you of?’

  Jody thought for a moment. ‘Wilhelmina Worlock! But you don’t think…?’

  Mr Majeika scratched his head. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘I’m afraid it’s possible.’

  Wilhelmina Worlock was a music teacher who had come to St Barty’s last term. She wasn’t just a music teacher. She was a witch.

  She had tried to take over the whole school, and she had made them spend their whole day playing in her orchestra. When people didn’t obey her, she said she’d turn them into toads. The only person who had liked her was Hamish Bigmore. She called him her Star. Pupil and said she would teach him magic. In the end, she had been stopped by Mr Majeika, who knew as much magic as she did. Mr Majeika had once been a wizard, though he didn’t like people to know this, and he never wanted to do magic nowadays. But sometimes it was necessary, and he had used his magic to get rid of Wilhelmina Worlock.

  ‘Do you really think it’s her, come back?’ asked Jody.

  ‘I’m awfully afraid it may be,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘And if it is her, I’m sure she wants to get her revenge.’

/>   Mr Potter, the headteacher of St Barty’s, came strolling across the playground.

  ‘Excuse me, Mr Potter,’ said Mr Majeika, ‘but have you seen an old lady helping children across the road outside school?’

  ‘Certainly,’ said Mr Potter. ‘A very nice old lady. She took me across, and made sure the Vicar didn’t bump into me on his bicycle.’

  ‘She’s been offering sweets to the children,’ said Mr Majeika.

  ‘Really?’ said Mr Potter. ‘Now you mention it, she gave me one. I quite forgot

  to eat it.’ He looked in his pocket, and found the sweet. He was about to pop it into his mouth when Mr Majeika snatched it from him.

  ‘Don’t eat it!’ cried Mr Majeika.

  He and Jody peered at the sweet. It was sticky and green, and was in the shape of a toad.

  ‘Oh dear’ said Jody.

  ‘Goodness,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘If Mr Potter had eaten this, he would have turned into a toad. Auntie Mina the lollipop lady is Wilhelmina Worlock, come to get her own back on Class Three. We shall all of us have to be very careful.’

  2. Miss Worlock asks for help

  Wilhelmina Worlock sat in a bus shelter, just around the corner from St Barty’s. She was very cross indeed.

  Her plan to turn Class Three into toads by giving them magic sweets had failed. She

  had seen Mr Majeika coming to look for the lollipop lady, and she’d guessed that everyone had recognized her.

  She fumed and muttered, but no other plan for revenge on Class Three would come into her head. It made her very cross.

  In the old days, when she had been a young witch, surrounded by magical servants – genies and the like – she had been full of the nastiest ideas. Now her head was empty.

  Wait a minute. Genies!

  A thought crossed her horrid brain. There had been one particular genie she’d always found most useful. Jim the Genie was his name. He would do anything she asked, move whole mountains if necessary. He was as strong as the Genie of the Lamp in Aladdin.

  Genies never die, so he must be around somewhere. She tried to remember how she used to summon him up. In Aladdin they rubbed a lamp to make the genie appear. But Wilhelmina didn’t think she’d used a lamp to call Jim the Genie.

  Ah, now she remembered. She’d rubbed the end of her nose.

  She tried it right away. At first nothing happened. Then she gave a terrific sneeze. Bother!

  But the sneeze had done the trick. There was a puff of smoke which filled the bus shelter, so that Miss Worlock coughed and spluttered.

  ‘Yes, Madam?’ said a voice. ‘Can I fetch you anything?’

  A tall man in a black suit was standing there. He had a cloth folded neatly over one arm, and a tray tucked under the other. Miss Worlock could see that he was a waiter.

  ‘Who are you?’ she screamed. ‘I want Jim the Genie.’

  ‘Madam,’ said the waiter politely, ‘I am James the Genie. And you, Madam, unless I am much mistaken, are Miss W. Worlock,

  whom I had the pleasure of serving many years ago. May I get you something, Madam?’

  ‘Thank you, James,’ said Miss Worlock. ‘I’ll have a large sherry, with an eye of newt floating on the top. No, what am I talking about? I don’t want a drink! It wasn’t a waiter I called for. Have you given up being a genie?’

  Jim the Genie bowed low. ‘Well, Madam, as I grew older, I felt I should take an easier job. I have opened a hotel.’

  ‘A hotel?’ screamed Miss Worlock. ‘What do I want to know about hotels?’

  ‘If I may say so, Madam,’ continued Jim the Genie, ‘it is a very good hotel. Allow me to show you our card.’ He handed it to Miss Worlock:

  THE GREEN BANANA HOTEL

  Wobbleswick, near Hadrian’s Wall

  Comfortable rooms, excellent cooking

  Proprietor: J. Genie, Esq.

  Miss Worlock tore it into pieces. ‘Stop wasting my time!’ she shouted. ‘Can’t you still do any magic?’

  Jim the Genie bowed low. ‘Madam, once a genie, always a genie.’

  ‘Then get on with it!’ shrieked Miss Worlock. ‘I want you to turn the school upside down.’

  ‘Madam?’ asked Jim the Genie, with a puzzled frown.

  ‘The school, you idiot! That one over there, St Botty’s or whatever they call it. Turn it upside down, and give them the biggest fright of their lives!’

  Jim the Genie bowed low. ‘Your wish, Madam, is my command.’

  *

  Thomas, Pete and Jody were going home

  past the bus shelter when they heard a frightful noise.

  They all looked into the shelter. A tall man, dressed as a waiter, was holding Miss Worlock upside down. He was grasping her by the heels, and shaking her hard.

  ‘Is that enough, Madam?’ he was asking her.

  ‘It’s not working,’ screamed Miss Worlock.

  ‘The school has turned upside down, I can see that, but no one’s falling out of it.’

  Thomas, Pete and Jody started to giggle. Miss Worlock saw them.

  ‘You’ve cheated me!’ she roared at Jim the Genie. ‘It’s not the school that’s upside down, it’s me!’

  Jody, Pete and Thomas ran away, though they were laughing so much it was hard to run.

  ‘I do beg your pardon, Madam,’ said Jim the Genie to Miss Worlock, ‘but it occurred to me that if you were upside down, it might serve just as well.’

  ‘I’ll turn you into a toad!’ shrieked Miss Worlock. ‘I suppose you were too old and feeble to lift the school in the air? Get back to your hotel! I can see you’re no longer any use as a genie. Get back to your silly hotel, and –’

  She paused. She had an idea.

  ‘James,’ she said thoughtfully, ‘this hotel of yours. It’s near Hadrian’s Wall?’

  Jim the Genie bowed low. ‘It is, Madam.’

  ‘Aha,’ said Miss Worlock.

  3. Hamish and the Romans

  Hamish Bigmore was making a great nuisance of himself about the visit to Hadrian’s Wall. ‘Romans!’ he kept on sneering. ‘Who wants to hear about silly old Romans? What’s supposed to be so clever about them?’

  ‘Well,’ said Jody, ‘they invented a language called Latin, and they made coins, and they built big houses with hot baths and central heating.’

  ‘Latin!’ laughed Hamish Bigmore. ‘Coins, hot baths. What’s so clever about that? I bet I could make up a language, and as for hot baths and central heating, my Mum and Dad have got those at home! If you ask me, the Romans were just a lot of silly savages, walking about in old sheets.’

  ‘They built Hadrian’s Wall,’ said Jody.

  ‘Hadrian’s Wall!’ laughed Hamish. ‘Why, even my dad can build a wall. He’s just put one up to keep the neighbour’s dog out of our garden. I suppose in a hundred years’ time people will be coming on expeditions to see Mr Bigmore’s Wall!’

  ‘Don’t be an idiot,’ said Jody.

  ‘You tell me one thing,’ said Hamish. ‘Had the Romans got guns? Had they got televisions? Had they got computers?’

  ‘No,’ said Jody.

  ‘Then that proves it,’ said Hamish. ‘We’re cleverer than they were. So what’s the point of going to see their silly old wall?’

  The day before the expedition, Class Three performed a play about the Romans in Britain, with the rest of the school watching. Mr Majeika had rehearsed them in their parts. Thomas and Pete were two Roman soldiers called Tiberius and Petrus, and there was a scene where they captured a British tribe, and made them all Roman citizens.

  Hamish Bigmore was supposed to be one of the British tribe who got captured, but up to the last minute he refused to have anything to do with it. He just sat in a corner sulking, while they rehearsed. Then suddenly he changed his mind. ‘I bet he’s up to something,’ said Pete.

  Sure enough, when they got to the scene where Tiberius and Petrus capture the British tribe, Hamish Bigmore ran on to the stage and pulled a toy machine-gun from under his British costume. ‘Stick ’em up, you guys!’ he roared. ‘This is Hamishus Bigmorus, the only Ancient Briton who knew anything about guns. Stick ’em up, or I’ll plug you all full of lead!’

  Thomas and Pete tried to carry on, but Melanie, who was playing a Roman lady, burst into tears and ran off the stage. Mr Majeika had to make them begin it all again, after Hamish Bigmore had been sent home. ‘I’d like to punish Hamish by saying he can’t come on the expedition to Hadrian’s Wall,’ said Mr Majeika. ‘But since he doesn’t want to come anyway, it wouldn’t really be a punishment.’