‘I am quite capable of taking myself up but I am just as capable of throwing you down, so be careful.’

Matron, muttering angrily under her breath, did not touch Margaret again but unlocked the door of the evil-smelling room, gave Margaret a savage push, then she slammed and relocked the door. Matron’s push had been so violent that Margaret fell to her knees. For a moment she knelt like that, fighting back her tears.

‘Is that you, Margaret Thursday? It’s me, Simon.’ The food she had given him and probably a lot of sleep had done wonders for Simon. He sounded almost himself. ‘She put me in here and locked the door,’ Simon explained. ‘She said I wasn’t to go to the theatre. I couldn’t get out, truly I couldn’t.’

‘I know you couldn’t. It’s very dark in here. Isn’t there a window? The lamplighters must have been round ages ago.’

‘I don’t think they have lamps in this sort of lane,’ said Simon, ‘but even if there was, it wouldn’t do any good, the window’s boarded up.’

‘Why?’

‘I never heard except that one of the orphans broke it.’

Margaret fumbled her way across the room to the outer wall and searched it for wood. Soon her fingers found it. But finding it seemed to be no help, for it was so strongly nailed into place.

‘Oh dear, this is terribly firmly fixed.’

‘It’s no good trying to move it,’ said Simon. He lowered his voice. ‘Don’t forget she’s a witch. I expect it’s magicked on to the wall.’

A witch! The words crept into Margaret’s mind. A witch! That was what Liza had called an old woman. It was when she had told her she thought Matron must have been a witch – not exactly meaning it, for she hoped there were no such creatures as witches. Then Liza had said: ‘Watch out. For they say they never die. Once they’ve had you in their clutches they come back.’ And Liza had been scared. She had said she would cross the road to avoid meeting her. What was it Liza had called her witch? It wasn’t Matron. Could there be two witches? She turned in Simon’s direction.

‘Who is a witch? What do you call the woman who owns this house?’

Simon was surprised. ‘Ma Mud, of course. Everybody calls her that.’

Ma Mud! How often she had heard Liza talk about her and the children she was supposed to look after.

‘But why do you live with her?’

It was a silly question and Margaret knew it as soon as she had asked it.

‘Because I’m an orphan. Nobody didn’t want me and for a few gold pieces she took me.’

‘But she can’t have been here long. I mean she was Matron of an orphanage in the country where I was not long ago.’

‘I’m new so I don’t know, but the other children say she ran a big orphanage once and that gave her the idea of starting this one.’