"Here's a nice welcome, Lady Davidstow," she said in a thin, cracked voice. "I sneezed to show I was coming, and, when I got through the keyhole, I found the hall dark, and no one to receive me. How dare you?"
Lady Davidstow advanced with faltering steps and fell on her knees.
"Oh, your majesty, forgive me," she said.
"Why should I forgive you?" squeaked the infuriated fairy. "Why shouldn't I take you away in my basket and put you in the Tower of Toads?"
Archie gasped. He would have given much for a touch of yesterday's scepticism, but he couldn't find an atom of it. The thought of his mother being whisked off to the Tower of Toads was insupportable.
"Oh, please don't," he said.
"And who is that?" asked Abracadabra.
Archie almost wished he hadn't spoken, and took hold of Jeannie on one side and Harry on the other.
"It's me; it's Archie," he said.
"And you don't want me to take your ridiculous mother away?" she asked.