The wind blew hard and the sky was almost black. Rebecca was getting very wet. Her dress was soaking and the Ariel ointment was beginning to bubble. ‘I think that’s enough rain for now, Glubbslyme,’ she whispered into the shopping bag. Glubbslyme sighed. ‘I summon forth a squally tempest but before it has scarce begun you wish it stopped. The Magical Arts are not worked like your newfangled taps, child.’ ‘But I’m getting soaked,’ said Rebecca. She had often been soaked in the short time she had known Glubbslyme. Perhaps she should prepare herself and dress up in waterproof apron and wellington boots each morning. Then she grinned and grasped the umbrella. ‘I am an idiot,’ she said, and she opened it up and held it over her head. Glubbslyme peered out of the shopping bag in alarm. ‘It will become aerial. Put it down at once. We cannot fly in a tempest!’ They had no option. Rebecca didn’t have a chance to collapse the umbrella. The wind whistled and whirled, and the umbrella bobbed and danced, shook and shivered, and then suddenly shot up into the air.
