There was a nasty silence.
'I'll give you one more chance,' the Trunchbull said, not moving.
'Ah yes, I know,' Eric said. 'It's got an H in it. W ... H ... O ... T. It's easy.'
In two large strides the Trunchbull was behind Eric's desk, and there she stood, a pillar of doom towering over the helpless boy. Eric glanced fearfully back over his shoulder at the monster. 'I was right, wasn't I?' he murmured nervously.
'You were wrong! the Trunchbull barked. 'In fact you strike me as the sort of poisonous little pockmark that will always be wrong! You sit wrong! You look wrong! You speak wrong! You are wrong all round! I will give you one more chance to be right! Spell "what"!'
Eric hesitated. Then he said very slowly, 'It's not W ... O ... T, and It's not W ... H ... O ... T. Ah, I know. It must be W ... H ... O ... T ... T.'
Standing behind Eric, the Trunchbull reached out and took hold of the boy's two ears, one with each hand, pinching them between forefinger and thumb.
'Ow!' Eric cried. 'Ow! You're hurting me!'
'I haven't started yet,' the Trunchbull said briskly. And now, taking a firm grip on his two ears, she lifted him bodily out of his seat and held him aloft.
Like Rupert before him, Eric squealed the house down.
From the back of the classroom Miss Honey cried out, 'Miss Trunchbull! don't! Please let him go! His ears might come off!'
'They'll never come off,' the Trunchbull shouted back. 'I have discovered through long experience, Miss Honey, that the ears of small boys are stuck very firmly to their heads.'
'Let him go, Miss Trunchbull, please,' begged Miss Honey. 'You could damage him, you really could! You could wrench them right off!'
'Ears never come off!' the Trunchbull shouted. 'They stretch most marvellously, like these are doing now, but I can assure you they never come off!'
Eric was squealing louder than ever and pedalling the air with his legs.
Matilda had never before seen a boy, or anyone else for that matter, held aloft by his ears alone. Like Miss Honey, she felt sure both ears were going to come off at any moment with all the weight that was on them.
The Trunchbull was shouting, 'The word "what" is spelled W ... H ... A ... T. Now spell it, you little wart!'
Eric didn't hesitate. He had learnt from watching Rupert a few minutes before that the quicker you answered the quicker you were released. 'W ... H ... A ... T,' he squealed, 'spells "what"!'
Still holding him by the ears, the Trunchbull lowered him back into his chair behind his desk. Then she marched back to the front of the class, dusting off her hands one against the other like someone who has been handling something rather grimy.
'That's the way to make them learn, Miss Honey,' she said. 'You take it from me, It's no good just telling them. You've got to hammer it into them. There's nothing like a little twisting and twiddling to encourage them to remember things. It concentrates their minds wonderfully.'
'You could do them permanent damage, Miss Trunchbull,' Miss Honey cried out.
'Oh, I have, I'm quite sure I have,' the Trunchbull answered, grinning. 'Eric's ears will have stretched quite considerably in the last couple of minutes! They'll be much longer now than they were before. There's nothing wrong with that, Miss Honey. It'll give him an
interesting pixie look for the rest of his life.'
'But Miss Trunchbull ...'
'Oh, do shut up, Miss Honey! You're as wet as any of them. If you can't cope in here then you can go and find a job in some cotton-wool private school for rich brats. When you have been teaching for as long as I have you'll realize that it's no good at all being kind to children. Read Nicholas Nickleby, Miss Honey, by Mr Dickens. Read about Mr Wackford Squeers, the admirable headmaster of Dotheboys Hall. He knew how to handle the little brutes, didn't he! He knew how to use the birch, didn't he! He kept their backsides so warm you could have fried eggs and bacon on them! A fine book, that. But I don't suppose this bunch of morons we've got here will ever read it because by the look of them they are never going to learn to read anything!'
'I've read it,' Matilda said quietly.
The Trunchbull flicked her head round and looked carefully at the small girl with dark hair and deep brown eyes sitting in the second row. 'What did you say?' she asked sharply.
'I said I've read it, Miss Trunchbull.'
'Read what?'
'Nicholas Nickleby, Miss Trunchbull.'