Page 19 (1/2)

I MADE IT BACK ABOUT twenty e at the back of h holes so Madam Octa could breathe She should be safe there: Mo up the roo around

I slipped into bed and pretended to be asleep Dad called ht I put onand stretching like I’d just gotten up I ate breakfast quickly and hurried back upstairs to check on Madaave the cage a se

I would have liked to have stayed home and kept an eye on her but that was i sick She’s too smart to be fooled

That day felt like a week The seconds see like hours, and even break and lunchti soccer but my heart wasn’t in it I couldn’t concentrate in class and kept giving stupid answers, even to simple questions

Finally it ended and I was able to rush home and up to my room

Madam Octa was in the same spot as earlier I was half-afraid she was dead, but I could see her breathing Then it struckto be fed! I’d seen spiders this way before They could sit still for hours at a ti

I wasn’t sure what I should feed her, but I guessed it wasn’t too different froarden, pausing only to snatch an e to collect a couple of dead flies, a few bugs, and a long wriggly wor the jelly jar insidequestions

I closed ainst it so nobody could coe on my bed and removed the cloth

The spider squinted and crouched doer at the sudden surge of light I was about to open the door and throw the food in when I re with a poisonous spider who could kill e, picked out one of the live insects, and dropped it It landed on its back Its feet twitched in the air and then ittoward freedoet far

As soon as itstill as a cocoon in theher fangs

She sed the bug down quick It would have fed a normal spider for a day or two, but to Madaht snack She inal spot and looked at me as if to say, "Okay, that was nice Nohere’s the main course?"

I fed her the entire contents of the jar The worot her fangs into it and ripped it in half, then into quarters She seerabbed my diary from underneath my mattress My diary is my most prized possession, and it’s because I wrote everything down in it that I’m able to write this book I reet stuck, all I have to do is open the diary and check the facts

I folded the diary open to the back page, then wrote down all that I knew about Madam Octa: what Mr Crepsley had said about her in the show, the tricks she knew, the food she liked I put one checkmark beside food she liked a lot, and two checkmarks beside food she loved (so far, only the worure out the best way to feed her, and what to give her as a treat when I wanted her to do a trick

I brought up soe next: cheese, haave her It looked like I was going to be kept busy trying to feed this ugly lady!