"Jones, Diana Wynne - Chrestomanci 2 - 1980 - The Magicians of Caprona" - читать интересную книгу автора (Jones Diana Wynne)

to its use and stamped with the sign of the house which made it. If you want to
find out who made your spell, look among your family papers. If you find a long
cherry-colored scrip stamped with a black leopard, then it came from the Casa
Petrocchi. If you find a leaf-green envelope bearing a winged horse, then the
House of Montana made it. The spells of both houses are so good that ignorant
people think that even the envelopes can work magic. This, of course, is
nonsense. For, as Paolo and Tonino Montana were told over and over again, a
spell is the right words delivered in the right way.
The great houses of Petrocchi and Montana go back to the first founding of the
State of Caprona, seven hundred years or more ago. And they are bitter rivals.
They are not even on speaking terms. If a Petrocchi and a Montana meet in one of
Caprona's narrow golden-stone streets, they turn their eyes aside and edge past
as if they were both walking past a pig-sty. Their children are sent to
different schools and warned never, ever to exchange a word with a child from
the other house.
Sometimes, however, parties of young men and women of the Montanas and the
Petrocchis happen to meet when they are strolling on the wide street called the
Corso in the evenings. When that happens, other citizens take shelter at once.
If they fight with fists and stones, that is bad enough, but if they fight with
spells, it can be appalling.
An example of this is when the dashing Rinaldo Montana caused the sky to rain
cowpats on the Corso for three days. It created great distress among the
tourists.
"A Petrocchi insulted me," Rinaldo explained, with his most flashing smile. "And
I happened to have a new spell in my pocket."
The Petrocchis unkindly claimed that Rinaldo had misquoted his spell in the heat
of the battle. Everyone knew that all Rinaldo's spells were love-charms.
The grown-ups of both houses never explained to the children just what had made
the Montanas and the Petrocchis hate one another so. That was a task
traditionally left to the older brothers, sisters and cousins. Paolo and Tonino
were told the story repeatedly, by their sisters Rosa, Corinna and Lucia, by
their cousins Luigi, Carlo, Domenico and Anna, and again by their second-cousins
Piero, Luca, Giovanni, Paula, Teresa, Bella, Angelo and Francesco. They told it
themselves to six smaller cousins as they grew up. The Montanas were a large
family.
Two hundred years ago, the story went, old Ricardo Petrocchi took it into his
head that the Duke of Caprona was ordering more spells from the Montanas than
from the Petrocchis, and he wrote old Francesco Montana a very insulting letter
about it. Old Francesco was so angry that he promptly invited all the Petrocchis
to a feast. He had, he said, a new dish he wanted them to try. Then he rolled
Ricardo Petrocchi's letter up into long spills and cast one of his strongest
spells over it. And it turned into spaghetti. The Petrocchis ate it greedily and
were all taken ill, particularly old RicardoЧfor nothing disagrees with a person
so much as having to eat his own words. He never forgave Francesco Montana, and
the two families had been enemies ever since.
"And that," said Lucia, who told the story oftenest, being only a year older
than Paolo, "was the origin of spaghetti."
It was Lucia who whispered to them all the terrible heathen customs the
Petrocchis had: how they never went to Mass or confessed; how they never had
baths or changed their clothes; how none of them ever got married but justЧin an