| abstract | - When Miss Cackle has to leave the school to visit her sick aunt, Mr Hallow brings in a temporary Headmistress to take her place. Meanwhile, Ruby has invented a machine that somehow allows you to travel from one place to the other without having to walk there - sort of the way Miss Hardbroom disappears and reappears. It doesn't work properly, and it makes Mildred disappear and reappear all around the room really, really fast. Ethel catches up with her father in the hallway. He explains that he was having trouble finding someone, but then he thought of the perfect person, tracked her down by phone, and she was very interested in his offer. The replacement is none other than Mistress Hecate Broomhead, the dreaded former OFWITCH inspector who tried to close down the Academy the previous year. Miss Crotchet comes into the staff room and tells Miss Hardbroom who just showed up. For the benefit of Miss Crotchet, Miss Hardbroom and Miss Drill explain all about who Broomhead is, and why nobody likes her. Broomhead is a stickler for saving time, and orders large clocks to be put up around the school. She also makes Mildred wear an electronic tagging device so she can monitor where she is at all times. The others go and complain to Miss Crotchet and Miss Drill, but, even though they loathe Broomhead, there's nothing they can do about it. In class Miss Hardbroom passes them out a time sheet to record their productivity, and a time card (the kind you punch in a machine). The point is to figure out who's habitually late for class. Ethel shows Mr. Hallow around the school and he's very impressed. Miss Hardbroom and Mistress Broomhead have "a little chat" and Miss Hardbroom comes storming into the staff room in somewhat of a rage because Mistress Broomhead criticized everything she does. Miss Drill and Miss Crotchet explain that she's doing that to everybody, and they think about it for a while, deciding that the best thing to do is to beg Miss Cackle to come back early. Meanwhile, Ruby calls Mildred off to a classroom during her free period, for another test of the transporting device. However the device malfunctions and transports Mildred to random locations across the school. Mildred ends up in the courtyard, right behind Ethel and Mr. Hallow. Mr. Hallow's saying how he wants Mistress Broomhead to take over permanently as headmistress of the school. Ruby gets Mildred zapped back, and she explains to everyone what's going on. Broomhead, who's been monitoring Mildred's location, tracks them all down and demands to know how she's been transporting about. Ruby explains it to her, and instead of being angry, she's very interested. She wants to use Ruby's invention to make everyone in the whole school on time for everything. She demands to have a test go at it. Against everyone's better judgement, Ruby hooks Broomhead up, toggles the controls, and zaps her across the room. It doesn't work properly. She starts flitting around like Mildred did before. Only, she throughly enjoys it. Mr. Hallow finds Mistress Broomhead shooting all around the room at lightening speed, very, very pleased that she can be in two places at once, and demanding that Ruby make it go faster. "Stop it!" Mr. Hallow says, and Ruby's been trying to the whole time. She finally does, and Mistress Broomhead comes to a standstill. But her head starts smoking. Mildred casts a spell to make it stop, but Broomhead doesn't say anything. Hallow pokes her but she just sort of sways back and forth. "What have you done to your headmistress?" Miss Cackle then returns, having been sent for by the other teachers, She tells Mr Hallow off for trying to replace her with Broomhead. Mildred explains why Broomhead's frozen "time catches up with you". Mr Hallow and Mistress Broomhead are sent on their way. Miss Cackle gets rid of Mildred's tracking bracelet, and reverses all the changes Mistress Broomhead made. Ruby doesn't give up on her invention. She puts it on and declares that she's going to her room "the fast way". She pushes a few buttons and disappears. It doesn't work. She ends up floating in the air above the academy.
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