I stuffed into Sandy’s mouth to keep him quiet. Then having assembled some logs from a pile which I found outside the back door I lit the kitchen range with the aid of an old newspaper which I found on the filthy floor of the larder. As I morosely watched the feeble smouldering of the logs I tried not to remember that a mere week ago I had been dining in the height of luxury at Starmouth Court.
‘I’ll make some tea,’ said Grace, struggling nobly from the sofa.
‘No, you stay exactly where you are.’ I filled the kettle, found the ration we had brought with us and unearthed a teapot from a cupboard which stank. Meanwhile Christian had returned to report the existence of a privy and Norman was shouting from upstairs that there were no sheets but plenty of blankets. We appeared to be making progress.
‘Take the suitcases upstairs and start unpacking,’ I said to Christian. ‘Do Sandy’s first.’
‘That infant smells as bad as the privy,’ remarked Christian, who was fastidious.
‘Why do you think I told you to unpack his bag first? We need a clean nappy.’ I had taken a plate from the dresser and was now busy extracting some spam from a large tin.
‘I’ll find the nappy,’ said Grace, making a new effort to struggle to her feet.
Sandy started to roar again.
‘I simply can’t understand,’ observed Christian languidly, ‘why infanticide isn’t more common.’
‘What’s infanticide?’ said Primrose as Christian and Grace trailed away upstairs together.
‘Baby-killing, my love.’ I opened two large cans of baked beans just as the kettle showed signs that it might one day come to the boil. Sandy was still roaring but when I gave him a baked bean he spat it out. Turning back to the table I found that the spam was being investigated by a mouse. Without thinking I snarled: ‘Bugger off, you bally blighter!’ – a response which avoided blasphemy (just) but was hardly a fitting exclamation for a clergyman. In a paroxysm of rage I hurled a spoon, but the animal merely frisked down the table-leg and scampered to safety across the floor. Primrose screamed. Sandy stopped crying and immediately began to chant: ‘Bugger, bugger, bugger!’ with zest. (Why is it that small children have such an unfailing talent for picking up bad language?) Seconds later Christian, Norman and James, all waving nappies, clattered down the stairs to inform me that Grace had had to rest again as she was feeling faint.
‘Well, don’t just stand there waving nappies as if they were Union Jacks! Get some cotton wool and the talcum powder – and some lavatory paper might be useful too, if one can judge by the smell –’
‘There isn’t any lavatory paper,’ said Christian.
‘Nonsense, there must be.’
‘I don’t feel very hungry,’ said Norman, eyeing the spam. ‘This conversation’s putting me off my food.’
‘Rubbish – stop being so feeble!’ I said with a robust good humour which bordered on the saintly. ‘Is that the spirit which built the Empire?’
‘Daddy,’ said Primrose, ‘I think the mouse went to the lavatory on the table.’
‘Bugger, bugger, bugger!’ shouted Sandy.
‘I think I’m going to be sick,’ said Norman, bolting for the back door.
‘Who taught Sandy to say bugger?’ demanded Christian in delight as he searched the kitchen cupboards for lavatory paper.
‘Daddy, did you hear me? I said: “I think the mouse – ”’
‘Yes, my love. Pass me that rag hanging by the sink, please.’
‘Neville.’ Looking up I saw Grace, white as a winding-sheet, in the doorway. She was carrying the cotton wool and the talcum powder. ‘I’ll change Sandy.’
‘Very well,’ I said, deciding that this was the moment when I would be ungrateful if I continued to refuse my wife’s noble offers of help, ‘but afterwards you’re to go straight to bed – and let’s hope there are no bedbugs.’
‘I simply can’t understand how the Church Gazette could have allowed –’
‘It’s not the fault of the Church Gazette. One can’t expect them to inspect all the properties they advertise. The fault was mine for not immediately realizing that “old-world charm” meant “no modern conveniences”.’
‘Gaudeamus igitur!’ cried Christian, flourishing a roll of toilet paper.
‘Christian, stop behaving like a precocious undergraduate and stir the baked beans. James, go outside and see if Norman’s finished being sick.’
‘Is Norman ill?’ said Grace alarmed.
‘Daddy,’ said Primrose, ‘what are bedbugs?’
‘Bugger, bugger, bugger!’ shouted Sandy with zest.
Grace reeled. ‘Sandy! Christian, did you –’
‘No, Mother, not guilty, absolutely not. I say, these beans look a bit odd –’
‘Here’s Norman,’ said James. ‘I think he might be dying.’
‘I feel terrible,’ said Norman, looking like death.
‘It’s always so metaphysically interesting,’ mused Christian, very much the Winchester scholar, ‘when feelings so precisely mirror appearances.’
‘Shut up, you great big beastly brute!’ yelled Norman.
‘Enough!’ I barked as Grace started swaying in the doorway. ‘Grace and Norman – go to bed at once before you both pass out. Christian, make the tea. James, start spooning out the baked beans. Primrose, bring over those plates from the dresser. Sandy –’ I sighed and reached for the toilet paper. There were times when even I, a devout clergyman dedicated to preaching the joys of family life, was obliged to admit that being a husband and father could leave a lot to be desired.
V
‘Why can’t Sandy learn to do without nappies?’ asked Primrose later when the spam and baked beans had been consumed. ‘I gave up nappies when I was much younger than he is.’
‘All babies are different, my love.’
‘You may think you’re clever,’ said Christian to Primrose, ‘but I walked, talked, gave up nappies and translated The Iliad well before my first birthday.’
‘Show-off!’ retorted Primrose, who was a girl of spirit.
‘Did he really, Daddy?’ said James worried.
‘No, of course not!’
James who was nine, had begun to realize that he was not so clever as his older brothers, and I knew he was mortified that he never came top of his class. Unlike Christian and Norman, he would never lighten my financial burdens by winning a Winchester scholarship,
