are in a sort of bubble filled with that getting-a-cold smell, and inside that bubble is Cranbury and Aunt Maria, and that is the entire world. It is hard to remember there is any land outside Cranbury. I got into a kind of daze of boredom. It was humming in my ears. When you get that way, the most ordinary things get violently exciting. I know when I looked round and saw a cat on the living-room windowsill it was like Christmas or my birthday, or when Chris’s friend Andy notices me. Wonderful! And it was one of those grey fluffy cats with a flat silly face that are normally utterly boring. It was staring intensely in at us through the glass, opening its mouth and dribbling down its grey ruff, and I stared back into its flat yellow eyes – they were slightly crossed – as if that cat was my favourite friend in all the world.
“You’re not attending, dear,” said Aunt Maria, and she turned to see what I was staring it. Her face went red. She levered herself up on one stick and stumped towards the window, slashing the air with her other stick. “Get off! How dare you sit on my windowsill!” The cat glared in stupid horror and fled for its life. Aunt Maria sat back down, puffing. “He comes in my garden all the time,” she said. “After birds. As I was saying, Ann Haversham and Rosa Brisling were great friends until Miss Phelps said that. Now you mustn’t think I’m annoyed with Amaryllis Phelps, but I was hurt—”
I thought she was horrid to that cat. I couldn’t listen to her after that. I sat and wondered about Chris’s ghost. It could have been a joke. But if it wasn’t – I didn’t know whether I wanted it to be Dad’s ghost trying to tell Chris where his body was, or not. The idea made my teeth want to chatter, and I had a sort of ache of fear and excitement.
“Do attend, dear,” said Aunt Maria. “This is interesting.”
“I am,” I said. She had been talking about Elaine-next-door. I had sort of heard. “We met Elaine,” I said. “She came in last night with a torch.”
“You mustn’t call her Elaine, dear,” Aunt Maria said. “She’s Mrs Blackwell.”
“Why not?” I said. “She said Elaine.”
“That’s because I always call her that,” Aunt Maria said. “But if you do, it’s rude.”
So I’m calling her Elaine. Elaine came marching in again, in her black mac but without her torch, at the same time as Chris and Mum. I’d heard Chris’s voice and then Mum’s and I jumped up, feeling I was being let out of prison. Something was actually happening! Then the living-room door opened and it was Elaine. “Don’t go, dear,” Aunt Maria said to me. “I want you here to be introduced.”
I had to stand there, while Elaine took no notice of me as before. She went to Aunt Maria and kissed her cheek. “They’ve done your shopping,” she said, “and I told them where to put things. Is there anything else you want me to tell them?”
“They’re being very good,” Aunt Maria said. She had gone all merry. “They’re trying quite hard. I don’t expect them to get anything right straightaway.”
“I see,” said Elaine. “I’ll go and tell them to make an effort then.” She was not joking. She was like a Police Chief taking her orders from the Great Dictator.
“Before you do,” Aunt Maria said merrily, “I want you to meet my new little Naomi. Such a dear little great-niece!”
Elaine turned her face towards me. “Mig,” I said. “I prefer being called Mig.”
“Hello, Naomi,” said Elaine, and she strode out of the room again. When I went after her, I found her standing over Mum and Chris and scads of carrier bags, saying, “And you really must make sure she is never left alone.”
Mum, looking very flustered, said, “We left Mig here.”
“I know,” Elaine said grimly, meaning that was what she was complaining of. Then she turned to Chris. Her mouth made the stretch with two creases at the ends. “You,” she said. “You have the look of a gallant young man. I’m sure you’ll keep your aunt company in future, won’t you?”
We think it was meant to be flirtatious. We stared at one another as the back door shut crisply behind Elaine. “Well!” Mum said. “You seem to have made a hit, Chris! And talking of hits, hit her I shall if she gives me one more order. Who does she think she is?”
“Aunt Maria’s Chief of Police,” I said.
“Right!” said Mum.
Then we unpacked all the loads of provisions and, guess what? We found a deep-freeze in the cupboard beside the sink, absolutely stuffed with food. There was ice cream and bread and hot dog sausages and raspberries in it. Half the stuff Mum had bought was things that were there already. Chris sorted through it with great zeal. Mum is always amazed at how much he eats and keeps saying, “You can’t still be hungry!” I have tried to explain, from my own experience. It’s a sort of nagging need you have, even when you feel full. It’s not starving, just that you keep wanting more to eat.
“Yes,” says Mum. “That’s what I mean. How can you find room? Oh dear. We wronged poor Lavinia again. She left Aunt Maria very well supplied after all.”
Chris taxed Aunt Maria with this over lunch. Aunt Maria said loftily, “I never pry into the kitchen, dear. But frozen food is very bad for you.” And before Chris could point out that Aunt Maria was at the moment eating frozen peas, Aunt Maria rounded on Mum. “I was so ashamed, dear, when Elaine came in. The thought of her seeing you and Naomi in that state. And you went out like that, dear.”
“What state? Out like what?” we all said.
Aunt Maria lowered her eyes. “In trousers!” she whispered, hushed and horrified. Mum and I stared from Mum’s jeans to mine and then at one another. “And Naomi’s hair so untidy,” Aunt Maria continued. “She must have forgotten to plait it today. But of course you’ll both change this afternoon, won’t you? In case any of my friends call.”
“And what about me?” Chris asked sweetly. “Shall I wear a skirt too?” Aunt Maria pretended not to hear, so he added, “In case any of your friends call?”
“These peas are really delicious,” Aunt Maria said loudly to Mum. “I wouldn’t have thought peas were in season yet. Where did you find them?”
“They’re frozen,” Chris said, even louder, but she pretended not to hear that either.
It is very hard to know how deaf Aunt Maria is. Sometimes she seems like a post, like then, and sometimes she can sit in the living-room and hear what you whisper in the kitchen with both doors shut in between. Chris says the rule is she hears if you don’t want her to. Chris is thoroughly exasperated by that. He keeps trying to practise his guitar. In the little room halfway upstairs, with his door shut, Mum and I can hardly hear the guitar, but whenever Chris starts to play, Aunt Maria springs up, shrieking, “What’s that noise? There’s a burglar trying to break into the house!” I know how Chris feels, because Aunt Maria does that when I have my Walkman on too. Even if I turn it so low hardly a whisper comes into the earphones, Aunt Maria shrieks, “What’s that noise? Is the tank in the loft leaking?”
Mum has made us both stop. “It is her house, loves,” she said when we argued. “We’re only her guests.”
“On a working holiday!” Chris snarled. Mum was cleaning Aunt Maria’s brass, because Aunt Maria said that this was Lavinia’s
