I waited till he’d gone into the kitchen, and then slipped down as quietly as I could, leaning on the banister rail to take weight off the stairs that creak. When I got close enough to hear what they were saying, the kitchen door swung open a couple of inches, and I could see Mum dealing laundry into piles on the table as fast as a croupier at a casino.
‘Mine. Kitty’s. Jude’s. These socks are mine, I think. Kitty’s – no, she’s grown out of it, it must be Jude’s now. Mine. Kitty’s. Mine.’
Goggle-eyes must have been rinsing grime from the radiators off his hands. I could hear water splashing in the sink as he said:
‘Why don’t you get one of the girls to help you?’
Mum laughed her hollow laugh, ‘Oh, ho, ho, ho!’ Then she threw down the last of the socks. ‘Jude’s. Kitty’s. Mine. That’s it!’
Lifting the nearest pile, which happened to be mine, she made for the door. But he stepped in front of her and prised the clothes from her arms. I couldn’t see the expression on his face, but I’ve no doubt that he was goggling at her as usual, because she was blushing when she protested:
‘No. Let me take them.’
‘No. Let her.’
Wrenching the door fully open so I was forced to duck beneath the banisters, he bellowed up the stairs:
‘Kitty! Come down and fetch your laundry from your mother!’
‘And hang it neatly on your floor,’ said Mum.
Goggle-eyes turned, and told her in stern tones:
‘It’s not a joke, Rosalind. Kitty’s room is a pit.’
I saw Mum’s grin fade pretty fast, and I knew why. Mum’s like me. She hates it when people speak out of turn about things they don’t understand. What Goggle-eyes didn’t know was that Mum used to be at me all the time about my room, threatening and cajoling, stopping my allowance and forbidding me to go out with my friends until it was tidy. She must have spent entire weeks of her life fighting the battle of my room with me, grinding on and on about it until, once every couple of weeks or so, I used to crack and reckon it was probably less trouble to clear it up than keep on arguing that it’s my room and I should be allowed to keep it how I like. But after Dad left home, Mum just gave up. We had one or two last horrible rows about the mess, and then she suddenly seemed to throw her hands up about the whole business. I think, once she was on her own, she simply couldn’t face the effort and unpleasantness of all that endless nagging and scolding.
What did old Goggle-eyes know about that? Nothing. He didn’t live with us. He didn’t know us. He didn’t understand that I’m one of those people who practically only have to glance in a room for it to begin to look as if a bomb hit it. If my poor mum stayed on my case long and hard enough to keep me tidy all the time, she’d have to give up hours of her time. She’d probably have to give up work.
Mum has her pride. She wasn’t going to tell Gerald Faulkner that, now my father wasn’t in the house to back her up through every battle, she’d had to make a virtue of necessity and throw in the sponge. Keeping her tone light, she just said to him:
‘Oh, take it easy, Gerald. Maybe you’ve just forgotten what kids Kitty’s age are like.’
‘Don’t try to tell me they all have floors thick with tangled electrical wires, and filthy dishes, and books in great untidy heaps!’
Mum was still trying to make light of it.
‘I call it her open-plan filing system.’
‘I call it disgusting.’
He put his foot in it there. It was quite clear from the expression on Mum’s face that, for the moment, she had heard enough from Gerald Faulkner about his views on natty housekeeping. Purposefully silent, she reached out for the laundry pile. But Goggle-eyes refused to hand it over. He hadn’t finished yet.
‘You’re doing your girls no favours,’ he lectured. ‘Letting them get away with murder.’
That really rattled Mum.
‘Murder?’ she snapped. ‘For heaven’s sake, Gerald! Look at the planet we live on! Wars. Famine. Poverty. These things bring misery to half the world! Ten million pounds a minute is spent on arms! My Kitty spends her time coming with me to meetings, raising money by shaking collecting cans, and trying to let the taxpayers of this country know that, for the cost of one single nuclear weapons system, we could afford a decent health service!’ She waved her arms in a flamboyant gesture. ‘What does it matter if her bedroom floor is knee deep in knickers?’
Time to stop eavesdropping, and push the door open fast! I wasn’t going to risk hearing his answer to that one!
‘Ah!’ he said, hearing me come in. ‘At last!’
He turned and dumped the laundry in my arms.
‘There you are,’ he said cheerfully. ‘Another forkful for your compost heap.’
I thought what he said was rather funny actually (though I would rather have died than smiled). But for some reason a look of real irritation crossed Mum’s face. Her lips set in the way they did when she and Dad were on the verge of arguing.
‘Gerald,’ she said coldly. ‘It’s not my children’s fault I always reckoned I had better things to do with my time than stand over them while they folded their vests and put their things away neatly. So please try not to pick on Kitty because, like me, she now thinks there are more important things in life than properly made beds and tidy sock drawers!’
I caught my breath. Dad absolutely hates it when Mum goes all tight-lipped and snooty on him. He scowls and snaps right back.
But Goggle-eyes was unruffled. In fact, he was standing there grinning his head off.
‘Rosalind!’ he said. ‘How can you talk such utter piffle?’
I think Mum was speechless from shock. (I know I was speechless from terror.) But Goggle-eyes was still beaming.
‘What you say sounds so lofty, so high-minded! But it’s pure rubbish.’
‘Rubbish?’ Poor Mum was mouthing like a fish.
‘Yes, rubbish. And I’ll tell you why.’ He waved a hand towards the ceiling. ‘I happened to walk past your bathroom half an hour ago, and, being the tidy sort of bloke I am, I couldn’t help noticing that it was in a shocking state. Simply shocking! Filthy rings round the bath. Teacups and bits of Lego everywhere. Soggy comics on the floor. Why, the lavatory was absolutely festooned with paper.’
Mum opened her mouth to interrupt, but he lifted his hand to stop her, and pressed on.
‘Then what happened, Rosalind? I walked by twenty minutes later and it looked perfect. Clear floor, clean bath, nice gleaming surfaces. Who cleaned it up? Not me. I was still scouring the house for that airlock. Not Judith. She’s out there swinging upside down in the park. And I’ll bet that it wasn’t Kitty here. I’d be prepared to put my life savings on that!’
I gave him the sour look that he deserved, but he didn’t notice. He was too busy smiling at Mum.
‘So who pitched in there with the wet mop, Rosalind? Who wiped the mirrors and the taps? Who was it took time off from going to meetings, and shaking cans in the street, and calling for an end to the arms race? Who was it cleaned up the bathroom?’
Mum went bright pink.
‘See!’ he crowed. ‘It was you. Of course it was. And all I’m saying is that every now and again, a serious and committed citizen like yourself could do with a little bit of help with the housework from equally serious and committed Kitty here!’