LITMIR.BIZ

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the gentlemen have come.’

      Things are pretty cramped in the tiny hall and when Rita joins us we need shoehorns. She is taller than her mother but built to the same pattern, e.g. bigly. Her hourglass figure has enough sand in it to last for six months. Not that I am complaining, mind you. I find all that flesh a bit intimidating but I would not mind her using my firm young body as a chattel for her base lusts should that be the only thing to stop her becoming a secret sennapod muncher.

      ‘Oh, hello,’ she says, sending her eyes rolling over us like a couple of balls bouncing round a pin table. ‘Did you have a good trip?’

      ‘First class,’ I say, but I am not only referring to our voyage north. With Sidney obviously spoken for by Mrs. R., this leaves the daughter to me. Whacko, the froggies! The sight of some bird lapping up Sidney has always been one to cause me near physical pain. I turn to Big N. and – oh dear! His eyes have glazed over and he is gazing at Rita like she is a bundle of fivers with his name written on them.

      ‘Did you see that bird?’ he says when we are alone.

      ‘Yeah, fantastic,’ I pant. Didn’t fancy her daughter much, though.’

      ‘I meant the daughter!’ says Sid. ‘I thought she was beautiful.’

      ‘I agree. I know some people would be put off by that squint but I rather like it. Makes her face more interesting somehow.’

      ‘What are you talking about?’ storms Sid. ‘She has lovely eyes.’

      ‘Oh yes, they’re lovely alright. It’s just that—well, I suppose you’d hardly notice it after a while. Especially if you were concentrating on her limp.’

      ‘Limp!?’

      ‘Yes. Now, come on. You must have noticed that. I thought she had a wooden leg at first. It was that hollow noise when she walked up the stairs.’

      ‘Sure it wasn’t something rattling around inside your head?’

      ‘Don’t be like that, Sid. I was only making a completely objective comment.’

      ‘Don’t try and confuse me with long words. I fancy that bird and nothing you say is going to change my mind.’

      And that is that. Sidney nearly spills the soup tureen fighting to sit next to Rita at suppertime, and I have never seen him do so much passing: pepper, salt, bread, butter. Nobody else gets a look in. He is behaving like Mr. Fanny Cradock. After supper he moves in front of the telly with her and spends more time gazing into her mush than looking at the screen.

      She munches her way quickly through a half pound box of chocs and occasionally says ‘ooh’ or ‘well, I never’! when sufficiently moved by something. How she feels about Sid it is difficult to tell with her cakehole full of hazelnut clusters but Mrs. Runcorn’s intentions are very obvious. She apologises about the furniture, the television set and anything else there is to eat, see or touch, and keeps asking if Sid would like a cup of tea or something. There is no doubt that her preference lies in the realm of ‘or something’.

      Eventually, at ‘News at Ten’ time, Sidney suggests that we should be turning in as we have a busy day tomorrow and we pad off leaving the girls to it. Our bedrooms are at opposite ends of the house, which means that they are at least eight feet apart and I notice that we have Mrs. R.’s room between us. We have not found out what happened to Mr. R. but he is certainly not around to clutter up the laundry basket.

      I pop into bed immediately and one thing I soon notice is that you can hear every sound in the house. It creaks like a windjammer in a BBC radio play. I hear Mrs. R. come upstairs and go into her room and soon there is the inviting wheeze of the springs as her body settles onto the bed. It is very disconcerting to know that she is only a few feet away from me on the other side of the wall, no doubt thinking the same kind of deliciously dirty thoughts as myself – only about Sid, while he in turn pines for Rita. My God, but life can be cruel, can’t it, Carruthers?

      As I lie there getting more and more worked up it occurs to me that nothing will be lost by nipping next door and asking for a hot water bottle, or a glass of water, or the telephone number of the local chinese laundry, or anything. Maybe I will be able to convert her to an appreciation of my own vastly superior charms, or maybe she will reckon that anything is better than nothing – I mean, it is a philosophy I have followed myself with considerable success.

      I am just swinging my feet off the bed when I hear Rita coming upstairs and the sound of Sid’s door opening. Immediately the bedsprings next door break into full squeak and Mrs. R. opens her door. As that opens so Sid’s closes and I hear Rita being asked what time she would like to be called in the morning. Rita reminds mum that she has already said, and mum goes back to bed again. I give it another five minutes and then, just as I am about to chance my arm again, I hear Sid’s door opening. This time the squeaking of the springs next door is very subdued and, at first, I do not think that Mrs. R. is getting out of bed. But she is. I hear Sidney yelp in terror as her door is suddenly thrown open.

      ‘Looking for something, Mr. Noggett?’ The voice is husky and has more promises in it than a Party Political Broadcast.

      ‘The bathroom, Mrs. Runcorn.’

      ‘That’s still on the landing.’

      ‘Oh yes. I must have turned the wrong way.’

      ‘Don’t do that, Mr. Noggett.’

      ‘No. No, I won’t. Good night, Mrs. Runcorn.’

      ‘Good night, Mr. Noggett. You know where I am if you need anything.’

      ‘Er—yes. Thank you.’

      Blimey! Sid must really have a dose of the hots for Miss Runcorn if he is going to turn down a cast iron certainty like mum. Just as well though. The sound of Sid bashing out Ravel’s Bolero on Mrs. R.’s bedsprings while I fretted next door would be enough to make me look round for a new hobby.

      I listen attentively but there are no more interesting noises and the next thing I hear is an alarm going off. The day of the Noggett Nugget launch has arrived.

      After breakfast Sid goes off to lead the girls on a major onslaught on the larger dealers and I find myself outside number fifty-eight Roberts Road. I choose fifty-eight because it is the last house in the street, it has just started to rain and I have to start somewhere.

      ‘Good morning,’ I say when the door opens, ‘I wonder if I could steal a few moments of your time. I’m conducting a survey into electrical appliances in the home and I would like to ask you a few questions about the products you own.’

      ‘You what?’ says the woman suspiciously. I repeat the question three times before she shakes her head. ‘My husband wouldn’t like that.’

      ‘But –’ No good. The door has been closed in my face.

      At the next house there is no answer yet I sense that there is someone at home. After prolonged jabs at the doorbell, I sink to my haunches and push open the letter box flap. Staring back at me are a pair of eyes. They are arranged side by side like yours or mine but I find the experience disconcerting. It is like a corpse winking at you. I jump back in surprise and when I next look the eyes have gone.

      ‘What are you frightened of?’ I shout through the letterbox. ‘I know you’re in there!’ A feeling that I am behaving in a slightly berk-like fashion is reinforced when I turn round to find the milkman looking down at me.

      ‘I thought I smelt burning,’ I say weakly.

      ‘I wish I could, lad. They’re boogers in there when it comes to paying for owt,’ he says. ‘I think they’ve dug a tunnel out to the back alley. That door hasn’t been opened since Armistice Day.’

      At the next house there is no answer and at the next a small child tells me that Uncle Jack is helping mummy with the plumbing and that she can’t come. The noises in the background tend to disprove this statement but I don’t say anything. You can’t really, can you?

      It

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