LITMIR.BIZ

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says. ‘Picked up an infection. We thought it best to nip it in the bud.’

      ‘He’s accident-prone,’ says Mac.

      Justin shoots his colleague a warning glance and puts an arm round my shoulder.

      ‘I’m trying to get something big off the ground. If it comes off then we must talk again. I take it you are interested?’

      ‘Oh yes, Mr Tymely.’

      ‘Call me Justin. We’re all one big happy family here, aren’t we, Mac?’

      ‘Yes, sir,’ says Mac, touching his forelock.

      Sandra has not been involved in any of the outdoor shooting and I have not seen her since we rummaged through the first-aid box together. Apart from the shaking-up I received, the sight of my phizog covered in bits of plaster does little to recapture the flavour of our earlier pre-grind touch-up and I eventually venture home by means of the Northern Line without suffering any loss of weight in the Y-front area.

      Returning to Scraggs Lane after the exterior shooting, I am surprised to find brother-in-law Sidney stuck into a cup of cha in the kitchen. There is a satisfied expression on his mush not dissimilar to that worn by cats with canary feathers sticking out of the corners of their cake-holes.

      ‘Hello, Timmy,’ he says. ‘Mum tells me you’ve become a bleeding film star. Can you get me lined up with a bit of crumpet?’

      ‘You do all right for yourself, Sidney,’ I tell him. ‘How’s the Cromby?’

      ‘Same as usual. Miss Ruperts had one of her turns and came down to dinner stark naked. I didn’t see it myself but I hear it was a disgusting eyeful.’

      ‘Sounds very nasty, Sid. How are the vacuum cleaners?’

      Sidney pushes his teacup away from him and looks at me thoughtfully. ‘Funny you should mention that, Timmo.’

      ‘I thought you might say that.’

      ‘There was an accident.’

      ‘No.’

      ‘Yes. Most unfortunate.’

      ‘Let me guess. Not a fire by any chance?’

      Sidney extends his arms and sighs deeply. ‘I know just what you’re thinking – but you’re wrong. I admit it did flash across my mind to set fire to the whole bleeding lot of them and collect the insurance. But, when it came to the pinch – well, you know me. Do you think I could do it?’

      ‘Sidney. This is probably going to come as a big surprise to you but, in a word: yes. Not only that but I think you could probably claim for the matches as a tax deduction.’

      Sidney closes his eyes and adopts an expression of anguish the like of which I have not seen since they last showed On the Waterfront on the telly.

      ‘Oh, Timmo, Timmo. How can you say that? I know we’ve had our ups and downs but if I can’t rely on you to believe me, who can I rely on?’

      I stare at Sidney blankly because, for the life of me, I cannot think of anyone. Maybe he shares my uncertainty because he continues without waiting for an answer: ‘Fireworks, Timothy. Fireworks. That’s what did it. You may recall that Guy Fawkes Day has just passed?’

      ‘I do recall that, Sidney.’

      ‘A stray rocket through one of the windows.’

      More like a two-inch mortar shell, I think to myself, but I remain silent.

      ‘Couldn’t the fire brigade do anything?’

      ‘They were all out on calls at the time.’

      ‘What a coincidence.’

      ‘Are you trying to suggest something?’

      ‘No, Sid. I was just wondering what that piece of sticking plaster was doing round your index finger.’

      ‘If you’re suggesting –’

      ‘That you rang in a whole lot of false alarms to keep the firemen busy while the warehouse burned down? Sidney! You know me better than that.’

      ‘It was an accident, so help me!’

      ‘Sid, it doesn’t matter if I believe you. It’s the insurance company that counts. I take it from the happy expression that was on your mug when I came through the door that they have coughed up?’

      ‘Justice has been done,’ says Sid grandly.

      ‘So you’re in the ackers again?’

      ‘I have recouped my loss. Yes.’

      ‘And no sign of Ishowi.’

      Sidney’s expression hardens. ‘No! Perishing little nip bastard! I wish he’d gone up with the cleaners.’

      ‘Sidney! Really. That’s no way to talk of an ex-colleague. You used to think very highly of him.’

      ‘Come off it! You can’t think highly of someone who only stands four-foot-six off the bleeding ground!’

      Sidney is definitely one to bear a grudge and there is obviously very little chance of him being invited to take the chair at the next meeting of the Anglo-Nippon Friendship Society. ‘I should have remembered what they did in the war,’ he says bitterly. ‘Your father warned me. It’s the only good bit of advice the bleeding old git has ever given me.’

      Any love lost between Sid and my Dad could be found wedged in the eye of a small needle and to remind me of this fact, Father Lea’s weary frame struggles into the kitchen and slumps into the only vacant chair.

      ‘Hello,’ he says, nodding at me and then at Mum. ‘Bleeding Ramon Navarro’s back with us, I see. Discussing a documentary on work-shy spongers, are you?’

      ‘If we were, you’d be a dead cert for the leading role, Dad,’ says Sid.

      ‘Don’t you “Dad” me. I never had no part in you!’

      ‘I should hope not. What a disgusting thing to say!’

      ‘Talk about work. You don’t know what it means. I’ve been slaving away down there since nine o’clock. Not a drop of food nor drink has passed my lips since I had a cup of tea this morning before you lot were up.’

      ‘That pong of beer is your deodorant, I suppose?’ I venture.

      ‘Deodorant?’ says Sid. ‘He can’t use one. When it gets a whiff of his armpits, that white stick thing shrinks back up the tube and won’t come down again.’

      ‘That’s marvellous, isn’t it?’ explodes Dad. ‘Decent working-class man slaves away all day and then comes back to be revealed in his own home. No wonder this bleeding country is going to the dogs. Any greedy, work-shy little basket can fiddle his way into a fortune while decent ordinary people have to scrimp and save to find two pennies to rub together.

      ‘You scrimped and saved enough to buy a colour telly, didn’t you?’

      ‘Blimey! I’m entitled to a little pleasure, aren’t I? I can’t afford to go out. What do you expect me to do? Watch the pattern on the wallpaper?’

      ‘You go out to the boozer,’ says Mum.

      ‘That’s fantastic, that is! Now you turn on me. I only got that colour telly because I thought it would give you some pleasure.

      ‘You only got it because my Premium Bond came up,’ says Mum.

      ‘That only paid for the deposit!’ bellows Dad. ‘Who’s looking after the instalments, then? You tell me that. I don’t know why I go on, I really don’t.’

      ‘I don’t know why you go on, either,’ says Sid. ‘Why don’t you belt up or drop dead or something?’

      The situation is quivering on the brink of unpleasantness but luckily Rosie chooses

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