‘No, darling, you’ll see Mummy later. Now listen, James. Mrs Hodges’s daughter is going to come for him at five-thirty. That’s when she finishes work. She’s going to take him back to her place and I’ll pick him up when I get home. And now I must fly, I’m meeting Gilbert at three.’

‘Well!’ exploded Rosamund as the car disappeared down the drive.

‘Isn’t she the end? Fancy getting lumbered with him. I was going to do my holiday art project.’

‘I was going to turn my room out, but it’s no good moaning. We’ve got him and that’s that.’

Oliver, once the front door was closed, had begun to whimper.

‘If it wasn’t raining we could go in the garden. We could take him out for a walk.

‘It is raining,’ said James. ‘And what would we take him in? Mum’s basket on wheels? The wheelbarrow? In case you hadn’t noticed, dear Mirabel didn’t think to bring his push chair. Come on, let’s take him in the kitchen. The best thing to do with him is to feed him. He shuts up when he’s eating.’

In the larder James found a packet of Penguin biscuits, the chocolate-covered kind, and gave one to Oliver. Oliver sat on the floor and ate it, throwing down little bits of red and gold wrapping paper. Then he opened the saucepan cupboard and began taking out all the pots and pans and the colander and the sieves, getting chocolate all over the white Melamine finish on the door. Rosamund wiped the door and then she wiped him which made him grizzle and hit out at her with his fists. When the saucepans were spread about the floor, Oliver opened all the drawers one after the other and took out cutlery and cheese graters and potato peelers and dishcloths and dusters.

James watched him gloomily. ‘I read somewhere that a child of two, even a child with a very high IQ, can’t ever concentrate on one thing for more than nineteen minutes at a time.’

‘And Oliver isn’t two yet and I don’t think his IQ’s all that amazing.’

‘Exactly,’ said James.

‘Ink,’ said Oliver. He kicked the knives and forks out of his way and came to James, hitting out with a wooden spoon. ‘Ink.’

‘Imagine him with ink,’ said Rosamund.

‘He’s probably not saying ink. It’s something else he means only we don’t know what.’

‘Ink, ink, ink!’

‘If we lived in London we could take him for a ride on a bus. We could take him to the zoo.’

‘If we lived in London,’ said James, ‘we wouldn’t be looking after him. I tell you what, I reckon he’d like television. Mirabel hasn’t got television.’

He picked Oliver up and carried him into the living room. The furniture in there was dark brown leather and would not mark so it seemed sensible to give him another Penguin. James switched the television on. At this time of day there wasn’t much on of interest to anyone, let alone someone of Oliver’s age, only a serial about people working at an airport. Oliver, however, seemed entranced by the colours and the movement, so James shoved him into the back of an armchair and with a considerable feeling of relief, left him.