‘He was a little cruel to a couple of the younger cousins, but, and this is most, he was especially disappointed not to search you. He made comments about it, in particular terms not exactly pleasant, that he would, you know, turn you inside out. He remembers, and retold the history, of finding you after poor Uncle Pitter’s pin. Well, dear plug, that’s the story, a penny dreadful to be sure; but don’t go home, lose yourself a bit, be quiet until evensong and then maybe he shall have forgotten.’

‘Thank you, Tummis,’ I said, shaking his hand and apologising as the dear fellow winced, ‘ever so.’

‘I shall head to my home, which will be underpopulated without you. But to my fur beetles and fireblats, to my mealworm beetles and my cockroaches, to my woodlouses and my clothes moths and my phorids, my darkling beetles and flesh flies, my thrips and sowbugs and my pill bugs and midges and grainbugs and earwigs and bot flies and of course to my gull, I shall pass your salutations.’

‘Thank you, my dear tap, I’ll find you later.’

‘Off you go then, plug,’ he said, ‘and be obscure about it.’

Grandfather

So into higher corridors I went, but not quite so high as the attics where the ceilings are thick with disease-carrying bats, kicking up the dust which was deep here and there, watching the progress of a snail or two in damp back rooms, stepping over the slugs, listening out for the rats, hoping to avoid Cousin Moorcus. Cousin Moorcus had broken arms and legs on five different occasions; it was not uncommon for an Iremonger cousin to end up in the Infirmary after Moorcus had been about him. Indeed it was most regular. I was particularly eager, profoundly eager, to avoid him.