"Help yourself. I feel we're going to get along fine. I'm an artist, that's why I need some help in the house. I work full-time at home. Book jackets mostly. I'm working on something at the moment. Absolutely dreadful, some fantasy book. But I always do my best, even when I don't like the material. That's one thing I have to make plain. When I'm in my studio, I'm afraid it's a no-go area. I mustn't be disturbed. Unless something dire happens with the brats."

Pamela noticed that Ruth had taken her sixth biscuit. She might have to be firm, there. It would be a shame for Ruth to spoil her lovely figure.

Pamela sighed inwardly. She had been eight stone when she and Trevor got married. But after the children she had put on weight. Of course, her shape was still all right, but she was three stone heavier. Ruth made her feel it, although Pamela did not acknowledge this. She shut the stomach of the pig and stood up.

"Well, I expect you'd like to see what you're in for. Bring your coffee."

"I've finished it, thank you."

The tour of the house was quite brief. Pamela would walk into a room, wave her arms artistically so her large breasts gesticulated in her cotton shirt, and then lead Ruth out again. Downstairs was a brown room with two large modern paintings, Trev's "study," which was done in beige with a poster of Corfu, and a small dining room with a chandelier and orange walls.

Upstairs on the second floor were the bedrooms and two bathrooms, one black and white with sepia photographs, and one yolk yellow, with a red abstract, and Pamela's studio, a large chamber in vermilion. On the vermilion were the large framed paintings Pamela had done for particularly successful books, and framed letters from authors and publishers thanking her. On an easel was an unfinished oil of mountains, towers, a girl and a winged horse. On several tables lay tubes of paint and brushes, bottles of turps, rags, various implements.

When they reached the third floor, there was a very small room which had been varnished purple. This was apparently to be Ruth's.

"I can't stand all that pink and chintz," said Pamela.

There was also a small bathroom. Across the landing were the children's bedrooms, and next door, their playroom. Quite an amount of noise was still coming from here.

"Isn't it ghastly," said Pamela, with a strange pride, "so much energy. We put them up here out of the way. Trev says we should fit them with silencers."

She opened the door. The room was white, and all over the walls were the drawings Pamela had encouraged her children to make, so the immediate effect was one of dangerous lunacy.