Without saying anything else, Agnes peeled off her nightdress and climbed into the water, inserting her chubby body between her mother’s legs and sitting like a self-satisfied Buddha while the water came up to her chin. She picked up the bar of soap from the side, looked at it curiously, then bit into it. The soap shot from her dimpled fist but for a few seconds the expression on her face didn’t change at all. Then she opened her mouth and gave a hoarse cry, while mushy tabs of soap fell from her foaming tongue and she thrashed her arms in the water.

‘Oh Aggie, you’ve gone and done it again,’ said Irene. ‘Come on, out you get. We’ll have to rinse it and rinse it until the taste’s gone.’

She heaved herself out of the bath and lifted Agnes, still hooting dementedly, up over the bath’s rim. Her wet legs swung, and her oily body slipped through Irene’s grip, a plump, writhing eel.

‘Spit,’ she said, as she filled a plastic beaker with water. ‘Get rid of it.’

‘Hooooooooo.’

‘Spit.’

‘You woke me up. Why are you wearing no clothes?’

‘Oh Clem. Sorry. Are you feeling better? You shouldn’t be out of bed.’

‘Hooooooo.’

‘What’s wrong with her? Is she ill too?’

‘She’s fine. Go back to bed. Spit, Aggie.’

‘I had a flying dream.’

‘That’s nice,’ said Irene distractedly, sloshing cold water down Aggie’s howling mouth.

‘No. I kept bumping into things. I kept bumping into windows and cows and things. It hurt.’

‘That’s probably because you’re ill.’ Irene looked at Clem intently, noticing the waxy pallor of her skin and the way her cropped hair was slightly damp and stood up in little peaks above her forehead. ‘People often have funny dreams when they’re ill. I used to dream I was being chased by giant ants standing on their back legs.’

‘Did they have grass in their mouths?’

‘What?’

‘Hoooooo.’