'Hello, group!' she said happily. 'It's Ralph! I got him back!'

'Ah!' said Emma. 'This calls for a celebration!' Everyone ignored her.

'I'm sorry,' said my mother, 'have you got the right house? Or the right self-help group?'

'Yes, yes,' the woman asserted. 'It's Julie, Julie Aseizer. I've been coming to this group every week for the past three years!'

There was silence in the group. All you could hear was the quiet click of Mrs Beatty's knitting needles.

'Well, I haven't seen you,' announced the tall thin man. He looked around at the group. 'Does anyone recognise this person?'

The group members shook their heads blankly.

'I expect you think this is really funny, don't you?' said the thin man angrily. 'This is a self-help group for people with severe memory aberrations and I really don't think it is either amusing or constructive for pranksters to make fun of us! Now, please leave!'

The woman stood for a moment, biting her lip, but it was her husband who spoke.

'Come on, darling, I'm taking you home.'

'But wait—!' she said. 'Now he's back everything is as it was and I wouldn't have needed to come to your group, so I didn't — yet I remember—'

Her voice trailed off and her husband gave her a hug as she started to sob. He led her out, apologising profusely all the while.

As soon as they had gone the thin man sat down indignantly.

'A sorry state of affairs!' he grumbled.

'Everyone thinks it's funny to do that old joke,' added Mrs Beatty, 'that's the second time this month.'

'It gave me a powerful thirst,' added Emma. 'Anyone else?'

'Maybe,' I suggested, 'they should start a self-help group for themselves – they could call it Eradications Anonymous Anonymous.'

No one thought it was funny and I hid a smile. Perhaps there would be a chance for me and Landen after all.

I didn't contribute much to the group after that, and indeed the conversation soon threaded away from eradications and on to more mundane matters, such as the latest crop of TV shows that seemed to have flourished in my absence. Celebrity Name That Fruit! hosted by Frankie Saveloy was a ratings topper these days, as was Toasters from Hell and You've Been Stapled!, a collection of England's funniest stationery incidents. Emma had given up all attempts at subtlety by now and was prising the lock off the drinks cabinet with a screwdriver when Friday wailed one of those ultrasonic cries that only parents can hear – makes you understand how sheep can know whose lamb is whose – and I mercifully excused myself. He was standing up in his cot rattling the bars, so I took him out and read to him until we were both fast asleep.

10
Mrs Tiggy-Winkle

KIERKEGAARD BOOK – BURNING CEREMONY PROVES DANISH PHILOSOPHER'S UNPOPULARITY

Chancellor Yorrick Kaine last night officiated at the first burning of Danish literature with the incineration of eight copies ot Fear and Trembling, a quantity that fell far short of the expected 'thirty or forty tons'. When asked to comment on the apparent lack of enthusiasm among the public for torching their Danish philosophy. Kaine explained that 'Kierkegaard is clearly less popular than we thought, and rightly so – next stop Hans Christian Andersen!' Kierkegaard himself was unavailable for comment, having inconsiderately allowed himself to be dead for a number of years.