He groaned. ‘The cupboard?’
‘Precisely. The cupboard. Why can’t you keep all that junk in the dark-room?’
‘I can’t see in the dark-room.’
‘Isn’t that rather the idea?’
‘Not for finding things.’
‘Well, you can’t keep that wretched printing paper in my food cupboard. Incidentally, another lot arrived from Kodak yesterday.’
His face registered mild disapproval. ‘Well, thanks for telling me! I was waiting for it.’ He played with her wrist, twisting it round delicately into different patterns, making pictures with her hands. ‘Where did you put the stuff?’
She laughed in spite of herself. ‘With the rest.’
‘In the food cupboard?’
‘There are some things you can’t fight!’ she acknowledged forlornly. ‘Still, they’ve got to go. Besides, they might get spoiled.’
‘How can they,’ he countered, ‘in your nice, clean, well-kept kitchen cupboard?’
‘Flattery will get you nowhere.’
‘Tell you what!’ he said. ‘I’ll do them next Saturday. Today the lawn. Also I want to develop those pictures of Maureen. You do want to see them, don’t you?’
She sighed resignedly. ‘All right; you win. But you must do it without fail next Saturday.’
He threw up his hands in mock despair. ‘Who promised to obey whom? All right, it shall be done.’
Julia picked up the tray and waited pointedly. ‘Now, drink up,’ she said, unconsciously using exactly the same tone as she did with Maureen. ‘No lunch until.’ She took the soup-bowl affair from him. ‘Let me see you move the ice-cream wagon — or whatever you call it. I know your tricks!’
‘For heaven’s sake, when are you going to stop treating me like a child?’
‘You know the answer to that!’ she said. ‘Come on, I’ll help you.’
Maureen was home from school in time for lunch, and they sat down, the three of them, to steak and kidney pudding. It was good lawn-mowing food.
‘I’ve finished cutting the grass,’ said Cartwright, with inordinate pride. Mr Jossborough, their immediate neighbour, mowed his lawn once every three weeks.
‘Thank you, darling,’ said Julia, lumping the potato out of a steaming dish. ‘Have you put the machine away?’
‘I’ll do that after din-dins,’ he said, mimicking her.
Maureen laughed. ‘Din-dins!’ she repeated.
‘Daddy is a very lazy man,’ said Julia, pretending to be cross. ‘I hope you don’t grow up to be as lazy as he is.’
‘My teacher thinks I’m lazy,’ said Maureen without reproach. ‘She says I fall asleep in class.’
Julia looked at her reproachfully. ‘Do you?’
Maureen tested a piece of kidney with her fork. ‘I’m not the only one,’ she said guiltily. ‘Teacher’s such a bore.’ She sounded very grown-up all of a sudden.
John said: ‘It’s not very polite to go to sleep, dear. At any rate, you mustn’t be caught doing it.’
‘John!’
‘Well!’ he exclaimed with his mouth full, ‘I always went to sleep during army lectures — only nobody ever saw me do it. It’s a matter of technique. You sleep, you see; and yet at the same time you don’t sleep. You’re moribund.’
‘What’s “moribund”?’ said Maureen.
‘Don’t take any notice of him!’ said Julia.
‘When I grow up,’ said Maureen, ‘I’m going to sleep whenever I like.’ Her tone changed perceptibly. ‘Mummy, do I have to eat this?’
‘Try, dear. Have a little of it, anyway. What’s happened to your appetite these days? You used to eat everything in sight!’
‘I’m just not hungry,’ she said simply.
‘Well, put it on my plate,’ said John. ‘I’ll eat it for you!’
They were silent for a while. An aircraft passed high overhead. Nothing was said until Maureen asked: ‘Can I get down, Mummy?’
‘Say your grace.’
‘ThankGodformygooddinneramen.’
‘Go and have a rest, there’s a good girl,’ said Julia.
There was no protest, and the child went quietly out of the room.
Julia waited until the door was shut behind Maureen. ‘You see?’ she said.
John looked absent-minded for a moment, not realising at first what she was talking about. ‘Oh, Maureen. I don’t know. After all, she’s growing up. She’s growing into a big girl. Nearly eight. You use energy when you grow.’
‘All the more reason to eat.’
‘Do you think there’s something on her mind?’ he asked. ‘Something worrying her?’
‘I wondered, too,’ said Julia. ‘But what? I thought I knew everything about that child, and she’s never seemed remotely unhappy up till now. And she looks so pale.’
‘Could it be something at the school that’s upsetting her? Perhaps some of the other children are making her unhappy?’
‘It’s possible. I think I’ll go and talk to the headmistress. She ought to know.’
Cartwright searched for the little machine he used for rolling his cigarettes.
‘On the sideboard,’ said Julia automatically. Then: ‘You know what I think? I think she’s a bit anaemic.’
‘Does Doctor Fuller think so?’
‘He didn’t mention it. But he’s given her an iron tonic.’
‘You don’t think she’s caught anything?’
‘There’s nothing at the school.’
John turned the handle and rolled the cigarette neatly. The mechanical action seemed to be geared to his thought processes, as if the act rolled a cylinder in his brain and set the controls for a decision.
‘I think you should see the teacher,’ he said. ‘She may have noticed something that we haven’t. And if Maureen isn’t any better in a few days, then we’ll go and see the doctor again.’ He had licked the paste, and now lit the cigarette with a table lighter. ‘Don’t worry too much, Julia,’ he added. ‘Lots of children go through phases like this. It’s all a part of growing up.’
Maureen was about the same when they took her to the doctor’s on the subsequent Tuesday.
Dr Fuller saw the parents privately after the consultation, while the child waited with the nurse in the other room.
Fuller was a short little man, with a flat top to his beautifully bald head. He stood with his weight slightly forward, as if he were about to open a door. He was squeezing out his chin with his right hand; pulling down the flesh until it formed a fat little lump below his face. Then, as his forefinger and thumb passed below the bone, the flesh shot up again with a visible wobbling motion. This usually meant he was puzzled.
‘I don’t know,’ he said. ‘I just don’t know.’ He closed the door of a medicine cabinet thoughtfully and with precision. ‘I know Maureen pretty well.’ It didn’t require comment. ‘She’s not generally like this. I’ve never known her like it before. You know how she always pulls my leg? Well, she didn’t this time. But physically she seems all right. I checked her thoroughly. What can be wrong? You were right to suggest a blood test. I’ve taken a slide, and I should get an analysis through by Friday. Maybe that will tell us something. If not, I’ll have her X-rayed.’
Julia was taking all this quite calmly. ‘What for?’ she said. ‘T.B.?’
‘Might have a spot on the lung,’ he said casually. ‘Nothing very serious about that. Got to catch it in time, though. I had one once; lovely excuse for a holiday in Switzerland.’ He somehow didn’t look as if he had ever taken a holiday in Switzerland. ‘Still, I don’t think it’s lung. Doesn’t cough, does she?’
Julia said: ‘No; I’ve never heard her coughing.’
‘That’s what I thought.’ He extended his hand. ‘I’ll let you know the moment the result of the blood test comes through,’ he said. ‘Meanwhile, don’t worry too much. And if Maureen seems to want to rest more than usual, well, let her. Can’t do her any harm.’ He squeezed his chin with the remaining hand. ‘Let me know if either of you start feeling a bit off-colour, won’t you?’