'Of course not. I refer to the Applecroft Fund for supporting Liberal candidates. I did not intend to approach them but I always can if you lack all interest in your husband's career in life.'

'Phineas!' Millie tried to sound positively menacing. 'I tell you again that I accept no responsibility for the future of the boys, financial or otherwise. They are out of my hands.'

'Well, Millie, in the very, very last resort, that's a matter for the common law, is it not? But there is no need at all for it to come to that.'

'It would be bad for your chances, if it did.'

'Not nowadays. Your notion of the world often seems antediluvian, Millie dear.'

'The boys neither love nor want me. Not that they love or want you either.'

Quite unselfconsciously, Phineas smiled. 'What boys feel for their father is something a woman cannot understand, not even their mother. It's something that really is antediluvian, Millie.'

'If you had any understanding whatever of what goes on around you, you'd know better than to talk such rubbish.'

'No one is more concerned than I am about what goes on everywhere in the world.'

His eyes were filled with a need for his mission to be understood and appreciated; for the lactose that by now really was due.

Millie set about preparing it.

'Where are the boys?' asked Phineas, as the sun sank in unnoticed glory.

'I expect they're at the Lavender Bag, as they were last night.' Millie looked at her watch; the boys having stopped the clock so often that it no longer seemed to her worth paying for repairs. 'No. The Lavender Bag will have shut some time ago.'

'Perhaps it's some kind of special evening?'

'They would have come here and gorged themselves and then gone back.'

'Well, what are we to think, Millie? It really might be better if you took more interest in what your sons do. I shan't be able to give so much time to it in the future. You must understand that.'

Millie went to the record-player and put on Honegger's Pacific 231. The next piece on the record was Mossolov's factory music. Before the record could reach Gravini's Homage to Marinetti, Millie turned the machine off.

'Would you like your supper? I should like mine.'

'I shall have to take more care over what I eat now that I have so much greater responsibility.'

But when, shortly afterwards, the moment came, he seemed to pick and niggle very much as usual. Her own appet.i.te was undoubtedly the more disturbed of the two.

In the end, the police arrived, though not until it was quite dark. Most unusually, it was Phineas who unwound himself and let the man in. For this reason, Millie did not learn his rank: lacked the opportunity to glance at his official card. The man was not in his blues, but dressed overall by a multiple outfitter.

'Good evening, madam. Do either of you know anything of two men named Angus Morke and Rodney Morke? They've given this address.'

'They are our two sons, officer,' said Phineas.

'Indeed, sir? I should hardly have thought it. Certainly not in your case, madam. These two are fully grown men. In fact, rather more than that.'

'Don't be ridiculous, officer,' said Phineas. 'They are our sons, and we know exactly how big they are.'

'I wonder if you altogether do, sir. If you don't mind my saying so, madam. It took a whole squad to get them under any kind of control. And, even then, there are some very nasty injuries which the Court will be hearing about tomorrow, in addition to the other charges. The Sergeant is worried about whether the cells will hold them. The station isn't Parkhurst Prison. It's only intended for quiet overnight cases. But I mustn't do all the talking. I've only come to make the usual routine enquiries. The two men boys, if you prefer, madam do really reside here, then?'

'Of course they do,' said Phineas. 'This is their home.'

'If you say so, sir. Now, how old would each of them be?'

'They are twins. Surely you must have realised that? As far as I recall, they are rising sixteen.'

'You mean that they're fifteen, sir?'

'Yes, I think that's right. Fifteen.'

'It's incredible, if you don't mind my saying so, madam.'

'In the course of your work,' said Phineas, 'you must have realised that some boys grow faster than some other boys.'

It was high time for Millie to speak. 'What have the two of them done?'

'What are they alleged to have done?' Phineas corrected. 'If anything, of course.'

The officer made it clear that from now on, and whatever the rule book might say, he preferred to deal with Millie.

'I'm afraid the charges are rather serious, madam. In fact, we've never before had anything to compare with it since the station first opened, which of course was when most of the houses like this one were being built. We haven't had much violence in the suburb, serious violence that is; though of course it's growing fast pretty well everywhere in the world.'

'What have they done, officer? Please tell me. I'm perfectly able to face it.' Again, the additional burden that could at the same time be a further remote prospect of freedom!

'Remember,' put in Phineas, 'that it's still only mere allegation. It is well known that the police exaggerate; sometimes very greatly. I speak as an adopted Parliamentary candidate.'

'Do you indeed, sir? For somewhere round here, that is?'

'No, not locally. But it makes no difference.'

'Well, madam,' said the officer, with professional quietness, 'as for the charges, they include a long list of a.s.saults, fifteen at least so far, and we are expecting more. Some of those we already have are very serious indeed. Not what we're used to round here, as I have remarked. More like the Glasgow docks in the old days, I should have said. Then there's a lot of damage to property. A lot of damage to a lot of property, I should have put it. Doors stove in and roofs ripped about and ornaments smashed. There are a couple of attempted rapes expected to be reported soon, from what the other officers say. A couple at least.'

'In these times, there's no such thing as attempted rape,' objected Phineas. 'It's a rape, or it isn't a rape, and most people are very doubtful about it even if it's supposed to be proved.'

'And that's not to mention the injuries inflicted on the officers, which we don't like at all, madam, especially in a quiet district like this.'

'No,' said Millie soberly, 'I'm sure not.'

'Now, if I could have a few details of the education these lads have had? Supposing them to have had any, of course. But it's no matter for joking, all the same. It's an offence too, not to educate a child.'

Millie realised that the night air was coming in through the front door which Phineas had left open: the night air of a hot summer. Phineas made no move, and Millie did not care to leave him just then even for a single moment. Besides, closing the outer door might lead to new suspicions.

By the end of it, and indeed long before that, Millie knew perfectly well that Phineas should have produced the whisky, but that, thanks to Phineas, there was no whisky in the house. Most a.s.suredly she could not be absent long enough to make tea, even supposing the officer to be interested in tea at that hour.

'If the accused really are what the law calls minors,' said the officer, 'then a parent will be required to attend the Court.'

'Of course my husband will attend the Court,' said Millie.

'Perhaps you too, madam? A mother can often influence the Justices more than a father.'

Millie smiled. 'I shall remember that, officer.'

'Not that a case of this kind is likely to remain with Petty Sessions for long. It will be simply a matter of a quick committal, as far as I can see.'

'I'm sure you are once more greatly exaggerating, officer,' said Phineas, smiling in his turn.

'You'll be there to hear for yourself, sir,' replied the officer, entirely reasonable.

When he had gone, Millie found it almost impossible even to speak to Phineas.

'I'm not sharing a room with you,' she managed to say.

'Please yourself,' said Phineas. 'After today's news, I've still a great deal to think about and plan, as anyone but you would see at once.'

Next morning, and really quite early next morning, the childless Hubert Ellsworth was the first with the local news; or with a bit of it.

In his old yachting jumper, with part of the club name still on it, and shapeless grey bags splashed with oil from his garden workshop, he stood there trying to arrange his scattered locks.

'I thought I ought to tell you first, Phineas, as, after all, we are neighbours. I've heard that there are two s.e.x maniacs on the loose. Apparently, the authorities feel we should warn one another to keep everything bolted and barred. What times we live in! Eh, Phineas?'

Millie, who had overheard this in her nightdress, could already see, from the bathroom window, Morwena Ellsworthy sealing every aperture with pa.s.se-partout, despite the season, and even pulling down blinds.

The next arrival was young Graham, the local weekly's cub reporter, as people described him, and the only one who left the office very often. Girls tended to tell him that they liked the name Graham.

That time, Millie opened the door.

'May I come in for a few moments, Mrs. Morke? It's really rather important.'

Millie had never before spoken to him, though, like everyone else, she knew who he was. He was a nice young lad, everyone said. In any case, he was by now sufficiently practised in his profession never to take even the hint of a negation as an answer.

'Well, what is it?' asked Millie. 'Do sit down.'

Phineas, having dealt with Hubert Ellsworthy, had gone back to bed. In the marital bedroom: Millie had spent the night on the lounge sofa-convertible which, at the time of hire-purchase, she had, consciously or subconsciously, made sure really was long enough and wide enough to live up to its brochure.

'You've heard the news, Mrs. Morke?'

'What news in particular?'

'The police station in The Approach has been completely wrecked. I've never seen anything like it,' said young Graham very seriously.

'Well, what can I do? Would you like a cup of coffee?'

'Not just at the moment, Mrs. Morke, though thanks all the same. The thing is that the Station Inspector tipped us the wink that your two boys were being held for all that damage last night. And now, presumably, they've made a getaway. Would you care to give me a statement?'

'No,' said Millie.

'Are the boys here, Mrs. Morke? After all, it's their home.'

'I have nothing to say,' said Millie, hoping she had the formula right.

'Then, presumably, they are here? Don't worry, I shan't give them away. Nor do you have to give them away. You can just say whatever comes into your head. It doesn't much matter what it is, really.'

Millie could see that he was only trying to be kind.

'Nothing. So would you please go? I'm sorry to turn you out, but I'm sure you'll understand.'

'Rum tykes, aren't they? Sorry, I suppose that's not a very nice way of talking to their mother. My kid brother told me about the month or whatever it was they spent in the under-seven. They made a mark there all right, from what Matheson had to say. Marked everyone, in fact. Do please give me a statement of some kind, Mrs. Morke. Anything you like. Just anything.'

'I'm sorry,' said Millie. 'I really am. I know you're only doing your job.'

'Well, I suppose there's not much more I can do this time, but you're famous now, Mrs. Morke, and there'll be others coming fast in my footsteps. Not that I've missed a scoop. Not personally, that is. I don't suggest that.'

'I'm glad,' said Millie, meeting his generosity at least halfway.

'And I'm sorry you're in trouble, Mrs. Morke. I really am. You're still a very nice-looking girl. If I may put it that way.'

'I don't see why you shouldn't,' said Millie. 'Well, that's it, wouldn't you say?'

Millie opened her handbag and carefully combed her hair. She went upstairs.

Phineas lay there, reading Minutes.

'Phineas! I'm leaving you.'

'Oh, please calm down, and let's have breakfast.'

'Get it yourself. I'm packing and going. I'll collect the rest of my things as soon as I can. The things that are left. Before the boys smash them too.'

'Millie!' cried Phineas, while she bustled around with a quiet efficiency she had not known for years. 'Millie, don't you realise that this is the moment in all their lives when our sons are likely to need their mother most? Surely you must see that for yourself? The moment in their lives when I need you most too?'

'I've done all I can,' said Millie. 'You're full of educational theories. Now's the time for you to give them a real trial. You. Not me.'

'At least come with me to the Court? Let's have breakfast quietly and consider what line to take. I'm sure the whole thing is quite grossly exaggerated. The police do that, you know. I keep saying so.'

'It would be quite difficult to exaggerate in any way about the boys.'

'But you're their mother, Millie!'

'Perhaps that's how I know. You learn nothing.'