‘Well what is it?’ I said.

Lucasta gave a naughty giggle.

‘She can take all her teeth out and put them in again.’

I loved the Mulhollands, I loved them all, but I couldn’t cope with them at the moment. I couldn’t cope with the feverish cross-currents. I felt like the centre court net at the end of Wimbledon fortnight. All I wanted was to go back to the peace of Ace and me being shut up together. ‘It’s because I haven’t been well,’ I kept telling myself.

Mrs Braddock and Lucasta were shortly followed by Jack, back from the Borough engineer. When he’d finished grumbling about the builders and his hangover, he said, ‘Since I’m obviously not allowed to seduce you, or bring you a drink, shall we have a game of chess?’

‘All right,’ I said. ‘That would be fun.’

As we were setting up the board, Maggie wandered in and watched us sourly.

‘You never play with me,’ she said accusingly to Jack.

‘I do,’ protested Jack. ‘I played with you the other day.’

‘Ah yes,’ said Maggie bitterly, ‘but that was chess.’

On Sunday matters came to a head between the two of them. They had been to a drinks party at midday and carried on drinking through lunch, getting more and more stroppy. I wandered downstairs in the afternoon — it was my first time up. I felt dreadful, so exhausted in fact that I had to hang on to bits of furniture. I found Maggie in the drawing-room with the Sunday papers and a bottle. She had that sulky petulant look of a cat huddling on a window ledge to keep out of the rain.

Outside in the garden Wordsworth was chewing on one of the Sunday joint bones, and Coleridge, who’d already buried his, was walking round and round under the weeping ash tree wiping his face on the twigs. Jack, Ace and Lucasta were making a bonfire. Jack was pulling up undergrowth with the exuberance of too much alcohol, and fooling around with Lucasta. Ace was laughing and breaking up sticks. He was wearing a thick black sweater. I thought what a handsome trio they made, then collapsed on to the sofa wondering if it were possible to feel so weak.

‘Have you got Ace’s piece on Venezuela?’ I said.

‘Here,’ said Maggie, throwing the Review Section across to me. ‘It’s the only decent thing in the paper this week.’

They had given him a huge byline, and a picture, taken before he’d grown a moustache. He looked younger and much less sombre. He wrote very well. The prose was spare and economic, but his powers of observation were amazing. It was as though he had a hundred eyes like Argus. You could feel the heat and dust and despair of the rebels. You felt as though you were there.

‘It’s terribly good,’ I said in surprise.

‘I know. And he’s just as good on the box. That’s why he’s being head-hunted so much at the moment. God, I hate the country,’ she went on, refilling her glass. ‘Nothing to do for days on end, no one to drive me to the sea when I want to go to the sea. Nothing round me except sulky faces, and mine is the sulkiest of all. What shall we do now?’

In the end we settled down together to do a huge jigsaw puzzle of the New Avengers. It was all either of us were fit for. It was nearly dusk when Jack came in.

‘Hullo, lovely,’ he said to me. ‘How are you feeling?’

He was about to ruffle my hair; his hands smelt of wood smoke.

‘I wouldn’t,’ I said. ‘Ace won’t let me wash it. It’s coming off my head. I’m sure I’ve got scurf.’

‘I never get scurf,’ said Maggie smugly.

‘You’re too thick-skinned,’ remarked Jack, bending over the puzzle. ‘Bags I put in Joanna Lumley’s crutch. I’ll get it,’ he said as the telephone went.

‘Darling, how are you,’ we could hear him saying from the hall. ‘So sorry I missed you the other day. Why didn’t you pop in?’

‘I think this is a bit of Steed’s bowler hat,’ said Maggie.

‘Who is it?’ I whispered.

‘Well, we know her name’s “Darling”,’ said Maggie.

‘No, she’s being marvellous,’ Jack went on. ‘Kept us all in fits. She’s out with Ace at the moment, flying the kite. He bought her the most fantastic fox puppet back from the States. Yes, he thinks she’s terrific.’

Maggie stiffened, and her hand moved slower and slower over the puzzle, ears on elastic. It must be Fay on the other end.

For at least a quarter of an hour Jack had a very leisurely gossip about the family, Copeland, the Admiral, and Pendle having been up for the weekend. I didn’t dare look at Maggie. Jack must be still tight, or he’d never have made such a meal of it.

I glanced round. He was lounging on the hall chair, his feet up on a table, smiling into the telephone, utterly relaxed.

‘When do you want Lucasta back?’ he asked eventually.

There was a long pause. Maggie unseeingly shoved a bit of Steed’s umbrella into the sky.

‘But that’s marvellous,’ Jack went on enthusiastically. ‘That’s a real break. I’m so pleased for you, darling. Until Thursday? Of course we can. No problem. No don’t worry about that; we’ll have her birthday party here. We’ve had enough practice for Christ’s sake. You can’t possibly organize it if you’re working. Maggie’s got nothing to do.’ Maggie clenched a pile of sky up in her fist. ‘And Ace is here, and Pendle’s girlfriend Pru. She’s been ill, but Lucasta adores her and she’ll be on her feet by then, so there’s only my dear Mother to rot things up… You’ve booked a conjuror? Well tell him to come here instead, we’ll pay the petrol… Of course we will, it’ll be fun, don’t worry about a thing. If you get away early on Thursday, come to the party. I know Ace’d love to see you… OK then and good luck, darling.’

Maggie got up and poured herself a drink. Her hand was shaking so much she spilt most of it. Her green eyes blazed. She looked like the Queen in Snow White, and as quite as capable of cutting out Lucasta’s heart.

Jack wandered into the room, looking pleased with himself.

‘Well, well, well,’ he said.

It was extremely unwell. I wanted to hide under the sofa.

‘I suppose you want a drink,’ said Maggie softly.

‘You read me like a book,’ said Jack. ‘Rather a bad one admittedly.’

He was still tight.

‘That was Fay,’ he went on. ‘She’s got a small film part at the beginning of next week.’

‘Playing the back of the pantomime horse, I suppose,’ said Maggie.

‘So I said we’d keep Lucasta here.’

‘For how long?’ These words were dropped like pebbles into a deep, deep pool.

‘Until Thursday night. It doesn’t matter if she misses school.’

‘And who’s going to look after her?’ said Maggie.

Jack filled his glass. ‘Why you are, darling. It’ll do both you and Lucasta good to have some time together with me out of the way.’

‘I’ve got things to do. Tomorrow, Tuesday and Thursday.’

‘Well you’ll have to cancel them and think of someone else for a change,’ said Jack sharply, picking up the sports page. ‘Oh sod it, United lost again.’

‘I should have expected it of Fay,’ said Maggie belligerently. ‘Trust her not to give anyone any warning.’

‘She’s only just heard about the part,’ protested Jack.

‘Oh, very likely on a Sunday afternoon! She’s just bloody inconsiderate.’

Jack went on reading the paper. ‘What have you got against her? She’s never done you any harm.’

‘Oh yes she has,’ hissed Maggie. ‘She divorced you. If she hadn’t, I’d never be saddled with you now.’

Still Jack didn’t look up.

‘There’s an extraordinary story here,’ he said to me, ‘about a woman who’s trying to get a crossing for toads on the Preston Motorway.’

‘Don’t bug me,’ screamed Maggie. ‘It’s a pity you’re not married to her if you think she’s so wonderful.’

‘I wish I was,’ said Jack quietly.

‘Oh no,’ I said. ‘Don’t say that, please don’t. You’re both pissed. You’ll regret it later.’

‘You keep out of it,’ yelled Maggie. ‘You haven’t been behaving like a vestal virgin since you came up here.’

Then the explosion came. Jack threw down the paper and got to his feet. ‘You spoilt little bitch,’ he said softly. ‘You’ve never done a bloody stroke in your life. You’re lousy at housework, you can’t hold down a job, you can’t organize the builders, or even remember to pick up a suit from the cleaners. The only thing you show any talent for at all is writing cheques, and bitching about my first wife. But you’re so bloody jealous of her you can’t even be civil to my child.’

‘Your child is a monster,’ howled Maggie.

‘Leave her out of it.’

‘How can I? You asked her to stay on.’

‘It never enters your thick head, I suppose, that if Fay gets work I won’t have to work so bloody hard to keep her in alimony. But you wouldn’t think of that, would you? You’re so wrapped up in yourself, you never give a fuck what I do.’

‘And I suppose old Fairy Fay did.’

‘Yes, she did. She loved me.’

Maggie was very white around the mouth.

‘Why did you leave her then?’ she screamed.

‘Christ knows,’ said Jack.

‘I’ll tell you why. Because you were bored to death with her and she was no good in bed.’

‘She was a bloody sight better than you, if you want to know.’

Maggie gave a little gasp.

I put my head in my hands.

‘At least she didn’t just lie back and think of Pendle,’ said Jack viciously.

There are things that couples should only say to each other in bedrooms, when they get a sort of sexual kick out of seeing who can hurl the worst insults, knowing the battle will end up in bed.

‘Stop it,’ I screamed, ‘Stop it.’

Jack took no notice.