Riptide

§ 41

There was a note on the kitchen table. Cal felt Stilton must have seen it a few thousand times in the course of a thirty-year marriage-‘Your dinner’s in the oven.’

Stilton took a tea cloth, opened the lower oven and pulled out a dish half full of something indeterminate and crisp.

‘Dunno what it is,’ he said. ‘But it smells a treat.’

‘It’s fish pie, Dad.’

Reenie Stilton appeared in the doorway, and eased her pregnant bulk onto a kitchen chair.

‘My Maurice got a twenty-four-hour pass, so him and some of his mates ‘went fishing out past Southend somewhere. Came back with two lovely whole cod.’

‘Past Southend? That’s a restricted area.’

‘Leave it out, Dad. Who do you think Maurice is going to spy on? Old fellers diggin’ lugworm? You just be grateful you got some supper. Rest of us ate hours ago.’

Stilton dished up. The greens were boiled to death and dried out, but Cal could have eaten seconds and thirds of the pie. It was fresh and spicy and it hit the spot. Stilton ate with a practised fork action that improved his elbow speed and upped his rate of consumption. He was scraping the dish before Cal was halfway across his plate. And he’d never thought of himself as a trencherman.

‘Where’s your mother?’ Stilton said as Reenie plodded across the floor to stick the kettle on.

‘Went round to old George Bonham to give him a bit o’ cooked cod. Reckons he don’t eat proper any more. Then she was going on to Aunt Dolly. Her Dennis is constipated again, and you know they always ask for Mum like she was the family witch-doctor. She’ll dose the little sod.’

‘You know, Walter,’ Cal said, ‘the house certainly seems empty.’

‘Kev and Trev are back at sea. They sailed a day or two back, I should think. Rose and Tom have got their own home to go to, though most of the time you’d never know it.’

‘Tel’s gone down the Troxy,’ Reenie chipped in, leaving Cal to wonder what a troxy was.

‘And Vera’s gone with Mum.’

Over the hiss of the kettle Cal thought he heard a motorbike engine putter down to nothing. The missing name from the list. He heard the door slam. A slight pause in the steps along the hallway as she hung up her helmet-then a rush of feet dancing down the stairs-and the kitchen door burst open. Kitty’s hair bounced the way it always did, springy on her blue collar. Her eyes flashed, the way they always did. If she was surprised to see him sitting there, she didn’t show it.

‘Late again,’ said Reenie. ‘I don’t think there’s any left.’

‘Wot?’

‘You shoulda got here on time. You’re on reg’lar shifts. You don’t work daft hours like dad. I reckon Captain Cormack’s had yours.’

Kitty looked from Cal to her father to the empty dish and back again.

‘Wot? You greedy so and sos. You ain’t left me a mouthful!’

‘Manners,’ said Stilton, as Cal knew he would. ‘Captain Cormack’s a guest in this house.’

‘I know,’ Kitty sneered. ‘Mum thinks the sun shines out of his-‘

‘Kitty!!!’

Kitty turned her back on her father and wheedled her sister.

‘Reen, be a love and take a look in the larder. A bit o’ bread and cheese. Anything.’

‘Walter,’ Cal said softly. ‘What does that mean? About the sun shining-‘

‘Don’t ask, lad, don’t ask.’

Upstairs the door slammed again. Stilton muttered that he ought to fix that door one of these fine days, asked Reenie to bring his tea up and told Cal he was just off for a word with the missis. Reenie slapped a meagre sandwich on the table in front of Kitty and said, ‘You make the tea, bossy boots. My fibroids are killing me. I’m off for forty winks.’ And Cal found himself alone with Kitty. Somewhere upstairs the telephone began to ring.

‘So, superman. It’s not enough that you get to eat me every so often. You’ve got to eat me dinner as well.’

‘Kitty-for Christ’s sake!’

‘Wot you doin’ ‘ere anyway? I was coming over to see you a bit later.’

‘I’ll be there. We kind of hit the buffers this evening.’ The phone rang and rang. Kitty had slipped off a shoe and was running one stockinged foot up the side of his trousers towards his groin.

‘Bout what time?’

‘Kitty-I can’t tell you how uncomfortable this makes me. Your mother could walk in at any minute.’

Kitty shot to her feet as though stung and yanked at the kitchen door.

‘Will somebody answer that bloody phone!’

Then she folded her arms and glared at Cal.