Chapter 10

My sons sat at the kitchen table tucking into their evening milk and biscuits. 'What did you do at nursery today?'

'Nothing.'

'And what did you have for lunch?'

'Nothing.'

'And to drink?'

'Nothing.'

Did you have a story?'

'No.'

'Or singing?'

'No.'

Their eyes twinkled, as did mine. They knew that I knew.

'We sat on the carpet ALL day - and did NOTHING.' Lars loved the pretence.

'That's nice, darlings. You must have had a lovely time. Now if you're ready for bed by twenty past, you can watch one of the German videos.'

We had recently been to lunch with one of their nursery friends whose mother is German. She has pressed such delights as 'Bob der Baumeister' and 'Max und Moritz' into our hands. Way above the boys' heads though it was, seeing well known-characters in unfamiliar situations appealed to their sense of the bizarre.

'Where's twenty past?'

'When the big hand reaches the 4, it's twenty past. There, you see, it's right up at the 12 now.'

A short while later, I realised that Ian had not moved. His eyes were fixed on the clock.

'It's not moving.'

'Well, not that you can notice, but it is moving - just very slowly. Come and brush your teeth and you'll see.'

When he returned, he could see that the big hand had moved inexorably closer to the 4. He assumed it had moved because he had not been looking. He stared at it for a while, reassured that it was no longer in motion. He collected his pyjamas from the wardrobe, put his washing into the laundry basket and looked again at the clock.

'Naaah! It's moved again!' He continued to stare at it, convinced that it moved secretly and only when his back was turned. He slipped his pyjama top over his head and tugged the bottoms on.

'Naaah, Daddy! It's done it agan. We'll never see the video. Naaah!' Tears were welling in his eyes. 'Naughty clock!' He smacked the air.

He had no idea that time passed in a predictable way. For him, the clock had a mind of its own. Was there a proverb like the watched kettle about a watched clock? I left him to his own devices, gave his brothers' teeth a final brush, and let one of them push the cassette into the slot. A few minutes later, when they had seen Max and Moritz feed their neighbour's chickens poison attached to ropes; watched them flap about in their death throes and hang themselves on a branch by the nooses; when they had seen the old woman pluck her chickens and roast them on her fire while tears streamed down her eyes; when they had seen Max and Moritz lower a device down the chimney and steal each roasting bird; when they had seen the old woman pursue her guiltless dog through the house with a broom, smashing most of her meagre possessions to fragments in the chase, they accepted that some countries have a rather different sense of humour from our own and made not a peep of protest when I slid the cassette out.

'I think that's enough. German humour's different from ours.'

Piers who, even at that tender age, had a developed sense of right and wrong, was flapping his hands, a sure sign that an idea was brewing and that he wanted to reserve a space of silence to externalise it before it dissipated.

'They weren't fair, Max and Moritz. They were horrible.'

'Quite right, Piers, but I'm afraid you'll come against lots of things like this in life. The moment you think life's fair, you're sunk.'

Keen to score a point over his brothers, he continued. 'They don't let them sit together at lunch. Lars and Ian. They don't at nursery. They make rude noises when they eat. They have to go away and think about it.'

'I thought that might be the case, but you shouldn't tell tales.'

'I'm not telling stories. It's true.'

'That's as may be and I'm not saying you're telling stories. I'm saying you're telling tales. And even as I'm telling you this, I can see that a story is a tale and that you must be thoroughly confused, so let's just say don't tittle-tattle on your brothers, even when what you say is true.'

'And Ian's hidden your glasses.'

'Ok, that you can tell Daddy about.'