Little Bits of Baby by Patrick Gale

Candida and went to inspect her mail. The envelopes were on the table beside the salmon, which Maison Rostand had dropped off as ordered. The fish lay under clingfilm on its returnable plate, poached, boned and with its skin replaced with alternating ‘scales’ of blanched arugula and radicchio. If Madame Rostand’s promises had been fulfilled to the letter, its intestinal cavity was stuffed with a fluffy mousse of haddock and ricotta, coloured with flecks of tarragon and lemon zest. Maison Rostand was confidential to the point of invisibility. Each dish delivered to a household for the first time was accompanied by its easily memorised recipe, all ready for passing on to an enquiring guest. Candida paid the company a small retainer to keep her recipes unique and to buy the right to pass them off as her own in magazine articles. ‘The hollandaise,’ she murmured. ‘They’ve forgotten the hollandaise.’
    â€˜It’s in the fridge,’ said Samantha. ‘I’ll slip it into the bain-marie before I put Jasper to bed.’
    â€˜Fabulous. What have you made us for pudding?’
    â€˜Two chocolate terrine. That’s in the fridge too.’
    â€˜Good girl. You have been busy.’
    The letters were more than Candida could face. She glanced at a couple of facetious postcards from abroad, peered inside a bank statement then, casting the rest aside, walked upstairs. She took off her shoes to free her hot, cramped toes, and tiptoed into Perdita’s bedroom. Her baby was fast asleep, breathing heavily. Candida had spent the weekend trying to acclimatise herself to the indignity of a human milking-device and Perdita to the less-than-luxury of a rubber teat. The news that she had accepted the replacement so fast had come as a relief; Candida was a valuable commodity but the studio would not take kindly to a backstage nurse, not now that the baby had already been introduced to the nation and become stale news. As it was, she was having to hire a babysitter from Lady Canberra’s to cover feeding times on Samantha’s day off. She was tiptoeing out again when the playroom door was grappled open with a grunt and Jasper came pedalling to greet her.
    â€˜Mummee!’ he shouted.
    â€˜Quiet,’ said Candida, and gestured to the doorway behind her. ‘She’s asleep and Mummy’s tired.’
    â€˜I’m tired too.’
    â€˜Are you, poppet?’
    â€˜Very. But Peter showed us how to make pasta pictures. Do you want to see?’
    â€˜Yes, please.’
    â€˜Oh. Well, I gave it to Rachel Highsmith because hers wasn’t very good and she’s always giving me kisses and things in the shrubbery …’
    â€˜Is she, by Jove?’
    â€˜Yes, so you can’t see it but it was very good. At least, Rachel said so.’
    â€˜Do you want a kiss from me?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Where?’
    â€˜Here.’ He pointed to his cheek, turning his head to one side. ‘And make sure you leave a red kissy-mark. Rachel can’t do those.’
    â€˜All right.’ She knelt on the carpet before him and planted a thick kiss where indicated. Still in the car, he trundled over to a full length mirror to inspect himself.
    â€˜Brilliant,’ he said. Although the kiss mark was less red than nymphe bronzée , and he would have preferred one to match his car, he knew from a severe dressing-down she once gave him, that Mummy’s lipsticks were fabulously superior to the redder ones Samantha let him play with.
    â€˜We’ve got people coming to dinner tonight, poppet, so you will be good about going to bed on time, won’t you?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜Good boy.’ Candida rose, stroked his hair and started towards her bedroom to choose what to wear.
    â€˜Mummy?’
    â€˜Yes?’
    â€˜There’s a man peering up at the house from the playground.’
    â€˜Is there?’
    â€˜Yes. He was there when you