Stopping for a Spell by Diana Wynne Jones

Mum’s desperately offered check. We had to go through all our pockets and shake Mum’s bag out on the table, and even then we were two pennies short. They forgave us that, but grimly. They looked after us unlovingly as we went. Mum nearly sank under the embarrassment.
    Then we had to walk home. It was still hot. Tony hates walking, and he whined. Pip got a blister and whined, too. Mum snarled, and I snapped. We were all in the worst tempers of our lives by the time we plunged up the garden path and burst into the house. We knew that Angus Flint would be standing there, upside down on the hall carpet, to meet us.
    â€œAnd this time I shan’t care that it’s his socks I’m talking to!” I said.
    But the person standing in the hall was Dad. He was the right way up, of course, and wondering where we’d all got to. Mum went for him with both fangs out. “Have you had the nerve to tell Angus Flint that he could live with us? If so—” I felt quite sorry for my father. He admitted that in the heat of the first reunion, he might have said some such thing, but—Oh, boy! Never have I heard my mother give tongue the way she did then. I couldn’t do it half so well. Even Cora couldn’t, the time she acted King Herod at school.
    After that, for a beautiful, peaceful half evening, we thought Angus Flint had gone for good. We kept the window shut, played the piano, watched the things we wanted on the telly, and cheered Dad up by playing cards with him. We were all thoroughly happy when Angus Flint came back again. He knew we were likely to complain, I suppose, so he brought a girlfriend home with him to make sure we couldn’t go for him.
    The girlfriend was a complete stranger to us. Handpicked for idiocy, with glasses and a giggle.
    â€œTeach her to play cards,” said Angus Flint. “She’s quite clever really.”
    She wasn’t. But neither was Angus Flint when it came to cards. Have you ever played cards with somebody who thinks for twenty minutes before he puts a card down and then puts down exactly the wrong one? He played the girl’s hand, too, though she was slightly better at it than he was. We went to bed after the first game. But Angus Flint didn’t take the girlfriend home until well after midnight. I know, because I heard Mum let fly again when he did.
    Angus Flint came back at three and woke me up hammering at the front door.
    When I let him in, he said, “Didn’t you hear me knocking? I might have caught my death.”
    I said, “I wish you had!” and escaped into the sitting room before he could pick me up by my hair.
    Menace was there. He crawled nervously out from under the piano to be stroked.
    â€œMenace,” I said. “Where’s your spirit? Can’t you bite Angus Flint?”
    Then I thought that I didn’t dare bite Angus Flint either, and got so miserable that I went wandering around the room. I patted the uncomfortable chairs and the poor ugly tables and stroked the piano.
    â€œChairs,” I said, “stand up for yourselves! He insults you all the time. Tables,” I said, “he said you ought to be burned! Piano, he told Mum to sell you. Do something, all of you! Furniture of the world, unite!” I made them a very stirring speech, all about the rights of oppressed furniture, and it made me feel much better. Not that I thought it would do any good. But I thought it was a very good idea.

6
    The Tables Turn
    Next morning Angus Flint ate my breakfast as usual, and Mum and Dad went out together to make friends again. Leaving us alone with Angus Flint, yet again!
    At least there was something “very profound” on the telly that afternoon. First I ever knew that racehorses were profound, but it meant twenty minutes’ peace. I did some practice. The piano sounded lovely. My elfin elephants shrank in size and were beginning to sound like mere hobnailed goblins when the door was