‘Sodom and eye ess ee,’ Samantha told her.
‘Uncle Wally’s really sexist. Talking about her thing like that is horrible.’
‘Uncle Wally is a wally and he is horrible. They’re both out-of-this-world awful. All that stuff he told us about the War and burning the Japanese with that flame thing. What did he call it?’
‘A turkey roast on the hoof,’ said Josephine.
‘It sounds absolutely horrible. I’m never going to touch turkey again. I’ll always associate them with little Japanese.’
‘Not all Japanese are little,’ Penelope pointed out. ‘Some of those wrestlers are fearfully fat.’
‘Like Auntie Joan,’ said Samantha. ‘She’s disgusting.’
In the surveillance truck across the road Palowski and Murphy nodded agreement.
The next remark was of a different and more intriguing sort.
‘I don’t know why we’re writing all this down now. The incriminating evidence is all there on the tape.’
‘Miss Sprockett would have a fit if we played that to the class. She’s as butch as can be. I’d like to hear her opinion of Uncle Wally.’
‘It’s just a pity we haven’t got it on video,’ said Emmeline. ‘Uncle Wally trying to find Auntie Joan’s ‘thing’ and giving it to her up the bum. We could make our fortunes.’
‘We could have made our fortunes if you’d done what I wanted instead of putting the backup tape on the sound system,’ Josephine said. ‘I wonder what it sounds like. It’s long past six. Uncle Wally’s going to go absolutely bananas. He’d have paid a terrific amount of money for that tape. An absolute fortune. I mean if people find out–’
‘If?’ said Emmeline. ‘I’d say he’ll kill us when he finds out.’
But Samantha shook her head. ‘He won’t,’ she said smugly. ‘I’ve hidden the original tape where he’ll never find it.’
‘Where?’ the others demanded but Samantha wasn’t telling.
‘Just somewhere he’s never going to find it. I’m not telling you anything else. Emmy might go and tell him.’
‘I wouldn’t. You know I wouldn’t,’ said the aggrieved Emmeline.
‘You said that when we put that stuff on the Revd Vascoe’s computer and then you–’
‘It wasn’t me. It was Penny said I was the one who put it there.’
‘Well, so you did. You were the one thought of it. And anyway I didn’t tell Mummy. She knows you because you’re always the one who fouls things up.’
‘I don’t care about that,’ said Samantha. ‘And I’m still not telling and no one is going to make me. So there.’
The discussion moved on to the coming visit to the Florida Keys. Uncle Wally had said he wanted to take them shark fishing in his boat and Auntie Joan and Eva wanted to fly to Miami to do some shopping.
But downstairs Wally Immelmann’s plans were being altered by the second.
‘You telling me someone’s tried to burglarise the Bear Fort?’ he shouted down the phone at Sheriff Stallard who had got back to Wilma and had partially recovered his hearing and had called to find out how to get in touch with Mr Immelmann.
‘I don’t know about burglarising,’ the Sheriff shouted back. ‘All I know is there’s a guy over Lossville says he’s going to sue for nuisance and contravention of the Obscenity Regulations. Had difficulty hearing him myself.’
‘Must be the fucking bears have set the system off. That guy is always complaining. And what’s he mean about Obscenity Regulations? It’s only a prolonged Frankie Sinatra. He sings ‘My Way’.’
‘If you say so, Mr Immelmann, I guess I got to believe you,’ said the Sheriff. ‘Though
