"You don't have spots. You just feel mean. You want dreadfully to do things. But you know you can't. So you don't."
"What things?"
"Well, like the swimming race next Saturday. Mummy and Dad are coming up for it. Prissy says I could win the Penguin Trophy if I didn't have my complex. But Clara knows she's going to win. So she will. She hasn't got any complex. She just overeats."
They sat side by side in melancholy silence. But Pip-Emma's misplaced toothache was easing off. Janet might not be the Gang. But she belonged to Emma. Ever since Emma had said she wasn't a dumb cluck she'd followed Emma round like a little lost dog that had been found. If anyone belonged to you like that, you had to look out for them.
"I wish my Pop and Ma were coming up," Pip-Emma said suddenly.
"Why? Are you homesick, too, Emma?"
"I dunno. I want Pop and Ma."
"It's no good wanting, is it?"
"Well, you've got yours, haven't you?"
"Not really. Not together. I mean—they don't live together."