the mattress, 1963 (pp. 498–499)

The marriage's cold war conducted as interrogation. Having exposed a filthy dust-rectangle under the bed, the father turns it into a prosecution of the wife's housekeeping — "When was the last time this got cleaned under here?", then the sneering "presidential administration" flourish — and the boy narrates his own suspended attention: "I looked at my mother to see whether she was going to say anything in reply." She doesn't. The contempt is performed for an audience of one child, the accused declines to defend herself, and the silence is her whole side of the exchange. It's the withholding-spouse note the theme will later hear in Avril's own marriage, sounded here in the grandparents' bedroom.