“Dinner’s ready,” Stella shouted, extinguishing the light beneath the potatoes. Strictly speaking, it wasn’t ready, but knowing George, it would be by the time he finally reached the table.

The next move in this nightly chess game would be a repetition of the call, in another minute or so when he hadn’t appeared. A minute passed.

“Did you hear me?” she bellowed from the kitchen.

“Yes,” hissed a voice from the lounge. “I’m coming, woman.”

She heard the cloakroom door close. Another five minutes then, prostates being what they were. She drained the water out of the pan and placed it back on a low light with a knob of butter.

When she heard him flush, she began to mash. Time a plenty yet. Returning to the lounge he would now rummage amongst the remote controls littering the coffee table until he located the right one to turn off the television.

“Dinner’s on the table,” she called, even though she hadn’t yet drained the vegetables.

“I said, I’m coming,” he yelled.

She sighed, taking the plates from the oven where they’d been warming.

“Have you moved my slippers?” he demanded from the doorway.

She stared at his reflection in the kitchen window, close to boiling point now.

“You silly, silly man,” she mouthed silently at him before saying sweetly “upstairs where you left them.”

Why, having watched television for three hours in his shoes, did he now need to have his slippers on to eat his evening meal?

She heard him trudging heavily up the stairs and began to carve the lamb joint. Down the stairs he came, one at a time, and back into the lounge to check he’d turned the television off.

She dished out the meal and took both plates to the table.

She began eating, watching the steam rising from his plate opposite her.

“You didn’t get any wine out,” he said accusingly over her shoulder, before beginning to rummage in the fridge, and then opening cupboard doors searching for the one that held the wine glasses.

He finally returned with the wine glasses and sat down, surveying the table.

“No mint sauce?” he queried, half raising his ample posterior from the seat.

She sprang up, grabbed a jar of mint sauce from the fridge, and slammed it on the table.

He opened the jar, spooning some onto his plate.

“It’s very green,” he said accusingly.

“It’s mint sauce,” she said, “it’s supposed to be.”

He laid down his knife and fork and began to read the contents of the label.

“Hmmm,” he declared triumphantly, “artifical colouring. I thought as much.”

***

“Are you seriously saying a little thing like that motivated you to stab him with a carving knife?” said Detective Inspector James, laying down his notebook.

“Oh no,” she interjected, “not the artificial colouring, no.”

“Well what then?” he asked impatiently.

Stella stared at him. Were all men idiots? she wondered.

“He complained his dinner was cold,” she said patiently, “now d’you see?”