Having never been on a honeymoon before, neither Peter-Bowman nor Melissa was quite sure what to do about it. It was sitting on the bed between them. It could even be said to be lurking, if that was the sort of thing you said. I say it very often. It was lurking in the manner of something that really wouldn't go away unless you plucked it.

'What do you think it is?' asked Melissa. She was wearing a rather fetching nightgown that you are free to imagine for yourself.

'I really wouldn't like to say,' In fact Peter-Bowman did have a reasonable idea about what it was. He just wasn't sure whether he should mention it in the presence of a lady. Melissa was certainly a lady. And his wife, he realised with a jolt of wonder. Perhaps when ladies were also wives it was allowed to discuss such matters with them. 'I think it is a bunch of French words,' said Peter-Bowman.

Melissa peered at the object on the bed. She was lucky enough to have done some French at high school and have completely forgotten it. This meant that she was only qualified to say, 'I see. What are you going to do about it then?'

It was quite gratifying to have married a Girl who not only couldn't speak French but also believe that he could do something useful when he found a bunch of French words nestled on the bed in the honeymoon suite of his hotel, Peter-Bowman mused to himself. Much nicer than having a wife who would leap up and become efficient and get rid of the things herself with a stern reprimand to the manager. Peter-Bowman considered the problem of the French words. Suddenly, he remembered the lesson of the Mona Lisa. Looking at a problem was never going to get you anywhere. He remembered that he still had some turpentine left over from that episode, and went to fetch it from his bag. Luckily the hotel room had a rather luxurious private art appreciation cubicle, and Peter-Bowman retired into it with the French words and bottle of turpentine. He grabbed some of the handy art cleansing paper that such places always have, and liberally splashed the French words with turpentine. He rubbed away, and gradually saw that the French words were dissolving. Eventually he felt confident enough to plunge the French words in to the paint rinsing machine and activate it. Peter-Bowman watched with satisfaction as the French words were washed pure and clean. All that was left was a rather nice piece of blank canvas. Peter-Bowman carefully folded it up and put it in his bag next to the canvas of the Mona Lisa, which he never travelled without. With the incident of the French words out of the way, Peter-Bowman and Melissa felt ready to begin their honeymoon properly. They went for a nice long ramble in the woods surrounding the hotel.

'Do you want to know the reason I married you Melissa?' asked Peter-Bowman after they had reached a handy lake and sat down on a fallen tree to properly gaze at the water romantically.

'Because you love me Peter-Bowman?' Melissa smiled at him and entangled her fingers in his. It took Peter-Bowman some time to figure out how to untangle the knot Melissa had accidentally created, but in the end he managed it by temporarily dislocating his index finger. When this was sorted out to his satisfaction, Peter-Bowman continued.

'Well, there is that of course,' Peter-Bowman said as Melissa kissed him. Her tongue became stuck in his ear for some reason and he had to pry it free with the aid of a nearby stick. 'But really it was because of my understanding that marriage leads to babies, and my Garfields are sorely in need of some children to play with.

Melissa gazed into Peter-Bowman's eyes, wondering if she needed to clean out her own ears as thoroughly as she had just cleaned out his. No, replaying his words from her memory, she was quite sure that he had said exactly what she thought he had said. She didn't quite know what to say. Instead of speaking, Melissa began to jiggle her foot up and down against the side of the log.

'Actually,' Peter-Bowman continued, 'I was rather hoping that you could give me some tips on how babies come about. I've been told that baby carriages are required as part of the process. My Garfields seemed quite knowledgeable about the subject really. Could you give me some advice? My understanding is that it is very rude to ask a girl about how babies are built before marrying her.'

'Yes. I can see how it would be.' Melissa said. 'I really don't know what to say.'

'Ah, I thought it must be a complicated business,' said Peter-Bowman encouragingly. 'What brand of baby carriage is best, that sort of thing. What sort of glue to use. I'd like to get all the details right, and hopefully get the first one built later this afternoon. My Garfields probably won't give me any more advice until they have a child to talk to, you see. I did give it a try, but I wasn't much good at it. Would a turnip work better, do you think?' Peter-Bowman handed Melissa a potato. 'What do you think of it?'

It was a rather sad looking little potato, with pipe cleaners stuck in to the appropriate places for arms and legs, and a face made out of drawing pins. He'd even dressed it in a nappy, Melissa noticed. She wasn't sure whether this was good or bad. She considered crying and running away into the woods but thought this was probably not appropriate behaviour for a newly wed wife on her wedding night. In the end she just sat very still and looked at the potato with wide eyes and the expression of a telephone company employee who's just caught a glimpse of the huge number of names and locations that the telephone company is about to engrave into her brain with a rubber mallet (or perhaps mallard, yes) and is not sure that the whole thing is a splendid idea. It had been some years ago now that this event had happened to Melissa, but she still managed to repeat the expression in exactly the same manner.

Peter-Bowman was impressed at how impressed Melissa was at his baby. 'Well, nothing to brag about I expect, I just put it together in an hour or so. The pipe cleaners were the Garfields idea really. I was just the manual labour, you could say.' Peter-Bowman giggled. 'I'm sure you've got a much better idea of how to put together a baby then me and the Garfields came up with. I expect the drawing pins are wrong, aren't they? They were my idea, I thought that using a black texta for the face might be poisonous. I read a magazine article about how important it was to keep toxic textas away from a baby's face.'

Melissa took in a deep breath. 'OK, Peter-Bowman. You don't seem to have very much of an idea about how this works at all.'

'Vegetables aren't involved then? I did wonder about that. Hate to be halfway through a bite of mashed potato and suddenly realise it. That would make for a rather awkward dinner party I should imagine.' Peter-Bowman had been hesitant about the vegetables in the first place, but the Garfields had assured him it was the best way. Peter-Bowman always followed the advice of the Garfields, ever since they had threatened to stop giving him advice if he ever failed to follow it exactly.

'Well,' thought Melissa to herself. 'He may be a little odd and have really quite peculiar ideas about just about everything, but I do seem to have fallen in love with him and I did marry him after all, so ...' She giggled a little herself, and Peter-Bowman joined in, never being one to miss an opportunity to laugh. 'Imagine that,' thought Melissa. 'Me married to a phone box screamer. I don't know what I'm going to tell the boss.' She decided it was time to make Peter-Bowman a man. She did so out there by the lake with the sun setting in the background and a nightingale singing next door. Peter-Bowman was ever so very glad that she did.