serving food to be lead-free and to contain 92 per cent tin, 6.7 antimony and 1.2 copper. You know the Romans poisoned themselves with the lead in pewter?’
‘And the date for the oldest pewter found – 1450 BC, wasn’t it?’ Sheff asked.
‘1450 BC and from an Egyptian tomb,’ said Georgie. ‘What’s it matter anyway?’
‘I might do a piece on it.’ He could knock out one of the freelance articles Chris had invited him to contribute. If he could rough something out while it was fresh, less time need be spent on it later.
‘Bronze is mainly copper with a bit of tin?’
‘Who cares?’ said Georgie. The man himself had been her interest, not his livelihood. ‘This is holiday time.’
Sheff continued to make his jottings, but a little self-consciously. He recalled that Mr Yuan-jen had said pewter was largely replaced by the mass production of glass and porcelain tableware towards the end of the eighteenth century. What did he have that was pewter? An elephant from Kuala Lumpur and an engraved mug he’d been presented with from fellow officers when he left the Territorials. He kept pencils and biros in it. Maybe pewter wasn’t interesting enough to be one of his subjects for the paper after all. Not unless he could find out more about the Romans poisoning themselves, or the Egyptians entombing it along with slaves for the afterlife. What was the relevance of pewter to a Taupo woman with three kids and varicose veins, but no job or partner, or to a Southland cow cocky worth millions, but grieving for his rugby-playing youth?
‘Would you read about pewter?’ he asked his sister. ‘In an article I mean. Would you be bothered?’
‘Oh, give it a rest about pewter,’ she said. ‘For Christ’s sake. Are you always like this?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like a nerd. A boring newspaper nerd,’ Georgie said, and Sheff caught the taxi driver’s half-turned smirk, and resisted the wish to make a retort. A couple bickering in public was a spectacle he despised. ‘Anyway,’ said Georgie, ‘you’ve tossed all that in, haven’t you? You don’t have to educate the world.’ Sheff just took in his breath deeply, and watched the green paddocks passing. It was all right for Mr Yuan-jen – a brief flight acquaintanceship and then he was by himself again,and the taxi driver would soon have other passengers to over-charge. Sheff, however, had days, maybe weeks ahead, to spend in his sister’s company.
Georgie had booked one room with two single beds in a hotel close to the Octagon. ‘Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it? We’re family and it’s more friendly.’ True enough, but Sheff was surprised nevertheless. Brother and sister they were, but now unaccustomed to being together. And the decision had been of so little consequence to her, that she hadn’t bothered to mention it: an assumption of prerogative that Sheff told himself to ignore. And he repressed the childish inclination to choose a bed, and the equally juvenile irritation when she appropriated the one by the window that would have been his own preference.
They walked for while in the shopping area and the small museum park by the university, and then went to a wine bar in Princes Street for a drink. Georgie had studied in the city and was pleased to be there again, but after a time her reminiscence took her away from Dunedin to the greater namesake of Edinburgh. She had flatted with a woman who came from a wealthy Liverpool family, and who walked in her sleep almost every night. Sheff countered with the tale of an interview he had with Aussie politician Kevin Rudd when he visited after the Christchurch earthquake. It had nothing of intrinsic interest.
Sheff was about to order another drink when a trickle of blood came from his right nostril, bright and thin on the fingers he raised. He remembered the nosebleed in bed a few weeks before: the same bright, arterial blood. ‘Put your head forward and clamp your nose for a bit,’ said Georgie, and
‘And the date for the oldest pewter found – 1450 BC, wasn’t it?’ Sheff asked.
‘1450 BC and from an Egyptian tomb,’ said Georgie. ‘What’s it matter anyway?’
‘I might do a piece on it.’ He could knock out one of the freelance articles Chris had invited him to contribute. If he could rough something out while it was fresh, less time need be spent on it later.
‘Bronze is mainly copper with a bit of tin?’
‘Who cares?’ said Georgie. The man himself had been her interest, not his livelihood. ‘This is holiday time.’
Sheff continued to make his jottings, but a little self-consciously. He recalled that Mr Yuan-jen had said pewter was largely replaced by the mass production of glass and porcelain tableware towards the end of the eighteenth century. What did he have that was pewter? An elephant from Kuala Lumpur and an engraved mug he’d been presented with from fellow officers when he left the Territorials. He kept pencils and biros in it. Maybe pewter wasn’t interesting enough to be one of his subjects for the paper after all. Not unless he could find out more about the Romans poisoning themselves, or the Egyptians entombing it along with slaves for the afterlife. What was the relevance of pewter to a Taupo woman with three kids and varicose veins, but no job or partner, or to a Southland cow cocky worth millions, but grieving for his rugby-playing youth?
‘Would you read about pewter?’ he asked his sister. ‘In an article I mean. Would you be bothered?’
‘Oh, give it a rest about pewter,’ she said. ‘For Christ’s sake. Are you always like this?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like a nerd. A boring newspaper nerd,’ Georgie said, and Sheff caught the taxi driver’s half-turned smirk, and resisted the wish to make a retort. A couple bickering in public was a spectacle he despised. ‘Anyway,’ said Georgie, ‘you’ve tossed all that in, haven’t you? You don’t have to educate the world.’ Sheff just took in his breath deeply, and watched the green paddocks passing. It was all right for Mr Yuan-jen – a brief flight acquaintanceship and then he was by himself again,and the taxi driver would soon have other passengers to over-charge. Sheff, however, had days, maybe weeks ahead, to spend in his sister’s company.
Georgie had booked one room with two single beds in a hotel close to the Octagon. ‘Well, it makes sense, doesn’t it? We’re family and it’s more friendly.’ True enough, but Sheff was surprised nevertheless. Brother and sister they were, but now unaccustomed to being together. And the decision had been of so little consequence to her, that she hadn’t bothered to mention it: an assumption of prerogative that Sheff told himself to ignore. And he repressed the childish inclination to choose a bed, and the equally juvenile irritation when she appropriated the one by the window that would have been his own preference.
They walked for while in the shopping area and the small museum park by the university, and then went to a wine bar in Princes Street for a drink. Georgie had studied in the city and was pleased to be there again, but after a time her reminiscence took her away from Dunedin to the greater namesake of Edinburgh. She had flatted with a woman who came from a wealthy Liverpool family, and who walked in her sleep almost every night. Sheff countered with the tale of an interview he had with Aussie politician Kevin Rudd when he visited after the Christchurch earthquake. It had nothing of intrinsic interest.
Sheff was about to order another drink when a trickle of blood came from his right nostril, bright and thin on the fingers he raised. He remembered the nosebleed in bed a few weeks before: the same bright, arterial blood. ‘Put your head forward and clamp your nose for a bit,’ said Georgie, and
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