the steps.
At the bottom of the stairs, she stood with a hand on her stomach, thinking of Hine at work, who, in the café that evening, had taken Eloise’s hand and pressed it to the hard mound of her stomach, the skin suddenly, astonishingly, moving under Eloise’s fingers, making her jump and pull her hand away.
‘So freaky!’ they all said, wanting to feel again. The baby was pushing its foot against Hine’s stomach. You could feel the hard bulge moving under the skin. Imagine it. The presence inside you.
‘Alien,’ someone said.
Stop thinking about babies.
Speaking of babies, she had kept up her surveillance of Anita O’Keefe. Her latest theory was holding: that the father of Baby O’Keefe was Prime Minister Dance, married father of adult children and secret lover of the beautiful young Minister for Social Development, whose travels around the country, revealed on Twitter and Facebook, used to, before the pregnancy, mirror his own. That was the theory anyway. But stop thinking about babies.
Eloise was on the stairs. She looked out the window at a patch of dry grass and a pepper tree, its long shadow crossing the garden. Ahead on the landing, the door to her bedroom was open. She entered the room and saw that the window to the balcony was closed, that all was tidy and unstained, the Sparkler and Silvio not having passed this way. She heard whispering behind her.
In the bathroom a tap was running a thin stream of cold water. She turned it off, returned to the bedroom and sat down to take off her shoes. A cushion had fallen on the floor. She picked it up and noticed that the door of the cabinet next to her bed was open. The book she’d been reading was not on the top of the pile. She searched, found the book at the back of the cabinet, behind the stack.
How had it moved?
Everything was uncertain, as mysterious as a migraine dream. In the next room she found the book she’d been trying to recall: Arthur’s copy of a collection of Chekhov stories. She sat down on a deckchair on the upstairs balcony to read:
A thousand years ago a monk, dressed in black, wandered about the desert, somewhere in Syria or Arabia … Some miles from where he was, some fishermen saw another black monk, who was moving slowly over the surface of a lake. This second monk was a mirage. Now forget all the laws of optics, which the legend seems not to recognise, and listen to the rest. That mirage cast another mirage, then from that one a third, so that the image of the black monk began to be transmitted endlessly from one layer of the atmosphere to another. So that he was seen at one time in Africa, at another in Spain, then in Italy, then in the Far North …
The sun was going down behind the stucco house, the windows blazing with reflected light.
I can’t stay here.
But her phone was ringing.
‘Hang on a second,’ she said half an hour later, and tilted the wine bottle. The level seemed oddly low. She filled her glass. ‘Go on.’
‘I said to him, You say Pilger lacks balance. I say … I say Pilger has a point of view. He cares . He cares and he has a point of view and he gives it to you. He socks you right between the eyes. And I said, So what is this thing you call balance? Do we always need to provide the other point of view? Tell me this. What if there isn’t another point of view? What if there’s just the truth ? Know what I mean?’
Eloise, who had been looking at the ceiling, allowed her chair to fall gently back onto its four legs.
‘E? You still there?’
She sipped, swallowed and said, ‘You get sick of the endless “on the one hand, on the other hand”. Sometimes there’s just the truth.’
‘Exactly. Exactly . I knew you’d … But we need balance to assess the truth. We need a balanced attitude. As I said to Thee …’
She drank, tilted back her chair, listened. Scott roamed away from his central point, came back to it, veered off again. She liked the sound of his voice. She loved the
At the bottom of the stairs, she stood with a hand on her stomach, thinking of Hine at work, who, in the café that evening, had taken Eloise’s hand and pressed it to the hard mound of her stomach, the skin suddenly, astonishingly, moving under Eloise’s fingers, making her jump and pull her hand away.
‘So freaky!’ they all said, wanting to feel again. The baby was pushing its foot against Hine’s stomach. You could feel the hard bulge moving under the skin. Imagine it. The presence inside you.
‘Alien,’ someone said.
Stop thinking about babies.
Speaking of babies, she had kept up her surveillance of Anita O’Keefe. Her latest theory was holding: that the father of Baby O’Keefe was Prime Minister Dance, married father of adult children and secret lover of the beautiful young Minister for Social Development, whose travels around the country, revealed on Twitter and Facebook, used to, before the pregnancy, mirror his own. That was the theory anyway. But stop thinking about babies.
Eloise was on the stairs. She looked out the window at a patch of dry grass and a pepper tree, its long shadow crossing the garden. Ahead on the landing, the door to her bedroom was open. She entered the room and saw that the window to the balcony was closed, that all was tidy and unstained, the Sparkler and Silvio not having passed this way. She heard whispering behind her.
In the bathroom a tap was running a thin stream of cold water. She turned it off, returned to the bedroom and sat down to take off her shoes. A cushion had fallen on the floor. She picked it up and noticed that the door of the cabinet next to her bed was open. The book she’d been reading was not on the top of the pile. She searched, found the book at the back of the cabinet, behind the stack.
How had it moved?
Everything was uncertain, as mysterious as a migraine dream. In the next room she found the book she’d been trying to recall: Arthur’s copy of a collection of Chekhov stories. She sat down on a deckchair on the upstairs balcony to read:
A thousand years ago a monk, dressed in black, wandered about the desert, somewhere in Syria or Arabia … Some miles from where he was, some fishermen saw another black monk, who was moving slowly over the surface of a lake. This second monk was a mirage. Now forget all the laws of optics, which the legend seems not to recognise, and listen to the rest. That mirage cast another mirage, then from that one a third, so that the image of the black monk began to be transmitted endlessly from one layer of the atmosphere to another. So that he was seen at one time in Africa, at another in Spain, then in Italy, then in the Far North …
The sun was going down behind the stucco house, the windows blazing with reflected light.
I can’t stay here.
But her phone was ringing.
‘Hang on a second,’ she said half an hour later, and tilted the wine bottle. The level seemed oddly low. She filled her glass. ‘Go on.’
‘I said to him, You say Pilger lacks balance. I say … I say Pilger has a point of view. He cares . He cares and he has a point of view and he gives it to you. He socks you right between the eyes. And I said, So what is this thing you call balance? Do we always need to provide the other point of view? Tell me this. What if there isn’t another point of view? What if there’s just the truth ? Know what I mean?’
Eloise, who had been looking at the ceiling, allowed her chair to fall gently back onto its four legs.
‘E? You still there?’
She sipped, swallowed and said, ‘You get sick of the endless “on the one hand, on the other hand”. Sometimes there’s just the truth.’
‘Exactly. Exactly . I knew you’d … But we need balance to assess the truth. We need a balanced attitude. As I said to Thee …’
She drank, tilted back her chair, listened. Scott roamed away from his central point, came back to it, veered off again. She liked the sound of his voice. She loved the
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