something?”
“Could I pay in instalments?” Breege said.
“Of course you can pay in instalments . . . that’s what friends are for,” Mrs. Bolan said, then unzipped it, helped her out of it, and in the shop folded it carefully and put it in a cardboard box, like a sleeping doll being put there to sleep. It looked so beautiful, so poised.
“And sure if you don’t pay up, I know where to find you,” she said, winking, as she copied in her cash-book the first deposit of five pounds, then drew a rudimentary calendar for the amounts owed for the next seven weeks.
Breege hid it in the very back of the wardrobe with coats and a bolster to keep him from seeing it. Joseph had his own wardrobe, but for some reason he kept his best suit and his overcoat in hers. After he had gone to sleep she would get out of bed and try it on. Even the roses seemed to breathe in the panel across her stomach. When Bugler saw it he would guess it was new; it smelt new.
To keep them from getting damp she changed the hiding place of the letters. She brought a biscuit tin from the house and put them in the dairy, adding each one as it came.
To a mare among Pharaoh’s cavalry.
I compare you my darling
Your cheeks adorned with bangles
Your neck with beads
Your groove a pomegranate grove.
She looked it up in Joseph’s dictionary: “The pomegranate has been known to man since time immemorial; largely regarded as a symbol of fertility, possibly because of the large number of seeds contained in the fruit. The Phoenicians took it from Western Asia to Carthage.” He had requested a meeting for the Sunday at two.
She chose the corner of the field that was farthest from the road. There being no wall to sit on, she piled a few stones together and made a perch of them. It was stifling. The dress was hot and so were her black stockings. She was really dressed for indoors and for nighttime. No matter where she moved to, the sun bore down. There was no shade to be found anywhere. One half of the field had been ploughed and the earth looked cross and disgruntled at being overturned. By contrast the young grass seemed to drink in the sun and gave back rays of greenish golden light. She listened, not knowing whether he would come on the tractor or on foot. What would they talk of? Not Carthage and pomegranates, not the myrrh mountain, and yet not their own mountain with its rock face and morsels of earth in the crevices. A black cat came sneaking through the grass to look at her, a mis-curiosity. Black cats that were supposed to be for good luck.
After a little while she realised that he was not coming and that those letters were not in his hand at all. She felt helpless, helpless to get up though the sun beat down on one side of her neck.
Joseph was dozing on the outside step when the telephone rang. He decided to let it ring, assuming it was Lady Harkness trying to coax Breege to make pies and scones for her. It stopped but then started almost at once, and he went into the house in an exasperation. There was no hesitation, simply a voice, a woman’s voice overloud, overenthusiastic, saying, “You ought to know where your sister is . . . look in the dairy and you’ll find out.” Then there was laughter at the other end as the phone was slammed down.
Out in the dairy he knew even as he lifted the lid of the biscuit tin, knew it by the smell of the thyme, smelling its way into the letters, knew their poison. When he read the first few words, he put them down, mortified by the lewdness, the vileness, the ravishment.
He met her out on the road, but heard her footsteps before he saw her, the brazen high heels on the hot dust-baked surface. Then he saw her as he had never seen her before, a Jezebel in a clinging dress with a gash of sunburn shaped like a fish down one side of her neck. She smiled at him to brave it out, but there was no braving, as she saw by his eyes.
“You tramp.”
“For God’s sake, Joseph,” she said, and
“Could I pay in instalments?” Breege said.
“Of course you can pay in instalments . . . that’s what friends are for,” Mrs. Bolan said, then unzipped it, helped her out of it, and in the shop folded it carefully and put it in a cardboard box, like a sleeping doll being put there to sleep. It looked so beautiful, so poised.
“And sure if you don’t pay up, I know where to find you,” she said, winking, as she copied in her cash-book the first deposit of five pounds, then drew a rudimentary calendar for the amounts owed for the next seven weeks.
Breege hid it in the very back of the wardrobe with coats and a bolster to keep him from seeing it. Joseph had his own wardrobe, but for some reason he kept his best suit and his overcoat in hers. After he had gone to sleep she would get out of bed and try it on. Even the roses seemed to breathe in the panel across her stomach. When Bugler saw it he would guess it was new; it smelt new.
To keep them from getting damp she changed the hiding place of the letters. She brought a biscuit tin from the house and put them in the dairy, adding each one as it came.
To a mare among Pharaoh’s cavalry.
I compare you my darling
Your cheeks adorned with bangles
Your neck with beads
Your groove a pomegranate grove.
She looked it up in Joseph’s dictionary: “The pomegranate has been known to man since time immemorial; largely regarded as a symbol of fertility, possibly because of the large number of seeds contained in the fruit. The Phoenicians took it from Western Asia to Carthage.” He had requested a meeting for the Sunday at two.
She chose the corner of the field that was farthest from the road. There being no wall to sit on, she piled a few stones together and made a perch of them. It was stifling. The dress was hot and so were her black stockings. She was really dressed for indoors and for nighttime. No matter where she moved to, the sun bore down. There was no shade to be found anywhere. One half of the field had been ploughed and the earth looked cross and disgruntled at being overturned. By contrast the young grass seemed to drink in the sun and gave back rays of greenish golden light. She listened, not knowing whether he would come on the tractor or on foot. What would they talk of? Not Carthage and pomegranates, not the myrrh mountain, and yet not their own mountain with its rock face and morsels of earth in the crevices. A black cat came sneaking through the grass to look at her, a mis-curiosity. Black cats that were supposed to be for good luck.
After a little while she realised that he was not coming and that those letters were not in his hand at all. She felt helpless, helpless to get up though the sun beat down on one side of her neck.
Joseph was dozing on the outside step when the telephone rang. He decided to let it ring, assuming it was Lady Harkness trying to coax Breege to make pies and scones for her. It stopped but then started almost at once, and he went into the house in an exasperation. There was no hesitation, simply a voice, a woman’s voice overloud, overenthusiastic, saying, “You ought to know where your sister is . . . look in the dairy and you’ll find out.” Then there was laughter at the other end as the phone was slammed down.
Out in the dairy he knew even as he lifted the lid of the biscuit tin, knew it by the smell of the thyme, smelling its way into the letters, knew their poison. When he read the first few words, he put them down, mortified by the lewdness, the vileness, the ravishment.
He met her out on the road, but heard her footsteps before he saw her, the brazen high heels on the hot dust-baked surface. Then he saw her as he had never seen her before, a Jezebel in a clinging dress with a gash of sunburn shaped like a fish down one side of her neck. She smiled at him to brave it out, but there was no braving, as she saw by his eyes.
“You tramp.”
“For God’s sake, Joseph,” she said, and
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