Read Online Poached Egg on Toast by Frances Itani - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Frances Itani
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hoping the vinegar will stay in the bottom so they can suck it out when the last chip is gone.
When the mail traffic dwindles and the steps of Tassé’s post office are empty again, Hector knows it is time for supper. He taps the loose reins against the horse’s back, lets go, and the cart begins to wheeze up and down narrow side streets. The women run out to meet him, wiping hands on aprons as they hurry down the paths. They hold out their deep white crockery.
“Lots of mouths to feed, Hector, fill it to the brim.” And dip their hands into the chips on the way back to their kitchens—after they’ve dipped into their apron pockets for the coins.
On Saturday afternoon the beerman comes. In the houses of the village, empties are stacked and ready. The beerman makes his rounds between two and four. Across the village you can hear the empties rattle and the children call, “Beerman! Beerman! La Bière!”
Mr. Smith, too, buys beer. Quincy and Marlene have gathered the empties and have put them by the porch door. They watch the gravel road to see who will come first: beerman? iceman? milkman? The iceman arrives and carries blocks of dripping ice in his steely picks, all the way around the house, down the long gangway, through the back door. He bangs the block into the top of the icebox and pushes aside the small piece left over from yesterday, melted smooth as an ocean stone.
At the front, on the road, his horse jerks and halts, jerks and halts as the children cry, “Whoaaaa!” The children shinny up the back of the cart to the slippery boards, and vie for slender ice chips to suck. Water drips through the wagon boards, leaving a chain of damp circles on the dusty road. The iceman returns and shoos the children away. He clucks to his horse.
If it is a hot day, Mr. Smith buys buttermilk from Borden’s truck for his children. There is a picture of Elsie on the side of the truck—Elsie with the dancing eyes and curly horns. In August, Quincy and Marlene will be taken across the river to the Exhibition, and there they will see, year after year, the real
Elsie the Borden Cow
in her glittering stall.
At last, the beerman arrives. Mr. Smith pays his money and then settles down on the front step with his neighbour, Ti-Jean. There they will stay the entire afternoon, arguing, waving their quart bottles, deciding once and for all who
really
won in ‘59. No matter who comes out ahead, Mr. Smith reminds Quincy and Marlene inside, later: “It’s ours by right of conquest! “ His hand sweeps in an encompassing gesture out towards the land beyond the window. Quincy and Marlene are not so sure. They have had their own skirmishes and are outnumbered, after all. Dubious victors, they have rushed into their house and looked back out through the curtains at the taunting, conquered faces.
Everything around seems to be in a state of being dismissed or constantly damned. Yet nothing goes away—only, finally, and much later, Mr. Smith and his family.
Oh, how the children are bored this summer. They have cut bows and arrows from green saplings; they have fashioned whistles from reeds; they have played deadman in the cove. They have scratched hopscotch into the dirt and thrown cut glass onto the squares. What is there left to do? Visit Mon Oncle Piché on the veranda of his black wooden house!
Mon Oncle is everyone’s uncle. He tilts in his wide rocker, all day, in shelter of the open veranda. He is too heavy to get up to walk around; it is enough effort to get himself into his chair each morning. His head is almost as big as his belly with its layers and layers of hard fat. His hair is cropped short to his scalp, peppered with grey. His black pants, held by suspenders, fit straight up from thigh to chin. All day he sits on the veranda and eats bread and jam.
But Mon Oncle—how he loves the children!
“Viens citte, mon p’tit chou. Come and talk to Mon Oncle.”
The children tell him stories. He teases them; he knows more
When the mail traffic dwindles and the steps of Tassé’s post office are empty again, Hector knows it is time for supper. He taps the loose reins against the horse’s back, lets go, and the cart begins to wheeze up and down narrow side streets. The women run out to meet him, wiping hands on aprons as they hurry down the paths. They hold out their deep white crockery.
“Lots of mouths to feed, Hector, fill it to the brim.” And dip their hands into the chips on the way back to their kitchens—after they’ve dipped into their apron pockets for the coins.
On Saturday afternoon the beerman comes. In the houses of the village, empties are stacked and ready. The beerman makes his rounds between two and four. Across the village you can hear the empties rattle and the children call, “Beerman! Beerman! La Bière!”
Mr. Smith, too, buys beer. Quincy and Marlene have gathered the empties and have put them by the porch door. They watch the gravel road to see who will come first: beerman? iceman? milkman? The iceman arrives and carries blocks of dripping ice in his steely picks, all the way around the house, down the long gangway, through the back door. He bangs the block into the top of the icebox and pushes aside the small piece left over from yesterday, melted smooth as an ocean stone.
At the front, on the road, his horse jerks and halts, jerks and halts as the children cry, “Whoaaaa!” The children shinny up the back of the cart to the slippery boards, and vie for slender ice chips to suck. Water drips through the wagon boards, leaving a chain of damp circles on the dusty road. The iceman returns and shoos the children away. He clucks to his horse.
If it is a hot day, Mr. Smith buys buttermilk from Borden’s truck for his children. There is a picture of Elsie on the side of the truck—Elsie with the dancing eyes and curly horns. In August, Quincy and Marlene will be taken across the river to the Exhibition, and there they will see, year after year, the real
Elsie the Borden Cow
in her glittering stall.
At last, the beerman arrives. Mr. Smith pays his money and then settles down on the front step with his neighbour, Ti-Jean. There they will stay the entire afternoon, arguing, waving their quart bottles, deciding once and for all who
really
won in ‘59. No matter who comes out ahead, Mr. Smith reminds Quincy and Marlene inside, later: “It’s ours by right of conquest! “ His hand sweeps in an encompassing gesture out towards the land beyond the window. Quincy and Marlene are not so sure. They have had their own skirmishes and are outnumbered, after all. Dubious victors, they have rushed into their house and looked back out through the curtains at the taunting, conquered faces.
Everything around seems to be in a state of being dismissed or constantly damned. Yet nothing goes away—only, finally, and much later, Mr. Smith and his family.
Oh, how the children are bored this summer. They have cut bows and arrows from green saplings; they have fashioned whistles from reeds; they have played deadman in the cove. They have scratched hopscotch into the dirt and thrown cut glass onto the squares. What is there left to do? Visit Mon Oncle Piché on the veranda of his black wooden house!
Mon Oncle is everyone’s uncle. He tilts in his wide rocker, all day, in shelter of the open veranda. He is too heavy to get up to walk around; it is enough effort to get himself into his chair each morning. His head is almost as big as his belly with its layers and layers of hard fat. His hair is cropped short to his scalp, peppered with grey. His black pants, held by suspenders, fit straight up from thigh to chin. All day he sits on the veranda and eats bread and jam.
But Mon Oncle—how he loves the children!
“Viens citte, mon p’tit chou. Come and talk to Mon Oncle.”
The children tell him stories. He teases them; he knows more
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