superintendent’s daughter,’ says the blonde woman. ‘We checked up.’
‘Bitch,’ I scream. ‘Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch.’
The woman holding the chair ducks, and someone goes to grab me. I am quicker than they expect, jumping with a gymnast’s fluid leap towards the fire door, finding myself in a stairwell, running down, not looking back. I hear, among the voices behind me, someone calling, ‘Mad as a maggot’, but I don’t care.
SCARLET RIBBONS
W ENDY AND S ARAH quarrel as they walk around Edith’s garden. Wendy carries the floppy velvet bag over her arm. On her head she wears a huge sunhat, tied beneath her chin with a paisley scarf.
‘It’s a man, isn’t it?’ Wendy asks. ‘You were expecting a man. I stood in the way of some fellow coming to slink into your bed after dark.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘He’s let you down, hasn’t he?’
‘Why do you say that?’ Sarah knots and unknots her hands. They are too thin and her veins stand out.
‘Ha.’ It is more of a bark than a comment.
‘I made a bad marriage — am I supposed to behave like a nun? Do penance?’
‘A touch of classical Renaissance here,’ says Wendy, looking around the garden. ‘Interesting.’
The garden is laid out from the house in a rectangular lawn with low narrow walls down which erigeron and rock plants fall beneath Italian lavenders. A central middle path leads across the central axis to a gazebo and an organised cluster of rose gardens; it is only beyond this point that a certain wildness takes over, as the garden fans into serpentine grassed paths among brilliant displays of annuals. These walkways meander towards a large avenue of trees that lead to the paddocks beyond.
A spare, suntanned woman with dark hair turning white in slashes round the temples, is surrounded by day trippers to the garden . She wears a pale green silk shirt and severely tailored slacks, casually elegant in a way that those of her guests are not. They are a mixed lot: mothers and daughters like Sarah and Wendy, grateful for an interest they can share; a sprinkling of older men shambling behind wives with crimped blue hair, pearl button earrings and winged glasses, their angora cardigans buttoned across their stomachs ; Japanese tourists taking photographs of each other in the swings beneath the trees, a small outing of the wheelchair-bound (to whom the organisation who has hired Edith’s garden today will make a donation); a group of private school girls carrying notebooks and piping with excitement as they discover botanical labels on the plants.
‘Who does your landscape design?’ asks a visitor intensely, pen poised over a notebook.
The owner looks surprised, and raises her eyebrows. ‘Nobody.’
‘You must visit other gardens?’
‘Never,’ says the woman in the green shirt.
‘Oh. Photographs, books, perhaps?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘Well’ The woman gestures helplessly. ‘You do seem to have a painterly eye.’
‘So what do you want, Wendy?’ Sarah asks her mother.
‘Ssh,’ says Wendy, her fingers to her lips.
‘Up here,’ says the owner, tapping her forehead with her forefinger . ‘It’s all up here.’ Finishing the conversation, she walks briskly to a long table where food is being set out.
‘I want you to be happy’ says Wendy, as if there has been no interruption to the conversation.
‘Well, let me get on with it.’
‘Oh, I would, I would if you could. The trouble is, Sarah, you don’t know who you are. How can you make choices?’
‘I’m sick of all that, don’t you understand?’ Sarah says, more sharply than she intends.
‘Don’t be a baby, Sarah. How can anyone know anything if they don’t ask questions?’
‘That’s your problem. You’re the one who wants to know.’
There is a veto on the information in Sarah’s adoption files. Her birth parents cannot be identified. It is a wound Sarah has failed to lick clean.
A group of madrigal singers in period costume is gathering
‘Bitch,’ I scream. ‘Bitch, bitch, bitch, bitch.’
The woman holding the chair ducks, and someone goes to grab me. I am quicker than they expect, jumping with a gymnast’s fluid leap towards the fire door, finding myself in a stairwell, running down, not looking back. I hear, among the voices behind me, someone calling, ‘Mad as a maggot’, but I don’t care.
SCARLET RIBBONS
W ENDY AND S ARAH quarrel as they walk around Edith’s garden. Wendy carries the floppy velvet bag over her arm. On her head she wears a huge sunhat, tied beneath her chin with a paisley scarf.
‘It’s a man, isn’t it?’ Wendy asks. ‘You were expecting a man. I stood in the way of some fellow coming to slink into your bed after dark.’
‘That’s not true.’
‘He’s let you down, hasn’t he?’
‘Why do you say that?’ Sarah knots and unknots her hands. They are too thin and her veins stand out.
‘Ha.’ It is more of a bark than a comment.
‘I made a bad marriage — am I supposed to behave like a nun? Do penance?’
‘A touch of classical Renaissance here,’ says Wendy, looking around the garden. ‘Interesting.’
The garden is laid out from the house in a rectangular lawn with low narrow walls down which erigeron and rock plants fall beneath Italian lavenders. A central middle path leads across the central axis to a gazebo and an organised cluster of rose gardens; it is only beyond this point that a certain wildness takes over, as the garden fans into serpentine grassed paths among brilliant displays of annuals. These walkways meander towards a large avenue of trees that lead to the paddocks beyond.
A spare, suntanned woman with dark hair turning white in slashes round the temples, is surrounded by day trippers to the garden . She wears a pale green silk shirt and severely tailored slacks, casually elegant in a way that those of her guests are not. They are a mixed lot: mothers and daughters like Sarah and Wendy, grateful for an interest they can share; a sprinkling of older men shambling behind wives with crimped blue hair, pearl button earrings and winged glasses, their angora cardigans buttoned across their stomachs ; Japanese tourists taking photographs of each other in the swings beneath the trees, a small outing of the wheelchair-bound (to whom the organisation who has hired Edith’s garden today will make a donation); a group of private school girls carrying notebooks and piping with excitement as they discover botanical labels on the plants.
‘Who does your landscape design?’ asks a visitor intensely, pen poised over a notebook.
The owner looks surprised, and raises her eyebrows. ‘Nobody.’
‘You must visit other gardens?’
‘Never,’ says the woman in the green shirt.
‘Oh. Photographs, books, perhaps?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘Well’ The woman gestures helplessly. ‘You do seem to have a painterly eye.’
‘So what do you want, Wendy?’ Sarah asks her mother.
‘Ssh,’ says Wendy, her fingers to her lips.
‘Up here,’ says the owner, tapping her forehead with her forefinger . ‘It’s all up here.’ Finishing the conversation, she walks briskly to a long table where food is being set out.
‘I want you to be happy’ says Wendy, as if there has been no interruption to the conversation.
‘Well, let me get on with it.’
‘Oh, I would, I would if you could. The trouble is, Sarah, you don’t know who you are. How can you make choices?’
‘I’m sick of all that, don’t you understand?’ Sarah says, more sharply than she intends.
‘Don’t be a baby, Sarah. How can anyone know anything if they don’t ask questions?’
‘That’s your problem. You’re the one who wants to know.’
There is a veto on the information in Sarah’s adoption files. Her birth parents cannot be identified. It is a wound Sarah has failed to lick clean.
A group of madrigal singers in period costume is gathering
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