Read Online The Home Girls by Olga Masters - Free Book Online

turning her eyes towards Rose and Yvonne daring them to dispute this.
    They each made a half toss of their heads putting the sugar bowl and milk jug each with a beaded cover and the jam and butter with great care in the centre of the table.
    Esme did sit next to Sylvia at supper but she would have been better next to Lennie.
    â€œAsk Varnia to pass the bread,” he whispered in an aside to Yvonne which Esme heard.
    She reached past Rose and Yvonne and pulled at the shirt on Lennie’s shoulder twisting it about.
    Fighting at the meal table, even talking to excess was not tolerated by either parent and Mr McMahon slapped the bread knife so sharply on the table some of the things rattled about.
    Esme with swift eyes towards Sylvia noticed how fussily with her lovely slender hands she put her bread and butter plate back in its place and straightened the pudding spoon which had gone askew. Esme immediately made similar adjustments at her place.
    â€œLook at her,” whispered Rose to Yvonne.
    â€œYou’ve asked God’s blessing on this food. Don’t make a mockery of it!” said Mrs McMahon and although she didn’t look Sylvia’s way Esme felt Mrs McMahon was laying the blame on her.
    Esme sneaked a hand down to touch the cool waistline of Sylvia’s dress.
    Sylvia brushed some breadcrumbs on the tablecloth into a little heap and dropped them onto her plate and laid the knife at a perfect angle across it.
    Esme wanted to but daren’t do the same at her place.
    After supper they did the usual things like washing up and Mr McMahon, Frank and Lennie went out in the half dark for more wood, to see that the dairy was locked against dogs and fowls and that calves in their paddock had no chance of joining mothers and sucking them dry by morning.
    Esme would have liked her father to have suggested they all go to the sitting room and light a fire there and let Sylvia entertain them with stories of her life in the city.
    Esme pictured Sylvia at the table with its ruby red cloth stroking it with her fine white fingers and the lamplight making a cameo of her face with her hair lost in the shadows.
    Perhaps she would change her dress for them. People in books changed their clothes a lot particularly in the evening. The best that could be expected of the McMahons was for Mrs McMahon to take her apron off and Mr McMahon to discard his blucher boots for an old pair of patent leather shoes he danced in during the early days of their marriage. The children under a rigid rule changed into old things no longer worth mending as soon as they came in from school or church.
    But Esme thought it was best to leave the idea of a family gathering a dream.
    Mrs McMahon’s face had tightened more than once at supper when Esme talked about her job and flat in Sydney. Esme thought her mother rose unnecessarily and sharply a couple of times to put the teapot back on the stove bringing about a break in the talk.
    At bedtime Esme and even Rose and Yvonne were disappointed that Sylvia shook from her case the nightdress her mother made her to go away.
    â€œYou can see right through my new ones,” Sylvia said.
    Oh.
    Mrs McMahon came in with the lamp and blew out their candle. She wasn’t making up a bed on the couch for anyone but taking Jackie to share the double bed with his parents.
    Esme raised herself in bed.
    â€œShe’s wearing the nightie you made her,” she said.
    Mrs McMahon raised the lamp.
    â€œIt’s ironed up very nice,” she said.
    â€œA woman at the flats did it for me,” Sylvia said, “She brings in my clothes from the line and irons them all and puts them outside my door.
    â€œShe would do anything in the world for me.”
    Mrs McMahon turned to leave.
    â€œDon’t talk but get right to sleep or your father’ll be in with the strap.”
    Esme crushed her cheek on Sylvia’s shoulder hating her mother.
    â€œNot you,” she whispered.
    She laid an