Read Online Tirra Lirra by the River by Jessica Anderson - Free Book Online

Harold. I was cooking the dinner, and he stood behind me at the stove and talked. The difference in our heels made me hardly shorter than him that day, and presently, continuing to talk, he put his chin on my shoulder. It was the only time we ever touched each other.
    Colin came in as he was leaving. After Lewie shut the door behind him, Colin continued to stand and stare at it, as if Lewie’s image was imprinted there.
    ‘You had that fellow in here? Alone?’
    I was warned by his goggle eyes, his hollow tone of wonderment. ‘Only for two or three minutes. He came to borrow some butter, but I don’t see why we should lend him things.’
    Colin was still staring at the door. ‘Do you know what?’
    ‘No. What?’
    ‘I reckon he’s a poofter.’
    ‘Oh, Colin, he is not. He’s engaged to a lovely girl in Adelaide. He showed me her photograph.’
    ‘Anyone can have a
photo
of a girl.’
    ‘Oh, but it had on the back of it, “To my darling Lewie, with all my love”.’
    ‘I don’t care, I don’t want him in here again.’
    How quickly I became sly. After that, when Colin came home, and kissed me, and asked what I had done that day, I would say in an offhand way, ‘Ah … mm … went and helped Ida for a bit. And, let’s see … what else? Goodness, I do hope I have a baby soon. I’m sick of not having enough to do. But never mind, it won’t be for much longer.’
    ‘It’s been too long already. It’s because you’re frigid.’
    ‘Perhaps it’s you.’
    ‘Perhaps. Only, I happen to know it isn’t.’
    ‘How?’
    ‘I just happen to know, that’s all.’
    ‘But Colin, how?’
    But Colin would say nothing more, and at that time I was afraid to encroach further on those silences of his, which I still hoped were charged with masculine mystery, and deep suggestion.
    There comes back to me the smell of the downstairs hall of the city library. Was it malt? Or vinegar? But though I ascended so often in the wrought-iron cage, and though I sat so often reading in the deep window embrasures, I continued to discriminate in favour of the books lent to me by the artists at Bomera, first because they were crisp and fresh while those in the library were furred with use, and then because they had the approval of people I liked. The gentle watercolourist lent me his favourites: Saki, Chekhov, and Katherine Mansfield, and among the novels I borrowed from others were
Chrome Yellow, Sons and Lovers
, and
The Rainbow
. But it was from furred paper, in the old navy blue covers, that I read
Madame Bovary
.
    The ignorance I still pretended of Colin now contended with a tide of theoretical knowledge. One day in the garden of Bomera, when we had been swimming, I watched two of the artists, a young man and woman, playing in the long grass below the timber walk of the pool. They were of a size, and both wore black wool costumes, and they rolled about like little bears, biting each other and laughing. I felt tears rising to my eyes. I had been married for more than two years. I left the pool and walked slowly through the garden to the house, past the rank shrubs, the dirty statues, and the summer-house with the stork on its peaked roof, dragging my towel behind me and hanging my head to hide my tears. I found Ida alone.
    ‘Oh, Ida, why don’t I have a baby?’
    ‘Is
that
all you’ve got to cry about?’
    ‘All!’
    ‘Well, look, while you’re waiting for this famous baby, why not take a job with me? I’ll pay you well, and what’s more, I’ll teach you to
cut
. You’ve got original ideas, Nora, and your finish is lovely. But you can’t
cut
.’
    I said to Colin, ‘Ida Mayo has offered me a job.’
    ‘No wife of mine is going to work.’
    ‘Colin won’t let me,’ I said to Ida.
    ‘Oh, one of those.’
    ‘It’s his pride,’ I said proudly.
    ‘Is it? Well, I don’t feel right about you helping me so often for nothing. He can’t object if we make you a dress now and again. Or can he?’
    ‘No,’ said