prepare the day, lay out the hours and count the minutes past.”
“Did you? Did you do with him? Did you?”
“You sillikins, of course not. Would I do? When you were last put up, put down…ah yes, I have the memory of it now.”
“Oh, do not mention it, pray not! How improper were our little games! Nose to nose and mouth to mouth we were, each bumping, wriggling, working to their whims. All squashed I was, Laura, and you laughing, Hannah saying he must take it out. In a corner she was and her face on a cushion.”
“Pouf! Make not much of episodes, Semantha, coming together of moments, enlacings of the days. There shall be tea and quietness now, discoursings on the usefulness of life. A truce is called to it, their rosaries fast held.”
“Around his naughty thing, I know! That's how he puts it in and works away, jinglings of beads and smacking of his balls. Both together they were and their legs up.”
“Shush! What a naughtiness is about you today that you prattle as you do! Come, come within. I have my rooms prepared, my niceties conveyed. If they are not aware of who I am-we are-there will be ructions.”
All is obsequiousness and quiet, the carpets scarlet and the drapes.
“Your rooms, Miss, yes, of course, your rooms.”
Full passage made, we to the elevator led, whisked all about, avoiding hazards, hamperings of feet, rugs, chests, and brass spittoons.
The rooms are small and yet commodious. Semantha bounces on the bed, comes up, goes down, moves hips and sinks again, her ankles neat in stockings white.
What shall we do today, Mama, what shall we do?
I sit beside her oh the bed, gaze in full hope upon her young, smooth face.
“Is it true that there is reality, Semantha?”
Her eyes, wide with surprise, are doves descending.
“Oh yes, oh yes. I took my medicine today, had breakfast with my aunt, saw to the menu of the day, upbraided cook, and kicked the dogs away. Papa took out his hunter, saw the time, and all was well. The sun rose high and clear. I shall have mulberry wine and dance my way all through the evening.”
“What medicine pray? Everyone is about medicines today, placebos, pills, and beads-anxieties.”
“Ho! Medicines indeed! You know well what I meant. Did we not always call it that? When first injected with the fruitful prong I struggled, then took heart and suffered it, tight easing in my passage, oiling me with early warnings of its succulence. Such a syringing did I have-oh my!” She laughs and kicks her legs, looks sudden coy, begging I think her not too wanton in her ways.
Messages of thoughts and memories. They are too slender here. I fret at that. Never too young for it and ever playful, white of dress and white of limbs. Let the messages come, trill at my fingers.
“Never wanton you, Semantha, no. You had the innocence at play which brought his cock up first, I do believe. You lisped when kissed and struggled not to feel a hand within your drawers. Strawberries and cream you said your titties were, the nipples gently sucked each morn, your bottom tickled in the bed. Made play between them with you, did they not? Cock at your bottom and her lips to yours.”
“Oh yes, I laughed, but I was scared. I'd never seen it up before. Aunt Aramintha wafted up my nightgown then and held me tight. 'Fuck, fuck,' she said-oh, such a wicked word! 'Come, tease him further not,' she said, and laid my hand beneath his balls, arm straining far behind my back. He who would tread his angel twisted me about, his naked staff against my belly burning. Aunt held my arms and laughed and nipped my ear. Then, seizing up my thighs, he put it in and said that he was only cozening.”
Our lips together now, our breaths come fast.
“Fucking, Semantha-fucking-say!”
“F…Fucking, oooh…oh, put your finger there!”
I have intruded on a word I would not speak, but now is said and done, curled up and dry. Plant it between the books you do not read. It has no eminence, ugly of sound, meaningless of purpose. Rinse your mouth. Take flowers to bed and dream of pale things.
I would uncover now her breasts, but we are visited. A knock discreet upon the solid door. Arranging my gown with care I go, a flush too high upon my cheeks.
Bury the word and let it have no roots. I would be done with it, to silence put.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
“Am I inopportune?”
He who proffers the question and appears to stumble over it a little is of comely mien, olive of skin, not having passed his fortieth year, tall, well-sprung, and with most kindly eyes.
“I know not your habits, sir, so cannot answer for you.”
“It is Hari!” Semantha rushing forth, her corsage disarrayed to show her mounds. A kiss exchanged, she presents him as her cousin. He noted, it seems, our entrance to the Duke of York's but tarried in his coming.
“You are not English, then?” Wine is dispersed.
“One cannot pick and choose the colours of one's skin upon one's coming. The desert stung my mouth before. Dry the vegetation, cruel the winds, nights cold, the days all oven baked. Were I a lizard I would lie beneath the stones and lick the coolness of their surface.”
“He is a philosopher, Laura-makes mysteries of words. As for myself, I prefer the simpler life. Even so, I must to my aunt. She knows me not diverted. May I leave you to your discourse?”
“Shall you return, Semantha?”
I have no anxiety upon the matter, though a simple curiosity.
“There are ever returnings, comings, and passings. Kiss me once more and pass your tongue within my mouth.”
“Hari will see.”
“Oh pouf, it does not matter. He may make play with you himself if you are minded to it.”
“Go, you minx.” I laugh at her. “Your tongue runs away with you and may be hard to catch one day. Kiss your aunt for me. Wear the ring forever, for I shall know you by its glittering, this life or that.”
“Have you come, then, to such understandings?”
Upon the closing of the door his glance is mild on me but rains its tiny questions on my brow. Thus it is with some that one may find immediate comfort with them such as the Germans call gemutlich. His skin is smooth as mine. His testicles though small perhaps will yet have power.
“I shall wear a sari. Would you wish me to?”
“Naked beneath as Grandma wore?”
“If you would have it so. My obedience may not be absolute. I have but one true master. Did her breath taste of olives? I often wondered at that. I know not why olives. The thought came to me upon seeing her likeness-pale and frayed though it was-the tincture of the sepia all but gone.”
“There was a muskiness, heady to the senses. I knew her breasts firmer than a young woman's, her belly flat. But we were younger then, in other climes. Why do we speak upon the merely physical?”
“Being human, we are prone to do. One looks for shade in light and light in shade, listens for footfalls, hears the creak of doors, waits for the postman's knock while arranging polished apples in a bowl where fitfully the sun will glance across their surfaces; and so the scenes will change from time to time, sounds will come and go, and presences be felt.”
“A fine cascade of words! You trust your senses far too much, abide in them too long. So long as you clutter your mind with concepts you will have no knowing of the truth of this little matter.”
“This little matter? Is that what you call it?”
My mischief is unintended, yet obtains. Winsome I look and soft to hold. He gazes at me long, rises from his chair, and draws me up.
“Know that your mind is like a monkey in a cage, ever fretting to take nuts or break without the bars.”
I recall what father said about the trumpet's blare, my aunt about the cats, and clap my hands.
