and my husband â not men in chains, just fortune seekers. I was their maid of all works who measuredout rum for sailors, kept brass things shiny and dresses sorted. I loved the feel of silk and satin running through my fingers when I lifted bolts of material. I held them to my face and breathed in their faint spicy smell, ran my fingers over the rich brocades.
Along the lower end of George Street are to be found open markets filled with bustle and noise and colour. Parrots and cockatoos swing in cages before the doors of shops crowded with sailors jingling Spanish dollars they have earned at sea. Down the left-hand side are stalls where maize and wheat are sold; on the right, green vegetables, turkeys, ducks, geese and sucking pigs. I compare the best prices, in order to buy something to put Charlotte in a better mood on my way back. A shilling for a basket of peaches and nicely ripened cheese at fourpence a pound, which I can afford, just so long as I donât have to touch the peaches, for I am like my grandmother in this respect: I cannot bear the feel of a peach, which puts my teeth on edge, or worse, feels like my fingernails are bending back on themselves. I would like to linger over the booths of drapery for, as youâll have gathered, Iâm partial to quality and, from the beginning, Jacky has spared nothing on me. All that is changed now; he has neither the mood nor the money to indulge me, for all our ships are lost at sea. In spite of myself, my eyes roam over hoop petticoats and some fine lawn camisoles; itâs hard to explain but itâs as if Iâm looking down into the lives of women and girls who are like the person I was once, and cannot be again.
I hurry on, not looking left or right now, past a myriad creaking signs over the inns â the Crooked Billet, Three Jolly Sailors, Rose of Australia and World Turnâd Upside Down. Well, that last one would do me, though it was meant for sailors who believe that when they put to sea and sail over the horizon they are hanging on by their toes to the opposite side of the world. Though how it works I canât tell either, for all the world round here looks flat to me â you couldnât get flatter than Australia. But out on the ocean with Jacky, Iâve seen the way the sky curls over on itself, and Iâve worked out that there is some solution tothe riddle of the world and how you get from one side of it to another without falling off.
I find myself glancing over my shoulder, as if I am being followed by something or someone, a shadow as large as a whale on the horizon, and I know that though he is not there â or, at least, I donât think he is following me â that it is the shadow of my husband.
When I reach the shop, I see it has fallen on hard times. The grog barrels drip into their saucers as ever, but there is not much else but a collection of dusty pewter mugs on a shelf, some cheap fabric stacked any old how, and a few odds and ends collected in tubs. The tobacco is tenpence a pound, which is daylight robbery, and available much cheaper at the port. Gone are the hats and hat boxes, which were almost as pretty as the hats themselves, not to mention the gentlemenâs hats with stovepipe crowns and ribbon round the brims, and fine kid gloves, and gold watches in locked glass cabinets, and a range of the best china money can buy. Once, when I was over from New Zealand, I bought a beautiful meat dish here, pale green and white, my favourite colours. My Granny said people who prefer green are cold by nature but that I do not believe, though she was right about most things. The centrepiece has pattern of thistles and roses and shamrocks, not that I have seen a shamrock. The platter has channels down the sides so the meat juices run down to a hollow; I pour them off to make the gravy. Well, I never expect to see that again. Ngai Tahu tribesmen have burnt down our house again, that I do know. Not for the first
Along the lower end of George Street are to be found open markets filled with bustle and noise and colour. Parrots and cockatoos swing in cages before the doors of shops crowded with sailors jingling Spanish dollars they have earned at sea. Down the left-hand side are stalls where maize and wheat are sold; on the right, green vegetables, turkeys, ducks, geese and sucking pigs. I compare the best prices, in order to buy something to put Charlotte in a better mood on my way back. A shilling for a basket of peaches and nicely ripened cheese at fourpence a pound, which I can afford, just so long as I donât have to touch the peaches, for I am like my grandmother in this respect: I cannot bear the feel of a peach, which puts my teeth on edge, or worse, feels like my fingernails are bending back on themselves. I would like to linger over the booths of drapery for, as youâll have gathered, Iâm partial to quality and, from the beginning, Jacky has spared nothing on me. All that is changed now; he has neither the mood nor the money to indulge me, for all our ships are lost at sea. In spite of myself, my eyes roam over hoop petticoats and some fine lawn camisoles; itâs hard to explain but itâs as if Iâm looking down into the lives of women and girls who are like the person I was once, and cannot be again.
I hurry on, not looking left or right now, past a myriad creaking signs over the inns â the Crooked Billet, Three Jolly Sailors, Rose of Australia and World Turnâd Upside Down. Well, that last one would do me, though it was meant for sailors who believe that when they put to sea and sail over the horizon they are hanging on by their toes to the opposite side of the world. Though how it works I canât tell either, for all the world round here looks flat to me â you couldnât get flatter than Australia. But out on the ocean with Jacky, Iâve seen the way the sky curls over on itself, and Iâve worked out that there is some solution tothe riddle of the world and how you get from one side of it to another without falling off.
I find myself glancing over my shoulder, as if I am being followed by something or someone, a shadow as large as a whale on the horizon, and I know that though he is not there â or, at least, I donât think he is following me â that it is the shadow of my husband.
When I reach the shop, I see it has fallen on hard times. The grog barrels drip into their saucers as ever, but there is not much else but a collection of dusty pewter mugs on a shelf, some cheap fabric stacked any old how, and a few odds and ends collected in tubs. The tobacco is tenpence a pound, which is daylight robbery, and available much cheaper at the port. Gone are the hats and hat boxes, which were almost as pretty as the hats themselves, not to mention the gentlemenâs hats with stovepipe crowns and ribbon round the brims, and fine kid gloves, and gold watches in locked glass cabinets, and a range of the best china money can buy. Once, when I was over from New Zealand, I bought a beautiful meat dish here, pale green and white, my favourite colours. My Granny said people who prefer green are cold by nature but that I do not believe, though she was right about most things. The centrepiece has pattern of thistles and roses and shamrocks, not that I have seen a shamrock. The platter has channels down the sides so the meat juices run down to a hollow; I pour them off to make the gravy. Well, I never expect to see that again. Ngai Tahu tribesmen have burnt down our house again, that I do know. Not for the first
Similar Books
