(1993) The Stone Diaries Read Online Free Page B

peas to pick for supper. She’s always running late, and always there’s a shrewish tune skirling away inside her head: now the stove to polish, now the mending, next the curtains to starch.
    The scolding voice is her own, so abrasive and quick, yet so powerless to move her. The men, her husband and sons, leave for the quarry at seven o’clock sharp and return at five. What do they imagine she does all day? It makes her shiver to think of it, how not one pair of eyes can see through the roof and walls of her house and regard her as she moves through her dreamlike days, bargaining from minute to minute with indolence, that tempter.
    God sees her, of course. He must. God observes her at the window where she stares and stares at the shadows of the caragana blowing across the path, or sitting on one of the kitchen chairs, locked into paralysis over her mending basket, watching a fly creep across the table. The minutes tick by, become an hour, sometimes two. These segments of time are untied to any other time she recognizes. It happens more and more frequently, these collapsed hours, almost every day since the summer weather came on. She wakes up fresh enough, but as the hands of the clock move forward she feels a force beckoning, the teasing seduction of ease and secrecy, and then, with the next breath, she’s lost the battle. Whatever it is that encloses her is made up of tenderness. It rises around her like a cloud of scent. There’s no face or voice to it, only a soft, steady, pervasive fragrance, a kind of rapturous wave that enters her throat, then moves downward through her body, bringing tightness to her female parts and the muscles of her softened thighs. The silence is perfect, and yet a torment, and always a dry little thought plucks away at her—that God is not interested in her lapses. He has not spoken out to her in any way, has not given a sign, not even troubled Himself to betray her, even though she has baited Him with a scrap of embroidered linen on her kitchen wall:
    Christ is the Head of the House
    The Unseen Guest at every
    Meal The Silent Listener to every Conversation

    It is frightening, and also exhilarating, her ability to deceive those around her; this is something new, her lost hours, her vivid dreams and shreds of language, as though she’d been given two lives instead of one, the alternate life cloaked in secret.
    Or does she deceive herself? Dr. Spears, when she met him by accident walking on the Quarry Road, did catch hold of her wrist and speak to her in a most curious and candid manner. "Women need the companionship of other women," he burst out after some polite talk about the weather. "A little laughter is a great comfort, a little harmless gossip. The Needlework Auxiliary or the Mothers’
    Union—and I believe, Mrs. Flett, you were once a member of the Ladies Rhythm and Movement Club, that you used to find enjoyment in an afternoon of cheerful company. My own wife tells me the recent talk on the Chinese missions was diverting, as well as edifying."
    "I’m very busy at home," Clarentine Flett told Dr. Spears.
    "Of course, of course," he nodded quickly. "Or perhaps you’re thinking of a few days’ visiting in Winnipeg. I believe you spend a few days there every year with your son Barker. He is still there, is he not, engaged in his studies? Botany, if I remember, his field of endeavor."
    "Yes," she answered. "Flowers. Plants."
    "I’m sure he does you credit. A fine young fellow. If you remember, I was one of those who put his name forward for the Epworth Scholarship."
    "I do remember, indeed I do, and—"
    "Why not surprise him, then, with the pleasure of a visit? We all need a change of scene now and then, especially after a long hard winter. I could mention it to your husband, if you like—indirectly, of course. I could suggest the healthful benefits of a little holiday."
    "Please," she’d said. She was thinking of the oval of silence she would enter as soon as she left Dr.