Bridge of Triangles Read Online Free Page A

frame and the other held a cream enamel mug. His face was grey and his shoes held no laces.
    â€œOn the bloody river where they always do and they belong.” He spat again.
    â€œYou shut your mouth Fenton,” Sissy turned to the man who lived now with the Old Granny. “Mind your own bloody business. Has he been hitting you Mum? By the Jesus Harry, if you lay a finger on her you’ll cop it. Now piss off!”
    The kids all stood with mouths full of fingers and hearts full of fear and their eyes on Harry.
    Chris edged closer to his mother but she continued tolook at Harry and he felt deserted and in danger. His mother’s face was ugly with anger.
    â€œCome on Sis, don’t start anything.” Rose’s voice was quiet and private.
    â€œYeh, alright. But if he hits you Mum you tell me, alright? I’ll fix him—I’ll fix him good and proper.” Her words floated through the empty door. “Miserable bastard!” she shouted at the space.
    The old lady looked at her daughter. She cackled. “Harry—he won’t murder me, not that one.” She grinned toothlessly and everyone traipsed into the dark interior of her house where Paula made strong milky tea.
    Sugary biscuits were in a paper bag on the table.
    â€œClarrie’s miles away Mum. Why do you think he’s got something to do with them fires last night?” Rose’s glass cup shook in her hand.
    The old woman slurped her tea. “’e says they pinched his grog don’t ’e? Could’ve done.”
    Rose said, “They might have done, but Clarrie wouldn’t do that—not that.”
    The Old Granny looked at her daughters’ faces. Paula’s dark and heavy, the other two like maltvinegar. The delicate blondness of her grandchilden. Not hers really, now that everything was changing. Her world was ended. Only Paula looked like family. And somehow Clarrie was to blame. More than Jack. He was a very visible threat to her world. With his red car and Rose stuck up front with those little blond kids in the back seat. You could go a long way in a car like that. You could drive off in a car like that and never be seen again.
    â€œHe’s got the car hasn’t he?”
    Rose had to think.
    â€œLook, do you think he left the car up near the bridge, crept down by the river and poured kero or some bloody thing all over the place and then just shot through?”
    Bitterly Sissy laughed. “I don’t trust him. I don’t trust anyone”
    The old woman her mother, said, “Trust your own.”
    Rose was angry. “Clarrie’s not a bloody murderer. Jesus, what’s everyone saying?”
    â€œNobody dead is they?” The Old Granny sounded strangely defensive. “I ain’t talkin’ ’bout that. I’m talkin’ ’bout us. Clarrie don’t ’long ’ere. We all ’long together. But no more. Anyway it all over now. It all over.”
    Her grey hair fell about her face and her fingers were limp beside her yellowed petticoat. She stood by the back door and near her bare feet a dog rested on the floor.
    This was years before the pink clay bricks supporting the old shack lay scattered and half buried in small mounds of earth and the man would scrape with a stick through waist high paspalum, disturbing lizards and wary of snakes as he searched to remember.
    It was many years before the red and black and yellow flag was raised in that town across the flats and the people saw again with a new vision the kangaroo and lizard and spoke of the Old Granny as Girlie, who once lived with her mob by the river. All so long ago but all so recent. One world forever ending but who is to know how far from the beginning is the ever-present now where still live the great goannas and lightning lizards and black bull ants?
    Only Paula’s heart was at peace on that day when the river flowed behind the standing house and Willy wagtails flitted