Mrs. Stevens Hears the Mermaids Singing Read Online Free Page A

she was and what she meant about her own personage began to flow back as she ran a comb through the fine childlike hair, hardly gray, and brushed her teeth—her own, and those the dentists had had to provide over the years.
    “Damn it!” she said aloud. It meant, in spite of it all, false teeth, falling hair, wrinkles, I am still myself. They haven’t got me yet.
    They , … the enemies. Who were “they” exactly, she asked herself while she put the kettle on, and admired the breakfast tray as she did each morning, resting her eyes on the red cocks painted on the white cup and saucer, the red linen cloth, the Quimper jam jar with a strawberry for a knob, rejoicing in order and beauty, as if she had not herself arranged it all the night before.
    There were moments when Hilary saw life as tending always toward chaos, when it seemed that all one could be asked was just to keep the ashtrays clean, the bed made, the wastebaskets emptied, as if one never got to the real things because of the constant exhausting battle to keep ordinary life from falling apart. She gave orders to the doddering servant about all this, but the old thing was getting slow.…
    Now, for instance, she had almost forgotten Sirenica in the cellar! Released, the white cat wound herself round Hilary’s legs and purred ecstatically, lifting first one paw and then another and stretching it out into the air, giving a single high-pitched mew when she heard the frigidaire door slam and saw her plate being lifted down.
    “Who are ‘they,’ Sirenica?” Hilary asked aloud, but there was no time to make an answer, for it was necessary while the eggs boiled to put the two little turtles into warm water to wake them up; they looked up at her with eyes as cold as her own, then swam wildly about waiting for their disgusting breakfast of mealy worms. Hilary had bought them on an impulse in the five-and-ten. Their coldness was restful; and she delighted in their beauty, like animated pieces of jade. Also it had been rather comforting to read in a turtle book that they might live to be forty, that the absurd creatures would outlive her. Still, any life is in constant peril, and before she knew it, she had taken on another anxiety, worried when they did not eat for a day, found herself involved, trying to imagine what they might enjoy, an hour outdoors in the sun, or a little piece of fish for a change. She gazed down into the bowl intently, now, studying the delicate webbed feet and tiny tails, often kept wound in under the shell. She forgot about her toast. It was cold when she finally buttered it and took the tray upstairs.
    Heaven, to get back into bed for this best hour of the day!—the hour when the door between sleep and waking, between conscious and unconscious, was still ajar and Hilary could consider the strange things that welled up through the night, could lie there looking out to sea, and feel energy flow back while she drank two or three strong cups of tea. With the first, she found herself observing Sirenica, who had jumped up on the bed (hoping no doubt there might be bacon this morning), and had settled down to wash her face. It was a long, intricate process; it began with the long rose-petal tongue lapping all around her mouth and chin, up and down and around, at least fifty times. When every taste of fish and every drop of oiliness had been savored, a washcloth paw lifted, to be licked in its turn, then rubbed back of the ears, round the nose, past the strong whiskers. Hilary watched it all as intently as a cat watches a bird: this was something she had never managed to “get down” in a satisfactory form, but she still had hopes.
    With her second cup of tea the unfinished dialogue about “they” was resumed, and she lay back on the pillows ruminating. Of course “they” varied a good deal. At one time in her life, “they” had certainly been the critics. Even the accolade on her last book of poems had left a slightly sour taste. She could