Sarah Thornhill by Kate Grenville Read Free Book Online Page A

saw Jack in the yard splitting kindling. The hatchet never missing, the wood falling away clean from the blade. His body moving so smooth and easy, him and the wood and the hatchet like a dance.
    Well, it’s Sarah Thornhill, he said. Bright as a bird.
    How did I pass those months without him? Now he was here, it felt like I’d been half dead.
    Come to stack for me, have you, he said. Just mind them splinters. Them soft fingers of yours.
    Our valley was that deep, the sun came into it late. Gold on the hills all round before it reached down to us. A lovely time. That soft light, and knowing the sun would soon shine warm on you. Me and Jack. Nothing said because nothing needed to be.
    Then Ma was bustling out from the house.
    Jack, leave that, she said. And Dolly, look at you all over splinters!
    Happy to do it, Mrs Thornhill, Jack said. You and Mr Thornhill good to me, least I can do.
    Well, Jack, she said. Glad you’re not a cadger like some. But we got the boy to do the firewood, rather you left it to him.
    All right Mrs Thornhill, he said.
    Ma went back into the house. The kitchen door banged behind her.
    Why’s she cranky? I said. Always nagging how there’s no kindling.
    Won’t be beholden to me, Jack said. Doesn’t want to have to say thank you. Her way of telling me she don’t want me here.
    Some of us do, I said. Want you here every minute of every day.
    We might of gone on smiling at each other all morning, except for Mrs Devlin calling out the window for Jack to bring her some kindling.
    He took an armload in, dropped it in the basket.
    Do the knives for you, he said. Mrs Thornhill told me she likes a good sharp knife.
    It was true Ma liked a sharp knife, but far as I knew she’d never said so to Jack. Mrs Devlin didn’t argue, got the knives out of the drawer and found the whetstone and the oil. I followed him through the house to the verandah.
    Can’t get her one way I’ll get her the other, he said. Want to hear her say it, thank you Jack.
    He sat on Pa’s bench, the whetstone on his knee, a bit of rag underneath to save his trousers, dripped the oil on the stone. Picked up one of the knives, an old one with the point broken off.
    Wouldn’t cut butter, he said. No one in this house got any idea of putting an edge on a blade.
    Smoothed the knife against the stone, turning his hand one way, then the other. That sweet stropping sound.
    Pa come out with his pipe and a drink of tea, sat watching.
    Your mother fetched that out from London when we come, he said. In her bundle. Little enough we had by then, but you had to have a knife. Got it off a man in End Lane, broken like that when we got it, but your mother said, it’ll see us out, and here it is, on the other side of the world, still good.
    Sat watching Jack’s hands, back in End Lane, in that past he never talked about.
    I see that knife, I think about the bit broke off, he said. Out there somewhere in this wide world. Nothing ever gone, just you got to know where to look.
    He drank down his tea and picked up the telescope, the end of it tracing the shape of his watching. Jack winked at me, turned the wink into the kind of one-eyed squint that was Pa with the telescope. No one but Jack would laugh at Pa, even behind his back.
    A boat was sliding up the river. Sail up, man with a blue cap on the stern.
    There’s Dick, Pa said. There he goes.
    Hundreds of Dicks in the world. Still, I asked.
    Dick who, Pa? I said.
    Seemed he didn’t hear. The man in the cap leaned on the steering-oar and the boat swung round to where the First Branch joined the river.
    Going up to Blackwood’s, Pa said. Away aways up. Ever been up the Branch, Jack?
    Watching where the boat had gone, as if it might come back.
    Never had reason to, Jack said. Was that Dick Blackwood, Mr Thornhill?
    Pa glanced at him, blue eyes like chips of glass.
    That’s what they call him, lad, he said. Dick Blackwood.
    Gave the name a