The Little Red Chairs by Edna O’Brien Read Free Book Online

winds and the trade winds of Greenland, who had made the hazardous journey to hatch her eggs in the very spot where she was born. Himself and the gardener had been watching her closely and what a production it was, to see how carefully she prepared her bed, like a belly dancer, moving back and forth to get it smooth, emptying it of clay and silt, then making it porous for the fresh water to flow through and that done, she sat back and evaluated her suitors. Several swam around her, swam ceaselessly until the strongest fella, the one with the most spunk, got it over her and as he said then in mock lament, the honeymoon was cut short. The funny thing was that the poor males, limp and exhausted, were still dancing around her, still hoping, like those eejits that hung around the court of Penelope in Ithaca.
‘Some of us caught those eejits and ate them,’ a voice was heard to say among the boisterous crowd.
‘So we did,’ another voice joined.
‘It was called the Christmas Pot … it’s what poor people had to make do with,’ the first man said and his comrades agreed and there ensued a friendly altercation as to whether poor people had broken the law in those times, poaching fish from a river that belonged to the gentry.
Like them, Fidelma was in her element, basking in the warmth and the banter. There they all were, locals she knew well, perched on their regular stools, next to the glass cases with the prize trout and photographs of the men who had caught them. Written in silver on the top of the two cases was the weight of each trout and the length of time it had taken a fisherman to hook it in. Now and then they called across to her, as Edmond and the doctor were exchanging hunting expeditions, in Europe, in Africa and all over. Suddenly she heard Edmond ask the doctor did he not think that this woman, the lovely Fidelma, born and bred in the west of Ireland, was some throwback to a noble woman in Spain or Italy. He remarked on her black hair, her porcelain skin, the long neck and the Gioconda smile.
‘Ah now,’ she said, blushing fiercely, the colour running up and down her neck in ripples, as if cochineal was trickling through her. An evening like no other, what with her plunging her face in the freezing water earlier on, then meeting him, the banshee scream that she had let out and now here, he fixing her, with his dark, untelling eyes. She looked up at him in that first sweet exchange of a glance and felt a sudden gladness, for the sake of which all other things were forgotten.
When they came out, he bowed and went on foot along theback avenue, to the outer gate that led to where he lodged with Fifi. She had scarcely exchanged a word with him in the bar and yet she had a sense of him, how attentive he was, his hands so expressive, as if they too talked, absorbing everything around him, infinitely courteous, yet mysterious and inscrutable.
There were more stars than when they had gone in, a cold silvery night that now seemed full of sudden and sourceless promise.

On the Veranda
It is after midnight and all is still at the Castle. The guests have gone up to bed, windows dark with heavy curtains drawn and the entire place, its ivied walls, its turrets, its broad walks, its steep steps, all engulfed in night.
The kitchen staff have gathered on the veranda, as they do most nights, for the smokes, the odd beer, to unwind. They sink into the bockled armchairs, in their coats, huddled around the tall gas heater, chatting and joking. They are a mixed group, Irish, Burmese, Italian, Spanish, Czech, Slovakian, Polish. In their small bedrooms, which lead off the courtyard, are the emblems of their own land, maybe a flag, or a map, electric and acoustic guitars, family photographs and in Ivan’s room, cookery encyclopaedias. In Mujo the mute’s room, there are no emblems, as he has no past and no family that they know of. They knew so little about him, except that he had been sent from Holland to Ireland, and spent time in