The Children's Bach Read Online Free PDF

of a mile.
    When Vicki saw her for the second time, Athena was standing in the wide doorway of the bookshop, arms folded and head tilted back, scanning the window covered in handprinted cards on which people advertised rooms to let in their rented houses. Athena lived, for as long it took to read a card, in each sunny cottage, attractive older-style flat, spacious house, quaint old terrace, large balcony room with fireplace, collective household with thriving veggie garden. Her children dematerialised, her husband died painlessly in a fall from a mountain. What curtains she would sew! What private order she would establish and maintain, what handfuls of flowers she would stick in vegemite jars, how sweetly and deeply she would sleep, and between what fresh sheets!
    Vicki saw Athena’s foot in its thick sock and sandal. She wanted Athena to recognise her, but she prepared a speech of reminder just in case, though it galled her that all she could think of to say was ‘Remember me? I’m Morty’s sister.’ She reached out and tugged at Athena’s sleeve. Athena jumped and turned and blushed. She’s shy , thought Vicki.
    â€˜Vicki! Are you all right?’ The girl was white, and looked tightly bound into her clothes.
    Vicki nodded. Until that moment she had not realised that she was not all right. ‘I feel a bit funny,’ she said. ‘I feel as if part of my brain has sort of come away, at the back.’ She raised one hand to indicate the trouble spot.
    A hypochondriac, thought Athena. ‘Is Elizabeth here too?’
    â€˜No. She’s still asleep. I can’t live there. There’s only one bed. I was looking at the house ads.’
    â€˜Does Elizabeth know?’
    â€˜Know what?’
    â€˜She’ll want you to stay with her, won’t she?’
    Vicki began to jabber. ‘Do you want to know what kind of person Elizabeth is? She’s the kind of person who doesn’t slow down when she comes to an automatic door. She buys herself a pair of jeans and gives them to you straight away because they’re stiff and she’s too impatient to wear them in, then three months later when they’re all broken in and perfect, she asks for them back.’
    Embarrassed, they looked away at the window full of white cards.
    â€˜There are some nice-sounding places,’ said Athena. The girl was in a state.
    â€˜Yes, except this one,’ said Vicki. She crouched down and pointed to a grubby notice right at the bottom of the mass. Athena bent over. ‘To let,’ it said. ‘One room, limited daylight only, $25 per week. NB house not communal.’
    â€˜Limited daylight!’ Vicki let out a pant of laughter. As Elizabeth had done when Vicki gave her opinion of papal benediction, Athena looked at the girl with sharpened attention.
    â€˜What are you going to do now?’ said Vicki. ‘I haven’t got anything to do.’
    They went into a cafe and sat at a table. Music was playing, not the usual kind of music you hear on a jukebox. The back door of the cafe had been left open; through it they saw new leaves, a lane. An Italian man with a narrow, tired face and a stern parting served them.
    â€˜What will you do, in Melbourne?’ said Athena. ‘You’ll go back to school, won’t you?’
    Vicki shrugged. ‘On the plane,’ she said, ‘I read a tourist book. I want to go and look at old monuments.’
    â€˜You mean – like the Shrine?’
    â€˜No. Old houses. Famous ones with all the furniture in them, and you can see how the servants did the cooking, and the funny bathrooms. Elizabeth hates that kind of thing.’
    â€˜I can’t believe she’s really as bad as all that,’ said Athena.
    The coffee came.
    â€˜What’s that in the cage in your yard, Athena?’
    â€˜A rabbit. I’m going to let it out.’
    â€˜Won’t cats eat it?’
    â€˜Not if I take it to the