The Rowing Lesson Read Free Page A

tablecloth out from under her. The cloth shrieks as you rip it in two. You give Gertrude one piece which she stuffs under her dress and the other piece, with the blood stain like Passover wine, you ball up and toss into the bushes.
    Aaagg! Ghh! Aaagh! You both look up above the spotted trunks, above the frills of leaves, above the damp feathers of moss, and there are two Knysna loeries in the sun, mating. There’s a burst of laughter that you hold inside you, a flash of joy, but all you do is squeeze Gertrude’s hand so hard that she pulls it away. Come on! Look at those birds! You’re almost spitting you’re so excited. Their undersides are bright red and they’re flipping and swivelling in the light and they disappear and then they’re back again, with their swooping and grunting, like squealing pigs instead of birds.
    Morry and Bunny and Hilda and Maisie come tramping up the river towards you and the birds become black dots, then vanish. Aaggh! Aaag! Ghhh . . . ! You missed them. You missed the loeries. Ggggh! Gertrude is laughing and telling them Harold sounds just like the loeries . I promise you. Maisie’s dress is stuck to her and you notice her nipples flashing at you and she says Morry threw me in the water, won’t Ma be furious. Auntie Molly gave me this dress. Where’s the tablecloth? She asks you and you don’t answer. You just get into the boat and shout, All aboard! It’s your captain speaking.
    The clouds have come over and now the water is steel and the goosebumps go up on everyone’s arms. Maisie is still asking about the tablecloth and why does it matter. It was so old anyway. You know how your mother is, she says, and you do. The time she slammed her hand down on the table and squashed a hot potato. The time she threw a bell at you, and it knocked some paint off the wall. You ducked and she was mad as a snake. She embroidered that tablecloth and everything. It’s starting to rain and the raindrops are bouncing on the water and this is not good either. You’re rowing and this time your arms are very tired but you don’t want Morry or Bunny to row. No sir. Bunny can carry the girls in and out of the water as if it’s nothing. Morry plays rugby and one of his ears got bent and it stucks out like a hand. But you have to row and row and row. You could never carry Gertude like that. She’s bigger than you. And so is Hilda. Maisie is your size but then she’s your sister. How about that!
    The river widens and you slide back under the railway bridge, your oars pointing home. There’s the Serpentine, a little river off the main river, that will take you to a string of lakes: Island Lake, Langvlei and Rondevlei. It’s narrow and there are tall reeds on both banks as it meanders its way to Island Lake but you’re not going that way today, not with Bunny and Morry and Maisie and Hilda and Gertude in the boat, and the rain pelting down. You pass the thatched bungalows of the Fairy Knowe Hotel and the river bends again, and there’s another campsite, and Freesia’s Rock, a bent elbow jutting into the water. Each place has a story and you can remember your ma and dad fighting in a boat about something and the time you went springer fishing at midnight. There’s the boathouse that got flooded and the pylon that collapsed in the worst storm of the century so far. Maisie says, Harold, where’s the tablecloth? She’s mouthing the words at you in the rain, and you say, Remember the springers we didn’t catch?
    Maisie is shaking and Morry has given her his wet jacket and his big arm is draped on her shoulders like a log. This is trouble, you’re thinking, this and the blood on the tablecloth, the one with the cross-stitched basket. Ma, please don’t shout. Everything is special in your house, everything has roots and a place and when something gets lost there’s a giant aching hole no one can fill. They came from Lithuania, from London, your pa’s ma and your ma’s ma, and they had their Shabbat