Stripes of the Sidestep Wolf by Sonya Hartnett

Author:Sonya Hartnett [Hartnett, Sonya]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781406375152
Publisher: Walker Books
Published: 2018-05-02T16:00:00+00:00

William forgave the misguided opinions of his priest and the O’Ryes went to church again, occupying their usual pew, four rows from the altar. Satchel would not take off his coat, despite his father’s pointed glare: he tucked the folds of material around him and twined his fingers against the cold. He did not unlock them to hold a hymn book or to offer his neighbour a handshake of peace. Outside, it was raining, the wind battering the drops against the stained windows angrily as if some natural force despised what the congregation was doing, shut away and murmuring. It was not a steady, useful, drenching rain: it was a storm that would end as suddenly as it started, leaving in its wake broken branches and puddles on the street. On the journey into the big town his mother had remarked upon the blossoming of the spider orchids that she’d seen on her morning walk; the unfurling of their blood-red petals was a sign that winter was finally giving ground to spring but the cold and dank was always loath to leave, digging in its heels and lurking until summer came, with its scorching force and temper.

Satchel stood, sat down, knelt and stood again, a ritual he followed without giving any thought. He thought, instead, of Leroy, who would be in bed and sleeping soundly. He would not repent the agitation he had left in the O’Ryes’ kitchen. Leroy’s mother was sitting some distance behind Satchel’s family and now and then Satchel heard her attempts to stifle an asthmatic wheeze. Leroy’s father never went to church, and neither did his siblings, and nor had Leroy himself. Mrs Piper didn’t like that, but she didn’t waste her breath to complain. She had been sick for many years, the onset of her illness being abrupt and without apparent cause; but malady seemed to stalk the countryside and she was not alone with her stubborn complaint. Others had bad hearts, cloudy eyes, constant influenza.

Gosling wasn’t here either: he claimed that the Lord heard his prayers six days of the week and that Sunday was a day of rest for both of them. But the big foreman was planted on the fringe of Satchel’s contemplations, puffing with impatience as the days went by and Satchel withheld an answer to his offer. When Satchel thought of Gosling, it was with dread: he worried that the foreman would be on the phone soon, or come pounding on the door. He would take no nonsense from William, careless of the trouble he’d cause.

Satchel slid his eyes sideways to take in his mother and father. William had repaired the generator, reinforcing his knowledge that the world could not turn without him, and was sitting straight as a flagpole, voicing the responses with gusto. The elderly woman to the left of him was also sitting rigid, as subdued as William was loud.

Laura, placed as always between her husband and her son, was the only one of the three who used her time in church constructively.

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