Peter Carey - Illywhacker

That night he slept on his own side of the bed with his hearing aid connected and turned up loud. In the morning he found Emma's side of the bed still empty, disturbed only by his dream-churned limbs. He had a headache. He rose wearily, tucked his hearing aid into his pyjama pocket, slipped his big feet into felt slippers (once the very symbol of his perfect happiness) and padded into the kitchen. He sat on a bin of millet and stared for a long time at the meal he had left out for her. The heavy mantel clock struck seven. He stood. He examined the meal closely and found two tiny scratch marks where a mouse had sampled the congealed white fat on the plate. Towards the centre of the table were two small droppings.

A cacophony of cockatoos vibrated the diaphragm of his ear. He could make out, in the midst of this din, the peculiar calls of the gang-gangs, cries they would normally have made in flight, but he was too depressed and frightened to take pleasure from anything so simple and everything that might have delighted him on a normal day now caused him pain, even – in the bathroom -the sight of Emma's worn-out toothbrush produced an agony that could not have been greater had she actually died.

He washed his hands fastidiously and returned to the chops. He fetched a sharp knife and began, slowly, to cut them into cubes of a size that might be acceptable to a puppy. Then, with one chop still to go, he changed his mind, laid down his knife, tied up his dressing gown, licked his larded fingers, and went downstairs.

Emma already had the baby at her breast. She looked up at him and murmured. There was nothing mad about her face, nor the slightest sign of any hostility. But when she made goldfish motions with her lips there was a look in her eyes that did not go with kissing.

"Emma," Charles said, squatting beside her. "Emma, I'm going to make you a really good breakfast."

Emma made goldfish kisses.

"But you've got to cut this out. Stop it. Stop it, Emmie. You've got to come upstairs and eat like a human."

No matter what words he said, his voice betrayed him and Emma saw that she did not have to do anything. She showed him her gums and her teeth but her eyes remained alien, connected to rooms full of curtained thoughts.

"Please, Emmie."

She frowned and shifted her bulk within the tight confines of the cage. At this stage she still wanted to get out. She was hungry. She wanted to eat bacon and eggs and chops and then have kisses. She wanted everything to be normal, as it had been before, and she did not guess that she was already clearing a path for her emotions to travel along, that the path would soon be a highway, cambered, sealed, with concrete guttering along its edges. She wrenched the baby gently and shifted him to her other breast and felt his lips begin their pleasant rhythmic contractions.

"All right," said Charles, standing so suddenly that the guinea-pigs next door suffered a nearly fatal terror. "All right," he said, stamping his foot, causing the ceiling of the fishes' world to see-saw, sickeningly, upsetting the sea perch which now began to bite the rufous redfish, tearing its pretty tail which flowed behind like a bloodied bride's dress.

"All right," he said, "if that's what you want."

He started to clean out the finches' cage, then, with tears streaming down his face, slammed the door shut.

He inspected his cockatoos and found the Major Mitchell already biting its feathers so severely that its glory was almost gone. The moth-eaten bird only reflected his emotions.

"All right," he said. "All right."

Emma saw his face as it came back to her cage. It was red and terrible. The eyes were bloodshot and the forehead creased. He squatted in front of the cage and groaned and Emma felt a pulse of pure pleasure. It did not last long. There was fear as well, fear mixed up with it, but the feeling was lovely. Those great red hands clenched and unclenched as if they would circle her white neck and throttle her and those brimming wet eyes were worshipping her, begging her. Henry Underhill's daughter had never experienced such a thing. She felt trembling weakness and steely power, was tiny and huge, was a wren within an all-protecting hand that might, at any moment, crush her.

Charles did not know what he had just done. His temper left him on the stairs. He went to the kitchen and fussed over the second chop, cutting it even more finely than the first. He placed the meat in a cereal bowl together with some mashed-up vegetables. He brought the offering downstairs and placed it in front of his wife's cage.

When she saw the bowl, Emma knew that she was stronger than the men in the tent. Her big straight toes curled and stretched. She murmured her thanks, but did not eat, letting him guess that she would prefer a drink first. He fetched milk and poured it into another bowl. This she drank, not like an animal, but like a two-handed primate.

"Fork," she said and Charles was so pleased to hear a clear word from her that he pounded up the stairs and down again. Emma felt the heavy footsteps. They set up reverberations which lasted much longer than the simple journey upstairs. She felt the eggshell edges of a pure white ping-pong ball that would not stop bouncing.

She became languorous and heavy-lidded. She accepted soap and water. She had no objection to fresh napkins and pins, but she had no inclination to abandon such a pleasant place.

"Emma," Charles said. "Emma, it's going to be a big day." His calf muscles were weary and so he kneeled beside her. "Come on, fair's fair. We have a shop to open."

Charles did not, at that moment, give a damn about the shop. He wished only for everything to be as it had been before. He was not saying what he really felt, and this did not matter, because Emma was not listening to the words themselves, only the emotions behind them.

"I can't open the shop and stay here with you, Honeybunch. Honeybunch, are you listening? I can't do business with my wife in a cage. Why don't I help you upstairs? Do you want a cage? I'll carry it upstairs for you. Would you like that?"

He knelt before her in his dressing gown. It was a rich diet for anyone brought up in Henry Underhill's house.

There were already people at the door who wished to be admitted. Charles was in his dressing gown and he had not shaved. The customers rattled the door handle and poked their fingers through the brass letterflap and although he did not wish them to come into his shop he was like a man who is incapable of leaving a telephone ringing – he opened the door.

In order to distract them from his wife he told them many facts about cockatoos, e. g. that the pink cockatoo is just another name for the Major Mitchell, that its scientific name is Catcua leadbetteri, that it is less popular as a pet than you might expect because it cannot learn English or (ha ha) Spanish either.

He succeeded in getting rid of customers almost as soon as they arrived. Only the jeweller's nephew would not be easily put off. He went straight to the cage and was surprised to find Emma where he had last seen her.

The young man made Charles feel both uncouth and guilty. He could think of nothing to say in his own defence.

The fox-faced fruiterer came next. He also handed Charles a sealed envelope with a signed petition inside it. Charles was, by then, so distracted that he did not even realize that the fruiterer was angry with him, and when the man left he locked the door behind him and hung up the "closed" sign. He sat behind the counter. Emma blew him goldfish kisses. He was frightened.

Leah slept on an old couch in the wide passage that led from the front door to the living room. She was careful not to be seen there by visitors but anyone passing down that echoing passage could hardly miss the evidence that the couch was occupied. There were folded rugs and pillows stacked neatly. Beneath the bed there were glasses of water (usually two, sometimes three), an ashtray, a writing pad, a pen, a Westclox alarm clock with a cracked glass and a loud tick.