He waved that aside. Again his hand was cutting into her arm.
“You’ll have to study. You don’t know how good it is. If only I could have studied!”
“Well, you’re studying, ain’t you? You’re gonna be a doctor.”
“That’s not what I mean....” How to explain it? “Listen, Etta, I wanted to study things like history. Not the stuff they gave me at high school. Real history. There is colour in it. The books never speak of that, though. They give you only dates and names. But when you shut your eyes you can see helmets and campfires. Flames and singing people in forests, monks in black hoods, golden coins. That’s funny how those golden coins come to you when you shut your eyes. That.... That’s history.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I never cared much for it in school.”
“Because you never shut your eyes to see. Then, take drawing. The way I imagine it.... Well, I wasn’t good at it, of course. My lines took crazy turns. They moved about the paper and I couldn’t stop them. The teacher was angry. But what could I do? He put there a vase and a strawberry box and I could see only patches of colour and sometimes fountains and sometimes dancing flowers. You know.... The lines went their own way. Sometimes one side was larger than the other, sometimes you could see through it.... And my teacher was angry.”
“I don’t understand you. What you mean flowers was dancing?” She reached out for his hand and patted it. “You say such funny things, Manny. What you shouting for so?”
He felt her face very close to his. Her hair touched his eyes. He brushed that aside. He spoke in whispers now.
“Listen, Etta, I’ll teach you how to sing. I’ll teach you. I can do it. I can’t sing myself, but I can teach you. It’s here in me! Shall I?”
She didn’t seem to care about that. She was flushed, her eyes had grown wide, warm. Her red bit of a tongue moistened her quivering lips: