Red Jacket (23 page)

He decides it is as well to begin with some embellishments to the vagabond's status. “Ralston, I wouldn't mind if you and me could have a talk, seeing as you are now a person of property and in a position to help your grandmother, who will shortly need care and assistance, for you know she is not well.”

Ralston is taken aback at the request, but after a lengthy pause, he replies. “Don't see any reason why not.”

“What about we take a walk?” Gramps says as he gets up. “Then whatever we say will be between you and me.”

Ralston looks askance at him, and Gramps realizes the fellow would remember how close Elsie and himself had been to Malachi and Evadne. He had been a big boy when the Carpenters left Hector's Castle, old enough to recall their many interactions. Gramps can envision him sitting in the moonlight on these same shiny concrete steps with Malachi and Evadne, his mother, Daphne, cradling Phyllis, who was still sucking her finger, Miss Elsie, and himself, listening as the five grownups told duppy stories. Pretending that there are things between him and Ralston that he'll keep from Evadne makes no sense. He rectifies his mistake. “Not to say is anything secret we going to be talking, but I would like to spare your grandmother's feelings. She been a self-sufficient woman all her life, and her sickness will in time make her weak, in need of support. It's a hard adjustment to make.”

Gramps is twisting the truth, but just then all he wants to do is get Ralston's backside up out of the chair and out into the road. After that he has no inkling what he will do or say, where they will go, what kind of arrangement he will try to make so Evadne can live in some kind of peace.

Ralston achieves his feet, checks to see that his parts are secure in his trousers, and with his free hand pats his shirt pocket to make sure he has the pack of cigarettes.

“A-right,” he says to Gramps. “So where we going?”

Gramps leaps down the stairs like a man half his age and is barrel-ling down the path by the side of the house, headed for the gate.

“What happen, Zeke? Where you going? You not leaving?” Evadne calls to him through the kitchen window.

“Me and Ralston just going for a walk, Evadne. Coming right back.”

“Hold up, Mr. Carpenter. Is bus you running to catch?” Ralston pauses so Gramps can grasp that he doesn't jump to anyone else's rhythms. “Only one thing I put on so much haste for!” He guffaws so loud that he chokes on his cigarette, whereupon he regards it with annoyance, observes that it is down to the butt, and hurls it into the bush.

Ezekiel makes an enormous effort to restrain himself from thumping Ralston. Knowing that won't help the cause, he grunts in a manner he hopes Ralston will interpret as appreciative of his wit.

“Listen, Ralston, if you own land, you have to behave like a landowner. You don't know that flinging a cigarette butt into the bush can start a fire? You could burn down your whole property from one careless act like that!”

Ralston absorbs this. “That make sense. I will heed it in future.”

He is tempted to think that perhaps Ralston isn't an entirely depraved creature whose most decent act is the consumption of hot hops in company with hooligans. Then, letting Ralston walk ahead of him, he notices the young man has a stout knife in a case attached to a leather belt that also sports a metal ring with a length of sash cord looped through it. The implements are in plain view, for the landed proprietor has on a tight white shirt that stops at his waist, and a pair of expertly laundered jeans. Gramps decides it is probably better not know what the knife and rope are for.

They are on the road now. Gramps halts for a bit and surveys the track running up the ridge on the other side that once led to the quarry. “You ever go up that road yet, Ralston?”

“After nothing not up there, no food, no diversion, no female company.” Hope flickers again at the relative delicacy of the remark until Ralston chuckles, groping his parts. “Me only go where the freeness is.”

“They used to have a quarry up there. That's where the stone that built your grandparents' house comes from.”

Ralston does not regard this as worthy of notice. Instead he offers, “One time few years ago, me and the fellows take slingshot and shoot bird up that way. The pickings wasn't bad, but is a long time now we don't go back up there.”

“I tell you one thing, Ralston. If you want a good idea of the size of your property, up there is the place to look from.”

Ralston debates Gramps proposal for a while Then he says, “Me don't have nothing better to do, so yeah, we could walk up there.”

Gramps doesn't know what he has in mind when he makes the suggestion. He certainly isn't worried that this strong, well-armed teenager may choose to hurt him. Malachi and Evadne Patterson were fine people who painstakingly raised their one child, Daphne, Ralston's and Phyllis's mother. But what he knows of Desmond, Ralston's father, is not encouraging. Clever, moody, own-way, Desmond gave up school to join a gang that trafficked in weed. An amiable fellow when he chose, he could be generous and funny, but his ganja smoking worsened his moods so that during the bad ones, even his comrades avoided him. Daphne lost her innocence to his charm at a church picnic when she was sixteen. She'd given birth to Ralston, who spent his growing-up years missing his father, for Desmond was by then as often in as out of the penitentiary. By age ten, never mind his grandparents' efforts, Ralston was as truculent as Desmond.

If the father has bad blood, what evils might lurk in the son? But they have no quarrel, Ralston and he. Besides, as Gramps often said when provoked, “I go to war and come back. Plenty never return.” He can handle Ralston, if need be.

They climb for five or six minutes, taking the steep slope without difficulty. When they reach a ways up, Gramps addresses Ralston's back. “If you stop now and look, you will see the whole place, starting from the river over yonder and coming all the way forward to the fence on the road right under us, and also going up, Long Backs way.” He gestures as he speaks, towards the slim line of wetness glinting through the trees, then down to the barbed wire threading the posts on the road below them, then north, towards the mountains shrouded in low black clouds.

Malachi and Evadne's holding is a fairly large one, as far as the property of slaves' descendants goes. With each succeeding generation, it has been broken up, and yet fifteen acres or so still stretch away from them through clumps of mahoe and cedar trees, with groves of breadfruit and a huddle of otaheite apple trees near what they call “the river.” It is just a large stream, but it never runs dry, not even in the worst drought. There is a pool there, where Gramps failed hilariously in repeated attempts to teach Elsie and Evadne to swim. Ralston's portion, marked off by the new fence, more or less splits the place.

“So it reach to the river all the way across?” Ralston is trying to sound detached, although Gramps can see he is impressed by the size of his acquisition.

“The bottom boundary of your grandmother's place is past the house, down in the gully by the primary school.” Gramps waves towards an untidy kraal of small buildings in a depression further down the road. Ralston uses both hands to shade his eyes against the afternoon sun, a yellow glare in the sky. “Your land, which starts at the fence, goes up so.” Gramps arm sweeps the other way, towards the mountains.

“So where it stop on that side?”

“I don't rightly know. I don't think even your grandpa rightly knew. It get into some thick bush as it start to climb and the gradient steep like a rock-face, so nobody know where private land stop and government land start.”

“So how I would know the bounds of my land?”

“You could ask a surveyor to come and measure.”

Ralston takes a step forward. He folds one arm across his chest and strokes his chin with the other, as he swivels his head from side to side pondering the extent of his acreage. Gramps stands behind him, looking down at Evadne's small property. Seconds later Ralston is in a heap at the bottom of the cliff.

Open Secrets

“Zeke, you never ... ?” Evadne contemplates Ralston in his coffin.

“How could you ask me that?”

The irony doesn't fail to strike Ezekiel. It was Evadne's question when he asked if Phyllis should perhaps have an abortion.

He isn't sure himself what transpired on the hillside, so he concentrates on his conviction that it is for the best. His report to the district constable states that the young man leaned over too far and fell. There are lots of people to witness to the fact that Ralston was drinking that day and enough who will think “good riddance,” for Ralston has not endeared himself to the small world of Hector's Castle.

After the funeral, Gramps promises to pass by Archdeacon and Mrs. Miller to tell Phyllis the news. There is no point in not telling her. Information in small places is, like the wispy flowers of the silk cotton tree, lifted by air and dispersed on its numerous currents. Never mind no mouths admitted to telling tales, accounts find their way across yards, then miles. It is magic.

This does not mean secrets cannot be kept. If people are determined enough, they can band together to fervently guard history. Gramps met an American negro in the war who swore he was descended from Thomas Jefferson. He carried Jefferson's face, his body shape, and his name.

When Gramps asked if people knew, he replied, laughing, “Plenty enough. But still, we be good at hiding what we choose.”

Two Letters from New York City

114 Riverside Drive, Apt 2G

New York, NY 10024, USA

12 June 1960

Dear Zeke,

We don't long since get here, just a week now. I am so sorry for leaving with no goodbye. This is so you don't hear on the street that I am gone. I could not forgive myself for that. Part of the reason why we leave so quick is that the papers come through sudden. God is good, for I was at my wits end worrying about Phyllis in the home at Alton Mount. As it turn out, I went to collect her just days after Gwen and Moses came for the baby.

After what happened, keeping on in Hector's Castle was impossible, never mind it has been my home for all my life. It reached the stage where I could not even think of the good times, the precious moments with yourself and Elsie, me and Malachi, the child I bore and raised there. I beg God to help me so I don't curse and condemn that grandson of mine, but rather find it in my heart to forgive and pray for him, so his soul don't fry in Hell. I am not sure I am able but I try, for that is Jesus's instruction and he has given me no leave to ignore it. I think if men could understand how with one sex act they can destroy a whole world, make people want to forget their whole life and every good thing that ever happened to them, they would take pity and satisfy their lust without benefit of partner. God forgive me, but if a man spill his own seed to spare the kind of evil that we are going through, I don't see how God will hold it against him.

Daphne's apartment is in Manhattan. The first woman she was companion to when she came up gave her a room to stop in and when the woman moved to Florida two years ago, she let the place to Daphne at a reasonable rent for she didn't want to trouble with new tenants. And we have a church. Daphne goes only a few times a year, but a more devout church sister introduced me to the pastor, a Rev. Morris who looks like he could be coloured. It is a mixed congregation, half us and half them. The services are what I am accustomed to although I find the singing half-hearted.

When we came Daphne took time off work to show us around so we know our way and understand how to take the bus downtown. I tell her I am not going into any subway. Underground is for worms and moles, not human beings except they are dead. The one time she took me down there will serve for the rest of my life.

Phyllis is settling in very slowly. She is still grieving for that baby. I find it nothing short of a miracle that she could love it any at all, though it was a pretty child with good colour and soft hair. Daphne has got her into a school for young mothers, run by nuns. She is one of just two girls who do not have their baby with them, which must cause her more pain.

I will write more soon, but I never wanted time to pass before I let you know how we were doing. I pray God's blessings on you for all your help, and Gwen and Moses who have opened their heart and home to a child that is no relation. I hope she has settled in well. My good wishes to the family.

Your friend always,

Evadne

12 June 1960

Dear Mr. Carpenter, sir,

I reech to this big city safe, so I writing to let you know. With how Granny Evadne feel about Hector Castle and everyting with me it dont make no sense for we to stay in that house. Everyting happen so fast I reelly dont get no time to say a good thank you so all I can do Mr. Carpenter is to say a big THANK YOU now I mean it with all my heart I hope is not a bad ting but I miss that likl baby for true an I will pray far it every day as God send life and also for you sir for kindnes to me. Granny Vads say that she long to have a lettre from you and I am hopin you give my likl dawter the lettre I rite on July 18. Remember pleas sir you promise to see she get her birtday letter that I will rite evri year.

Yours fatefuly,

Phyllis Patterson

Mirando y Dejando

He calls Mona every night when he's away, but he isn't looking forward to tonight's call. He's exhausted. They all are, though council wound up early, at about five, so they could make it to their hotels before the six o'clock curfew. The meeting had not been able to address any of the agenda items, some of which were urgent. He
'
s especially worried that they hadn
'
t got to the report from the Standing Committee on Information Systems Management. It addressed Y2K-related plans, and there was no postponing that to a subsequent council meeting, not with 1999 less than two months away. Tomorrow they'd have to get past the security and other issues relating to graduation and consider those items. But sufficient unto the day.
He strips, throwing clothes on the bed, and stepping cautiously into the shower. He's fallen at home more than once, and his doctor suggested some of the slips might have been episodes of cataplexy.

He worries about Mona. Not that she can't manage by herself, being an independent and capable woman. She'd come to the United States to go to Georgetown University when she was only seventeen, and although she'd intended to, had never returned to Trinidad to live. After her first degree, she'd done an MA, then a PhD.

He'd met her at the university in St. Chris when she was doing research for her dissertation, although, unlike Grace, she hadn't joined the faculty. She'd been sitting on the side of the senior common room pool, thick black hair a waterfall over her shoulders, toes playing in the water. She had unusually well shaped legs for a coolie woman and a nicely filled-out bottom. He liked East Indian women, but for their skinny legs and skimpy backsides. The tar brush must have slipped in somehow to round this one out.

“How're things, Manny?”

“Observing and going my way, sir.” The bartender in the senior common room made his usual rejoinder as Mark slid onto his accustomed barstool, massaging his forehead as he issued the order for his daily ration.

“What's this ‘observing and going my way' you always on about?”

“Funny, you know, sir. You the first person ask me. Make me think that maybe if I say a obscene word to these good folks when them ask me how me doing, them wouldn't even hear it.”

“Don't do that, my friend. They'll hear anything that could be considered even vaguely offensive.”

“Don't do it up to now, sir, but many times tempted.”

“But you still don't tell me what it mean!”

“Something my great-granny used to say, sir. She come from Cuba. Name me herself, Manuel. And she would say, if you ask her how things going, ‘Mirando y dejando.' It mean you watching how things going and proceeding on your ways, minding your own business.”

From ten in the morning when it opened, until seven at night when he signed off, Manny was at his post behind the bar, ready with towel and good nature.

“Right, then. Cheers!” Mark hoisted his Red Stripe.

He liked Manny. He liked the bar. That day, the beer was a reward for teaching steadily since nine o'clock. He'd been pinch-hitting for a colleague.

Refreshed and pleased at learning about observing and moving along from Manny, he was en route to his office when Mona asked him the time as he walked by. She was still poolside. He'd obliged, then pointed to her watch.

“Oh!” She'd laughed, embarrassed. “It doesn't work.”

He'd nodded, still smiling, and said goodbye, pretending to leave but circling back to the bar to ask Manny who she was.

“Seem you omit important info from the update, Manny.” Mark rolled his eyes in Mona's direction.

“Is you omit to ask me, Prof. She name Mona Mansingh. Writing doctor thesis, something about patois. I not too clear. She live over by Stokely.”

“Bright as well as beautiful, then?”

“Guess so, Prof, if doctor thesis mean you bright.”

“Point well taken, Manny.”

“I could tell you one thing though, Prof. You got to be careful with these coolie ladies. I a coolie man myself, on two side, mother full and father half, so I could tell you. They very high strung, sensitive, like them thoroughbred breed of horse. Need careful handling.”

“Thanks for the advice, Manny, but for now I am just observing and going along, as you say.” Landing Manny a good-natured punch, he set off again.

His relationship with Mona had seemed fated. In uncanny ways, it had unfolded in tandem with his prospects at the Caribbean-Inter-American Development Bank. The next time he'd seen her (it was at the pool again), he'd asked her to have a drink with him.

“I really shouldn't,” she'd replied.

“Why not? Is there someone who would object?”

“My mother mightn't like the idea.”

“You never do things that your mother disapproves of?”

“That's a pretty personal question from someone I don't know!” She was on her feet by then, pool bag in hand.

“You're leaving because I asked you to have a drink?”

“I'm going to change.”

“I'll be here when you come back.”

He'd stayed, she'd come back, and the drink became lunch, during which he'd enjoyed being the centre of attention for he was with by far the best-looking female there. When he'd returned to his office, there'd been a letter saying he was short-listed for the bank job. The day after their first real date, he received a phone call inviting him to DC for an interview: he was one of the final three candidates. He'd wooed her as he waited for the verdict, and once certain of the job, pressed his suit home.

“So, who do I ask for your hand?”

“Whom, not who,” she instructed. They'd been walking from his office towards the sub-warden's flat where she stayed.

“Sorry. Whom do I ask for your hand?”

“It's mine so I'm not sure why you'd ask anyone else.”

“Well, I know your Dad is dead, but there's your Mum in Trinidad, and that bro, the one with the vile temper somewhere in Canada, not to mention sister Nora in Maryland, all of whom I'd prefer not to get on the wrong side of.”

“And there's you ending a sentence with a preposition and, far more important, not being very romantic about asking me to tie my future to yours.”

He's deeply fond of her and glows with pride when he considers that she's his. He thought he'd never be bored for her mind was quick and her interests broad. Superbly qualified as wife and mother, it grieves him how it went awry.

“Bad luck worse than Obeah,” he speaks into the mists of the shower. He'd call after the ten o'clock news and pilot their conversation carefully. She probably hasn't yet heard about Edwin Langdon's murder.