Small Island Read online

  We lashed all the hives with rope to move them. Careful as lifting a bomb we delicately placed these flimsy, weighty wooden boxes on to the borrowed truck. Elwood whispered, ‘Hush, hush, soon come – not long now,’ to the curious bees inside. Unloading them he shouted rude at me, ‘Careful, man, watch it, easy, boy, easy.’ Any time, he warned, any time the bees could swarm. We laid out these buzzing boxes – Elwood heedful to make every last one lay straight on the stony land, bending low like an artist to test the angle of each against his thumb. ‘Bring me wood, Gilbert . . . get me stone nah . . . lift . . . hold it . . . hold it . . . no . . . back . . . stop.’ Twenty-two hives were placed with the same care. It took us hours and Elwood, looking on the rows of shabby grey weather-worn hives, proudly proclaimed them a kingdom of bees, (come, I thought them more a shanty town). Veiled as a bride, Elwood lifted a frame from a hive that squirmed with a confused layer of black bees. While I, defenceless and nervous, stood still as death, desperate to believe his assurance that an unmoving body will not be stung. Blowing smoke to calm the tormented ones, he checked that none were too crowded, none were too hot and a queen still ruled over every box.

  In the evening light I sat to eat a mango alone under the refuge of the guango tree. Worn out – most of my muscles still twitching from the unaccustomed activity and yet too tired to sleep. Luminous white smoke from fires drifted ghostly through the dense green. Enid chomped loud on his favourite crabgrass. I could hear Aubrey in the neighbouring farm whistling to call his cows to take them to their night meadow. A black dash of crows flew home against the sky. A tree lizard scuttled up the bark licking grubs with its lightning tongue. Cicadas hissed rhythmic as cymbals. The sparks of fireflies buzzed my head like thoughts escaping, while dots of bees returned to the hives, oblivious they were now working for me. This was a beautiful island. As sweet with promise as the honey that would soon flow from the combs. I stuck my fingers into the soft earth that yielded under them. If I held them there long enough, surely this abundant country could make me grow.

  Tell me, who could blame Enid? My belly had been grumbling impatient for some time – tormented by the sweet fragrance of the chicken Auntie Corinne was frying and the cornbread she was baking. Elwood glanced up from his newspaper when the mule, smelling the food, brayed with the pierce of a baby’s cry, to be fed. Useless, he slowly said, ‘Enid, soon come, nah, man.’ The fence that confined the mule was flimsy. How many times had Elwood and I looked to each other to promise, ‘We must fix up that enclosure’? Tomorrow, the next day, perhaps the day after that? Let me tell you, it was Enid’s furious back end decided this neglect was enough. How long did it take Enid to break down the fence? We did not hear as Auntie Corinne had just laid before us a plate of succulent, spiced fried chicken. She slapped both our hands from the meat and followed that with a grumpy order for us to wait before returning to the kitchen. Elwood and I were quietly busy: a wing each of the too-hot-to-hold-chicken in our hands, we were pulling at the flesh using only our teeth, fanning our mouth to cool while all the time watching for Auntie and telling each other to shush. We only heard Enid when Auntie Corinne screeched crimson for us to come. The mule had entered the field with the bees.

  As if dislodging an imaginary rider the mule’s back legs thrashed uncontrolled at the air. The first hive crumbled like a biscuit under the falling hoofs. And a fuzzy balled dust of black bees rose from the debris.

  ‘The windows – come, close all the windows!’ Elwood was alive with panic and command. ‘Gilbert – move nah, man, close the doors, the windows!’ One, two, three more hives just dissolved under the mule’s blows, leaving the hovering homeless bees to seek out the culprit. Attacked by enraged bees eager to defend, the mule’s eyes rolled white and wild with the pain of the stings. Crazed now, it rampaged through the field unwittingly flattening each hive like skittles. The angry bees, amassing to a black smoke, trailed the bucking mule before entirely enveloping it. I was standing still because if you stand still you cannot be stung. ‘Gilbert, you wan’ see us eaten alive, man?’ Elwood shook my shoulder as he struggled to pull on his veil and tuck up his clothes with gloved hands. A doodlebug – that’s where I had heard the sound: the bees droned resonant as those flying bombs.

  On slapping the windows shut this morbid hum died a little. But the bees, unsure who to blame for being rudely thrown into the light, became popping black spots against the window glass. Auntie Corinne fell to her knees praying very loud, ‘Lord deliver us from this plague of bees . . . Lord deliver me son from this . . .’ While with the same pleading tone that makes heroes of men whose hearts rip at the agonised sound, the mule howled so all for miles around would know that it was slowly being slaughtered. All the while its unwitting hoofs still found bees to vex.

  Elwood was outside. Avoiding the mule he lit a fire with the frenzy of a speeded-up film. All the hives were now crushed and their fleeing contents, like soot, rose up to attach themselves surely to all parts of the mule. Auntie Corinne, awakened from her lament, was now ready to kill. Those bees that found themselves buzzing lost inside the house she whacked at with her broom. Knocking pictures from walls, ornaments from shelves, she chased them round like they were burglars, while the mule’s squeals bounced its agony from every wall. I stupid hit about me with the rolled up newspaper as Elwood – the fire wafting sheets of white smoke he hoped would pacify – fanned his arms, demented. Enid was no longer a mule: the writhing bees covering him made him furry as a grisly bear. He squealing, circled the field round and round, kicking and shaking his head to flick the stinging bees from his ears, his eyes, his mouth. Was it an hour or was it a day that I stared while him, tortured, stumbled? A million bees piercing his flesh to fill it with poison. How long did I hear those heartbreaking strangled brays before the mule eventually fell, almost graceful, on to one knee? Then the other where he stayed awhile as if praying before he slumped, his whole body falling leaden on to the ground. Whining now, an occasional violent jerk shuddered his frame, his hoofs kicking as if still riding along the stony floor. Crawling with the savage bees, if it was not for his chest that still rose and fell you would think him an old louse-ridden fur coat lying discarded.

  Not daring to go outside, useless, impotent, feeble as the frail, I watched as Elwood warily circled the dying carcass of his mule. And all our bees gone. Most dead and spilled on the ground, their tiny bodies ripped apart by the murderous stings. Others flown away. In swarms of black fury they launched themselves off on the breeze.

  I laughed. What else could I do? I laughed when Elwood called this event a little setback. We lose the bees, we lose the hives, we lose a mule. I lose all my money. All that remained were jars full of sunlight. Was Elwood a fool or just plain mad? At that moment I could not tell. ‘Come, man, you mus’ have a likkle faith,’ he said, brushing off the incident with a flick of his hand.

  ‘We lose everyt’ing,’ I tell him, ‘What you wan’ me have faith in?’

  ‘Cha, we no lose everyt’ing. There is still two hive and them bursting a honey.’

  I had no words to speak that would not come out as a cuss.

  ‘Cha, nah, man – don’t give me big lip. No look on me so downcast – too much fog cloud up your blood in England. Listen up to me now, I have a likkle plan. We get a few of the boys – Aubrey, Glenville and some other – we go look for the bees. They no go far. Some hole in a tree them all fly in or they resting in some bush. We can find them, bring them back. Mark you, I know we no find all of dem, but enough to start again is what I’m saying to you.’

  ‘You want us go find the bees?’ I asked.

  ‘You, me and a few of the boys.’

  ‘Elwood, you think I am about to run round this island looking for lost bees?’

  ‘Yeh, man. Then we can fix up some hive again. A likkle nail here and there – good as new.’

  ‘A likkle nail here and there! Elwood, are you mad? Have you lost your mind?’ I stunned him and startled myself with the temper of this sho
ut. He looked inquisitive on me, a little boy again, curious to know if this was real anger or just foolery. ‘Elwood, I will not run round this island chasing bees.’

  ‘You have a better idea for me then, Mr Soldier Boy – Mr War Man?’

  It was then I said, ‘We cannot get a break in this place.’

  ‘Cha, nah, man, you no hear me, nah? We can collec’ up the bees. This is jus’ a likkle upset. Tomorrow will be the day we start again.’

  ‘Elwood, come, tell me, you know this is a small island?’

  ‘What you chattin’, man?’

  ‘Listen, man. I have been in England, I have been in America.’

  ‘So what?’

  ‘There is opportunity ripe out there.’

  ‘There opportunity here if you look right.’

  ‘So why so many young men and women queuing up for passport? Why so many striking for job and busting up the place? Elwood, I have seen it with my own eye. The world out there is bigger than any dream you can conjure. This is a small island. Man, we just clinging so we don’t fall off.’

  ‘You chattin’ nonsense, man.’

  ‘Everyone movin’. The time is right.’

  Eyes wide with impact, Elwood said, ‘But come, now me see – you gon’ go licky-licky to the British.’

  ‘I need opportunity, Elwood. I need advancement.’

  ‘You wan’ go back a England.’

  ‘I can’t get a break here, man.’

  ‘Why you no come to a meeting with me? Me show you the future being suckle and nurture there. An independent Jamaica gon’ take care of us.’

  I had been to several of his meetings. Angry young men, not enough money to put decent clothes on their backs or keep their teeth from rotting in their heads, fighting with each other over this tiny scrap of land. Squabbling over who will get the fifth quarter. Man, they wrestling over who their next master is going to be.

  ‘When we get rid of the white man—’ Elwood began.

  ‘Stop! Elwood, you no see? When you get rid of the white man is a coloured man you will have to fetch for instead.’

  ‘I fetch for no one. Black man will rule.’

  ‘You a dreamer, Elwood.’

  ‘And you a Jamaican. You born a Jamaican. You die a Jamaican. Jamaica mean nothing to ya, man? Why you wan’ leave?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Oh, and I am the dreamer. How you gon’ get England? You need money. You gon’ swim or maybe you slip in some rich-lady bag make her carry you?’

  ‘I don’t know – but I mus’ try.’

  ‘Why? Why you wan’ the whole world when ya have a likkle piece a hope here? Stay. Stay and fight, man. Fight till you look ’pon what you wan’ see. Man, fight for your own country this time.’

  ‘Elwood, I tired of fighting.’

  Looking on me like I was a stranger who had just appeared in his yard, he said nothing while he leisurely shook his head and sucked his teeth. Then lifting his eye away from mine, he quietly began, ‘Ah, Gilbert, me know you would do this. Me know you would wan’ go live Babylon. Me know you nah stay here. You wan’ ask me how I know? Come, let me tell ya, Gilbert. You may look like one of us but not’in’ gon’ change the fact your daddy is a white man.’

  I was a giant living on land no bigger than the soles of my shoes. Everywhere I turn I gazed on sea. The palm trees that tourists thought rested so beautiful on every shore were my prison bars. Horizons my tormenting borders. I envied the pelican, I envied the crow – with wings they could fly easy from this place to rest in some other. I became a big-talk man – even when the clinking of small change in my ragged pockets accused me of being a fool. Oh, there were plenty men like me, wandering this small island, their head cluttered with the sights they had once looked on. If you would listen then we would talk – widen your eyes with stories of war and the Mother Country. Tell you of bombs, planes, bullets and guns. Fog and snow and autumn mist. Come, ask a question you have always wanted to know. The King – oh, a fine man, and Shakespeare too. Paved with gold, no – but, yes, diamonds appear on the ground in the rain.

  When my mirror could only return to me a look of disgust, a dainty girl like Celia Langley, who would gasp excited at my traveller’s tales, puffed me proud as a prince. I had no thought of courtship, my only need was her adoration. Entrance her, dazzle her. Come, let me tell her those truths, those lies, those half-baked dreams.

  But with Hortense my feet landed on solid ground with such a thump my ankles nearly snapped. How come this woman who was inches shorter than I could look down at me from so high a height that I felt like a dwarf? Oh, she was pretty – a golden complexion that left a faint blush of pink at her rounded cheeks. Eyes flashing alive – brown and wide with lashes that flapped like butterflies’ wings. And her lips could have been soft and charming if not always pinched tight with vexation or lifted haughty about the corners to show her disdain. Man, when she doubted the truth her eyebrows would raise so high on her forehead they looked to be blown there by the wind. How did this woman learn to sneer so? Was it through bad odour or was she always smelling her top lip? Even her ears could cuss you. Come, let us face it, my big talk just shrivel in the face of her scorn.

  She did not like me. My face distressed her, my jokes confused her, my tales of war bored her and talk of England made her yawn. So I thought she was messing with me when she offered me the twenty-eight pounds and ten shillings I needed for a passage to England. ‘I can lend you the money,’ was all she said. She followed it with no explanation. Man, I do not recall that she even smiled. I laughed – a sort of giggle you make when someone is having a joke you do not find funny. But she just stare on me in so serious a way it led me straight to wondering how I might pay her back. Excited now, I decided that every week I would send her money. A little at first until I find me feet, then I would build it up. Sometimes more, sometimes less, but regular until this woman was paid. I would write it down in a little book so no argument would occur. My honour would see the debt was paid. Hear this, I even thought to slit my finger to seal the deal in blood. But she had not finished with me yet. With no persuasion, with no fancy words, with no declarations of love, she let me know that I would have to marry her for the money. This woman was looking for escape and I was to be the back she would ride out on.

  When I walked away from her that day I went to sit under the refuge of the guango tree. Tree lizards still scuttled up the bark and the cicadas still hissed like cymbals. But the ground was now parched and dry – too hard for me to push my fingers down into the earth. And it was there that I wept. I am not too proud to tell you I sobbed like a boy lost. I was beaten. There was no choice before me except one. If Hortense had money to buy me then, come, let us face it, my price was not too dear.

  Nineteen

  Gilbert

  You see, most of the boys were looking upwards. Their feet might have been stepping on London soil for the first time – their shaking sea legs wobbling them on the steadfast land – but it was wonder that lifted their eyes. They finally arrive in London Town. And, let me tell you, the Mother Country – this thought-I-knew-you place – was bewildering these Jamaican boys. See them pointing at the train that rumbles across a bridge. They looked shocked when billowing black smoke puffed its way round the white washing hung on drying lines – the sheets, the pants, the babies’ bonnets. Come, they had never seen houses so tall, all the same. And what is that? A chimney? They have fire in their house in England? No! And why everything look so dowdy? Even the sunshine can find no colour but grey. Staring on people who were staring on them. Man, the women look so glum. Traffic turning their head this way and that. Steady there, boy – watch out. Look, you see a white man driving a bus? And over there, can you believe what the eye is telling? A white man sweeping the road.

  But this old RAF volunteer had seen it all before, during the war. So I was looking down, unlike them big-eyed newcomer boys. I just arrive back in England and there on the pavement before me I spy a brooch. What a
piece of good fortune, what a little bit of luck. Lying lost, this precious oval jewel shimmered the radiant iridescent green of a humming-bird caught by the sun. My auntie Corinne would have raised her hands to the heavens to call it a sign.

  Now these were the thoughts that passed through my head in the three steps it took me to reach that brooch. One: perhaps it fall from a young woman’s coat. Cha, so my blessing was another’s misfortune. Two: it was an old woman that lose it from her purse; maybe the police station was the proper place to take it. And three: Hortense – this deep-green brooch would look so pretty on her. I conjured an image in me mind. See me take the sparkling brooch to pin it to her dress, near her neck, against her smooth nut-brown skin. And look, see her touch the pin then tilt her head to charm a smile on me.

  So all this rumination is taking place as I move closer. I was about to bend my knee so I could reach the brooch when hear this . . . it flew away. Black flecks suddenly pitting the air. That jewel was no more than a cluster of flies caught by the light, the radiant iridescent green the movement of their squabbling backs. My eyes no longer believed what they saw. For after the host of flies flew they left me with just the small piece of brown dog’s shit they had all gathered on. Was this a sign? Maybe. For one of the big-eyed newcomer boys walk straight along and step right in the muck.

  Sleep in a room squashed up with six men and you will come to know them very well. Not because they tell you why they leave Jamaica or pine for the sweetheart that stay behind. You learn nothing of mummies, or schooldays, and hear no hopeful dreams for their life in England. No. What you come to know more intimate than a lover is the sound of every sleeping breath they make. Take Winston: every night him call out the words, ‘Gimme nah.’ His twin brother Kenneth sleep slapping his lips together as if sucking on a melon. Eugene and Curtis snore. Both sound to your ear like a faulty rumbling engine. But if you shout, ‘Hush nah, man,’ Eugene will obey while Curtis will rev up. The breath from Cleveland’s open mouth smell as if it come from his backside, and Louis spend his night scratching himself and his morning wondering why his skin raw.