Authors: Lawrence Scott
A ray of hope had been lit for Thérèse, by a letter which had arrived mysteriously via a sister house in Montreal. A sister at Notre Dame du Lac had a brother with the Free French in London. The mail came down on the convoys after many delays. Her father’s letters had ceased, once the occupation of France had taken place. Thérèse conveyed the news to Vincent, barely being able to contain herself. ‘Look at this news.’ He could never get her away from the fears for her father.
Mother Superior read the letters out in the Chapter House before Compline. There were deep sighs when they heard of the visit by Hitler to Paris. This was how they enlarged on the news of Petain’s armistice, De Gaulle’s broadcast from London.
The different sisters carried the legacies of the original political affiliations of their families. Somewhere in their midst was the embroiderer of the yellow stars.
They heard of the setting up of the Vichy government. Deep divides fractured the community when the news came through of the British sinking of the French navy at Mers-el-Kebir, on the 3
rd
July, 1940.
Jean Michel – no surname was ever given for their informant from London – told in a postscript of the banning of Jews, who had fled to the Southern Zone, prevented from returning to the Occupied Zone. All this talk of zones mystified the sisters. What had happened to their beloved France? Towards the end of the year they heard of the
Statut de Juifs
, of the census according to the
Statut
, by which Jews were no longer allowed to hold public office. Thérèse feared for her father as a senior surgeon in the hospital in Avignon, where he had moved.
It was only just before Christmas, almost as an aside, that Thérèse said to Vincent, ‘I’m not pregnant,’ as they pored over their notebooks.
‘Why’ve you not told me before?’ All his fear spilled out.
‘I could barely contemplate the possibility. I wanted to be absolutely sure. I’ve missed periods before, once, when I had Dengue fever, the radical change in temperature threw my cycle out.’
‘Madeleine!’
‘You never asked me. I didn’t know what you thought. We didn’t talk. We don’t talk. What can we talk about?’
When would he tell her about his son? Could he? Vincent thought.
They had kept things strictly formal according to their duties and research, though he could see her passion in her eyes. He spoke with his.
Jean Michel’s letters from London via Montreal, after their perilous journey south as part of the convoys, had given them something different to talk about. By the end of the year, Thérèse was fearful of who were agreeing with Petain’s advocation of collaboration.
Mother Superior was censoring the letters from Montreal, and not reading out those parts of the letters which referred to ‘Jewish Affairs’, as she called them. Thérèse had overheard Mother Superior talking to Mother Hildegard about, ‘Jewish affairs’, how the news ‘inflamed’ the sisters.
But she heard of the second
Statut des Juifs
, excluding Jews from commerce and industry, requiring a census in the Southern Zone where Thérèse still believed her father to be. The letters contained news of the resistance, and of Germans being shot. For instance, in August of 1941, they heard of the shooting of a German by Colonel Fabien at the Metro, and of a German soldier shot at the Gare de L’Est.
‘Cut the motor, Jonah.’ Theo was poised in the bow. Since the night of the hurricane, Vincent noticed that the boy and Jonah were closer than ever. Theo needed no encouragement now. He was leaping from the bow, with the coiled rope, to tie up on the jetty, before Jonah had fully pulled in alongside. He was giving the instructions. ‘Easy, easy!’
Jonah had his cuatro this afternoon. He sat on the jetty strumming, improvising a tune, instead of immediately departing for Saint Damian’s. The Christmas season had started. He was picking out a
Parang
tune, the Venezuelan, Spanish rhythms tinkled at the end of the jetty, accompanied by his soft humming.
Vincent stood watching and listening. Theo had taken his doctor’s bag and deposited it on the verandah. He was back quickly, down the steps, with his fishing rod.
Vincent lit a cigarette, leaning up against one of the benches at the end of the jetty. He was allowing the day at the hospital to fall away. But his gaze fell across the bay, to the convent at Embarcadère Corbeaux. His mind was on Thérèse. He had hardly let himself think of the child she might have been pregnant with. But, now, the possibility of what might develop for them began to consume him. What really would they do? Could he tell her about his son, the son he did not know?
Vincent smoked, watching Theo baiting his line. The smoke from his cigarette trailed off into the soft breeze of the afternoon. The boy was hunched, bare backed, at the edge of the jetty, holding his rod intently for a bite. The plate of bait was by his side. Flies buzzed.
Jonah’s
Parang
increased the afternoon’s harmony. No one
spoke. He hummed, and his song began to build towards its chorus, ‘
Maria, Maria, Maria, Maria Magdalena.
’ The folk carol brought an elation to a time that Vincent could dread, when he returned in the afternoon from a hard day at the hospital, to an evening alone with Theo. But, now, that was changing. He looked forward to coming home with the boy. He was pleased with his relationship with Jonah. His progress under Singh’s tutelage was a good thing, despite Vincent’s worry about Singh’s politics, and his puzzlement over Christiana. What was Singh up to?
As he watched Theo fishing, Vincent reflected on the influences of the two men. Jonah was big and generous. Singh was serious and fastidious.
‘Jonah, where you learn
Parang
, boy? I connect you with stick fight and the Shango, not with this coco ’
panol
thing.’ Vincent interrupted the playing, offering Jonah a cigarette.
‘You good, yes, Doc.’ Jonah laughed, taking the cigarette and cupping his hands round Vincent’s lighted match. ‘I in all kind of thing since I is a boy. Is through my father that I in the stick fight. The
gayelle
right there behind our house. I hearing drum and stick fight in that arena since I born. I bring up in that challenge. The
Orisha
worship strong with my father mother, that grandmother who live by we since I small. So, it in my blood from long. We in the Catholic thing, but we also in the
Orisha
. But is my mother who give me this. She mother is a woman who come from Venezuela and was half Carib. Is she who teach me these tunes. Is so our village is.’
Theo picked up the tune and whistled it.
‘Plenty religion, boy, but what about this politics thing?’ Vincent was getting into the talk with his own questions.
‘Politics? Well, what you calling politics is necessity,
oui
.’
‘How you mean, necessity?’
‘Look at where we is. When you bring up so, with all them kind of soul thing going for you since you small, you know you have to stand up and do something. You can’t just let thing happen and you don’t do nothing. I never did want to go in no
gayelle
. Since I small I see my father come home with a buss head. My mother nurse that. One time I hear her ask, ‘Warner, all this bravery boy, for buss
head in the ring? I need you for something else.’ Not, that she go stop him. She can’t stop him. Then one day, my father come back and he say he join the Oil Workers Trade Union. My father was a roughneck on them early rigs. So he right in the old and the new, modern things and things from long time.’ Jonah laughed with his story. ‘History, Doc!’
The sweet
Parang
tune brought the welcome of clapping and the shuffle of dancing feet to the boards of the jetty. It was like a breeze. It was the gentle breeze which the old people of the country villages always said came on these evenings before Christmas, the sweet season. It came with the wood smoke from the cooking fires. It came with the coo of the ground doves and the murmur of the pigeons. It came with the drum of wood being cut in the forest,
Gommier
for canoe. It came with the music that water made over small stones, under the bridge where the children fished for
guppies
and
wabeens
. It buckled in the kerosene tins a young girl was filling at a standpipe in a village somewhere.
‘What about this young girl Christiana, Jonah?’
‘What you say, Doc?’
‘The young girl, Christiana. Singh’s student?’
‘Student, you say, Doc?’ Jonah laughed.
Jonah had moved on to another tune.
Feliz Navidad
. Vincent began, like in jazz, to improvise, picking up an old bottle and spoon from the jetty, with Jonah strumming the cuatro, giving voice.
Theo was on winds. His boy’s voice was a flute. ‘
Feliz Navidad
.’
‘
Feliz Navidad
,’ Jonah’s deep voice echoed.
‘I get him. I get him. I catch him. I get him, yes.’ Theo was flicking his rod over his head, catapulting his line into the air and scrambling with its length, as he hauled in the weight at its end. It finally emerged as a big red snapper. ‘Is a red fish. I catch a red fish.’
Vincent and Jonah looked on, more in awe at the voice, the natural voice of the boy, than the red snapper which was jumping on the boards.
Theo got control of his fish and stunned it into submission. It
lay still, blood oozing from its gills. He looked up at Jonah and Vincent. He held up the red snapper, allowing its length and weight full view. He smiled with his eyes, with his mouth, his whole face creased with joy and pride.
‘Well done, Theo. Well done!’ Vincent walked towards where he was sitting. He went to touch him on his shoulder, to put his arm around him. But, suddenly the new Theo retreated. A barrier went up.
Not even Jonah, jumping up and parodying the excitement of the child, ‘Oh gawd boy, is real big red fish you catch there,’ moved Theo into the physical contact of
pardners
.
He had left them. He had given them a glimpse of who he was, and who he could be fully, and then retreated behind the veil which seemed to hang before his eyes, to mantle his face. He had once again coupled himself with his old
pardner
, melancholia.
‘Theo, what happen, boy?’ Jonah tried in a gentler tone. Theo turned away.
Then, as he reached the steps to the house, he turned and shouted. ‘I know about Christiana. I know about them.’
Jonah was already pulling in the pirogue from its mooring. He straddled between the jetty and the bow of the pirogue, descending into the boat.
Theo put down his catch on the steps and came back.
‘What you know, Theo?’ Vincent came and stood behind him as he coiled the rope for Jonah. Theo did not answer immediately.
Jonah was preparing to row, rather than disturb the stillness with the sound of the motor which might alert the Coast Guard. Theo got up and made his way up to the dark and empty house. Vincent picked up the fishing tackle at the end of the jetty. He followed the boy. Theo stopped and turned to face him. ‘I see them. I see them. I see what they does do with each other.’ He stopped himself.
Jonah straddled the pirogue. ‘What he say, Doc?’
‘Tomorrow, Jonah.’
‘We go talk.’ He pushed off.
Theo went to the tap by the tank outside the kitchen to clean and gut his red fish. Then he came back into the kitchen and
prepared to fry his fillets in hot oil. When he was ready, he served them with a bake he had made earlier. He and Vincent ate silently in the light of a hurricane lamp Vincent had pumped up. It was a silent communion.
Something new had happened, but something old remained.
‘Theo, you want to talk about what you’ve seen?’
‘No, no, leave me alone!’
No sooner had Vincent fallen asleep, than he was awakened. Theo was perched at the end of his bed like an owl, like a
jumbie
bird. All eyes.
T
HIS IS MY
last Christmas in barrack yard up Pepper Hill. Even Mama say, Like is your last Christmas, darling. Sweetheart? Those words. Just so. What she feel? I has a feeling in my blood. I has that feeling sitting down right here, night before Christmas Eve in the dark by the window, leaning on the sill of the Demerara window, waiting for Mama.
A sweet breeze only rustling the leaves in the sappodilla tree outside. A sweet breeze coming over the cocoa hills from Montserrat. A sweet breeze cooling down the day. But, is a lonely breeze too.
Barrack yard tinkling. Barrack yard tinkling with Christmas time music. Right down by Chen Chiney shop I hear it.
Parang
band. Bottle and spoon,
tamboo bamboo
, cuatro strumming.
Maria Maria Maria Maria Magdalena
under the rum shop where Spanish and the big fellas playing cards, All Fours. Arnaldo Barradas, slapping down dominoes on the counter as he drink Chen rum. Wha dap! Like I hear a domino fly down. Is like when I go to shop for Mama late at night and the fellas in a huddle playing. Wha dap! And is only rum I smelling.
Emelda boy! Spanish say, when I come in the door. Spanish only calling me, Emelda boy! Like Spanish like my Mama? Calling my Mama name so, in the shop. Running his fingers through my hair.
Vincent propped a pillow behind his back.
M
AMA WORKING
in big house late.
The feeling that I go miss everything here in the barrack yard crawling over my skin. It burning my eye. My eye brim up full full. I leaning my head on my arm. I fall off. Then they open big and the immense sky above me, as I lean out over the windowsill and look up to the heavens.
I learning big vocabulary from Father Angel for Exhibition Class.
Con-stel-la-tions. Father Angel say the syllabic way is the best way to spell. I learning a little Latin too, and I know that
stella
is star and Mary the Virgin is
Stella Maris
, Star of the Sea, like in the hymn we does sing after Benediction by La Divina Pastora statue.
Where I was? Dreaming. Dreaming of Chantal. That is what happen when Mama late in big house.
How I know Mama safe? Mama not safe coming home in the pitch black night. Tonight is moonlight. She can see the road like a white satin ribbon down the hill, and the barrack yard glittering like Christmas time candle. Like yellow flower-candle.
Chantal!
Yes. Big house like a giant Chiney lantern hanging in the sky. White and shimmering, like it make of lace. Mama late late. Chantal in there. Sometimes I think I can see her.
Chantal. Chantal. I almost shouting loud loud. But is a whisper in truth. Chantal, Chantal, because I don’t want neighbour to hear. I don’t want neighbour to hear my business.
I don’t want Popo teasing me and talking talking. What you like that girl for? What you like that girl for? You don’t see is big people. Big white people! Whitey cockroach. Popo get vex too much. Like the big men in the rum shop.
Mama say is the times we living in. Father Angel say is living history. Men must fight for equal justice. I read it on
The Gazette
I stick up on the wall. Policeman Burn in Fyzabad. Spanish say one day they go burn down big house.
I listen to all that. But that is not how I see Chantal.
Sometimes, I sure I see she by the balustrade of the verandah. Hanging over, and her long blonde hair like Rapunzel in my Royal Reader. I have in my orange box in the corner. That is where I does
learn vocabulary. Sit down in the corner on a little box stool and rest on turn up orange box. Keep my old red Primers and my brown Royal Readers in the box by my feet crunch up. The kerosene lamp burning burning till Mama come down from big house and catch me, wrap me up against she warm skin, and take me into her cosy bed. Mama.
Vincent echoed the child’s word, ‘Mama.’ So that Theo’s eyes darted like a distracted owl, like an agitated
jumbie
bird. But then he settled back into his staring. Vincent dared not move.
C
HANTAL
. Sometimes I think of she spinning spinning. Mama say they have a Singer sewing machine and Chantal does sew in the bedroom.
When I go up to big house with Mama I don’t go inside. I does stop by the kitchen door and peep in through the pantry door into the dining room and into the drawing room and the other room deep inside where Chantal is.
That is when Chantal don’t come out and play. Chantal must be making things for Christmas.
Wait nuh, I hear somebody in the yard.
And down the road they still singing:
Drink a rum and punch a creama, drink a rum, on a Christmas morning
.
Vincent could hear Jonah again on his cuatro on the jetty earlier in the afternoon.
S
OMEBODY
in the yard. Somebody outside the window.
Not exactly voices. Sounds. Wet sounds. Like how
crapeaux
does sound on the wet rocks by river pool. Sschupp! Sschupp! I bend down under the windowsill. Then I poke my head up little little. I peep through the crack of the jalousies. Moonlight milky in the yard. I wonder that nobody don’t see me. It so bright. Moonlight flooding Mama and my little dolly.
Like a vision, as Father Angel say. Somewhere for the Virgin Mary, La Divina Pastora to appear in all her splendour. Jewels and lace and golden crown.
I see all Ma Procop flower garden. Red red poinsettia, red turning into black in the Christmas Eve night. Because I see on the clock on Mama cabinet that it late late. Is now early early morning. Christmas Eve.