Authors: Lawrence Scott
Some weeks later, there was another letter conveying the deepest regret and confirming that Bernard was considered missing, having failed to return from ‘an operational sortie.’
They now knew that his aircraft had left to take part in an attack on the city of Hamburg, and that after take-off, there had been no further contact with the flight. They conveyed that they were of the opinion that the crew would have been able to make use of their parachutes in case of an emergency. The exact circumstances were not known. They were not advising that they should hold high hopes. They mentioned that Bernard was a keen officer, popular with his fellow officers and always ready and willing to get on with the job. They would pass on any other news immediately. Bernard’s belongings were being kept at the Central Depository.
He was dead and not dead.
One afternoon, later that month, when he had returned to the doctor’s house earlier than usual, Theo brought Vincent a cup of tea out on the verandah with a composition on “Catching Butterflies” that he had written the previous evening, with the help of Madeleine. Compositions and stories were proliferating. Vincent was re-reading and reflecting on the impersonality and particular poise of the official telegraphic prose, and then comparing it with Theo’s descriptively charged words.
Theo sat opposite him and looked over the corrections that Vincent had made to his composition, in addition to those which Madeleine had made.
The night-time stories had subsided. There had not been any more for some time, since the one who came at night, galloping through the window on a horse. There was no more talk of the cold key.
Vincent was not reassured that this was the end. No. It was probably only a respite.
The quiet of the afternoon, and the reflections of the boy and the doctor on the different kinds of prose and their purposes, was interrupted by the sound of a pirogue coming into the bay.
Theo got up and went down to the jetty, as he often did when a boat came close to the house.
Vincent could see that it was not Jonah, nor any of the fishermen that he knew. Unusually, they looked like holidaymakers. There were many holiday homes on the archipelago. But it was very unusual to find holidaymakers down the islands at this time, with the restrictions made by the Americans. He got out his binoculars. It was a family group, possibly even a family that he knew, though he so seldom went into town now. He wondered who he would recognise.
The boat had come in quite close, but was not showing any signs of wanting to come into the jetty. Vincent took in the whole scene. An older woman sat in the middle under a parasol, and a man, who he presumed was her husband, was at the tiller. A young girl, about Theo’s age, with long blonde hair blowing in the breeze, was sitting in the bow. A younger boy was next to the older woman. The man
was the first to wave. Vincent waved back. The man kept on waving as if he had not got the attention that he sought.
Vincent looked at Theo on the jetty. He stood with his arms at his sides staring at the pirogue in the bay. They had come in so close. It was now very clear who they were.
They were a white creole family. Vincent was sure that he recognised them, but then he had not met them for a long time, since his family had moved into town, and he had gone away. Vincent heard quite distinctly the man call out, ‘Coco!’ Hearing the name from the tale shocked him. He looked for Theo’s reactions.
The boy remained stone-still, staring out to sea. He did not respond to the waving, or to the man calling out. The man called again, ‘Coco!’ He cupped his hands to his mouth like blowing on a conch. The pirogue circled the bay once more, so at one point, the boat with the blonde girl in the bow came in very close to the jetty. ‘Coco!’ the man called again.
Vincent felt a chill down his spine.
Then there was the girl’s voice, ‘Theo,’ and she waved.
At first, Theo did not respond. Then, as the pirogue raced off, leaving a wide wake, the girl stood in the bow, and over the head of her father, mother and brother, looking down the length of the boat, waved wildly. Vincent noticed Theo raise his arm and wave very deliberately, and then his arms dropped to his side.
‘Theo! Theo!’ she called again and again. The girl stood staring at the bow until the pirogue left the bay.
The sun was just beginning to set. The light caught the girl’s blonde hair in the breeze, and the spray from the fast moving pirogue. She disappeared into the white light.
Madeleine had left her work and come out onto the verandah, having heard the voices calling. She looked at the scene: Vincent watching Theo waving, the girl waving from the fast disappearing boat. And the man, still with one last shout, calling out, ‘Coco!’
Then Theo let out a piercing cry. ‘Chantal!’
That night, Vincent noticed that Theo was like he had been when he first arrived at El Caracol. He was impenetrable. He knew that the cause was the appearance of Mister. He had never wanted to know the identity of the family that Theo always talked about. He knew the name well, Marieneaux. But he had lost touch with the families on the estates, particularly after being away for seven years in England. He had also agreed with Father Dominic that the whereabouts of the boy would not be disclosed to the family. Something had happened to break that promise.
This would put Theo back, maybe months. He feared most of all that the boy would think that he had betrayed him. What would Theo do? He recalled snippets from earlier tales, earlier nights spent with his turmoil.
A
ND NOW
, I want to fly. I hear a woman in Chen shop tell Spanish one day that people uses to fly, just so. They see them over the hills Tortuga way. Just so, they take a hoe in the yard, in the cane piece, and fly. Fly away. They never come back.
Some say they yearn for Africa. Africa? Yearned?
Father Angel say, Catch the spirit.
Spanish say, That is a lot of stupidness.
What a wonder it would be to fly! Me, Popo, Chantal and Jai. Fly away.
Me, Popo, Chantal and Jai.
Vincent grew sad for the loss of the boy’s childhood. There she was, Chantal, on the bow of the boat this afternoon. Vincent had to confess to himself his interest in this girl, an emblematic interest in the destinies of this boy and this
girl. For sometime he had noticed some concurrence with his own story. But theirs was a terrible fate. Chantal, a girlfriend! Vincent left that sad fate for the more urgent understanding of Theo’s desire to fly. Then he remembered one of Father Dominic’s earlier accounts, before he had lost touch altogether, of what had been going on in the friary.
“One day, the boy tells me I’m not seeing what is under my nose. When I leave his cell I must check for matches. And when he tells me I am not seeing what is under my nose, I think that that is what he means. Being sacristan, he could easily have some which he brings to his cell. He smiles when he sees me looking. There is a sense of humour there, or something else. ‘You think I go burn down the place, Father?’ he laughs. Maybe, we’re becoming friends.”
Father Dominic had a definite fear that the boy would resort to fire. Vincent’s mind was running. He could not put any boundaries on Theo. He was left all day alone. He had access to everything. He had complete freedom. Vincent believed that that trust was paramount in the regaining of the boy’s full health. But, with this regression, what was he to do? Fire was apparently part of Theo’s pattern in the past. Theo’s voice from the past moved and frightened him.
Flying and fire!
That night Theo was at his bedside with a fleeting tale.
A
U REVOIR
! Adieu!
Ba-bye!
I see Father Angel and Mrs Goveia. I see Ma Sybil and all the children. The yard standing out and waving. I see far up on the hill where the verandah use to be, where Chantal use to be. Nothing. There is nothing. Pillars, blackened pillars! There is nothing, nothing.
First the dolly house and then the big house.
The stories were catching fire in Vincent’s mind, and his imagination was running away with him. He read through some of Father Dominic’s other letters the next day.
“That particular morning is an example in question. How to
pick up the pieces? I thought, Oh, Lord God, and I excuse myself to take the Lord’s name in vain. It is a prayer. For I needed to have all the assistance, both divine and worldly to deal with what I had to deal with that particular morning. And I had to swear Brother Stephen into my confidence, that this was not a matter to trouble the Father Superior with at the present moment, But in good time, I would let it be known what had happened. As indeed, I had intended to do. This was not an untruth. I intended, once I had brought the boy some harmony, or he came to it himself, that I would give a full report to Father Superior about his state.
“Brother Theo rang the house bell for Matins, and then went out into the yard to ring the big bells. So he was up earlier than the rest of the community. I had arranged that my room be on the same corridor as his. Not next to him. That room was spare. It was used as a storeroom. But I had grown so used to my care of the boy that even in sleep I seemed to be vigilant. I woke usually about the time that he should wake, so I would hear him on his way down to the cloister with the hand bell. He would start at the other end of the cloister, and make his way back to where my room was.
“I thought it strange that I had not heard the bell that morning. For all his tortured life, when it came to his duties, he performed them very well, with punctuality and with great credit. Father Angel’s Exhibition Class boy, he would say to me. Sadly, of course, it did not happen. I have not got to the bottom of that as yet. I expect it to be made visible, as a consequence of the more serious happenings. Father Superior’s words, his notes, are so brief.
“I am not complaining, but at times I am so in the dark. Father Superior, suspecting that I thought this on one occasion, when he routinely asked about Brother Theo, said that I had to work with faith. At times we should perhaps assist faith with some reason. I dare not even think that.
“I needed all my faith on this particular morning, given what I found when I got out of bed and went down to the cloister, wondering why the bell had not yet been rung, worried that the community would be late for Matins, and consequently all the hours would be thrown into confusion.
“The boy was lying on the ground, if not fully unconscious, at
least dazed, very dazed, seeming to be asleep. It took me a while to rouse him. I coaxed him with some assistance from water at the fountain near where he had fallen, it seemed. I checked from bruises and cuts. I attended to the abrasions on his hands and knees. There was a cut on his forehead.
“I don’t know what made me look back and up, but I seemed to do so instinctively. There was all the evidence of bed clothes and pyjamas on the roof beneath the window of his cell, which was above this part of the cloister. I then discovered some shingles which had been displaced and fallen into the cloister. Also, the galvanise parapet was broken.
“How to attend to the boy and repair this damage before the community got up? I had to seek the assistance of someone, and that was when I took Brother Stephen into my confidence about this matter, only treating it as an isolated instance, not something that indicated anything. I think I said something stupid, like he must be a sleepwalker. Brother Stephen seemed to accept this, and was quickly repairing the damage to the roof, and dragging the bedclothes through the window. Then he had to rush to ring the bell to get the community up, while I attended to Brother Theo, taking him to the infirmary where I didn’t imagine there would be any danger of being discovered at that hour of the morning.
“Once in the infirmary, Brother Stephen was miraculously able to give me a hand to lift the boy, who thank God was slight. I pleaded with him. Brother Theo, Brother Theo. What have you done? What has been done to you? I could not get him to talk. I checked his limbs. Mercifully, they seemed to be in order, though I don’t know, given what I imagined had happened, that he had jumped from the window or slid on the parapet. But what was he doing out there?
“But, you see, flying. He insists that he tried to fly from the window. One can understand the desire for flight. I am seeing now that this boy is here by force, against his will, if he knows what his will is. He expresses his will in such childlike forms. To be reunited with his friends Popo and Jai and the girl, Chantal, to take his Mama from the yard. Again, I would like to be able to see these conditions which the boy describes. He has admirable sentiments
for his parish priest, Father Angel, and his housekeeper Mrs Goveia. But what really is the will of someone in his present state?
“Some arrangement has been made with the Marineaux family. I don’t at the moment have the facts, but I must get to the bottom of the question if I am to be of real assistance to this boy. Having to carry the personal responsibilities for these deliberations, I find this very burdensome. But I feeI this would be betraying the boy to something worse, if I was to simply tell all that has been going on.
“This idea of flight has to be one of his fanciful stories. What did he say? That over the Tortuga hills people used to fly. Apparently he is alluding to some ancient custom going back to the dark days of slavery when it is said that African people had the power, the science, to fly back to Africa, to escape the terrible conditions of their enslavement.
“So, yes, this was his explanation, that he had tried to fly from his window, out over the cloister to reach the sky. He had been testing the breeze with his sheets, to see if they would billow like sails. What state of mind was he in, that he could throw himself from a window, jump from the parapet over the cloister? Thankfully, it is not very high.”
Between the fear of fire, and the possibility that Theo would want to fly again, Vincent could not sleep that night. He saw the friar’s words in a new light. He would have to make new arrangements. He would not be able to let the boy out of his sight. He would have to take him to the hospital at all times. Singh, Jonah, Madeleine would have to keep an eye on him. He could not have the boy killing himself or burning down the place.
Vincent dozed. Then he woke, waking Madeleine. They sat and listened, as they saw and heard Theo at the window of their room.
T
HEN, HE THERE
. Right at the window this time, a string of stars is his halter, the milky way his bridle. Orion is his stirrup. He is there at the window. And the horse speak to me.
Come, ride, ride with me, for you know you have ridden me in the past. You know you stole me for your canter over the cocoa
hills. Come, lay your cheek on mine. Come and rest on my eyelids. Come, lie the length of your boy’s body along my long neck. Come, press your knees into my flanks. Leave your moons there, leave your tattoos for me to carry them to glory. Crouch and hide in the dark, as I take you through the darkness which hangs with the purple cocoa pods. High is the sound of the rivers running over the blue stones, which is a chorus of bell frogs, a choir of crickets, a net of fireflies, to our hiding spot that no one know about, where they can’t hear me neighing with the joy of you on my back. Can’t hear you cry.
Theo was now kneeling at the bedside and speaking into Vincent’s ear in urgent whispers, his horse music, as he might speak through the grille of a confessional.
Madeleine moved from the bed and sat in the rocker near the window. She needed air.
F
ATHER
S
UPERIOR
leave no key this time. I don’t have a key. He calling for the key to be let in. He say is under my pillow. He say is by the wash stand. He say is wrap in a towel. Look under the mattress. He say don’t play those tricks. We have enough of tricks.
Then I see the chestnut horse. I holding the cold key. I have it in my mouth, as I curl on the bed waiting for the horse to come
clop clop
through the window. Waiting for the door,
clackityclack.
I wait for him. I know the smell of the
eau de Cologne.
I know the feel of khaki. I know the switch. I know the echo of the boot on the corridor. I know the scrape of the boot outside. I know these things before they happen.
I anticipate and then I experience. I experience twice. I am in a double terror, because I know my terror and my torture. And in this quiet place of God, I do not know how no one hears what goes on in the next room. I don’t know how they don’t hear till I call and then it is too late. Even when I sing
Frère Jacques, dormez-vous.
Vincent woke with a jolt. He had nodded off. ‘What’s too late, Theo? Theo, you must tell me now, tell me all. I’m here. I’m hearing. Call out, Theo. Call out. Call out to me. I’m listening.’
‘He says it’s too late when no one comes when he calls.’ Madeleine leant over towards the bed.
But Theo was all whispers. He could hardly talk.
B
ONE STICK
in my throat. Fish bone in my gullet.
‘Bread Theo, eat some bread. I’ll get you some bread, some water to dislodge the bone in your throat. Wait Theo, wait there.’
Vincent jumped out of bed and ran downstairs to the kitchen. He returned with bread and a glass of water.
Theo was no longer kneeling at the bedside like a child at the confessional when Vincent returned with the bread and the glass of water. He was standing with his back to the door, as if he were looking out of the window, but the window still had its blackout curtains drawn. He was looking into that darkness. When Vincent’s eyes grew accustomed to the darkness he could then see Theo turn and kneel.
He spoke in the same urgent whispers.
I
READY
.
Then Vincent and Madeleine heard from his stifled throat the words:
D
IE, DIE DIE.
When there was no immediate response from Vincent, Theo’s tone of voice changed. His demeanour was transformed into an authoritative one.
G
ET YOUR SWITCH.
Do your work.
Bois, bois.
Give it to me.
He turned and offered his naked bottom. He bent over and invited Vincent to beat him with a switch.
‘I can’t stay and see this.’ Madeleine fled from the room. She hesitated on the landing, and then sat at the top of the stairs outside the room, part listening, part not wanting to hear.
Then Vincent came close and touched Theo’s back saying, ‘Theo, Theo, come, drink some water, eat this bread.’ Theo leapt up from his bending-over position and knelt in front of Vincent. He knelt with his mouth open like a child, waiting for the priest to place the host on his tongue at Holy Communion. He began to undo Vincent’s pyjamas, to grab at his penis.