Paid Servant (18 page)

“Sit down, pal.”

Obediently I seated myself. Gradually my attention swung from the room and its other occupants to myself, and anger began a slow boil inside me. What the hell was I doing in this place? ‘Sit down, pal,' he had said, with the casual assurance that I would sit down, that I would accept the crummy place and his own untidy person, and wait patiently for his attention. Why? Why? I asked myself, only half-hearing the rise and fall of the voices around me. Was I accepting this filthy place so obediently, merely because it was operated by a Negro? Did I need a haircut so badly that I was prepared to forgo every hygienic standard? Would I have been prepared to accept the same from a white barber? My anger mounted as the full meaning of my surroundings struck me. This barber probably did not give a damn about me or any of the rest of us who were waiting for his attention. He was doing us no favour. The prices marked up on a fly-specked notice on the wall were the same as those in barber's shops where the attendants were smart in clean, white smocks, the instruments constantly sterilized, the floor regularly swept and the general hygienic standard high. He knew that English barbers were often either unfamiliar with Negro heads or disinclined to accommodate them; he guessed correctly that many black men, in Brixton and farther afield, had little alternative to his services, so he virtually had a captive clientele. Yes, maybe this fellow knew that most of us would be forced to come to him, so he saw no reason to put himself out for our accommodation.

Or perhaps, another thought intruded, the bastard knew no better. He may have learned his trade in similar crude surroundings, had never known anything better, and was merely continuing in a familiar pattern. It was easy for me to backtrack through the years to memories of British Guiana. There were barber's shops of all types, some elegant, others mediocre, and others little more than a crudely assembled tin shack with a smooth dirt floor. But memory was strong on one point. They were kept clean. The nicest were the open-air ones, just a chair or packing-case under a spreading mango tree and the barber was in business on Sunday mornings. Perhaps this man was attempting to transpose that sort of casual, catch-as-catch-can situation to the English scene …

Snatches of the conversation got through to me, the all too familiar chorus of complaints … “the Jumbles don't like us, Man,” “They won't rent me a room, Man,” on and on and on, while they sat in this sty without seeing the filth. Christ, if this barber
liked
them and treated them in this way, what should they not expect from people who disliked them, or hated them. I was now really angry, mostly with myself for letting him do this to me. I stood up. I had had enough.

“What's up, pal?” the barber asked.

“I'm leaving,” I replied, coldly and pointedly.

“What's your hurry? I'm nearly finished here and you're next. These Spades are only shooting the breeze.” He nodded towards the talkative men, all of whom laughed heartily at his reference to them as ‘Spades'. Funny, they'd laugh when he called them spades, but the sparks would fly if a white man made a similar remark.

“I've changed my mind,” I answered. I suppose my manner and tone of voice reflected my displeasure, but I did not care. Conversation around me slowed down and then died, as they all turned to stare at me. Down inside I knew that I should walk out without further comment, but some perverse inclination kept me there, insisting that I make my protest somehow.

“So what did you come here for?” the barber asked, his voice still slow and casual, his eyes assessing me with calculated indifference.

“A haircut.”

“Then sit down, if that's what you want.”

“I don't think I'll bother,” I replied, deliberately looking around the shop, that he might not mistake my meaning.

“Then f—k you, pal.” He returned his attention to his work. I opened the door and walked out, closing it on the thick hostility which had so suddenly been generated in the room. I don't suppose my gesture meant a damned thing to him, yet I felt better for having made it. Probably the others hated me for it; they might so easily have considered it as snobbishness on my part, as another instance of ‘uppitiness' by those black men who, with a little education, looked down their noses at their humbler brethren. Oh, well, to hell with them and what they thought. If they imagined that the situation of which they complained would improve itself magically while they sat on their arses and grumbled they'd have a long wait. If they did not mind the dirt and stink in the barber's shop, probably they might not mind it in their homes. When they acquired guts enough to demand higher standards among themselves, and the self-respect to insist on those standards, they would take the first steps towards earning the respect of the host community.

With these thoughts rampant in my mind, I caught a train to Victoria, then travelled by Underground to Bond Street to make a few purchases at one of the large department stores in Oxford Street; while shopping I noticed a sign ‘Gentlemen's Hair-dressers, Third Floor.' I went up, was courteously received and served, and it cost no more than I would have paid at Brixton.

Now, listening to Miss Spendler, I remembered the shop, the man and the name. It was Cosson. Small world.

“What is it that the Council wants to do in this case? From reading the file I could see that things had reached an impasse, but I wasn't sure what was expected of me.”

“Before Mr Cosson went to prison he had been trying to get his children sent to their grandparents. Perhaps, everything considered, it would be the best thing for them. Maybe you could get in touch with him and see whether it can be arranged?”

“Were the children all born in Britain?”

“Yes.”

“If, as you say, they are so attached to their father, it might not be an easy thing to sort of pack them off to strangers whom they have never seen, no matter what the relationship.”

“But it might be better for them to be among their own people,” she said. I did not feel in the mood to discuss that.

“I think I'll see the children, then arrange to visit the father in prison. I'll let you know what happens.”

“Best of luck, Mr Braithwaite.”

Falconbridge lay deep in the Sussex countryside, a collection of pleasant, red-brick houses dispersed over several acres of meadowland. Tall, spreading oak-trees, rough lawns and flowering shrubs and the warm afternoon sunlight conspired to present an air of peace and contentment; somehow I had expected something different, less orderly. A network of paved roadways led from the main administration building through shady trees to the houses, each of which was centrally divided to accommodate two ‘families', a housemother and her children; each residence had a nameboard on the door. The Cossons lived in ‘Perivale House'. The housemother, Miss Bancroft, answered my knock and invited me into a comfortable room which bore all the signs of being used by many children; it was disorderly, but pleasant and relaxing. I explained the reason for my visit.

The children were all at school, but were expected in soon after four o'clock; the youngest ones came in first—they were at the local junior school. The others attended school in the town, so they travelled by bus. She invited me to stay to tea, when I would be able to talk to them.

She was a cheery, ample person, with a broad face and short, pale hair. She chatted on about the children in her care, what they did, how they were progressing at school, the easy ones, the difficult ones; but she spoke as if they were all her children, her own flesh and blood.

“I've just taken over the Cossons, and I'm hoping to see their father soon, to discover if he still plans to send them to British Guiana,” I said.

Immediately some of the warmth seemed to evaporate from our easily established rapport. “I heard that Mr Cosson had thought about it,” she replied, “but I took it for granted, after all this time, that he had given up the idea. After all, these children were born here in England, they grew up here, and I don't think they would like it in Africa. I mean, it won't be fair to them.”

“British Guiana is in South America, not Africa,” I said.

“It's still foreign, isn't it?” she replied. “They're comfortable here, they live in a house, go to school, and I take care of them. It would be cruel to send them to a foreign country, where you don't know how they'll live or what they'll eat or anything. They've been talking to me about it and I know they didn't like the idea of being sent away to any foreign place.”

It was clear that she didn't like the idea at all; and I suspected that whatever talking had been done on the matter was initiated by herself.

“I'm merely looking into it. Whatever is decided about the children's future must be their father's responsibility.”

“If what the papers said about him is true, then they're better off here, without him. They're lovely kids, and it's a shame their father has to behave like that.”

“How are they getting on at school? The older ones?” I thought if safer to keep away from discussion of the children's future until I knew more about Mr Cosson's plans.

Once again this set her off in lively praise of the girls; both were at the local Grammar school, and to hear Miss Bancroft tell it, they were the double-distilled quintessence of intelligence and good conduct.

“And the others?”

“That Victor is a card.” The way in which she said it clearly indicated that the boy occupied a very special place in her heart. “He's not as clever as the others and he can be so stubborn when he chooses! But he's a lovable child.”

We chatted about the other children in her charge and got along fine until the children arrived. I was introduced to them as a friend of their father, which I thought was going it a bit steep, especially as this caused the Cosson children to ask me a million questions about their father, most of which I tried to parry, with evasive replies. Desperately I exploited my forthcoming visit to him, and suggested that they each write a letter which I promised to deliver.

Miss Bancroft had not exaggerated in her remarks about the children; they were sturdy, bright and well-mannered; Victor, the youngest, was inclined to show off in order to attract attention to himself; but this is a normal characteristic for the smallest member of any family group. Diane, the eldest, was a lovely, shy child; like the other two girls, she wore her wavy brown hair in two thick plaits which hung halfway down her back. Her skin was pale
café au lait,
and her large brown eyes shone behind long, curling lashes.

“Is my Daddy still too ill to write?” she asked me.

“He has been, but he is recovering and I'm sure you'll get a letter soon from him.”

It sickened me, having to lie to these children, and I made a mental note to say a few things to their father when I met him; he could, at least, write to them through Miss Bancroft, and thus avoid whatever embarrassment he feared from a prison postmark.

When tea was ready we all sat down, ten of us; the Cossons, four other children, Miss Bancroft and myself. The conversation was lively and very entertaining. The housemother asked them about the day's events in school and encouraged them to express themselves. The more I listened to the group, the more I began to appreciate the truth of an observation someone had made at the Kinsmans'. “Put an adult and some children together in a congenial atmosphere and you're well on the way to creating a family.” This was a family; furthermore, any attempt to disrupt it would not be happily received. Miss Bancroft was a paid servant, but the Council was receiving something from her which it could not buy, and, watching her, it occurred to me that she too was receiving something—perhaps the affection and love which the children might otherwise have given to their parents.

When tea was over the children collected the dishes and formed wash-up and drying teams while I had a further chat with Miss Bancroft.

“What do you think of them?” she asked.

“I'd like to congratulate you, Miss Bancroft; you're doing a wonderful job with them.”

“It's easy.” She was evidently pleased with my remark.

“I'm sure Mr Cosson will be very pleased to know they are getting on so well.”

“I don't suppose he cares, or he would surely have written to them or something.”

Outside the very air had changed; now it was jocund with the laughter and shrill cries of children at play; safe, happy children. On my way to the main gate I saw them in groups, boys and girls, skipping, playing football, rolling about on the grass or juggling rubber balls expertly against a wall.

Next morning I wrote a letter to the Welfare Officer at Strangeways Prison, Manchester, explaining the situation and asking permission to visit Mr Cosson; at the same time I wrote to Mr Cosson, introducing myself as the Welfare Officer dealing with the case, and indicating that I would soon be calling to see him. In this way, I thought, he'll either see me, or he'd have to give the prison Welfare Officer a damn good reason for declining ….

B
Y ARRANGEMENT THE TAMERLANES
picked me up at my office soon after two o'clock on Saturday afternoon, and we drove out to Franmere. I sat in front beside Mr Tamerlane; behind me the two girls were like jumping beans in their excitement, asking all kinds of questions about Roddy, to which I could not possibly give answers. It seemed as though they wanted quickly to bridge the gap between not knowing and knowing him, to draw him into the family circle with the least possible delay. I rather suspect that their parents were equally excited, especially Mr Tamerlane. He was just too concerned with other things—the sparkplugs needed cleaning, time to change the oil in the crank-case—anything except what lay at the end of the trip.

Matron was waiting for us and ushered us into her office. She chatted with them about the Home and the children, and the usual pattern of visiting.

“We like the parents to come here and be with the child for an hour or two at first; then, as they get to know and accept each other, the child can be taken out for an afternoon, then later for a weekend visit, to see how he'll settle in at what is likely to be his new home. We like this to be quite unhurried, so that it could be discontinued without too much bother if there's any indication that it might fail.”

Mr and Mrs Tamerlane were listening quite patiently to this; I could hardly refrain from laughter as I watched the girls trying bravely to restrain their impatience, sitting there, well-mannered and outwardly quiet. I knew that Matron was carefully watching them all, getting the ‘feel' of them, so to speak. She chatted a little with the girls, about school, then said: “Roddy's outside with the rabbits; I'll take you to him.”

I followed them as far as the doorway to the backyard, then watched as the group converged on Roddy who was squatted on the rough lawn feeding two tame rabbits with lettuce leaves; momentarily he looked pathetically small beside them, in spite of the wide-legged stance which he assumed on rising to meet them. I walked away in the opposite direction, through an alley and down a narrow walled lane. Later I returned to see him squatted in the same place with the girls, all three in serious discussion about something closely related to their private world.

Indoors I found John and Ella in Matron's office; Ella looked quite pleased and excited, “He's marvellous,” she said.

To put some slight curb on their enthusiasm I mentioned that there were a few difficulties likely to be encountered with the Middlesex Council, but assured them that the Supervisor was working on that end.

“One thing I should mention,” Matron said. “Recently Roddy got himself a foster-aunt, as you might say. A Miss Keriham. Would you have any objections to her visiting him occasionally? They seem to get on quite well and I feel sure she'd like to keep in touch with him even after he leaves here.”

They both said they had no objections, and Ella added: “What's she like, Miss Keriham?”

“Very nice,” Matron replied. “Ask Mr Braithwaite, he brought her.”

Without replying I excused myself and went out to the children, who greeted me with loud excited cries, each wanting to tell me something. Before long I noticed that Roddy too was calling me ‘Uncle Ricky', quickly following the pattern set by June and Jacqueline. Looking at the three of them I wished desperately that nothing would occur to spoil this chance, but everything was working so smoothly that it worried me somewhat.

Before leaving, we told Roddy that the Tamerlanes would take him to their home for tea the following Saturday; that was to give him something pleasurable to think about and also to assure him that he'd see his new friends again, soon.

I telephoned Olga that evening to inform her of these developments; at least that, I argued to myself, was my reason for telephoning. I told her about the Tamerlanes and anticipated her queries by assuring her that there would be no objections to her continued visits to Roddy even when he left Franmere.

On Monday I received a reply from the Welfare Officer at Strangeways Prison. I would be welcome to visit Mr Cosson; enclosed was a short note from Mr Cosson thanking me for my letter and expressing his wish to see me. I travelled to Manchester the next morning. In the same compartment were three men, two of whom were, from their conversation, representatives of an important firm of industrial engineers, on their way to a conference; the other person's face was quite familiar, and after a little while I remembered seeing it regularly on television; he was one of a panel of experts who, each Sunday, discussed questions of topical interest. The rest of the week he was a Member of Parliament for a constituency not very far from London. Both he and I tried to read our newspapers, and I suspected that we experienced the same difficulties of concentration because of the uninhibited way in which our dynamic fellow-travellers reviewed recent occasions on which they had managed to impose their views on resistant but less imaginative colleagues. Between bouts of reading and gazing through the window at the same grey, dull, flitting scene, I slept fitfully, and had not realized that the two engineers had left, until I felt the protracted silence.

Opening my eyes I met those of the M.P., who smiled and said: “Rather quiet, don't you think?”

I got his meaning and we both laughed. From there on we fell into conversation. I told him I recognized his face and we talked about television and its effect on public information, entertainment and taste. He made his observations with the same suave, slightly detached professorial air which I had remarked so often, and which was rather pleasing at closer quarters.

As the train crawled into the deeper gloom of Manchester Station we collected our macs and papers, preparing to leave, and he said: “This has been a most delightful chat, Braithwaite most delightful. Oddly enough, it is the first time I've sat and chatted with a Negro. I hope we meet again sometime.”

Somehow, that spoiled it for me, and all the way to the prison his words kept repeating themselves in my mind. This suave, intelligent, informed man, an elected representative of the people, making a remark like that in the year of Our Lord 1958. I was not sure if it was intended as a boast or confession. I thought of the location of his constituency; I knew that many coloured families lived there. They were part of it; they very probably worked in it, their children were at school in it, some of them surely voted in it. Yet he had never talked with one of them. Probably because none of them had ever sought him out personally for help or advice on a personal matter. But was that the only basis for a relationship between the Member of Parliament and those who elected him? Should he always wait until some personal crisis forced them to seek him out? Was it not also his business and his responsibility deliberately to seek to know as many of his constituents as possible? Did he even know that there were coloured people among his constituents?

Perhaps I was letting my imagination run riot, discolouring an ordinary pedestrian remark. But the idea persisted that, in spite of the deep social malaise which occasionally erupted in inter-racial violence and disorder, this man, and probably others, had not considered it worth his while to meet some of the people concerned, in an attempt to understand the root causes, because in the normal processes of his professional duties he would certainly find himself discussing the symptoms.

Maybe, I further argued to myself, he considered his constituency sufficiently distant from the centres of reported troubles, to remain free and isolated from those ugly, dramatic circumstances. Perhaps if I had known earlier that our conversation represented something new in his experience, I might have put a flea in his ear, so to speak. Then I thought, that, after all, our conversation represented nothing more or less than a discourse between two men, conducted in terms of equality and respect; for whatever reason he made his parting remark, I should not attach too much importance to it. When we parted he had been smiling broadly, apparently really pleased about our encounter; yet I found myself thinking of the old days when elderly people in the East End of London reached forward to shake hands with me, just for the luck which they believed would result. Well, good luck to him too.

At the prison I was shown to the Welfare Officer's office; we chatted awhile, then he sent an orderly to fetch Mr Cosson. In the meantime the Welfare Officer spoke of Mr Cosson as a model prisoner during the eighteen months he had so far spent at Strangeways; if he continued in the same way he was likely to be released in a little over two years; he worked in the prison barber's shop, in order to maintain his proficiency against the time of his release. As I listened to him I hoped that the standards in the prison barber's shop were such that Mr Cosson would learn a few lessons on cleanliness.

He had changed little. The drab prison uniform was worn with the same casual arrogance, though it hung loosely about his spare frame; but it was the same barber of the brief Brixton interlude. If he recognized me, he gave no sign. I introduced myself and we shook hands. The Welfare Officer said we could have our chat in his office; if Mr Cosson preferred it, he could leave us to speak privately. Mr Cosson quickly indicated that he would prefer the Welfare Officer to remain, reminding him that he already knew everything about his affairs, so there was nothing secret to be said. Hearing this I said my piece, stating first that the Council was concerned to know whether he intended to pursue his earlier plan to send the children to his parents in British Guiana; then I said that with no sign of the mother, and himself out of circulation for some time, the children were rather insecure, especially as he had, so far, refused to communicate with them.

Watching him, as I spoke, I got the impression that he was watching the prison Welfare Officer, as if gauging his reaction to my remarks. When he finally spoke he completely surprised me. I suppose it is natural to expect that any period of imprisonment produces some change in a man or woman, but I was unprepared for the whining tone in which he attempted to defend himself. He blamed his wife for all his misfortunes, expressed his love for his children, claimed that he did not write to them primarily for their own sake, because he did not want any taint of prison life to reach them, even through a letter. But he insisted that he missed them terribly, dreamed frequently of them, and missed them even more after each dream. He said that his immediate ambition was to see them; his good conduct record in prison would probably justify a short two-day parole to allow him to visit them, providing someone on the ‘outside' would be willing to guarantee him accommodation for that period.

Perhaps I do him grave injustice, but I had the feeling that his obsequious humility was completely phoney, put on for the benefit of the prison official and myself, in order to achieve the two-day parole. The ‘somebody on the outside' was evidently myself, and his professed concern and love for his children was the lever. He had me nicely in a corner.

“Is it true about the parole?” I asked the Welfare Officer.

“Yes. Providing a prisoner's conduct is satisfactory over a reasonable period of time, he may apply for such a parole on compassionate grounds. But some responsible person must give a written guarantee of board and lodging, and an assurance that the prisoner will return at the end of the parole.”

It occurred to me that Mr Cosson knew all this, had been fully briefed about it, probably by prisoners who knew all the ropes. I said that, as a Council employee, I could not undertake to offer any guarantees without the Council's express authority. Although it would be a pleasant thing to have Mr Cosson visit his children, my business was to discover whether he still intended to send his children to British Guiana, or, if not, what alternative plans had he got for them?

“I think I've changed my mind about sending them home,” he replied. “They'd be better off here in England where I could keep an eye on them, and they'd have the chance of a good education. When I get out I could find a job or maybe start another shop and after a while have them with me.”

This was said in the same persistent, whining voice which somehow I found very off-putting. I felt prompted to ask: “Would you be able to raise the funds necessary to open another shop?”

“Yes,” he replied, quickly. “I've got some friends who'd stake me, you know; all I'd need is enough to open a shop and buy some furniture and equipment.”

“Perhaps one of them could be your guarantor for the parole.”

“Well, not exactly,” the Welfare Officer intervened. “Guarantors are only accepted from certain specific categories of persons.”

I got the message. I was in a category marked “Acceptable”. Then an idea occurred to me. “Perhaps Mr Cosson can get in touch with the Migrants' Division of the West Indies Commission,” I suggested. “They might be able to help and advise on the question of repatriating the children and might even make some suggestions about guaranteeing his parole.”

I must have touched on something, an exposed nerve in the carefully arranged persona, for a flash of the Cosson I had first met showed itself. “They're no damned good, those people. Oh, excuse me, Sir,” this was more to the prison officer than to me. “I've written to them time and again, but they say they can't do anything for me. They wanted to write and tell my parents I'm in jail, and ask them if they'd have the children, but I refused to let them do it. Those black big-shots know how to talk, that's all.”

“Well, as I've already told you, Mr Cosson, I cannot promise you anything. I'll put the matter to the authorities when I return to London and, if they think it is in the best interests of the children for you to visit them, they may decide to take some action. I can promise you no more than that, except that I will write to you promptly after discussing the matter in London.”

Soon afterwards Mr Cosson left us.