Tangled Passion (15 page)

After a hundred meters stood between them and the dog, Jonah stopped and took a long look into the eyes of the animal. It was devoid of evil intentions. He saw no danger, no hatred or rivalry; nothing but a request for friendship. Slowly tearing himself away from Ashana's tight embrace, he summoned up courage and took a scary step towards the dog. It wagged its tail faster. Stopping at a safe distance, Jonah reached out his right hand and lowered it slowly on the dog's head. The dog's tail went crazy wagging in all directions then it rolled over on its back begging for more love.

“You like it, right?” Jonah said, his initial fear slowly ebbing as he continued to rub the dog’s belly. Turning to look at Ashana he immediately realized that it would be a while before she accepted the newest member of their family; she was still frozen and her face bore expressions of not only disbelief but disapproval as well.

“Ash,” Jonah called out gently.

Silence.

“Ash, what do you think we should name her?”

Silence again.

Ashana wasn’t planning to be a part of anything that had to do with the beast, even if it only meant suggesting a name. She didn’t feel comfortable with the arrangement.

It was late afternoon when they finally arrived at Roseau and it took them another hour before Nathan finally sat at Mr. Bushwacker’s table with Edwards standing behind him while the rest of the slaves waited outside the hut.

“What brings you here Mr...?”

“Nathan. Nathan Longstands, sir,” Nathan said, his eyes traveling from the steam that rose from the stained china cup enclosed in Bushwacker’s oversized palm, down to the wooden table where the giant’s huge elbows rested squarely.

“Longstands? You must be Captain Longstands’s son then,” Bushwacker said with a smile that revealed a mouth crammed with teeth.

“Yes sir, I certainly am,” Nathan replied reluctantly.

“Mighty pleasured to meet you, young man. How is your old man?”

“Fine.”

“And how is our beautiful homeland?”

“England is great,” Nathan said.

“Always, always, she is great and beautiful, I truly miss her. May I offer you something?”

“No thanks,” Nathan replied. He would have liked some water but he reckoned that the other cups in Bushwacker’s collection mightn’t be in any much different condition from the one in the giant’s hand.

“Ok then, when did you arrive on this Godforsaken island and why, if I may ask?”

“My father said to hand this to you,” Nathan said, placing the brown envelope on the table. He’d already decided that there had been enough pleasantries and it was time to get down to business and he wasn’t about to respond to any unnecessary questions. “There is a note inside, my father wants you to read,” he added, pushing the envelope across the table.

“Not the type for chitchats, huh?” Bushwacker said, transferring the cup to his left hand. His right palm came down on the envelope and slowly dragged it across the table. He picked it up, tore the envelope impatiently, and slowly pulled out the notes of money in it; his eyes bulging. Then he licked his fingers and began to count them. After the last note, he looked up at Nathan and picked up the letter. His eyes scanned the few lines on the paper very quickly and the paper returned to the table as a ball.

“What?” he said, giving Nathan an angry look as if the young man was responsible for whatever he’d read in the letter. “Two slaves—male and female, escaped the Fort yesterday morning?”

“Yes sir,” Nathan replied, nodding briefly. “We reckon it might have been the night before last night and Father seems to have a lot of confidence in you. He believes you can find them and return them to the Fort in no time.” Nathan said this very calmly, without any signs of intimidation by the huge man’s stare.

“Old friend, Longstands,” Bushwacker said with a smile, absorbing the compliment and exposing his tobacco-stained teeth once again before taking another sip of his tea. “That's what we do young man, everybody on this island and across the West Indies knows me for my professional work and...”

“When can you start?” Nathan interrupted. Every lost second mattered and he was not going to waste any more time listening to Bushwacker’s CV read aloud, while risking Ashana getting far and farther away from him.

“We go now,” Bushwacker replied. He had gotten the message from the young man; it was clear enough that he didn't have any time to waste and wasn’t in the mood for small talk. The immense man stood up to his feet, cautious not to bang his head against the wooden ribs of the ceiling, which his head was only a few inches from. Then he drained the last pint of tea in his cup and roared out a name. Soon another giant appeared from the back; a male slave that was much taller and bigger than Bushwacker.

Nathan reckoned he had to be close to seven feet. He looked well-fed and had on an old, washed-out pair of blue jean trousers with a thousand holes.

“Go get the boys ready, we got work to do,” he said to the giant in a language Nathan didn’t understand. The slave disappeared with a look of excitement in his eyes.

“You speak their language,” Nathan said.

“Yes, I do and that is one of my advantages,” he said, getting into a shirt that was hanging on the chair he was sitting in. “While others were busy teaching them the English language, I spent my time doing the opposite; learning theirs.”

“That is very smart of you, Mr. Bushwacker,” Nathan said.

“They learn your language and you’d have no secret from them, you learn theirs and they have no secret from you, plus you are now one step ahead of them because you understand them. I can have a conversation with you in their presence and they wouldn’t understand anything but they couldn’t do the same.”

“Right!” Jonah said.

“Now I go get ready for the hunt,” Bushwacker said, heading to the back of the house.

“We’ll wait outside,” Nathan replied and headed out to join his slaves.

“As you please.” The giant’s replied, cheerfully.

Mr. Longstands spent the remaining part of the night trying to justify his decision; on all the islands, the punishment for a recaptured slave was worse than death. In his situation, not only did the slaves commit the abominable by escaping but his family and life was on the brink of collapse due to his son’s stubborn interest in the slave girl. If Ashana was in some way removed from the equation, everything would balance out and return to normal. There would be no marriage, no embarrassment to endure, his wife would regain her sanity and return to England in peace, and Nathan would hand him back his diary.

As he staggered onto the balcony, he saw Suzanne; she was already there, seated in his favourite chair. “Honey you are up already. Good morning, what a beautiful day,” Longstands greeted her.

“How are you, Longstands?” Suzanne replied.

“Wonderful, I am fine,” he answered, immediately sensing that something was amiss. Suzanne was never ever in a good mood in the mornings. What could be the possible reason for her sudden upbeat attitude, this particular morning, Longstands wondered.

“I made breakfast, come sit,” she said, a misplaced smile perched on her face.

“Breakfast?” Longstands asked, his suspicion greatly heightened. His wife never touched a spoon unless she needed to use it to eat.

“Em em…. yes I’d love some breakfast but I really have to go meet with the slaves first and then return for breakfast...Edwards!” Longstands said. The last thing he wanted to do was sit with Suzanne for breakfast; it would never end well. He wasn’t sure how long her pretence would last, and soon he assumed there would be an argument and then a disagreement.

“Edwards? You sent him along with Nathan remember, Massa Longstands?” she said casually not trying to hide the sarcasm in her tone.

“Oh yes I did, God, I need him now. Anyway, he should be back before sundown,” Longstands said.

“Really?”

“Yes!” Longstands said abruptly, not in the mood to continue any conversation with his wife. He already knew what she was trying to do.

“Is it very urgent? I mean what you want Edwards to do for you? Because if it is and it’s something I can do, I would surely love to assist you with it. So please don’t hesitate to let me know because the rest of slaves all went to the plantation and there is no one out there to help you with anything,” she said, in one breath.

“You can’t be serious Suzanne, you can’t!” Longstands didn’t believe what he’d just heard.

“I said, the slaves all went to do their jobs; that's what they are here for, to work on the plantation not take a vacation. All of them, including the old and the young. My father's plantation needs to be tended and he has you here to see to that, not to run a bloody charity,” she said blatantly.

In another circumstance, on a different day, Suzanne’s latest disrespect and recent attitude would have been enough to push Mr. Longstands over the edge. At times like this, he’d say to hell with everything and everybody and proceed to do what he wanted and what he really wanted at that point, was to send Suzanne into the sea with a single slap from his right palm. He wanted to put her head under the water and count up to one hundred, over and over and over again. His face turned red and his body shivered from anger, but she wouldn’t stop.

“And since you are no longer the man my father knew you to be, I have chosen to help out in this period of your distress,” she added.

“Suzanne!” Longstands cautioned.

“What has come over you Longstands, moaning over the death of a stupid slave, going after a slave girl so your son could marry her. There is no labour union here, this is the West Indies and for the slaves there is only one thing to do—plant sugar canes. The only other job available on this plantation is the one you are supposed to be doing, which is to make sure they do their jobs. Yours is the easy job and you are failing at it and very miserably,” she said, letting out a cloud of smoke from her mouth then walking away, leaving Longstands to marinate in her statements.

“I sent Anthony to do your job, Longstands,” she added casually as she walked past him.

He ignored the voice in his head but it wouldn’t stop urging him—“Do it, do it now, do it now, Longstands–right this moment as she walks past you, grab her in the throat and snuff the life out of her.”

For a moment Longstands toyed with the thought, struggling to conceal his trembling hands. He needed only but a split second to send the elephant on her back gasping for air. One hard chop to her throat would temporarily disrupt the supply of oxygen to her brain and she would crumble to the floor, kicking like one caught in an epileptic tornado. But he was a trained soldier, he knew how to be cool even when the temperature headed north; how to wait for the right moment and he was going to wait.

So Longstands managed to convince his shaky legs to convey him to the same spot where Suzanne had been previously sitting, he felt like he’d been taken hostage in his own house and his property had been trashed to pieces while he watched powerlessly because his hands and legs were securely tied by his son and wife.

As they returned from the spot where he had dropped the cassava tubers to fight off the dog the day before, the same dog trotted behind, sometimes running ahead happily as if it had just received a new lease on life. “What could this mean?” Ashana queried, her voice as heavy with suspicion as the cloud before a heavy downpour.

“I wish I could explain all of this, Ashana but I am just as lost as you are,” he said. It was all too mysterious to him. “The gods are with us Ash, this I am sure about, what else can I say?”

“What if it’s a crazy dog that slips in and out of madness,” she countered, her voice making an uphill climb.

Nathan shook his head to the remote possibility of Ashana’s insinuations. “Ash...” he began but Ashana interrupted.

“And what if the next time it slips back into its madness we are asleep? Have you considered what could happen to us? We would be at her mercy, Jonah; helpless and very vulnerable.”

Jonah simply shook his head again and shrugged his shoulders. He thought about Ashana’s words and came to the conclusion that Ashana could be right, the dog could be slipping in and out of some form of madness and if they happened to be asleep the next time it was in its mad state, they’d surely be at risk.

“Think about it Jonah,” she said imploringly. Not only was the fear and lack of trust in the dog abundantly evident in Ashana's voice but also in the way her eyes followed the dog's every movement.

“She had the chance to harm us last night while we slept but she didn’t. Why would she harm us now if we simply love her and let her know that she is welcome and that we are family,” he added. But Ashana did not reply, she simply gave Jonah a look that indicated that his defence of the dog didn’t carry any weight.

They sat down to fresh cassava tubers for breakfast. He knew that his next challenge would be to find water; they were running the second day without water, and had no hope of finding any soon. Jonah prayed for some form of miracle. “Is it me or do you feel the same way?”

“What way? How do you feel, Jonah?”  Ashana asked.

“I mean, isn’t it strange that there is no sign of us being pursued? It just doesn’t seem right, something is up and I really think we should make haste and get going before it gets dark.”

“You are right,” she said very softly after a moment of hesitation. “I think we should keep moving, we have lost a lot of time but I think we couldn’t have done any better considering the circumstances and obstacles.”