Red Jacket (17 page)

First and Last

Last year's letter from Phyllis Patterson is the first one Grace reads. She doesn't really read it, just skims, but she's a good skimmer.

25 March 1978

My dearest daughter,

Today you are eighteen years old. That means you are grown up, an adult under the law. You can vote, and you can take your place in society. I am so proud of you. I don't know what you look like, or whether you are still at home in St. Chris or out in the world making your own way. But it doesn't matter, because there are some things I do know, for I have prayed for them all my life. I know you are a good person. That means you care about other people, starting at home and then going out into the community where you give service. No matter how you contribute, I am certain you do. I also know you have worked and studied hard, and so you have had good success in all your efforts. I know that whatever path in life you choose, you will achieve your goals and be a shining example to others of your race. I know you love God, whether or not you are a churchgoer, for not all those who go to church love Him and many serve Him who never darken a church door. I smile at the word
darken
, as if all the faithful have coloured skins.

And I know that because of all these things, you are happy with the face you see in the mirror each morning.

There is a last thing that I have asked God for all through these years. When they took you away from me and refused to even let me give you a name, I know your Grandma Evadne and Mr. Carpenter thought they were acting for the best. Their concession was that I could write these letters, and even then there were stipulations: write on your birthday (which I haven't always done, but how were they to know?), and post by month's end. I think they were convinced that I would stop, once I forgot you. But Mr. Carpenter said he would give you my letters. I am holding him to his promise. You have been a part of my life all these years and kept me going through many difficult days. I'm sure your adopted parents love you, but I want you to know that I have loved you too.

I pray for you with all my heart today. I pray that you continue in good health, loving God, and being a credit to your family and community. My heart is full, so I will end now just as I began. Have a happy birthday, my grown-up daughter. God bless you today and all your life long.

Your mother,

Phyllis

The next letter, from the same address, is dated 26 March 1977. She doesn't think she can read through the whole bundle. It occurs to her that it's near the end of March. Her birth mother must be about to write this year's letter. She doesn't want another letter. Maybe there is a way for Gramps to tell this person she needn't write anymore.

It's cool still, though the sun is gaining on mist and cloud. Next door she hears the squeak of the Williams gate, opening and closing to let Miss Constance in. Miss Constance goes to Mass every morning, and she just has time to go and come back before her invalid parents wake.

Grace is not sure she likes how this new mother sounds: she's too full of praying and God, especially for somebody that grew up in a big, foreign city like New York. Then she recognizes the silliness of that. Caribbean people go all over the globe and carry their God, whether Jesus, Jah, Allah, Krishna, or whoever, with them. But it's hard enough to find out that you have a mother you never knew about: she is not able to cope with any saint. She'd rather a mother who, like Gramps, is a rogue who knows God is one too.

All this trouble sake of one little hole in a woman's body! “Woman Hole.” She had forgotten Woman Hole, a place near Tavern Town where, never mind the dangerous curve, people stop on the road to pitch their garbage down the hillside. There's no actual hole, and nobody can see where the filth lands up. Which tells her how people conceive of a woman's vagina: a hidden-away place where you off-load stinking, rotten things. It's good agricultural soil all the same, for plants are forever rooting there. Weeds take root in the refuse heap; dump pikni catch in vagina dungle.

That decides her on what to tell Maisie. There's no reason why Sylvia can't have the baby. She seems to want it, and it has grandparents who will love it, no matter what. Sylvia is lucky. The baby will give her something to care about, her parents aren't poor, and at fifteen she is over the age of consent. It's a horse of a very different colour from the one Phyllis had been obliged to ride. Maybe that explains her pious-sounding birth mother. Maybe religion is like Tiger Balm, and when you have pain and trouble, you just rub it all over your aching self to get relief.

27 March 1979

Dear Maisie,

First, I have to say a Big Sorry. I know you said I was to call, and I had every intention of calling, but every day turns into the next without my going with Pa to Wentley Park, or with Ma to Mrs. Sampson. I think I am reluctant to leave Gramps for however short a period. I may well be back in Toronto before you get this, but I'm writing anyhow.

The good news is that Gramps is better than I expected, for when they brought me home I thought he would be on dying, which he is not. It's only two and a half years since I left but those years have made a big difference. He looks tired and a lot older. It seems to be his heart, the organ itself or the blood vessels, for I don't think it is yet sorted out. My problem is that I have never thought of Gramps as old — after all, he's only seventy-seven and plenty people here live until they are eighty and ninety, and some even make it to a hundred.

A lot else has happened and even if I wanted to tell you about it, I wouldn't know where to start for I am still trying to put it into some kind of order in my own head.

Anyway, this was to be about your problems, not mine.

Don't pressure Sylvia. She's pregnant, the baby-father is not around, and she's probably depressed as well as overwhelmed. Just go-long with her, and try to get her to cheer up and take an interest — doesn't matter in what. The baby could be a very good thing for her. That is how you have to look at it and get her to think about it. If the two of you are on the same side when her father gets back, things are bound to go better.

No abortion though. Plenty things are going through my head now that lead me to give you that advice. We will talk more. Meantime, just put on the best face you can manage for Sylvia's sake, and the baby's, for you don't want to mark it with a sad spirit!

I will call when I come. Take good care of yourself, and Sylvia and the baby.

Grace

No Rest for the Wicked

The chancellor's suite in the administrative building is named Garvey, after the Jamaican national hero who spent two months in St. Chris before going to Panama to commence his American adventures. A painting of the great man hangs in the vestibule along with portraits of UA's first two chancellors.

It's early Thursday afternoon, and Mark is lying in his recliner, awake. Foiling his efforts at an afternoon nap before council starts are memories of his first and last conversations with Grace at UA. At the time he had been both Head of Department and Dean. Though she was only a part-time member of the faculty, come to do research for her doctoral thesis, she'd made a splash by publishing a paper entitled “A Model for Real Time (RT), Real Circumstance (RC), Tailor-Made Interventions (TMI) in Communities Affected by Vector-Transmitted Diseases.” It had got attention as far afield as the World Bank. Because she'd arrived with funding and wasn't just any old grad student, he'd duly stopped by to check on how she'd settled in.

“Hi, Miss Carpenter. Are you very busy?”

“Always busy, Dr. Blackman, but do come in and have a seat.”

“Mark, please. We're informal here. I won't stay long, as I know you must be busy.” Idiot. She'd just said that!

“I could do with a break. And you may as well be comfortable, even if it's only for a minute.”

“Thanks,” he said, sitting. “I thought I'd see how you were doing, check if there's anything I can help with. You know, stubborn issues, intractable people. We've been known to have those.”

She smiled, but didn't say anything, so he rambled on about workload, office hours, and library access. He was running out of topics when she spoke.

“Mark, you really want to know what I find hard to deal with?”

“Absolutely.”

“Everybody here is forever talking about plantation: plantation economy, plantation society, plantation attitudes, plantation this, plantation that. I tired to hear it and I just come. And this place is the biggest plantation!”

He was surprised at the plantation label. That was an old quarrel made by rabble-rousing students. She had a reputation as a fine scholar, with the objectivity that implied, and she hadn't struck him as the activist type.

“You see me?” she went on. “I grow on a plantation, and I find it hard to see people who're supposedly educated, intelligent, travelled, behaving like gorillas, jealous about territory, real backra massa style.”

Aha! All politics is local! She'd clashed with some departmental high-up!

“Would it help,” he spoke in a way meant to convince her, “if we talked about what's bothering you? We won't be able to fix it entirely, or right away, but it might be useful to have a chat?”

She seemed to consider it and then said, “I'm sorry. I'm new here, Mark. I shouldn't have spoken so quickly. I should give UA a chance.”

After that she'd seemed happy, productive in her work, liked by the students, respected by her colleagues. Then one day she'd resigned; not had an altercation with anyone; not been found wanting in any way. Just upped and gave notice.

He'd been off on sabbatical for the year, and her letter had arrived during his leave period, effective at the end of the Michaelmas Term, so pretty much the calendar year's end. The acting dean mentioned it while bringing him up to speed on their way from the airport. He went to see her the next day.

“Hi, Mark. Welcome back. Did your sabbatical go well?”

“Very well, thanks. Better than things seem to have gone for you here.”

She shrugged, said nothing.

“I understand you've resigned. Is there no persuading you to stay?”

“You know why I'm leaving, don't you, Mark?”

Through the window he saw rain, drops plump as ripe St. Chris cherries. September was a rainy month. A lake covered the quadrangle, which was enclosed by cement buildings housing the Social Sciences Faculty. Someone had convinced officialdom to leave them unpainted.

“Suppose you tell me again.”

“You remember that incident just after I came? A charge of sexual harassment that a post-grad student brought against Dr. Hazelton?”

“Very clearly. The student's name was Vie MacMillan.”

“Right. You wouldn't forget her. She was very bright.”

Hazelton was memorable too: a fine teacher and remarkable scholar.

“When they set up her committee, I was asked, not to be on it, but to hold a watching brief, because she was working on a model similar in some respects to the one I propose in my paper. I said yes, and I've taken an interest and offered her any help I could.”

The rain increased. It sounded like they were talking inside a waterfall.

“Please go on.” He had to raise his voice.

“She told me he showed her his — glowing, by the way — report on her dissertation. However, he threatened to tear it up unless she withdrew the sexual harassment charge retroactively.”

“But why is he one of her examiners? It's
ultra vires
. And he can't have threatened her. That's unimaginable.”

“She says he did, and why would she make it up?”

“I agree. I don't see her doing that. So has she lodged a complaint about this latest incident?”

“No, she hasn't.”

“Well, what has she done? Nothing?”

“Withdrawn the harassment charge. She said she had it sufficiently tough the first time around, and if she tried to make another accusation, it would be her word against his, and who would believe her. Last time she at least had some proof. Besides, she said, his report is enthusiastic.”

“Did you do anything?”

“I went to her supervisor, Colin Hall, who happens to have been a friend of Hazelton's — still is, I think. Dr. Hall dismissed it as outrageous and accused me of having a personal grudge against Dr. Hazelton. Said he was very pleased Vie had eventually come to her senses and set the record straight.”

“So you went to the Chair of the Committee for Postgraduate Affairs?”

“I did. He said Vie would have to lodge a formal complaint.”

“And what did Miss MacMillan say?”

“She says she's ‘going along with the fiction.' She's hoping they will set a date for her defence early in the New Year. Two reports are already in, including the external's. Hazelton's is the third. She has an attachment at UCLA starting in the fall that turns on her completing the degree, and that's what's important. If UA is happy with sexual predators on the faculty, so be it.”

“And that's why you decided to resign?”

“It was the straw that broke the camel's back. Made me think of all the many things that oughtn't to go on that we allow to go on anyhow.”

“And you won't change your mind?”

“Remember? I grew up on a plantation and that experience was enough.”

“Bad as that?”

“Plenty worse. I'm getting out of this place before I turn into a house nigger, especially like how I'm red already.”

“I'm very sorry that's what you've decided.”

“White backra massa, brown backra massa, black backra massa! Same breed of dog.”

He checks his watch. God Almighty! He best get at least twenty of the bespoke forty winks. The damn meeting is in a half hour.