Small Island (48 page)

But Gilbert was still sucking on his teeth. Every two bells the man said ‘cha’ and could not, no matter how I tried, stop himself exclaiming, ‘Nah, man,’ with every utterance. I worried that the refined and educated people at the education authority might look aghast at me if Gilbert Joseph were anywhere near. But I have to confess: ‘Hortense, “bus” is not enough instruction to see you delivered safely.’ So I agreed. ‘Okay,’ I told him. ‘You may accompany me.’

It was a fine establishment. Brick-brown and ageing with all the dignity of learning. The building stately imposed itself on the rundown street with as imperial a demeanour as Miss Morgan in front of we girls. With trepidation my heart beat like fluttering wings. Gilbert walking in front of me placed his hand on the shining brass of the door.

‘You can leave me now,’ I told him.

‘What, you no wan’ me come in?’The man look on me in that same pained manner.

‘No, thank you, I will be fine.’

‘I wait here for you, then.’

‘There is no need for you to darken up the place. I can find my way now.’

‘What is there to find? I get you here.’ He was trying my patience. So I told him politely that perchance the education authority would want to show me the school at which I would be working. It might take some time and I did not want to disrupt his day further. The man look on me for a long while. Then, quietly, he said, ‘Hortense, this is not the way England work.’ I then informed him that a teacher such as I was not someone to be treated in the same way as a person in a low-class job. He just shake his head on me and say, ‘You won’t listen to me, will you? I wait for you.’ There was no persuasion could dislodge this man from the step. I could see his shape sucking on a cigarette through the glass of the door as I approached a gentleman at a desk. He made no attempt to keep himself hidden. Catching my eye while I waited for the gentleman to finish what he was reading, Gilbert raised his thumb to me grinning like a buffoon. This wretched man was lowering my tone.

I was heartened when the gentleman at the desk understood my request with only one asking. Straight away he answered me. Unfortunately he began his directions to the correct office in the same manner as Gilbert. Left-right-left-right-up-down-and-around. Not one pause for consideration. When he had finished he returned to perusing his newspaper. I was left with little choice but to ask, ‘Excuse me, could you perchance repeat the instruction?’

The gentleman tutted then rolled his eye before yelling loud as a street caller, ‘Seymour.’ One gangly boy appeared. I had to avert my eye from him, for this young man’s face was so angry with raw pimples and pustules he looked to have been wrestling a cat.

‘Take her up to Inquiries,’ the gentleman at the desk commanded.

‘Thank you for your help,’ I said, but he had already returned to his reading and I had to run to keep up with this red meat-face boy.

Three women sitting neatly at desks perused me as I came through the door. In a puppet dance all three quickly glanced to each other then returned to staring on me.

‘Good day,’ I said.

Two dropped their heads returning to their business as if I had not spoken, leaving just an older woman to ask, ‘Yes, do you want something?’ This woman smiled on me – her countenance gleaming with so much joy that I could do nothing but return the welcome. Her beaming smile was so wide I had trouble stretching my own lips to match the delight. She bathed me in this greeting for several moments before breath sufficient enough for a reply returned to me.

‘I am a teacher,’ I said, intending to carry on with some further explanation. But I was startled to find myself timorous in this woman’s friendly presence. My voice faltered into a tiny squeak. I took a moment to cough into my hand. Having composed myself I began again. ‘I am a teacher and I understand this is the place at which I should present myself for a position in that particular profession.’ Through this woman’s warm smile I detected a little confusion. Too well bred to say ‘What?’ she looked a quizzical eye on me, which shouted the word just as audibly. I repeated myself clearly but before I had completed the statement the woman asked of me sweetly, ‘Did you say you are a teacher?’

‘I am,’ I said. My own smile was causing me some pain behind my ears but still I endeavoured to respond correctly to her generosity. I handed her the two letters of recommendation which I had taken from my bag in anticipation of their requirement. She politely held out her slim hand, took them, then indicated for me to sit. However, instead of studying the letters she merely held them in her hand without even glancing at their contents.

‘What are these?’ she asked with a little laugh ruffling up the words.

‘These are my letters of recommendation. One you will see is from the headmaster at—’

Interrupting me, her lips relaxed for just a moment before taking up a smile once more, ‘Where are you from?’ she asked. The letters were still held in mid-air where I had placed them.

‘I am from Jamaica,’ I told her.

She was silent, we both grinning on each other in a genteel way. I thought to bring her attention back to the letters. ‘One of the letters I have given you is from my last post. Written by the headmaster himself. You will see that—’

But once more she interrupted me: ‘Where?’

I wondered if it would be impolite to tell this beguiling woman to read the letter in her hand so all her questions might be answered. I concluded it would. ‘At Half Way Tree Parish School,’ I told her.

‘Where’s that?’

‘In Kingston, Jamaica.’

She leaned back on her chair and instead of opening the letters she began playing with them – flicking the paper against her fingers. ‘And where did you train to be a teacher?’ she asked me.

Her comely smile belied the rudeness of her tone. And I could not help but note that all gladness had left her eye and remained only at her mouth. ‘I trained at the teacher-training college in Constant Spring, under the tutelage of Miss Morgan.’

‘Is that in Jamaica?’

‘Yes.’

It was relief that tipped her head to one side while she let out a long breath. I eased myself believing everything was now cleared between us. Until, leaning all her ample charm forward, she told me, ‘Well, I’m afraid you can’t teach here,’ and passed the unopened letters back to me.

I was sure there had been some misunderstanding, although I was not clear as to where it had occurred. Perhaps I had not made myself as understood as I could. ‘If you would read the letters,’ I said, ‘one will tell you about the three years of training as a teacher I received in Jamaica while the other letter is concerned with the position I held as a teacher at—’

She did not let me finish. ‘The letters don’t matter,’ she told me. ‘You can’t teach in this country. You’re not qualified to teach here in England.’

‘But . . .’ was the only sound that came from me.

‘It doesn’t matter that you were a teacher in Jamaica,’ she went on, ‘you will not be allowed to teach here.’ She shook the letters at me. ‘Take these back. They’re of no use.’ When I did not take them from her hand she rattled them harder at me. ‘Take them,’ she said, so loud she almost shouted. Her smile was stale as a gargoyle. My hand shook as it reached out for the letters.

And all I could utter was ‘But—’

‘Miss, I’m afraid there really is no point your sitting there arguing with me.’ And she giggled. The untimely chortle made my mouth gape. ‘It’s not up to me. It’s the decision of the education authority. I can do nothing to change that. And, I’m afraid, neither can you. Now, I don’t mean to hurry you but I have an awful lot to do. So thank you for coming.’

Every organ I possessed was screaming on this woman, ‘What are you saying to me?’

She went back about her business. Her face now in its normal repose looked as severe as that of the principal at my college. She picked up a piece of paper, wrote something at the top. She looked to another piece of paper then stopped, aware that I was still there.

‘How long is the training in England?’ I asked her.

‘Goodbye,’ she said, pointing a finger at the door.

‘Must I go back to a college?’

‘Really, miss, I have just explained everything to you. You do speak English? Have you not understood me? It’s quite simple. There is no point you asking me anything else. Now, please, I have a lot to do. Thank you.’

And she smiled on me – again! What fancy feigning. I could not stand up. My legs were too weak under me. I sat for a little to redeem my composure. At last finding strength to pull myself up, I told this woman, ‘I will come back again when I am qualified to teach in this country.’

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘you do that. Goodbye.’

As I stood she rolled her eyes with the other women in the room. But I paid them no mind. I fixed my hat straight on my head and adjusted my gloves. ‘Thank you and good day,’ I called to them all, as I opened the door to leave. Each woman returned that pantomime greeting as if I had meant it. I opened the door and walked through. Suddenly everything was dark. I was staring on a ladder, a mop and a broom. I put out my hand and touched shelves stacked with bundles of paper. For one moment I wondered how I would find my way out through this confusion. Only when my foot kicked against a bucket did I realise I had walked into a cupboard. I had stepped in with all the confidence I could grasp, while the women watched me.

All three were giggling when I emerged from the dark of the closet. One behind a hand, another with a sheet of paper lifted up so I might not see. The older woman was, of course, smiling but pity encircled the look. ‘It’s that door,’ she said, pointing her spiky finger at the other wooden opening. I thanked her, bade them all good day once more and passed through the correct exit, untroubled by the sound of their rising laughter.

Fifty-one

Gilbert

It was in bewilderment that Hortense walked from the place. Clutching her bag, her head held high. Four strident steps she took before she stop to look about her. Dismayed, she stand, fingers trembling at her mouth. She change direction for two steps. Then stop once more. She look up the street one way, then down the street the other. A paper drop from her hand on to the ground. She stoop to pick it up. Then bump against a big man who call at her, ‘Oi, watch where you’re going.’ And the paper slip from her again. She chase it. Struggling with the clasp from her handbag she stuff the paper in before she start anew. Four paces this way then two paces the other.

I call out to her, she see me. All at once this woman finally know which way she is going. Anywhere that is away from me. Tripping along the road I try to keep a steady course beside her.

‘How you get on?’ I asked. She dodged round me to walk on. ‘They tell you you have a job?’ She feigned a deaf ear. And, man, she is walking faster than any Jamaican ever walk except when they run. I have to call after her, ‘Hortense,’ for I was out of puff. ‘What they say to you?’ Still this woman has no word for me. Cha. I am following on behind her like a lame dog. ‘Wait, nah,’ I called. She quicken her pace. So, as Auntie Corinne taught me when chasing a chicken round the yard, I make a jump to grab this woman. Two hands I use to seize her then swing her round to face me. ‘Wait,’ I said. Stiff as a rod of iron, her neck twisted misshapen to turn her eye from me. ‘So what they say?’ I asked. Suddenly she look on me, her nose go up in the air and, man, I am ready to duck. Aah, I knew that look.

‘Why you ask me all these question? What business is it of yours?’

What little wind was left in me she cause to expel. Come, this was a good question. Why was I asking anything of this wretched shrew? I was ready to walk away. Plenty boys would by now be chasing the next pair of pretty legs that passed their eye, not wasting their time listening on a lashing tongue. So why I bother to say, ‘You are my wife,’ only for her to look on me like this was one pained regret?

‘Leave me alone. I can look after myself. I was doing it for many years before you came along . . .’

So what was it? A quickening breath? A too-defiant shrugging shoulder? The gentle pout of her lip? Who can say? But something beg me stay. ‘Hortense, no more cuss me. Tell me what ’appen.’

She purse her lip tight. Cha, I could do nothing but shake her. Not hard, for I am not a brute. But I rattle on her bone. It was the teardrop that splash on my lip, warm with salt, that cause me stop. She was crying. Steady as a rainpipe, the crystal water ran from her eye. She start contorting again to hide her face from me. A woman passing by begin staring on us. But it was not concern for Hortense’s welfare, she was just ready to walk a wide circle around we two.

‘What happen?’ I asked her.

‘Nothing,’ she said.

So I tell her, ‘Nothing is a smile, Hortense. You no cry over nothing.’

And the woman scream, ‘Nothing,’ at me again.

Man, let her burn. Come, this was probably the first time the woman’s cheek ever felt a tear. She was insufferable! I walked away. Two paces. Then a hesitant third before I turned to look back on her. She was snivelling and trying with all her will not to wipe her nose on her good white glove.

I thought to smile when I hear it: Hortense reeling wounded after a sharp slap from the Mother Country’s hand. Man, I was ready to tell her, ‘Pride comes before a fall.’ To leap around her rubbing me hands while singing, ‘Now you see . . . I tell you so . . . you listening now.’

But her breath rose in desperate gasps as she mumbling repeated over, ‘They say I can’t teach.’

Come, no pitiful cry from a child awoken rude from a dream could have melted a hard heart any surer.

I guided her to a seat in a little square, she followed me obedient. So did a little scruffy boy whose wide eye perused us all the way. Softly delivered in my ear, Hortense informed me that she was required to train all over again to teach English children. And I remembered the last time I saw Charlie Denton. My old RAF chum grinning on me because he was happy he said, oh, he was tickled pink that he had become a teacher of history. Now, let me tell you, this man once argue silly with me that Wellington had won the battle of Trafalgar Square. And yet there was he, one year’s training, and they say he can stand before a classroom of wriggling boys to teach them his nonsense. Hortense should have yelled in righteous pain not whimper in my ear. And still the goofy boy was staring on us. ‘Shoo,’ I told him. He poked out his tongue and wiggled his big ear at me, then ran away. But other eyes soon took his place. An old man was so beguiled by Hortense that, gaping on us, he leaned his stick into a drain and nearly trip over. A curly-haired woman crossed her eyes giddy with the effort of gawping. A fat man pointed, while another with a dog tutted and shook his head. Come, let me tell you, I wanted to tempt these busybodies closer. Beckon them to step forward and take a better look. For then I might catch my hand around one of their scrawny white necks and squeeze. No one will watch us weep in this country.