Strange Music (7 page)

Hastily Isaac tramps back across cane stubble. Speeding up me run to fetch coconut water from we noon rest place.

You me Isaac, me thinking, but you've changed. Some days flames blaze in me belly and me fear me want you too much. Fear me love too deeply. Isaac, is you now a stranger? Why? Because you beat we master? It's a trick of strength you win and you know me know Mister Sam will make you pay.

Smiling, buckra hovers, moustache drooping over top lip. Buckra's eye haunts me, making me insides hunch up.

Isaac straightens up, arches him back. He gulps sweet silver stream of coconut water with dull pride. Lord made a judgment letting all we field-hands through heaven's gate – this joy me feel. But coldness sits in me belly sameway as mangrove mud at bottom of blue pool.

Isaac sneers with cold teeth like he swallowed something sour. Huge wind gusts sway canes. Unsteady, Mister Sam leans on buckra's shoulder fe a spell. Turn this day back, me pray, when Mister Sam mounts him nervy horse, and we watch him canter sorely away.

Day feels more weary than night fe we back to we blade slashing cane; tying rows of bundles; loading mule, donkey, we head, old ox wain. Cane quivers like a heart trembling. Smooth as shadows buckra's stare slants between sugar canes, crossing me face, leaving me mind scarred sameway as cart whip lash scars can. Wind hisses overhead bringing shiver nearer. Machetes swing high. Wind comes to a standstill again. Isaac and me're dripping, cyaan hardly hold wood handle. Cyaan pause fe me eye to seek Isaac in next cane tunnel. How me do feel? True as me love's hair's black; true as earth turns deep brown when rains come. Me cling to you love like mango leaf clings to tree, Isaac, but fear fe you coils through me body.

Machete blade winks silver, bites soil. Blackened clouds rumble. Shuddering, clods flake, crumble, beneath bare rough-skinned feet. Shadows slide over we back. Heat sharpens. Canes shiver. Cart whip comes into sight. Hard me struck from behind. Whistles split me head – a head singing loud with pain
Me skull's cracked?
Me skin goes heavy.

Wrapping him arm around me neck overseer locks me to him chest. Isaac plunges through parting cane throwing himself at me. Swimming through swishing sugar, grabbing me hand Isaac trips and falls blindly, bringing we all three down. Inside me roar. Buckra dives on me again. Sinking, me stretch skywards fe air to see another buckra leap on Isaac. Buckra's hands, elbows, slide between Isaac and me, prising we bodies apart. Like slippery fish Isaac's hand slides from me grasp.

Whip tears Isaac's back, him flesh bursts open. Struggling free fe hiding me glimpse him head top. Then Isaac's swallowed by sugar cane.

Isaac's fighting spirit's all me sense when buckra round him up and me watch them push him back across cane piece.

Eleanor stares like she don't recognize she boy. Bloody shoulders lined with gashes, me cyaan recognize you either. You a sack on bendy legs. Me stare. Me stare again. You stumble-step. Eleanor approaches she son, horror in she eye.

Bashing canes aside to reach you, me caught by buckra hands again, struggle-fighting, boxing hard, head spinning, me scream, ‘Isaac! Isaac! Isaac!' Across you face green canes close as buckra tears you from me.

Buckra men haul Isaac up by bloody dust-caked hands, dragging him far. Buckra's swaggering footsteps swallowed by rustling cane. Cautiously now me rise, and slowly. Buried in darkness me stand. Me want to melt into earth, be part of it like blood marks, blotted by sand. Loud as devil Isaac shrieks, ribs standing out like washboard ridges. Begging buckra men to bring him back me chase a little way, but me also want Isaac to go and never return to this place of pain.

Eleanor, Sylvia, Trouble-Too-Much have on their faces a kind of dread me seen before. Gulping sorrow lumps down she throat, shaking, Eleanor comes towards me.

Starving fe you, Isaac, me fingertips seek to feel you sticky, thinly sugar-coated skin, but only Eleanor me have to touch. Sun's rage already dried blood-soaked sand.

Buckra drags Isaac away until him shrieks sound like demon laughter and then are drowned by motionless greens, blue blue hills beyond.

Canes thrash me face. Lickle Phoebe's small hand locks, stiff, on mine. Without you, Isaac, me cyaan be meself. Me see you face, and me see you face in Lickle Phoebe's – jagged, dark brown. She face becomes a scavenger's: matted hair; starved cheekbones poking loudly from skin.

‘We must tek revenge,' Eleanor say.

‘Burn de trash-house!' Trouble-Too-Much's yelling. ‘Fetch torch fram boiler-house!'

Isaac's gone forever. We take revenge all de more we suffer, me eye say to Eleanor. Isaac's cries, him deathly moans, don't spool away but hang in torrid air like threats, hover with scraps of dreams, of memories, too beautiful to forget. Me heart howls,
What's left of yu, Isaac? Sad pain?

Blindly me mount hilltop where thinly grasses grow, pink sky splinters gold through tears flying from me eye, valley spreading before me's moulded into me mind: we battered shacks sitting side by side on wasted ground between parched vegetable plots lying above, and sugar mill – a monster moving noisily – below. Me know each broken plank of Isaac's verandah and wattle walls of him shack that flap on windy nights and blow away feather-light on wind puffs whenever hurricanes come or a great storm raging, stripping we of everything. Me know odd mix of pens fe chickens, pigs, tethered brindled goats, and dirty yards where pickney stay every day when too weak to work. Me know sun slides quietly red behind pointed shingle roof belonging to Cinnamon Hill great house. Me know what little we have fe it goes to make drab place we call home. All we field-hands coming over hillside feel bitter hatred fe foulness of we world. Splashes of brightly coloured flowers beside track taunt me with their beauty. Sandy paths wind down towards gold sand bay, warm blue star-sparkling sea. This a part of you, Isaac? Part of me? Soon me learned me cyaan belong in Jamaica. This island cyaan ever be a home. Although buckra say we belong, although me blend in, fit with other field-hands, although me live here since a pickney, part of me don't fit anywhere. This island don't belong to we.

Sundown's nearly done with making wattle-shack village red. Me heart searches fe you, Isaac. How close, when me don't know where you gone, you death seems.

Whispers drift into me shack on a gentle honey smell and sink deep into me belly. But no one can reach lone place life's become so sudden. Me see you try taking a step, see you falling down, Isaac. Lickle Phoebe holding me cyaan save me from falling too. Even Phoebe's still and pained face's a tormenting reminder of you.

Softly she voice drops into me ear, ‘Wot's fiah made fram?'
Answer
, me heart say,
is love
, but me mind say,
No. De idea of fiah sparks fram angry hunger
. ‘Me stay wid yu, fiah-maker,' Lickle Phoebe say. She sweet pickney kiss cyaan give me even small hope grain. Inside a scream slices me guts. Love's fire burns only fe me lover. Me fear me love too much.

Tools rest against wattle wall. Axe, hoe, billhook, machete. Buckra passes on him plodding horse, a glance meets me from him eye. Anger presses in on me. A knot ties tight in me belly, me saddled with memory. That thickly rolled collar of skin under back of buckra's head glows red in late-evening sun.

Chapter Three

Shuffling along main drive now Old Simeon leads a loping horse. Slack reins trail from one hand; a lantern swings from him other hand heading for stable block. Old Simeon's rank leg smells strong even from here, way back.

‘Where yu bin?' he shouts. ‘Bin waitin on yu. Gotta let de dogs out.'

‘Me jus ax Pa fe fetch Doctor Demar,' I say.

Old Simeon wasn't born, he always lived here. Old milky blue-brown eyes slide towards me. Greenish-white lantern glow slips across Simeon's wrinkled face as he turns, looking to great house, turns back, looks for stable block. ‘Demar's in de house. Passed by on im way. Junius in dere wid 'em. Mister Sam won't be needin yu.' Snorting violently Demar's mare nods like she agrees with him.

‘Me musta missed im wen me went fe Pa,' I say. I hear Old Simeon turn Demar's mare into a stable. Old Simeon stinks ugly as burnt hair, rotten bones. Simeon's lamp's dying. Bolting bottom door behind him he grunts, slings tack on saddle-room rack. Steered by great-house hall candles he trudges behind me across main lawn.

Doctor Demar's oily black hair's plastered to him head. Rolling shirt sleeves to elbows, Doctor Demar's all voice. ‘Get the stable boy to saddle the mare. Call the guard dogs too.'

Old Simeon hobbles into Cinnamon Hill hall, hitches up brown overalls. Looking like Old Simeon's in charge.

‘On second thoughts there's no need.' Doctor Demar staggers towards hall table candelabra. ‘I'm not feeling too good. I'll stay here until dawn.' He flops into dark wood chair, him head moving into my shadow – a darkness lurching across walls. Doctor Demar's arm sticks out at Old Simeon like a branch stripped white of bark, ‘You, feed and water the mare. You,' branch swings to me, ‘watch over Sam. He says he told you to nurse him. Give him water, keep him cool.'

‘Mister Sam miss me?' I ask. ‘E did notice me gawn?'

Sternly Doctor Demar says, ‘Sam's very, very sick.'

‘Ganja mek Mister Sam betta,' Old Simeon mumbles, putting lantern on table-top with a weighty thud. ‘E have no need fe white buckra doctor, e need Myal man, not obeah. Trouble is yu cyaan tell difference tween Myal an obeah. Yu know wot difference dere is? Yu no good like dat Ope spirit minister man.'

Doctor Demar's whole body shivers like air's cold, or he scared of a high wind passing through tree branches.

Old Simeon's hand's a crinkled paw screwing lantern wick up until orange-white flame leaps yellow then mellows to pale jade-orchid green. ‘No need fe work now,' he says. ‘No need fe Mister Sam.' Lantern spits, light floods gritty maps, curling parchment, quill pens, plantation stock books loosely stacked on hall table.

Choking, Doctor Demar mops him balding head with a clean white handkerchief so skin's not so shiny-red. ‘I'll take my rum neat.' He smiles a shabby smile.

Mister Sam's door's half open. Cockroaches slip behind skirting boards. Little blinkies flash emerald on wallpaper. For a moment I am still, him eye go into mine.
Even sea's lost she magic, only after rain clouds clear does salt water ripple like sunlight in attic
. My shadow drifts on chamber floor, surprised at sudden urge me feel to hold him again that close. It passed between we then – a shock – he did feel it? No other light comes, but for moon shafts spilling dull silver onto black sea, dappled, glimmering hauntingly.

Mister Sam wails, ‘Oh God, I'm dying,' high-pitched and hoarse. Threatening to leave life too soon he stares at me. I look on slippery shaky hands dangling from nightshirt sleeves, frail face yellowish, hot, and fold back top sheet with gathering storms in my belly.

All Mister Sam's badness started years back from now. Reaching out fingertips him hand shakes horribly. Worry sharpens my thoughts but worry don't wash fear from my mind – I'm thinking of my daughter, Mary Ann. Up rise rank memories.

Dragging my old faded brown dress de shade of a rat-bat drawn to a flickering candle, hop-skipping, Mary Ann followed Mister Sam up Cinnamon Hill staircase. Though it was Mary Ann who danced, she was naked like a flame.

Charles I knew before that time always he was joking, always he was good to Mary Ann and me. All three together we'd sleep in attic room, until that dawn when conch-blow's uproar woke we to find Mary Ann no longer lay at we side. She said mattress was too hard and monsters walked in she head. Feet stealing down steep narrow attic ladder took she to sleeping below hall stairs. From then on Mary Ann had monsters in she head. Some days she skin went hot and strange smells lived in she hair. Charles said he'd flog Mary Ann if she didn't tell where she been almost all of every night. She took to hiding in daytime too. Mary Ann was like a snake, I never heard she coming; she'd slide around each room, sneaking up behind me. Then darting off. Hours later I'd find she – straw tangled into matted hair; dress skew-whiff; small body balled-up tight like she was cornered by life.

‘Where yu bin?' I'd ask.

‘Aint bin nowhere,' she'd answer. Pretending it was a game. Pretending she wasn't sure what I meant. Always she was pretending.

Charles' anger grew worse and worse. ‘Sumting wrong,' he'd say, ‘an if yu cyaan git she straight all we go fram ere.'

‘No need to be rank, Charles,' I'd said. ‘Yu dawta's only lazy, bin sleeping in stable, lying in hay.'

‘No, Mary Ann's crazy,' he said.

Charles went to talk to church minister saying he worried something wicked going on. But Lord God couldn't lift big worryload about Mary Ann from we heads. And Charles' talk turned queer. All that church sermon stuff Charles began to believe. ‘Let Satan have im way wid she,' he'd say.

‘Is me fault she won't go to church? Me fault she's like she be?' I asked.

‘God hurts dem dat hurt demself,' Charles said. So I started going to Sunday church and encouraged Mary Ann to come, and Pa felled trees by Barrett Hall lake, and he and others built church school by church hothouse. Pa carved with Charles benches, altar, and one table for minister's wife. But minister's wife got sick. She never liked Mister Sam any more than anyone did. She wouldn't set foot on Cinnamon Hill plantation land, though she got so sick even Mister Sam offered to lend she a hothouse nurse. I started working at night for minister in church school, sharing out corn biscuits, teaching to pickney whatever I learned to read. Mister Sam grew angry when he knew. He set me heavy daytime chores, evening chores too, and I didn't mind much for church sermons get so boring and minister always shouts, him face have hard woodgrain marks like white planks Pa planes. Minister's eyes look cold and blue as deep freshwater pools. I know how England brings all its coldness here, brings it with bleached white sheets or stony faces; brings it as white stone ballast in ships English build great houses with; brings it into cold air of each great chamber, savagely cold at dawn; brings it with too much agony at de heart of each slave's soul.