The Last Warner Woman (13 page)

Of all the wards at the Public Hospital, this was the most infamous. To doctors it was known simply as Ward 18 but to everyone else—nurses, patients, the general public—it was also known as Ward “Lord me done!” So certain were Jamaicans of their impending deaths if admitted to this ward that relatives would start the grieving process immediately, calling family members from around the world, telling them to come back home for the funeral. In fact, many a moving Sunday morning testimony began,
Brethren, them did put me on Ward “Lord me done!”
The congregation would gasp.
But the blessed Savior never done with me at all!
To which the congregation would shout
Amen.

The cry of the Warner Woman carries with it a scent, and if you are close by when she prophesies you will smell it too. It is the smell of nutmeg, of earth, of rocks, of rain coming in from a distance, of salt, of ocean, of egrets, of oil, of cream soda, of coconut, of dust.

an installment of a testimony spoken to the wind

Shhhhhhhhh

Just as every fruit don’t name mango, and just as every animal don’t name dog, so too the Warner Woman’s mouth is not only full of thunder and lightning. It is true, many times I did cry Warrant. And Flood. And Earthquake. But sometimes the cry of the Warner Woman is Peace. Peace and love I bring to you, peace and love. One day I may tell you of the storm, but the next day I may tell you to cast your eyes to the east where there riseth a rainbow. And furthermore, sometimes a warning is not a thing to be avoided, nor a thing to fear. Like when I did first join the Band of the Seventh Fire, and the message of the Lord did come unto me saying, Beware, a thief cometh in the night. But lock not your doors, Ada. Close not your windows. For this thief is a man as tall and slender as the palm tree, and he wanteth only your heart and your love.

Shhhhhhhhh

But warning was never easy with me. It was a thing more terrible than woman cramps. It feel like when you eat something bad and a sickness start to grow in your belly, and it grow and it grow until you just need to throw it up. That’s what warning was—something that grow inside you and make you feel miserable till you spit it out. And I tell you what—I never know pain like the day when I decide to give it all up. I never just sick for days; I did sick for years. More years than I can bother to count. I thought I was going to dead. But in this country that name England, things is different. Warning ongly going to get you in trouble here. Warning ongly going to make the nurse strap down your hands. Warning ongly going to get you the electric shock. Warning ongly going to cause you to have to sit before a bald-head doctor you never like from morning and now you have him staring at you for hours. Him is the expert, the know-it-all, but he want
you
to do the talking. When you don’t talk Mr. Doctor say you not cooperating. When you do talk, all you hear from him is
delusions
and
visions of grandeur
and
hallucination.
So this is where I come and find myself, between a rock and a rock. If I don’t warn, I feel sick, but if I warn, I get in even worser trouble. So after a time I just keep silent and bear the pain. If I feel the need to spin, I don’t spin. If I feel the need to shout, I don’t shout. I stop completely. I just wait and wait for the day when the Father’s word would stop rumbling in my belly-bottom and my tummy would finally settle. I cry and cry like spoil pickney who don’t get his porridge. And in the nights when the lights turned out, I bawl like Elijah in his cave. I start to eat aspirin like how people eat food, and when that don’t work, I beg for morphine. I say God, if ever you did love me, make this cup pass from my lips. But still I continue to get warnings. Still I hear voices tormenting me.
Rise up Daughter of Zion. Rise up Daughter of Jonah and Legba.
I tell them
no. I is ongly the daughter of Pearline Portious. I am ongly the girl who did born amongst the lepers. I never make for this.
And if you could do more than hear my voice, if you could also behold me, you would see a dried-up old woman. My only talent was that once upon a time I could warn. I could make people consider the words of their God. But I can’t even do that no more.

T
HE CRIES OF ADAMINE BUSTAMANTE WERE IN FACT SO
terrible and so often true, and the timber of her voice, which she threw into the wind, so powerful, that her cries became famous. In the July 15, 1967, edition of the
Jamaica Star,
from which you have cut a picture of her, there is a also a short article written by one Henry Kirkpatrick. It is quizzically titled, “The Last True Warner Woman?” and reads:

an installment of a testimony spoken to the wind

Shhhhhhhhh

It never need God to make people know that that bus was going to crash. The driver, a man by the name of Sam, did drive reckless from time. But when I see him that morning walking to the bus, I shake my head. His legs was already trembling and couldn’t find a straight line, for him was the kind of man that sayeth unto himself,
what is life for but to drink wine and be drunk.
But the Lord say everything in its season, and Sam was a man who never consider these words. On top of that, the set of pickney who was climbing onto the bus appear me like some demons released straight from hell’s furnace. They was making one heap of noise and talking nasty talk, like they wasn’t nobody’s children. I know something awful was going to happen so I try to stop it. I give them a warning. But may as well I did warn a stone. The bus drive off same way, and half hour didn’t pass before I get to understand it fall into the river. When the newspaper man talk to me and the article come out, it was like my name grow wings. Who never know me before suddenly know me. People was coming up to me and shaking my hand as if to say I was supposed to be proud. As if to say this crash was a thing that me did orchestrate. But who could be so heartless to feel proud that a set of pickney was dead? Them did need talking to, yes, and perhaps a good caning cross their behinds, but them never need to dead, and I take no joy in that. But people was talking talking like it was me who push the bus off the road with my own arms. One morning I even had to keep myself hid, because up and down the lane in St. Jago, the father of one of those dead children was walking. He was waving a gun, and looking for me and shouting,
weh she deh? Which part she deh? Bring out the stink bitch and see if God can save her from bullet!
Part of me did want to go out and stand up cool, cool before him and say,
Son of man, be cursed. Don’t you dare threaten the Lord’s anointed.
And believe you me I was brave enough to do it, for I consider to myself the words that did come to the prophet Jeremiah—for they shall fight against thee, but they shall not prevail. Still, I decide to stay hid, because I know it was just the grief inside that big man, making him carry on with his foolishness, and in truth, part of me was grieving right side with him.

Shhhhhhhhh

Well, who never want to kill me, all on a sudden want to be my friend. Shepherds and Captains of different bands was coming to me in secret, saying why I don’t join their bands. They was promising to make me senior Mother of the church and all these kinds of things. I don’t pay none of them no mind. I wasn’t going to profit from dead pickney. I never pay no mind to the politician-man either. He come knocking on my gate—a stout dark man with silver in his hair– and he ask me to stand with him on the platform whenever him was to give speech. He tell me I don’t have to do nothing more than just stand there, and maybe give a warning to the man from the party him was running gainst. This politician-man look strange in his sharp black suit, standing up in the ghetto of St. Jago, his big black car behind him that could barely squeeze its way through the lane behind him. I consider my childhood dreams, when I used to think that Father Bustamante would have did drive up in a car like that to fetch me. But I just kiss my teeth and shut the gate on the politician. And people tell me I was a fool. They tell me I should not treat an MP like that. But understand this—I answer not to man; I answer only to the Most High. Besides, every season have its beginning and its end, and though my name was large for a time, it wasn’t long before they forget all bout me.

T
HAT SUNDAY HAD TRULY BELONGED TO THE SUN. THE
round yellow beast had beat down so hard and had warmed up the zinc roof so much that underneath it felt like an incinerator. But Captain Lucas did not seem to have taken any notice, or if he had, he had decided to turn the experience into a song. He had asked the band of worshippers to sing it over and over,

I wish somebody soul woulda ketch a fire

Ketch a fire, Ketch a fire

I wish somebody soul woulda ketch a fire

Bun them with the Holy Ghost!

The service went on longer than usual. Three women fainted, and people were kind enough to assume this was because of the Spirit and not the stifling heat. But at last it ended and the skyjuice man who had dozed off just outside the balmyard was now rewarded as a flock of women jostled around his cart wanting to buy his cooling drinks of shaved ice and syrup. Adamine frowned. She listened to the women chattering excitedly, saw the glittering specks of shaved ice alight in the air, saw the exchange of money. Captain didn’t like this sort of thing. He had told his congregation over and over, “Don’t turn the balmyard into a marketplace. People wouldn’t be selling if you wasn’t buying. Buy farther down the road.”

But all of this was forgotten on third Sundays, especially on days like this when the sun had been beating down and the women had shouted and sung so much their mouths had become dry and swollen. On first and second and fourth Sundays the Band of the Seventh Fire met in different places—with other bands, on street corners, sometimes in the forest, or by the river—but third Sundays were special for they met at their own home, the seal ground, the balmyard. This was where Captain Lucas Gilles lived and it was in the middle of a St. Jago slum. There was a trick to finding the balmyard, and people who did not know it could get lost in the maze of zinc and corrugated iron. The trick was simple: one only had to look to the red flag, and not anywhere else. The flag was mounted on a tall bamboo pole in the center of the balmyard and once you entered the St. Jago slum, it could be seen from almost anywhere. So although it would feel like you were walking in circles, if you fixed your eyes on the flag and simply walked, one foot in front of the other, eventually you would be guided safely into the sanctuary. Inside the balmyard there were many altars, simple wooden stands. On top of each stand was a container of water, and at the base was a cardboard sign with writing that appeared to be in Hebrew. There were three buildings, each standing right next to the other, each one dilapidated, a mismatch of scrap board and zinc. The first building was the room in which Lucas slept. The second was the broad shed into which the eighty-five members of the Band of the Seventh Fire would cram themselves. The third building was a fowl coop full of white chickens who squawked all day, but who, despite their racket, could never compete with the Band when they met for service.

Adamine was sitting on a concrete block in the yard and was watching as the women got their skyjuices and marched down the road together. Soon almost everyone was gone. Adamine felt a hand rest on her shoulders. She did not look up but reached up to pat the hand. “I will stay around here for a little while longer, Bishopess,” Adamine said. “You will be alright to get home by yourself?”

“Then I look so old that I wouldn’t be alright?” Bishopess Herbert chuckled, and then added in a lower, more conspiratorial tone, “Well I glad to see you and the Captain getting on so good. You will reach far if you just continue to sit by him feet. Plenty revelation come to Captain. Plenty.”

Adamine had been doing more than just sitting by the Captain’s feet. She squeezed the older woman’s hand. “I will see you later then.”

“Yes, my child. Later. Don’t hurry back.”

Adamine watched as Bishopess Herbert ambled to the gate. She frowned to see the Mother of the church also stop by the skyjuice vendor. Sipping on her drink, she continued up the road and disappeared. At last everyone was gone. Adamine got up from the concrete block and went over to shut the gate. The skyjuice vendor looked up as if expecting to make a final sale. Adamine instead closed the gate with a slam.

“Fuck you too,” she heard him shout.

Briefly she considered opening the gate again, just to glare at him and have the satisfaction of watching him tremble, stealing from him what she knew would be his boast later on that evening to his friends, “Those Revival people don’t scare me none at all. I look at them and tell them fuck off, same so.”