The Ten Incarnations of Adam Avatar (54 page)

But the dream that disturbed me most was the one where I was black man fucking a red woman, while my mother watched. I always woke up feeling shame, but for what I didn know.

Christmas pass and Carnival season come. Marriott said he had trained me all he could. I was ready to fight. The time come. Drums beating, flambeaux throwing dark smoke into the dark night. Everybody drinking rum and eating souse. The cuatros play melodies too sweet for busshead, but the shak-shak sounding in mi blood. Two people step in the gayelle and the drums beat more, echoing back from the sky so you almost think is a black goatskin stretch above you head. Lesser stickfighters just in roll-up pants and loose shirt. Them fights either end with a quick busshead or bruise knuckle or they only gallery till the crowd start to hiss and cuss and the fighters either get to it or get out before somebody pelt bottle. The better stickfighters decorate like parrot. Everybody wearing rope sandal,
alpargatos
, to make sure they doh slip on the dirt.

I come out to win. I wear a cotton shirt trim with metal bells at breast and shoulders. Mammy sew it for me. I have on velvet breeches and every man
soot
when they see me and I feeling real conscious of mi arse. Mi
fol
have swansdown but I ent wear no hat or crown. I doh fraid busshead, and I ent no queen. Yet.

Pappy give me a hug before I go in the gayelle to challenge Bowfoot Jean. I see Marriott up on the bleachers with some other white people. The drums beat faster and we dance, bois high above we head, and I feel like a spirit take me. Bowfoot dancing she
wajank
dance, shaking she body like if a bull fucking she in she arse. But when I wasn training, I was dancing. I move graceful but rude, like a slow standing fuck. I say, ‘Mi bois long and stiff. This dance is for he. This is mi
lover
dance.' And everybody laugh, because ‘lover' in French mean to coil up, and mi body was winding like a snake in truth. I hear the men clapping for me. Jean vex and come in, bois swinging like lightning-flash. But I block and mi back swing nearly catch she belly. She come back from the side, but mi bois there to parry, then flick! and she gone back, hands to head, blood already seeping through she fingers. And I dance, I dance, and the drums beat for me alone.

I only fight that one fight that night. Marriott say I should start slow. He say I should savour my first victory, like a fine wine. I was used to how he talk by then. He never had no doubt I was going to win. Pappy was so proud, and Mammy too. Like she wasn worrying about me being a jamette again – once I was a jamette who could buss other jamette head. (Besides, she know man did like jamette.) Caliban was there with he guitar – a small fella with a head like a coconut and frog-eyes. After I beat Bowfoot Jean, he ask me mi name. I tell him and he think for a few seconds, then start to strum he guitar and sing in English.

In the gayelle that night was bacchanal for so

Bowfoot Jean meet up Legba Cudjoe,

Bowfoot never had a chance was plain to see

Because Legba girl move so elegantly.

But was more than that, if Bowfoot did only know

She would a beg for truth, she would a beg for so,

Yeah, I say she would a have to beg

Because everybody know foot does get kick by leg!

And, as we laugh, he end up with usual ‘Sanimanitay' and Pappy give him some bits.

Later that night, I meet Marriott. He had champagne in the carriage. We went back to his house and, for the first time, I let him fuck me. And, for the first time, the bells ring.

In the next few years, I get known as one a the best female stickfighters in the island. I win most a mi fights, though it had three women who use to beat mi regular – Dominique ‘Reds' MaCherie from San Fernando, Phibbah Lagos from Arima and Indian Mary from Carapichaima. The one I use to most mind losing to was Indian Mary. She was a East Indian, a skinny set a people who the English people bring to work on the estates after Emancipation. They did keep to theyself, and we didn too like them because they make it harder for we to get work on the plantation when we wanted some money. (We didn like Bajans, Grenadians, Vincentians, or Carriacouans because them use to take up work and land, too.) Mary didn lime with she own people at all, and talk was she didn lime with man at all. But I wasn concern with any a that. I did beat Red and Phibbah on occasion. I never beat Mary, and the thing was, I couldn figure out why I couldn beat she. Mary was a nashy little girl and she use to move like she falling asleep. She had a round face with small round eye, like a monkey. She use to smile a bit, but usually she face never change expression. She didn talk much and I never see she take a drink. Some people use to call she Half-Dead. But in the gayelle, I never touch she once. Was like she know every move I was going to make, and always mi bois get block or miss she complete, and when she swing I was always wrong-foot or off-balance or something, so I use to get lash.

Marriott say she had good wrists and perfect timing. I tell him that that didn tell me how to beat she, and he shrug. ‘She has no obvious weaknesses,' was all he could say.

But I do well enough for Mammy to open she own gayelle. She break down the shop and build back a bigger one with a room with chairs and table for people to lime in. She plant more land and get licence to sell liquor. Once a month we had a bouquet ball, with Mammy and Pappy playing host. After Christmas till Carnival was fete every Friday, with stickfights most weekends. I was the main attraction. People use to watch the men stickfighters more, but they use to bet just as much on the women. Between Mammy cooking and Pappy organizing and me dancing mi lover dance, we use to make a good bit a money. For the first time in she life Mammy get fat. She was proud a she size – was a sign a prosperity. But she would a give way three-quarter a she money and all a she fat for one granchile. But I was too busy fighting and singing and winding mi body to think about man.

Caliban take a liking to me from that first night, and every time I win he use to sing a song about me. When Mammy open the gayelle, I pay him to make up songs specially for me to sing before the fight. Every stickfighter had dey robber talk – ‘I am So-and-So and I challenge all comers' when you step in the gayelle, and you hold up you bois to your opponent and say, ‘I come to measure you grave' and make boast like, ‘Rain cyar touch me when I hold my bois'. That was the tradition, and I thought singing mi own kalinda would a be a good attraction. And Caliban didn disappoint.

My name is Legba Cudjoe, even demons in Hell know

Not to cross my winding path.

No fighter is more frightening, mi bois lover like lightning,

So fast I strike, I stop before I start!

You can't see wind, you'll just see me wine,

You'll just feel a cruel breeze,

No set a fuss, but you head buss,

And you go hear me saying, ‘Next, please!'

Sanimanitay

Every week was a new song and, even though he use to sing mostly in English, Caliban soon become the next reason why we tent use to be full up every Friday and Saturday night. Oftentimes, the people spend more time listening to he than watching the stickfight. Even when the song was about me.

It have no woman in this land

Who could handle stick better than Legba

When you see how she stroke the bois

All you could do is beg and say ‘Ah!'

She does stroke the stick with skill,

She does sting the stick with licks,

She does lash the stick until

The stick turn into a little matchstick.

Caliban never let on that he was in love with me. He figure he was too small and too ugly. But he was real jealous a Marriott. In fact, I figure that was half the reason he use to sing in English instead a patois like every other
mait kaiso
. He wanted the English people to know what he singing.

Now people, I wonder if you could tell me

What is the difference between a Negro and a English fellow?

Now people, I wonder if you tell me

What does make the two a we different so?

One difference is obvious,

For he skin white and mine is a brown colour,

But what come out both a we other heads is white

The difference is that he own does come out plenty sooner.

Sanimanitay.

Another difference is my hair hard and he hair soft,

True, but it have another difference even more true.

You see we heads that don't have hair

Them hard and soft too.

Sanimanitay.

The problem was, Marriott use to laugh harder at them kaisos than anybody else.

One season I beat Red and Phibbah one after the other. And Mammy had the bright idea of holding the biggest ever champion stickfighting contest. She tell me this only after she print up the bills. I was blue vex.

‘So you going to make me embarrass miself in mi own gayelle?'

‘You wouldn embarrass youself. Look how easy you beat them two, and you did hardly do so before.'

‘And I never beat Indian Mary.'

‘You go beat she. You like to bring down youself too much, Legba. I always tell you so.'

In fact, Mammy always tell me I was a lazy good-for-nothing. But I button mi lip. I could always get sick whatever night I had to face Mary or take a busshead the night before from somebody else. People could say I was fraid, but they wouldn know . Truth was, I did only beat Red and Phibbah because they was slowing down in dey old age. Both a them was at least thirty years old. But Mary was about my age, in she early twenties. Old too, but not too old. But as the day draw closer, it start to really grind me that I couldn beat Mary. And it wasn just me bringing miself down. Mary was just faster, more coordinated, and stronger than me. That was the simple truth.

I take mi woes to Caliban. I did already know Marriott wouldn be no help. Caliban listen to me and at the end he say, ‘Doh worry. I know how you could beat Mary.'

I say, surprise, ‘How?'

He say, ‘When you can't attack somebody body, attack dey mind.'

And he tell me he plan. I didn know if it would a work, but I would know for sure on the Night of the Champions, as Mammy's bills announce in big black letters.

We had preliminary rounds. But everybody already know who was the best stickfighters and all a them was there on the final night. There was also a good few from the other islands, like Jamaica and Barbados and Grenada. Everybody dress to kill, or at least to buss head. Some in velvet
kandal
, some in satin ones, ending just above the knee, curving like a second skin round dey round arses. Who doh have on embroidered shirt have on short-sleeve jacket with heart-shape
fol
sew on over the chest. The fighters with real skill would try to knock off that before going for a busshead. With the women stickfighters, we would make that the target instead of a busshead. That was Mammy idea, because she say people doh really like to see woman fight. Some people decorate dey
fol
with swansdown, some with rhinestone, some with mirrors. Some wearing cap or hat or paper crown (so they could put a pad under it).

I dress in a purple satin skirt, a red silk long-sleeve blouse with two mirrored
fols
, one on either breast. Mi hair was covered with a Madras handkerchief decorated with gold shirtpins. The outfit was Caliban's idea. He had sung his kaiso for the first time two weeks ago, and we knew that word would a reach Mary. It was that song that make Caliban the
mait mait kaiso
a the West Indies.

‘Why you never come up with this plan before?' I boof him. I knew he must have had that song for years.

‘I was waiting for a occasion,' he answer.

Even though we had the event in the yard, the place was still packed. Even the street didn have space. Was like every Negro person in Trinidad had come. I even see one Chinee, though I really notice him because he didn look like the usual Chinee. He was baldhead, instead of having a pigtail, and he wasn yellow pale, but had a kinda bronze complexion. Everybody was having a good time. The music was playing, the tables was loaded with chicken, pork, agouti, lappe, fish, rice, yam, eddoes and plenty other things. The rum was flowing like water. Me, I didn take a drink and I didn eat. Too much tension in mi belly and in mi soul.

Me and Mary had two fights with other people before we meet. I face she and then, very deliberate, I watch Caliban and raise a finger. He start to sing and the talk die down.

Mary Mary quite cunt weary

From taking too much man,

Just tell she how you love she so

And once you name man, you can.

Well, most people there had never hear the song before, and the whole place buss out laughing. I sing the second verse.

Mary Mary quite cunt weary

Because you just cyar say no,

I wouldn tell why you belly cyar swell

Of if you just hot-up or a ho.

This was more than picong, when you just provoke somebody. Was pure
meprìs
– the kind that singers use to get jail for if they sing about important people in society. But what Mary could a do? The song had three more verses, all just as insulting, but I sure most people didn hear them in all the laughing and hooting. And was the first time I saw Mary face change expression – just she mouth get a little more thin and I think I see she eye start to shine. Wasn much, but was enough. She come in to attack, when she usual thing was to wait to counter. And for the first time, she timing was a little off. And I was in perfect form that night. One lash, one parry, one counter. Mary was on the ground. I stand up there for seconds, not believing it. Everybody was cheering, but was as if was far away. And then I throw up mi bois in the air, and start to dance like a madwoman. Pappy rush in the gayelle and lift me up on he shoulders. Was the best night a mi life.