The White Woman on the Green Bicycle (27 page)

‘Of course not! There’s no slavery any more.’

‘They killed all the whites in Haiti. I know that.’

‘Two hundred years ago.’

‘They stuck white babies on spikes. Raped the women.’

‘Dear God! You’re mad. This isn’t Haiti. You’re talking rubbish.’

‘But we’re just as hated.’

‘You could see it another way.’

‘How?’

‘This was bound to happen. You should be
pleased
.’

‘Pleased?’

‘This is exciting. Eric Williams is quite an orator ‒ exceptional, in fact. We should be glad they have him and not some half-educated hooligan. Or a man who’s decided to call himself a prophet, with a light in his eyes. He’s not some crazy. He’s using democracy, calling for a new order. We should be thankful it isn’t worse.’

I was exhausted, my face caked with dust.

‘I hate this place,’ I rasped.

But George wasn’t thrown. ‘Come on, let’s go home,’ he said, caressing my hair.

 

I was twitchy until Venus arrived the next morning. I pounced before she had a chance to put on her apron.

‘Were you there yesterday?’

‘Where?’

‘In Woodford Square.’

‘Oho, de University.’

‘What?’

‘Dey call it de University of Woodford Square.’

‘Why?’

‘Dat is where Doc Williams go to speak to us. He speak about political tings. He like to educate de people. He der long time, man. Many times he speak. Granny Seraphina, she go to hear him.’

‘I went there, too ‒ yesterday.’

Venus’s eyes bulged.

‘I was on my bicycle. I rode into the crowd by mistake.’

‘Madam, you crazy, in trute. Dat no place for you to be.’

‘Never mind that. Have you been?’

‘Once or twice. With Granny.’

‘What does Granny think of him?’

‘She tink he a great man. He been to Oxford University in England. He does write books and ting. Granny, everybody tank de Lord for Eric Williams. De contry will be safe wid him.’

De contry
.

Dr Williams spoke in the same preposterous dialect even though he wore a suit and tie. The local English was spoken in an infectious sing-song. It wasn’t just the way they spoke, that mad fusion of Europe and Africa, but how.

I was determined to be serious and speak the Queen’s English. I didn’t need education from Eric Williams, a man who couldn’t speak properly.

‘The country,’ I tried to correct Venus, but she was inspecting the fridge.

‘It empty, Miss. How ah suppose to mek food?’

I blushed.

‘Let’s go to the market then.’

‘In Charlotte Street?’ Venus stifled a grin.

‘Yes, why not?’

‘You wanna go der, Miss?’

‘Yes, of course, I was there the other day. On my bicycle.’

Venus laughed out loud and slapped her thighs.

‘What’s so funny about me riding that goddamn bike?’

‘Nuttin, Miss. You tink I sit behind you on dat green cycle. Nah!’

‘Of course not. Don’t be silly. Let’s call a taxi.’

Charlotte Street was more hectic than the last time I’d ridden past. The market was even bigger than I’d guessed, sprawling across a whole block. I followed Venus into the midst of it, where vendors displayed their produce in a maze of long wooden trays used as tables. Weighing scales stood on each tray, blocks of rusted weights. Baskets the size of bass drums were all over the ground. Jars and jars of spices: nutmeg, mace, powdered ginger, star anise. Vermilion salted prunes, magenta dried mango. Castles of brown-sugared coconut candy behind glass cabinets. Bundles of blue crabs trussed up in string. Kingfish and snapper and careet. And fruit! Oh, once you could buy fruit in Trinidad, not like now. Trinidad was a garden once. Fruit was piled up like towers of jewels. I marvelled, wanting to pick up mangoes the size and smoothness of babies. I wanted to pinch them, squeeze them.

‘Madam, you feel all right?’

‘Yes. I feel fine.’

I stared, bewitched. Breadfruit and jack fruit and sapodilla plums. Guavas and jars of dark unguent which was guava jam. Custard apples. Pawpaws, which were rude and pendulous, somehow still growing. Tamarinds in their rough-smooth suitcases. Choko and okra and bodi and pumpkins. Limes like grapefruit and grapefruit like cannonballs. Bananas still on their stalks, great emerald hands.

I followed Venus as she picked her way through the stalls. She knew exactly who to buy from and what was what. I tried to look natural.

I spotted another white woman, someone I recognised from the
Cavina
. Only weeks had passed, but it felt like an era.

‘Gladys!’

‘Sabine, hello, what a surprise.’

I almost jumped into her arms. ‘How are you coping?’ I asked.

Gladys was a thin, delicate-looking woman, her skin the colour of paper. Her shoulders were burnt, peeling, her hairline was damp with perspiration, her arms blotched with mosquito bites.

‘I’m OK.’

I wanted to tell her about Eric Williams. ‘Can you understand the people here?’ I laughed.

‘No!’

‘I’ve already employed a maid. She makes me feel better.’

Gladys raised her eyebrows.

‘She cooks. We were starving. She brought me here. Do you know what anything is?’

‘No.’

I hugged her.

‘Where are you living?’ I asked.

‘Winderflet.’

‘Me, too.’

‘This is Venus.’

Venus came forward.

‘Venus, do these people here go to the University?’

‘Yes, madam.’

I suddenly felt ashamed, on edge.

‘What university?’ said Gladys.

‘In Woodford Square.’

‘Oh,
him
. Yes.’ An astute expression crossed her face.

‘You’re a teacher. What do you think of him?’

‘He’s doing a good job. No one can touch him. The
Trinidad Guardian
, as far as I can see, backs Gomes, his opponent. But Eric Williams is an original. An ex-pupil of QRC, where we teach. He’s revered there.’

‘I saw him speak,’ I blurted out.

‘Gosh, that was brave.’ I could see she was impressed.

‘It was an accident. It’s made me feel very different. Are you going to stay?’

‘Yes. For now.’ Gladys looked sad, though, her eyes a little wet.

‘I want to go,’ I said.

‘But you’ve just arrived.’

‘I can’t stand the heat. And I don’t feel . . . right, either.’

‘Why?’

‘We’re not wanted.’

Gladys nodded. ‘I know.’

‘I’ll stick it out, I guess. Three years.’

But Gladys wasn’t listening.

 

I began to read the
Trinidad Guardian
avidly, a broadsheet not unlike the
Daily Telegraph
in layout, allied, of course, to the colonial government. Even so, it followed Eric Williams’ campaign. I wanted to know what he was saying. And who was Gomes?

‘Darling, you’ve taken a sudden interest in Eric Williams,’ George commented one day, when he returned from the office.

The
Guardian
was spread out on the table. I was reading an article about Williams:
PNM and Women
.

I blushed. ‘I’m just keeping an eye on him.’

‘Yes. You and Sir Edward Beetham, eh? The Roman Catholic Church and the CIA.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Everyone’s keeping an eye on Eric Williams. Everyone is hurling abuse.’

‘Why?’

George snorted with faint impatience. ‘They’re afraid he’s a Communist, a nationalist, a Marxist, you name it. He’s
uncommon,
that’s all. In fact, I hear Sir Edward Beetham regards him with some esteem.’

‘The Governor? Really?’

‘Yes, dear.’

‘Don’t “yes, dear” me.’

‘Sorry, dear. I mean, it’s quite possible the British think highly of him. He’s an Oxford man. But Williams doesn’t like the Governor, or white people in general, even though he has a drop of white blood.’

‘No! Really?’

‘Yes, of course. It’s common knowledge. His mother is a Boissière.’

I was shocked. ‘You mean . . . like the woman who owned the Country Club?’

‘Exactly the same. The illegitimate children lost the noble “de”. Williams’ mother was Eliza Boissière. A relative of no repute. An unwanted connection.’

‘So he’s part ex-slave, part aristocrat?’

‘You could say that. Probably a prevalent mixture on this island.’

Later, when George was out of sight, I cut the article out and put it in a shoebox. And so that day I started my first shoebox file on Eric Williams. I was very careful to conceal my spy work from George. He’d think it very odd ‒ he seemed to understand everything implicitly. Who was this black-white-slave-nobleman? I read everything I could about Williams. It made me less anxious. The more I knew, the less I feared him. The more I knew, the more I came to be intrigued by him. Eric Williams hated the likes of me, but I found I couldn’t hate him back.

 

I quizzed Venus extensively about Williams. I wanted to talk to Granny Seraphina, too, know what she thought. But Venus was evasive; she often went quiet on me when I asked her about Granny.

‘Can I meet Granny soon?’ I pushed.

‘Granny doh like visitors.’

‘Oh, I see. I don’t want to be a nuisance. But I’d love to meet her.’

‘She fonny so, fonny about dese tings.’

‘About what things?’

‘Political tings.’

‘Why?’

‘She waitin’, das what she always say. She doh like to talk much. But she waitin’.’

 

For some reason, I knew what this was like. But I didn’t know what I’d been waiting for all my life. Images of Williams plagued me constantly: up there, on the bandstand, the crowd around him. Balisiers waved. My breath slowed just recalling that day. What he had to say, all those people listening to him.
Father, father
. And Williams so casual and self-contained. I was distracted by it all. I wanted to make love to George more. He was delighted with my new fervour.

One night, after a particularly vigorous session in bed, both of us spent and covered in sweat, I looked down at my husband.

‘No one can touch him,’ I whispered.

‘What?’

‘That’s what Gladys said.’

‘Touch who, darling?’

‘What . . . what did I say?’

‘You said, “No one can touch him.”’

I stared.

George looked puzzled.

‘Who, my darling?’

‘Oh, nothing.’

I bent to kiss his mouth, covering my mistake, writhing and working George slowly back into a state of passion and all the time shutting my eyes tight, blocking Eric Williams from our bed.

A month later we were invited to a garden party at the Governor’s residence, one of the estate mansions on the savannah, next door to the Botanical Gardens. John and Irit were invited, too. Stockings and hats and gloves were in order, suits and ties for the men. We went together in John’s Hillman, all a little nervous, the men in the front, women in the back, Irit clutching her hat on her lap.

‘These stockings encase my legs just like sausages,’ Irit complained. ‘Why do the English insist on keeping up these bloody stupid formalities even in this heat? They are mad. I bought the biggest hat and most horrible loud dress just to annoy them. What do you think? It will be like an umbrella on my head, no?’

The brim of Irit’s hat was almost a foot wide. Her dress was fussy and gay, made of fuchsia silk. ‘I made it special,’ she winked.

John indulged her every whim. ‘You could wear a bag of coconuts on your head, my pigeon, and still look stunning.’

I wore a lace dress, gloves and a cloche of black feathers. George said I looked as if a dead corbeau had fallen from the sky and landed on my head.

The party was a grand but staid British affair. We made an entrance, Irit in her hat and inappropriate pink dress, me like a high-class call girl. Pale English women stood around in shapeless flowery tea dresses, hats and white gloves. Most looked about to faint.

‘They look sick,’ Irit whispered. ‘Look at them. Half of them are ill. No colour. They look like they are dead.’

Mute black waiters glided about, trays of champagne flutes in their hands. Their silence was like the aftermath of an argument: righteous, powerful. Irit stopped a waiter. ‘Ugh,’ she choked, tasting the champagne. ‘It’s warm. Like cider. May I please have some coconut water instead?’

The waiter nodded and disappeared, returning with a glass of opaque liquid. ‘This is better. Thank you so much.’

People stared.

Irit was indignant. ‘Half these people are low class. They come from nothing back in England. They are no one. They come out here and are big fish. But just look at them. Half have no breeding, you can see it in their faces. They are peasants. And they think they are higher than the blacks. They treat them terribly. Give us all a bad name.’