The White Woman on the Green Bicycle (3 page)

‘De Tineke interview a big hit. She sexy, eh?’

‘Yes, a nice girl. Clever, too.’

‘Who you wanna do nex?’

George’s heart surged. Ray was in a good mood.

‘The coach. Beenhakker.’

‘Ahhh.’ Ray laughed in appreciation, sucking up a French fry. ‘Somptin tell meh you go aks dat. De Warriors comin’ soon, yes. We already try him. He not givin’ one-on-one interviews yet or even at all as far as we know. An’ if he do, de editor go give him to de boys in de newsroom. Dey already fightin’ over it. It go be a big ting, George.’

‘I see. Of course.’ George tried to hide his disappointment. Trinidad and Tobago had qualified for the 2006 World Cup. Thanks to their expensive Dutch coach, the Soca Warriors were going to Germany. A huge story. He was OK with his status at the paper. Crazy-ass ol’ white man; good writer, though. Besides, he’d invented himself; the personal interview was his forte. George Harwood – Soft News Man. He covered features, fluffy stuff. He interviewed women, children, elderly people, award-winners, priests, nuns, monks, comedians, calypsonians, businessmen, birdwatchers, dog lovers, forest-dwellers, potters, painters, Rastamen, Baptist shouters, and, occasionally, members of the government. He’d interviewed almost everyone on the island and wrote his interviews with love and care. He did all the
up
beat stories, the good-news stories the younger men on the paper refused to touch.

‘I’d like you to do Boogsie for me.’

‘Again?’

‘Dey name a trophy after him.’

‘A Boogsie Sharp trophy?’

‘Yeah.’ Ray laughed. ‘At de music festival. Just do us somptin small. For next Sunday.’

‘Anything else?’

‘I hear Lara coming back after New Zealand.’

‘Brian Lara?’

Ray nodded. ‘Have you met him?’

‘Actually, I haven’t.’

‘If he come, ah go ring yuh. I know you hot on cricket.’

‘Thanks.’

George left Ray’s office whistling. Lara, he was happy with that. Brian Lara was a great man.

The newsroom boys were back from an editorial meeting, a young bunch, all in ties and Clarks’ desert boots, hair slicked back.

‘What are the stories for tomorrow, boys?’ George asked.

‘Cop on murder charge,’ Joel read from his screen.

‘Cop on drugs charge,’ Ramesh read from his.

‘Policeman chopped chasing drug traffickers,’ chipped in Corey.

‘Family claim police brutality charges,’ said Joel.

‘Surely there must be one baby rescued from a burning building?’

‘Yeah,
right
.’ The boys smirked at him pityingly.

‘You wanna interview my mother?’ Joel laughed. Joel was the chief reporter, serious about his work, but also the office joker.

‘Is she as ugly as you?’

‘Uglier. But she like your interviews. She aks meh if yousa single man. Ah could fix you up.’

George walked past them, shaking his head.

‘Goodbye, boys.’

‘Bye George,’ they chorused.

‘Ay, how de lips dese days,’ Joel called after him.

George turned round, blushing and smiling with shame. ‘Get lost,’ he mouthed.

The boys fell about laughing.

At the last Christmas staff party George got rat-arsed, taking a shine to a pretty, skinny Indian girl in the subs department. He stayed on far too late, fancying his chances, that she had liked him back, for he hadn’t
completely
vanished, damn it. The girl was at least ten years younger than his daughter; tiny tits, round and hard as apples, tiny backside, tiny T-shirt, tight jeans. Finding himself alone in the lift with her on the way down, he became confused, missing the curves of his wife, the luscious wife of his youth. Knowing he’d always been lucky with women. He lunged. The girl dodged. He’d ended up kissing the wall.

Sabine smoked in their air-conditioned bedroom, curtains drawn, the covers pulled up over her knees. She liked to smoke in the cool and the dim light. At least she no longer took pills, no longer slept for days at a time. Lucy, many years she worked for them, years ago now; her tonics had brought her some relief, pleasant fragrant drinks made of hibiscus petals. The
Cavina
, the banana boat which had delivered them to the island decades ago, she saw it drifting towards the dock. Those black birds in the sky, corbeaux. She still saw them, too, circling overhead. Saw them every day, picking at her carrion flesh, the dead meat she was. Now she couldn’t remember how to leave the island. And to where? Her skin was black now, just like them. Being like this was a soft experience, as though she were nearing death. Of course she was near death. But at last she was from here now, like it or not. She was part of things. She no longer lived in the past, or dreamt of the future, no one could accuse her of that. She lived day to day, thinking for the moment. She avoided the newspapers, of course, never even read George’s articles any more. Life was simple, like a hermit’s. She ate very little. She drank a lot, though. Never mind about that. She smoked her cigarette to the nub and crushed it out, then rolled over and curled herself up into a ball under the covers. Eric Williams – the football. She remembered taking him in her arms. Those bleak days, Port of Spain in flames. She shut them out but they returned again and again. The letters she wrote. Hundreds. The air-conditioner hummed. It lulled her into a vague, comforting doze and once again she forgot.

On his way home, George slowed his truck to let cars pass at the bottom of Morne Cocoa Road, at the T-junction joining Saddle Road, next to the gas station, opposite the route-taxi pickup spot. La Pompey stood in the gas-station forecourt in ragged shorts and a bright white pair of trainers, his mahogany chest aglow in the evening’s dim heat, his girlish pointy nipples erect. He counted through a roll of red dollar notes, the money he had earned from washing cars.

‘Yess, Mr Harwood.’ La Pompey grinned across at him.

La Pompey wasn’t mad. Maybe a bit simple. But no madman.

‘Good evening, sir.’ George waved from the cab of the truck.

‘Man, yuh truck a
state
. Looking like it been tru de pitch lake.’

‘Yes. Sorry about that.’

‘How yuh could drive dat ting so wid no shame?’

George shrugged. The rust was so bad it resembled a spray of machine-gun bullet holes, but he was very attached to it.

‘It need a wash, man. Ah comin’ to fix it up.’

‘Yes, sir. Come round any time.’

‘How’s Mrs Harwood?’

‘Very well.’

‘You is keepin’ her well den. You know what dey say.’

‘What’s that?’

‘A kiss a day keep de doctor away.’

George made an amused half-sour face. ‘You should write greetings cards, sir.’

‘Yes, man. Kiss your woman every day and keep her sweet and she will always be a treat.’

‘You’re a poet, too, Mr La Pompey.’

‘Just La Pompey,
La
Pompey,’ he corrected. ‘Yes, man, ah does write a little verse from time to time.’

‘And your favourite poet, do tell.’

‘William Shakespeare.’

‘Shakespeare?’

‘Yes, man. Learn him well in school and ting.’

‘And what poems did you learn?’

La Pompey smiled, only three teeth showing before his face went calm and serious. He studied George with careful attention, his eyes a little wet. ‘Shall I compare de to a summer’s day?’

George stared.

La Pompey mock-wooed George through the car window. ‘Dou art more lovely, man, yes, man – an’ more tem-per-ate!’

George wanted to kiss him.

La Pompey slow-winked. ‘Nice, eh?’

‘Yes.’

‘Poetry say everytin.’

‘Maybe.’

‘Summer, man.’ La Pompey grinned. ‘Summer all de time in Trinidad. Heat in de place. Heat an’ sunshine.’ He glowed, his face like a big sun.

‘I like that poem.’

‘You
know
it?’

‘Of course.’

‘You does speak poems for Mrs Harwood?’

‘Not these days.’

‘I’m sorry to hear dat. You should speak more poems fer she.’

‘She wouldn’t like it if I did.’

‘Really? You never know.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘You mus speak of de love inside you, man. Or else where it go? It go rot, form a lump inside you. Rot and swell and make you sick.’

‘How did you know . . . that’s how it feels?’

‘I’s a sweet-man.’ He winked again. ‘Can’t you see? Ah does love plenty women. Keep me healthy.’

‘Good for you, La Pompey.’

‘Yes, man. Take care Mrs Harwood. Treat she sweet. Mrs Harwood a plenty good woman an’ yousa lucky man. Summer every day, man, in Trinidad.’

A car behind beeped George and he turned left, driving on through the village.

 

Winderflet village spread itself beneath the green hills of Paramin. The valley, rich in soil, once boasted nine flourishing estates, several mills and four rum distilleries. A brown river, Winderflet River, sometimes slim, sometimes fat, according to the season, slithered through the valley and the village embraced its shallow curves. Our Lady of Lourdes dominated the settlement, a grand square church peering down from an excavated mound; French, Catholic, it was carnivalesque with its gaudy red and vanilla exterior. The church cast a long shadow from up there on the mound, a shadow which fell directly onto Winderflet Police Station, much to the disdain of Superintendent Bobby ‘Big Balls’ Comacho. Between the church and the police station, they had things all sewn up. A quiet place, Winderflet. The church boasted a robust choir, tenors, a soprano, the whole range of gospel voices. Sometimes, when driving through the village during choir practice, George listened to the hymns sailing out, songs to God, songs floating upwards, lifting his heart. One voice was always very particular, more celestial than the others, mournful: the boy’s voice.

 

It was dark by the time he arrived home. The house he had built nestled at the foot of the same imposing green hills. Sabine had always seen a woman in the hills, a colossus, asleep on her side, half-exposing her loins. The house was a Spanish finca in design, arches and courtyards and wide porches all around. Sliding glass windows opened so the hummingbirds could flit through, siphoning nectar from the cut ginger lilies. A pool out back in which George paddled like a duck. He stopped at the wrought-iron gates which stood seven foot tall and peered through the bars.

The sticky Julie mango tree nodded at him.

Don’t look at me like that.

Like what?

Like you know how.

No, I don’t.

One day she lit up, one day
I
lit her up; the next, nothing. When did it happen? I don’t recall the day.

It’s not your fault.

Sabine was right about this country. She punishes me.

It’s not your fault. Anyway, you’re sure it all happened in one day? Think.

What? Think?

Eric Williams, remember him?

Yes.

It’s all
his
fault. More than you care to know.

George snorted. You going to quote Shakespeare to me, too?

I am going to let down my bucket where I am, right here with you, in the British West Indies.

Who said that?

Eric Williams.

When?

A long time ago.

Yes. Poor bastard. Whatever became of him in the end?

Ask your wife.

What’s that supposed to mean?

You know.

No, I don’t.

You do, you just don’t want to remember.

I miss her.

Yes.

We survive off our past glory.

It’s not your fault.

No.

Her eyes are evasive, that’s the worst part. I should let her go.

Maybe you should.

But I would miss her so.