The White Woman on the Green Bicycle (31 page)

‘George?’

‘Yes, my love?’ Casually, he looked up.

Slowly, I began to unfasten my blouse from the bottom upwards, pulling it open delicately, as though the fabric were opera curtains.

‘Look at me.’ I revealed the stage.

George’s eyes lit up.

I pulled the blouse wider, exposing my flat belly, my breasts, which were firm and snug in a fine black-lace bra.

George gazed at me.

I shrugged my blouse to the floor and unhooked my bra, the cups relaxing. I held the bra to my breasts, gazing down at myself, the feast of me, and then flicked my eyes back to George, raising my eyebrows to make sure he understood that I was a gift, that he must never take me for granted. I smiled, dropping the bra. Moonlight fell on my shoulders. I caressed myself under the moon-curves of my breasts, running my palms over my nipples until they stiffened to points. I loved my young body. I turned slowly, so George could look at the shapes of me, the swells and swoops, my slim waist, the S of my back. My breasts, like fruit, like pears, soft and swollen in that first skin of youth. I lifted up my arms and arched my back so they moved like naked dancers.

George stopped reading his novel, oh yes. He came towards me on his knees.

Irit had opened a boutique at the top of Frederick Street, Zandolie, and it was a great success locally. It reeked of heady scents, the musky incense sticks she bought from Rastafarian vendors on the pavement: orangewood, frankincense.

‘Like a holy place, no?’ Irit laughed.

She served strong cardamom-scented coffee to regulars and had arranged a peacock-backed wicker throne in one corner which encouraged customers to sit and chat. We often gossiped while she sewed behind her tiny desk. Most of the dresses were her original design. She sold locally-made accessories as well as expensive smuggled-in watches and jewellery and crystal perfume bottles and handbags. The boutique was half cave, half Burlington Arcade. You could buy Cartier and Rolex watches and brooches carved from a coconut husk.

‘Guess who came yesterday?’ Irit gushed one day.

‘Who?’

‘Eric Williams.’

‘No!’

‘
Oui
.’

‘On his own?’

‘Yes, of course. Late, after I’d closed. Earlier I’d received a telephone call from his secretary. She asked me if he could come then. He likes to be private.’

‘And he came?’

‘Of course. He has very good taste. He likes to give presents.’ I couldn’t hide my amazement.

‘He bought several things, all the most expensive. He knew exactly what was what, has a very good eye for what a woman might want. He even asked me to order something, too, something from New York. He chose all the finest quality.’

‘What was he like?’

‘Charming, natural. I liked him. We talked. He sat down and drank my coffee.’

‘I don’t believe it.’

‘Yes. I am a Trinidadian citizen now. I will vote for him in September and I told him so.’

I felt heat blossom in my face, heat in my chest. ‘I bet that shocked him.’

‘No. He has whites in his party, some influential French Creoles. He’s not stupid; he wants his party to appeal broadly. And he’s a man, he likes women. I fluttered my eyelashes at him.’

‘He’s married, no?’

‘Yes.’

‘He bought gifts for her?’

‘I didn’t ask! He has many friends, I expect.’

‘Where did he sit?’

‘Where you are. Right there.’

‘Williams sat
here
?’ I almost shot straight out of that great peacock-backed chair.

‘My dear. You’re blushing like a child.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

‘Well, nothing wrong with that. I blushed, too. He will be in charge. Run things. Power,
ma soeur
. I had to go home and have a cold shower afterwards.’

‘I saw him speak a few weeks ago, down in Woodford Square.’

‘Yes ‒ I know.’ Irit’s eyebrows rose. ‘Good for you.’

I wanted to tell her about my boxes of clippings, how I’d been following Eric Williams’ career. I wanted to confess, as though it were a sin.

‘The PNM will win this election in September and then all the British will leave soon afterwards. Give them a few years. Then the PNM will run things, formally. The Queen will come and shake hands and say bye-bye. Williams will be Prime Minister.’

‘We will leave, too.’

‘Oh yes?’

‘Yes. Our contract will be up by then.’

‘And you think George will leave his new job and all that is happening here? Go back to that dreary weather and all those grey, sick-looking people in England? Live in the suburbs? Why should he go back?’ Irit levelled her long lashes at me. ‘What’s there for him? Why don’t you like it
here
?’ Irit spoke like a villain, like she was in cahoots with the PNM, part of their secret force. And for a moment I didn’t doubt that she had charmed Eric Williams. I could see them conferring, thick as thieves, both cool and glamorous and serious in their intentions.

 

In September 1956, Election Day was fraught: a British warship was anchored in the Gulf of Paria, another off San Fernando in the south. Eighty per cent of the population turned out to vote with long winding queues all over Trinidad. Schools and community centres were packed. That evening the masses rallied in Woodford Square, baying for Eric Williams to be with them, beckoning him from a cool shower, his hot dinner. Euphoric, he went to speak to them again, taking the bandstand. His public speeches had already made him an iconic figure: in a year, he’d caused a revolution without spilling a drop of blood. Eric Williams’ PNM won thirteen of twenty-four seats; it was all announced on television.

Irit was exuberant. ‘I’m glad for them,’ she toasted the PNM. ‘I’m glad they will kick those fat horses out. Hooray for Trinidad and for Eric Williams. I gave Glory the week off. It’s like carnival again this year, eh? Mas in Port of Spain, everybody drunk. I think the people are shocked. This is historic, no?
Viens
, come over for some rum punch.’

Helena was cautious. ‘So now maybe the Country Club will accept me as a member.’ She smiled her serene, distanced smile. ‘I’ll be the first to put my name down. Or maybe I won’t. I’ll see. Maybe now I’ll have the choice.’

Venus was overcome. ‘We goin’ to de Red House to celebrate, madam. Granny gone already. Ah meeting her der. She cryin’ all day, she overcome. She dancin’. De house decorated wid PNM flags, wid balisiers. Oh gorsh. Dis a good ting, madam. Carnival in tong in trute.’

Carnival, the Robber Man, bloody Eric Williams and his big flashy car, his robber talk, the people of Trinidad absorbing his every word up there on the bandstand. I thought of that hot day in Woodford Square, of his queer stare through the window of the car, his eyes on me. Something wasn’t right and I couldn’t put my finger on it. Eric Williams now had the chance to deliver what he promised. Love? Oh God. The people of Trinidad were in love with him, all right. Somehow, we all were ‒ such was the need for him then and there, at that particular hour in Trinidad.

I was happy for Venus. This was her victory. Even so, we stuck to our own kind. We entertained a lot at home, socialised with our own type or Trinidadians of our own class, those with light skins who went to the clubs, others from George’s working world. We refrained from talking politics.

We drank more rum.

 

I brooded. When we’d left Southampton eight months earlier, I hadn’t bargained for this. I thought we were coming to a friendly charming island. Palm trees. Beaches. I hadn’t bargained on sullen black women in the supermarket, on being laughed at on my bicycle, on ‘racism’, on snooty French Creoles, on seas infested with man-o’-war, or this Eric Williams and all that came with him. I wanted to make sure George was on board, that he too would be looking forward to getting back to a life in a temperate country.

‘I want to have a baby,’ I informed George one morning.

‘All of a sudden?’

‘No. I’ve been thinking about it.’ My thoughts were that once children came along, George would see sense, pack up and go back to England at the end of our contract. ‘I want
your
babies, remember?’

‘Of course.’

‘And I want to leave in two years, before we’re sent back all tied up in chains.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Like the Robber Man threatened. I want to come and go in peace.’

‘We will.’

‘You’ll be sad, won’t you?’

‘Yes. I’m not afraid of the Robber Man.’

I inspected my brown skin. It was impossible to stay indoors all day. I was changing, too, in some indistinct way. The heat made me weary, less me.

‘I don’t want our children to be Creole,’ I told George. ‘It’s far too complicated. I want them to be English, European. I don’t want my children to be part of this.’

‘But “this” is exciting.’

‘I want to leave.’

‘But we’ve just got here. Remember, a few months ago. I’m doing well in the job. The boss is already talking promotion.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’

‘But you said three years.’

‘And you said you were flexible.’

‘I was. Before I got here.’

 

Two months later, I was pregnant. With my son in my belly, I rode past the same spot where our crate marked
FRAGILE
was tossed onto the dock, where the old Chevrolet waited for us. I gazed out at the Gulf of Paria, wanting to jump in; I could have happily swum back to England. My head was full of ideas and possibilities, and of what lay ahead, of what I would do when we got back to England. Two years away. I thought of the new woollen clothes I’d need in England, new shops I’d visit. Shops! And theatres and cafés and everything would be familiar and I could say I’d once lived in Trinidad, but it was a strange place. That the people there were waiting; that they were somehow
en train d’attendre
. And that I’d never felt at ease there. We had arrived at the wrong moment. Eventually, I’d acclimatise, get used to England again. Eventually, I’d forget Trinidad completely.

 

My son was born in the month of August.
The Mountain
, a Spencer Tracy film, was showing at the Starlight Drive-In at the shopping plaza in Diego Martin; we didn’t see it all. My waters broke halfway through, flooding the car seat. George sped me to the Park Nursing Home opposite the cricket oval in St Clair. Dr Sebastian Baker met us there.

‘Here we go, Sabine,’ he smiled, all scrubbed and gowned. Sebastian Baker had a talent for doctoring, especially this kind of hands-on work. In his green theatre gown, he was no longer the ladies’ man, the limer, drinker, raconteur. He was tense as a scholar in his approach, gracious in his bedside manner. His eyes glinted and he smelled of antiseptic soap.

‘No wriggling,’ Dr Baker joked softly, placing my legs in the stirrups. My son had curled up inside me, his backside pointing downwards as if he were already suckling my breast. The midwife remained mostly silent yet I understood her every instruction: breathe, push, pant, strain, push again. George had brought me in at half past ten and by two in the morning there was still no progress. The baby was stuck, unable to turn around. Dr Baker grew calm, and calmer still as the evening wore on, as I panicked more.

‘This may have to go Caesarean,’ Dr Baker muttered.

‘No!’ I cried, more frightened of the knife than anything. ‘I don’t want a big scar. I want to wear a bikini!’

Dr Baker raised his eyebrows.

‘I’m serious!’ I shrieked. I
was
serious. I’d seen other woman with Caesarean scars, a great mess on their stomachs, as if clamped back together with coat hangers.

Dr Baker fell quiet. Sweat beads popped on his forehead and the air was a fog despite the jalousie shutters. The delivery-room lights dazzled like radiant sunshine even though the clock showed the dead of night. But I’d more strength left in me.

‘Please, no knife, no cutting,’ I begged.

The midwife steupsed and turned her back, busying herself in the corner.

‘Please,’ I whispered.

Dr Baker nodded.

I lay back on the hospital bed and prayed, opening myself up wide. His hand slipped inside me, enough to get a gentle grip, enough to turn my son round. Oh, he was quick as a fish. In and out and then he caught my son as he slipped from me in his coils and fluid.

It rained. It rained my son. When the storm broke, relief surged through me, racking my body in aftershock. I bucked out the rest of what was inside me, the swell sending me into a stupor, a grand and intoxicating relief, the relief of all births, of all deliverances. I wanted to sleep heavily and immediately but George ran in from the waiting room, speechless.

‘A boy!’ he cried. George kissed me, weeping, his warm tears falling onto my damp face. Dr Baker and the midwife attended our new baby.

Venus was delighted with our firstborn.

‘Watcha go call him?’

I had already suggested the name to George, on the way home. He’d agreed. It was a fine name.

‘Sebastian. Sebastian Wilfred Harwood.’

‘Madam, he so handsome already. How he get so handsome?’

 

Two years later, again at Park Nursing Home, I gave birth to Pascale. She was bonny and bright-eyed from the day of her birth. We took her home and she fitted right into things. George had persuaded me to stay
one more
year. I agreed.

Now we were four. A family. This was a new time for us. My children were both born on the island. They were Creole. I was only dimly conscious of this, at first. Venus mothered them almost as much as I did, hugging them to her black breast, singing them her African lullabies, loving them as her own. They wore her smell as much as mine, they knew her voice, obeyed her wishes. They kept her in their eye, tracked her movements. She could hush them when they cried. So my children knew two mothers: one black, one white. They extracted love from us equally, needed us equally. I wasn’t troubled by all this, not at first. I was glad of Venus’s help. In her large extended family an infant was always being nursed. Venus owned a natural passed-down wisdom when it came to mothering and I observed her. I came to care for her sons, too. Granny Seraphina looked after them mostly. Granny Seraphina: by then she had become a fabled luminary, such was the reverence with which Venus spoke of her. I saw Bernard and Clive now and then, Venus’s children, when Venus brought them over. Even so, my relationship with Venus’s children was different. They didn’t wear my smell on their skin.