The Pink House at Appleton

by Jonathan Braham

  Papa laughed with relief. He had not been impressed with Moodie at all. Moodie needed to get a grip. He would much rather talk about his biggest project at the moment, upon which much depended: the new house on the hill. ‘What else did you hear?’

  It was Mr Moodie’s turn to laugh. ‘Harry, you deserve that house. Boy, you don’t waste time. You’ll probably get rid of that little American jeep of yours and get a Land Rover now, just like a proper estate busha.’

  Papa chuckled. ‘Maxwell-Smith’s still on contract, but he’s definitely going early. Moodie, that house was built for me. It was waiting for us. Gawd! Don’t say anything at dinner, whatever you do. I haven’t told Victoria yet, in case things don’t work out. Y’know, no use raising her hopes.’

  ‘Your secret is safe with me, busha Brookes,’ Moodie said, downing another stiff gin and tonic and casting his wife a swift, glowering look.

  That night Boyd dreamt of a house, set among perfectly drawn trees with leaves like green clouds, in a forest full of mystery, with a winding white road leading to it, the pink house of the Maxwell-Smiths.

  CHAPTER 5

  The Maxwell-Smiths were an English family. Papa said they were English because they said “Tay” instead of “Tea” and didn’t socialise. To get to their pink house meant driving across the black metal bridge over the Black River. It meant driving up the white road between green pastures with guango trees and Brahman bulls on every side, up beyond the tree-lined path, through heavy whitewashed wooden gates on estate-manufactured hinges and onto a driveway, to the right of which lay an expanse of emerald-green lawn. Where the lawn ended there loomed the impressive pink house with the red roof. An English car, a Wolseley, burnished-grey with coffee-coloured leather upholstery, sat just outside the gleaming whitewashed garage in the shade of giant papaya trees.

  This pink house, a delicate pink that appeared white in the heat, with its exotic red roof, gleamed and winked during the day. The children, on the verandah of their green and cream house on the opposite side of the valley, gazed longingly at it because it looked like a picture in a book. Papa contemplated it over his test tubes and Bunsen burner at the factory. He looked at it from the open-top jeep on the way home each evening. And he studied it from the verandah of the house he now despised, the house that did not do justice to his station.

  ‘Inez going to Englan’ with Mrs Maxwell-Smith,’ Perlita announced breathlessly at breakfast, as she served up fried dumplings and burnt Vienna sausages for the fourth morning in a row. ‘She travelling by BOAC, ma’am, by aeroplane!’

  Papa and the children’s heads went up in a single motion. The children were fascinated with the new dumplings, small, round, the size of golf balls. They loved them. Papa’s head went up for another reason.

  ‘Is that so?’ he said, with magnificent restraint. He’d been struggling not to tell Perlita to pack her bags. But she was lucky that day. Perlita’s younger sister, Inez, worked for the Maxwell-Smiths at the pink house.

  ‘Yes, sar,’ Perlita said. ‘She buying grip and getting her passport. She going to Englan’, sar, Englan’! The Queen, Buckingham Palace, Big Ben!’

  ‘So when is she leaving?’ Papa enquired casually.

  ‘The first week of July, sar. It all planned. She going to bettah herself in Englan’, where the Queen live. Travelling by BOAC, sar.’

  Perlita held a dishcloth in one hand and a heavy wooden tray in the other. She smelled of Vim and coconut oil. It was her only smell; Vim from scouring the saucepans and the sweet coconut oil from all the frying. She wanted to talk and there was much to tell. Mama and the children were studies in curiosity. Papa ate, not looking up, the muscles in his temples working away.

  ‘I see,’ he said finally.

  ‘Yes, sar, ma’am, she going to bettah herself. She can’t sleep. The poor chile so excited. Mrs Maxwell-Smith leaving me some of her clothes, nice things, shoes and such. And Mista Maxwell-Smith is a very nice man, y’know, sar? Him leaving us a clock, crockery and other things as well. English people sooo nice.’

  ‘Coffee,’ Papa said curtly, giving Perlita one of his hard looks.

  ‘Ah bring in the pot right away, sar.’ And off she went, her flip-flops flip-flopping noisily against her bare heels.

  Yvonne, forehead wrinkled, asked, ‘Are we going to England, Papa?’

  ‘England?’ Papa eyed Yvonne with his customary mixture of pity and amusement. ‘Only poor people go to England,’ he said. ‘The kind who don’t know how to use their knives and forks; people who sit with their elbows on the table, who speak with food in their mouths, who yawn without putting a hand to their lips. Did you hear me, all of you?’

  ‘Yes, Papa,’ the children said in unison, snapping to attention.

  ‘Those are the kinds of people who pack their grips and go to England, to better themselves, as they say. And God knows they need to better themselves. The men have names like Delroy, Elroy, Glenroy, Alphanso, Adolphus and Wilfred. And the women are called Icilda, Delcita, Agatha, Esmeralda and,’ Papa thrust his chin in the direction of the kitchen and lowered his voice, ‘you know who.’

  ‘Perlita,’ Yvonne chirped innocently.

  Papa glared at her. ‘Eat your breakfast,’ he said.

  ‘Aunt Leah’s daughter, Bunny, went to England, to Cambridge University,’ Mama said, not looking at Papa. ‘And cousin Astley, too. They’re not exactly poor people.’

  Papa pretended to scowl at her, putting up two fingers. ‘All right. Only two types of people go to England. A few students to university. Mainly to London, Cambridge or Oxford. They are from good families and come right back home with their names in The Daily Gleaner against a BA, an MA or a PhD, and take up respectable positions in education, medicine, law or the government. All the rest, the great mass of them with their brown grips, their white shoes, the women especially, flashy hats and badly made double-breasted flannel suits, are poor people. English people think that these are the only Jamaicans that exist. They think that all Jamaicans are like you know who.’ He glared at Yvonne. ‘Can you imagine a thing like that? Gawd. They go up to England and disgrace the rest of us with their bad behaviour. It’s always in the English newspapers. The best people stay at home and build the country. Poor people go to England to work. And they never go by BOAC, only by boat. Why? Everyone of them as poor as a hungry mongoose.’

  Yvonne laughed out loud and repeated, ‘Poor as a hungry mongoose.’ She would repeat it throughout the day until someone said ‘Shh!’ and ‘That’s enough!’ She laughed then and everyone joined in, even Perlita, listening in at the kitchen door on one leg.

  ‘Hmm,’ Mama said. ‘Men from Lluidas Vale have been going to England by boat for years, leaving their poor wives behind.’

  ‘See what I mean?’ Papa said. ‘By their behaviour you shall know them. They leave their wives and children here in Jamaica, go over to England and shack up with English women. They have another half dozen children but never stay around long enough to accept their fatherly responsibilities. That’s poor people for you, reckless, irresponsible.’

  ‘They do well in England by the look of it,’ Mama said. ‘They send home money for relatives; a guinea here, a guinea there, which goes a long way. And parcels too, with English clothes, woollen hats and coats and furry boots.’

  ‘Sending woollen hats and furry boots to a hot country,’ Papa said with contempt. ‘What they should be doing is getting an education. They don’t have to pay for it in England, thanks to a Labour government. But I bet you tuppence that all they do is sit on their behinds in rum bars. They call them pubs over there. They’re not going to England to become lawyers or doctors or big shots. Mark my words. A few may, if they buckle down. But most of them will go to what they know: cleaning houses, driving buses, lazing about at the betting shop and thieving. Why? Well, you can take a person out of the pigsty but you cannot take the pigsty out of a person. That is what poor is.’

  ‘Is Inez poor?’ Yvonne asked the question they all wan
ted to ask. They weren’t sure about Inez and Perlita, who ate three meals every day, wore clean clothes and were given heaps of money in a brown envelope on Fridays. If anyone was poor it surely must be people like Mr Rawhog, who lived in the gutter with bloodshot eyes, wet, red lips and a stench so revolting that even dogs backed away. But he wasn’t going to England.

  ‘Well, she’s going to England but she’s certainly not going to university,’ Papa said under his breath. Fresh coffee aroma drifted into the room.

  ‘Where’s the coffee?’ Papa thundered.

  ‘Coming, sar,’ a high-pitched voice shot back from the kitchen, triggering utensil sounds, slamming of cupboard doors and the turning on and off of taps.

  ‘Are we poor?’ Yvonne asked, her confused face turned towards Mama, hoping to get an answer that was not suspect.

  ‘Out of the mouth of babes,’ was all Mama said, as if some fundamental question had been answered.

  Papa laughed a whooping laugh, his voice echoing in the pantry, head thrown back. ‘Are we poor? Well, we don’t have stupid, frilly crochet stuff, glass animals and plastic flowers on our coffee table. And you don’t go to government schools. You’re not poor if you are educated, speak proper English, dress correctly and don’t behave like dark people.’

  Papa had strong views about dark people. They were people who were constantly leaning up against a wall, a tree, a door or anywhere. They didn’t stand tall and straight. Such people were weak of character. They crowded outside betting shops with beer bottles in their hands, used bad words like rass clart and blood clart, and had little or no education. Jamaica was full of them. Dark people were decidedly worse than those people because, in addition to values and principles, they also lacked genuine ambition and were narrow-minded. In Papa’s book they were the lowest of the low. Many of them, trying their luck, were taking the boat to England, to places like Birmingham and Manchester, dressed up in ill-fitting clothes and carrying huge brown grips. Good riddance to them too.

  ‘You’ll be poor if you don’t study your lessons,’ Papa warned. ‘All this fooling about on the verandah will get you nowhere. You’ll end up like little ragamuffins.’

  ‘They need a good school,’ Mama sighed, ‘as good as Worthy Park Prep.’

  ‘You know it’s at the top of my list, the very top,’ Papa told her irritably. There’s a Catholic prep at Balaclava but it’s very expensive. That’s the place I’m thinking of.’ He turned to the children who were listening intently. ‘Don’t buckle down to your work and I will put you on the streets to beg your bread. Let me tell you, you and you.’ He pointed a threatening finger at each of them in turn.

  Hearing this, Perlita stepped forward. ‘Sar, my niece, Ina, go to Teacher Fraser school in Taunton.’ For a moment she’d hesitated, then she came right out with it, convinced she was helping her employer. ‘Is a good school, sar. She get good eddication, sar, good eddication. Teacher Fraser is no fool.’

  ‘Thank you, Perlita,’ Mama said, hoping to spare her, anticipating Papa’s response.

  Yvonne’s eyes lit up instantly. ‘Papa, why can’t we go to Ina’s school?’

  ‘Yvonne, look at me,’ Papa said with a basilisk stare, his forehead deeply lined. ‘There are other schools. You hear me, other schools.’

  Yvonne seemed confused. ‘But why can’t we go to Ina’s school?’

  ‘That’s not the school for you.’

  ‘But, why?’ Yvonne spread her arms indignantly.

  ‘Because I say so.’

  Yvonne persisted. ‘But, why?’

  ‘Go to your rooms and read your books,’ Papa growled, waving them away.

  ‘But we haven’t done anything!’ Yvonne was dumbstruck.

  ‘You’ve done enough. Get away!’

  * * *

  That night, Mama and Papa sat on the verandah talking, a half-moon contemplating them. They sat in nocturnal warmth, breathing roseapple and guinep. Their words drifted into the room where Boyd lay in bed under the covers.

  ‘Barrington will go to Munro College in September,’ Papa was saying. ‘And he’ll eat well there because they’ve just advertised in The Daily Gleaner for a new catering matron. I’m not sending him to that government school at Taunton. Full of riff-raff.’

  ‘But it’s so far,’ Mama said, thinking of Barrington living away from home.

  ‘Baldoo thinks Munro is the best private secondary school in St Elizabeth, in the country; and the Balaclava Academy the best prep in the parish. It’s where that young Miss Casserly teaches. A lot of Chinese and white children go there; the Lee’s children, the Cadien’s, the Lyn’s and the Jureidini’s. Boyd will start in September. Yvonne, next year.’

  Lying in the dark, Boyd’s excitement and anxiety grew.

  ‘But the expense,’ he heard Mama say.

  Papa inhaled harshly. ‘They think they’re on holiday because they haven’t gone straight to a new school. I’ll get a private tutor to brush them up before next term and get Yvonne a few more books. Keep her busy with reading, writing and arithmetic.’

  ‘When they go back to school they’ll settle down,’ Mama said.

  There was a pause. Then Papa’s voice took on a restrained, meaningful tone. ‘Victoria, you know I’ll always look after you. And I’m not saying this because I’ve been drinking. Yes, you know I can sometimes be a bit hard, but that’s only to make sure the children understand that life isn’t a bed of roses. They think everything comes easy. As long as you are a black person in this country you have to work three times as hard as other people to get anywhere. English people with half your experience and brains come out here and before you know it, they take over. In two ticks they’re in charge. It’s not right.’

  ‘You work very hard, I know,’ Mama told him. ‘Harold, I want to help, I can –‘

  ‘Victoria, you cannot help. This is my responsibility as head of the house. And that’s not complaining. It’s just a fact.’

  ‘But you have us!’ Mama was emphatic. ‘Harold, you are not on your own.’

  Papa chuckled. ‘I don’t need help. My father knew what he was doing when he spent all the money he had on my education and all the time he had on his women. With education you can go anywhere, face anyone. You can stand on your own two feet. I disowned my mother and her side of the family because they chose to be peasants, without ambition. I am a motherless child, Victoria, a loner. I want the best for the children. They will be everything we have ever dreamed about. I’ll work my fingers to the bone, for you, for them. I have my faults but, in the final analysis, I will succeed because I take my responsibilities seriously, you know…’

  Papa’s voice trailed off, replaced by Mama’s reassuring words. ‘Harold, I know. You do your very best. You’re a good man.’

  The clink of glasses came to Boyd’s ears and he breathed Papa’s Royal Blend cigarette, the ultimate adult scent. From the drawing room the Mullard radio and WINZEE brought the music of America into his room, the melodious tones of Dean Martin, Memories are made of this. The music was like a warm caress.

  And that night, Boyd, made apprehensive by Papa’s words, surrendered to the soft caress of the pink women from the pages of the American People’s Encyclopaedia. His dreams, ecstatic, were of a school full of Chinese and white children, of pretty girls like Pepsi and teachers like Miss Casserly. And fleshy pink women were on every page of his reading books. Throughout the following day, in the quiet of his room he sought out these voluptuous creatures hidden away in the heavy volumes. These were not the Lydia Parsons, Pepsis or Estellas who made his heart leap and imbued his thoughts with the scent of lilies and pretty music. The pink women frightened and impassioned him. They called him to them day after day and made him very guilty of acts that he had no knowledge of. Their pink bodies, like untouched flowers in the heat in a secret place, astonished, tormented and absorbed him. And they made his head hurt with a fever. But he wanted to be with them, to feel the pain of pleasure and misery. That was what they did to him.r />
  Papa said the American People’s Encyclopaedia wasn’t half as good as the Encyclopaedia Britannica. Even the name was more authoritative. The Encyclopaedia Britannica was the encyclopaedia to have, as all educated people knew. But he bought the American People’s Encyclopaedia one evening from a travelling salesman who had demonstrated that any of the volumes could be suspended by holding on to a single page. Boyd had witnessed the impressive demonstration with Papa after supper. The salesman had stroked the demonstration copy of the encyclopaedia full of the knowledge of mankind, covered in sumptuous burgundy leather. The smell filled the room.

  ‘Let your boy have a look at the book, suh.’

  The salesman had handed over the heavy object, sensing, from the moment he arrived, the eyes of the small boy upon him and the contents of his grip. He understood children and knew that they could make the difference between a wasted journey and a productive one. ‘The encyclopaedia is a university, suh. If you want it, suh, it’s in there, everything, more than the teachers themselves know.’

  Papa made up his mind on the spot, taking delivery of the American People’s Encyclopaedia two weeks later. And Boyd lived in the books after that. He spent hours gazing with shocking curiosity and longing at the Birth of Venus and at the other nude women among the pages. These women with their lolling breasts, fleshy buttocks and thighs reminded him of Mama. There were many pictures of babies clinging to breasts, in pensive poses, eyes dreamy, full of contentment from the full titties, reminding him of himself when he was little. Women were everywhere, in tight bodices with creamy breasts pouring out like dough. Some of the pink women had dark patches of hair at their vital spots. He did not know why but the thatch of dark hair on the women’s bodies triggered troubling enquiry and a curious yearning. He struggled to know their significance. And the names of the painters of these pictures fascinated him – Titian, Michelangelo, Botticelli, Goya, Raphael, Poussin, Clouet. They were names that he could not pronounce but imagined that he could. And always his thoughts were pulsating and hot. And Perlita was there too, her big titties bouncing under the shower, shocking, disturbing, wonderful.