The Housing Lark

by Sam Selvon

  ‘How much you want?’ Bat ask him.

  ‘Ten bob,’ Fitz say.

  ‘Here,’ Bat say, and give him the money.

  All the same, a sucker is born every day, and though Fitz turn the tables on Battersby, it had about three hundred thousand other infants who would fall for his spiel.

  Battersby open up a tin of Brunswick sardines and put them in a plate. He slice up a onion and two tomatoes, and mix it up with the sardines. He put in some olive oil and some pepper sauce, and mash up everything until it come like a paste. He sweeten his tea with condensed milk, and then sit down on the one chair by the table, and begin to eat breakfast.

  He hardly put the first bite in his mouth before the basement door knock.

  ‘Who the arse is that so early?’ Bat say to himself, because it wasn’t even seven o’clock yet. He went by the window and draw the curtain a little and peep out.

  He see Charlie Victor stand up there. He drop the curtain and tip-toe back to the table. Charlie Victor come to collect the rent. That is the only time that Bat ever see him.

  Bat feel if he keep quiet Charlie might think he not there, or he still sleeping, and go away.

  ‘Open up Battersby,’ Charlie say, ‘I see you peep by the window.’ Bat open the door angrily. ‘A man just get up,’ he say, ‘a man ain’t even wash his face yet, nor had breakfast.’

  ‘I can’t help for that,’ Charlie say. He stand up by the door waiting for an invite to come in. ‘You owe two weeks rent. I come round last Sunday but you was out.’

  ‘I am out this Sunday too,’ Bat say.

  ‘You know what the rule is,’ Charlie say. ‘If two weeks go and you don’t pay, out. You should praise God that I come, else you don’t pay and you get put out.’

  ‘I ain’t have no money,’ Bat say.

  Charlie stop waiting for invitation and come inside, and went and sit down on the bed.

  It look like Charlie was up with the larks. The man dress up in a smart suit and a flashy tie, and he have on them new kind of shoes what you can’t tell if is boots or shoes. And his hair plaster down with coconut oil and lard, to make it look smooth, though here and there a little kink rebelling.

  Just the sight of the man dress up so much so early in the morning put Bat off, not that it needed that. Nobody in Brixton didn’t like Charlie. Not only because he was a rent collector, but because he had a way as if butter won’t melt in his mouth, and all the time you know the man vicious like a snake and only after your money. Once he collect that rent, Charlie would change as if the pound notes had some sort of chemical what had an effect on him as soon as they touch his hand. If he was serious, his face break out in a grin. If he was standing up, he sit down. As if it had two Charlies, Before-Charlie and After-Charlie.

  Right now, it was Before-Charlie who was talking to Battersby.

  ‘I go have to give you notice,’ Before say.

  ‘I only have three pounds,’ Bat say.

  Charlie hesitate between Before and After, but Before win. ‘That ain’t even one week rent,’ he say.

  ‘Look at this bloody place,’ Bat say, ‘look at this bloody room. It damp, it old, it falling apart. The whole house going to collapse on my head one day.’

  ‘The builders coming in next week,’ Charlie say.

  ‘What builders? You been saying that for years now, Charlie. Listen man, you is one of we, you shouldn’t be so hard on the boys.’

  ‘I always have to tell all-you that this is my job,’ Charlie say. ‘I only working for the company, and is my job to go around and collect the rent. But I tell you what I could do. A Jamaican fellar looking for a place, and I could put another bed in here, and bring down your rent to two pounds.’

  ‘I don’t want no kiss-me-arse Jamaican living with me,’ Bat say.

  ‘When you take this room the first time, we give it to you as a double,’ Charlie say. ‘It going to make it easier for you.’

  ‘You can’t get a Trinidadian instead?’

  ‘Look at you,’ Charlie say expansively, ‘we have so much of prejudice with the white people and them, and you don’t like a fellow-countryman in Brit’n. How we could get on?’

  ‘You know all the answers,’ Bat sulk, ‘but I know you, Charlie. You would be a missionary to the white races if it pay off.’

  ‘A man got to live,’ Charlie say, ‘if the world offering that sort of situation, what you want me to do? You want me to change the world?’

  ‘A man got to have things he believe in,’ Bat say.

  ‘Well all I believe in, is what bringing me money, because money is the thing that I got to have to live in this world. If you vex with me, what happen? The sun stop shining? Snow stop falling? No. But if I ain’t have a job, and if I ain’t have money, I might as well be dead, because I can’t live without it. What the arse I really care what you think of me? Or anybody else? That don’t count at all. If I had a million pounds, you would fall down on your knees and salaam, no matter if you think in your heart that I is a bastard. You think I don’t know people?’

  ‘Still, it have a few of we who have principles. Fellars like you, you only out to bleed people, even your own kind.’

  ‘I can’t do anything,’ Charlie say. ‘If you have any complaints, I could tell the company about them, and leave it to the top men to do something.’

  ‘Why you don’t look for a decent work,’ Bat say, ‘instead of robbing poor people.’

  Of a sudden Charlie get up, as if he tired talking, and say, ‘You agree to another tenant coming or no? Because if you don’t, I will write out a notice for you.’

  ‘I mad to get the Rent Tribunal after you-all,’ Bat grumble.

  ‘I wouldn’t do that if I was you,’ Charlie say. ‘You remember what happen to Eric Lopley?’

  What happen to Eric Lopley was past history, but all the same, nobody ain’t ever forget. Eric was a Grenadian who get to share a room in the house. The room had three other fellars in it. Eric wasn’t in the country long, and it may be that back in the West Indies he hear about the housing situation for the boys, how landlords like to cram up a room and charge high rent, and how the authorities always complaining. So it may be that he thought all he had to do was go to this Rent Tribunal thing that he hear about, and they would break down the house and build a new one, or something. Anyway, Eric went, and when the Rent Tribunal hear what he had to say, they say they hear of many cases, but this was the worse they ever know. That same night, two Englishers stop Eric in front the house and wash his arse with licks. They beat him until he couldn’t move, and left him laying down on the pavement. Eric migrate to Birmingham, saying that London was too evil for him.

  The next time Charlie Victor pass around to collect rent, he full of sympathy with the tenants, telling them what a shame it was. ‘All the same,’ he say, ‘let that be a lesson, you see how they against us in this country, so the thing to do is make the best of it. I myself tired talking to the company about getting some repairs done, and thinning out the tenants. You-all mustn’t blame me, I only making a living.’

  Well Bat remembering all that, and he frighten if the company treat him like Eric Lopley if he go to the Rent Tribunal.

  ‘I was only making a joke,’ he say.

  ‘You mustn’t make them kind of jokes,’ Charlie say. ‘Somebody might get to hear.’

  Bat don’t know what to do. If he give Charlie Victor the three pounds, he would be broken for the rest of the week.

  ‘I tell you what,’ he say at last. ‘Bring the Jamaican fellar, but don’t tell him what the rent is. You just let him come and I will give you six pounds a week, every week, on the dot.’

  ‘That is a bit unusual,’ Charlie say.

  ‘Live and let live,’ Bat say.

  ‘All right,’ Charlie say, ‘being as both of we is Trinidadians, I will ease up the situation for you. Sh
ift some of the things you have out of the cupboard, and give him some room.’

  * * *

  * * *

  Thus it was that Harry Banjo come to live with Battersby in that basement room in Brixton, and get behind Bat for a set of them to pool together and buy their own house, instead of paying all that wicked rent.

  But before we come to that, I best hads tell you some more about Battersby, because he have a sister named Jean, who living in a room upstairs in the same house with another thing from Trinidad name Matilda. To tell you the truth, though Jean was a nice girl, she was a hustler, going up to Hyde Park every evening to look for fares. But Bat don’t care what she do. The way he look at it, she have her own life to live, and if she want to hustle fares, that is her own business.

  In fact though Bat is the man, was Jean who always taking the upper hand, and after him to go to work, and keep the basement clean, and take his clothes to the laundry, and in general trying to improve Bat as a human being.

  Sometimes she come down in the basement and help him to clean up, grumbling all the time, but still doing the work. And the morning after Harry Banjo arrive, she come down. Bat wasn’t there, only Harry tuning his banjo.

  ‘What you doing here?’ she ask him right away, because she didn’t know anything about this new tenant.

  ‘I am living here,’ Harry say, strumming the banjo. The way he strumming, as if his fingers reacting to Jean more than his eyes, because Jean was a sharp craft, and though white people feel that the boys only after white things, Harry never see a piece of skin like the one before him now.

  ‘Which part Battersby is?’ Jean ask next.

  ‘He gone out,’ Harry say. ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’

  Now all this time Harry Banjo don’t know that is Battersby sister he talking to, because Bat didn’t tell him anything.

  And as for Jean, she so surprise that this man offering her a cuppa, because she always have to slave for Bat and do everything.

  ‘I don’t mind,’ she say, and sit down by the table, watching Harry put the kettle on by the gas ring near the fireplace. ‘You from Jamaica, ain’t you?’

  ‘You never hear about me?’ Harry say, as if he is some famous film star or something. ‘You don’t know I am the greatest calypsonion in town?’

  Jean sniff. ‘Since when you living with Bat?’

  ‘Only yesterday.’

  Harry want to tell she that he only land up in the country a few weeks, but he don’t want to appear like no newcomer who don’t know anything at all. Besides, from the moment he see Jean as if he feel a kind of electric current pass. Right there and then if Jean did tell him to go and jump off of Nelson Column in Trafalgar Square, Harry would of gone. Is so it happen to you sometimes.

  ‘You know Battersby long?’ he ask.

  Was then that Jean realise that he ain’t know that she was Battersby sister. She was mad to keep on fooling him, but she tell him who she was and say that she come to clean up the room. She pick up the banjo and look at it.

  ‘You does make money playing this thing and saying calypso?’

  ‘Not saying, singing,’ Harry say.

  ‘All-you Jamaicans don’t know calypso,’ Jean scoffed. ‘Trinidad is the place.’

  ‘Hear you!’ Harry say, ‘I does make up my own tunes and words.’

  ‘In any case,’ she go on, ‘them English people won’t know the difference.’

  As Harry was pouring out the tea, Battersby come back and make a formal introduction.

  ‘I can’t clean up if the two of you going to be in the room,’ Jean say.

  ‘We could go up in your room and wait till you finish,’ Bat say. ‘Matilda home?’

  Bat had his eye on Matilda for weeks, but she was playing hard-to-get. Bat didn’t want to rush the position: he figure if he give she enough rope she might trip up of her own accord.

  ‘You leave Matilda alone,’ Jean say, knowing what kind of fellar Bat is. Every time she bring a friend home Bat want to make a stroke with them. She even warn Matilda about him, although she regret afterwards because Matilda perk up and ask all kinds of question, how many girls he have, what job he doing, if he on night-shift or day.

  ‘The way you have this place so damn dirty,’ she say looking around. ‘And now is two of you.’

  ‘I had a upstairs room the last place I live,’ Harry Banjo say, ‘and the landlady used to clean it every day. But she was a Jamaican.’

  ‘A lot of you Jamaican buy your own house,’ Bat say.

  ‘What stopping you from doing the same thing?’ Harry say. ‘Why about six of we can’t pool and do the same thing? You ain’t have friends?’

  Now, that is exactly how everything happen. If I was writing a story I could make up all sorts of things, that Bat say so-and-so and Jean say this-and-that and Harry say but-what-about.

  Because how you know the idea catch on? Just like that? Is so things happen in life. Some words here, a little meeting there, and next thing you know, War Declare, or a Man Gone to the Moon.

  And being as I want to tell the truth, I have to say that that is how it happen.

  Bat say, ‘I was thinking of that, you know.’ (Funny how he never ask the geni on the wallpaper for a house to live in!)

  ‘You ain’t the only one thinking,’ Jean say, ‘but what you going to do? Look at this place! If you add up all the rent we been paying, we could of put down a deposit on a house long time!’

  ‘You give me an idea there, Harry,’ Bat say.

  ‘If you really serious, we could do it,’ Harry say. ‘I for one expect some big money one of these days. My agent tell me to make some recordings on a tape and he would try and sell me. You don’t know anybody what have a tape recorder you could borrow?’

  ‘I know somebody,’ Jean say.

  ‘Take it easy, now,’ Bat say. ‘First thing we have to get the boys together and discuss the idea, and see how they react. Is no sense planning anything until we get together.’

  * * *

  * * *

  The get together happen a few nights later, right there in the basement room: It had Alfonso, Fitzwilliams, de Nobriga, Sylvester, Gallows, and Poor-me-One.

  To introduce you to all these characters would take you into different worlds, don’t mind all of them is the same colour! But if you want to start with Poor, he does traffic in dope cigarettes. Nobody don’t know which part he does get them from. He have a way of disappearing from the scene for days and weeks, then he reappear as if he was there all the time. And always, the same impression on his face, as if he is a walking statue or painting. Always cool, on top of the world, as if he have a Secret. To go into more detail—tell you where he come from originally, whether he six foot tall or five foot six, whether he have big eyes and a small nose—what difference it make to you? All you interested in is that he black—to English people, every black man look the same. And to tell you he come from Trinidad and not Jamaica—them two places a thousand miles apart—won’t matter to you, because to Englishers the West Indies is the West Indies, and if a man say he come from Tobago or St. Lucia or Grenada, you none the wiser.

  Next, take Gallows. As he come into the room, you know what he doing? His head bent down, and Gallows searching all over the room for a five-pound note that he lost one day.

  Many years ago in Trinidad a calypso make up about Gallows. What happen was a feller name Johnny thief Gallows girl, and the calypso quote Gallows as saying, when he catch up with Johnny, ‘The grave for Johnny and the gallows for me.’

  And the five-pound note? Well, one day Gallows lost this five pound. He went back down the road looking for it. He search his room. He stop people on the road asking them if they see his fiver anywhere? To lost a fiver like that was no joke. It hurtful enough when you have to pay income tax, or a landlord bleeding you for the rent, or the boss deducting money for club fu
nd and pension and insurance and that sort of thing. But to have a fiver disappear just like that, as if it never exist, I mean, that really hurt Gallows. In his mind he already spend that five pounds—three for rent, two for rations. Imagine facing a whole week and not having to worry. And when he discover the fiver missing, he only laugh. The possibility of that fiver getting lost casually, like falling from his pocket, was so remote that Gallows was sure he had it in another pocket, or in a drawer in his room, or—as the search went on and desperation begin—maybe he lend it to somebody and forget?

  Search high, search low, Gallows ain’t find that fiver. And it come like an obsession with him. The more he look and he ain’t find it, the more he come sure that one day he bound to find it. So all over Londontown Gallows walking as if his head have no support and falling forward, and his eyes scouring the streets. He make some interesting discoveries, like wristwatch and french letters, and once he find a tanner. Gallows so bloody vex when he find the tanner that he fling it away. Tanner! Who want any blasted tanner when a man lose a whole five pound?

  And he roam in strange places that he never went before, because with these breezes that does blow over the city, you never know, one might lift up the fiver from one district and blow it into another, in somebody yard, or through an open window or something.

  So as Gallows come in Battersby room he ain’t even say a word to anybody, he just begin to bend, looking under the bed, under the table, shifting the girls’ legs (because Poor and Alfonso bring their girls with them) and then looking around the room, as if the fiver might be stuck up on the wall or the ceiling.

  Meantime mine host gone out with Harry Banjo to buy some soda water and lime juice, because they already had a bottle of rum what remain from what Harry bring from Jamaica, and naturally they have to warm the boys up with a few drinks before making the preposition about the house.