The Meeting Point

by Austin Clarke

  “It coming in,” Boysie said, somewhat unnecessarily; and with not too much joy in his voice. “That is the plane Estelle on,” he added, as if he was sorry her journey would end their journey to the airport; and their joy of expectation.

  “What is the time, Dots?” Bernice asked. “Estelle landing at ten. If that is really Estelle’ plane, she landing at ten.”

  “Is quarter-past, gal.”

  “Past what?” Bernice asked. She was very anxious.

  “Nine, gal. We still early.”

  Going across the road off the main highway to the airport, the car was quiet again. The road was under repair. The imminent arrival, which they had all experienced before, was beginning to tell on them. They felt something was going to happen to Estelle: not a plane crash; not air-sickness; but something after arrival; something to do with immigration. Bernice was tense; and her mind was jumping the hurdles of immigration and difficulties, even before she could see them. And then she mentioned the telephone poles, which everybody had forgotten about. “Look at them telephone posts running down this dirt road to meet we. Telephone post after telephone post, one after the other, one following ’pon two, and two preceding behind three and four and five … all the time, never stopping never ending, more telephone posts than the snow.” Boysie kept his eyes on the gutter; and Dots kept hers in the air, tracking down the aeroplane. They remained quiet, as if to give Bernice this liberty of expressing her fears, so as to help her relax herself. They felt she must have this freedom of thought and imagination, this fantasy running away from her, and she from it; just as the poles were running. But then, the camouflage of her real thoughts blew off, and she said, “You think Estelle got the passport in order? I wonder.” No one answered. They knew, though. But they did not answer. They knew that to come into this country, even with a passport and papers in order, was a difficult matter: if you were a black person. Dots tried hard to think of something else to take Bernice’s mind off passports and papers.

  “Hey, Bernice! Boysie says he contact Henry, and Henry say he coming and bringing some more men, for tonight. We have three men now, counting in Boysie, here. And with you, and me, Brigitte the German girl from ’cross the street, Estelle …”

  “Suppose the passport that Estelle have, isn’t made out properly, though,” Bernice asked herself; and them. “What you think they could do to her?”

  “Everything all right, gal. Everything in God’s hand now, and it couldn’t be in a more better place, at this moment. Anyhow, it damn late to start worrying ’bout passport and papers. And we arrive.”

  “We here!” Boysie said, unnecessarily; and driving into the parking area.

  “What you think them immigration people going to do?” But Bernice started to weep before Dots could think of an answer. Boysie became very confused. There wasn’t much space to turn the car around; and he could think of nothing to cheer Bernice with; and the lack of space and the women getting on like women … and then Boysie saying “Gorblummuh!” over and over again. And the tension was reduced.

  “Bernice, Henry say he coming to the party, and he bringing another man,” Dots said. But she knew it didn’t matter at this moment. It was all she could think of saying; she, being not a very imaginative woman. “Henry says he coming, and bringing another man.”

  They were standing, the three of them, with their faces pressed flat against the glass partition of the waiting room, at Malton International Airport. They were standing near the door through which all incoming passengers from overseas had to pass to enter the Dominion of Canada. It was now thirty minutes past ten. And Estelle was nowhere in sight. A black family of a man, woman, two children and a large box marked CAPTAIN MORGAN RUM was leaving just as they arrived. A black woman was waiting very patiently, while a customs officer searched her bags. Estelle was invisible. Each time a gust of people came through, they would press their faces even flatter against the glass. Boysie had just returned from the departure lounges; but no one had seen a woman called Estelle. She was not in the airport bar (Boysie had a quick double rum, to cheer himself up while inquiring); not in the restaurant; and just as he stumbled at the Ladies-Femmes-Senoras door, by mistake, a black red cap waved him aside, saying, “This is a hustling night, baby! Move!” Boysie was furious; and all the way back up the escalator, he called the red cap a “blasted nigger, a blasted black Negro!”

  Boysie became suspicious of Bernice’s arrangements for her sister. “The men in the immigration place back in Barbados could have made the mistake, yuh know. And the immigration people here, could make the same mistake. I mean, they could make a man who went to Oxford look like a damn fool. So, I asking you, Bernice, to remember if you tell Estelle all the things she had to do … Did Estelle have a passport, though?” Both Bernice and Dots ignored him.

  “Don’t mind him! Estelle coming, gal. She ’bliged and bound to pass through this door.”

  “The worst things that could happen to Estelle, according to that black fellar, the red cap fellar … ”

  “Look, Boysie, nobody ain’t asking you for no opinion, man!” And to show him how disgusted she was with his attitude, Dots moved to the other side of Bernice, far from him. She rested her hand on Bernice’s shoulder. “Christ! man, you is nothing but a black cat in my path, bringing me bad luck on top o’ bad luck.”

  “Sometimes, gorblummuh woman, you makes me feel you too decent for a man like me, you don’t know? You sorry you married me?”

  “We are not asking you for no advice, Boysie!”

  Boysie fell silent. Bernice fell silent. And after this, Dots herself was silent. For some time, they remained standing in front of the new crowd which had gathered; waiting, waiting for Estelle to appear from inside. Bernice had already made up her mind that the “worst thing” had happened. Dots thought the worst had happened. Boysie was sure it had already happened. Still, none of them said what he really thought. Then, a voice belonging to one of them, shouted something. It took some time for them to realize whose voice.

  “Look, look!”

  Boysie was pointing at something inside the glass partition. “Look!” he exclaimed. And they looked. But they saw nothing. Dots was about to swear at him again. “Look at that valise, man! the valise there, tied-up with a piece o’ string, a piece o’ string that could only come from one place, namely, Barbados. That is we string, man!”

  “Oh Christ, yes!” Bernice was jumping up and shouting. “And look! the valise has Estelle’s name on it. And it address to, to … care of Miss Bernice Leach, Forest Hill … ”

  “Oh God, she come!” Dots said.

  “She here, man, she here!”

  “She come, she come, Estelle come!” Bernice said. “And didn’t I tell you all the time she …”

  “Estelle in the land, and I did know all the time, that you two stupid womens was only moaning …”

  “Looka, Boysie, shut your damn face, do! You were guessing. How the hell could you alone, outta the three o’ we, have known a thing like that?”

  They waited a little while longer before they saw Estelle come out. She was mad. Carrying a parcel in one hand, her passport in the other, she was looking round for a face she knew. The black woman sitting on her side of the fence was still there; and Estelle looked at her, and said within her heart, I beat you, you bitch! but still it saddened her to see the black woman sitting so long on the bench; and without much hope. And then saw Bernice; and she wanted to scream for joy, for relief; but she realized that many people were watching; and she restrained herself. And she wished she was back in Barbados, because back in Barbados, she wouldn’t give a damn, she would shout as loud as she liked because she was home and free to shout, Bernice, good Jesus Christ, girl, I land, at last! She glanced round and saw the black woman, exiled on her bench, smiling. She too, would know the feeling of exhilaration, had she been back home. “Little, little Estelle, who I used to hold in my hand, when she was a little baby …” Bernice began; but tears were in her eyes now. She
took out a lace handkerchief which Mrs. Burrmann had given her for her birthday, and she moved it in front of her face; and when it reached her mouth, she rested it there for a while, while the water continued to come out of her eyes. And when they passed the fatness of her jaws, they stained the glass because she was still leaning against it. “Little, little Estelle …”

  “She come,” Dots said, “because we can see her standing up there, like a lord, like-like-like a queen. She sure come.” Tears came also to Dots’s eyes, as she spoke. They slid down the white powder on her face, leaving a black mark across the whiteness of the powder. They flowed over the plains of her face, and she did nothing to regulate them, or restrain them. Uncontrolled, they rambled over the powder on her face, that was like snow. Out of the corner of her eyes, she saw Bernice; and Bernice saw her. And she gave the lace handkerchief to Dots, and Dots took it. But she did not wipe away the tears. She let them run. “You know why I shedding tears, gal? I crying because I happy. Estelle come through, and she beat them. Be-Christ, they can’t keep we out o’ this country, no matter how they contrive it! We is good, hard-working people, and they need us, God blind them — pardon my language, gal, but I happy, happy as hell now!” They were her tears of victory; and Bernice’s tears of victory. It was their victory over the experience of arrival. Boysie saw them crying; and he played brave, and sucked disgustedly on his teeth. But he could not regulate the convulsions of his body. And when they moved, the two women, arms round each other, to the door to kiss Estelle, and to throw their arms and their kisses on her, Boysie lingered behind so he might wipe away the sorrow from the joy, with the back of his hand.

  “It was the first time I ever was in a plane. I remember flying over America, God! that America is a place of places! In a way, I wish it was to America, I was going; not that I’m grumbling that it is to Canada that I come; but I couldn’t help saying to myself, that America is really God’s country on earth.” Boysie cleared his throat to object to what Estelle was saying about America; but before he could say anything, his wife interrupted.

  “You in Canada, now, gal!” she said.

  “I know,” Estelle said, “and this is a good place too, ’cause a white lady in the plane asked me where I come from, and where I was going. And when I say, Canada, she said, My goodness! And she went on to say that jobs easy to get here, and there isn’t any problem finding somewhere to live. But I told her I was coming on a holiday, to stay with my sister in Forest Hill, and she didn’t say another word.”

  “Take your time, Estelle,” Bernice cautioned.

  “… when I say I was living in Forest Hill, that white lady didn’t say another word. I wonder why.” Boysie started sniggering. Estelle went on. “Though this is the first time I ever flew, I wasn’t nervous. I was sitting down beside a white gentleman, for more than five hours, and he and I talked about everything under the sun. And when the plane reached the ground, guess what? Christ! when you see that plane putt-putt and landed, I never set eyes on that man again. “ ‘Twas as if he was going to a different world altogether.”

  “He would see you a thousand more times, on Yonge Street or Bloor Street, and he won’t even fart on you,” Boysie said.

  “I don’t see how that could be true, though, because he gave me his telephone number to call him, if I need anything.…”

  “He what?” Dots shrieked. She saw she had lost control of her emotions, and added instead, “What you say he do?” Estelle showed them the card with the man’s company, his name, and his telephone number at his office. Bernice took the card out of her hand, and threw it through the window. Boysie expected a row to follow; and he was surprised when Estelle said nothing. After the tension left the car, Estelle began to talk some more about her flight.

  “Well, anyhow, in that plane, I fell in love with a Chinese lady, who was one of the four stewardesses on the plane. And do you know what struck me as being funny on that plane? She was kept chipping, on her toes, the whole flight, whilst them other three brutes was in the front o’ plane licking their mouths and laughing with the other first-class passengers.”

  “They have Chinese stewardesses, these days?” Dots wondered.

  “Progress,” Boysie commented. “That is one reason why I like this country, and hate Amer’ca so blasted much. Things tough, here. That is true, ’cause I been trying to track-down a job for eight months now. Still, you could see a star o’ progress, here. And that Chinee on that plane is one.”

  Estelle was very excited. She talked and she talked; and she told them about the small boy in the plane who called her Aunt Jemima. “What really made the devil get up in me, was that I was waiting for that child’s mother to scold him.”

  “You still waiting!”

  “Boysie, this is one time you utter a mouthful, boy,” Dots said. “White woman apologize to you? Well, gal, you just come and you got a lot to learn and unlearn. One thing I going tell you, in case this sister o’ yours forget to tell you. And it is this. You weren’t born here. You were not born in Canada. And furthermore, the people who born here, they ain’t black, eh, gal!”

  “Be-Christ, Dots! if I wasn’t behind this steering wheel, I would kiss you ’pon your mouth.”

  “Look, niggerman, mind your manners, eh?”

  “Dots is right, Estelle. We were not born here. We in captivity here.”

  “All the time,” Estelle said, continuing her story, “all the time, I could see my five fingers printed plain plain in that boy’s behind. That is the way we treat children where I come from — if they don’t have manners.”

  “Huh!” Boysie sniggered, “you try it here!”

  “Rudeness is rudeness,” Estelle said. And she said it as a final pronouncement on children, and upon the whole world.

  “The childrens in this outside-world is a different breed o’ beasts altogether, from the ones I uses to know back in Barbados,” Boysie said. All the time he was talking, he never once left the road with his eyes. “They watches too much damn television. Everytime you pass near somebody living room, beChrist! all you hears is bang-bang-bang!”

  “Violence, gal!”

  “But that is children, though, Dots.”

  “Children, my arse — excuse me, Estelle — you mean this brand o’ children.” Boysie was really mad. His words affected everybody in the car; and for some time, there was a general re-shuffling of positions and comfort. Estelle took out a package of Barbadian cigarettes, and made a big stage-show in lighting one. Bernice made a mental note that she wasn’t going to smoke in her apartment, oh no!

  “I would never forget how, one day, Mrs. Burrmann’ second girl-child nearly caused me to go to the gallows,” Bernice said. She paused there, while a little more attentiveness crept imperceptibly into the car. You could hear everybody breathing, as they settled back to listen. Bernice herself had to think hard to remember what she was going to say, because the fact of Estelle’s smoking worried her greatly: she never thought Estelle was a woman who smoked. It was too much. She couldn’t stomach Mrs. Burrman’s drinking and smoking; and Estelle’s smoking, too. She recalled her story, and said, “ ’Twas during the first days I was working for that princess, Mrs. Burrmann. One day … I think it is the first time, too … she ask me to bathe them two brutes o’ hers. Well, I got the firstborn, Serene, in the bath tub, and she licking all the damn cold water … those two children love cold water! they are like eskimoes, heh-heh-heh! … Serene throwing all the blasted cold water up in my face, all in the bathroom, and making the water into waves as if a storm brewing up in the tub. The soap burning my eyes. I feel I losing my sight, but I still laughing with the child all the time, hee-hee-hee-water-water-water cool, cool water! me and she playing we are two children playing. But I vex as bloody hell, and any moment now, I feel I going strangulate or drown the blasted unmannerly child …”

  “Ho-ho!” Boysie brayed; he was enjoying this.

  “Listen, man. The next bastard, Ruthie, the second-born, she come round behind me
. Well, I paying attention now to the next one in the tub, seeing that she don’t drown by mistake, and have all o’ Forest Hills and Mrs. Burrmann out looking to lynch me, blind them! … although, to tell the truth, that was exactly what went through my head. But, murder is murder. Then, as I telling you now, I feel this thing running down my leg, right from up under the middle o’ my behind … pardon me, Boysie, child … in the soft part o’ my behind. Christ! a fright take a hold o’ me. Wait! am I wetting myself already? A young woman like me, starting to wet my trousers so early in life? And then, as I telling you, something told me look round, look round, Bernice, a mind tell me, and inspect thyself when nobody ain’t noticing, and see. Could the water you feel crawling down your leg be your own water, or water from the bath tub? And Jesus God, Dots! when I turn round, that little white bastard was up under my uniform.…”

  “But wait!” Estelle exclaimed, because she could think of nothing else to say.

  “… and her hand was ‘vestigating what she didn’t put down.”

  “Gorr-blummuh!” Boysie said; threatening the whole world. He spoke the threat again, equally viciously, in two distant murderous syllables. “Gorr-blummuh!”

  “But look Satan, gal!” Dots tried not to laugh. “Jesus Christ, what was she searching for, Bernice?” But her laughter was too much for her, and she collapsed, loud, and sensuous and throaty. “Look the devil!” Her heavy breasts were jerking up and down like two pneumatic drills.

  Estelle was vexed; and she asked Bernice, as if challenging her, “And what did you do?”

  “I turned round, and I say, but Miss Ruthie …”

  “Miss Ruthie, my fat arse!” Dots screamed. She was almost hysterical. “Miss Ruthie, hell! You should have slapped her arse till it is still black-and-blue. Miss Ruthie? Miss Ruthie?”

  “Do what, Dots?” Bernice asked, obviously embarrassed and humiliated. “You ask me to touch that woman’s child? And lose my head? And lose my job?”