The Meeting Point

by Austin Clarke

  Agatha had meanwhile organized the women in a parlour game. She had missed Henry; she would have left but knew he would come back to take her home. (“I hope he’s not up to any of his tricks, like the day I dressed and waited for him for three hours, with Mother screaming her head off, and he turned up late, as usual, without an excuse.” He had never left her like this before; and she was a bit nervous.) The game they were playing, was Botticelli, a game of guessing. Dots liked it, although she did not really understand it; and she was screaming her head off. Estelle remained sedate, tired, bored, but slightly happier now. Bernice, once or twice, opened the door, and listened to what was going on downstairs at Mrs. Burrmann’s party, and when she caught snatches of the civil rights song, We Shall Overcome, she smiled, and went back to the game. Neither she nor Dots had guessed anything correctly; (Estelle just watched, and exchanged an occasional smile with Brigitte, who was listening to the radio) and Agatha purposely mis-guessed, so as to allow the other women to win. But they did not. Agatha, nevertheless, persisted in making the chances of their winning very great; and only once did she actually wonder, “if their IQ is really correlated to their cultural deprivation.…”

  Boysie drove to the end of Marina Boulevard; and then reversed. He did not turn on the car lights. The engine was still running when he stopped. He reversed again and came back to the original parking spot. Henry said nothing about this odd behaviour. Perhaps he didn’t find it odd. And of course, Boysie did not think he had to explain this small diversion. Back to where they had set out from, twice, Boysie eventually turned off the engine; and he reclined in his seat, as before, and began talking. “I wonder, what the hell them women doing up there?”

  “Forget the women, man. We is men.”

  “They must be giving that poor woman, Agatha, a damn hard time!”

  “Or they could be treating her like a blasted queen, too.”

  And this stopped further comment. Henry closed his eyes, and found that his eyes and his entire head were revolving; and his body began to revolve, and the car too. And when he opened them, the revolving stopped. He knew he was drunk. He closed one eye, his left eye, and the revolving did not begin. He closed his right eye, and it didn’t begin, either. He was drunk in a strange way. Boysie was talking: “… you want to know something, man? I goes home at night, late late sometimes, gorblummuh! Sometimes I don’t reach home till the morning following the night that I left; and I does lay-down beside Dots, in the same bed, but the two o’, we does be in two different worlds, altogether, entirely. And once, on a night like this night, I get suddenly frighten, frighten as arse. And I jumped up outta the bed, and all the time, Dots rubbing my back and the back o’ my neck with limacol, thinking I was having a nightmare. But the blasted nightmare I was having, was Dots! I wasn’t having no other nightmare. And I run outside the bedroom, and into the indoor-shit-house, and Henry, you want to know something? I puked and puked and puked, till I thought that all I had inside o’ me, was puke and not guts.”

  “You was drunk.”

  “No, man. I wasn’t drunk no drunk.”

  “You was having a nightmare, then.”

  “No! I wasn’t drunk and I wasn’t having no damn nightmare. What cause me to spring-up like a blasted tiger cat outta the bed, was that sudden so, before my eyes, just as I come outta a deep sleep, I saw my wife, Dots, in old age, as a old woman, be-Christ, and she had false teeth and rimless glasses, and she was peeing herself left and right, and was too feeble to perform the ordinary duties o’ life, like going and coming from the bathroom. And you want to know something? Gorblummuh! it was me, me a young man, who had to clean and wipe Dots. Look man, Henry, I was never scared so much in all my life! I was shaking like two leaves, when I crawled back in that bed, that night. And from that night, I never make love never, never had a piece o’ love with Dots.”

  “Jesus God!”

  “I have kept this to myself for almost seven months now, seeing as how I know you in all that time, and I never picked my teeth to you with a indication of it … look man, from that night, seven months, running into almost eight months …”

  “You mean to tell me that in seven months, you haven’t lay-down on top o’ your wife, and did a little thing, old man?”

  “Seven fucking months!”

  “Be-Jesus Christ!”

  “Seven months! November the ‘leventh gone, is seven months. I cannot tell you neither, what is the colour, nor the embroidery, o’ the bloomers and panties Dots, my wife, does wear. Seven months.”

  “Seven months is a long time, man.”

  “Don’t misunderstand me. Don’t mistake anything in my words. I not saying that once in a while, when I come home drunk as arse, or when my outside-woman playing the arse, that I don’t lay-down on Dots’ belly. I am not saying that, at all! But what I am saying to you, is that each and every time I do that, my mind does be wandering, and I have to imagine it is Brigitte or somebody else I laying-down on top of … ”

  “Wait! you mean to tell me that you hit that German stuff already?”

  “No no no! you misunderstanding me, man.” The poetry in the rum in his head, was wearing off. He noticed he was finding it difficult to get his words out. “Instead,” he said, “instead o’ thinking and telling myself that I am laying-down underneath Dots, whilst in the act … ”

  “Laying-down underneath?” Henry exclaimed. “Man, you should be on top! You is the man. A man should be on top!”

  “I say laying-down on top, man.”

  “No, you say, underneath! Jesus, I am not deaf, man. I hear you say, one second ago, Boysie Cumberbatch, that I am laying-down underneath Dots … ”

  “Anyhow, that ain’t the point, so forget that.” Boysie was becoming a little mad. “What I trying to say is, that the once or the twice when I laying down on top of Dots, I have to tell myself that I am laying down on top of somebody else, entirely different. And I don’t even have to know that person. Understand? That person do not have to exist. That person could exist, but I don’t have to know that the particular person is really an existing person. I just mention Brigitte by name, because she looks like the kind o’ person it could be. But it could be Mrs. Burrmann, or Estelle, or the Japanee girl, or anybody else. Instead o’ me laying-down on Dots, it is Brigitte in this instance, that I laying-down on top of. Understand?”

  Henry was very uncomfortable with all this involved talking. His head was registering circles of argument and logic; and when he closed his eyes to think harder, it was worse. Eventually, he gave up; and luckily for him, when he looked towards the house, to take his mind off Boysie’s problems, he saw Bernice leading Agatha, Brigitte and Dots to the car.

  Brigitte said goodnight, and clip-clopped groggily between two houses, and out of sight. Henry pinched Boysie on his leg. Then Bernice came round to where he was sitting, and said, “Estelle say ‘night.” And to Agatha, she said, “I glad to meet you. You’s really a lot of fun.” And Agatha shook her hand, and waited until Dots invited her into the car. The two women got into the back, and Dots said, “Boysie, let we go home and jump in that bed, boy. Tired as a ox!” She laughed a short sensuous laugh; but Boysie, fearing she might say something more personal about their married life, switched on the radio; and when he found a rock-’n’-roll station, turned up the music so loud, that nobody could talk. Just as they were about to turn off Marina Boulevard, they saw somebody walking fast towards them. Dots recognized him first. “But where he going this time o’ night? And in this district, at that?” Boysie slowed down; and instantly, Henry recognized Freeness, walking briskly, with shoulders hunched, probably in determination and in anticipation of drinks, eats and women. Boysie and Henry burst out laughing. Although Agatha did not really know what was going on, she laughed too.

  “Oh-Jees-and-ages!” Henry sniggered, imitating Freeness; and in that mood, they turned off Marina and travelled towards Agatha’s home, which was to be the first stop.

  “But where he could be goin
g, this time o’ morning, or night?” Dots wondered, aloud. She was very worried about Freeness; and her worry must have become contagious, because instead of moving off with the green light, Boysie turned round in the middle of the road and headed back for Marina Boulevard. “Boysie, are you drunk? Where the hell you taking we? … excuse my language, Miss Agaffa, dear.” But Boysie said nothing until he spotted Freeness, slowing down in front of the Burrmanns’ house. Then she knew. She breathed easily, and then laughed. She put Freeness in the back seat with her and Agatha.

  “Man, that’s a funny funny thing, pardners,” Freeness said, excited, without having first told them what he was talking about. “A funny funny thing! oh-Jees-and-ages! boy, when I got off that street car, a police rushed me, and start asking me a lot o’ questions! Good thing a white woman get off with me, and could tell the police I just got off, too. Jees-and-ages, wait! this place becoming as bad as New York, pardners!” Henry remained silent, and allowed Freeness to talk.

  Bernice lingered for a while by the gate, after the car left. She looked across the street, up to the third floor of the house that faced her. She saw a light in Brigitte’s room. She wondered if Boysie was up there with Brigitte, then remembered that it was Boysie who had driven Dots and the others home a moment ago. And Henry had left in the same car.

  A car was parked across the street, a little distance from where she was standing. Looking round further, she noticed the long line of garbage pails standing at the front gates, like stubby fortresses. She looked at her own gate. No pail: she had forgotten to bring out her garbage. But she wasn’t thinking of garbage tonight. Go to hell, garbage, she said. And then she was sorry, for she was a clean woman. She stood in the cool air, thinking; the wind was tugging at her hair; and she felt the wind kiss her cheeks. Her mind now went to Estelle: Estelle got in safe, praise God; but I have to see whether me and she could set horses together. And she thought of Mrs. Burrmann; she thought she had heard them quarrelling as she passed them on the way out with her guests. That poor, lonely, unhappy woman! Lord help her, for she shouldn’t be always having to quarrel … Bernice and Mrs. Burrmann, two sad women, two lonely women, sad and lonely for two different reasons. Bernice wondered whether she knew the reasons for Mrs. Burrmann’s sadness. She wondered …

  It was time to sleep: time to get outta this blasted freezing wind, gal. Tomorrow morning does come too damn quick in this country. I have a hell of a lot o’ things to do in that kitchen in the morning, and Estelle living with me, now; and I can’t say yet how living under the same roof as her, will turn out, ’cause I hardly know her. And then she went back inside. She was going up to her room when she stopped and heard: “Sam, I think I’ve been a good wife to you, I think I’ve tried to keep your home as a home, I’ve always kept myself tidy, because I remember when Serene was born and things were a bit tough, you remember? when you were doing extra studies in Law, you used to comment on the shabby way I used to look around the house … but then, things were hard then, remember? things were hard, then …” and as she moved off, she loved Mrs. Burrmann very much; a woman with a heavy responsibility of being a woman and a wife and a mother and an employer; and she forgot the amount of time Mrs. Burrmann spent drinking. She told herself that she had to drink, in order not to let life, and those hard things in life, get the better of her. Mr. Burrmann, when I come to think of it, is a real brute to treat you as he treats you, she said. That woman spends all her time in this house, looking after her children. Christ! it took her nearly twelve months before she would let me touch them two girl-children, even to bathe them … all the time she does spend knitting things for that Mr. Burrmann, and for the two kiddies, and she have enough money that she could buy everything brand-new and at the most expensive o’ prices and still, she treats him as husband and man. Lord, these bitches you put in this world as men and husbands! Help me not to get myself trapped with one o’ them, do, Lord, heh-heh-heh!

  She passed the squabbling which came from Mrs. Burrmann’s bedroom and walked along the silent corridor to the children’s room. She opened the door, and walked in, in the vague night light. She tip-toed up to the larger bundle of striped bedclothes and she unknotted the sheets from Serene’s young body. She spread the sheets properly, then kissed the peaceful face on the left cheek. She moved over to the other single bed and tried to take the coloured doll out of Ruthie’s grip; but Ruthie, conscious in her sleep, of this intended rape, clutched all the firmer. Bernice rested the small india-rubber hand on the child’s breast. She kissed Ruthie too … “You too damn young to suffer becausing your two parents in there don’t have any decencies …!” she climbed the stairs and she could feel tears coming down her face. But she did nothing to stop them. Mrs. Burrmann, poor soul, poor you, Mrs. Burrmann.

  When she reached her apartment, she called for Estelle; but Estelle was already asleep on the chesterfield with her clothes still on. Bernice was mad. It was an insult: Christ! this girl didn’t even ask me where she going to sleep, but she bound off and sleep!

  She pulled the blanket up over her sister. She sat by the window. (Estelle had not pulled out the chesterfield to make it into a bed.) Bernice was too tired to wake her and so remained by the window. She turned off the lights and closed the plastic curtains so she might see outside, without being seen. She was studying Brigitte’s window. A car came along worm-slowly; blew its horn very softly and immediately, a light went on in Brigitte’s room. The car honked again, softly. The light went off and came on, twice, like a blinker sending a message. Bernice listened carefully. Then a man came out of the car, closed the door without a noise; and walked beside the house, Brigitte’s house. Soon, Bernice was seeing images behind the curtains in Brigitte’s room, which had not been closed properly. It must have been a long time that Bernice sat there, in the freezing, lonely night, because just before she got up to go to the bathroom, a milkman dropped a white bowling pin of a bottle on the front steps of the house opposite.

  2

  THE TASTE OF THE APPLE

  Bernice had grown accustomed to her triangle of life, in thirty-two months of working with Mrs. Burrmann. It was a life that centred round her kitchen, her radio and her princess telephone. It was a life, which, although restricted by virtue of her being a domestic in Forest Hill Village, nevertheless, was an interesting perspective into the world around her, the world of riches in Forest Hill itself. Because of which, she never considered changing this world. Nobody could get her to change her daily pattern of existence. “I happy as hell in Canada,” she once told Dots; and Dots had to wonder whether it was the same person who had said last week, “Canada, Mississippi, Alabama, South Africa, God, they is the same thing!” And when Dots asked how, Bernice added, “As far as a black person is concerned.” This made Dots very unhappy and confused. But it was this ambivalence which Bernice entertained even with the Burrmann’s: on Monday morning, she hated Mrs. Burrmann for what she had done to her over the weekend, and by Friday, she was in Mrs. Burrmann’s corner, blaming Mr. Burrmann for his wife’s drinking. And she would say he was giving his wife a dog’s life. And sometimes too, she would say, “Child, it is Canada that liberate me, you hear?” One Thursday afternoon, when Dots was visiting her, Bernice pulled from under her chesterfield, a handful of wrinkled and dog-eared Muhammad Speaks (the newspaper of the Muslims in America) and some Jet magazines. She had been introduced to these by her cousin in Harlem. “Look at the facts o’ your life,” she said, holding them in Dots’s face. “Here! read the truth ’bout yourself.” And she tossed them into Dots’s lap. Deep inside her, Bernice really felt she could be happier living somewhere else; maybe even in Harlem. (She had never considered going to Africa.) She thought of returning home; but she knew the chances of living happily there, depended upon the amount of money she could save here; and after hearing Estelle talk about the number of people unemployed back home, and after talking with some domestics who had gone back on holidays, Bernice decided that going back to Barbados to live, was n
ot such a good idea after all. She was, in a sense, as happy on Marina Boulevard, as she could be (as a black woman) anywhere else in North America.

  Before Estelle’s arrival, Bernice could not conceive of anyone living in her apartment with her. She resented the intrusion upon her cleanliness, tidiness and order. Yet, the closer her sister’s arrival drew, the happier she became. She was going to have someone to talk to; someone with whom to share her loneliness. But the moment Estelle arrived, Bernice saw the mistake. It might have been better to have brought up Lonnie: at least Lonnie is a man … Lonnie that damn woman-hound, always wanting something, always writing asking for something as if he think I am up here working off my backside in his behalfs …! And she thought of what Estelle’s presence would do to her on Thursdays, her days off; her day for putting her wages in the bank; her relaxation and visits downtown; and sometimes, her little laughing and drinking (“Just a Coca-Cola for me, Mr. Geary, please. You don’t know I is a Christian?”) at the WIF Club. On those Thursdays which coincided with her wage-days, Bernice would take a bus from Marina Boulevard to entrust her wages to the Personal Chequing Account she had opened with the Royal Bank of Canada, near the corner of Eglinton and Yonge Streets. Something about the name, and the impressively printed lion, yeah, the British lion! and her name — her own name! — on her own cheques (a prestige she could never have hoped to attain in Barbados, in her class) drew her, like a magnet, to put her money into the safekeeping of this bank. The very name — Royal Bank! — impressed upon her, the worthiness and durability of the bank: a bank where her money would never be in danger. But it was only recently that she had come to regard banks as being safe for her money. She could not forget that night in Barbados, when the flames vied with the moonlight for the possession of the Penny Bank; and they fought the moon’s fluorescence for all the life-savings of the poor villagers. That night, Lord, it was in the dry season, I think, and the dollar bills and the shingles off the house burn and turn into leaves o’ black brittle wafers, or like crusts of soot; and they blow all over the village, like if they was interests o’ grief. Lord, and I would never forget how, even before the last speck o’ black burned-up shingle-money had disappeared from the skies, like black-birds flying home, that man, Mr. Toppin the owner, manager, president and inventor o’ the Penny Bank, was already halfway on his way to Harlem, New York City, America. Five years! and fifty dollars and forty-five cents I had saved-up, all the money to my name, to pay down on a house with. Five, ought, forty-five and five!