Red Jacket

by Mordecai, Pamela;

  I would have expected him to be more concerned.

  Yours sincerely,

  Grace Carpenter

  Mr. King come back with the advice that she “shouldn’t worry her head about the health and welfare of this community,” since it was “fine before she came and would remain so after she had gone.” He also remind her that Canada was in the First and not the Third World. At that point, she elect to let the matter drop, for the back-and-forth not achieving anything.

  Wishful thinking! Polite disagreement blossom into a big kas-kas. The fuss in the Globe and Mail hop nimbly over to a magazine called City Weekly, and another called Current, where a writer name Mary Hellman take it up in her column. People now writing letters and columnists taking sides, but by this time, Grace staying out of it. The flare-up in Current was early in February, and she despair when the sparks from that fire ignite the student papers in March.

  At that point, the Foreign Students Association get in on the act. Unhappy with the lightly veiled racism underlying some of the commentary, they arrange a discussion on April 7. Grace never want to have anything to do with it, for she have plenty work, but they press her, and she finally agree to participate. Flyers trumpet that the forum will encourage a “frank and free exchange.”

  So at seven o’clock in the lounge at Hardy House, Grace, Malcolm Hinds, presenter of “This City Now,” a program on the campus radio station, CIUT, and Mary Hellman from Current are scheduled to be on a panel. After that, there will be comments and questions from the floor. Grace share her misgivings with the chairman, a Nigerian medical student named Kwame Edo. She tell him she not up-to-date on the relevant figures concerning incidence of death among youth in the city, whether by sickness or otherwise, and other statistics and information relevant to the discussion. Also, she suspect that her mouth going lock up with fright, plus she not able to compromise her scholarship. He assure her it will go well.

  Grace present herself in the student lounge at 6:45 p.m. to find that Steph is already there, gently flirting with Kwame and a next man, still in his winter coat, who must be Malcolm Hinds. She see one, two other people in the room, but the attendance is sparse. Kwame wave her over, looking at his watch as she walking across.

  “We’ve made a big blunder, and also hit some bad luck,” Kwame get right to it. “We’ve just been discussing what to do about it.”

  “What kind of blunder?” Grace ask.

  “As you see, there aren’t many of us gathered here.”

  “I can see that. Yes.”

  “Also, we’ve had a phone call from the columnist at the Current,” Kwame is irritated, “to say she’ll be late. We’re wondering if we should reschedule.”

  “Okay. That’s the ‘also.’ What about the big blunder?”

  “Tonight’s the very first Toronto Blue Jays game. Ever.” He shrug. “We forgot. I don’t think anyone else is going to show up. Plenty people are either at the game or watching it on TV. Several of the Trotskyites were here earlier, but when a fellow came in to report that police were working over some students in front of Robarts, and they heard that there was violence, they scooted off.”

  “There’s something else.” Malcolm Hinds, flecks of snow still decorating hair and coat, sniffle into a handkerchief. “Some senior ladies who run the William Wordsworth Society have been promoting a free event, with Donald Sutherland reading Wordsworth’s poetry, for today. It’s on at Hart House, donuts and coffee afterwards.”

  “Donald Sutherland? How could they manage that?” Kwame ask.

  “U of T graduate. It’s his birthday. He’s two hundred and eight,” contributed by Steph, helpful, smiling at Kwame.

  “Sutherland?” Kwame, incredulous.

  Steph gurgle, “No, silly. Wordsworth!”

  Hinds, restless, ready to leave, snort into the hanky again. “I’m going there after this. There’s a rumour one of the ladies had an affair with Sutherland. She was here as a mature student. I’m interviewing her.”

  He shake Kwame’s hand, nod goodbye to the others.

  “I’ll be in touch about a reschedule. Thanks, man.”

  “No trouble. You have my number.”

  The Toronto Blue Jays won, the city was euphoric, the old ladies produced a fine actor named Donald Sutherland, but not the movie star. Grace wrote Lindsay about the whole affair. He never answered. The event was never rescheduled.

  In the end, good come from bad, as Pa maintain. When she add Colin’s death to a discussion about hungry-belly children pre-empted by a ball game and multiply the sum by the controversy her letters cause, the result equal a revision of what she intend to study. It was like, by means of the letters, she reach out to touch a set of circumstances larger than herself, a web of contemptible attitudes and behaviours that recall Manny, Aloysius, and the kowtowing dance in Toronto General on the day she find out migraines been tormenting her since she was a child. She going ally herself with her Christophian countrymen at the hospital, join the struggle, and “do her do” as best she can.

  At the end of August, Lindsay come back, looking tall and suave. She could see he was dressing instead of just putting clothes on, and he have the tiniest bit of a Australian accent. He greet her as if he write her a letter every day, proclaim how rigorous the program was, how he scurry around with assignments all year long, how every letter from her make him glad.

  He say he staying in Toronto till fall and he hope to see lots of her. He is very charming, and so Grace forgive him. Once he come, Steph tease her, say she look gorgeous and glowing. True, whether sake of Lindsay, summer, or both, she feel good: no migraines, no sick stomach, no splotchy vision. But she always feel better once it get warm, even when the temperature rise a little in winter. Anytime that happen, she is bouncy, cruising smooth. Studying is easy — she understand with no effort. Lindsay persuade her to go with him to watch the Caribana festival parade. She enjoy the music, but not the dancing and the daring costumes. Lindsay tease her and tell her she is a prude.

  Many a time afterwards, as she contemplate the mad course she plot that summer, she wonder if the up-and-down cycle of good-then-bad feeling is because she is really crazy. After all, madness run in the blood, and she, poor she, don’t know whose blood is in her! The crazy course she set concern a lovey-dovey affair.

  Lovey-dovey is all around, hand holding, bum squeezing, deep-throat kissing in the library stacks, on the street corner, at every kind of event. Pa had a way to hum a calypso tune, “Love, Love Alone,” about how the ex-King of England love Miss Simpson so much he give up his throne for her.

  She don’t know about that kind of love, don’t have no example of it in her life. Pa love Ma for sure, but nothing like that. And Pansy was just force ripe and ready for big-woman business. Grace know about sex, of course, like every country pikni. Sudden as a midday rainstorm, she is back on the mattress in Wentley, listening to the susuing nightly news, as delivered by Pansy, Stewie, and Edgar, after Ma fall asleep, all ears upright, alarmed by the multitudinous dangers awaiting those who risk the highways and byways of illicit sexual activity.

  Ma tell her before she leave that never mind she is a big brains, she is a woman too, so she better be thoughtful about any attachment she form and she better make sure not to rush into anything. “Don’t make any sweet-mouth man coax you to open your legs before you good and ready!” Lindsay arrive back in Toronto when she make up her mind she is ready — for what, she never really know. She know the mechanics, of course, and courtesy of Beastly Buxton, a swell-up penis come near enough to her parts. But as she make her plan that July, the memory of what she flee from at Miss Carmen’s should have prompt her to consider “good” as well as “ready.”

  True, she like Lindsay; he like her; they are easy with each other. He is sort of shy; she like that about him. And true, he probably need encouraging, but she confident she can do that. And she is not any immature adolescent, seducing him like Pansy seduce Mortimer. She is a big woman, old enough to do what everyb
ody else is doing, Lindsay no doubt included. But also true that Lindsay never send her any romantic signals, and equally true she never really have any romantic feelings about him.

  It turn out worse than her wildest imagining. She never throw herself at him for it never get that far. All the same, she end up feeling trashy. And poor Lindsay! Embarrassed to confess he never like her “in that way.” She couldn’t stop bawling, she feel so shame. She vex with Steph for going home for the weekend. She vex with Lindsay for coming to Toronto. She vex with everything and everybody. She so mash up that next day, Sunday, she find her way to Beloved, first time in months. She jump and clap in the service like a jack-in-the-box, glad when they fuss round her, vowing regular attendance after that.

  One week later she get a letter from Lindsay to say that in truth he love a Carpenter, but not she — her brother, Edgar, the sad poet. It never take her long to get into the ring with her favorite boxing partner. Buff! Why, if he is God Almighty, he never whisper caution into her ear? Buff! Why he so bad mind when she never do him anything? Buff! How come he hate her so, hate her since she was little? Buff! Why he don’t want her to fit anywhere? Not into the Carpenter family, not properly. Certainly not into the snooty high school in Queenstown. Not in this cold, foreign place where they count her as a alien. Buff! Buff! Buff! Not even in a normal man-woman relationship! Buff! She throw blows so fast, the Deity don’t get a chance to land a return punch.

  Then she remember Edgar and Lindsay. Lindsay insist they are a couple, from as long ago as when he was in St. Chris. Couple or not, her brother is in big trouble. Sodomy is illegal in St. Chris. Homosexuals have to hide, all except the rich and powerful. But she can’t think of anything to do to help. Edgar have to tell the others, if he choose. Then, if he smart, he will escape, maybe here to Toronto, where they mostly live and let live in those matters.

  She take more tablets than she should, go to bed, and stay there for three days, pillow on her head, drinking warm Coke, eating plain crackers, cursing a God who keep picking on her and who now take set on her poor brother. A pebbly voice remind her she is going to a fine university, free of charge; she have forebears and siblings that love her; a down-to-earth roommate she get along with; a church community that always glad to see her; and the very best marks.

  So what?

  MARK

  17

  The Chancellor Considers

  The chancellor’s suite at the University of the Antilles is a stunning combination of state-of-the-art and down-home. It boasts TV viewing on a gigantic screen, music on a Bose system, a kitchen to make a gourmet chef’s mouth water. At the same time, the rooms celebrate the island, from bamboo floors through furniture of blue mahoe to intuitive paintings by Pamungo and Ngosao. If the North thinks it knows posh, St. Chris is where it must come to be set straight.

  Eyes closed, Mark is relaxing in a leather recliner, a surprise gift from Mona. It had been waiting there when the principal showed him the suite on his first visit as chancellor.

  Celia sticks her head in just as Mark settles back in the large leather chair.

  “Can I make you a cuppa to start the day, sir?”

  “No, Celia. I’m fine, thanks.”

  “I’m off, then. I’ve still a few things to do.” She turns to go and then swings round to ask, “Have you spoken with Dr. Carpenter?”

  “Actually, no, not yet. Why do you ask?”

  “I just wondered.” She smiles again and he thinks he detects something. For a split second he has a vision of the St. Chris trash weekly, Kris-eye, with front page headlines that shriek, “Honoured Guest Back to Rub Chancellor’s Belly?”

  Mind made up to set the outlandish imaginings aside, he goes into the kitchen, turns on the kettle, and finds that he’s still wondering about the look on Celia’s face. He’s being paranoid. It’s been years, and besides, they were discreet. Except of course for the farewell at Logan Airport, for which he now curses Grace. But it’s absurd. Nobody who knew them had been anywhere nearby.

  Now Celia is gone, he does want a cup of tea. Feeling lazy, he sprinkles tea leaves straight into a china teapot — Mona insists tea only tastes right in china. He pours the tea when it’s brewed, sips, sets the cup aside, tips the recliner back, and closes his eyes. Time to work out what the chaps are up to, what the agendas are.

  He wishes he knew more about the brain, about the relationship between intellect, intuition, and imagination. He’d been surprised at his invitation to the seminar, a three-day meeting in Cambridge sponsored by World Resources Institute, for his research and writing had been confined to what was needed in his job and therefore had constituted mostly reports for the bank in the previous few years. Six working groups, and yet somehow Grace and he had ended up on the same one. They slogged on, three women and one man, late into the last night, and then Agnes, a South African, and Fatima, from Delhi, begged off. Though both were staying in the hotel, they had spouses put up in nearby bed-and-breakfasts whom they were anxious to join. There’d been nothing for Grace and him to do, as the unencumbered ones, but volunteer to tidy up the report for the plenary next day.

  They fell asleep on the divan in Fatima’s room where they’d all been working. At just after three they woke together, roused by a noisy heating vent, for though the days were unseasonably warm, the nights got pretty cool. A hiccup at the start, then it ran smooth and sweet as molasses.

  “There’s just one thing, Mark. I take it you’re not married? Because if you are, we can’t do this.”

  “I am married, Grace, but we haven’t lived together as man and wife for almost three years.” It was true, word for word. Mona and he hadn’t made love for about that long. He and Grace ended up having great sex for the next couple of hours, after which they’d napped. He’d stirred first, content, and so cursed, as Mona said often, to be reflective.

  “There are two people inside of you,” he declared, rolling over to face her.

  “Two people in me?” Grace raised an eyebrow. “No way. One’s plenty.”

  “Not just you, or me. Two people in all of us,” he insisted.

  “Sorry. I’m not following you. It must be the recent, exhausting activity.”

  “One must examine one’s life,” he persisted, “to gain perspective.”

  “Some folks have a cigarette after sex. Some have a shower. Some have sex again. You philosophize?”

  “That’s because I always wanted to be a teacher.” He’d wanted to be other things too, but that one popped out, so he didn’t take it back.

  “Okay. Shoot. If you can.” She smiled at his penis.

  “There’s the ideal person, the one you’d like to be, and the real person, the one you are.”

  “That’s the actual person. According to Steph.”

  “Who is Steph?”

  “My roommate at U of T, who saved me in foreign. She did English.”

  “Okay. Two people, one ideal, one actual.”

  “So who bedded me?”

  “Since it was indubitably idyllic, I would have to say my ideal self.”

  “Cor-nee! I’ve been had by a vintage, sweet-mouth, St. Chris saga boy.”

  “That’s heartless!”

  “As for me, I’m happy to say that was the actual me. See?” She leaned over and licked his ears, nipples, navel. They’d gone at it again till the bells rang six.

  “I’ve never done this before,” she’d announced as they picked through the clothes on the floor. It stopped him. She was no virgin.

  “Are you on the pill?”

  “Why would I be?”

  “Suppose you have a baby, Grace?”

  “Suppose you do?”

  The last day went superbly: good reports, the concluding statement not too ambitious, the final reception affording thanks, toasts, no speeches. They’d spent the last couple of hours old-talking by the river before going to the airport. She was going to London, then Geneva, and then some place in Africa.

  He couldn’t believe his luc
k: a halfway decent meeting; unexpected and excellent sex; a clean leave-taking, the woman off to be occupied with her life.

  “If I get pregnant,” she said over her shoulder as she got in line at the gate, “I’ll name the baby for Ma or Pa. Just tell me if you want to know.”

  A couple nearby looked up. He flushed, black as he was. She saw his discomfort, smiled, and went through the gate.

  JIMMY

  18

  Ordination

  On Thursday, 15 September 1988, the feast day of Notre Dame des Douleurs, patron saint of Mabuli, Bishop Ndule of the diocese of Benke will ordain Michael Nathan Nabene, Simeon Peter Lubonli, and James Nathaniel Atule.

  Crowds of tourists, believing and unbelieving, flood Benke for the national feast day. They come mostly to gape at the great church and to be part of the Procession of Renewal of La Cathédrale de Notre-Dame-des-Douleurs, as Mapome, when she was alive, always called it. When the church was built in 1806, the Mbula, a clan related to the Fulani who live in the North, near the desert, created the decoration for the cathedral in a style similar to that of the Gourounsi. Mbula artists had renewed it every year since.

  The ritual preparations for this annual maintenance process involve treks to forest and kouris to find a special tree bark and a fine, loess-type dirt, which yield dyes that contribute two colours to the decorations: a deep indigo and a brilliant cerulean blue. Both, it is said, are not to be seen anywhere else on earth. There are costumes, music, dancing. At first, anyone could join the search and festivities. Now it costs ten US dollars or the equivalent in buleles.

  If visitors wonder at the choice of the Sorrowful Mother of God as the country’s patron saint, it has never been a difficulty for Mabulians, who agree that the story of the Dame Bleue des Douleurs, one of three great fables from the Mabuli Chronicles, foreshadowed her selection.