On the Way Back

by Montague Kobbé

  Bottom line is I won’t go out for dinner tonight. In fact, I will do absolutely nothing at all tonight. I will get home, cook myself some fish, and sit in front of the TV until I fall asleep. Exactly the same thing I did last week, and the week before last, and the one before that. Not because I’m sad or depressed or anything like that, but because there is simply nothing else to do in Anguilla on a Sunday. There’s nothing else to do in Anguilla generally, but Sundays are even worse. At least if it were Friday I would know where to go. On Fridays the night comes alive at The Velvet. You can see the girls get horny to the rhythms of soca or calypso. They really can dance, these girls, really can shake those hips. But then they seem to disappear for the rest of the week. You never see them anymore. You certainly don’t see them on a Sunday night. Sunday is the day of the Lord, and Sunday night must be the night of the Lord, or the husbands, or the goats, but they’re sure not the night to be seen. Friday night is the night to be seen, to have some fun. Still, better one night of entertainment a week than no night at all. I’ll just go home, cook, sit in front of the TV, and wait till next Friday. Let’s see what I can catch then.

  III

  While Sheila Rawlingson-Jones spent the best part of the month that followed the extended celebrations of carnival in Anguilla crossing out the names included on her pointless list, Dragon suddenly found himself immersed in negotiations to buy a Trislander from the Dominican Republic. The addition of Arturo Sarmiento to the company was an immediate boost, not only morally, but also pragmatically—he had knowledge of the technical detail that mattered; he could communicate with the negotiators in Spanish; he could ask the right questions and provide Dragon with insightful information. But there was one thing not even Arturo could fix: the fact that, once again, even if the plane proved ideal and the price right, Dragon Wings could not afford to purchase it.

  Although the plane was, in fact, far from ideal, its general condition anything but clear, and the story behind it positively shady, the times did not allow Dragon and Co. the luxury of selection. For very much the same reasons why beggars cannot be choosers, Dragon and Arturo found themselves piecing together a puzzle, with the main objective of finding out whether the aircraft in question would actually be legal. The Trislander had been privately owned by a Dominican businessman who had leased it to a small company which had used it as a cargo plane to run the route between Santo Domingo and San Juan de Puerto Rico. It had been stripped of its inside but all the interior had been kept in the hangar at the airport so the plane could be cleaned (industrially, the Dominicans worryingly insisted) and restored to its original configuration.

  In technical terms, the Trislander would provide considerable improvement to the commercial potential of Dragon Wings. Averaging a speed of 140 knots/hour, it could take seventeen passengers anywhere from the Virgin Islands to Antigua within an hour: flights to St. Barths, Nevis, and Barbuda—destinations with the same scent of exclusivity as Anguilla—could become Dragon Wings’s niche; direct flights to Statia could exploit the appeal of scuba-diving day trips in one of the most privileged locations in the Caribbean; meanwhile, daily flights to St. Kitts and Antigua would appease both the government’s and the HTA’s desire (condition, in fact) to use the airline as an air-bridge to destinations other than St. Martin, which linked the region with Europe.

  The seventeen-seat Trislander was perhaps not the best option to deploy an intricate net of connections from Anguilla to the rest of the Windward Islands, or even the rest of the Leeward Islands, but it was the only option readily available to Dragon Wings, and seventeen seats were better than nine, and two planes were certainly better than one, and US $150,000 seemed like a reasonable price, and a Trislander, with its distinctive third engine above the rudder, could become a trademark around the islands for an emerging airline. So, Dragon pressed on with the investigation, found that Mr. Alexandre Martínez was a respected businessman from Santo Domingo involved in a number of enterprises in the city, from real estate management to waste disposal. Dominair, the cargo airline which had leased the Trislander for the past five years from Alexandre Martínez, claimed they could transfer anything from door to door between the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico. The price list included a section for livestock—chickens, goats, pigs—and fresh food. It also encouraged customers to “challenge us”: an attitude which did nothing to appease Dragon’s concerns regarding the legality of the aircraft and the company.

  But the time was not ripe for Dragon’s trust to play any role in the negotiations, because after his third conversation with Alexandre Martínez the next obvious step should have been to go to Santo Domingo to carry out a personal inspection of the airplane, to have a look at the logbooks, to make certain the condition of the interior of the plane was acceptable, to begin the actual transaction, to dispense with all this talking. Except, of course, Dragon could not do this, because he had no means to fund the trip, because even if the trip were to be financed by Jones Investments’ PC1171 “expense line,” the company still had no means of funding the purchase of the machine, because there was no way in hell he would allow Nathaniel to make use of Jones Investments to assemble Dragon Wings’s fleet of aircrafts. So Dragon stalled the negotiation, sat on his hands, stopped contacting Alexandre Martínez, and simply watched as the month of September slowly turned the dream of a commercial airline in Anguilla into smoke.

  IV

  Sheila Rawlingson-Jones parked her 4x4 SUV on the muddy road at the top of the steep hill that led to Gwendolyn Stewart’s house in Island Harbour. She looked in the backseat and pulled out of a thick folder one of the numerous files with the details of the proposition to join Dragon Wings. Sheila dipped her small sandals in the mud as she walked around the house, hips unusually close together, their swaggering consciously restrained, to find Auntie Gwen sitting on her reclining chair, gazing at the indigo sea from her backyard. Auntie Gwen hardly said a word once she caught sight of Sheila, simply let out a warm smile that served the purpose of a welcome. Sheila was ashamed to conduct business with the unnameable friend who not so long ago had made possible the prolongation of her happiness with Nathaniel Jones, but when she brought up the episode Auntie Gwen acted as if she had forgotten all about it. Tell me, nuh. Wha’ brings you here? I know is not for me you come. Auntie Gwen sent a scrutinizing—sharp, avid, alert—look in the direction of the file Sheila held between her hands. Sheila understood that at her old age, Auntie Gwen felt she did not have much time left to waste on small talk. Auntie Gwen, I wan’ talk business wit’ you for a little while.

  Business propositions and personal requests were all Auntie Gwen ever got these days. Hardly anyone bothered to visit her at all unless they had a problem that needed solving. She had reached that stage of life where there was no longer any point in asking how she was, where hardly anything at all could make her feel better—or worse. Auntie Gwen was fully aware of everything that happened around her, she was in complete control of her faculties, she still possessed her characteristic willpower, her overwhelming force, that commandeering look in her eyes that told you she had the power to steer the interests of the Stewart family in one direction or another. But her weathered body was not fit enough to allow her to be at the helm of things the way she might, the way she had been all her life. Auntie Gwen’s old age made her feel tired from the time she opened her eyes so early in the morning it was still dark, to the time when she gave herself to the irregular, restless slumber that filled her nights. So Auntie Gwen hardly ever felt the urge, the drive, the need to interfere in the way the family’s interests were looked after by her six younger siblings—Fabian, Evaristo, Darius, Connor, Bacchus, and Attila, her only sister, the youngest of the bunch, who had been given a tyrant’s name after her father read it somewhere and took it as some sort of sign. When the midwife told old Connor Stewart that Attila was a boy’s name he simply laughed it off. No sir, you’re wrong: Attila dis baby’s name and is plain for everyone to see she ain’ got no stick between sh
e legs.

  Like every family, the Stewarts had their disputes, but every time Evaristo insisted on creating a recording studio in Anguilla to help propel the career of local musicians such as his latest sweetheart, K-Sandra, or Attila demanded funds were made available to purchase a mansion in Harbour View that was in keeping with the stature and the prominence of the family in Anguillan society, Gwendolyn would emerge, of her own accord and long before anyone mustered the courage to summon her, as the ultimate authority to settle the issue with her usual resolve. Is for pimps and bad ras dem houses made, an’ if is pimpin’ pimp you come trouble me ’bout I already tastin’ enough of dat wit’ Evaristo an’ all his music-business foolishness, you know.

  But in recent times the occasions when Auntie Gwen would venture out of her self-imposed exile in her house on the hill in Island Harbour, overlooking Silly Cay, Scrub Island, and the great expanse of the deep indigo sea were few and far between. The last time Auntie Gwen had left her lodgings in Island Harbour by herself had been the distant day when she had traveled the long way to Akira Hart’s office in The Valley, to help the cause of a seemingly indistinct old tourist who, unwittingly, had become a defining factor in the suddenly idyllic relationship her favorite niece, Tanika Percy, held with Antwan Thompson.

  This time, though, Sheila’s corner was not being backed by the sobbing requests of Auntie Gwen’s favorite niece; this time Sheila did not have on her side Gwendolyn’s secret ambitions to link—ally, really—the Stewarts with the Thompsons; this time all Sheila had in her hands to secure Auntie Gwen’s favor was the carefully crafted proposal she casually held under her arm. This time Sheila only had the facts and numbers printed on her sheet of paper to convince Auntie Gwen that it was in the best interest of the Stewart family to get involved in Dragon Wings, to come to the rescue of what was, ultimately, the latest enterprise by a member of the Rawlingson clan from South Hill, one of the island’s most notorious rivals of the Stewarts from Island Harbour.

  But Auntie Gwen was a kind woman, a woman who had always tried to balance the weight of feelings against the arguments of reason in order to come up with the most advantageous decisions for herself and her family. She had not always succeeded and at times she had seemed irrational or even ruthless, but Auntie Gwen had never concerned herself excessively with keeping a spotless reputation: she had learned too early in life that people like you most when they need you most, that the best way to make an enemy is to help people when they are in desperate need, that the status she had come to enjoy in Anguillan society made her vulnerable to envy but also allowed her to get away with a certain amount of unpopular behavior. Presently, Auntie Gwen felt an unfamiliar sympathy for Sheila’s request—perhaps triggered by the distant memory of the last time she had actively (physically) sought to further her interests. At the same time, Auntie Gwen felt an irrepressible mistrust—a disposition bordering on scorn—for the Rawlingsons. Of course, Auntie Gwen knew that, of all the Rawlingsons, she was facing the one rogue element in the family, and she knew that any influence she could gain in Dragon Wings now would be influence she would be taking from the hands, the control, of the rest of the Rawlingsons in the future. Yet, rogue or no rogue, no Rawlingson was likely to deserve her trust.

  As Auntie Gwen entertained these thoughts, the welcoming smile which she could not help but show whenever anyone—even a Rawlingson—came to visit, ran away from her withered face. Sheila saw in the full extent of her wrinkled expression that it was about time she retraced her steps around the house, left the enemy camp, allowed the terms of her truce to speak for themselves. Somewhat reluctantly, Auntie Gwen agreed to take a look at Sheila’s proposition, telling her (and herself) that, ultimately, it would be the numbers contained in the orange folder that would have to determine the outcome of this unusual conversation.

  Three days later, Auntie Gwen summoned her little brother Bacchus to her home in Island Harbour. I wan’ you take a close look at dis before you go into de board meetin’. Bacchus browsed attentively the bunch of papers Auntie Gwen handed him. A look of disdain surfaced on his face as soon as he realized this was about the airline the Rawlingsons were trying to set up. There was a sudden reproach in his voice, an unusual strain of disobedience. Is de numbers I talkin’ ’bout, not de names. Bacchus knew far too well that Auntie Gwen’s privileged status among the Stewarts and, indeed, among the rest of Anguillans was not merely a matter of tradition. He knew there was absolutely no hope in any attempt on his side to dissuade Auntie Gwen from her latest inclination. Nevertheless, he still, somehow, managed to gather the strength to voice his dissent before capitulating. You proposin’ a partnership wit’ de Rawlingsons? The weight of contempt shackled his voice, reduced his words to a croak. Auntie Gwen knew perfectly well the question was rhetorical, and she was far too old to have to repeat herself in the first place. The sparkle in her dimmed gray eyes told Bacchus all he needed to know. So he slid the orange folder under his armpit, and with a dose of curiosity to spite his resentment, he turned around, headed west to review the details of Sheila’s alluring proposal.

  V

  While Sheila Rawlingson-Jones spent the best part of the month that followed the extended celebration of carnival in Anguilla crossing out the names included on her pointless list of potential investors and Dragon found himself immersed in similarly pointless negotiations with Alexandre Martínez concerning the purchase of a Britten Norman Trislander which, regardless of the price, they could not afford, the board of directors of the Indigenous Bank of Anguilla had their monthly meeting to discuss the direction the institution would take regarding several matters of immediate interest.

  Not very high on the list of such matters was Dragon Wings’s application for a credit of US $1,000,000, which failed to meet the minimum conditions and therefore should have been dealt with within seconds. But Glenallen Rawlingson wanted to turn the board of directors of Anguilla’s only indigenous bank into the sounding board on which he could test the appeal, the popularity, the reach of this outlandish project, and Glenallen Rawlingson wanted to gauge the reaction that this specific proposal would provoke on the rest of the bank’s board because, if nothing else, that would give him a reasonably accurate idea of how much interest or even support the Joneses had been able to garner on the island to that moment, so when Glenallen Rawlingson brought up the application for US $1,000,000 to set up a local commercial airline he did so almost inconspicuously, as if he did not know the exact details surrounding the project, and he left it there, lingering in space, awaiting his peers’ reviews.

  That’s why no one was more surprised than Glenallen Rawlingson when what should have been a straightforward rejection sparked the most heated argument to have taken place in the directors’ conference room of the bank’s building in The Valley not only since its recent rebranding as the Indigenous Bank of Anguilla but also during its previous incarnation as the Bank of the Leeward Islands. Bacchus Stewart, Glenallen’s lifelong nemesis, showed not so much interest but total familiarity with the business plan. The youngest of Auntie Gwen’s brothers, Bacchus was only five or six years older than Glenallen Rawlingson but over the years had bred the most genuine hatred for him, resulting in the sort of competition that is best described as vicious, deliberately seeking to overshadow his achievements, to smear his reputation, just because Glenallen had taken part in the single most important event in Anguillan history, the revolution against St. Kitts well over four decades earlier, and Bacchus hadn’t. Consequently, and almost coincidentally, Glenallen, like Bacchus’s nephew, Walter Stewart, his brother Fabian’s son, had been involved in Anguilla’s earliest experiences as a democratic nation.

  Just a teenager at the time, though, Glenallen had not shared Walter’s fascination with politics, instead putting to good use his connections with the highest echelons of the young country’s revolutionary elite to profit from a wide array of commercial ventures on an island that boasted absolutely no infrastructure, no services, no commodities at
all. For the following four decades Bacchus Stewart busied himself shadowing Glenallen’s every move, making certain that whatever he did, Bacchus did better. Thus, when in 1973 Glenallen bought a taxi, Bacchus bought three and operated a taxi company from Island Harbour which he called Glennbeat, only for him to realize later that the business model was unviable and that he would have to sell the cars before they were eaten by the rust if he wanted to save some of his capital. Similarly, when Glenallen decided to open a restaurant in South Hill, Bacchus did everything in his hands to have the Stewart family build the largest hotel on the island; when Glenallen decided to buy a piece of land, Bachus would double Glenallen’s offer, and when he was faced with a seller who did not want to sell to the Stewarts or who had already taken Glenallen’s money, he would endeavor to secure a piece twice the size Glenallen had bought, regardless of the price, without even remotely thinking of its use. By the same token, when Glenallen Rawlingson had joined efforts with Alwyn Cooke in 1979 to create the Bank of the Leeward Islands, Bacchus Stewart had embarked on his very own crusade to have Auntie Gwen move ahead with the formation of the Anguilla Home and Trust Bank, which had opened its doors to the public in 1982. So it might well have been by the agency of some perverse divinity or principle of cosmic order that Glenallen Rawlingson and Bacchus Stewart were forced to sit in the same boardroom ostensibly working together toward the same goals, once the Caribbean Central Bank in St. Kitts intervened in the affairs of both the Bank of the Leeward Islands and the Anguilla Home and Trust Bank and ordered their merger shortly before Nathaniel Jones’s first arrival on the island.