The Chip-Chip Gatherers

by Shiva Naipaul

  However, the Settlement insisted on its rights. If anyone had a claim on the dead man, it had. ‘He was my son-in-law,’ Basdai wept, ‘you can’t keep me out.’ ‘We was friends when we was boys,’ another said. The chorus swelled. ‘It’s more trouble than its worth trying to keep them out,’ Sita said. Wilbert reversed his decision.

  There was little grief exhibited by those filing past the coffin in solemn, awed procession. The eccentric, capricious tyrant had died. They had gained nothing from him in his lifetime. His death at least afforded them a chance to gloat. They had feared Egbert Ramsaran would never die; that he would live on simply in order to plague them. Thus they had come to see with their own eyes that their fears had been unfounded and that this man who had held court in his wooden chair and hurled abuse and insult at them was actually quite dead; exiled to a region from which he could no longer torment them. One by one they came and went, reticent and unsure of themselves at the start but, as the irrefutable conviction and finality of death took hold of their imaginations, with a rising sense of triumph. Singh put in a brief appearance, behaving as he had done when Rani had died: as though he had come merely to identify the body and ascertain the truth of what he had heard. He spoke to no one and slipped away unnoticed, returning to his own exile at the beach house.

  The Bholais were there.

  Mr Bholai seemed genuinely affected. ‘We grew up together like brothers,’ he said. ‘Bosom pals me and Ashok was.’ He considered he was at liberty now to refer to his friend by the forbidden name.

  ‘Bosom pals indeed!’ Mrs Bholai snorted. Fortunately, she did not pursue the subject. Her moderation was not prompted solely by feelings of delicacy: she was preoccupied by a happier train of ideas. It struck her as singularly fitting that her first visit to this house should be on the occasion of Egbert Ramsaran’s death. Mrs Bholai interpreted his death as a personal triumph and judged herself to have acted generously in consenting to come to the camp of her defeated enemy. Of late, the fates had been extraordinarily kind to her. She could afford to dispense with some of her scruples. In fact, Mrs Bholai’s benignity was so far advanced that, catching sight of Sita standing by herself, she immediately went across the room to condole with her.

  ‘This must be a great blow to you,’ she said.

  ‘It was to be expected.’

  ‘Is always best to prepare for the worst,’ she commiserated cheerfully. ‘That is what I does always say. If you prepare for the worst you will never be disappointed.’

  Sita said nothing.

  ‘I suppose you going to be leaving here soon? It can’t have much reason for you to stay on now.’

  Sita smiled. ‘No – there isn’t. I intend to leave as soon as I find a job and somewhere to live.’

  ‘You shouldn’t find it hard to get a job. Not with the education you have.’ The benignity receded momentarily into something harder and less forgiving.

  ‘It should be quite easy,’ Sita replied. She regarded her questioner imperturbably. ‘Is there anything else you would like to know?’

  Mrs Bholai was unabashed. Hailing Wilbert as if he were a fellow guest at a party, she hurried up to him.

  ‘I haven’t had a chance to speak to you yet. It must be a great blow losing your father. Still, is the future what matter most and you is the boss now.’ Mrs Bholai twinkled genially.

  Wilbert agreed.

  ‘You must come and visit we more often. Don’t wait for an invitation. Just come any time you feel like it. You mustn’t stand on any ceremony with we.’ Mrs Bholai beamed at him, brimming with her glad tidings. ‘Especially as you won’t even have Sita to talk to in a short while.’

  Wilbert looked at her with greater interest.

  She giggled. ‘Like you don’t know about it?’

  ‘We haven’t had the time to discuss it,’ he said.

  ‘The two of we was having a chat about this and that when she happen to mention it.’

  Wilbert smiled.

  ‘She say the moment she find a job – and that won’t be hard for she – and somewhere to live, she going to leave here.’

  Wilbert stared intently at Sita.

  ‘Remember what I tell you. Don’t wait for an invitation. Come and visit we any time you feel like it. Any time at all. The door will never be closed against you.’

  Wilbert nodded absently; and Mrs Bholai, casting a triumphant glance at the corpse of her defeated enemy, departed in high good spirits.

  Two days after his death, Egbert Ramsaran was lowered with due ceremony into the gaping hole dug beside his wife’s nettled grave in the Victoria cemetery. The Presbyterian minister uttered invocations to the divine grace of God.

  5

  Wilbert and Sita walked back together from the cemetery. The purple clouds of sunset had spread like bruises across the sky.

  ‘Mrs Bholai told me you said you were leaving as soon as you found a job and somewhere to live. Is that true?’

  Sita nodded.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ He looked at her. She was taut and erect in her black dress.

  ‘I thought it was obvious that that was what I would do – though it clearly wasn’t so obvious to Mrs Bholai.’ She laughed. ‘As she herself pointed out, there’s no reason for me to stay on.’

  Their feet crunched in unison on the loose gravel of the roadway. Ahead of them, the ragged file of cows trundled on their homeward journey.

  ‘Where will you go?’

  ‘To Port-of-Spain. Find a room.’

  ‘How will you live?’

  ‘I saw a job advertised in the paper for a clerk – a female clerk – in the Ministry of Works.’ She was almost invisible in the swiftly gathering darkness. ‘I have all the qualifications they’re asking for. Including being a female.’

  ‘Do you really want to be a clerk in the Ministry of Works?’

  ‘It’s better than nothing.’ Her eyes were pinned on the meandering line of cows.

  ‘When will you go?’

  ‘Next week.’

  ‘And if you don’t get the job?’

  ‘Whatever happens – whether I get the job or not – I’ll go next week.’

  They were nearing the front gate which had been left open. One of the cows poked its nose inside. Wilbert picked up a stone and rushed at it. ‘Get out of there, you stupid animal. Get out! Get out!’

  Sita got the job. The day she had set for her departure arrived; but, to her disappointment, there was nothing to distinguish it from all the countless days which had preceded it. Time was an arid and featureless desert. She had finished her packing (it had not taken her long) and sat hunched at her desk by the window, her chin propped on her hands, staring at the field where the sun-bleached bones of the Ramsaran Transport Company were strewn and scattered. The afternoon, like so many other afternoons, was warm and soporific. Unseen and unheard by her, the stream sang its discordant song at the bottom of the field. She heard the shouts and laughter of a group of young boys playing on the banks of the stream; of late they had roamed its length with impunity. It was on a day such as this she had sat under the mango trees with Julian listening to him talk about his love of poetry and watching the play of light and shadow on the ground. She saw him, reclining lazily, his hair tinted red by the sun, chewing on a blade of grass.

  – Why did you never write to me? I waited for your letters but you didn’t write.

  – I’m very busy. But I always think of you even though I don’t write.

  – You’re not fooling me?

  – I’m always thinking of you.

  The soft, embracing lies enveloped her. She luxuriated in them. Sita was unable to rely on herself any more. That hard core of faith, that conviction of a singular destiny which had always guided her, had been destroyed. She wanted to be taken in hand and led; to find strength in something or someone other than herself. In what or in whom was she to look for it? There was nothing at all beneath her to prevent her from falling. She was prepared to fool herself; to listen
to lies. But there was no one even to lie to her. She had to invent her own lies.

  – Why did you never write to me? I waited for your letters but you didn’t write.

  – I’m very busy. But I always think of you even though I don’t write.

  – You’re not fooling me?

  – I’m always thinking of you.

  There was a knock on the door.

  ‘Come in. It isn’t locked.’

  Wilbert entered. Sita turned round.

  ‘The reason I’m here is to find out if you have everything you need.’ Wilbert was awkwardly formal and stiff.

  ‘I think so.’

  ‘What about money?’

  ‘I have enough to see me through for at least a month or two.’

  ‘You should have more than that.’

  ‘You’ve been kind enough as it is. I’ll manage.’

  He strolled to the window and looked out at the field. ‘It will be strange living here alone.’

  Sita listened to the distant shouts of the young boys.

  ‘Is that all? The one suitcase?’

  Sita smiled and nodded. ‘That is all,’ she said.

  ‘I’ll carry it for you.’

  ‘You don’t have to. It’s not very heavy.’

  He lifted the suitcase, testing its weight. ‘I’ll carry it for you.’

  Sita looked round the room. ‘In Russian novels people sit down before they set off on a journey.’

  ‘Why?’ Wilbert looked at her.

  ‘It brings good luck. Gives you time to collect your thoughts. It’s a nice custom, don’t you think?’ She sat down. The shouts of the boys hung faintly in the air. After a minute, she stood up. ‘Time for me to go,’ she said.

  They walked in silence to the Eastern Main Road.

  A taxi stopped.

  ‘Port-of-Spain?’ the driver asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Sita said.

  Wilbert opened the door for her. She climbed in. The driver got out and unlocked the boot. He shoved the suitcase inside and closed it.

  ‘Good luck.’ Sita held out her hand to him.

  ‘Good luck.’

  The car drove off.

  Chapter Nine

  1

  Egbert Ramsaran was lucky to have died when he did. The half-baked militant who had complained to him about the exploitation of the workers had been silenced by a single shouted obscenity that echoed through the concrete fortress assaulting the ears of the exploited. When another half-baked militant had had the temerity to mention something about a trade union, he had been forcibly expelled from the building. Those were the halcyon days. Egbert Ramsaran congratulated himself on his forthright and effective handling of the matter. ‘It just take one good kick up his backside to end all that bullshit,’ he had boasted.

  The forces of change had retreated only temporarily in order to lick their wounds; and when they returned to resume the battle, their strength and vigour had grown, whilst that of the foe was in decline. The single shouted obscenity was no longer sufficient and neither was the vaunted kick up the backside. It was left to his son and heir to discover this.

  Wilbert went blindly ahead with his plans to make the Company more ‘streamlined and efficient’. There was no attempt to consult or persuade: he had decided to tread in the autocratic footprints of his father. He was the boss and he would be the boss. The senior employees of the firm, particularly Mr Balkissoon, were less than pleased by his highhandedness. After all, Mr Balkissoon had been Egbert Ramsaran’s old and trusted foreman and it was he who had been in charge during the latter’s illness. He considered it his right to be consulted and persuaded. To be pushed around by Egbert Ramsaran was one thing. To be pushed around by his son, quite another. Mr Balkissoon set great store by his dignity. Old and trusted foreman though he had been, his dignity had received some severe punishment from the ‘old boss’. He was determined it would not happen a second time round. Mr Balkissoon expected reparations. It had been a disappointment hard to swallow when he had been passed over in silence in Egbert Ramsaran’s will. ‘Not even a thank-you,’ he grumbled to his fellow workers. They nodded their heads in sympathy. Disappointment jelled into rancour.

  As a matter of principle, he opposed every one of Wilbert’s proposed reforms. ‘Your father wouldn’t approve of all that,’ he said sourly. ‘What you need a secretary and a accountant for? He would have consider it a waste of money and that is exactly what it is.’

  ‘That is exactly what it isn’t,’ Wilbert replied. ‘Having a secretary and accountant will save money in the end. It will make everything more rational and orderly. I want to know where every cent going …’

  ‘Your father wouldn’t approve. He used to manage very well without a secretary and so-called accountant. Is a waste of money.’

  ‘I’m not interested in what my father used to do, Mr Balkissoon. He’s dead now. Six feet under the ground – you was there at the funeral. Anyway, I didn’t call you here to ask for your advice. I call you here to tell you what you have to do.’ He was sitting in the metal cage formerly occupied by his father directly above the main entrance. From there, the entire building was visible at a glance, spread out obediently below his feet.

  ‘I know more about this business than you,’ Mr Balkissoon said. ‘I been working here since before you was born.’

  ‘So what?’

  ‘It won’t work,’ Mr Balkissoon mumbled vindictively. ‘Nothing you say going to work.’

  The lined, grizzled face confronting him across the desk, warm with injured pride, spoke of an obduracy not to be shifted.

  ‘All right, Mr Balkissoon. I don’t intend to waste my time arguing with you. I’m just going to say this. You’re part of the dead wood in this place – the dead wood that’s been collecting for the last twenty years and more. And …’ (Wilbert raised his voice so that it could be heard throughout the building) ‘… and I’m not going to let dead wood stand in my way. You understand that? I’m going to clean this place up from top to bottom.’

  ‘You threatening to fire me?’ Mr Balkissoon leaned across the desk. ‘Don’t be afraid to tell me straight to my face.’

  ‘I’m not threatening,’ Wilbert said, listening to himself speak. ‘I’m firing you. Twenty years is far too long for any man to spend in the same job. You need a rest.’

  Mr Balkissoon seemed delighted. ‘Fine.’ He rubbed his hands. ‘I had see it coming a long way off. I had know you and me would never get on together. Twenty years’ faithful service and then …’ Mr Balkissoon laughed. ‘Don’t let it worry you that I have a wife and six children to support.’ He waved a finger in Wilbert’s face. ‘But all the same, nothing you say going to work. It not going to work.’

  ‘Get out of here,’ Wilbert shouted in the best Egbert Ramsaran style, rising from his desk. ‘Get out of here and never let me see your face in this building again.’

  Mr Balkissoon proved himself an assiduous propagandist. Sammy was elected the leader of a deputation of workers appointed to plead his cause.

  ‘He have a wife and six children,’ Sammy said. ‘If you look through the window you will see them standing outside.’

  Wilbert did not look through the window. ‘He should have thought of them before refusing to carry out my orders.’

  ‘What sort of work he going to get now?’ Sammy asked. ‘Who will want to hire an old man like him?’

  ‘He should have thought of that too. My decision is final. Final! Now get back to work.’

  Sammy grinned. ‘So, you playing the big boss now. But that don’t frighten me one bit. What work in your father time won’t work for you. Times changing. For too long the workers been treated like dogs in this country. All you rich people feel all you is God but God is only dog spell backwards …’

  ‘If you not careful,’ Wilbert said, ‘I’ll fire the whole lot of you.’

  Sammy smiled insolently. ‘If you fire we, you won’t get a single person to replace any of we. You may as well close down the pla
ce.’

  ‘You don’t frighten me either. If you choose to starve that is your affair. But my decision about Mr Balkissoon is final.’

  ‘Man don’t live by bread alone,’ Sammy said. ‘It have other things that just as important.’

  So, choosing not to live by bread alone, Sammy led the workers out on strike. Pickets paraded in front of the building with Mr Balkissoon’s wife and six children as the chief exhibits. Victoria had witnessed nothing like it before and large crowds gathered daily to boo and jeer and shake their fists at the gaunt fortress which had dominated their lives for so long. Sammy displayed oratorical genius and placards were daubed with the slogan, ‘Man don’t live by bread alone.’ The Trinidad Chronicle dispatched a reporter to cover the event.

  The strike dragged on for a month – until the night Wilbert was awakened by the police and told that someone had tried to set fire to the Depot. He went with them, dressed in his pyjamas. The Fire Brigade was already assembled. A thin plume of smoke snaked upwards from the rear of the building. The silent crowd made way for him.

  ‘Is lucky the Fire Brigade on the spot so quick,’ one of the policemen said. ‘Otherwise, if the flames had get to the gasoline …’ He rolled his eyes.

  As it was, the damage was minimal. A repair shed was slightly charred. That was all. It was the climax of the revolt. Tempers subsided in the aftermath of the abortive fire and the majority of the strikers quietly returned to work. Soon, the red and black trucks were rolling again and the metallic clamour resumed in the cavernous interior – though Victoria had the impression that it was more muted than before. Sammy left the district and no more was heard of him; while Mr Balkissoon’s wife and six children faded from the public consciousness. If there had been a loser in the struggle, it was the Company – not the workers. It emerged from the fray with its stature whittled down.