The Claws of Mercy

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The Claws of Mercy Page 7

by John Harris


  “We have not got sprinklers, Boss,” Momo pointed out.

  “No,” Gotto said, and his brisk voice had given way to a fretful snap. “And we haven’t got a lot of other things either, as far as I can see. Is it always like this?”

  “Not when the rains come, Boss.” Momo flashed him a broad grin. “All mud then. Too much mud. All-same glue in the office.”

  “Don’t you use a pump?” Gotto’s eyes were sharp and needling and Jimmy was reminded of the angry glance of a ferret.

  “Yassah. As much we can. But the rains come faster than the pump work. Sometimes, it stop loading. The lorries cannot move in the mud.”

  “We’ll have to use shovel boys, then.”

  Momo grinned again and spread his hands with a shrug. “Boss, the shovel boys cannot move also.”

  As he laughed heartily with an African’s belly-laugh, Jimmy joined in but Gotto’s expression didn’t change.

  “Because of mud?” he said. “Is that all? Mud doesn’t stop me working. I’ll chase ’em up.”

  Momo began to sense the hostility in the questions and he flashed a nervous glance at Jimmy who was immediately reminded of his own reactions the previous night when he had discovered that Gotto was not given to appreciating jokes.

  When Momo continued, his voice had acquired the cautious note that had already become part of Jimmy’s.

  “Boss–” he said, his dark eyes sad. “Black man on Amama Island best in Africa. But black man funny man. Plenty queer in head. Boss Jarvis leave ’em to me. I’m black man, too. I understand black men. He put me in charge the black boys.”

  “Oh, he did, did he?” Gotto said. ‘Well, listen. Boss Jarvis isn’t here any longer. He’s gone home. My name’s Gotto. Ivor Gotto. I’m in charge now. Savvy?”

  Momo’s face was calm and dignified as he replied. “I understand, sah,” he said.

  Gotto stared at him, hot and uncomfortable in the stifling room, his shirt sticking to his back, the dust creeping down his collar and into his eyes and nose.

  “Right,” he said. “Let’s have no more about Boss Jarvis then, eh?” He shuffled the papers again, nervously, his manner belying the briskness of his words, then his pale eyes lifted and rested on Jimmy’s face.

  “Agnew, how about you keeping an eye on that gang who’re supposed to be building the jetty? I’ll look after the workings and you look after the jetty.”

  “Haven’t we got a foreman on that job?” Jimmy sat up, puzzled.

  “I’m not trusting any damned African.”

  Gotto used the word as an insult and Jimmy’s eyes flew to Momo’s face, but the shift boss sat impassively, his features expressionless. Gotto looked up, saw Jimmy’s glance, and waved a hand.

  “Not you, Momo. Not you,” he said. “Don’t start getting touchy, for God’s sake. I wasn’t thinking of you. But you have to admit some of these chaps of yours have to be watched, don’t they?”

  Momo licked his lips. “African good worker, Boss,” he said deliberately. “Give him trust, he work well.”

  Gotto laughed flatly, softly. “Oh, that’s all baloney, Momo, you know. Some African workers, maybe. But ninety-nine out of a hundred you can’t trust as far as you can throw a grand piano. You can’t kid me. I’ve been around a bit. You have to get up early to put one across me. What say, Agnew?”

  Jimmy flushed and wriggled uncomfortably in his seat. For lack of anything to say, he lit a cigarette and offered the packet to Momo, defiantly, conscious of Gotto’s disapproving eyes.

  “All right, Agnew,” Gotto went on. “I’ll look after this end and you look after that.” He sat back and smacked the table again, his enthusiasm returning. “That’s all, I think. Everybody satisfied? All weighed, all paid?”

  Jimmy pushed his chair away, conscious that the conference had produced nothing but uncomfortable silences and embarrassing faux pas. He glanced instinctively at Momo who had also risen.

  “Boss,” the shift boss said. “One thing. Rice.”

  “Rice?” Gotto, who had half risen, sank back into his chair. “Rice? What’s that got to do with an iron mine? We’re not growing rice, are we? They’re doing that down at Bonthe, not here. Or is this a rice quarry, eh?” He laughed loudly at his own joke.

  “Boss–” Momo’s black face was serious – “boys tell me rice short in Amama Island.”

  “Oh?” Gotto’s glance was hostile. “And why should they tell you particularly?”

  “Boss, always they ask me speak for them.”

  “Troublemaker, eh?”

  “No, Boss.” Momo remained unmoved. “I am educated black man. Other black men trust me.”

  “Oh, do they? Well, they’d better not trust you too much or I shan’t.” Gotto sat back. “OK. Spit it out. What are you belly-aching about?”

  “Boss, good rice harvest this year. Indian Joe collar it. Syrian trick. Joe Soloman not good Syrian. He hang on to the rice and charge high price for it. Black boy can’t buy.”

  “Well, what about it? That’s not my affair. That’s between the boys and Indian Joe. It’s nothing to do with me.”

  “Plenty trouble, Boss,” Momo said earnestly. “No rice, black boy go hungry. Plenty trouble then.”

  “Well let black boy sort that out.” Gotto sniggered and rose quickly. “I’m damned if I’m going to worry my head about black boys’ grub. Let black boy look after that. I’ve plenty of other things to occupy my mind.”

  “Boss,” Momo put in earnestly. “I get rice. I am son of chief–”

  “Chief of what? A scruffy little village? That doesn’t mean a thing to me.”

  Momo’s expression remained unaltered, though his eyes flickered towards Jimmy. “Boss, I take lorry. I bring back rice. I know where there is plenty rice.”

  “Yes,” Gotto said. “I know you lot. You’ll take the lorry and have a damn’ good holiday. Plenty mammies and plenty booze. Then you’ll come back and say, ‘Boss, no rice. No got. Rice done get lost en route.’ It’s just a damn’ good excuse for a holiday. You’re paid to work here, not go jazzing round the bush looking for mammies.”

  Momo looked angry for the first time. “Boss, I have got wife. I am a Christian.”

  Gotto laughed. “Go on. Tell me another. Listen, I’ll write to Twigg and the appropriate Government department. That’s what I’ll do and that’s all I’ll do. But you’re not going off up-country. Savvy? OK, Momo, off you go and let’s see you get those boys moving. And I mean moving. And no dodging it yourself in the foreman’s hut.”

  Momo paused, as though to say something further, then changed his mind and went out without a word. Gotto stared after him, his hands on his bony hips.

  “Mr Momo’s going to cause trouble, Jimmy,” he said sharply. “He’s trying to tell me my job already. Trying to get me mixed up with the local politics. He doesn’t like me and he’s looking for a chance to do me down. A proper barrack-room lawyer by the sound of him–”

  He spun round, studying the office, then he turned to Jimmy again. “Right, let’s have Smith in now,” he said. “He might as well know what’s expected of him, too.”

  He sat down at the desk again as Smith stood before him, rolling his eyes.

  “Well, Smith,” Gotto said cheerfully. “What do you think of this office? You think it’s a nice office? A good office? A well-run office?”

  “Boss–” Smith’s eyes seemed to be spinning in their sockets. “Dis fine office. Plenty fine-fine. All same de Buckingham Palace. All same de Houses of Palleyment. All same–” he searched for a rapturous description worthy of the occasion – “Boss, all same paradise wit’ de angels.”

  “Well, it isn’t, see?” Gotto shouted and Smith’s feet seemed to leave the floor as he jumped. Gotto slammed his hand to the table and the cloud of dust rose again. “Look! Dust! Muck! Filth! The place’s grimy. Get a brush and sweep it out – not now, you fool!” Smith, who was already half way into his own office, thankful to be free of Gotto, shuffled unwillingly back in front
of him. “When I’ve gone. And every morning. Throw water down. Lay the dust. And get that damn’ clock repaired. And that telephone. It was like that when Jarvis, was here. Broken. Useless. See it’s done. Get the place tidy. All these papers–”

  “Boss Jarvis tell me no move de papers. He say I lose ’um.”

  “I’m not Boss Jarvis. I’m sick of Boss Jarvis. Everybody throws Boss Jarvis down my throat. I say get the place tidy.”

  “Yassah. I get.”

  “And see we have fresh drinking water every day.”

  “Sah, labourer boy do dat. I tell him.”

  Gotto sat back and studied Smith, his lean face twisted into a crooked smile. “Who’s in charge of the office, Smith?” he demanded.

  Smith beamed proudly. “Clerk Smith, sah. He in charge, sah.”

  Gotto leaned forward abruptly, his long nose out-thrust. “Well, Clerk Smith can damn’ well do it himself. OK? When Jarvis was here, it was always left to a labourer and it was never done. From now on. you can do it. Savvy?”

  Smith bobbed his head nervously. “I savvy, sah.”

  “Right. Now about furniture.” Jimmy saw Clerk Smith’s eyes widen. “Get some different furniture.”

  “Furniture, sah?”

  “Yes, furniture. Are you deaf or something? Furniture, Tables. Chairs. This chair’s falling to pieces.”

  “Boss, sah, where I get?”

  ‘Oh, God, look around.” Gotto was on his feet now and walking up and down the office, using his hands to gesture as he talked. “If your chair’s better than this, bring it in here.”

  “Boss, what I sit on?”

  “Get a box. Or stand up. I don’t care. But I’m not sitting on a chair that’s on its last legs.”

  “Yassah, Boss, I get.”

  “And get a different table.”

  “Sah, where I get?”

  “Oh, God!” Gotto flung his hands heavenwards. “‘Where I get?’ Is that the only tune you know. There’s a carpenter, isn’t there, building huts in the workings? Get him to make one.”

  “Yassah. But, sah, de carpenter he busy making de huts.”

  “Well, tell him to stop being busy making huts and start being busy making a table.”

  “Yassah. I tell him.”

  “And get some of these cobwebs shifted. And let’s have the place sprayed for insects. I detest insects. They give me the creeps and there are too many in this place. If I see so much as a fruit fly in here I’ll flay you alive.”

  Smith’s face was growing longer and longer, and his eyes were widening more with each sharp word. Just as he seemed about to wilt to the floor, Gotto turned on his heel and made for the door. As he passed Jimmy, he grinned encouragingly. “Got to let ’em know who’s boss, Agnew,” he said. “Idle hands, you know. Keep ’em busy and they haven’t time for complaining then. They’re like children. They only understand this sort of treatment.”

  Puzzled, Jimmy watched him stride away across the clearing in front of the office towards his car, then he turned round and almost bumped into Clerk Smith standing behind him, staring at Gotto through the door.

  As Jimmy moved away, the African raised mournful eyes to his face.

  “Boss,” he said, wagging his head dolefully. “Boss Gotto, he plenty hard man. He plenty difficult. He make plenty trouble.”

  Jimmy grinned and patted the black man’s thin shoulder. “Smith, old boy,” he said. “You don’t realise it but I think you’ve really said a mouthful.”

  Five

  Jimmy drove the station wagon slowly between the trees down the curving road towards the river, wondering what his application for a job in Sierra Leone had let him in for. He was annoyed to discover the depression he had fought off earlier had returned.

  Earnshaw, who appeared, smothered in copper oxide paint, from underneath a boat dragged from the water on its cradle, listened to the story of the conference in silence, then he lit an old fag-end and flipped the match into the water.

  “What he want,” he grinned, “is a little nig to take his mind off hisself. I could find him a darkey girl easy, nice and clean and willing. Better men than him have done it and at least it’d prove he got red blood in his veins ’stead of dandelion and burdock.”

  He laughed softly in a dry cackle, sly and vulgar and scruffy in his sweat-stained shirt and with one sock hanging over his shoe. But to Jimmy he suddenly seemed twice as wholesome as Gotto.

  “He gives me the pip,” Earnshaw went on. “Allus did. Every time I offer a bit of advice about the jetty, off he go, full of the old acid. Di-da. Di-da. Di-da. Just like that. Three bags full. And him looking at me like I’ve come to the front door of Gotto ’All selling bloomer elastic and cards of buttons.”

  He was still talking when Clerk Smith came rattling down the rutted road on an ancient bicycle, trailing a little cloud of dust from the wheels.

  He almost fell off at Jimmy’s feet and began to wipe the sweat from his face with the sleeve of his starched white suit.

  “Boss Jimmy,” he panted. “Boss Gotto say come quickly! Plenty trouble.”

  “Take yer time, kid,” Earnshaw shouted as the station wagon drew away. “It won’t be nothing. Somewhere a voice is calling. That’s all.”

  When Jimmy arrived at the workings, choking with the dust his furious drive had thrown up, Gotto was standing beside one of the diggers whose huge boom towered over their heads. The digger handler was waiting in front of him in the shadow of the machine, his eyes rolling, watched at a distance by a group of labourers and lorry drivers who were trying hard but unsuccessfully to pretend they were working.

  “Ah, here you are,” Gotto said gaily. “Taken you long enough.”

  “I came as fast as I could.”

  “Make it faster next time.” Gotto smiled and indicated the digger handler. “A point here: this lunatic almost scooped me and the car up just now. We’ve got to post a chap near these people, Agnew, with a red flag or something as a warning. They don’t understand machines. Never will. I’ve seen it before.”

  “You mean, you want a look-out of some sort?”

  “Yes. See to it, will you?”

  “It’s not usual, is it?”

  “Perhaps not. But it’s going to be. I’m not going to be held responsible for accidents. Besides, I don’t want half a ton of ironstone dumping on me. Tell Momo. He fancies himself at handling things like this. Let him have a go.”

  “It seems a bit of a waste of a man, don’t you think?” Jimmy ventured to protest. “If we all keep a sharp look out that ought to be sufficient.”

  “Surely,” Gotto said with a touch of asperity in his voice, “we’re not going to start off together by having a disagreement.”

  “No – but – one man out of every gang–”

  “Let’s have it fixed, shall we?” Gotto turned his weary smile on Jimmy. “And worry about that when the output falls, eh? What say?”

  “So,” Jimmy said to Earnshaw the following day as they stood by the fringe of the river listening to the clatter of the concrete mixer, “a boy from each team does nothing all day except sit in the sun and swipe flies. That is, until His Lordship appears, then he really goes to town. He shouts, dances, waves, sings, turns somersaults, fires rockets, and generally puts on a gala performance to let him know he’s on the job. He does everything except turn inside out.”

  Earnshaw squinted into the glare of the sun that cracked the surface of the mud into a crazy mosaic peopled by landcrabs and mud-hoppers.

  “Son,” he said slowly, “he suffers from a funny idea that he knows how to handle wogs.”

  As the sun rose higher above the river, even the shade grew stifling in the pitiless overhead glow and the earth looked gorged with sunshine. Africa seemed suddenly unfriendly with its fierce colours and the deep silences in which, like a child’s cry in the wilderness, was lost the stomachic chug of the steam engine. This ancient contraption that drove the concrete mixer and the pile-driver and kept the dozens of chattering b
arrow boys running from its side to where the first foundations of the new jetty were being laid, was so dilapidated that it blew its safety valve regularly or leaked steam through the confectionery of patches on the boiler, and work had to stop for hours at a time until it cooled down sufficiently for repairs to be made to it.

  Every time this happened, those labourers not involved in the noisy display or histrionics round Earnshaw and the pile-driver stretched themselves luxuriously in the sunshine, avoiding Jimmy’s eye whenever there was anything to be done. But, bearing in mind Gotto’s stated desire to see things achieved and the example of his drive up in the workings, Jimmy forced the foreman to chivvy them to other duties and he was delighted at the end of a fortnight to see some progress.

  “Couldn’t have done it no better meself,” Earnshaw shouted, a shrivelled figure on the old wooden jetty. “Not if you give me the time and place. How’s it go, Jimmy, old lad? I just seen Sonny-Boy outside the office carrying on alarming to Alf Momo. Proper got his knife into Alf, hasn’t he? I bet he’s a bright ’erb to live with. Jolly as a handful of worms. You want any funny stories to make him laugh?”

  At the thought of Gotto laughing, Jimmy laughed himself.

  He drove cheerfully towards the bungalow when he had finished work, trembling with fatigue and with the dust chafing his neck along the collar of his shirt. He was feeling well content and was looking forward to seeing Stella Swannack later in the evening.

  Already, for some time, he had been arriving regularly every day at the Mission bungalow to make some dubious inquiry as an excuse to see her, to produce battered magazines she might like to read; to drive her to the hills for air, or to Mansumana beach for a swim; to practise photography with one of her three cameras, or more simply to discuss the ever-absorbing subject of Gotto, whom Stella now knew by repute as well as Jimmy knew him by fact.

  He stopped the car outside the mine bungalow and went inside, looking for Gotto, proud of his achievements at the river’s edge and quite prepared to boast about it. But his triumph fell flat as an old love affair. Gotto had already lapsed into the bored vacuum which seemed to come over him the minute he left work. He made no comment on the news but, talking nervously all the time, followed Jimmy from his bedroom to the shower and back again as he changed from his dirty shorts to his clean evening drill.

 

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