The Claws of Mercy

by John Harris

  “You’re a fool! That thing can’t do you any harm!”

  “Plenty fool, Boss. But I go, Boss.”

  “Oh, get the hell out of it, then,” Gotto shouted. “But send us another boy up. Get us someone else.”

  “No get, Boss. No boy come. Ju-ju frighten ’um away. All boys know.”

  “Why? Have you told ’em?”

  “No, Boss. But all boys know. All people in Amama know.”

  “Jungle telegraph, eh? Listen” – baffled and infuriated, Gotto made a sudden dive for Amadu but the black man dodged round the table and watched him warily from the other side.

  “Come here,” Gotto raved.

  “No, Boss. I no come.”

  “I’ll bloody well shake some sense into you!”

  “No, Boss. You no catch Amadu!”

  “Gotty!” Jimmy put down his cup and stepped between them. “Don’t be a blasted fool. Can’t you see this is important to him? Perhaps we can get Swannack to find us a Christian boy who won’t worry about it.”

  Gotto turned away towards the veranda. “I’ll find out who put it there. I’ll get Asimani on the job.”

  “Oh, for God’s sake–” Jimmy’s temper flared up – “leave the poor devil alone for a bit. God, man, haven’t you noticed yet? He’s bored with your complaints. He couldn’t care less.”

  Gotto stared. “Oh, couldn’t he? Right, I’ll go somewhere else then.”

  “Gotty!” Jimmy tried to introduce the subject of Zaidee in the hope of offering a warning or clearing the air a little. “Where are you going? I know there’s something going on in the village. What are you up to?”

  Gotto’s expression was sly. “Wouldn’t you like to know,” he said.

  “Gotty–” Jimmy became silent as he turned away unheedingly. He watched him start his car and rocket on to the main road with a groan of springs, then, as he turned back into the bungalow, he almost trod on Amadu who was waiting just behind him.

  “Hello, Amadu. My breakfast ready?”

  Amadu gave the bunch of chicken feathers a sidelong glance. “Yassah, Boss,” he said. “Chop ready now, sah!” He paused as he turned away. “Boss.”

  Jimmy stopped on his way to the bathroom.

  “Boss Gotto no come back?”

  “I dunno, Amadu. Why?”

  “Boss, I stay cook your chop dinner-time. I ’gree for you, Boss Jimmy. I no ’gree for Boss Gotto. He come back den I go.”

  The rains came more heavily during the morning and the river was full of logs, driftwood, torn-up bushes, and even, occasionally, a great tree. The palm-trunk supports of the ancient jetty trembled under the feet as the weight of the water struck them. The conveyor belt, that rickety system they used for loading the boats, looked if anything less safe than it had ever done.

  The pile-driver stood untended and the native labourers crouched, pinched and cold, in the shelter of the trees with wide banana leaves over their heads. The concrete piles were sinking into the sea of mud that was forming on the low ground where they lay.

  The mine office, its dust gone, its walls wet with the fine moisture that seemed always in the air now, was a cheerless place when Earnshaw stormed in to Jimmy. It was typical of him that he had no umbrella and that the banana leaf he held over him as he ran through the rain looked as though he’d slept in it.

  “My jetty,” he said savagely. “My flaming jetty! You seen it?”

  “I know, I know,” Jimmy said wearily, drained of energy and sweating in his oilskin. “It’s falling down. But so’s the conveyor. So’s the explosive store. There hasn’t been a pile driven in for days. His Lordship spends all his time in the foreman’s hut yarning with Clerk Smith or off in the car somewhere up-town.”

  “We’ll be losing them boats,” Earnshaw said. “And then I’ll sue you – or at least I’ll sue Twiggy. No offence to you, old lad.”

  He stamped the length of the office and back, then he jabbed a dirty finger at Jimmy. “Down there at that jetty that bloody Clurk Smith’s doing as he likes these days. ’Im and Gotto get on like they was running a three-legged race. Proper matey, they are. Just like two of cheese.”

  “Except when he goes off in the car.”

  Earnshaw stared at Jimmy through the grey rain-filtered light, his eyes narrow and suspicious. “’e got a girl? – a bit o’ black stuff?” he asked.

  “I doubt it.” Jimmy laughed nervously, trying to cover up his incautious remark, and pretended not to hear Earnshaw’s next comment:

  “He behaves like a bloke who’s feeling his oats.”

  While they were talking, Alf Momo appeared in the doorway, holding an umbrella. He smiled wryly and entered the office.

  “Boss–” he began and his very manner made Jimmy groan.

  “Don’t tell me,” he said. “I know. Gotto.”

  Momo laughed, a deep, rich laugh, then his face became serious immediately. “Boss, bad man. It is good you know what he does.”

  Jimmy glanced at Earnshaw and went on quickly. “I know only too well what he does, Alf. Gives everybody the pip. That’s what.”

  Momo grinned again, but once more his face became serious quickly.

  “Boss, this old mine no good any more. Jetty does not get built. People all unhappy. Boss, union officials have decided to make complaint to Freetown.”

  “They have, have they?” Jimmy felt a vague sense of relief. “That’s that then, Alf.”

  “Boss, he does not pay attention. Mine no longer matter. He go other place. Bad place. I see him.”

  “You do?” Earnshaw leaned forward eagerly. “You hear that, Jimmy? Alf knows where he goes.”

  “Oh, it’s nothing, I suppose,” Jimmy interrupted quickly.

  “’Course it is. Out with it, Alf. Where?”

  Momo fiddled with his umbrella for a while and glanced at Jimmy and they listened in silence to the tricklings and gurglings of the rainwater outside until he spoke.

  “Boss Earnshaw, you don’t know where he goes?”

  “’Course not. Why you think I’m asking you?”

  Momo turned to Jimmy. “Boss Jimmy, you don’t know?”

  Jimmy turned away and nodded slowly. “I think so, Alf,” he said quietly. “I think I know.”

  “Well, come on,” Earnshaw said impatiently. “What we waiting for? Why don’t someone tell me?”

  “Boss, every day he go,” Momo said earnestly. “Every night he go. Plenty bad.”

  “Spit it out, old lad. Where?”

  “Boss Jimmy,” Momo said. “It is good he knows.”

  “’Ere–” Earnshaw was becoming suspicious – “what’s going on? Where does he go?”

  “Zaidee Soloman, Boss.”

  “Zaidee Soloman?” Earnshaw gave a howl of rage, quite out of character with his dry, dusty manner. “What’s he doing there?”

  “Boss, I don’ know. Sometimes, he stay plenty late. I see him go. My house down the road.”

  Earnshaw swung round on Jimmy, his face dark with anger. “Did you know this, old lad?” he asked dangerously.

  Jimmy nodded.

  “Well, why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

  “I thought it best not to, Archie.”

  “Best not to! Same old story, eh? The old husband’s the last to know about his wife. Jesus, the laugh’s on me. I reckon he thinks he’s got me by the short and curlies. That’s what I reckons he thinks. But he’s not, you know.”

  Earnshaw seemed on the point of bursting with fury. He began to stamp from one side of the office to the other, swiping papers to the floor and shouting. “If he thinks he’s getting anything there, he’s got another think coming. I’ll give him a smash in the chops. It’s me as pays for that bloody bungalow – not Indian Joe. If he thinks he’s going to push me out, he’s proper in the dripping he is. He’ll get a smack on the earhole. I’m a right boy to handle that randipoling streak of whitewash. He’ll feel like a sick cat when I’ve finished fixing him.”

  Jimmy watched him storming
about the room for a while, like a cyclone in a bottle, before he interrupted.

  “Dry up, Archie,” he said soberly, his face serious. “Gotto never pinched anybody. He isn’t capable. If Gotto’s paying regular visits to Zaidee, she made the suggestion.”

  “She never!” Earnshaw howled. “She wouldn’t. Not after the way I help to keep her.” He stopped dead, his expression of furious anger giving way to one of crafty suspicion, and went on in a low furious voice. “She would though, you know. The bitch, she would. I’ve ’ad it afore. I’m always warning ’er.”

  “Oh, come off it, Archie,” Jimmy said. “It isn’t love Zaidee’s after. Don’t kid yourself. You’re probably twice the man Gotto is. I’ll bet Indian Joe’s behind all this. They had a go at me but I didn’t bite.”

  Earnshaw stared, calming down, then he slapped his leg. “By God, you’re right, old lad! She’s more Syrian than African any time.” He turned and pointed. “That’s where Clurk Smith got his money to buy the gramophone. Zaidee and Indian Joe gev it ’im to ’elp ’em.”

  “That’s where he was for those three weeks,” Jimmy said bitterly. “Love and indoctrination. Brain-washing par excellence. He’d fall for it hook, line and sinker. It must have stood out a mile to them the time we went to complain about the rice that he was wide open to that kind of treatment.”

  They were still talking when they heard Gotto’s boots on the concrete step outside and, instinctively, they drew apart as he stopped in the entrance. His face was working with rage and he was saturated to the skin.

  “The swine slashed my tyres,” he spluttered. “While I was with Asimani. I had to come home on the rims. Christ, that finishes it! I’m going to the District Commissioner. Where’s Smith? Get him to get ’em changed. There’s a spare set in the store.”

  He suddenly became aware of them all staring silently at him across the room.

  “Ha,” he said sharply. “A conference, eh? To find a way to sink a knife in my back. Ganging up on me, the whole damn’ lot of you.”

  “We’re falling over backwards to avoid ganging up on you,” Jimmy said angrily.

  “Never mind ganging up on anybody,” Earnshaw snarled. “What’s all this we ’ear about you and Zaidee?”

  “She’s not your property!” Gotto backed away to the door immediately, his face drained of colour as he realised his secret was known. “And why not, anyway? She’s the only person in this blasted place who’s been decent to me.”

  “Decent! I bet she’s been decent. I know ’er.”

  Gotto’s eyes were bright and his face was devoid of colour. But he was defiant, and in his defiance there was confidence, something they had never seen before, something that came from the belief that someone wanted him.

  “You can howl,” he shouted. “But none of you lot ever helped. Whenever I appeared, you all shoved off. It was Ma-Imi all over again. Snotty Gotty. I know what you called me, all dashing off to each other’s houses to talk about me and laugh at me. At least, Zaidee never did that.” His voice choked in his throat. “She was the only person who wanted me around.”

  “Wanted you?” Jimmy hated himself as he pricked the bubble of Gotto’s happiness. “God, man, it’s not you she’s after. It’s the mine.”

  Gotto sneered. “Who’s been telling tales out of school? You, Momo?”

  Momo looked wretchedly unhappy. “Boss, Zaidee no good. Bad woman. All black people say so.”

  “Shut your great mouth, you swine,” Gotto shouted, tears of fury springing to his eyes.

  Momo’s face twisted. “Boss, she agree too much for Indian Joe. They like that.” He held up two fingers. “What she says, he tell her. She plenty wicked woman.”

  “You dirty rat!” Gotto made a wild swing at Momo, who received a glancing blow on the jaw that sent him staggering back, and Jimmy and Earnshaw immediately leapt on him and held his arms.

  “You bloody fool,” Jimmy shouted.

  “That swine’s not going to slander a lady – he’s not going to spread his filth about a friend of mine!”

  Between them, Jimmy and Earnshaw got him on to the veranda still storming at Momo and struggling in their arms.

  “Gotto, you thrice-damned fool,” Jimmy yelled above his raving. “You can be pinched for that!”

  “Not after what he said about Zaidee!”

  “You sawny bastard,” Earnshaw roared, his fury at his punctured pride forgotten. “What he say is right enough! Christ, I don’t care about the bitch! Take her if you want her. There are plenty more.”

  Gotto struggled in their grip, his eyes wild and not quite sane. Flecks of foam appeared on his lips as he glared at Earnshaw.

  “You bloody immoral, dirty-minded drunken swine,” he shrieked. “I’ve a good mind to do the same to you.”

  “Listen, Gotto,” Jimmy shouted, “if you don’t stop this blasted nonsense, I’ll clout you myself.”

  With a strength that came from fury, he shook Gotto until his hysterical rage died down. Then they released him and they all stood staring foolishly at each other on the veranda, not knowing what to say, with the rain gurgling behind them from the low roof into the gutter below.

  Finally, Gotto turned abruptly and stalked away past his car towards the station wagon, heedless of his umbrella which lay trampled on the floor.

  “He’s gone towards Amama,” Jimmy said.

  “And good riddance. Come on, let’s have a shufti at Alf.”

  They turned slowly and went back into the office where Momo was still rubbing his bruised jaw.

  “Alf,” Jimmy said. “If you want a witness, I’ll willingly speak for you.”

  “No, Boss.” Momo drew himself up with dignity. “I no tell police. Boss, you muss tell.”

  “Alf, I will,” Jimmy said earnestly. “I promise I will.”

  “Boss–” Momo’s voice was full of reproach – “that what you said last time.”

  Jimmy flushed. “Alf, I will this time,” he said. “I’ll tell Twiggy straight away.”

  “You muss tell District Commissioner this time, Boss Jimmy,” Momo went on seriously. “Bad trouble coming. I know, Boss. I African. I smell death, Boss.”

  Jimmy stared at him. The chickens were coming home to roost. All his own certainty of approaching disaster seemed to have culminated and crystallised in Momo’s warning. He glanced quickly at Earnshaw whose face was unexpectedly grim.

  “Death, Alf?” Jimmy said. “Whose death?”

  “I do not know, Boss. Only death. I smell the fine-driven rain. I hear the noise of the trees, Boss, and feel the cold Harmattan wind. I know ju-ju. I know these things about Africa.”

  He picked up his umbrella and went out into the rain.

  “Come on, Archie.” Jimmy said to Earnshaw. “Let’s go up to Old Doc’s.”

  Romney dismissed the black man he had been treating in the surgery and listened to them with grave eyes that stared unseeingly through the dusty mesh of the windows. He stood with his back to them as they told him their story in excited, panting bursts, each one treading on the heels of the other’s words in their hurry to get it out. All the time, his mind was dwelling more on Amama than on Gotto and on the problem that assailed him every year at this season.

  This damned rain, he was thinking. Nothing thrives because of it. Nothing ever comes out right. If I could only find out how to beat it before I die.

  With a start, he turned as he realised they had finished and were watching him.

  “Well?” Jimmy asked. He was seething with anger and itching to destroy Gotto without mercy. “Which one of us goes down to see the District Commissioner? I’m damned if I’m going to cover up for the clot any longer. I’m sick of picking up the bricks he drops.”

  Romney held out a hand. “Just a minute, Jimmy. Going to the District Commissioner wouldn’t perhaps be the best thing. We must think of Amama itself, and the mine after he’s gone. We can’t afford to let the troublemakers think they’ve scored a political victory by getting him rem
oved or they might be tempted to try again. After all, Amama must go on, the mine must go on.”

  Jimmy rose abruptly as he finished and started to stalk about the room, then he halted by the window where the moisture from the heavy rain drifted in through the mesh.

  “Are you suggesting we leave it to Twigg?” he demanded and Romney nodded.

  “Fat lot of notice he’ll take,” Jimmy commented.

  “I think you’ll find he’ll have to take notice this time,” Romney pointed out. “And if Twigg removes him, it will be done quietly – for Twigg’s own sake. He doesn’t want a scandal.”

  “No! To hell with Twigg!” Jimmy’s answer was sharp and decisive. His eyes fixed on Romney’s and held them until the older man’s fell. “Alf Momo said not Twigg. It’s got to be the District Commissioner this time.”

  “Jimmy–”

  “It’s no good, Doc. I’m not having Twigg. He’ll put us off again as he did last time.”

  They became silent again and Romney knew they were waiting for him – as they had always waited, as Amama had always waited – to set the seal of approval on their decision by his word, to accept the onus of what they were doing, and he felt the weight of responsibility on his plump bowed shoulders. Suddenly he felt he had grown too old for decisions of this kind.

  He sighed as he was driven by their silence to take the initiative. “All right,” he said heavily. “Let it be the District Commissioner. Someone must tell him.” He took his glasses off and began to polish away the moisture, his mind working like a tired machine. “But you can’t leave Amama, Jimmy. You must stay here to keep an eye on him in case there’s further trouble.”

  Earnshaw looked up at him, shrewd as an old fox. “And you’re too old,” he said. “That leaves me. You said it nigh on as good as I could have done meself, give the time and place. OK, I’ll be spot ball. I’ll go down tomorrow – early.”

  Romney turned to Jimmy who, it was clear, would have preferred to be the instrument of Gotto’s downfall, and occupied his uneasy mind with trying to placate him.

  “This way, Jimmy, you can’t be accused of engineering it so you can take over his job,” he pointed out. “People talk too quickly about these things out here.” He was speaking rapidly, nervously, still unconvinced of the rightness of what they were doing.