And De Fun Don't Done

by Robert G. Barrett

  ‘Yeah. And I imagine you’ll be busy again all day tomorrow?’ said Les. ‘What about tomorrow night?’

  ‘I’m not doing anything tomorrow night.’

  ‘Okay. How about I shout you a nice dinner in Mo’ Bay tomorrow night? We’ll have a few drinks and you might be able to fill me in on a few things. And if you want to bring your wife or your girlfriend along, that’s alright.’

  ‘No. My fiance’s over at Port Antonio visiting her family. I’ll just bring some documents and that.’

  ‘Terrific. Well, I’ll ring you here at, say, ten tomorrow morning, and make arrangements?’

  ‘That would be excellent. In the meantime, Les, may I suggest you go and have a look at Rose Hill Great House? It’s not far from here.’

  ‘Yeah. But I was thinking more of having a look at Sweet Ginger Hill. Where Eduardo and Elizabeth were born.’

  ‘I doubt if you’ll get in there, Les. It’s privately owned now.’

  ‘That’s right. It is too.’

  ‘Anyway, Les, I must get going. I’ll hear from you tomorrow morning.’

  ‘For sure,’ nodded Les. ‘Before you go though, Mill. Would you mind coming over to the car for a minute?’

  ‘Okay,’ shrugged Millwood.

  Les stood near the door and, rather than make a big display on the steps, discreetly slipped $300 US out of his pocket and handed it to Millwood Downie.

  ‘Take that, Mill. My family back in Australia aren’t short and your school sounds like it could do with some help. And please don’t take it the wrong way, either. It’s just my way of showing… the family’s appreciation. And that we’re fair dinkum. I think you know what that means, Mill.’

  Millwood looked at the money, shook his head for a moment then put it in his pocket. ‘Thank you very much Les. You’re very generous. To a fault, I suppose you could say.’

  ‘Don’t worry about that,’ winked Les. ‘There’s worse people around than us Nortons.’

  ‘I’ll hear from you tomorrow morning, Les.’

  ‘Till tomorrow, Millwood.’

  They shook hands once more then Les watched Millwood slowly walk towards the office; it was obvious he’d been moved. At the bottom of the steps he jumped slightly in the air, clicked his heels together and ran up them. It was an awkward, knock-kneed kind of run with his elbows all out of plumb. That was when Les knew what movie star Millwood reminded him of and which movie. It was Jerry Lewis in The King of Comedy. When he was running down the street trying to get away from Robert de Niro and his ugly ratbag girlfriend. Les shook his head and got in the car. I’m gonna have to turn this up. Equating everyone I see with either some cartoon or a movie. A schoolteacher and an historian becomes Jerry Lewis a comedian? This is madness. They’ll finish up putting me in the rathouse. He started the car, slowly motored back down the white gravel driveway and through the sandstone gates. At the A1 he stopped and looked at his watch. It was too early to go back to the hotel. Why not take another look at the manse? See what turns up. Les hung a right and headed towards Dredmouth.

  On the way to the manse Les mulled a few things over in his head about Millwood Downie and what he’d just done. Like giving three hundred bucks to some bloke he’d only just met. It was questionable if he could help him anyway and leaving it until Tuesday night was cutting it a bit fine also. But there was something about the skinny Jamaican teacher Les liked. He was genuine; and you didn’t often see that in people these days. As for the lousy three hundred bucks, Les wouldn’t even miss it, and it would go to a good cause anyway. Spring Water Primary. It had a nice sound to it. Les also couldn’t help but think Millwood Downie, with his funny Jerry Lewis run, had another string to his bow besides teaching and a part-time interest in Jamaican history.

  Les spent the rest of the afternoon at the manse. He walked all over it, banged his fist against walls looking for hollow spots, had a good look upstairs just in case, stubbing his toe on a big bolt half sticking out of the crossbeam. He waded through the weeds and shrubs in the backyard, checked the remains of the old sundial and the stables. He paced out the old building’s measurements front and sides and around the cobblestones, took notes, even checked the alignments of the manse with the sun. After a while he found a spot in the shade across the road and went through Elizabeth Norton Blackmore’s book of poems looking for clues.

  There were references to a manse in four of her poems, one containing something even more obscure about an old fruit tree. Treasure was mentioned in six poems and gold and diamonds bobbed up in a couple of others. And to Les it was all gibberish. Ye olde seventeenth-century English speak, with its thees and thous and doths and dothn’ts, didn’t go down well at all with the big Queenslander. In the end Norton was half convinced that whatever was there, if there was anything there, was either hidden in among the sandstone blocks or buried under the cobblestones out the front. That’s where Les would have put it if he owned the joint. And if it was there, how was he going to get it out if he found it? Les gazed from the book of poems across to the manse and shook his head. Father Eduardo and his sister Elizabeth had certainly left him, and everybody else, a puzzle alright. The hot Jamaican sun had sizzled down into the blue waters of the Caribbean and it was quite dark when Les got back to the Badminton Club.

  Well, didn’t the day go quick, Les thought, as he stood under the dribbling, lukewarm water of the shower and washed away the dirt and dust he’d gathered crawling around and over the manse. I knew this was a good idea and it would keep my mind off things. Better than sitting around picking your arse and feeling sorry for yourself. The heat takes the edge off your appetite too; especially after that monster breakfast this morning. Though I’m a bit peckish now. I’ll grab a bit of something down at the Mardi Gras. Hope to Christ it’s not only fairycakes and queen pudding that they’re selling. Mardi Gras in Montego Bay, Les chuckled to himself as he towelled off in front of the balcony. And I simply haven’t got a thing to wear. Not long after, he was in his blue shorts, green Wallabies T-shirt and Nikes, and in the Honda heading down towards the waterfront.

  Les knew that skinny hairpin bend coming up from town looked out over the harbour and the park next to where Gloucester Avenue began; he stopped about two- thirds of the way down, did a U-turn and parked facing back up. A few shifty-looking types were standing around talking or smoking cigarettes, Les locked the car, ignored them and started walking down. There were no buildings, only a low fence on the right side of the road and everything was spread out below him. Traffic and taxis were flowing towards town, it looked like some kind of reggae band was playing in the park and across the road behind the park were the inky-blue waters of the bay. More traffic was slowly moving down the road alongside the park, and to the right, barricades, cops and crowds of people swarming in that direction said the Mardi Gras was in full swing. Les got to the bottom of the hill, ducked across the traffic to the corner where the park met the intersection and the short road down to Gloucester Avenue. There were plenty of people around, all Jamaican men and women. A couple of blokes tried to sell him something, some women higglers selling drinks along the footpath called out to him. Les ignored them and stopped to look at the crowded park.

  It was circular in shape with trees here and there, about a hundred metres across and built like an amphitheatre with tiers of seats facing down. The rows of seats were packed with people of all ages, the women in long dresses wearing red, gold and green belts, sandals and coconut shell earrings. The men mainly in jeans and T-shirts, with great mops of dreadlocks tumbling out all over the place and all looking gaunt and stringy. They were all avidly watching a stage set up below where a bunch of men were lounging around in front of two banks of speakers, out of which was coming this deep, slow beat from a bass and drum. In the middle of the stage some wild-looking bloke appeared to be preaching into a hand-held microphone. He had the mike and a clipboard in one hand and in the other a joint about as big as a Darwin Stubbie, which he was attacking with relish. Norton�
�s reggae band in the park was a full-on Rastafarian meeting. Jah Rastafarai, mon. All the straight and righteous waiting it out away from the immoral peel-heads. Les was fascinated. More than a few punters along the footpath were giving him odd looks. But Les was expecting that, being one of the few honkys walking around. He also wasn’t expecting any favours either, so he’d left everything at home, except some of his money, which he’d spread into all the pockets of his shorts so if he did get a tickle they wouldn’t get the lot in one go. The street sloped down past the park towards Gloucester Avenue, Les followed the footpath to the end of the park and moved in among the crowd standing in front of the stage for a better look at the boys in the band.

  Midnight Oil it wasn’t. There were about a dozen stringy-looking dreads lolling about near the speakers. A couple of yabbahs were going around, glowing in the dark, some bloke was plunking out two notes on an electric bass and some other bloke was thumping out one monotonous note on a drum. Les arrived just in time to see the head rasta with the mike pull a massive toke on his spliff that made almost the top half of his body disappear in a cloud of thick blue smoke. Shit a brick, thought Les. I had three small tokes of that shit last night and I thought I was rollerblading through the rings around Saturn with Elle Macpherson. That ratbag just burnt off enough to jam a reaper and binder. Where must his head be? The rasta let some more smoke out and started crooning into the mike with this strong, melodious voice that crackled through the speakers in a rich vibrant bass. It was John Laws eat your heart out; about five octaves lower and twice as rich. The head rasta was in the middle of some giant spiel about Haile Selassie.

  ‘Ire mon,’ he crooned into the microphone. ‘In nineteen tirty-tree, Haile Selassie broke de drought in Africa, stopped de war in de homeland and gave all de banks back to de people. Did you know dahhhhttt?’

  Behind and around Les the crowd clapped and cheered. ‘Ire mon. Jah rastafah!’ they all yelled, in between toking on their spliffs.

  ‘Ay. Jah Rastafarai,’ echoed the rasta on stage. ‘And in nineteen tirty-seven,’ he continued, ‘Haile Selassie saved all de peoples from starveershun, stopped de exploiteer- shun of children and gave women de vote. Did you know dahhhttt?’

  ‘Ya woo! Ire mon. Jah Rastafah. Jah Rastafah,’ howled the crowd, as another half a ton of ganja went up in smoke and hung over the park.

  ‘Ire. Jah Rastafarai. Jah Rastafarai,’ repeated the dread with the mike, and took another horrifying toke on his spliff that would have made a Nimbin hippy buy a grey flannel suit and get a job flogging life insurance in Melbourne. ‘And in nineteen tirty-nine,’ he crooned, ‘Haile Selassie built twenty new dams, gave edjookeer- shun and’ lectricity to de peoples and beat de forces of imperialism. Did you know dahhhttt?’

  ‘Ya roo! Ire. Jah Rastafah. Jah Rastafah,’ howled the mob.

  ‘Ire. Jah Rastafarai,’ said the dread up on stage.

  By the time he’d had another two tokes while continuing his rap, about the only things Haile Selassie hadn’t done was invent the wheel, discover penicillin and beat Armstrong to the moon. The rasta was just about to load up again when Les noticed the bloke on stage wasn’t the only centre of attention. Norton looked around and there were all these odd-looking, pinky brown eyes staring at him from the darkness. It was then that Les also noticed he was the only slice of white bread at the rastas’ picnic; and from the looks he was getting it was giving most of the gathering a bad case of indigestion. Oh well, thought Les. I think it might be exit stage right for the goyen. Slowly and smiling Les eased his way through the crowd, jogged across the street and around the barricade, winked at a cop, then joined the crowds of people swarming past the waterfront along Gloucester Avenue.

  There were hundreds of people crowding along the street, mainly Jamaicans in their early twenties and a smattering of Euro-trash backpackers. The seaward side of the street was fenced off and open with a few restaurants, the other side mainly held small hotels and shops. Les passed another smaller park then above the crowds of people something caught his eye. It was a small, white, two-storey hotel with a parking area out the front for about a dozen cars and a sign near the street that said Biltmore Hotel, same as the one at Bondi. Norton’s face broke into a grin, then a thought struck him. He wasn’t all that rapt in where he was staying and was thinking of brushing it; the only reason he was there was because he’d been a bit confused and in a hurry and it was the only place he could think of. He could have stayed at the best hotel there was in Montego Bay. But why not get a room at the Biltmore just for a gag? It was only for another night. Yeah, bugger it. Why not? Les laughed to himself. I’ll see if they’ve got any rooms. There was a vacant building on the right side and an open-front bar on the other. Les skipped through the crowd and into the parking lot.

  It was full of small cars and led to a very plain-looking hairdressing salon at the rear, left of a set of stairs. A security guard in a white shirt and black bowtie was leaning against the wall next to the bottom step. He seemed about as energetic as the one at the Badminton Club but about a foot taller. He looked at Les sleepily.

  ‘I’m after a room,’ said Les. ‘Okay if I go up?’ The man mumbled something that sounded and looked like yes and stood aside. ‘Thanks, mate,’ winked Les, and jogged up the steps.

  The stairs went up one storey to the foyer and office set just to the left. Right of the office a door led to what looked like a bar or restaurant and in the left corner from the office another set of stairs went to the floor above. On either side of the office the rooms angled off along two long balconies looking down on the carpark and at the top of the stairs was a small dining area scattered with black and white chairs and tables that overlooked the carpark and the darkness of the ocean behind. The reception desk was a wooden counter with a bell and the usual things found on hotel counters, a wall and a glass door led to the safe and office behind. A girl sitting on a chair behind the bell looked up as Les approached. She was plain and dumpy in a yellow uniform but appeared to be about a thousand times more pleasant than Lucretia Borgia up at the Badminton Club.

  ‘Good evening, miss,’ said Norton, returning her smile. ‘I’d like a room for two nights if I could?’

  ‘No problem, mon.’ She pointed to the balcony behind Norton on his left. ‘There’s one over there. When did you want to move in?’

  ‘Tomorrow morning.’

  ‘No problem, mon.’

  Les explained his position to the girl about being in the other hotel and not liking it, how he was walking past, saw this place but the only ID he had on him was his room key at the Badminton Club. Would $50 US as deposit be okay? No problem, mon. The girl gave him a receipt and Les said he’d fix the rest up when he came down in the morning with his bags to pick up the key. He wouldn’t bother to check the room; he was certain it would be alright. Les pocketed the receipt, thanked the girl and said he’d see her tomorrow. Thank you, sir. Have a good night at the Mardi Gras. Les jogged down the stairs, told Sleepy on the door he was moving in and rejoined the noisy throng milling along Gloucester Avenue.

  Les got about two hundred yards or so when things began to change. All along the sides of the road now was stall after stall of people trying to sell pretty much the same stuff. Jamaican T-shirts, beanies, scarves, etc. Jewellery, carvings, shells, dope pipes, etc. The usual tourist junk you find in any tourist trap anywhere in the world. Others that didn’t have a stall were walking along the road, trying to flog stuff to any luckless tourists strolling along. As soon as they saw a white face they zeroed in like heat-seeking missiles.

  ‘Hey, mon.’

  ‘Hey, mon.’

  ‘Hey come here, mon. I don’t want to sell you nothing. I just wan to talk wit yu.’

  After a while Les was wishing them to the shithouse and starting to think he wasn’t a human being, just a walking dollar bill sign. A few higgler women selling fruit got a bit of Norton’s business. He bought some beautifully sweet, chopped-up pineapple, some bananas and a bunch of wh
at looked like huge yellow grapes that were more like berries with a big stone in them and reminded him of a cross between a plum and a paw-paw.

  It was about now Les began to notice he was getting lots of smiles from young girls in bunches of twos and threes. Like a mug Les began smiling back. Next thing he knew he had five girls on his arm; two on his left, three on his right. They were all about twenty, wearing jeans, short dresses and T-shirts. No oil paintings and not quite as swedyang tunti as the two he picked up in the car. But takeaway tunti, nonetheless. In which Norton was not the slightest bit interested. Not having access to three, industrial strength, East German condoms and a hose-down with detoxicant afterwards. Les laughed along with the girls though and was sorry he hadn’t brought his camera. It would have made a good photo; if someone could have taken one without running off with it. Les was pretty certain the young ladies weren’t after him for his good looks and it didn’t take them long to put their spiel on. First was, give them twenty bucks to get into the Mardi Gras. You didn’t have to be a Rhodes scholar to know it was free and you were already there. Then it was, fifty bucks to get some beef jerky — they were hungry and hadn’t eaten. Back in Australia three of the girls could have done with fifty bucks to join Jenny Craig.

  Strolling along with the five young chicks having a yahoo was fun and they liked him even more when they realised he wasn’t an American. But some of the looks he was getting from the local lads weren’t so funny. Some of them seemed to know the girls and when they spoke Les could pick up parts of the conversation that were along the lines of, what are you girls doing with that prick just because he’s got money when you should be porking your own kind for free. Les walked along with them a bit further before slipping each girl some monopoly money, saying he’d meet them later outside the hotel they were standing in front of. Once he was rid of them Les disappeared into the crowd.