This Side Jordan

by Margaret Laurence

  TEN

  Johnnie poured two more drinks, a little whiskey and a good deal of soda. They had been drinking cautiously, making one drink last a long time. Neither wanted to say more than he intended. But for all that, they had talked like old friends.

  Cameron Sheppard had none of the qualities Johnnie had once admired in James and Bedford. He had to be admired for another reason: he knew exactly what he wanted and he was going after it, methodically, scientifically, and without the slightest scruple. He didn’t ask whether a thing was right or wrong. He only asked if it could be made to work. Perhaps that was why Miranda didn’t like him.

  Cameron hadn’t left them in any doubt about his African policy. And yet he hadn’t held forth on the subject, as James did. His grey-framed glasses gave the necessary executive touch to a face that was, at forty, still the face of a young man. Behind the glasses his eyes crinkled often into a smile as he expounded his theories in a casual and conversational way.

  ‘Personally, I neither like nor dislike the Africans,’ Cameron had said. ‘There’s been entirely too much emotion in our dealings with them in the past, and it’s done no one any good. It’s essential for our own self-preservation that we should understand them, though, but it must be an objective study, without the personal involvements of hate or love. We can’t afford the luxury of such irrationalities in these lean times. Britannia’s no longer a buxom wench who can give or withhold her favours. She’s a matriarch, and an emaciated one at that, and she’ll have to be very sharp-witted if she’s to hang onto her family and keep them from straying. Don’t you agree, Johnnie?’

  Johnnie had nodded, and Cameron continued smoothly.

  ‘Take Independence, for example. It’s an inevitable development here, and there would be no point in our burying our heads in the sand about it. The question is – what can we salvage from the whole thing? The British government’s taken the only possible course in agreeing to grant Independence to this colony. Certainly, we all know the Africans aren’t ready. But what was the alternative? To do as the French have done in North Africa, and have an interminable rebellion on our hands? Or as the descendants of the Boers have done in South Africa – segregate black and white, and create such hatred and tension that civil war is almost bound to result one day? Admittedly, we were forced to suppress the Africans in Kenya, chiefly, I think, because Mau Mau wasn’t a genuine movement towards independence. It wasn’t a forward-going thing, you understand, but rather a return to the past, to the old secret societies and horrifying rites of their ancestors. And, of course, there was the ghastly complication of the white settlers. But this country – well, independence was bound to happen first here. All the conditions were right. No white settlers have ever been allowed. The country is rich in resources – cocoa, timber, gold, palm-oil. And there exists a certain minimum of educated Africans who can take over. We did the only sensible thing. We gave in gracefully. And the new Ghana will probably stay in the Commonwealth because of it. Maybe they’ll make a mess of things at first, but it can’t be helped. We’ve made them a partner in the Commonwealth, and let’s hope it keeps ’em happy for a while. We’ve cut our losses. We’ve salvaged what we could from the maelstrom.’

  He had smiled at Johnnie then, and given him a meaningful glance. Johnnie knew he was being flattered, but he could not help feeling pleased all the same.

  ‘What is true in the macrocosm, so to speak, of Empire,’ Cameron had finished, ‘is equally true in the microcosm of a business firm. There you have the whole thing in a nutshell.’

  ‘Expediency,’ Miranda had said. ‘There you have the whole thing in a word.’

  Miranda had gone to bed soon after dinner. From then on, the atmosphere had been entirely agreeable.

  Now it was midnight. The ceiling fan still churned the sour air. Outside, the only sounds were the trilling of the tree toads, and the bougainvillaea vines scratching at the thief-netting on the windows.

  Cameron leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms.

  ‘It’s getting late. Well, we’ve had quite a discussion, Johnnie. Do you realize, though, an amusing feature of it?’

  ‘You mean we’ve talked about everything under the sun except the one specific thing that concerns both of us most at the moment?’

  Cameron laughed.

  ‘Just what do you think of Africanization, Johnnie? I’m asking you in a completely unofficial way. I simply want to know, for my own information. Quite frankly, we’ve hit a number of snags in the Textile Department, and I want to know why. We have our own views in London, but I want to get a reasonably unbiased view from someone here. And that’s not easy to find. I think you can give it to me.’

  ‘Exactly what do you want to know?’

  ‘Do you think we can make Africanization work, especially in the Textile Branch? If so, how, and how soon?’ Cameron’s staccato questions seemed to be typed in the air.

  Johnnie drew a long breath.

  ‘Yes, I think it can work quite well,’ he replied. ‘As to how soon – that depends.’

  ‘On what?’

  Here it was. The course had to be set now.

  ‘You’ll never have Africanization in this department,’ Johnnie said slowly, ‘unless someone sets the wheels in motion.’

  He glanced up uncertainly. But Cameron was nodding encouragingly.

  ‘You don’t have to be afraid of saying it, Johnnie. That’s why I’m here, you know. To find out why nothing’s been done.’

  Faint and far away, Johnnie heard the womenvoices – what will become of us? where will we go?

  He remembered Cora’s eyes as she looked at the brocade. And James’ hands that had danced a ballet of anxiety, the anxiety of an old man who had created only one thing with his life and now stood to lose it. And the massive knight, clutching in his hands not a sword to go with armour, but a child’s paper cup full of his consolation and his grief. And Helen, obsessed with a double fear – the fear of staying and the fear of being forced to leave.

  These were all the reasons why nothing had been done.

  ‘It’s not easy to say it –’ Johnnie stammered.

  ‘I know,’ Cameron replied soothingly, ‘and I respect your reticence. You mustn’t think I’m trying to pump you. If you’d rather not go into details, that’s fine. But – you’re the only man here who can tell me what I want to know. I suppose you realize that?’

  If he remained silent, he would not save those others. He would only make certain his own destruction as well.

  ‘Well, never mind,’ Cameron was saying. ‘It’s getting late, now, and perhaps we’d better –’

  Johnnie made a quick movement with his hands.

  ‘No – wait a moment, Cameron. It has to be said sooner or later. I think I can – tell you everything you want to know.’

  And everything was what it turned out to be. Not one thing, or several, or a selection. Once he began, it all poured out, everything he knew about the other Europeans in the Textile Department, everything he knew about their wives.

  It took two hours, and when it was over, Johnnie’s shirt was drenched with sweat and his hands were shaking.

  Cameron was looking at him curiously.

  ‘It wasn’t easy to say all that, Johnnie. I know. But I’m grateful. It makes a lot of things clearer in my mind. It’s not easy for me, either, you know, coming out here for a few days and having to grasp the whole complex situation and remedy it. You’ve helped. I won’t forget.’

  A look passed between them. Two men who understood each other. Two realists. Johnnie felt strength and assurance flow into him. He told Cameron, then, about the boys.

  ‘I’d hoped to have a few definitely lined up by the time you got here,’ he finished, ‘but it couldn’t be managed by then. I’m seeing these chaps next week. It would save us a good deal of time and grief, it seems to me, if we could go straight to the schools and have them do a preliminary screening of applicants. This particular schoolmaster – he’s a ped
estrian sort of chap, really, not too imaginative, but very earnest and serious. If he can find me some promising boys,

  I can begin grooming them, if you like, to take over from men like Cooper and Freeman.’

  ‘Yes, I see. Look here, Johnnie, you haven’t mentioned the scheme to James?’

  ‘No. I could scarcely – I mean, he’s so dead-set against –’

  ‘Quite right. We don’t want anything underhanded, of course, but I don’t think you need go into details with James just yet. I’ll assume responsibility. It’s merely – what shall we call it? – a pilot scheme. I can’t give you any definite authority, you understand. But you go ahead with it. It’s the first promising sign I’ve seen here.’

  ‘That’s very decent of you,’ Johnnie said. ‘Thanks.’

  Cameron was leafing through his wallet.

  ‘Here – ’ he held out a card to Johnnie, ‘my home address. If you care to make the odd progress report –’

  Johnnie took the card. The dead voices were still. Now there was only his own voice, shouting inside him, shouting his identity.

  When Johnnie went into the bedroom, he found a dead gekko on the floor, belly uppermost. It was already covered with black ants. They swarmed around it in a loosely organized army, and their combined strength was shifting it. Swaying from side to side, in jerky halting movements, the lizard corpse was being carried away to have its bones picked clean. The ants had not been obvious in this room before, but they must have been here, unobtrusively waiting. In its strength of life, the lizard had preyed upon them. Johnnie looked at the gekko coldly. Then he kicked it away, out of sight, and the ants with it.

  ‘I’ll tell you something,’ Bedford said, closing the door behind him, ‘it’s eleven a.m. and I’m tight as a tick, and I fully intend to stay that way.’

  Johnnie looked up from his desk.

  ‘Well, keep out of James’ way, then, for God’s sake.’

  ‘James!’ Bedford snorted, lowering himself onto a chair. ‘It’s not James we have to worry about any longer, Johnnie. It’s that pipsqueak Sheppard.’

  ‘Has he been talking to you, then?’

  ‘With a vengeance,’ Bedford said heavily. ‘I tell you, Johnnie, the man has simply no manners whatsoever. Barged into my office without so much as a by-your-leave, and demanded to see all the staff records and God knows what else. Well, I mean to say, one can’t always produce that sort of thing on the spur of the moment, can one?’

  Bedford certainly couldn’t. Johnnie knew something of the chaotic state of the big man’s office.

  ‘And that chummy manner of his,’ Bedford went on, pulling at his grey moustache, ‘“Now tell me, Bedford, old chap, what do you think of Africanization?” So I bloody well did tell him.’

  Johnnie groaned.

  ‘Why on earth did you do that? You knew he –’

  Bedford drew himself up, and for a moment Johnnie saw him as the massive knight once more.

  ‘Oh, certainly, I know he’s flat out for Africanization,’ he said, ‘but, as it happens, I’m not.’

  Johnnie felt a grudging admiration for Bedford’s staunchness, his immovability. But such qualities weren’t worth tuppence any more.

  Bedford leaned forward and spoke in a confidential and rumbling whisper.

  ‘Sheppard’s angling for a senior partnership, of course. Old Mr. Bright plans to retire soon.’

  ‘Oh,’ Johnnie said with interest. ‘I hadn’t known.’

  ‘Yes. I suppose he thinks this is the way to impress the Board. Howling success in West Africa – lots of publicity – that sort of thing. So he flits merrily in here, bursting with all sorts of sociological theories, and we’re expected to lap it up gratefully. Well, I’m blowed if I will. James says the same.’

  Bedford laughed without amusement.

  ‘You know, Johnnie,’ he finished, ‘I’d never have thought it possible, but I find myself of late becoming quite fond of old James. At least he understands the situation here. And he’s in the same boat – you and I and James, we’re all in the same boat. We’re on our way out. No use beating around the bush. There it is, plain as paint.’

  Johnnie flushed and looked away.

  ‘It may not be as bad as you think –’

  ‘No,’ Bedford said steadily, ‘I’m afraid it’s finished, old chap. Well, there you are. No use moaning about it. I wouldn’t so much mind if it weren’t for Helen –’

  ‘What does she –?’

  ‘Oh, you know Helen. She storms and rants, but she knows it’s all quite pointless, really. She’ll calm down after a bit. She always does. It’s not been easy for her, bringing up two youngsters – this way. I haven’t exactly helped the situation, ever. She thinks I don’t realize. But actually, I very rarely think of anything else.’

  He glanced at Johnnie in embarrassment, as though he had not intended to reveal this much. Then he rose to his feet, straightened his cumbersome body and assumed once more, with effort, his military bearing.

  ‘Stupid to talk this way,’ Bedford said. ‘Of course we’ll make out all right. Something will turn up, although it’s hard to see what possibly could. But as far as Sheppard is concerned, and all this nonsense about Africanization – well, I mean to say, a man’s got to draw the line somewhere, hasn’t he? We’ll be a pack of nobodies quite soon enough, I expect. At least we needn’t let it happen to us here.’

  He lumbered out of the office. His pace was careful and measured, and the expression on his face, for the benefit of the African clerks, was strong and self-contained. Whether he had been accepting the enemy’s flag, or handing over his own, his expression would have been the same.

  Watching him go, Johnnie would almost have traded his own cleverness and an assured future to be that stiff-spined and unbending figure.

  When Attah came to tell him that Mr. Thayer wanted to see him, Johnnie felt for a paralysed moment that he could not walk down the hall to James’ office. What if Cameron Sheppard were there? He could not talk to either man in the presence of the other. But when he entered the Manager’s office, James was alone.

  The Squire was standing at the window, looking out with fixed concentration, as though he had not seen the same noisy throng of Africans every day for years.

  Johnnie waited, and finally James turned around. Johnnie was startled at his appearance: the Squire’s face was an unhealthy grey and the skin was puffed into dark pouches under his eyes. He blinked repeatedly, like a dun-coloured mole trying unsuccessfully to penetrate the daylight.

  ‘Oh – Johnnie. Mr. Sheppard – ah – goes back to London tonight?’

  They both knew he did.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Then I suppose you’ll be taking him to the airport, as he’s staying at your place? Or do you want to arrange transport?’

  ‘I’ll drive him myself.’

  ‘Oh – ’ again the vague worried blinking, ‘you’re sure it’s no trouble?’

  ‘None.’

  James coughed and rustled some papers on his desk. Then he appeared to make his decision. He leaned against the desk and gripped it with both hands.

  ‘Johnnie – has he – discussed this Africanization business with you?’

  Johnnie felt his face grow hot and scarlet.

  ‘A little,’ he evaded. ‘Why?’

  James did not reply at once. His fingers again sought and found the letters on his desk. He kept his eyes averted, and Johnnie, hazarding a quick glance, was able to see why.

  Horrifying in their absurdity, the tears rolled slowly down the Squire’s face. James could not speak because he was crying.

  In a moment, James had himself under control, although he took care to turn once more to the window so that Johnnie could not see his face.

  ‘It’s preposterous – ’ James’ voice sounded more surprised than angry, ‘but he won’t let me explain my point of view at all. He talks and talks about the necessity of having Africans in top posts, and when I try to explain that whitem
en will never be able to work alongside blacks, not decent white-men, anyway – then he simply ignores me. He acts as though I haven’t said a word, and goes right on outlining his own theories. Why, Johnnie, I knew Sheppard when he was a mere youngster, scarcely out of school. And now –’

  James brought one fist down on the windowsill, in an impotent and meagre gesture of rage.

  ‘Now – ’ he cried, ‘he treats me as though I were a schoolboy, as though my opinions and experience didn’t count for a thing – almost as though he didn’t even know it’s my department – the department I’ve made –’

  James did not seem aware of the extent to which he was exposing himself to another’s eyes. But Johnnie, shocked into sharp vision by the Squire’s tears and by the pain in the old man’s voice, saw for the first time what James’ true position here had been. Bumbling and pompous, the Squire would likely have spent his life as a mole-like ledger-keeper, had he stayed in England. But here – here he had walked on Mount Olympus. He had dispensed justice as he saw it – rewards for the compliant ones, punishments for the unruly. A frail and balding Jupiter, he had paced his temple in time of riot, waving an old army rifle, subduing and chastening his erring children.

  The Squire had spoken as a god might speak, who had created a world only to have its creatures mock and finally destroy him by their disbelief.

  Then James swung around, and his eyes, meeting Johnnie’s, were both apologetic and eager.

  ‘I was wondering, Johnnie – would Miranda mind not going to the airport? You’d have some time alone with him then. You’re young. You speak in his idiom. You’re a convincing talker. Maybe he might let you explain our point of view, the way we feel, out here, about Africanization. All the things the London office doesn’t understand – the impossibility of the whole idea. He might listen to you. Would you – would you try, Johnnie?’

  Johnnie felt unsteady, as though he were very drunk, and his own voice sounded strange to his ears.