The Secret Life of Winnie Cox

by Sharon Maas

  Johanna, though only three, is turning out to be quite a wild little thing. She is such fun! We call her Yoyo, as that is what she calls herself, and it suits her – she is just like a yoyo, bouncing up and down with energy, with her moods; a tantrum one minute, the next, bubbling over with some new enthusiasm, and the tantrum forgotten!

  What a little trio we have! Archie adores them all, though he has longed for a son ever since I was expecting Winnie. He says it’s not that he loves the girls less; it’s just that we do need a boy to inherit the plantation, to learn the ropes, as it were, from a young age. It seems there are some business troubles – the Bookers company which dominate this country is threatening to do us harm. Sometimes I do wonder about these matters but I must leave that to Archie. He probably knows best. I do wonder, though.

  I am no longer pining away with loneliness. It is as if I have turned a corner, found my strength. In not giving in to those feelings of despondency, I have grown into my true personality and now I really am the backbone of this family. I recognise Archie’s weaknesses, though he does not do so himself. He truly thinks himself the master here, not recognizing that he is just like a creeper, limp and weak without its support. And that is me. I am slowly but surely easing him out of the grasp of Mr McInnes. Not an easy task, but I will do it. I have to, for my own sanity.

  I have to say, dearest diary, that you have helped me through all this. I talk to you all the time. I tell you everything, even if I don’t actually write it down. I speak to you in my thoughts, as if you are a living friend. I know you are there, somewhere, listening, and holding my metaphorical hand. You are my lifeline! So there’s no need to feel neglected. You are my constant companion! The twin sister I never had! You know it, don’t you? You are always listening! Always reading!

  Chapter Seventeen

  In the morning a great commotion shook me out of my sleep. Dazed, I wondered where I was and what great disaster was upon me. Then I remembered the night before and the sounds identified themselves as simple morning sounds balled into a tangle: children squabbling, pots and pans banging, water rushing down in the yard, a bicycle bell ringing, and behind it all the inevitable dogs barking. At Promised Land we no doubt also had all these noises but they were spread over a vast space, some of them behind closed doors. And, I noted by a glance out of the window, it was much, much too early. I pressed the pillow over my ears. But it was no good. This was the day.

  I felt stiff and still exhausted; the very thought of the coming day filled me with both excitement and dread. It is extraordinary how even a little injection of doubt can pull down a sky-high edifice of hope. Extraordinary, too, how that dread, though immaterial, can manifest in such very physical symptoms. My whole body felt heavy and dark, and it was all I could do to drag myself to a sitting and then standing position. It was as if I had not slept a wink – but I had. It was the doubt creeping through me that pressed me down, earthwards, made me want to creep back into bed and cover myself with a sheet and wake up back in Promised Land.

  I supposed I still could. I had the choice. I could go to the station, count out my fare in pennies once more, board a train and make my way back to Rosignol and New Amsterdam. I would turn up at Emily Stewart’s house and invent some excuse, some lie to explain to her mother my reappearance. On Sunday, tomorrow, Poole would come and pick me up as arranged. No one who mattered would ever know of my foolishness. It would be so very easy. It was so very inviting.

  What was it, then, who was it that cried, ‘Yes, I’m up!’ to Auntie Dolly’s rap on the door and wake-up call, ‘Winnie! Get up! Time to get ready!’

  Why were they up this early? It was Saturday, after all; there would be no school. I soon learned why, for Auntie Dolly told me over breakfast: Myrtle ran a stall in Kitty Market where she sold clothes that her mother made. It was, it seemed, quite a successful venture. Normally Auntie Dolly would stay at home to do some more sewing and look after the children. Today, the children would be going to the market with their mother, a source of some subdued grumbling on Myrtle’s part, but not of a quarrel. It seemed that she had relented somewhat in her opposition to me. Auntie Dolly herself, of course, would be accompanying me to Georgetown to hunt down George Theodore Quint. The quest was on! It was here, today, happening! The next thing I knew I was seated in a chair in the cramped front room and Auntie Dolly was brushing my hair free of knots and dressing it into an elaborate style. As she fiddled with my hair she talked, and I learned some of her story.

  ‘I use to work for a white lady,’ she said. ‘When I was young. Young like you! I was a maid in a big house in Georgetown. And then I get to be lady’s maid. I know how to dress-up white people hair – the daughter, Dorothy – my, that was a vain one: “No Dolly, I want it so, no Dolly, I want a chignon today. No, Dolly, the part in’t straight.” She marry a big boss from Bookers. Livin’ now in one-a them big houses in Main Street – I gon’ show you the house when we pass it today. My, them was fancy days! I did serve at big dinners an’ clean rooms an’ all kind-a-thing. That lady did have a seamstress who did come in the house to make she clothes. I use to help wit’ de pinnin’ an’ de tackin’. De seamstress did make a lot-a money an’ when she buy a new fancy Singer machine she did give me the old one – this one right here in de corner. That’s how I did learn seamstressing an’ get me machine an’ build up me own business. I save up me money an’ one day I buy this house.’

  She spoke with great pride. And slowly I realised: this place I had turned up my nose at, this little cottage where the rooms were so small you could stand in the middle and touch opposite walls, was for her, a great achievement. A success story. The result of diligence and ambition, of a lifetime of scrimping and saving for an end result that I, in my immeasurable arrogance, deigned to criticise and disdain. What had I done in my life that came even close? I was born into privilege. I had not earned my position. I had no real right to it. And here I was sneering, albeit silently, at Auntie Dolly’s great life achievement, and flirting with the thought of flight just to avoid a similar future.

  I straightened my spine. No. There would be no flight. This was, indeed, the day.

  Auntie Dolly pulled and prodded and tweaked at my hair. Her fingers wove expertly between the strands, and when she finished she showed me the result in a tiny mirror, and borrowed a second tiny mirror from Myrtle to show me the back. I gasped: she had done a beautiful job; two long plaits arranged like garlands around my head, with a smooth crown at the top.

  ‘Lovely!’ she said. ‘You look lovely! Now go and put on some nice clean clothes; come let me help you.’

  Auntie Dolly and I looked through the clothes in my suitcase and chose the prettiest blouse, white sprinkled with blue flowers and a high laced neck, and a smart blue skirt. Again, I looked at myself in the two tiny mirrors, but it was Aunty Dolly’s word that convinced me the most.

  ‘Beautiful’ she said this time. ‘Just beautiful!’

  She conjured a box of Pond’s Face Powder from somewhere and patted me all over my face with a powder-puff. Another look in the mirror: who was that wide-eyed girl staring back at me? A princess about to set off to find her prince, that’s who!

  There was a little hullabaloo concerning my suitcase. I wanted to take it with me. Auntie Dolly insisted I leave it behind; after all, wasn’t I going straight back to the Courantyne tomorrow? Wasn’t I spending a second night with her? How would it look, my turning up in George’s life with a packed suitcase? I was loathe to leave it, but I had to concede she was right, and so, removing only the bag full of coins, we set off together.

  It was strange to see that this time, nobody stared. They glanced, and looked away.

  ‘Is because, today you look like a lady,’ explained Auntie Dolly when I remarked on this.

  ‘You look like a lady, an’ I look like you servant. That’s the way they expect things to be. Yesterday, you was lookin’ more like the servant, an’ carryin’ you own suitcase too.’

  We walk
ed to the station, where a crowd of people was waiting for a hackney carriage, and queued quietly under a rain shelter. The carriage arrived as we did, the two horses’ hooves clattering on the tarmac as they passed us. ‘Whoa!’ cried the driver, and they slowed to a walk and then came to a standstill. Several people emerged from the coach; those waiting clambered in. The driver descended from his seat, removed his cap, and turned to me with a polite bow. ‘You wantin’ to go to town, Miss? Plenty of room for you!’

  It wasn’t true. The coach was already full, and more people waited. I shook my head. ‘No, thank you.’

  He ignored me. ‘Don’t worry ‘bout them people – they can get down and wait for the next coach.’ Without waiting for a response, he turned to the people already seated. ‘You-all don’ see the lady waitin’ to go to town? Get down all-a you!’

  And indeed, some of the passengers obediently stood up and made to descend back into the street.

  ‘No – no! Please don’t get out! Please sit down! Stay where you are!’ I called out, flustered. I turned to Auntie Dolly.

  ‘Do we have to take the coach? Can’t we go by train?’

  She shrugged. ‘In’t no train comin’ this whole mornin’’, she replied. ‘The Rosignol don’t get in till midday. You want wait so long?’

  ‘No, but …’

  ‘You is a lady. You can’t travel with common people.’

  ‘But I can! Of course I can! We’ll just wait for the next coach!’ And I walked off and joined the back of the waiting queue. Heads turned, brows raised, lips whispered.

  ‘Miss Winnie, you can’t …’ She tugged at my elbow.

  ‘Yes, I very well can!’ I said firmly, and loud enough for everyone to hear. I shook her hands off my arm. ‘We will wait here just like everyone else and sit in the carriage with everyone else. I don’t need a private coach. It’s just not right. It’s not right, Auntie, don’t you see it’s not right? It’s just wrong!’

  By the time I had finished speaking my voice had risen and I could myself hear the note of hysteria in it, the hysteria of sheer helplessness. What was this thing I was up against? This huge nameless, shapeless thing that put me at the head of queues and into empty carriages while others waited and caused heads to bow deferentially at my coming? What was it, what caused it? Why? It made me feel bad: shoddy, wicked, crooked, tearful.

  The driver climbed back into the carriage, flicked his whip; the horses nodded, swished their tails, and lumbered off.

  Auntie Dolly pursed her lips, and shrugged. ‘If you say so, Miss Winnie. If that’s what you want.’ She drew nearer and whispered: ‘You don’t see people gon’ get confuse? Why you got to be so different?’

  ‘Because I’m not different!’ I said, quite loudly. ‘I’m just like everyone else. Don’t you see?’ I pinched my arm. ‘It’s just skin! That’s all! Inside I feel just like everyone else. No different!’ I looked around, at the faces fixed on me. ‘Don’t stare! It’s nothing! Just let me be! Please, just let me be!’

  They all turned away then, as if embarrassed at my outburst, the outcry of a spoiled child, because that’s exactly how I felt. As if I’d had a tantrum and got my way, and yet still burned with frustration.

  The next carriage came after fifteen minutes. Again, the driver invited me for a private drive but I shook my head and Auntie Dolly explained and we climbed in and took our seats. There was room for six in the carriage and there had definitely been more than six passengers waiting, but several had mysteriously melted away so that I was able to embark without displacing another. The seats were arranged along the sides of the carriage with an aisle in the middle. Auntie Dolly made me take one of the front seats. I shrugged and took it, though again I felt some kind of symbolism in this position. But by now the fight had gone out of me.

  The driver collected our fares. I counted out my coins and handed them to him. I wanted to pay for Auntie Dolly as well, but she refused: ‘I is not you servant!’ She said quite loudly, embarrassing me further.

  Once everyone was seated we drove off, hoof-iron clip-clopping along the middle of the road. I felt rotten and sulky for half of the journey to Georgetown; but then my spirits lifted, and I remembered what this day was all about: this was the day I would see George.

  Mama’s Diary: Plantation Promised Land, British Guiana, 1900

  Liebes Tagebuch,

  So much has happened. I now have a friend. In Georgetown. Someone I can speak to intelligently, and divulge my cares and worries to, just as I do to you. I cannot be more precise. It is too dangerous. The thing is, he is a man. He speaks to me of things Archie has always hidden from me; rather, things I did not wish to know, for they are far too painful. They cause me great grief and great guilt. If I had known these things before, well I would never have come.

  Slavery has always been an abomination to me. I now know that this place, this Promised Land, was built on the backs of slaves. That the cane fields have been nurtured by the blood of slaves.

  I honestly don’t know what to say, what to think, what to do. I only know I am sick to my stomach. It seems that even though slavery has been abolished, the slaves replaced with indentured servants from India, things are not much better. This friend – I dare not even name him – has given me literature on the subject.

  All I can say is that I feel despondency creeping up on me again, and this time I feel defenceless against it. Not even music is helping. Not even my joy in my children. Nothing is helping. I wish I could say more but I can’t. Though I know you are discreet, I feel that everything I say or do is under surveillance. I know it isn’t but I feel that way. I cannot even mention his name. It is like a lump at the back of my throat.

  Archie, oh Archie. What is happening to us? Where has the love flown to, the love we swore was eternal? Most of all, what have you become? Where is that wonderful young man I fell in love with, the man so full of dreams, the man I laughed and danced with?

  Chapter Eighteen

  The horses kept up a brisk trot all the way through the fields to Georgetown. We turned down Camp Road and drove past Queen’s College, a one-story, cream-coloured long wooden building set back from the road. My heart beat faster – this was where George had gone to school! I imagined him as a schoolboy, sailing through those wide open gates on his bicycle, school bag slung across his shoulder just as his post-bag had been that first day we met, grinning his huge wide infectious grin; I saw his face, rich-brown in a sea of pale English faces, and felt inordinately proud of him. My George.

  We turned right into Lamaha Street and headed west towards Main Street. Auntie Dolly had said it was best to go to the main post office in the centre of town, for there he would be known and we could seek further directions. It might take us some time to find him, she had said; it was a bit of a wild goose chase.

  ‘But everybody know everybody in Town,’ she had concluded. ‘We gon’ find him. Don’t worry.’ And I didn’t. I knew we’d find him. A second sense, a feeling of joy and immanent fulfilment, made me heady, tingling all over. This was the day!

  The coach stopped just past the junction of Camp and Waterloo. A man and a woman stepped down on to the street. The driver flicked his whip and we set off again. We turned south into the shaded avenue of Main Street, stopped again for another passenger. I looked around me in appreciation: this was one of the loveliest streets in town, with its white wooden mansions set in gardens overflowing with colour. A walkway ran up the middle of the street, lined on both sides with flamboyant trees – now in full flower, flaming red. Set between two wide grass verges, the path was strewn with fallen blossoms – a red carpet set in green. Here lived the high and mighty: government dignitaries, Booker managers, friends of Papa. I had been in a few of these houses, met their inhabitants, in my other life. If one of those fine ladies should step out into the street right now, and see me in a carriage full of darkies – I smiled to myself at the thought. She’d fall over in a faint, most likely.

  It was then that I saw him. On
the other side of the walkway, just coming out of one of those very mansions, closing the gate, stepping out into the street, turning to head for the next house. In his dark blue postman’s livery, his postman’s bag at his side, its wide strap slanted across his back as he turned to walk away.

  The coachman flicked his whip to urge the horses on, but I shouted to him. ‘No! Stop! Stay! Let me out!’

  ‘Miss Winnie …’

  ‘Auntie Dolly! Look! There! Over there – between the trees – oh, you can’t see him now, he’s gone through the gate – but it’s him! George! It’s him, it really is! Come on, come down, let’s go!’

  I got up, grabbed her hand, tugged her to her feet; almost fell over my own feet in my haste to descend. Huffing and puffing and raising her skirt to climb down the steps, Auntie Dolly followed. The carriage drove off, its inhabitants peering at us through the open windows.

  I rushed across the street, hardly looking out for traffic. Auntie Dolly called after me to wait, to take care, to stop, but I did not heed her. I ran across the first grass verge on the walkway, leaped the gutter, across the brick path and the second verge and second gutter. I had to stop for a moment then, for a coach came clip-clopping past. And then I darted across the street, towards the gate I had seen George enter. There I stood, looking up. He had climbed the staircase to the front door. There he was, pushing a handful of letters through the letter-box. It was him. It was truly him.

  ‘George!’ I shouted. ‘George! It’s me!’