The Night of the Rambler

by Montague Kobbé

  So, while a catalog of candidates was mentally reviewed in order to make sense of the war cry let out by the young girl with the rolls in her head and the rugged scarf, Melinda Isaacson, a tall, lanky woman with matte dark skin as hard as a shark’s and see-through eyes, announced with a deep, otherworldly voice, You ain’ gettin’ outta here wit’ de men tonight, you know. Whether this was a threat or a divination is anyone’s guess, but as soon as she finished her sentence a blue pot tumbled through the skies, making three full circles before colliding against the windshield of the police car, shattering the screen right in the space between Sergeant Edward’s eyes.

  The women gained courage as the police lost control. They reached the cars and brazenly banged their pans, their stones, their fists against the frames, the windows, the roofs of the vehicles. The policemen were too afraid, too intimidated, to react. Eventually, it occurred to someone to open the door of the van. The three suspects stepped out victoriously, greeted by hugs and kisses as if they had been locked away for decades. Only Bathsheba Henderson grabbed Gaynor by his hair and, with one quick movement, pulled him to the ground as she reprimanded him for allowing the police to lock him in the van. Away from the attention of the women, the three police units raced in the direction of The Valley, once again empty-handed.

  * * *

  Later that night, shielded by the cloak of darkness, Alwyn Cooke emerged from the shrub and paid Ylaria a visit. His trousers were all torn at the sides, his pressed white shirt muddied, wrinkled, his face ragged, mottled with whiskers, his hair gone wild. Ylaria greeted her husband lovingly as he approached the house from the backyard: Alwyn Cooke, you look like truck run over you head. Alwyn knew she meant it in the best of ways, and he simply acknowledged her gesture with a Boy, I all mash up, man, as he walked into the living room and crashed on his wicker sofa. Ylaria undressed her husband carefully, examining his body for wounds as she stripped him naked, then sent him straight to the shower while she cooked him a meal.

  The shower was a balm for his broken spirit and the fish and johnnycakes were exactly what he needed before a few hours’ sleep. But there would be no time for that, because as soon as he finished devouring everything from the plate, a knock on the front door startled the two of them out of their skins. Apprehensively, Ylaria walked toward the door as Alwyn moved in the opposite direction, ready to dive straight back into the bush. But he did not have to run away again, since the stranger at the front door was a messenger sent by Rude Thompson to inform Ylaria Cooke that he wanted to speak to her husband in all haste, and that as soon as she saw him, she should tell him to meet Rude by the flamboyant tree between the school and the East End pond.

  Ylaria Cooke quickly dismissed the messenger, saying she had not seen Alwyn since the night before and promptly shut the door behind the loose, thin curtain that hung from the threshold. But she didn’t need to tell Alwyn Cooke where the meeting should take place, because he had heard everything the boy had said to Ylaria, and he had chosen a new pair of trousers—not his usual gray ones, but much thicker blue denim ones that would better cope with the bush—and a jacket to keep himself warm, and he was now tying the laces of his boots before heading toward East End.

  You comin’ back tonight? and Ylaria’s worried countenance went unnoticed by Alwyn, face turned downward toward his shoes.

  Dunno. But he might as well have said no, because both of them knew this emergency meeting was likely to be too long for him to be able to return home for any meaningful amount of time before having to head back into the wild again for cover, prior to the break of dawn.

  Ylaria put the rest of the fish and some johnnycakes in a bag with water and ginger beer. Jus’ in case. Alwyn kissed his wife on the lips and went out the front door, as if he were not hiding from anyone in the world, before turning around and, with a calm, self-assured voice, No worry, nuh. We all goin’ be okay. Whether Alwyn meant the men at the flamboyant tree by the school in East End, he and his wife, or the island at large with that “all” was unclear, but reassurance was precisely what Ylaria Cooke’s heart wanted that very moment, and as soon as she heard the words, they soothed her beyond reason.

  Alwyn Cooke traveled in his green Ford Anglia eastbound on the single road of the island, climbing the sharp hill over Harbour Ridge, through the scrubby hinterland that lay behind Island Harbour, past the stony path that peeled off to the left, leading to the easternmost spot of Anguilla, Windward Point, next to Junks Hole Bay, with its dense forest of coconut trees, and Savannah Bay, the last beach on the Atlantic shoreline, before he reached the left-hand bend down Mount Fortune, which ended across the East End pond from the school.

  As soon as he saw the flamboyant tree, Alwyn Cooke could make out the silhouette of Rude Thompson gesticulating wildly at Gaynor Henderson. The men were discussing the events that had taken place that same afternoon at Gaynor’s home and then on the road. Gaynor’s version of the incident somehow made him look a lot braver, a lot more self-sufficient, than he had seemed a few hours earlier, but Rude was not so much concerned with the image that Gaynor was trying to convey, nor with the heckling of the men around him, as he was with the precautions that should be made the following day to prevent the police from taking any more prisoners.

  Is some sentinels we needin’.

  Nobody quite understood what Rude Thompson meant, but there was no doubt he would presently elaborate on his idea, so nobody dared speak a word.

  I tell you wha’ we goin’ do, and Rude Thompson explained that he wanted men placed atop Welches Hill, on both sides of the road, and on the smaller hill that drifted eastward from it (How you call dat hill, nuh? and an anonymous voice from the back gave it such a sharp and unforgettable name—Liberation Hill!—that, although nobody had ever called it this before, Rude Thompson gallantly acknowledged the inventiveness with a Par’ner, Liberation Hill is de name from now an’ forever!), and he wanted the men to be in full view of each other, such that they could exchange signals from a distance (and here again a spontaneous outburst proposed the use of conch shells to communicate—Two blows, an’ we know police on de way), and Rude’s arms flailed in the dark as he spoke, when Alwyn Cooke interrupted with, Is youself you should take care of, you know. Not everyone dis side of Anguilla agree wit’ wha’ you done.

  The arrival of Alwyn Cooke brought back a sense of reality to the dialogue.

  Wha’ you t’ink you kyan achieve by attackin’ de police? Sooner or later dey come attack us bad-bad. If dey intention be to crush us tomorrow, dey could come an’ do it, you know, to which a roar erupted from behind, from the men gathered around the flamboyant tree, who all bounced brave interjections against each other.

  No sir.

  Not me.

  Dey ain’ crushin’ me.

  No one go crush East End while I here.

  But an impending sense of danger weaved its way around the silent consciousness of the men present, until Rude finally gave the order for everyone to look for stones for the watchmen to carry and throw at the police when they came through the narrow path between Welches Hill and . . . Liberation Hill.

  You still insist wit’ you nonsense? You ain’ see violence goin’ take we nowhere at all? But Rude Thompson had not seen that violence would not take the Anguillian cause anywhere at all. In fact, Rude Thompson thought the violence that erupted on the night of February 4, 1967 was the first palpable step forward they had taken in months and months of struggle. What is more, Rude Thompson felt that in the wee hours of the night of February 5, leading to the morning of February 6, Anguilla was closer, much closer, perhaps not to escaping the tyrannical hold that St. Kitts, and Robert Bradshaw in particular, held over the affairs of the island, but certainly to what Alwyn Cooke and he had identified as the first step necessary for the island’s cause to be taken seriously: to let the world, i.e., the British, know about the situation in Anguilla. Hence, there was a sense of accomplishment in Rude Thompson as he sat surrounded by his followers—his supporters�
��by the flamboyant tree, halfway between the school and the pond at East End; a sense of accomplishment that was in accordance with his practicality, with his need to get things done, regardless of the consequences, and this, undoubtedly, blended with the not-so-muted admiration of the men around him to make him feel the complacent pleasure of a garlanded hero.

  So you t’ink you Anguilla Fidel? You t’ink you kyan hide in de bush an’ fight for mont’s out here?

  Rude Thompson did not hear the Fool! that Alwyn Cooke muttered to himself, or if he heard it he chose to ignore it, because Rude had called for Alwyn to work out a common strategy between the villages of East End and Island Harbour, to work together from this point forward, because Alwyn and Rude had had their differences, and I know you never approve wha’ we done las’ night, and not only had Alwyn not approved, he had openly, outspokenly disapproved, he had tried everything in his power to dissuade Rude from carrying out such foolishness, until Rude had gone beyond the point of dissuasion, But now de t’ing done, an’ dere ain’ no goin’ back, an’ like it or not de police t’ink you one of us, an’ if we don’ go work together we go make de police stronger, so Rude wanted Alwyn to come back into the fold and help him and his men devise the best strategy of resistance against St. Kitts.

  All dis time, Rude, an’ you still understan’ not’in’ at all, at all, and Alwyn Cooke paced back and forth before the static figure of Rude Thompson. You sit here for everyone to know, surrounded by you hoodlums, like Anguilla jus’ a game. But plenty people don’ like wha’ dey see las’ night, you know. Plenty God-fearing people, who wan’ de same you say you wan’. Plenty right-t’inkin’ people who would call de police right now to put us all to jail, if de police had de guts to show dem faces in de east dis late at night.

  Rude Thompson took the comment more as a threat than as a warning, and his men behind him encroached upon Alwyn Cooke, asking him, Who you mean? pressuring him into naming the traitor.

  Easy, fellas. Easy.

  Alwyn Cooke might not have been an educated man, in the formal sense, but he had been through enough in his life to develop a strong judgment, and he had been rewarded by Lady Luck with a hefty fortune, and he had nerves of steel, which made it unlikely that anyone that night was going to get anything out of him in the first place, so Alwyn just looked straight into the night and I ain’ namin’ no names, fellas, so cut it out. But I ain’ sayin’ no lies, neither. Is be careful, all I sayin’, be careful wit’ de games you play—you may burn youself hard, and he turned his back on the crowd, walked away from the flamboyant tree, jumped into his green Ford Anglia, and made his way back to Island Harbour, into the bush, to find a suitable place to follow the example set by Jesus and meditate for a while, to spend the following day, to digest the whole situation.

  Rude Thompson had not envisioned this end to his meeting with Alwyn Cooke, much like he had not foreseen the events that would unfold over the next few days: on the morning of Monday, February 6, the police force landed its first victory against the group of insurgents from the eastern portion of the island as Inspector Edmonton himself took control of the situation and, notwithstanding the shell-blowing, the stone-throwing, the fist-waving, the manic screaming, the threats, the anger, the complete indignation of the people, a new convoy entered East End and departed the area with not three but six detainees, filling, for the first time ever, the island’s jailhouse.

  But Inspector Edmonton was not really interested in hauling in three, six, ten, or twenty prisoners from his excursion into the eastern end of Anguilla. What Inspector Edmonton wanted more than anything else was to get hold of that loudmouth Alwyn Cooke, who had tormented him and his force incessantly on Saturday night, when the Statehood Queen Show had had to be brought to a premature end with the use of tear gas. And now that the man had gone into hiding, Inspector Edmonton was also keen on getting hold of Rude Thompson, because running away was akin to confessing that he was one of the leaders, one of the two leaders, of the group of troublemakers who insisted on making Anguilla the home of unruliness. So Inspector Edmonton detained six nobodies, Gaynor Henderson and Whitford Howell among them, more because he could than because he wanted to; and he questioned them, more to have them go through the trouble than to gather any information, because Inspector Edmonton already knew everything he needed to know, and he certainly did not need these six good-for-nothings in his jail, but he charged them anyway before releasing them. He charged them with disturbing the public order, he charged them with rioting, he charged them with assault, he charged them with occasioning bodily harm, and he even charged them with impropriety for swearing in public. However, regardless of all these charges, Inspector Edmonton headed to Island Harbour the following day with the intention of brushing every single inch of the bush, of turning every goddamned stone, until he found Rude Thompson and, more importantly, Alwyn Cooke. That was the decision that spiraled into havoc.

  The men of East End, the men of Island Harbour, infuriated with the police force, took to the positions indicated by Rude Thompson the previous Sunday night and, without further instructions or consultation, they awaited the return of the convoy. Except this time they were armed not with conch shells and stones but with rifles and handguns, such that when the three police cars that brought Inspector Edmonton and his lot into an area where they were unequivocally not welcome took the sharp bend to the left that took them from the village of Deep Waters up Welches Hill, two shots from opposite directions warned them that they were ambushed, and when they sought to push through the hill onto the other side, a flurry of gunshots made Inspector Edmonton change his mind, give the order to turn round, and head back toward the station with a whole lot of trouble on his hands.

  From that point onward, Island Harbour was an open city. Or an open village—call it what you will, but the police were most definitely not going to be allowed into town, and whenever a new convoy arrived from The Valley on the days that followed, the reception became increasingly hostile, not least because the police force countered fire with fire, despite the fact that the strategic positioning of the rebels in the hills made it almost impossible for the officers to know at what or whom they were shooting. Speeding past the ambush point was precluded by the poor condition of the dust road, so on Tuesday and Wednesday the task force organized excursions into Island Harbour, with the convoy advancing slowly, in formation, covering all corners. But on both occasions it all came down to a standoff before Welches Hill, and the unexpected firepower of the rebels prompted a retreat. Meanwhile, the six prisoners had bought their provisional liberty through hefty bails, and they had rejoined their friends and families on the eastern end of the island, when, on Thursday evening, it occurred to Gaynor Henderson that the best way to get revenge on Inspector Edmonton and the rest of those pigs was to organize a nighttime raid of the police station.

  Again there was no consultation, again there was no order from above, not a word from Rude Thompson, nothing from Alwyn Cooke—the operation was as spontaneous as Gaynor’s initial idea. So, on the night of Thursday, February 9, a squad of “sharpshooters” from East End ventured out into The Valley, positioned themselves upon the low hills that rolled toward the southeast of Wallblake Airport and that offered a privileged vantage point, just a few hundred yards away from the government building, the jailhouse, and the police station, from where they could attack the latter. The whole affair lasted about two minutes, and only eight or ten shots were fired, but in spite of the fact that each of them missed the concrete building far wide or high, it seemed like a whole battery of infantrymen had just besieged the neural center of the island, because gunshots were not usually heard in the still Anguillian nights, and gunshots had never before been directed consciously, premeditatedly, at the authorities in Anguilla. The message delivered was loud and clear, and all that was left for the rebels to do was head back east and wait for the response from the police.

  East End was a bag of nerves on Friday morning. Several men took their sho
tguns and, of their own accord, made their way by foot down the two-mile dust road to Welches Hill and Liberation Hill, where, it had now become part of the local lore, just two armed men were enough to keep any force, no matter how strong, from passing through. And if two men were enough, well, imagine what could be accomplished with four, with eight, with fifteen, with twenty bold and eager armed men. Except nothing at all had to be achieved during that Friday, because Inspector Edmonton, in light of the previous night’s attack, decided against entering the eastern side of the island, instead asking for reinforcements from St. Kitts for his thirteen-man strong (or weak, rather) force, and putting in place a daytime roadblock that would essentially isolate the rebels and safeguard peace in the rest of the island. Inspector Edmonton figured the supplies of the dissidents were relatively limited, particularly when it came to ammunition. He also assumed that, having attacked the station at night, nothing would stop the rebels from striking again on subsequent nights. Le’ dey be anxious. Le’ dey build dey confidence. Le’ dey shoot all night, if dey wan’. Den we come inside, when dey have no bullets no more.

  All through the day the tension grew among the hotheads gathered at Welches Hill, at Liberation Hill, awaiting the convoy of policemen that never arrived. From time to time a shot could be heard, fired at the sky for no other purpose than to vent some anger, to let out some of the frustration, to rile the troops, or simply to dare the authorities to do something about it. But the authorities were in no rush to make any movement at all, and when the sun set, Inspector Edmonton told his men, all twelve of them, to go home and avoid being seen until the following day. So, when the same men who the night before had taken aim and shot at the police station with impunity reached Rey Hill to inflict much heavier damage on the task force, there was no one to shoot at inside the police station. Except the rebels did not know this. Far more collected than the night before, encouraged by the passive attitude of the police, the four men became more daring, more precise in their shooting on Friday evening: more than thirty shots were heard howling through the thick of the night in Anguilla, and twice as many, it seemed, shattered windows, splintered doors, echoed in the empty rooms of the building. The inspector’s foresight had saved the lives of his men, and spared the revolution its first episode of bloodshed.