Dottie

by Abdulrazak Gurnah

  Sophie duly lost some of her fervour in the latter stages of her time, put off by the labour of dragging her cumbersome body from Segovia Street to Reverend Mosiah’s tabernacle. She became more preoccupied with the coming birth, and gradually allowed herself to miss some of the church events. Together, the two sisters went out to look for a cot in the second-hand shops. They found a cradle in the ironmonger’s yard in Rossiter Road, and asked the man in the front if they could buy it. He looked incredulous, and perhaps assumed they were making fun of him. He was a short plump man, with metal-rimmed spectacles and a cap pushed back on his head. He looked even more surprised when they agreed to pay a pound for it, and his wily, put-upon face melted with melodramatic pity. He had a couple of innocents on his hands! ‘It needs cleaning up a bit. You won’t be needing it for a couple days yet, will you?’ he said with a smile and a nod at Sophie’s bulge. ‘If you tell me where you want it sent, I’ll have it cleaned up and brought round in a couple of days. Don’t mention it, love. What are you hoping for? A boy? They’re more trouble than they’re worth.’

  When the cradle arrived, not only was it clean, it was also painted white. The frame consisted of two intricately wrought panels that made up the ends, linked together by four longitudinal bars. At the top of the panels and pointing inwards were two hooks. The basket, which was made of a fine mesh around a sturdy, box-like frame, hung from these hooks. A delicate rod was fixed to the head-panel, from which, they assumed, would hang an awning or canopy to screen the baby at appropriate times. Sophie played with it for hours after they got it upstairs, putting different objects in it and endlessly rocking them.

  2

  At the very beginning of November, three weeks before the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy in Dallas, Texas, Sophie’s baby made his appearance. Dottie was called from the factory and came to lament the arrival of a new Hudson into her unhappy world. The next day she went looking for Jimmy, and tramped from one billet to another looking for him. At the Camberwell address she found two men. They were sleeping, perhaps night workers on the Transport, and she was sorry to have disturbed them. They told her he had moved out, and now was to be found at a place in Stoke Newington. She took a bus to the street they told her, and was met by an angry black woman with dyed auburn hair. She looked Dottie contemptuously up and down then sucked her teeth. She spat out an address in Ladbroke Grove when Dottie persisted, saying she had very important family news. Dottie nearly turned back after that, but the thought of Sophie’s misery persuaded her to make one more try. He was not at the address she had been given in Ladbroke Grove, but she left word with the man who was there and went back south of the river.

  Jimmy came the following day. Sophie had not seen such a lot of him in recent weeks. In truth she had not seen such a lot of him since she fell pregnant, but in the very last weeks he had not appeared at all. Dottie found it almost impossible to hide her disapproval of him, and this neglect, although she spoke of it with Sophie as a matter of mutual condolence, vindicated the low opinion of him that she held. She had found out from Sophie that Jimmy was no longer his name. He had changed it to something else. When Dottie asked what his new name was, Sophie shrugged and looked persecuted.

  When he came to see Sophie at the hospital, he had eyes only for the baby at first. He picked it up and played with it, whispering to it and smiling, exclaiming at its every feature. It was only when the baby was taken away from him because it started to grizzle and grumble that he showed his annoyance for not being consulted about the name. It was his right as a father, and he had been denied it. He insisted that the baby should also be given his brother’s name, Patterson, as a second name.

  ‘I didn’t know you had a brother,’ Dottie said. ‘Is he older than you? How many of you are there?’

  Jimmy laughed, arching his body and then straightening lazily, affectedly. ‘He’s not my real brother,’ he said.

  ‘You’re full of surprises these days. Sophie tells me you’ve got a new name as well.’

  He sang out a long name which was incomprehensible to her but which was unmistakably African. It sounded like Bongbongbong, and she wondered if he was saying it right. When Africans said their names and she could not catch the word, the sound was usually a blur, a hiss and roll of vowels and diphthongs, like a long knife being drawn out of a dry scabbard. Jimmy said the word like a series of clumsy hammer blows. He laughed to see her open-mouthed shock, and explained that it was a Ghanaian name. His adopted brother Patterson, who was himself Ghanaian, had given it to him.

  ‘Oh, it’s a Ghanaian name,’ Dottie said, and nodded her head patiently as if she was humouring him.

  Like someone reciting from a memorised passage, Jimmy told the story of Patterson. His father had been a sailor from Gold Coast in the Thirties, had been paid off at Tilbury at the end of a voyage and had never gone back. He had left a family back in Gold Coast whom he chivvied and nagged until they sent the eldest boy to him when he was old enough. The education here was better, he said. Patterson’s family had been reluctant to see him go. They had hopes of their own for him, and put a high value on his quick understanding and his gentle manner. They called him the son of their white man, but they did so with irony, lamenting the loss of the boy’s father. In the end they had no choice but to let the boy go. They did so with trepidation, afraid that with the boy they would also lose the remittances that they had learned to depend on from their absent man. The boy was given a new name when he came to live with his father and his new mother in Barking. He was called Patterson.

  Sophie had already met Patterson, and had her own reservations about him. But she was so pleased that Jimmy had come that she nodded her grateful consent without a murmur, even though she found Patterson frightening and overbearing. Dottie said nothing, suppressing her disdain for Jimmy and his new African name. For Sophie’s sake, she stopped herself from being sharp with him for his high-handed insistence on his rights. She could tell him a thing or two about his rights if he wanted to listen. Patterson was not even his real brother anyway, and in any case what kind of name was that! However much he irritated her, though, she could see Sophie’s affection for him. She had seen him being kind and caring with her, and perhaps the child was what was required to make him give more of himself. She remembered one Saturday afternoon in the summer, during one of his visits, when he had gone shopping with Sophie. She had stumbled and sprained her ankle on the High Road, and he had carried the shopping and supported her all the way home. Dottie had boiled some water and poured it into a bowl, and made her sister soak her foot in a mustard bath. While she had some spare hot water, she made him a cup of tea, and was pleased that he stayed a few minutes and cheered Sophie with his conversation. He had come back the next day, bringing a bunch of lilies to cheer the lady who was poorly.

  It was not really her business. However uneasy Dottie was made by Jimmy, she felt she should not interfere to spoil things for her sister. Jimmy had a wild way about him. Sometimes his joking got out of hand and he laughed too much and too loudly, like a man who was sick and bitter inside. He would not say exactly what he did when Dottie asked him. Just general labouring, he said. The last time she tried to find out he had frowned and seemed on the point of getting angry, but then he had smiled and wagged a finger at her. He told her that he did whatever came his way, mostly jobs on building sites. He could get a job whenever he wanted because he was a welder by trade. Whatever her worries, she had not imagined him being able to do Sophie any real harm, unless it was to make her fall pregnant.

  ‘You don’t worry, girl,’ Jimmy said before he left. ‘I’m the father and I’ll look after you. Just get yourself out of this hospital so I can come and give you some loving. I miss you all this time, girl, and I don’t want you to keep them bubbies just for him.’

  He had not asked her how she felt, or how she would manage, but Sophie was so pleased that he had come, and had promised to come to her once she was out of hospital, that his lack of interest
in her pain only hurt her for a short while.

  The hospital asked her to leave after three days, and told her if she was ever pregnant again, she must get in touch with her doctor and attend ante-natal check-ups. They told her about checks and vaccinations for the baby, and frowned at her respectful and confused silence. At last they let her go, ‘See you next year, love,’ they said. She took the bus back to the room in Balham that she shared with Dottie, glad to be going home. She found the room ready to receive her, even though Dottie was at work. The cradle was decorated with ribbons, and a fragile-looking mobile of satiny goldfish hung from the tapering pole above the head-panel. The wall nearest to it was covered with pictures from advertisements cut out from magazines. Sophie put Hudson in the cradle and painfully stretched herself on her bed beside him.

  When Dottie came home, and after her initial surprise that Sophie had been discharged so suddenly, she too sat near the baby, watching her sister ministering to it. Little Hudson seemed to prefer having his eyes shut but, after much cajoling and chucking under the chin, agreed to open them briefly. The two sisters were delighted with their success, but their attempts to repeat it incensed the young lord, who emitted powerful screams of rage that were quite out of proportion to the provocation. And he filled his nappy for good measure, intent on demonstrating that he would not be trifled with. Instead of casting down his new devoted slaves, this behaviour only seemed to delight them, and Hudson sighed to himself as he realised the tasks that lay ahead.

  Later, after Hudson had gone to sleep, Dottie watched Sophie stretch herself out on the bed again. She groaned and creaked as she did so, unfolding herself as if flexing a wounded muscle after long misuse. Sophie looked so ill and fat, and so resentful of her condition, Dottie thought. For all her prayers and her religion, the God she worshipped had not seen fit to make her better suited to life, and instead had given her such a heavy lot. Soon they began to talk of what would need to be done. Dottie brought out the exercise book in which she spasmodically kept their accounts. It usually came into use when they had to save money for something. In it Dottie did the sums that showed undeniably that she could not earn enough money on her own to look after all three of them. She had to say it several times, and mention all the alternatives she could think of, which were mostly unavailable to them, before Sophie would reluctantly concede that she had to go back to work immediately.

  ‘I have to go to the doctor. The nurses told me,’ she pleaded. ‘And Hudson has to have injections. Do you want the baby to fall ill? They’ll keep the job for me, Sis. The supervisor told me . . . Jimmy will help until we can move to our own place.’

  Dottie snorted with contempt. Sophie looked apprehensively at her, fearful that she would lecture her again for believing in Jimmy. But Dottie said no more, looking down at the depressing rows of figures in her exercise book.

  ‘The Lord will provide,’ said Sophie.

  ‘Amen,’ Dottie said sarcastically.

  ‘It’s the burden our Almighty has given us to bear, and we must manage as we can to earn His love. Now He has given us the most wonderful gift we could’ve asked for. He has given us our Hudson back. Thank you Lord for this little angel.’

  ‘Amen!’ repeated Dottie, throwing in a wiggle of the head, the way she had seen the Holy Rollers working themselves up. ‘But we have to find somebody to mind him now. I’m sorry it’s so hard, Sophie, but we don’t have very much choice. We can make a life for the boy, never fear that, but we have to organise ourselves.’

  ‘Jimmy will help . . .’ Sophie started, and then stopped when she saw the look of irritation pass across Dottie’s face. She scowled obstinately and continued. ‘Jimmy will come for me and Hudson as soon as he finds a place for all of us. Then you won’t have to worry about us. You have no faith in him, Sis, but you’ll see.’ She picked the stirring Hudson up out of his cradle and busied herself with the buttons on her dress. Dottie passed her a wet cloth, and she wiped herself gently before putting him on her breast. She leaned back a little against the wall, and watched him as he sucked at her with joyful zest. His eyes were tightly shut, and his noisy, slippery gulps were punctuated by moments of silence. He lifted one tiny leg in the air and held it like that, then gently he swung it to and fro in the air before putting it down again in his mother’s lap. After a moment Sophie looked up and smiled at her sister, and wiped away all memory of their disagreement.

  3

  Hudson spent his days with a woman called Joyce, who had recently had a child herself. She lived in Elmfield Street, not too far away, in a room of her own. It was not difficult to guess what she did at night to make a living. Her costumes were hanging on a rail in the alcove that served as her wardrobe. Joyce had come to see them, saying she had heard from one of the women in church that they needed a minder. She was younger than both of them, tall and slim with a large wide mouth and eyes full of mischief. Dottie guessed she could not be more than nineteen. She laughed a great deal that first time, anxious to win them over. The Reverend Mosiah would recommend her if they wanted to ask him. She needed the money, she said, and another little one would be no bother since she was already looking after her own. Feeding would be no problem since her own was still on the breast and she produced more than her baby could consume. Sophie was reluctant, glaring at her and touching her own breasts. The younger woman looked too skinny to be able to produce enough milk for two babies, and she did not want Hudson catching something from her.

  Dottie was also uneasy about Joyce, but her price was so reasonable that they could not refuse. Sophie still whimpered grumblingly as the arrangement was made. She would give Hudson three of his feeds, so Joyce only needed to feed him in the late morning and late afternoon. And she was to change him after every feed, and keep his nappies separate from her own baby’s. Joyce agreed to everything, desperate for the money, until Sophie ran out of objections. They agreed that Sophie would drop Hudson off in Elmfield Street every morning, and pick him up on her way back from work. Joyce smiled, leaning down to look at Hudson in his cradle. He reached up and clutched her blouse, and then let out a polite whoop of delight, which finally banished Sophie’s lingering unease. The three women joked about the terror he would cause the world’s unsuspecting female population when he had grown older.

  Jimmy came one weekend, three weeks after Sophie had left hospital. He had been working in Moss Side, he said. That was why he had not been round earlier. He had told Patterson about the little boy who was named after him, and he would like to come and greet them and his namesake. ‘Where’s the little Patterson?’ he cried. He was obviously well tanked-up, and took no notice of Dottie’s tight-lipped disapproval. It was early Saturday afternoon, the end of Sophie’s first week back at work. She had been woken up several times by Hudson the previous night, and she had been feeling depressed and put-upon before Jimmy turned up. His arrival transformed her, and she clung to him as if she was afraid he would run out any minute. Jimmy gave Dottie some money and asked her to go and do some shopping. ‘We’re celebrating, girl, so don’t you spare any of that legal tender. Get us a slap-up down-home feed. There’s plenty more where that came from, honey.’ Dottie took the money and went, if only to give them time to themselves and to buy him the rum he kept asking for.

  As soon as Dottie left the room, Jimmy threw himself on Sophie, reaching into her dress without many preliminaries. He gave her his mock-satyr laughter as he struggled to pull her pants down. She fought him off playfully, giggling with anticipation of the love-making that she knew would come. Jimmy was very good at giving her pleasure, but at the back of her mind was a nervous worry that this time it would hurt. She helped him take her dress off. He lunged for her huge breasts, making wailing baby noises and tickling her sides at the same time. He overcame her guilty reservations about allowing him to suck her by making a comically crestfallen face. She laughed and gathered him to her breast. Her eyes filled with tears as she watched her man nestling on her, and she suppressed the desire to have Hu
dson suck on the other side.

  He was sleeping when Dottie came back. Sophie avoided her eyes, concentrating on the pain between her legs, feeling the pulse of its rhythm as it beat through her. Hudson started to make small snuffling noises. Dottie reached for him before Sophie could move, rebuking her for Jimmy and for neglecting the baby. When Sophie started to undo the front of her dress, Dottie snorted with derision. ‘You’d better go and clean yourself first, my girl,’ she said, looking pointedly at the dark stains her leaking milk had made on the bodice of her dress. ‘If you’ve got anything left . . .’

  ‘There’s no need for that, Sis,’ Sophie cried, wounded by Dottie’s accusation. ‘If you don’t like him to come here . . .’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Dottie said quickly. ‘It wasn’t charitable to say that.’

  ‘The Lord watch over us, Amen,’ Sophie said in a hurt undertone.

  Jimmy stayed the night, so drunk by the end of the evening that the sisters had to undress him. Dottie would have left Sophie to get on with it, but she did not want her to hurt herself for such a worthless snail as him. They squeezed him up against the wall on Sophie’s bed, and Dottie went to the bathroom down the hall while Sophie finished undressing him and tucked him up.