‘Damn you to hell, Maisie. Couldn’t you think of other people a little? Couldn’t you think of me?’ He had been so happy, life was moving so smoothly and now—
‘You haven’t done anything. What is it to you? I didn’t want him here and I wouldn’t have him here. And don’t damn me, Mr. Haynes. I have never heard you damn anyone before. And you mustn’t begin with me.’
‘I’ll damn you when I please.’ He looked at his watch. ‘Come on, dress yourself. I have to be here when Mrs. Rouse learns about this. If I am not here she’ll kill you.’
‘Kill who? She! All this hatchet and knife business is only a lot of style she makes.’
‘Don’t argue. You have to leave the place with me. Here is some money. Go to the pictures. And mind you, don’t you show your nose in this house until after five.’
‘All right, boss,’ said Maisie.
‘Hurry up. I am not leaving here until I see you out of this place.’
‘Yes, cap’n,’ said Maisie, but she moved quickly away. In three minutes she was out.
‘Don’t pass by Argyle Street. You may meet her. Go down the Avenue.’
‘All right, Mr. Haynes. But before I go, Mr. Haynes—’ She was in one of her rarely serious moods.
‘What is it?’
‘I am sorry, Mr. Haynes, to cause you all this trouble. You are not vexed with me?’
‘I am; damned vexed. Don’t stop here talking. You make all this trouble and I have to get you out of it.’ Maisie turned and walked away with slow steps and head down. Haynes began to be sorry for her, but hardened his heart and rode past her on his bicycle without turning to look. He had to teach her a lesson.
Chapter Twenty-Six
He worked that afternoon with feverish haste and anxiety. Maisie rang him up and he answered, telling her that if she went home before he did he would never speak to her again. She gave a very docile ‘All right,’ and he slammed the receiver down. If she was wretched she had every right to be. He would make it up with her some time, but not until this business was settled. He rode home as fast as he could, but when he reached did not go straight in but leant his bicycle against the side of the house and reconnoitred.
There was no sound of any disturbance. As he was going quietly across the yard to get into his room, Mrs. Rouse called to him from the dining-room and he stopped, nervous but ready.
‘Mr. Haynes, you will not guess what happened here today.’
But there was no sign of anger on her face. Triumph, rather.
‘Mr. Benoit come back here this afternoon.’
‘Benoit!’ said Haynes.
‘Yes, sir, Benoit. Come right back like a dog to eat his vomit,’ said Mrs. Rouse. ‘Go in, Mr. Haynes. I am coming to tell you.’
She followed him into the room and sat down. She didn’t know yet at any rate.
‘Yes, sir. Come right back here this afternoon. But I knew he was coming, you know. He had to come. But let me tell you. I went to town to see my solicitor about some business I had been trying to fix all the week. They keep me there longer than I thought, you know how these solicitors disgusting, and up to now the man ain’t tell me anything, tell me to come back next week. I drop off the car here about half-past one and I come straight in. Well, as I reach to go up the step, I hear, “Alice, Alice!” I turn round, and I see the man standing up in the yard. Mr. Haynes, you could imagine! From the day the man leave here I haven’t seen him up to that hour. You could have knocked me down with a feather, and if you had run a pin into me I don’t think you would have got a drop of blood. Anyway, I pull myself together, you know. God give me courage, and I ask him: “What you want here? You have no right here.” And I watch him. He say: “I come to see you.” I tell him: “Go to your wife. She is the one you have to see now.” And I turn my back on him and walk into my bedroom. I sit down on the bed. I was feeling upset, you know, Mr. Haynes. So I lean my head on the bed like that. Then I suddenly feel somebody standing over me. And when I look up was he.’
‘Into the bedroom?’
‘Into the bedroom! You ever could imagine, Mr. Haynes, that the man so bare-faced? I face him stern. “You have no right here,” I say. “I will call the police to put you out if you don’t go.” He say: “Yes, I know you will call the police. I hear you and the police very nice. I’s that that bring me up here today.” Sergeant Parkes he mean, you know, Mr. Haynes. I tell him: “Yes, I have a protector now, so don’t think you can take advantage of me.” He tell me he hear I was going to take somebody and he come to find out if i’s true and not to do it.’
‘Well, I never,’ said Haynes, and seeing Maisie standing in the yard, felt his heart sink. She had just reached; her hat was still on.
‘Imagine that man, Mr. Haynes! But that is not all. I am telling you. I tell him: “You not ashamed McCarthy Benoit, to come here and come into this bedroom to ask me questions? Man, you ain’t afraid God will strike you down?” He say: “If God ain’t strike me down already he wouldn’t strike me down again.” I tell him: “Ah! I’s your conscience pricking you now? But your troubles ain’t begin yet, boy. Wait!” He talk a little bit, then he turn the conversation. He say: “But tell me, Alice—” “Alice to my friends,” I tell him, “not you.” He ain’t say anything to that. He only stop a little bit, then he went on: “Tell me you not going to take him.” Mr. Haynes, I look at the man. All his big punch gone. His eyes red, his clothes dirty, his face with a lot of hair on it. He look like a fowl that fall in a barrel of molasses. You know, Mr. Haynes, how bright Mr. Benoit used to be when he step out from here long ago. But where I reach? Yes. He ask me if I going to take Parkes. I tell him: “It’s no business of yours. What you have to do with that?” He say: “Alice, wherever I go I see you before me.” I tell him: “And you will see me to your dying day.” And then I went for him, Mr. Haynes. I tell him all I was to him and all I do for him and how he treat me. I tell him: “Look at your condition. What care is the woman taking of you? You think when you was with me I would see you leaving this house looking as you looking now? Never. When you was with me you was somebody. But look at you now. Who respects you? You are nobody. You have an old prostitute for your wife. You can’t walk a street in the town without meeting a man who live with that woman you take and give your name.” Mr. Haynes, I give him good and he ain’t say a word. He hang his head like a dog. So when I finish he say: “Tell me, A., promise me you not going to take him.” “I going to take him,” I tell him. He say: “I’ll prevent you.” He catch a little spirit now. “You are mine until death,” he say. “Never in this life,” I tell him. I stand up, you know, for he rouse my spirit.’
Haynes could guess how she stood up and how she looked at him. But if she had driven away Benoit for Parkes she would rend Maisie limb from limb when she heard.
‘I cow him, Mr. Haynes. I cow him down, for I had God on my side. Then he try to come near me to hold me. But I tell him that if he touch me I will bawl the house down. So he stand up looking sheepish and then I call for Aucher, and when I call he pick up himself and walk out.’
‘So you have triumphed over both of them,’ said Haynes.
‘God will it so,’ said Mrs. Rouse. ‘He haven’t kept me long.’
At half-past five, to Haynes’s surprise, Miss Atwell, who never got home until long after seven, came hurrying into the yard.
‘I am in at Mr. Haynes, Miss A.,’ called Mrs. Rouse. ‘What you doing here so early?’
‘Hey, my dear! Good afternoon, Mr. Haynes. Excuse me, Mr. Haynes. So, Ma Rouse, I hear the man come back.’
Philomen had come up, heard the news, and the overworked girl had gone half a mile out of her way to tell Miss Atwell.
‘As soon as she tell me I tell the boss that I get message somebody very sick at home and I come up to hear.’
Beads of perspiration covered her face and she fanned herself vigorously. Mrs. Rouse repeated the interview almost word for word, Miss Atwell making the appropriate ejaculations of astonishment, exec
ration, admiration and here and there suggesting what Mrs. Rouse should have said or what she, Miss Atwell, would have said.
‘God was testin’ you, Mrs. R., to see if you have learnt you’ lesson. But if you hadn’t you would have been chastened with whips and scorpions. The owdacity of that man. ’E want to come back now and think ’e have only to wiggle his finger for you to come runnin’. ’E run ’is run and now, like the fox who lose his tail, ’e want to come back. The venimous reptile. Mrs. Rouse, I used to hear them girls in the kitchen say that if ’e did come back here you was goin’ to take ’im, but I know you had better sense than that. But you are a good woman. You talk to ’im. But I’d ’a see him in the gutter with the dogs lickin’ his sores and I wouldn’t notice ’im.’
‘Take him back, Miss Atwell! I take him back! The whole island would laugh at me. I wouldn’t know how to walk the street. And if I take him back now after what he do me he have a right to kill me this time. Take him back! Never see the day.’
Haynes heard Aucher’s deep voice at the door.
‘Madam, the sergeant say ’e here to see you.’
Sergeant Parkes had returned.
Haynes braced himself for the ordeal. What would happen he did not know. All he knew was that he had to stand by and use his influence to stem the foaming torrent of Mrs. Rouse’s righteous wrath. There was going to be a hell of a row. But he felt that difficult as it might be and awkwardly as the situation might develop, he could manage Mrs. Rouse. It would be hard, damned hard, but he could do it. He was watching her face intently. Did she know? Hardly. How would she greet her future partner? To his astonishment a slight expression of annoyance flitted across her face.
‘Why that old man only bothering me? Tell him I am busy and I can’t see him.’
But Sergeant Parkes, hat in hand and whiskers in evidence, was already by the door. A grey, but well-preserved military-looking man in the late fifties. His whiskers were certainly not attractive, but Haynes liked his face. Nor did he look like one who had come to complain about his ill-treatment of the morning. He had more important matters in hand. Suddenly Mrs. Rouse cut him off from Haynes’s view. With a sudden movement she went and stood in the doorway.
‘I am sorry, Mr. Parkes,’ she said decisively, ‘but I am afraid that we wouldn’t be able to come to any arrangement.’
Haynes could not see Parkes, but the others told him afterwards what he looked like. Miss Atwell raised her hands in horrified amazement.
‘But, Mrs. Rouse—’ said Parkes.
‘I have considered everything, Mr. Parkes,’ said Mrs. Rouse, firmly. ‘I am sorry.’ And she turned back into the room. ‘Man only bothering me,’ she said. ‘I don’t want to have anything to do with any man.’
‘He is gone?’ Haynes asked.
Miss Atwell looked out.
‘Yes, it looks as if ’e gone. Aucher, the gentleman gone?’
‘Yes,’ said Aucher.
There was a silence. Mrs. Rouse’s hands lay idle in her lap and her eyes were on the floor.
‘But I thought you was going to take ’im,’ said Miss Atwell at last.
‘I am too old for that sort of thing now. I had two experiences and that is enough for me. I’s the third attack that kills.’
Maisie coming to the door on some pretext chose her moment skilfully, and under Mrs. Rouse’s unsuspecting nose gave Haynes a wink of exquisite triumph.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Benoit, defeated in the attempt to re-establish a footing in No. 2, began another series of persecutions directed against Mrs. Rouse. Once for a period of two or three weeks scarcely a day passed without somebody coming in and offering to buy No. 2 at some absurd price. It was in vain Mrs. Rouse protested that she was not selling. All told her that it was freely rumoured in town that the place was now for sale. Next, Mr. Rojas came up to see her. He said that a woman had come to see him and asked him to lend her some money to buy a property in the suburbs. She did not have all the money, but she would give him a mortgage on the building she was about to purchase. Asked where the house was she named it as No. 2, Minty Alley. Rojas told her he was sure she had made a mistake. She said no. She had sent someone to value the place and interview the owner, who was anxious to sell as she was leaving the island soon. It was easy to prove that Benoit had sent her.
It was all stupid, as Mrs. Rouse could not possibly sell without Mr. Rojas knowing. But Mrs. Rouse said that the idea was to maintain a lot of talk and bother about No. 2 so as to get Mr. Rojas annoyed, when to end everything he would probably sell her out.
The day she told Haynes about it, she seemed discouraged and inclined to give up the struggle.
‘I have it all around me, Mr. Haynes,’ she ended. ‘I don’t know where to look. I have to fix my eyes above to keep my courage.’
Miss Atwell, who slept with her, said Mrs. Rouse still cried at nights. And her temper during the day was tempestuous. Once or twice when he heard her fly out at Philomen, Haynes really thought that she should try to keep more control of herself. Until one day, nearly a year after he was living in the house, he went into the kitchen for the first time. As soon as he was fairly inside, he felt that he was in the mouth of hell. The big three-decked stove was going, the coal-pots with food, the concrete below so hot that he could feel it through his slippers, and above, the galvanized iron roof, which the tropical sun had been warming up from the outside since morning. He could scarcely breathe and involuntarily recoiled.
She came to the door smiling as usual.
‘You find it hot, Mr. Haynes?’
‘How can you stand it, Mrs. Rouse?’
‘Poor people have no choice, Mr. Haynes. It’s hard, but it is better in the hot season. When it is raining you have to leave the hot stove to go out into the wet yard and so you catch cold.’
He stood at the kitchen door wondering how any mortal could stand that for so many hours every day for so many days.
‘Ha, Mr. Haynes,’ she said, mildly self-satisfied, ‘now you know. But it isn’t that which troubles me. I’s the thoughts. They hurt me more than the heat.’
He looked at her and it struck him how much more she had changed during the months since the marriage. She still carried herself well – she was made like that – and though she had lost flesh she remained a big woman. But it was her face which really showed most the effect of all she had undergone. It was thinner, so thin that he could see clearly the contours of the cheek-bones, the hollows in the jaws and the long, thin chin. Now that all the flesh had gone it was a different face. Had he never seen her after that first morning, he might have passed her in the street today. But in the thin face the strong Roman nose was more prominent than ever, the lips tighter and more firm, especially when she paused during recitals of her woes. The hair on her forehead and temples was very grey. Thin and worn she might look, and she might complain at times, but if her courage was ever fundamentally shaken Haynes never saw it. Hour after hour all through the day and every day she was on her feet, up and down the yard and kitchen, in and out of the house, working, directing, exhorting her helpers to increased efforts. Frequently she was unjust. How she quarrelled! But he could forgive her this as did everybody (except Maisie) when he realized how powerfully she was struggling to stem the tide that threatened to overwhelm her.
‘You have courage, Mrs. Rouse,’ he said to her one day after they had made up some accounts.
She smiled a grateful smile.
‘But I have a good friend, you know, Mr. Haynes,’ she said, looking at him quizzically.
‘Who is that, Mrs. Rouse?’ Surely he knew all of Mrs. Rouse’s friends who mattered.
She threw her head back with pride, almost with exaltation, and pointed upwards.
‘God, Mr. Haynes. He is my refuge and my strength.’
Side by side with her, with less responsibility but with equal interest and spirit, worked Philomen. Strong as was Mrs. Rouse, Philomen was stronger than she, was indeed of exceptional physical str
ength. But she too was getting thinner and thinner and Haynes spoke to her about it one day. Her explanation was unexpected.
‘It’s Sugdeo, Mr. Haynes. The man is troubling me. I lose twenty pounds in the last two months.’
She went off into a long rambling story of her love affairs, the intolerance of her lover and his exorbitant demands upon her patience. Nothing pleased Philomen more than to get an opportunity to chatter about her sweetheart. If Maisie was near, however, Philomen was soon cut short. Maisie would come in and sit down very quietly, giving the impression that she was above being interested in what Philomen was saying. But that always meant the end of Philomen’s confidences for the evening. And frequently Haynes longed for Maisie to appear.
But it was not only love but work which was causing Philomen to lose weight. All the rushing up and down to get money, the marketing, the goods from the shop, the messages here and there, all this Philomen did expeditiously and cheerfully. And she did her share in the kitchen, mincing the meat, helping in the making of the jam, attending at the stove, down to the town in the broiling sun with one half of the cakes (to keep Gomes quiet), back again, down with the second lot, helping to make the afternoon despatch, down to town with that, too, on one arm, and on the other her own basket to see what she could sell to bring in a few cents. Then came dinner and the preparation of the cake pans and the kitchen for the next day. (Mrs. Rouse was frequently out at nights to church, or to see the various persons whom she owed money, either to pay or to make excuses for not paying.) Sometimes Philomen would leave everything to go out with Sugdeo till eleven and then when she came back would set to work to put the kitchen to rights.
Maisie did some of the washing for the household, but refused to wash Philomen’s clothes.
‘I will wash and starch and iron,’ said Maisie, who liked to play in water and did not very much mind doing jobs where no one interfered with her. ‘But I’ll leave this house now, before I wash the clothes of any damn servant. And a coolie beside!’
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