The Meeting Point (13 page)

The room is warm; no man, it damn hot. Bodies are beginning to perspire. The ten different body perfumes and body odours, are finding it hard to circulate, because it is winter, and the windows are closed; and the room is already overheated. There is the fire of the music, and the fire in the brimstone white-rum which Estelle has brought up from Barbados; and the fire in the liquor which Bernice stole from Mr. Burrmann’s liquor cabinet. There is also the black, white and red pepper in the rice and peas, laid royally on the table that has a white Irish linen tablecloth borrowed from Mrs. Burrmann’s pantry, food which Agatha, Carmeets, the young Japanese woman and Boysie and Henry, have tasted. I waiting to see if neither one o’ the two o’ them bastards isn’t going to ask my sister for a dance! Her eyes follow Brigitte, always Brigitte; Brigitte the maid, Brigitte the same maid as she; Brigitte the man-stealer, the husband-stealer, Brigitte the Second Cinderella. Look at that damn woman, though; and look how tight her corsets fitting her! and look at the lipstick she wearing: lipstick that look so damn natural that it look as if she ain’t wearing no lipstick at all. I should wear some o’ that natural-looking lipstick, myself, and see if man will notice me. But what the hell I would be wearing
her
lipstick for? … perhaps, I should start wearing corsets on this tumbling-tumbling-botsy-rumbling-heh-heh-heh-behind o’ mine and make it stop jumping ’bout the white man road! And that time, remember, Bernice? when I was fixing the table, and turned round, and my-Christ! there behind me, not
two inches away, was that scamp, Mr. Burrmann, examining my behind. But what the hell he was after, though? … look how close Boysie have Brigitte riding up on him, look how close! as if they is two Siamese twins; and look at that whore’s face, she isn’t even ’shamed, she don’t care how she crawling up on Dots’s husband, she don’t even know they is people in here noticing him and her, and
in front o’ the man’s wife, to boot!
But look at these white women, eh? they would come in a man’ bedroom and take him from on top o’ his lawful wedded; not one ounce of shame! But Boysie feeling his oats, now, boy! he feeling himself and smelling his piss; and look how Boysie making Fredastaire and Arthur Murray, wrapped up in one, look stupid as anything. Boysie so damn pretty on them two foots o’ his, and that footwork, a wonder to behold and a joy to follow! And look, look at Dots. Stupid stupid Dots, sitting down here on her backside and watching her husband, her man, winding-up his fronts all over Brigitte. Christ, I could run out there and pull rotten Brigitte from offa Dots’s husband; give that Henry one cuff, and teach the two o’ them monkeys some sense, ’cause there is four ladies, not counting myself, for I old now and retired from man, four ladies sitting down here, the whole night, waiting for somebody to notice them, and ask them for a fox-trot.
Praise Christ, Boysie isn’t my husband! ’cause it would be bloodshed by now
. And look how Boysie squeezing Brigitte on her hips every time their backs facing Dots; look how Boysie have his fronts pressed close to Brigitte’s fronts, and the look in that niggerman’s eyes, the look in her eyes. And Bernice remembered: you remember, Bernice, the morning Mr. Burrmann came into the kitchen in a rush, looking for his clear cuppa coffee, with the cigarette in his hand; and you was bending down,
dusting out the coffee grounds outta the coffee-thing, before putting on more water? And plugging it in? And you happen to turn your eye in the direction o’ satan, and that sinner, Mr. Burrmann, dressed in clothing like a wolf had
that look
on his blasted face, the same look that is now on Boysie’s face …? I wonder what the hell Mr. Burrmann was looking at, or for …? She inviting Boysie to come across the street and to bed with her, the brute! And look now, look quick! yuh see Dots? getting blue as anything with jealousness? Every once in a while, she takes her eyes offa the girl sitting down beside her, Miss Carmeeta Anne Bushell and she fix them on Boysie, ’cause she want to make sure she have his warm body beside her tonight, if yuh please! But Boysie not noticing wife, tonight, boy; not Boysie. Boysie noticing woman tonight. Tonight is white woman night. Tonight isn’t even Estelle’s welcoming-party night; no. It is Boysie’s woman night … but Dots, you don’t hear the lady, Miss Bushell just asked you, are you a student, too? Not you, Dots, you is a student all right; but you studying
man
, ’cause man studying woman … and twirl your backside on her proper, Boysie; give her a good twirl; and I hope you put a proper black man breeding on her, too! Boysie, twirl-up, man, like you is in Queen’s Park Shed in Barbados, dancing at a bram-party. Yuh see, God, you see how that jezebel begging Boysie to hold her close? And look at Mr. Boysie, pretty for so! pretty as hell, footworks,
hah-daiii
! Gyrations, letting-go, breaking-away, and letting-go and coming-to-she again … the wind in that gal’s tail now, Boysie boy, in her skirts, and she ready. Look at them, the two o’ them both, like two tired-out fishing boats coming back into Bridgetown harbour, fagged-out, danced-out, oh Christ, happy happy happy as anything; and I, Bernice, the one who invited
them into my place this blessed,
blasted
Thursday night … “
I ain’t boasting, but I know I got durability
”
…
Christ, I wonder what is really going on through Estelle’s mind, and Dots’s mind, and Priscilla’s mind, and Miss Bushell … 
“if a woman ever tell you that I, ever left her dis-satisfy, she lie! she lie! I say she lie!”
 … The record is finished.

Bernice jumped up before either Boysie or Henry could touch the player, before anybody in the room could move or think. “Come come come,” she said, “come, and eat some o’ this. You-all must be damn hungry. Dancing the whole night on a empty belly!” She went to the table which was close to the bathroom door, and began placing food on paper plates which she had stored away under the chesterfield, from a carton of Christmas paper plates Mrs. Burrmann had used last Christmas. The paper napkins also had a Christmas motif of red and green jolly holly on them. Dots edged up to her, and turning her head towards the rest of the guests, whispered out of the corner of her mouth, “Gal, what the hell occurring in your place tonight?”

“Well, how you mean?”

“You ain’t seen how the two o’ them taking over?”

“Child, what I am going to do, eh? They are my guests too.”

“Like hell, they is!” Before she could say more, Agatha was upon her, smiling, happy and a bit exhausted. “Would you like some o’ this, Miss Agatha?” And as she said,
“Miss,”
Bernice gave her a sharp reproving, but playful, stare.

“This is dee-licious!” Agatha was beaming.
“Dee-licious
, indeed! Henry’s always bragging how nice you women can cook your native dishes. You are
born
cooks.” The other women, Miss Carmeeta Anne Bushell, Priscilla and even the young
Japanese woman, heard and saw something distasteful in the comment. Henry came from talking to Boysie, and patted Dots on her shoulder, affectionately.

“Hey, sweetness! How you tonight, Dots? I going to have to dance a little thing with you after all this food, girl.” And Dots rested her right hand on her left shoulder, covering Henry’s hand, and grabbed it, and removed it, forcibly; and looked him straight in the eyes, and said, “
Haul!
” Henry understood what she meant.

“Pardon me, please,” she said to Agatha, smiling; but Agatha too, understood. And Dots, seeing there was no point in hiding her real feelings, added, “You hasn’t seen me in here the whole night? Christ!
Iffing
I was so badly off as to be sitting down on that chesterfield, waiting ’pon you to come and ask me for a dance, well, Henry …” She checked herself, and added aloud, because she had just glanced Boysie retreating into a corner of friendliness with Brigitte, “You don’t see that I have my
legal wedded
husband here, with me tonight?” (Everybody stared at Boysie and caught Brigitte removing her hand from his hand.) “You don’t see Mr. Boysie Cumberbatch there? He is still
mine
, man!” And she laughed out aloud, in her sensuous and infectious laugh; and soon everybody in the room (except Boysie), was laughing.

“Hey, sweetness!” This time Henry was addressing Bernice. But Bernice, glad at the notice, smiled sweetly at him, and inclined her head to hear what he wanted. “Sugarcake, you got any filter cigarettes?”

“Henry, I don’t smoke, man.”

“I going out and get some, then.”

“I have some,” Agatha said. “You don’t have to go all the way … ”

“Not my brand,” he said; and on the way out, he whispered in Boysie’s ears, “We better dance with some o’ these black women, old man. I’m going to call some of the boys.”

“My old lady vex as arse.”

“That ain’t the word!” And he went out. He closed the door too hard and Bernice called after him, “Look, you, this ain’t my house, yuh! Don’t wake up that princess down there, and cause her to march up here, and …” and knowing he could no longer hear her, and that he really didn’t want to hear, she turned her attention to the young Japanese woman and invited her to eat some food. “You would like this, miss. I know your kind likes rice, and this is some o’ the best.”

Henry went down the stairs, taking one step and not taking a second until he had heard all the goblins and ghosts behind corners (once he had slept in a women’s hall of residence on St. George Street, and he had had to creep out, like this, down the fire-escape ladder, or were they stairs? He couldn’t tell, he was so drunk with fear and the cheap sherry his woman-for-a-night had served him in her room which was opposite the don’s; and each terrifying crunch in his descent of winter and sinful extra-curricular, extra-marital love, he prayed that he would never again fall prey to his desire for a woman), going out, slowly, carefully. And as his hand touched the doorknob, he heard a voice from downstairs.

“Hey!”

His body stiffened. The first reaction his only reaction in times like this was to run.

“Hey, mate! Enjoying yourself?”

“Please,” a woman’s voice said. “Behave.”

“Having a ball, mate?” And before the man could disclose more of his happiness, the woman rested her hand over his
mouth and inclined her head to Henry, signalling him to leave. The man was going to talk so long as there was someone around. Just before Henry went out he heard laughing and talking; someone opened a door and he heard music. They were having a party downstairs. This cheered him up and he decided that on his return, he would drink, laugh and be happy. He took a rather full pack of cigarettes from his coat, lit one and puffed on it as if he had just purchased the house he had left. He was going to call some more boys to help out with the party; perhaps, even to divert Dots, so that Boysie could “do a little thing with that nice German beast.” He found a public telephone box, just before he reached the corner of Marina Boulevard. There was one man who would never let him down. Freeness! Freeness lived almost at the end of the east end of Toronto, but this did not prevent him from coming to a party at the west end of the city. Freeness even went, once, to a party in Hamilton, when he got the call from Henry, one morning, at three. Freeness borrowed a car, and drove the forty-odd miles to Hamilton, in time to have the last drink from a bottle of South African port, which nobody wanted to be caught drinking, because at that time, there was much talk about anti-Apartheid boycotting.

“Man, what happening?” Freeness’s tired voice, miles away, said he was tired, and in bed. But when Henry outlined the situation on Marina Boulevard, Freeness brightened. The yawns went out of his voice.

“Oh-Jees-and-ages!”

“Some domestics, man. A lot o’ food and drinks, man.”

“Jees-and-ages!”

“Women like peas! And only two men. Me and Boysie.”

“Oh-Jees-and-ages!”

“A Japanee thing here, man, would make yuh mouth run water for a mile, and …”

“Oh-Jees-and-ages!”

“Take down the address. Come in through the side entrance. And don’t mind it is late, the landlady, or the missy, or who the hell she is, having a big worthless party downstairs, man … and Freeness, listen, man. When I was coming out just to phone you, guess what?”

“What happen?”

“I bounced up ‘pon two people screwing …”

“Oh-Jees-and-ages! I’ll be there!”

And Henry, with the mission accomplished, walked back easily across Marina Boulevard, holding his cigarette cockily at a corner of his mouth, with one eye shut to prevent too much smoke from getting into his eyes.

There was a car, blended into the darkness of the side of the road and the shadows from the trees. Henry noticed the car, thinking that a man was doing something to a woman inside. A fellar get a lot o’ licks, once, for just looking through a window of a parked car. And as he was getting near, he slowed down, and a thought came to him. Christ, Henry, that is a damn risky thing, man; and besides, it is maliciousness; but he slowed down and lingered beside the car, peering through the window, and there was no one in it, this is damn funny! ’cause I swear I saw a man in this blasted car … and just as the thought struck him he was unnerved by a form which dashed from hiding on the other side of the car. The form grabbed him, by the arms, pushed him up against the car and frisked his pockets as they do in crime movies when searching criminals.

“What’re you doing up here, Mack?”

“How you mean what I … ”

“Come on, don’t give me no goddamn cheek, nigger!” The form was becoming serious now. “Come on! Come on! What’re you doing up here?”

“You really want to know, Mister Officer?”

“Come on, Mack!”

“Well, I came up here to rape three white women!” Henry could feel the man’s hands loosening their grip on his clothes. “But shit, man, you’re preventing me …”

“You smart black son-of-a-bitch!” and just as the form’s hands left Henry’s clothes, Henry backed away and threw a straight right. It caught the man unawares; and he slumped over the hood of the car. Henry put him back into his car, and there, he noticed the radio system, and the spotlight and the clip-board with a lot of scratchy writing on it. He had struck the Law. Panic did the rest. He slammed the door, ran back to the house and before he went in, cross-examined himself in his mind; convinced himself that it was too dark to be identified; shrugged the man’s handprints and suspicions out of his clothes, and shrugged off his concern going back up the stairs, as if he had really gone out for a packet of filter-tipped cigarettes. He did not see the man or the woman who had seen him go out. But he had heard and recognized Beethoven’s Sixth Symphony. “That is a goddamn funny piece o’ music to play at a party!”