The House Of Mr Christus

Chapter Eight - Downtown

The week following Samuel's first visit downtown, the memory of Priscilla, the white dove, and the narrow streets had begun to affect his perception of the house. The world inside the house had suddenly grown small. The objects by which he had once navigated had lost their mystery, and the smooth, warm expanse of the floor was no longer a sea. Rooms had become just rooms because now there was an outside to measure against. He knew he preferred to be outside because that was where he would find Priscilla.

That the house only occupied a very small corner of the world had diminished its presence and increased his own. He began to traverse it's dark rooms and to stare back at the old man looking out at him from the pictures on walls and tabletops. He crept down the porch stairs to the backyard and gazed at the towering fence constructed from corrugated sheets of iron and wood. Looking up, he was sure the clouds grazed their belly on its jagged edges.

When he next saw Angelita lay Mrs Chirstus's black dress on the bed, he knew where she was going. He waited till he heard the sound of her walking shoes on the wooden floor and then ran to the door to join her. By the time he got there, she was already at the gate. Understanding now that he was to be left behind, he let out a piercing wail. Caught in midstep, Mrs Christus turned to find him sobbing and beating the veranda floor with his skinny legs. Astonished by his behavior, she could at first find no appropriate reaction and continued down the street. But he followed her, shoeless, yelling at the top of his voice. People in the street stared at her and she returned home and stood back in alarm. Angelita brought him his shoes, and, sobbing still, he went down the steps to the gate. Unable to summon up a firm voice, Mrs Christus joined him at the gate, and they walked together in silence.

That the child was capable of asserting himself was a nasty surprise. In one determined retaliatory action, he had broken the boundaries she had set him. Mrs Christus opened her umbrella. It shaded her from the sun, but, more importantly, it protected her from the street. The child did not want the shade. He ran ahead, stooping to pick up a stone. She wanted to shout and make him walk with her under the umbrella, but his outburst had taken her unawares, and now she was unsure whether she could restrain him. Again, she felt her loss. It was an old, decrepit feeling.

By the time Mrs Christus reached Lazario's, she was still smarting from the experience. As before, they walked single file down the brick passage, and, having regained her composure, she was able to take hold of his hand and restrain him as she had wanted to do, just moments before. He struggled but eventually climbed the stairs beside her.

Lazario opened the door to his few rooms, his hair untidy and his eyes squinting at the light. There was music coming from the radio, and newspapers were strewn across the table. A pile of shop ledgers was stacked next to his chair and loose scraps of paper with sums and figures tallied in small, neat script were scattered about the floor. Samuel remained obstinately at the doorway, looking into the sitting room, then leaned against the corridor wall with his hands behind his back. He saw the cake and three silver forks shining beside it. Lazario approached him, smiled into his sullen face, and opened the main door to the apartment. "Go," he said.

Outside, it was a cloudless day and a sudden breeze stirred the leaves on the mango trees at the edge of the yard below. The mangos, bright yellow and orange, glowed like lanterns. He saw that the dove had returned just as the woman had predicted. Again, it was fluttering in its cage. The noise made him feel cold inside. A door slammed somewhere behind him. He turned and saw Priscilla standing with a nylon shopping bag in her hand. She looked at him for a moment then turned to the stairs. The continuous flutter of the bird was making him feel colder and colder. Priscilla's voice from the floor below stilled the bird a moment, "Ah noh wahn wait all day fi yu!" He joined her.

The street was busy with cars and bicycles. Two street vendors had set up their carts beside the rum shop opposite, one selling peppered oranges and the other cooked food from large plastic tubs covered with cloth. On the porch of the rum shop, a man lay sprawled out. Samuel instinctively pressed close to Priscilla, placing his palm on hers. But she knocked it away like a fly. "Baybi!" she said, and her look told him that the word was meant to be an insult. He did not want to be a baby, and so he kept his distance. She sauntered across the street and stared at the man. Flies had gathered around his mouth and his feet stuck over the edge of the porch, one shoe on the ground below. She tiptoed up the three porch steps.