Pilgrims Way Page 4

  Karta had told stories endlessly. He told stories of his pompous school, Prince Henry the Navigator, he called it, which tried to maintain British standards in the heat and shanties of Freetown. He told stories of his father, a solicitor’s clerk, whose love of the English extended beyond his cruelly self-mocking name. He had been christened Edward Samuel Benson-Hylen. The Edward was after the King of England. The Samuel was after Smiles, the self-help evangelist. Benson-Hylen was the name they had brought with them from the West Indies, from where they had been repatriated by a philanthropic master whose name they then adopted. Edward Samuel Benson-Hylen named his son less ambitiously. He called him Carter, after the senior partner of the law firm he worked for. Karta called his father the black monkey, when he was not calling him Daddy with perfect devotion. ‘Daddy likes being described as an English gentleman. The biggest compliment you can pay that African monkey is to tell him that he sounds like Mr Carter, of the firm Carter, Sinclair and Hogg, Solicitors. I always wondered what that white man was doing in Freetown – hiding from Interpol probably. At least I can thank de Almighty that Daddy didn’t choose to call me Hogg.’

  Mr Benson-Hylen collected pictures of British royalty in the same way that other people collected posters of the black athletes giving the black power salute in the 1968 Olympics, or of Bruce Lee destroying another slit-eyed fooey with the sole of his foot. His constant adversary was Karta’s English literature teacher, a man called Hitler Jones. I swear to God, bro. That was his name. Hitler Kitchener Jones. Mr Jones had been christened by the same priest who had warned his flock against reading The Heart of the Matter because it was immoral. Mr Jones thought of himself as young and radical, and rejected The Heart of the Matter for quite different reasons – because it revealed a colonial indifference to Africa and its people, and saw both as simply an exotic and dangerous background to its banal tale of middle-aged discontent and lust.

  ‘It was Hitler who introduced us to Soyinka and Ngugi. Radicals like myself, he used to say. And introduced us to Naipaul. He’s sick in the head that Naipaul, he told us. But Daddy wanted us to read Dickens and Shakespeare, or at least Sheridan, so he went to see the Headmaster to complain. He reported him for the books he made us read and because he taught us about the Yoruba pantheon. Daddy used to get so angry. God of Thunder indeed! he always said. He said to the Headmaster: How can you allow your school to teach that heathen, mumbo-jumbo voodoo to modern African boys?’

  Karta had felt so ashamed of his father that he decided to change his name to Karta Benso. To his friends and to the world at large – he did not dare mention his change of identity to Daddy – he was no longer Carter Benson-Hylen, but Karta Benso, the New African, disciple of Hitler Kitchener Jones, scourge of the imperialists and their comprador lackeys, excoriator of the racist literature of Graham Greene and Joseph Conrad.

  There was a time when Karta told such stories against himself. Daud had admired and enjoyed his benign anarchy then, but Karta had changed during his few months in England. He had become intolerant and irritable, full of mockery and a bitter, angry cynicism. He brooded now over small insults where he would have laughed and manufactured worse ones in reply. They sat in the pub, Daud looking at his empty glass while Karta fulminated against these arseholes.

  ‘And when are you going to be able to afford to buy me a drink? It’s time you got yourself a decent job,’ he said, allowing his irritation to reach Daud. ‘Every time I see you, you’re broke.’

  Daud gave Karta a long, patient smile. ‘African hospitality done finish?’ he asked.

  ‘Done gone!’ Karta said, turning his pockets out. ‘We now have to wait on the generosity of that English Ape, that Boy Monster . . . if his daddy lets him out of the house.’

  ‘No problem, oga,’ Daud said, pulling out a bundle of notes. ‘Night-duty is double money. I was just testing your African hospitality. Let’s have your glass, I go show um real hospitality now.’

  Karta sucked his teeth. ‘I don’t know why I bother with foreigners like you, but at least we’re saved from begging the white man again. But I mean it about the job,’ he continued when Daud returned. ‘You should leave that damned place. Apart from anything else, it’s bad for your health.’

  ‘Lloyd is here,’ Daud said, relieved to be able to change the subject.

  Karta picked up his glass and emptied it. ‘Let the Englishman pay for the pleasure of my company.’

  4

  ‘I’m in love,’ Lloyd announced after he had paid the price of admission. Karta looked frankly disbelieving. He thought Lloyd was ugly, and often took the trouble to say so. That was how they were together: Karta who cared everything for his appearance and Lloyd who believed he could do nothing about his. Daud was convinced that they would come to blows sooner or later. Not that he cared that much, he protested. At every opportunity, Karta sought to lash Lloyd with his tongue while the latter used his full array of abuse to defend himself. Daud knew it would be up to him to ask the questions that would draw the story out. Otherwise they would sink into bickering and sulks, and turn the evening into an interminable squabble. Karta had already turned away with elaborate disgust, sipping the drink that Lloyd had bought him. For that was another curious thing, Daud thought, putting on his pince-nez to examine the specimen, the way that Lloyd tried again and again to buy his way into Karta’s affections. As if a pint of beer could do anything but nourish the loathing that Karta felt for him.

  ‘Who’s the lucky girl?’ Daud asked. Karta spluttered into his beer, and Lloyd smiled to acknowledge the sarcasm and to concede what he thought an undeniable fact. He was ugly, big and formless. That was how he described himself once. Like a maggot, Karta had told him with relish. His face was small and pointed, and was topped by a large, inverted bowl of black hair, falling in a fringe round his face. The smooth black dome was like a compound eye, glaring sightlessly around it and, viewed from the appropriate angle, carrying the same undiscriminating menace. The rest of his face was like the confusion of an insect’s jaws, all the features delicate and indistinct, immemorable like the sunken chin of a cockroach.

  ‘You wouldn’t know her,’ Lloyd said, dropping his eyes as if to hide the hurt that Daud’s words caused him. ‘She’s much too grand for a yob like you. I mentioned you to her. I said I’ve got this friend who’s the most civilised person in England.’

  ‘A paragon!’ Karta said.

  ‘And he’s a wog,’ Lloyd continued, cheering up and raising his voice when he got to the word. ‘She wouldn’t believe me. She said she’d never met a civilised wog before. And she should know! Her granny lives in Chatham and half her street’s been taken over. The pungent aromas of curry powder . . .’

  ‘All right, cut that out,’ said Karta, jaws working with anger as he glared at Lloyd.

  ‘I wasn’t talking about you, love,’ Lloyd gasped, pretending innocence. ‘I wouldn’t dream of calling you civilised. Anyway, she was very impressed. I suggested that perhaps she’d like to meet you and . . . and . . .’ He struggled to complete his sentence, hindered by bursts of laughter. Karta made a disgusted face and turned away again, shaking his head.

  ‘But she said no,’ Lloyd continued. ‘She said she didn’t fancy the idea of meeting . . . a smelly wog!’ He finished triumphantly and burst into squeals of laughter, pointing first at Daud and then at Karta.

  Daud saw the glass quivering in Karta’s hand, its contents about to be dashed in Lloyd’s face. He waited for Karta to raise his head, and when he did, he caught his eye. Daud knew that Lloyd was rarely embarrassed by public commotions and enjoyed them with the same delight that children found in romps and squabbles. He took to them with zest, like a shaggy dog its evening rumpus across the common. Karta’s gesture would only involve him in further indignities.

  ‘You’re being more offensive than you realise,’ Karta said, biting his words off to dramatise his anger.

  Lloyd glanced at Daud. ‘Oh, come on, you know I don’t mean anything,’ he said, l
ooking suddenly stricken and demanding Daud’s concern and care. ‘It was only a joke. I’m not a racist! You know I don’t . . .’

  ‘Yes, all right,’ Daud interrupted. He hated the way Lloyd made these slithery guerrilla raids on his sympathy, civilised wog and such like, and paid for his insults with exaggerated concern.

  ‘But you know I don’t mean anything,’ Lloyd protested.

  ‘Just shut up, you fat Englishman,’ Karta said, his teeth still clenched.

  ‘I don’t understand why you have to go on like this,’ Lloyd said. ‘You call me these names, I don’t get offended. What makes you think you have a right to abuse me for my race when you find the slightest remark about yours offensive?’ His voice had risen to a quarrelsome whine, and they had arrived, Daud thought, at their usual impasse. ‘Why do you bother getting upset? Why don’t you just ignore me? I say the same things to Daud. He knows I don’t mean anything. Why do you have to be so over-sensitive? Are you something special?’

  Daud watched Karta sigh, and struggled to suppress a smile. ‘I’ve got a chip on my shoulder,’ Karta said. ‘You carry on and tell your civilised wog friend here about how he smells and has a big penis and things like that. I think I’ll go mug an old lady or something. I don’t think I can listen to this arsehole any more.’ Daud nodded and said nothing. All along he had refused to join in their fights, and ignored the opportunities they offered him to declare himself on one side or the other. Lloyd never talked this way when he was alone with Daud. He did it for Karta’s benefit, and Karta knew that but could not resist the provocation. He found Lloyd’s very presence a provocation, and had the matter been up to him, he would have despatched the monstrous slug long before.

  ‘Why do you have to take it like this?’ Lloyd asked, looking first at one and then the other. ‘I’m not a racist! I was going to say why don’t we go for an Indian. I’ll pay. Come on, I’ll treat you all.’

  ‘I’ll see you some time during the week, bro,’ Karta said, ignoring Lloyd. He could not quite keep the hurt out of his voice, that Daud should choose to stay on in the pub and drink with Lloyd. ‘You’ll be in?’

  ‘Glued to the telly watching the Test Match,’ Daud said, happy to be reminded of the pleasures in store for him during his week off.

  ‘It’s going to be a draw,’ Lloyd said, nudging Daud to claim his attention. ‘Rain stopped play, or the bloody batsman fell asleep before wicket.’

  ‘I don’t know how you can watch that stupid game,’ Karta said, rising to leave. He gave Lloyd a last baleful glance and then blew Daud a kiss. Lloyd made an obscene gesture as soon as Karta’s back was turned.

  ‘How about an Indian?’ he suggested. ‘I don’t feel like staying on here.’

  ‘You carry on, then,’ Daud said. ‘I’ll hang on here.’

  ‘There’s no rush,’ Lloyd said. ‘We can go a bit later.’

  Daud was sure he did not want the homage that Lloyd insisted on paying him. He refused the endless kindnesses that Lloyd was always extending to him. Lloyd took this to be an example of Daud’s modesty and simply became more cunning with his generosity and more free with his advice. You’ve got to look after yourself. You let people walk over you too much. Nobody gets anywhere if they can’t be ruthless. That’s just an invitation for people to crush you. I know you don’t like to hear this, but that’s because you’re generous and you don’t want to think that people are that way. But they are! You even walk in the streets with your head lowered. Daud had been struck by that last description, and had examined it thoroughly, catching himself unawares in his wanderings and trying to surprise himself in his humble nigger slouch. But in the end he decided that that was the way Lloyd liked to think of him, as the retiring foreigner whom he would help come out of himself. Without question, Daud discovered, he walked with his back ramrod-straight and his head held high.

  Lloyd would invite himself to dinner and bring a shopping bag full of food with him, which he would then insist on leaving behind. He visited Daud frequently and never came empty-handed. The gifts were more helpful than Daud liked to admit, but he would happily have done without them to escape him. He did not even want Lloyd’s company, but he did not know how to chase him away. He could not bring himself to perform the necessary cruelties that would convince him. There were many times when he thought that his fastidiousness came from a reluctance to have Lloyd think ill of him, that he really quite enjoyed the elevated opinion that Lloyd gave him of himself. He hated most of all the pretence of sympathy and interest that Lloyd forced him into. What made it worse for Daud was that he suspected that Lloyd really was the little racist he played to Karta. Daud had been uncertain at first, afraid of misunderstanding him. Perhaps it was nothing more than boisterousness, a boorishness that Lloyd indulged in to disguise his isolation, he had thought.

  ‘Well, how are things?’ Lloyd asked, breaking the silence and nudging Daud’s leg under the table.

  ‘Fine,’ he said.

  ‘How’s work?’ Lloyd asked again.

  ‘The night-duty wasn’t too bad in the end, and now a few days off. It could’ve been worse.’

  ‘That’s good,’ Lloyd said, leaning forward. ‘I’m really bored actually.’ Daud had recognised the movement. It meant that Lloyd was about to lay a burden on him, was about to talk. He would be forced to listen and, worse still, would have to say something in the end. He guessed that he was the only one who did listen.

  ‘That shop depresses me! It’s destroying me!’ Lloyd said, gritting his teeth comically, making a joke of his desperation. His father owned a footwear business, and insisted that his son learn all aspects of its workings. He had spent six months in the factory as a costing clerk, and was now enduring a six-month stint in the shop. His father had allowed him to open a bank account at the end of the first six months, and had promised him a loan for a car at the end of the second. ‘I’m sorry about all that . . .’ he continued after a long silence. ‘You know I don’t mean anything, don’t you? It’s him, that bloody Karta. He makes me act like that. He treats me like a fool, as if I’m something ridiculous. So I react that way.’

  ‘Shall we go for this meal?’ Daud said, but it was too late to stop him.

  ‘I’m not a racist, you know that. But that bastard really makes it difficult,’ Lloyd said when they were on their way. ‘He’s hardly down from the trees and he acts like he knows it all. Sorry, but I just can’t stand that kind of behaviour. From the very first day I met him! Do you remember?’

  Daud nodded. He remembered that Karta had turned up with Rosa, a Dutch girl with hair the colour of dark honey, and that Lloyd had been unable to keep his eyes off her. She had said afterwards that he had made her feel sticky. Her English was rudimentary but Daud had no difficulty understanding what she meant by this.

  ‘He was talking to you most of the time,’ Lloyd said. ‘He didn’t even speak to me. He ignored me as if I was dirt under his feet. He had this Dutch floozy he had picked up somewhere, and you could see him touching her up as he was talking. God, he was disgusting. I’ll tell you something else that really pissed me off. The way he looked at me whenever I said anything, as if I was talking rubbish. It was the contempt. He’s a fine one to complain about prejudice if that’s how he treats people. He had that horrible sneer as he looked at me. I really can’t stand people like that.’

  Daud smiled to himself. He knew that Lloyd had been frightened of Karta. He had jumped, a small start, every time Karta spoke to him without warning. Later on he found out that Lloyd had never spoken to anybody black before meeting Daud. At that time they were on the same evening course, Lloyd trying to find a way of escaping his father’s shoe shop, while he was trying to find a way of escaping the hospital. Daud had enjoyed the course, goading and provoking the tutor into hilarious displays. Lloyd had attached himself to him, and Daud had been relieved that he was not to be shunned by everyone. Then he had seen how Lloyd was rejected by the others, how they laughed at his accent and his boisterous way
s. Whenever he said anything in class the other students stopped paying attention, and the teacher sighed gently while she heard him out.

  He had been generous from the start, bringing him a chocolate bar or offering to buy him a portion of chips after class. Without any embarrassment he told Daud how surprised he was by his first black. Sorry, I didn’t catch your name. Where did you say you come from? Daud told him that he was named after the slayer of the Philistine Goliath, and the father of Solomon via poor Bethsheba. That doesn’t mean anything to me. I’m an atheist, Lloyd told him, pleased with his wit. Of course he had never believed the cruel exaggerations about black penises, he assured Daud, but he had expected his black to be always on a short fuse, on the point of eruption. Like the hysteria of the song-and-dance coon with his rolling eyes and blubbery lips. That was how he had thought of them, he confessed. Excitable and a little dumb, and not really interested in very much. He could not imagine one of them writing a symphony, for example, or being a philosopher. Daud egged him on, wanting to know the worst, taking comfort that this was all they thought of him and no worse. He smiled his superior smile and left the man to his ignorance, judging him beyond the reach of irony or sarcasm.

  Karta would have nothing to do with such scruples, and licked his lips with anticipation when Daud told him the story. ‘I’ll make that racist cunt eat shit!’ he said. ‘How can you sit and listen to somebody saying all that and not stick a fist up his arse?’ When Karta finally cornered Lloyd, he preached at him like a demented evangelist. His tongue rolled over centuries while he claimed everything within sight. He claimed the civilisation of the Pharaohs, before the envious and greedy Greeks under Alexander conquered Egypt and transformed that African country into an exotic brothel, complete with its brothel queen, Cleopatra. He claimed Leo Africanus as well as the first Augustine. Yes, Saint Augustine, you ignorant man. What did you think he was? A Viking? He ranted about Pushkin and then gleefully destroyed Lloyd’s scepticism by recounting in precise detail the history of the Pushkin family, and the astonishing rise of Grandpa Pushkin from slave boy at the Court of Peter the Great to a General in the Russian Army. He claimed Alexandre Dumas, all three of them.