Wide Sargasso Sea - Jean Rhys [53]
So we rode away and left it – the hidden place. Not for me and not for her. I’d look after that. She’s far along the road now.
Very soon she’ll join all the others who know the secret and will not tell it. Or cannot. Or try and fail because they do not know enough. They can be recognized. White faces, dazed eyes, aimless gestures, high-pitched laughter. The way they walk and talk and scream or try to kill (themselves or you) if you laugh back at them. Yes, they’ve got to be watched. For the time comes when they try to kill, then disappear. But others are waiting to take their places, it’s a long, long line. She’s one of them. I too can wait – for the day when she is only memory to be avoided, locked away, and like all memories a legend. Or a lie….
I remember that as we turned the corner, I thought about Baptiste and wondered if he had another name – I’d never asked. And then that I’d sell the place for what it would fetch. I had meant to give it back to her. Now – what’s the use?
That stupid boy followed us, the basket balanced on his head. He used the back of his hand to wipe away his tears. Who would have thought that any boy would cry like that. For nothing. Nothing….
Part three
‘They knew that he was in Jamaica when his father and his brother died,’ Grace Poole said. ‘He inherited everything, but he was a wealthy man before that. Some people are fortunate, they said, and there were hints about the woman he brought back to England with him. Next day Mrs Eff wanted to see me and she complained about gossip. I don’t allow gossip. I told you that when you came. Servants will talk and you can’t stop them, I said. I am not certain that the situation will suit me, madam. First when I answered your advertisement you said that the person I had to look after was not a young girl. I asked if she was an old woman and you said no. Now that I see her I don’t know what to think. If she dies on my hands who will get the blame? Wait Grace, she said. She was holding a letter. Before you decide will you listen to what the master of the house has to say about this matter. “If Mrs Poole is satisfactory why not give her double, treble money,” she read, and folded the letter away but not before I had seen the words on the next page, “but for God’s sake let me hear no more of it.” There was a foreign stamp on the envelope. “I don’t serve the devil for no money,” I said. She said, “If you imagine that when you serve this gentleman you are serving the devil you never made a greater mistake in your life. I knew him as a boy. I knew him as a young man. He was gentle, generous, brave. His stay in the West Indies has changed him out of all knowledge. He has grey in his hair and misery in his eyes. Don’t ask me to pity anyone who had a hand on that. I’ve said enough and too much. I am not prepared to treble your money, Grace, but I am prepared to double it. But there must be no more gossip. If there is I will dismiss you at once. I do not think it will be impossible to fill your place. I’m sure you understand.” Yes, I understand, I said.
‘Then all the servants were sent away and she engaged a cook, and a maid and you, Leah. They were sent away but how could she stop them talking? If you ask me the whole country knows. The rumours I’ve heard – very far from the truth. But I don’t contradict, I know better than to say a word. After all the house is big and safe, a shelter from the world outside which, say what you like, can be a black and cruel world to a woman. Maybe that’s why I stayed on.’
The thick walls, she thought. Past the lodge gate a long avenue of trees and inside the house the blazing fires and the crimson and white rooms. But above all the thick walls, keeping away all the things that you have fought till you can fight no more. Yes, maybe that’s why we all stay – Mrs Eff and Leah and me. All of us except that girl who lives in her own darkness. I’ll say one thing for her, she hasn’t lost her spirit. She’s still fierce. I don’t turn my back on her when her eyes have that look. I know it.
In this room I wake early and lie shivering for it is very cold. At last Grace Poole, the woman who looks after me, lights a fire with paper and sticks and lumps of coal. She kneels to blow it with bellows. The paper shrivels, the sticks crackle and spit, the coal smoulders and glowers. In the end flames shoot up and they are beautiful. I get out of bed and go close to watch them and to wonder why I have been brought here. For what reason? There must be a reason. What is it that I must do? When I first came I thought it would be for a day, two days, a week perhaps. I thought that when I saw him and spoke to him I would be wise as serpents, harmless as doves.