Brixton Bwoy. Rocky Carr
you get up already,’ said Pops. ‘Good, you can help me kill one fat bull we killing fe you welcoming home,’ said Pops.
‘That sounds like my kind of talk,’ said Joe.
Mama was still smiling with delight as Carl and Pupatee went for the fatted bull while Joe and Pops got rope and a big sharp knife, and when the boys returned with a young beefy bull, Pops and Joe tied it to the slaughtering post.
Before they could begin, Mama called everyone for breakfast. They all sat around the big table in the kitchen and ate their bellies full of fresh hot chocolate, saltfish fritters, fried dumplings, salt-fried pork with callaloo greens and two big half-ripe roasted breadfruits as extras. While Mama started cleaning up in the kitchen, Pops and Joe took a bottle of white rum and two coconuts with milk inside for a chaser, and went and sat in the sun near the bull at the slaughtering post.
Carl and Pupatee were left in the kitchen to help clean up and after a while an argument started. It was over something trivial, a fishing weight, but soon they were readying for a fight. First Carl hit Pupatee, and just as Pupatee drew back his fist to hit him back, Joe walked into the kitchen. He needed a file to sharpen the knife that was to be used to kill the fatted bull.
‘What!’ cried Joe, taking off his belt and giving Pupatee a few whacks. ‘How dare you hit your elder brother. Don’t you ever do that again.’
Tears poured down Pupatee’s face. It wasn’t the pain, but the shock of being hit by his brother Joe, who he so idolised.
‘Wha wrong with you bwoy, wha you ah cry for?’ Pops asked.
‘I caught him throwing punches at his elder brother and gave him a slight belting,’ Joe said.
Pops laughed and Pupatee turned round to see a smile on Joe’s face, which only put him in an even hotter temper.
‘Pupatee, wha you ah cry like a girl for?’ said Mama when she saw him coming towards her, sniffing away.
‘Nothing.’
‘Come, me comb you head fe you, son.’
Pupatee went to her. Mama’s warmth was comforting, and he felt better after she had oiled and combed his hair. You look nice now, Pupatee,’ she said. He smiled.
Outside, Pops and Joe were tying up the bull so that it would not be a danger during its slaughtering. The post was an old stump of a tree, still attached to its roots. After a while the bull was trussed to the post by its horns, and it looked fierce no longer, but frightened. It mooed and tried to pull itself free, but its struggles were useless.
Carl appeared with a large container to catch the blood for the dogs. Pops offered Joe the big slaughtering knife to do the killing, but Joe refused. Pops smiled. ‘Faran country changed you a lot, son, you used to love doing de killing years ago.’
‘Can Pupatee do it, Pops?’ Pupatee said. They all turned to see him watching them from the veranda.
‘You still a pickney, bwoy, dis a man work.’ Pops laughed, then he looked at him and said, ‘Pupatee, you no remember de time when you kill Massah Tom little pig?’
He did remember. An animal had been raiding one of Pops’s far-off vegetable fields every night and Pops had grown so weary that he had offered his sons a pile of money if they caught it and killed it. So one day, Gamper and Carl packed a tent, food, knives, cutlasses and machetes and walked to this far-off field. They set up their tent and slept at the spot where they expected the intruder would try to get into the field. That night, it showed up just as they hoped. It turned out to be a very large sow, bigger even than them. The boys were frightened, but they wanted the money even more than they were afraid of the harm that sow might do them. So Gamper charged at the sow and dived on it with a long sharp knife. The sow put up a strong fight, trying to escape from Gamper and Carl. Even after its throat had been cut, it stumbled several yards before it finally fell down and lay still.
Mama and Pops had made much of Gamper and Carl, giving them their money and praising them to the skies. So when, several months later, Pupatee came across a piglet, he pulled out his knife and killed it. But no one had told him to kill this piglet, and it wasn’t even trespassing, so instead of getting a hero’s welcome, Pupatee got only a good beating.
‘Pupatee! Pupatee?’
‘Yeah, Pops?’
‘You deaf?’
He shook himself out of his trance. Joe and Carl tied a rope to the back legs of the bull and Pops took the knife and pulled it across the underside of the bull’s neck, cutting right through and almost taking its head off. The blood gushed out and fell into the waiting container. The bull made one last deathly moo, kicking and quivering all over, and as the blood poured from its throat, the dogs began to gather.
‘Pupatee, you and Carl go bath, den go tell de people you big bredda Joe deh home from England, and one big whole dinner get together ah ran fe him. And me, and you Mama, ah invite everyone. Also tell dem on sale is fresh beef. Tell dem me kill de best bull and plenty good food is here.’
‘OK, Pops.’
‘And son, go tell de whole ah you cousins and dem friends fe come help Mama,’ said Mama. ‘And hurry, Pupatee.’
That night, when darkness fell, they had a great feast of beef from the slaughtered bull. They built a big fire and roasted nuts and all kinds of other goodies, like breadfruits, sweet potatoes, fish, birds, yam and sweet corn. There was rice and peas, boiled pumpkin and plates of fried green bananas. Everybody joined in the fun of lighting fire crackers and big loud bangers and rockets which flew up and exploded with a wonderful brightness in the pitch dark. And all the time people were playing music and dancing and singing. Pupatee’s disagreement with Carl, and even his beating from Joe, was soon forgotten, and it was the biggest and best Christmas ever.
A few days later it was time for Joe to go back to England. The whole family were sitting together, Pupatee between Mama and Pops. Then Mama said, ‘Joe, me ah beg you. One last favour for Mama, do son.’
‘What is it?’ asked Joe.
‘By de time Pupatee and Carl done looking after dem fadda’s cows, dem always late fe school and Pupatee no even badda go sometimes. Lord have mercy pon me, Joe, me wash-belly pickney no even know two letter out de ABCDEFGH, so me would ah glad if him could ah come ah England wid you, to go school, where him would ah learn fe spell and write him name.’
‘Oh no, Mama,’ Pupatee stuttered. He was happy at home with Mama and Pops and Carl. But to his horror, Joe agreed.
‘I suppose he could wash my car on Sundays,’ he said. ‘You can send him over in a few weeks.’
And that was that. There was nothing Pupatee could do. Mama had made up her mind and he was going to England. After all, Joe was there and so was another brother and several of his sisters. Pupatee would be looked after fine.
When the day finally came for Pupatee to leave for England, his father was not his normal self. Pops barely looked at him or said goodbye. He didn’t want his youngest son to go, but he hadn’t been able to persuade his wife. She was a determined woman. Mama, Carl and Pupatee left Pops behind and set out for town, where they stayed overnight, and the next day they made their way to the airport.
At last the moment came when they all stood by the escalator that would take Pupatee to the plane and away from everything familiar.
‘Bye Mama, bye Carl,’ he said quietly, turning to start up the escalator.
‘Wait!’ Mama cried. ‘You not going to kiss Mama before you go to England?’
Pupatee ran back and threw himself at his mother, hugging and kissing her. Then she gently sent him on his way. As he was carried along on the escalator, tears dripped on to his shoes. It was the first escalator he had ever seen.