Veronica Carnegie

'Who killed Cock Robin?'

'I,' said the sparrow. 'With my bow and arrow, I killed Cock Robin.'

'Who saw him die?'

'I,' said the fly, 'with my little eye, I saw him die.'

And the fowls of the air and the fishes of the sea ...

'For Chrissake, Ray, yu really out of control. Yu in America, yu know.' Leroy said this under his breath, gritting his teeth and barely moving his lips. I ignored him, said my poem and followed the doctor to the reception area.

The place was glossy, scrubbed and clinically clean. I looked around for cobweb and wished a big banner cockroach would crawl out from under one of the six fabric-covered chairs. Nothing happened. Elation overwhelmed me and I ran on the spot for about fifty counts. The doctor, a Dr. Morgan Briscoe, steadied my arm and introduced himself. My parents, who had turned up to meet us, were allowed to accompany us to what appeared to be an outpatient examination room. Leroy had to wait on the outside.

That first doctor shut the door and there was Mr. Bedford's son, Dr. Mark Bedford, standing by the small bed, affixing a drip bottle. We spoke briefly. He had already ordered a physical. That done, I was unceremoniously strapped to the bed. They had to, for when I heard the word hypnosis, I became angry. Nobody was going to take my mind from me. If I had known they were going to hypnotise me as part of the treatment, you think I'd have left my country? I decided to put up a struggle. I would not cooperate. I'd show these people my strength of character. Who the hell, the hell, the h-e-l-l! I was in another body, in and out of my own fluffy grey-white cloud with shades of pale blue and light cream. I could hear. I said my poem, backways.

'Robin Cock poor for weeping a went all sea the of fishes the and, air the of fowls the and die him saw I, eye little my with fly the said, I. Robin Cock killed I arrow and bow my with sparrow the said I.'

'Oh, my Gad! My Gad! We never gat a caase lack thiis.' The white-uniformed person was excited and loud.

'Mr. Walsh, I want you to think back to your childhood. You are Ray, little Raymond, and you are four years old. Ray, you are four.'

I heard the voice, but what was I supposed to tell them? I could not remember one thing that happened when I was four. I said my poem fast-forward, and then in rewind.

'Raymond, Ray, think back. You are seven. You are s-e-v-e-n.'

I remembered; I screamed and went under the old double bed I'd shared with my brother.

Mama had given me the grocery list to deliver to Mr. Mac at Mr. Mac's Shop, when we saw Mr. Mac himself running towards us. Leroy pulled me behind the big tree and I saw a bad thing.

'No! No!' I shouted. I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to turn away.

'What did you see, Ray? What? What!'

'He chopped off Mr. Mac's head! It fell with the hat on it.' I stopped talking again. I struggled to get under a bed.

'What happened, Ray?'

Leroy put his hand over my face. He was trembling too. Mr. Gentles threw the machete over to our side of the road. It landed near us. We waited till he left. Mr. Gentles, Mr. Mac's near neighbour, walked back up the road with his hands in his pocket. That was how he always walked. Hands in his pockets.

'Don't tell. Don't tell. Tell tale Tit, yu tongue shall split! Ray, if you ever talk, Mr. Mac's head, with the hat on it, will come after you and kill you, you, you!'

They dried my eyes and made notes.

'Raymond. Ray, you are ten. Remember your birthday?'

I remembered ten. I got a blue bicycle with black and silver streaks.

'Ouch! Stop! I fell off my bicycle and broke my hand. I must get under my bed. I couldn't ride for a long time. My tongue feels heavy. I want to sleep.'

'Raymond. Ray, you are twelve.'

I heard.

'He's smiling. That's good.'

I was not smiling. I was grinding my teeth and giving the pressure grin. Top teeth push down on bottom teeth, lips part, but there is no smile.

'One evening, my sister and I were sitting on our aunt's verandah in Newton Square, Kingston. The neighbours, Mr. and Mrs. De Vaughn, were quarrelling. He was dressed to go out for the evening again and the pregnant Mrs. De Vaughn was unhappy about it. She said he was always dressing up, going out and leaving her to look after their two small children. She tried to stop him. The bedroom door to the five-foot high front verandah flew open and Mrs. De Vaughn slid on her bottom off the verandah to the hard ground. The children, about two and four, saw and cried for their mummy. We quietly slipped inside. We said nothing to our aunt and soon returned to the country. We later learnt that Mrs. De Vaughn and the eight-month-old foetus she had been carrying died. Mr. De Vaughn went on to marry his lover.

That picture of a pregnant woman sliding off a high verandah has never left my mind, my mind, my mind.'

Whatever they gave me, to drink or intravenously, loosened my tongue more freely than my country's white rum. I talked everything I was not supposed to. I moved so fast they stopped calling out the years. Before the doctors knew it, I had raced through the disturbing events of my life. I told them about the murder of the high school principal and ran in my spirit, for they had constrained me. I told them at one point I was fully awake and there was no need to clap three times to bring me back to reality.

Something about one of the doctors reminded me of the bloody Sunday evening. We had finished singing the choruses and Rev. Jeb Johnson of the City Mission Church in Spanish Town was about to preach when a young man, panting and wet, raced to the altar. He begged to be baptised immediately. God had spared him and he wanted to spend the rest of his life in the church. He and three friends had planned to rob Mrs. Palmer's house down the road. They were inside stacking things when she returned and raised an alarm. The neighbours caught three of the young men and made minced meat of them, but he had escaped.

With some members of the congregation, I ran to the yard and viewed the bloody heap. The gaping crowd seemed glued to the spot. I felt sick in my stomach and hurried back to the now emptied church. Rev. thought it best to end the service and devote some time to the frightened, still sweating, young man. The remains of the three thieves were shovelled in tyres and burnt.

'Why, Mr. Welsh? Why do they kill like that?'

'The police are slow in answering calls and very often have neither road-worthy cars nor gasoline in them. The court system snails on at a painful pace and grinds time. Some impatient people take the jungle justice into their own hands.'

I was 15, and a track-and-field trainee. Coach had given me a lift to the top of my road and I ran towards our house. Then I heard a vehicle approaching, so I left the road and continued running on the guinea-grass-hidden track. The car stopped. I stopped. The tall grass shielded me entirely.

'Three men got out of the car. Two of them killed the other one. They stuffed his ears, nose and mouth with green bush, forced him into a large crocus bag, heaved it into the trunk of the car and drove off.

I was weak and afraid they'd seen me and would come back for me. I slumped in my odour and waste, for I had lost control of my bladder and bowels. I got home late.'

I felt my mother's hand in mine. She had not forgotten.

'What happened, Raymond?'

'My parents called the doctor, my uncle burnt the clothes I took off, and we moved away from the parish even before the house was sold.'

'Were these murders reported?'

I don't remember answering that question.

Two more doctors were summoned to the room; I heard the terms, 'psychotherapist' and 'psychoanalyst'. But whatever 'psychos' these specialists were, all seemed to agree that I was carrying around too many negative pictures and far too much garbage for my own good. I needed to dump useless stuff.

A neurologist had suggested, some time ago, that I move away entirely from the violence that seemed to be confronting me. Now somebody touched me and called my name. I was frightened; my child's voice took over.

'Willy and Doreen, don't go! No! No! Let's walk the long way.'

'Papa gway beat us if we come home late from school.'

Willy held his little sister's hand and stepped in the swirling water. They never got to the other side. I ran home, crying.

My adult voice tripped in. 'That bridge remained broken for more than seven years and everybody had to cross the river or go the long way.'

'No, Willy. Wait!' I shrilled. 'My father will explain to your father.'

'Willy's gone. Doreen's gone.' A child's voice wailed.

The team tried to get in a question about child molestation. Had anybody touched me 'here' or 'there'? No. But I told them about the lying girl and her scheming mother who accused me of touching her inappropriately and the personal tragedy that followed. I explained how I wanted to run every time I thought about it, even though the matter had been legally cleared up.

'Mr. Walsh, you seem to be a part of a close-knit, caring family. Why didn't you tell them about these tragic episodes?'

'No. I was afraid to tell anybody. Most times I shouldn't have been at the place when the thing happened.'

One doctor kept saying, 'Interesting. Interesting.' Another repeated, 'My Gad,' especially when I stood up, stretched my long, lanky self, looked at her and said my poem.

They were getting ready for the summation, as one of them called it, when I remembered something. 'Did I tell you about the nurse?'

'No, Mr. Welsh, but I think we've heard enough to satisfy our deliberations. Thank you.'

I took a seat and began. If they thought I was going to travel so many miles and still take back this story, they were making a sad mistake.

My sister and I were picking coolie plums at the back of our uncle's house on Vintage Road when we heard the sound. We peeped through the crack in the pebble dash board of the maid's quarters, saw the nurse crouched, in her uniform, on the floor and the man, trousers' belt in hand, raining blows on her. We ran to the telephone.

'Come quick, Mr. Toyloy, Mr. Greyton is beating your mother!'

Mr. Toyloy was concerned about his mother's mental health. She, a registered nurse, had moved out of their upper St. Andrew house, run off with the house painter, and lived with him in the out house.

Our uncle, like our father, turned black when he was angry. He told us we were out of order and had stepped out of line when we called Mr. Toyloy.

'It's none of your business. You're 13, Raymond and should stop your sister. My children would know better. Pack your things.' Uncle shortened our Kingston holidays and Aunty stood there and never defended us. She had told us about Nurse Toyloy and what was going on. I have to get the picture of the beaten nurse out of my mind. Nurse!'

'Mr. Welsh, who is Nurse?'

'Somebody I want to marry.'

They all began to talk at the same time. I didn't listen to their comments; I escaped into my cloud. It floated in the distance, a soft, fluffy whiteness with puffs of light grey and pale blue.

To cut a long story short, after the physical tests and psychosomatic sessions, they concluded, among other things, that I was the product of a truly violent society and needed to get out of the box. I asked them which box. If they only knew how many boxes I had packed myself in! I heard them say my neuroses were so deep-seated, specialists would need a minimum of 12 sessions to even begin to help me.

My case turned out to be complex and complicated. Whether I liked it or not, the Samaritans explained, bi-polar was the same as schizophrenic. Bi-polar sounds better to me so I'll stick with it. I can say the best doctors saw me and after a week and a half of deliberation and consultation, they hemmed and hawed and could find neither cause nor cure. I have to take the same tablet till death does me part, and I have to go back home with no visible change.

Dr. Mark Bedford, Mr. Bedford's son, drove us back to the airport. I took the small package he handed me and promised to deliver it to his parents.

- Veronica Carnegie