Cordella Lewis, Contributor

It all started with a lost cheque, an unwanted chit that conveniently disappeared.

Jonavee Broodie - pardon, Ms. Broodie to you - went through her new dwelling in the housing scheme (the '2br1br' conjured up cold climes to some of those who perused the ad) like a tsunami, interrogating every drawer, pile of paper, handbag and shopping bag.

She did not wish to admit to herself - or to anyone else living in this area, which an enthusiastic press had designated volatile - that her last and final payslip from the workplace had taken the ska-verbial wings of a dove and flown away. She was saying aloud, with what some might call religious fervour (though not loud enough to be heard outside the walls of her newly-acquired housing 'solution'), that she could not believe it was really gone.

Not being one to lower herself to the level of indecent language, Ms. Broodie said this in several tenses, including past, pluperfect and subjunctive.

One hand holding her belly tight, the other across her head, she bent herself almost double, in a way suggesting imminent collapse, and continued talking to herself in what Mr. Shakespeare would call a soliloquy. Remaining in that position for a while, Ms. Broodie had time to admit, silently, that she had, in fact, glared at the cheque with a blend of intense dislike and dissatisfaction; indeed, had cut her eye and hissed her teeth at it, especially because there were those who were going to be thinking she had left the service with a hefty severance pay.

Even the handcart man would want to stop at her gate, expecting an upswing in the amount and unit price of her purchases. The deductive reasoning of The Street would have given the impression that that lady was holding down at least One Point Five. As if she was among those blessed with employee share ownership at Daring, Hunting & Folding!

Perhaps, Ms. Broodie chided herself, she should have followed the once popular sentiment that advocated pasting such a cheque on the wall, where it belonged in terms of bearing witness. People nowadays would understand that any cheque so small had to have originated at gov@jm dot com. It would at least have still been there to look at - and weep.

Ms. Jonavee Broodie - Ms. B, as she had allowed a few people to address her - went and placed her hand on the wall where she should have taped the offending article with cellotape, right next to the pastiche showing Jesus kneeling in the garden of Gethsemane. At least it might have attracted a little blessing. She shook her head.

Then, she got onto the phone with her dear friend and confidante, Ms. Merciline, who tried valiantly to downplay the momentous incident.

'Perhaps it mislay, not lost,' said Ms. Merciline, and Ms. Broodie brightened a little. After all, they consoled each other, more than a few things had been disappearing from under their very noses in recent times, and no burglar was to blame.

'One minute, things could be right there on the table, the bed or a chair, then pouf!' agreed Ms. Broodie.

'Old people say you put them down with you left hand, revival say the devil around like a ramping and a roaring lion, and pastor say duppy in the house and want exercise. In fack, some demon nowadays brazen enough to gone all to college.'

'How you know so much, Ms. Mercy?'

'I listen to call-in and health programme, me dear, which is a thing you hardly do. Read too much book.'

'Miss Lou would call you Mouth-ha-massy. Have mercy on your listener! What else you hear?'

'A woman like yourself must be reach this sickness they call menopause. It attack you memory and you reflex, so you definitely shouldn't search for what lost because whatever it is will come back of itself on its own. But remember, is only when you stop search for it you find it.'

Ms. Broodie stiffened her neck and pursed her lip at the phone.

'Well, speaking of things that occur outside of our control, I must inform you that as soon as I received my keys from the developer and turned them in my own lock, I took early retirement from the civil service on my own volition, not because of age or conflict at the workplace.'

She paused to let that sink in.

'So don't pull out this menopause bag of tricks on me. In fact, you and I went to primary, so you are not too far off the mark yourself.'

'I never say anything about 'valuation' to you, so don't turn round and valuate what I say. Nowadays even baby experiencing stress; so even dem reaching early children-pause. As to the man them, even if them have this thing they will never admit it. A' know we woman handle things different, we more prosistent, we stick it out to the bitter end. I also know that anything 'bout man is bad news to you. You don't trust the ground them walk on. But we have to admit that man don't care what pause, what lie down prostate, or what lost.'

'True, they ponder on no such trivialities. What's lost is no loss to them; it is well and truly lost, buy another one. Wasn't it a man, according to Big Boy story, who was there searching high and low for his spectacles which all that time was perched on his forehead? Men don't even know when they are swimming in the sea of forgetfulness.'

'Well, I have to go now to fix some punkin soup for a' old lady near me. But I can tell you I sorry for you, for is almost two weeks gone now since you put your bad mouth on that cheque, and you helper soon come and must get pay when her work done. Why not report the matter, and govament will issue another one, no? Them have plenty more.'

'You wish! That would be in the next century. But one thing I know, it came through the door with me, for I saw it just after the neighbour gave me some rat bait to set in the corner.'

'I tell you what.' The solution hit Ms. Merciline like a sound system on a Friday evening. 'Leave it to the day's worker to find. You always say she is such a good worker, sweep out corner and all that. Only, don't mention it at all, at all. Surprise is the way to go.'

Jonavee Broodie was an athletic woman who moved effortlessly along the endless tunnel of contemplation into which her life had recently slipped. The paper-pushing from desk to file jacket, and back again, the inky photocopying machine, followed by the decisive 'thwok' of the guillotine as it demanded precise alignment of foolscap - all was behind her now.

She looked in the mirror and saw 40. Maybe 45, if you were to split a few hairs. Her own hair had a tendency to be brittle and reddish, but after the skilful young cosmetologist had worked her magic, Ms. Broodie would stoutly deny any help from Ms. Clairol, whether in bottle or tube, countering sly detractors with, 'Although my father was dark-dark, my mother was on the fair side, so it seems I take after her.'

She had also reluctantly given half an ear when, after her own engagement had disengaged, younger men proclaimed, soft-like, that with such a coca-cola bottle shape and sexy lips her 'age paper must lost.'

But when they followed up by soliciting 'a little contribution', and not for any church rally either, she began to give way to her underlying suspicions. If they could get a little help with a Civic, she would be touring the island. She didn't drive. And since they were going into the car parts business for big profit, a little help with airfare to clinch a sweet little deal in Miami would.

''I see,' said the blind man.' Ms. Broodie quoted her elders and resolutely pursed her lips.

Standing five-foot eight, she tried daily to push her shoulders back and tuck in the extremities so as to downplay her repeated failed manoeuvres in the battle of the bulge. She used to pause in the lunchroom, listening to other women, who themselves came from families of anything up to 10, explain away the flab around their middles as attributable to the perfect pair of children they had made the sacrifice to bear. Once your maw stretch, they gabbed, your belly push out of proportion forever.

Ms. Broodie had borne none. Their maw must stretch, she sniffed, they eat too much cowfoot stew with spinners and rice and peas, to say nothing of flour dumpling and curry goat. She talked with pride - but not too insistently, and not for all ears - about a fair alliance with steamed vegetables washed down by natural juices. A mani and a pedi she could look forward to, once in a while. Meanwhile she fondled her secret weapon, a Kate Smith girdle (how many of them had closer than screen contact with Charlie's Angels?) purchased in K-Mart one summer vacation in Dade.

The new house was in a cul-de-sac which did not turn out to be as quiet as Ms. Broodie had hoped.

Although the scheme's layout was by no means over-extended, nor enjoyed the dubious benefit of blaring loudspeakers paid for by the ever intrusive 'caretakers', it was already losing parochial care before it had even received it. Ms. Broodie watched with dismay as many cars and minibuses turned around after missing their intended route because street signs were not all up. Piles of garbage mounted when the truck with the big writing and a man hanging off it like a basketball player on a metal hoop failed to arrive. Rats were seen darting into drains.

When choosing the site, Ms. Broodie had dared to see it taking on the character of a hideaway, just in case anyone would want to visit discreetly. And, almost imperceptibly at such times, her lips would move at some forbidden thought, nostrils flaring like a filly at the racetrack, eyebrows rearing themselves up over the railings of her frames, and the hand that was not holding tool or hose would hold down her skirts.

She looked around. The Government had not yet taken over road maintenance from the developers, so no one was responsible for the early collapse of curb walls.

What kind of cement did these people use? What kind of workmanship without supervision? She heard someone say it must be shoe whitening they'd used for the pedestrian crossing. And what if Government was losing a little revenue by not yet putting all the water meters in place?

Ms. Broodie sighed loudly and repeatedly. Outfitted in matching hat, bib and sandals while on the daily round of 'establishing' her front garden with yellow and purple lantanas such as lined the political verges along midtown's main streets, she was totally unaware that children passing had nicknamed her The Mad Lady.

The morning when the two co-eds arrived at her gate to take census was the one on which she expected her day's worker. Gone were the days when older female scrutineers were accompanied by the opponent's seeing-eye aides, all of them sweating along in party-coloured tee-shirts, water bottles and teenage socks - Ms. Broodie screwed up her lips.

These nowadays youthful administrators of questionnaires made no pretensions concerning the paltry pay they would receive for asking questions, the answers to which, they said, went to reside in the Department of Statistics. They resented the valuable time they were giving up from completing college projects, which were expected to be done at home on computers which their parents could not afford.

To Ms. Broodie, taking part in a discussion about the origin of her name was not her idea of time well spent when there were lost cheques to be found, reconciliations to be effected at banks, and mortgages and helpers to be paid.

The youngsters had arrived at her gate just as she was anxiously attempting to water the tomatoes and sweet peppers in her back garden, depending on a mere trickle, too. Bad enough that starving ants had made off with most of the seeds she had sown. How was she to know that she should have sprinkled ashes on them?

Trying to keep a straight face, one ignoramus had asked if it really wasn't Genevieve with a 'G' and Broady with an 'A' and a 'Y'.

'Jonavee with a 'J',' she reiterated frostily. 'My grandfather was Jonathan and my mother Veenis, so the names combined.'

'So Mistress B' the questioner cleared her throat suggestively.

'I never told you I made any excursion to the altar.'

'So then Ms. ...,' the other one put in hopefully.

'I am not, and will never be, one of your teachers, the names of whom you all never seem to know.' The exercise seemed more hopeless, in fact well nigh impossible, by the minute.

'Well then, Ms. Broady, it seem you not only broader than Broadway, but you father help make up the statistics of the marginalised males then, since your surname derive from your mother and her father, not yours,' summarised the female.

'Is Professor Miller say so, Miss,' concluded the male; at which point they both hastily retreated.

'Cheeky,' she said to their departing backs, and, lifting the hose in a slightly menacing manner, proceeded instead to coil it for storage.

The day's worker - DW, for short - struggled with the grille gate. Preparing for her employer's accusation of being late at 9:15 a.m., she walked round the side of the house, mumbling that she would have to have something to rock back on, just in case.

Blame it on the damn bus driver who make one wretched roadblock to keep him back at the blasted intersection. Him must buy him licence, to rahtid! If that didn't work, she was just planning to drown out the accuser by breaking forth into Racks of Ages Clear For Me when Ms. B surprised her by opening the back door for her before she quite reached it. She gave her a certain smile and said not a word about lateness. Something was funny. DW soon found out what it was.

'I want you to clean before you wash today, Esmerelda, starting in my bedroom while I am in the bath. I have my reasons.'

The woman exploded, but exercised voice control.

'You want me fe sweep out your room before clothes wash put on line, ma'am? Then suppose rain fall early? Suppose water gone? As to the ironin', light might go 'way too.'

The two women faced each other over this new dilemma.

Realising that time was short, Ralda went to the washroom to extricate herself from her travelling clothes - tight Mizrahi jeans skirt, orange wig and imitation Gucci bag - then forced her ample frame into a now shapeless swing skirt and Fubu Ts.

She set the coloured clothes to soak, cut her eye at the whites, collected the mop, broom, dust rag, wiping bucket and bottles of cleaning fluid and approached the master bedroom. (In housing scheme lingo, the latter meant the one storing no unironed clothes thrown across the bed, no boxes of books and assorted papers, no battered suitcase and out-of-style handbags.)

The two opponents, who could now be titled DW and JB, almost collided in the narrow passage, the latter armed with housecoat, slippers, combs and brushes. DW threw a glance at the master showroom, equipped with new headboard from Courts, flat and fitted sheet-set from Amart, sham and dust ruffle from Answers, lacy curtains with Panamanian appliques from Midtown Centre, figurines from Chinese traders downtown.

With her mouth, she said, 'So that's the bed ruffle and sham you was telling me about last time, ma'am?'

Thinking, Even mattress wearing skirt nowadays, and, Miz B. make sham draw the sheet across the bed, say she make it up! She smiled at her own smartness.

'Don't bother look at the hire purchase bed set, Esmeralda! About six years' instalments you looking at, plus NHT mortgage.'

'Then, ma'am, you t'ink I can tidy this room propaly be the time you take you shower?'

'No, man, I also have my hair to shampoo to cut the hairdresser's time short and reach the bank before they close, if I am lucky! I can save some money by washing my own hair.'

'So, be the time you get back me can get a raise. I must be the only day worker washing, cooking pea soup, cleaning and then ironing the wash clothes same day. Is three day work me givin' you for one, you know, Miss. Those days done, slavery abolish long time.'

'Give me pass, Esmie. You eat fowl feather this morning, no?'

In the role of defender of the peace, DW was familiar with the unwritten rules governing housework - when and where to dust, which drawers not to open, which obvious cobwebs to remove, what bits of paper you do not throw into bins, where to mop and remop.

Today, she stole a little rest on the new stool beside the new dresser, deciding not to run the broom under the bed because she planned only to wet-mop there. She knew that Ms. B kept her windows tightly closed to ward off the swirling dust outside and to keep out grandfather flies, too-friendly lizards, and too-prying eyes.

In this hallowed room, nothing blew except the oscillating fan, and at minimum speed at that. The wet mop she retrieved from its first arc under the bed came back with something trapped in it - not tangled hair, as it seemed at first to the woman, but a muss-muss lying stiff on a strip of yellow paper which showed tell-tale nibbles.

Esmeralda's scream hit the ceiling at the precise moment the bathroom door was thrust open, melding with Jonavee's as her eyes spotted the mouse. Both women turned, with a synchronised fast-forward that was only stopped by the back fence.

It was only after the neighbours' curious stares gave way to shouts of 'Thief!' 'Murder!' 'Whoi!' 'Police!' and 'Jesus!' in that order that Ms. Jonavee Broodie realised that her cheque was alive. That she wasn't exactly dressed for the outdoors was of little consequence.

One neighbour said the pink pellets made rats thirsty. Those which she had given Ms. B to place in her kitchen should have sent the little wretch outside in search of the standpipe, not inside.

DW, still not realising, asked what business a mouse have with a receipt. JB said it was really not a receipt but a more valuable piece of paper which the arthritis had prevented her from bending to search for thoroughly.

Esmeralda, now realising, decided she definitely would need eyeglasses from her employer to see the difference between different colour paper in future, and Jonavee wondered under her breath if the new manager at the bank would allow the long-standing tellers, who still knew customers by name and nature, to accept a gnawed and slightly smelly cheque in exchange for good money.

Back in the house, she looked at the telephone and wondered if she should call Ms. Merciline.

She decided against it, and thoughts of the Women's Bureau, Consumer Affairs, and the voluntary association flitted through her mind. Because, all in all, it seemed that this hand-to-mouth retirement was not going to be the essence of retiring.

Some new, perhaps gender-related, survival strategies, according to these organisations, would have to be worked out for sustainable development, and for the playing field to be level. The cul-de-sac suddenly looked like a dead end.

- Cordella Lewis