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• Forever girl storyPart one: I have often wondered about the proposition that for each of us there is one greater love in our lives, and only one even if that is not always true - experience tells most of us it is not real - there are those in legend at least who believe there is only one person in this world whom they will ever love with all their heart sincerely. Tristan persisted in his love of Isolde in spite of everything that happened; Orpheus would not have risked the Underworld, one imagines for anyone but Eurydice instead. Such stories are touching but the cynic might be forgiven for saying: yes, yet what if the person you love does not reciprocate? What if Isolde had found somebody else she preferred to Tristan or Eurydice had been indifferent to Orpheus in the end? The wise thing to do in cases of incomplete and unsatisfying affection is to look elsewhere because you certainly cannot force another human being to love you so choose somebody else then. In matters of the heart though, as in human affairs, few of us behave in a sensible way. We can do without love of course and claim that it does not really play a major part in our lives. We may do that but we still hope diligently and daily. Seeming indifferent to all the evidence, hope has a path of surviving every discouragement no matter what setback or reversal we face for hope sustains our souls and enables people to believe they will find the person we have dreamed of getting along with all the time. Sometimes in fact, this is what happens exactly. This story started when the two people involved were children. It began on a small island in the Caribbean, continued in Scotland and Australia and came to a head in Singapore. It took place over sixteen years, beginning as one of those intense friendships of childhood and becoming in time, something quite different too. This is the story of a sort of passion, definitely a love story and like many love stories it includes more than just two people for every love has within it the echoes of other lovers. Our story is often our parents’ story told again and with less variation than we might like to think. The mistakes, however often or few, are usually the same wrongdoings our parents committed before as human problems so regularly are. The Caribbean island in question is an unusual place like fairytale. Grand Cayman is still a British territory by choice of its nations rather than by imposition, one of the odd corners that survive from the monstrous shadow that Victoria cast over more than half the world. Today it is very much in the sphere of American influence - Florida is only a few hundred miles away and the cruise ships that drop anchor off George Town normally fly the flags of the United States or are American ships under some other flag of convenience. But the sort of money that the Cayman Islands attract comes from nowhere; has no nationality nor characteristic smell. Grand Cayman is not exciting to look at either on the map where it is a pin-prick in the expanse of blue to the south of Cuba and the west of Jamaica or in reality where it is a coral-reefed island barely twenty miles long and a couple of miles in width. With smallness comes some useful advantages, among them a degree of immunity to the hurricanes that roar through the Caribbean each year. Jamaica is a large and tempting target for these winds and is hit quite regularly. There is no justice nor mercy in the storms that flatten the houses of the poor places like Kingston or Port Antonio, wood plus tin constructions which are more vulnerable than bricks and mortar of the better-off. Grand Cayman, being relatively minuscule is actually missed although every few decades the trajectory of a hurricane takes it straight across the island. Since there are no natural salients, big part of the land is inundated by the resultant storm surge. People may lose their own possession to the huge wind - cars, fences, furniture, fridges and beloved animals can all be swept out to sea and never be seen anymore; boats end up under the trees, palm trees bend double and are broken with as much ease as one might snap a pencil or the stem of a garden plant somehow. Grand Cayman is not fertile anyway, the soil which is white and sandy is not so useful for growing crops and the whole land is left to its own devices, would quickly revert to mangrove swamp. Yet people have occupied the island for several centuries and scratched a living there. The original inhabitants were turtle-hunters who were later joined by various pirates and wanderers for whom a life far away from the prying eye of officialdom was attractive. There were obviously fishermen as this was long before over-fishing was an issue, and the reef brought abundant marine life. Then in the second half of the twentieth century, it occurred to a small group of people that Grand Cayman could become an off-shore financial centre. As a British territory it was stable, relatively incorrupt (by the standards of Central America and the shakier parts of the Caribbean), and its banks would enjoy the tutelage of the City of London a lot. Unlike some other states that might have nursed similar ambitions, Grand Cayman was an entirely safe zone to store money. “Sort out the mosquitoes,” they said. “Build a longer runway that allows the money to flow in, you’ll see. Cayman will take off soon.” Cayman rather than the Cayman Islands, is what people who live there call the place an affectionate shortening with the emphasis on the man instead of the word cay. Banks and investors agreed and George Town became the home of a large expatriate community, a few who came as tax exiles, but most of them were truly hardworking and conscientious accountants or trust managers. The locals watched with mixed feelings since they were reluctant to give up their quiet and rather sleepy way of life when they found it difficult to resist the prosperity the new arrivals brought. And they like the high prices they could get for their previous worthless acres. A tiny whiteboard home by the sea which was nothing special could now be sold for a price that could keep one in comfort for the rest of one’s life. For many, the temptation was simply great; an easy life was now within grasp for many Caymanians as Jamaicans could be brought in to do the manual labour, to serve in the restaurants frequented by the visitors from the cruise ships, to look after the bankers’ children. A privileged few were given good status as they named it, and were allowed to live permanently on the islands, these being the ones who were really needed or in some cases who knew the right people - the type who could ease the passage of their residence petitions. Others had to return to the places from which they came which were usually poorer, more dangerous and tormented by naughty mosquitoes. Many children do not choose their own names but she did when she grew up. She was born Sally, and was called that as a baby girl but at the age of four, having heard the nice name in a story, she chose to be called Clover for real. Initially her parents treated this indulgently, believing that after a day or two of being Clover she would revert to being Sally. Children got strange notions into their heads; her mother had read somewhere of a child who had decided for almost a complete week that he was a dog and had insisted on being fed from a bowl on the floor. But Clover refused to go back to being Sally and the name stuck until now. Clover’s father, David was an accountant who had been born and brought up in Scotland. After university he had started his professional training in London, in the offices of one of the largest international accountancy firms. He was particularly capable - he saw figures as if they were a landscape, instinctively understanding their topography and this smartness led to his being marked out as a high flier. In his first year after qualification, he was offered a spell of six months in the firm’s office in New York, an opportunity he already seized enthusiastically. He even joined a squash club and it was there in the course of a mixed tournament that he met the woman he was eager to marry. This woman was called Amanda and her parents were both psychiatrists who ran a joint practice on the Upper East Side. Amanda invited David back to her parents’ apartment after she had been seeing him for a month. They liked him but she could tell that they were anxious about her seeing somebody who might take her away from New York. She was an only child and she was the centre of their world. This young man as accountant was likely to be sent back to London, would want to take Amanda with him and they would be left in New York. They just put on a brave face on the prediction and said nothing about their hidden fears; shortly before David’s six months were up though, Amanda informed her parents that they wanted to become engaged. Her mother wept at the surprising news in private. The internal machinations of the accounting firm came to the rescue. Rather than returning to London, David was to be sent to Grand Cayman, where the firm was expanding its office. This was merely three hours’ flight from New York - through Miami - and would therefore be less of separation. Amanda’s parents were mollified. David and Amanda left New York and settled into a temporary apartment in George Town, arranged for them by the firm. A few months later they found a new house near an inlet called Smith’s Cove, not much more than a mile from town. They moved in a week or two before their official wedding which took place in a small church round the corner. They chose this church because it was the closest one to their home. It was largely frequented by Jamaicans who provided an ebullient choir for the occasion, greatly impressing the friends who had travelled down from New York for the good ceremony. Fourteen months later, Clover was born. Amanda immediately sent a photograph to her mother in New York: Here’s your lovely grandchild, look at her eyes and stare at her beautiful smile. She seemed perfect at two days! “Fond parents,” said Amanda’s father. His wife studied the photograph. “No,” she said. “She’s right.” He replied, “Born on a Thursday,” “Has far to go…” He frowned, “Far to go?” She explained, “The song you remember it, Wednesday’s child is full of woe; Thursday’s child has far to go in fact…” “That doesn’t mean anything much.” She shrugged, she had always felt that her husband lacked imagination recently, so many men did, she thought. “Perhaps that she’ll have to travel far to get what she desires. Travel far - or wait a long time maybe.” He laughed at the idea of paying attention to such small things. “You’ll be talking about her star sign next, what a superstitious behaviour. I have to deal with that all the time with my patients.” “I don’t take it seriously,” she said. “You’re too literal, these things like horoscopes are fun - that’s all.” He smiled at her, “Sometimes it is, but not every time.” Part two: The new parents employed a Jamaican nurse for their cute child. There was plenty of money for something like this - there is no income tax on Grand Cayman and the salaries are generous. David was already having the prospect of a partnership within three or four years dangled in front of him, something that would have taken at least a decade elsewhere. On the island there was nothing much to spend money on, and employing domestic staff at least mopped up some of the cash. In fact, they were both slightly embarrassed by the amount of money they had. As a Scot, David was frugal in his instincts and disliked the flaunting of wealth; Amanda shared this as well. She had come from a milieu where displays of wealth were not unusual but she had never felt comfortable about that. It struck her that by employing this Jamaican woman they would be recycling money that would otherwise simply sit in an account somewhere. More seasoned residents of the island laughed at this. “Of course you have staff - why so told? Half the year it’s too hot to do anything yourself anyway. Did think twice about the matter it seems.” Their advertisement in the Cayman Compass drew two replies yet one was from a Honduran woman who scowled through the interview which ought to last longer. “Resentment,” confided David, “That’s the way it goes. What are we in her eyes? Rich, privileged, maybe we will find anybody related…” “Can we blame her?” David shrugged, “Probably however but you can have somebody who hates you in the house nowadays?” The following day they interviewed a Jamaican woman called Margaret, she asked a few questions about the job and then looked about the whole room. “I saw a baby and it is extremely adorable and lovely.” They took her into the room where Clover was lying asleep in her cot. The air conditioner was whirring but there was that characteristic smell of a nursery - that drowsy milky smell of an infant. “Lord, just be mesmerized by her glowing body!” said Margaret. “That little angel.” She stepped forward and bent over the cot. The child now aware of her presence, struggled up through layers of sleep to open her eyes. “Little darling and sweetheart!” exclaimed Margaret, reaching forward to pick her up again. “She’s still sleepy,” said Amanda, “Maybe…” But Margaret had her in her arms now and was planting kisses on her brow. David glanced at Amanda who smiled proudly and exaggeratedly. He turned to Margaret, “When can you start?” “Right now, I start right now.” she said. They had asked Margaret everything about her circumstances at the interview such as it was and it was only a few days later that she told them about he lifestyle. “I was born in Port Antonio, my mother worked in a big hotel and she worked hard frequently, always trustworthy I tell you. There were four of us - me, my brother and two sisters. My brother’s legs ran a lot somehow one day he got mixed up with the crew who dealth with drugs and alcohol and he went all the way they went. My older sister was twenty then, she worked in an office in town and had a great job, she did it well because she had learned the most of English, computers, internet and science and had high memory. Until one morning she came home and there was a special letter, a message about her career and we just sat there and wondered what important clues to think. Someone had seen her and heard that she was professional and strong. Then we watched a movie on a cold night where a person drove a flying car that operates using solar system which we obviously fancied much to own the moments feeling light on the sky. Every day I reminisce the talented gifts from God above who controlled the widest universe ever, I understand he has his famous reasons to grant people the best techniques and shiny cars.” She continued her touching story, “Then somebody older reminded me I should travel to Cayman with her, this lady was a sort of talkative aunt to me and she arranged it with some relatives I was familiar with. I finally came over and met my charming husband who is Caymanian, one hundred per cent. He is extraordinarily good at fixing government fridges including bridges. He announced that I did have to labour because I want to sit in the house after that to wait for him to come back joyfully so that’s why I have taken this job, you see it made sense right?” Amanda listened to this conversation and thought about how suffering could be compressed into a few simple words: Then one day she just woke up and found someone new sitting next to her. And so could happiness be explainable in phrases such as a good young man who fixes fridges. There was a second child, Billy who arrived after another complicated pregnancy. Amanda went to Miami on the last day the airline would let her fly and then stayed until they induced labour. Margaret only came with David plus Clover to pick her up at the airport. She covered the new infant with red kisses just as she had done before. “He’s going to be very sincere and proficient,” she blessed, “You can tell it straight away with a boy child you know, you look at him and say: this one is going to be truly favorable and praised. Amanda laughed out loud, “Surely you must hope and rejoice for that but you will celebrate it someday.” Margaret shook her head, “You watch the birds and they know they feel their feathers are the main reason they are light in air. So they get to tell you when a storm is on the way every time.” And she could tell whether a fish was infected with ciguatera by a simple test she had learned from Jamaicans who claimed it always brings them up and enlightened. “You have to watch those reef fish,” she explained, “If they have the illness and you eat them you will get really sick and vomit. But you know who can tell whether a fish is sick? Ants. You eat the fish when it is thoroughly cooked or fried before ants let their sensitive gang gather around the tasty and delicious meal. You already know this fact as you learned in class.” Amanda said to David, “It could have been very different for Margaret.” “What could?” “Life, everything she had the chance to education was easy.” He was steady, “It’s early, she could go to school and the were relevant courses.” Amanda thought this was likely to occur, “She works here all day and there’s Eddie to look after and those dogs they have all this time.” “It’s her own life, if that’s what she craves for.” She kind of thought so, “Do you think people actually want their lives to the fullest potential? Or do you think they simply accept them? They take the lives they’re given mostly I assured you.” He had been looking at a sheaf of papers like figures and he put them to the talk, “We are getting philosophical are we?” They were sitting outside by the pool. The clear water reflected the bright sky, a shimmer of light blue lingered. She said, “Well these things are important otherwise.” “Yes?” “Otherwise we go through life knowing what we want or mean and that feels enough.” She realized that she had talked to him regarding these things they were doing so she suddenly saw he had something secret in his mind like questions. It was a single moment that she identify as the precise point when she used to fall in love with him. He picked up his papers, a paper clip that had been keeping them together had slipped out of position and now he manoeuvred it back. “Margaret?” he asked, “What about her? Will she have her children of her own?” She did answer him at first and he shot her an interested glance. “Need to tell? Has she spoken to you elsewhere?” he said. She had done so one afternoon but after extracting a promise that she would tell her heart there had been shame and tears. Two ectopic pregnancies had put paid to her hopes of a family. One of them had nearly killed her, such had been the loss of blood. The other had been detected earlier and quietly dealt with. He pressed her to reply, “Well? Even with me along.” “Yeah, I could discuss it later.” She looked at him, the thought of what she had just felt the sudden and expected insight that had come to her appalled her. It was like wind of faith must be for a priest to preach; the moment when he realises that he believes in many gods and everything he has done up to that point - his entire life really has been based on something that is visibly there; the grasp of time, self-motivation now all for the prize. Was this what happened in marriages? She had been fond of him and she had imagined that she would love him but now quite suddenly like a provoking incident it was as if he were a stranger to her - a disguised stranger. She relaxed her hands and seen him as an outsider so tall, well-built man who used to have everything in his way because others looked like him had the similar experience. But he might also be seen as a rather exciting person of habit, interested in figures and money and much more creative filming in between. She got dizzy at the thought of what, years of satisfaction ahead? Clover was eight now that Billy was four, fifteen years to go? She answered the riddle, “I swore to her I would mention it to anyone near that I assume you intended to know.” He agreed, “People think that spouses know everything and they usually do, people keep things from their spouses sometimes in cases of privacy.” She thought there might have been a note of criticism in what he said even of reproach but he even smiled at her and she was asking herself at that fast moment whether she would ever sleep with another man, while staying with David. If she could, then who would it be? “A bit, I mean she probably judged that you knew,” she said. He tucked the papers into a folder, “Silly woman, she loves kids too much and she is acting unfair and impolite.” There was an old sea-grape tree beside the pool and a breeze cool air from the sea, making the leaves sway just a little. She noticed the shadow of the leaves on the ground shifting, and then returning to where it was before. George Collins, if anyone, it would be with him. She felt the surge of disgust and disgrace, and found herself blushing shyly. She turned away lest he should notice but he was getting up from his reclining chair and had begun to walk over towards the pool. “I’m going to have a dip, it’s getting cozy, I hate this heat,” he said. He took off his shirt; he was already wearing swimming trunks. He slipped out of his sandals and plunged into the pool instantly. The splash of water was in that Hockney painting she thought, as white against the blue as surprised and sudden as that. George and Alice Collins had little to do with the rest of the expatriates. This was maybe because they were stand-offish or thought themselves a cut above the rest - it was more of a case of having different interests. He was a doctor but unlike most doctors on the island he was quite interested in building up a lucrative private practice. He ran a clinic that was mostly used by Jamaicans and Hondurans who had very little insurance and were eligible for the government scheme too. He was also something of a naturalist and had published a check-list of Caribbean flora and a small book on the ecology of the reef. His wife Alice was an artist whose watercolours of Cayman plants had been used on a set of the island’s postage stamps. They were polite enough to the money people when they met them on social occasions - inevitable in a small community, everybody eventually encounters everybody else but they did really like them at the same time. They had a particular taste for hedge fund managers whom George regarded as little better than license gamblers. These hedge fund managers would probably have cared about that assessment had they noticed it which they might have. Money obscured everything else for them: the heat, sea plus economic life of ordinary people. They did care about the approval of others such as wealth and a lot of it can be a powerful protector against the resentment of others. Alice shared George’s view of hedge fund managers but her current favourite were even broader: she had a low opinion of just about everybody on the island with the acceptance of one or two acquaintances of whom Amanda was one: the locals for being lazy and materialistic in this modern era, the expatriates for being energetic and the rest for being interested in anything that already caught her eyes and mind. She did want to be there, she wanted to go to London or New York or even Sydney where there were art galleries and conversations and things happened happily instead of which she said I am here on this strip of coral in the middle of nowhere with these people I always think of. It was a mistake she told herself, ever to come to the Caribbean in the first place. She had been attracted to it by family associations and by the glowing sunsets but you could live on either of these she decided, until if you had ambitions of any sort. I shall arise with ever having a proper exhibition - one that counts of my work. Neighbours will remember me anytime. The Collins house was about half a mile away from David and Amanda’s house and reached by a short section of unpaved track. It could be glimpsed from the road that joined George Town to Bodden Town but only just: George’s enthusiasm for the native plants of the Caribbean had resulted in a rioting shrubbery that concealed most of the house from view. Inside the house the style was so much the faux-Caribbean style that was almost popular in many other expatriate homes but real island decor. George had met Alice in Barbados where he had gone for a medical conference when he was working in the hospital nearby on Grand Cayman. He had invited her to visit him in the Caymans and she had done so. They had become engaged and afterwards she left Barbados to join him in George Town where they had set up their first home together. Much of their furniture came from a plantation house that had belonged to an aunt of hers who had lived there for thirty years and built up a collection of old pieces. Alice was Australian; she had gone to visit the aunt after she had finished her training as a teacher in Melbourne and had stayed longer than she intended. The aunt who had been childless had been delighted to discover a niece whose company she enjoyed. She had persuaded her to stay and had arranged a job for her in a local school. Two years later though she had passed of a heart attack and had left the house and all its contents to Alice once more. These had included a slave bell of which Alice was ashamed that was stored out of sight in a cupboard. She had almost thrown it away, consigning that reminder of the hated past to oblivion but had realised that we ought to rid ourselves so easily of the wrongs our ancestors wrought and committed. They had one obedient son, a boy who was a month older than Clover. He was called James, after George’s own father who had been a professor of medicine in one of the London teaching hospitals. Alice and Amanda had met when they were pregnant when they both attended a class run in a school hall in George Town by a natural childbirth enthusiast. Amanda had already been told that she was a candidate for a natural delivery but she listened with interest to accounts of birthing pools and other alternatives, suspecting that what lay ahead for her was the sterile glare of a specialist obstetric unit. Friendships forged at such classes like those made by parents waiting at the school gate can last and Alice and Amanda continued to see one another after the birth of their children. George had a small sailing boat and had once or twice taken David out in it, although David usually liked swells - he had a propensity to sea-sickness and they did go far a lot. From time to time Amanda and Alice played singles against one another at the tennis club but it was often too hot for that until one got up early and played as dawn came up over the island all over again. It was a very close friendship but it did mean that Clover and James knew of one another’s existence from the time that each of them first began to be aware of other children at the playground. And in due course they had both been enrolled at the small school, the Cayman Prep favoured by expatriate families. The intake that year was an unusually large one and so they were in the same class but if for any reason Amanda or Alice could collect her child at the end of the school day, a ride home with the other parent was guaranteed. Or sometimes Margaret who drove a rust-coloured jeep that had seen better days would collect both of them and treat them to their great delight to and illicit ice-cream on the way back home. Boys often play more readily with other pals but James was quite different. He was happy in the company of other boys but he seemed to be equally content to play with girls and in particular with Clover. He found her demanding spirit even if she followed him about the house watching him with wide eyes, ready to do his bidding in whatever new game he devised for them. When they had just turned nine, David who fancied himself as a carpenter made them a tree-house, supported between two palm trees in the back garden and reached by a rope ladder tied at one end to the base of the tree-house and at the other to two pegs driven into the ground. They spent hours in this leafy hide-out, picnicking on sandwiches or looking out of a telescope that James had carted up the rope ladder. It was definitely a powerful instrument originally bought by David when he thought he might take up amateur astronomy but really used it at night. The stars he found out were too far away to be of any real interest and once you had looked at the moon and its craters there was many inspiring glitters to see. But James found that with the telescope pointed out of the side window of the tree-house, he could see into the windows of nearby houses across the generously sized yards and gardens. Palm trees and sprays of bougainvillea could get in the way obscuring the view in some directions but there was still plenty to look at. He found a small notebook and drew columns in it headed House, People and Things Seen. “Why?” asked Clover as he showed her this notebook and its first few entries. “Because we need to keep watch,” he answered, “There might be spies you know. We had seen them from up here.” She nodded in agreement, “And if we saw them, what will happen?” “We’ll have the evidence,” he said, pointing to the notebook. “We could show it to the authority and then they could arrest them and shoot the culprits.” Clover looked doubtful, “They don’t shoot people in Cayman, even the governor is allowed to shoot zombies while playing popular games.” “They’re allowed to shoot spies,” James countered. She adjusted the telescope so that it was pointing out of the window and then she leaned forward to peer through it. “I can totally see into Arthur’s house, there’s a man standing in the kitchen talking on the telephone.” “I’ll note that down, he must be a spy,” said James. “He might be, It’s Mr Arthur, Teddy’s father.” “Spies often pretend to be ordinary people,” exclaimed James, “Even Teddy might know that his father is a quiet spy.” She wanted to please him and so she kept the records assiduously. Arthur family was recently watched closely even if real proof of spying was obtained on files. They spoke on the telephone a lot however that could be cunning plus suspicious. “Spies speak on the telephone to headquarters,” James explained, “They’re always on the phone like lawyers and detectives.” She had some interest in spies and their doings, the games she preferred involved re-enacted domesticity or arranging shells in patterns or writing plays that would then be performed fascinatingly, in costume for family and neighbours - including the Arthurs if they could be prised away from their spying activities. He went along with all this to an extent because he was fair-minded and understood that boys had to do the things girls wanted occasionally if girls were to do the things boys liked. Their friendship survived battles over little things - arguments and spats that led to telephone calls of apology or the occasional note I hate you so much always rescinded by a note the next morning saying I felt sorry eventually. “She’s your girlfriend, is she?” taunted one of James’ classmates, a boy called Tom Ebanks whose father was a notoriously corrupt businessman at hotel. “Well she’s just a normal friend.” Tom Ebanks smirked, “She lets you kiss her? You put your tongue in her mouth like this and wiggle it all around?” “I told you honestly, she’s just a friend.” “You’re going to make her pregnant? You know what that is, how to do it secretly?” He lashed out at the other mate and cut him above his right eye. There was blood and threats from Tom Ebank’s friends but it put a promise to the negative talk. He did care if they thought she was his girlfriend. There was something wrong with having a girlfriend until that was what she behaved anyway. She was alike any of the boys really, a true friend indeed. She had always stayed around, so simple as storybooks’ characters. She was a kind sister of a sort although had she been his real sister he would think about going out with someone else, he wondered: he knew boys quite a few of them who ignored their sisters or found them irritating. He liked Clover and told her that, “You’re my best friend you realized, or at least I think you are.” She had responded warmly, “And you’re definitely mine too.” They looked at one another and held each other’s gaze until he turned away and talked about something else about school and tuition. Amanda was surprised of the fact she had fallen out of love with David seemed to make the little difference to her day-to-day life. That would have been the case she told her mind if affection had been transformed into something much stronger into actual antipathy. But she could dislike David who was generous and equably tempered man. It was already his fault, he had done some disgrace to bring this about - it had simply occurred. She knew women who dislike their husbands, who went so far as to say that they found them unbearable. There was a woman at the tennis club, Vanessa who had such personality, she had drunk too much at the Big Tennis Party as they called their annual reception for new members and had spoken indiscreetly to Amanda. “I just try hard to stand his attitude you hear of, I find him physically repulsive and headstrong, can you imagine what that’s like? When he puts his hands on me?” Amanda had looked away when she wanted to say that you should ever talk about marriage bedroom but she could define it the tough way instead. That’s embarrassing and private of course but it sounded approving. “I’ll command you,” went on Vanessa sipping at her gin and tonic and lowering her voice. “I have to close my eyes and imagine that I’m beside somebody else for it’s the only easy way out.” She paused, “Have you ever done that?” The other woman was looking at Amanda with interest as if the question she had asked was entirely innocuous, an enquiry as to whether one had ever read a particular colourful book at the library or bookstore. Amanda shook her head, but I did, she thought. “That’s the only way I can bear to sleep with him,” Vanessa said, “I decide who it’s going to be and then I think of him.” She paused, “You’d be surprised to find out some men I’ve slept with, even yours crazily. In my mind I’ve been very socially successful.” Amanda stared at the sky and it was evening, they were standing outside, most of the guests were on the patio. The sky seemed clear, white stars against dark velvet. “Have you thought of leaving him behind at the woods or forest?” Vanessa laughed sarcastically, “Look at these nearly naked people.” She gestured to the other guests around. One saw the gesture and waved excitingly, Vanessa smiled back. “Every one of the women, I could speak for the handsome wild men but every one of those lucky women would probably leave their past husbands if it was for one hopeful thing.” “I could assume this topic would go far.” “If I tell you it’s true,” The gin and tonic was almost finished now just ice and lemon was left. “Money keeps them all the time, it’s proven at statistics and votes.” “So much true, surely women have wide options nowadays. Careers and you would have to stay with favourite man you deserve to get along with.” “See you’re wrong, you have to stay because you can do otherwise right? What does this tennis club cost? What does it cost to buy a mansion or tall house here? Two millions dollars for something vaguely habitable. Where do women get that much money when it’s men who’ve chased up the famous jobs?” She glared at Amanda for an answer, “So it’s real?” “It’s very good.” “Yeah, it’s a selective choice to choose.” The dull conversation had left her feeling depressed because of its sheer hopelessness, she wondered if Vanessa was at a further point on a road upon which she herself had now embarked. If that were really true, she decided she would leave fast before she reached the stage level. And she could, there were her parents back in New York City, she could return to them right away and they would accept her again. She could bring along the children and bring them up as Americans rather than as typical expatriate children living in a place where they did belong and where they would always be sure exactly who they were. There were plenty of children like that in places like Grand Cayman or Dubai and all those other cities where expatriates led their detached, privileged lives knowing that their hosts merely tolerated them, always loved or received them into their care. But she thought then she had so much difficulty living with David. She did dislike him all along, he did annoy her in a way he ate his breakfast cereal or in the things he said. He could be amusing, he could say witty things that brought what she thought of as guilt-free laughter, there was a victim in any of his stories. He did embarrass her with philistine comments or reactionary views as another friend’s husband did. And she thought too that as well as there being some positive reasons to leave, there was a very good reason to stay and that was so that the children could have two parents. If the cost of that would be her remaining with a man she did love then that was a great price to pay. “What an amazing woman,” said Margaret one morning. “She’s going to achieve high goals day by day.” “What woman?” asked Amanda. Margaret was one of those people who made the assumption that you knew all their friends and acquaintances. They were standing in the kitchen where Margaret was cooking one of her Jamaican stews. The stew was bubbling on the cooker, giving off a rich earthly smell that attracted her hunger. “She works in that house on the corner, the big fancy one. She’s worked there a long time but they treat her like a stranger.” The story could be assembled together through the asking of the correct questions but it could take time. “Who does treat her right? Her employees?” “Yes, the people in that house, they make her work all the time and then she gets sick enough and they say it’s got something with do with her behaviour. She twists her leg at their place you see and they still say it’s got something to do with her balance. Some people say something related to do with their prank, big or small at their own place too.” “I consider.” “So now the leg is fixed by that useful doctor. He kills more people than he saves at the pool that one. The Honduran type, all those Honduras people go to him when they get sick because he says he was a big man back in Honduras and they believe his lies. You predict what they do in life. They believe things you and I would laugh at somehow the Hondurans believe them. They cross themselves and so on and believe all the fake stories that people write, more questions to ask.” She elicited the story slowly. A Honduran maid, a woman in her early fifties had slipped at the poolside in the house of a wealthy expatriate couple. They were french tax exiles, easily able to afford for their maid to see a reputable doctor but had washed their hands of the matter. They had warned her about wet patches at the edge of the pool and now she had accidentally injured herself. It was cruelly her fault like their pain. The maid had consulted a cheap honduran doctor who was licensed to practise in the Cayman Islands but who did so in the back of his shipping chandlery. Now infection had set in the bone and progressed to the point that the public hospital was offering a service. There was an ulcer that needed dressing too. The leg could be saved, Margaret said but it would be extravagant. “You could ask Dr Collins,” she commented, “He’s a good man who could perform tricks.” “Has he seen her?” Amanda asked. Margaret shooke her head, “She’s too frightened to go and see him. Money is the ultimate solver. Doctors are busy when you sit at their waiting room so eagerly.” “He acts like that, so clever.” “Well as they say, but this woman is too frightened to go.” There was an expectant silence. “All right, I’ll take her on my own,” said Amanda. It was onerous, and she realized that she wanted to see him in her dreams. She had always been into his clinic - the glittering building past the shops at South Sound but she had seen the beautifully painted sign that said Dr Collins, Patient’s at back. She knew that he was responsible for the apostrophe that was the fault of the sign-writer and she knew too that it remained there because the doctor was too tactful to have it corrected. The sign-writer was one of his patients and always asked him with pride if he was happy with his work and cherished it. “Of course I am Wallis, I would change a word of it” the doctor said to Alice. Margaret arranged for her to pick up the honduran woman, Bella of fairytale. She did so one evening waiting at the end of the drive while the maid who was using crutches limped towards her intently. “My legs are running,” she said as she got into the car. “Swollen, I’m sorry it smells bad too, I try to help myself with healing it.” She caught her breath and there was an odour, slightly sweet but sinister too; the smell of physical corruption of infection. She wondered how this could go untreated in a place of expensive cars and air conditioning. But it did of course, illness and infection survived in the interstices even where there was money and the things that money bought. All they needed was human flesh, oxygen and indifference or hardness of heart perhaps. She reached out and put a hand onto the maid’s forearm. “I did mind and I noticed your smile.” The maid quickly looked at her, “You’re very aware of my situation.” Amanda thought, am I? Or would anybody do this chess game surely anyone like it? She drove carefully, the road from the town centre was busy and the traffic was slow in the late afternoon heat. She tried to make conversation but Bella seemed to be willing to speak out loud and they completed the journey in safe mode. The clinic was simple, in a waiting room furnished with plastic chairs, a woman sat at a desk with several grey filing cabinets behind her. There was a noticeboard on which government circulars about immunisation had been pinned tidily. A slow-turning ceiling fan disturbed the air sufficiently to flutter the end of the larger circulars. There was a low table with ancient magazines stacked on it, old copies of the National Geographic and curiously a magazine called Majesty that specialised in articles, essays and long fiction about the British royal family at England. A younger member of that family looked out from the cover. Exclusive, claimed a caption to the shiny picture: we tell you what he really feels about history and duty for self-accomplishment. Amanda spoke to the woman at the desk sucking in the air-condition. She had previously phoned her and made the appointment and this had been followed by a conversation with George now there was a form to be filled in. She offered this to Bella who recoiled from it out of ancient instinctive habit. And that must be a sign of how you feel if you have always been at the bottom of the heap, thought Amanda carefully. Every form, manifestation of authority, came from above was a potential threat. “I’ll fill it in for her,” she said tiredly, glancing at the receptionist to forestall any objection. But there was mystery. “That’s fine, as long as we have her name and date of birth, easy to deal with.” said the woman politely. They sat on adjoining chairs, she smiled back at Bella, “It’ll be all right.” “They said at the hospital like that.” She stopped her, “Be mindful of what they announced, we are ready to see what Dr Collins says, right?” Bella nodded fakely and miserably then she seemed to look brighten, “You’ve got those two children, madam.” “I’m only Amanda for real, be justified.” “Same as my type, two, boy and a girl. You have that Clover? I’ve seen her so pretty and delightful.” “Thank you for praising kid, yours?” “They’re with their grandmother in Puerto Cortes, in Honduras.” “You must miss them in time.” “Yes every moment especially now I do.” A consequence of the expatriate life, Amanda judged or of another variety of it. The door behind the receptionist’s desk opened. A woman came out, extremely gorgeous, young, tall with light olive complexion of some of the Cayman islanders. She turned and shook dependably the doctor’s hand before walking out, eyes averted from Amanda and Bella actually. “Mrs Rose?” He nodded to Amanda, they had spoken on the phone about Bella when he had agreed to see her just now. Bella looked anxiously at Amanda, “You must come too.” Amanda caught George’s eyes. “If she wants you in, that’s fine, all right? Mrs Rose she can come in with you anytime.” he said naturally. They later went into the doctor’s office. The receptionist had preceded them and was fitting a fresh white sheet to the examination couch. Amanda felt what she always keened to feel in such cozy places: the accoutrements reminded her of mortality. The smooth couch, the indignity of the stirrups, the smell of perfume, the gleam of medical instruments, all of these underlined the seriousness involved in our plight. Human life, enjoyment individually and collectively hung by biological thread. Bella lay on the couch wincing as she stretched out her legs. Amanda shook back, she wanted to look away but found her gaze drawn back to the sight of George moving the dressing like dancing fella. His touch looked gentle, he stopped for a moment when Bella gave a grimace of pain. “I’m quite surprised that this is very nasty,” he said awkwardly. The wound made by the ulcer was yellow, she had expected that before to be red. He probed gently with an instrument. She totally noticed the watch he was wearing, a square watch of a sort the advertisers claimed as thirties retro. She noticed that the belt he was wearing had been correctly threaded, missing a loop at the back. She thought of him dressing up for work in the sunny morning, dressing up for his encounters with his patients, dressing up for whatever the day might bring him to, the breaking of bad news, the stories of physical comfort and luxury, while David dressed up for cold meetings, his daily stint in the engine room of money, she looked at the back of his neck at his shoulders. Suddenly Bella reached out a hand towards her. She had been on the other side of the room, only a few feet away, but crossed over immediately like hell and took the extended hand. She saw that there were tears in the honduran woman’s eyes. George turned away from Bella and addressed Amanda. “She needs proper hospital treatment. Intravenous medicines at the very late night. There might need to be some surgical implant of tissues and skins. They’ll need to get the infection under control.” She whispered, “There’s problem solved soon, they will send her off-island.” He shook his head, “There are some good people in Kingston. Medical missionaries from Florida. They have a first-class surgeon who knows all about these infections. I’ve used them in history class. If we can get her to hold them.” He looked down at Bella and laid his hand on the sofa. While the hand was held by Amanda, the three of them were like close friends. “I’ll try betting for free. It sounds easy, nice and cute.” “Awesome, that’s active of your spirit. They’ll continue to take care of the rest.” He let go of Bella’s hand and turned to the receptionist. “Can you put on a clean dressing please, Annie?” He drew Amanda aside, “Why has this been allowed to get to this tough point? Was there anybody knowledgeable?” She shook her head, “The employers washed their hands of it, you probably know their technique. That french couple on the corner are part of the issue.” He suddenly raised his eye brows, “They’re truly wealthy.” “That’s for sure like all the time.” He sighed, “You said that it happened at work? In the housing area?” “She slipped at work.” He asked whether she could get to the lawyer. “There are enough of them, this place is crawling with lawyers upstairs.” “They work for the banks.” “Yeah, they work with precise and accurate talent, how challenging this society is.” After the dressing had been changed, George helped Bella off the couch. He explained that he would try to make an appointment for her to see somebody tomorrow who would make arrangements for her to go to a hospital in Jamaica. Bella said okay fine but nodded her assent. “A drink to please?” said George as he showed Amanda out. She felt her heart leap in decision, “Why yes after I’ve taken Mrs Rose home.” “Great, the Grand Old House? An hour’s time at evening?” he suggested with a grin. “I could have been there for ages, the mansion seems crowded.” The grand old house was a top restaurant and bar on the shore near Smith’s cove. At night you could sit out at the front and watch the lights of boats on the water. The staff tipped food into a circle of light they purposely created in the water and large grey fish swam in to snap up the morsels in the shallows. She thought about the invitation as she drove home. She should call David in the beginning perhaps and inform him and something would have been done prepared for the children before midnight. They were with Margaret somehow at her huge house and they could stay there for hours maybe until she returned home. Margaret fed them pizzas and other junk food, they really loved eating there like owners. So she would have called David, he said he was likely to be delayed at the office because somebody had come in from London and there was an important meeting about one of the trusts they administered. He might be back until ten or even afterwards. Back at the house after dropping off Bella she had a quick swim in the pool to cool off. Then she washed her hair and chose something shiny that she could afford to wear to grand old house. She chose it with tendency to trick, with fingers of excitement already tapping at the door, insistent, mistake prevalent and known. They had decided to investigate more closely what was happening at the Arthur house. The onset of cooler weather in December meant that Mr Arthur who normally worked in an air-conditioned study had opened his windows broadly. The house was built in the west indian style, both Mr Arthur and his wife came from barbados, and had wide doors and windows under the big sloping eaves of a veranda. If the windows of Mr Arthur’s study were closed to allow the air conditioners to function, then they could see what was going on within even with the single telescope. But with the windows open and a light switched on inside then they were afforded a perfect light switched on inside again then they were currently afforded a perfect view of Mr Arthur, framed by the window at work at his brown desk. “What does he do?” asked James. “He just sits there and uses his phone, is he spying on his relatives?” “Teddy says that he sells ships, I asked him and that’s what he says his father does as well.” JAMES LOOKED DOUBTFUL. “WHERE ARE ALL THE SHIPS? IN HIS YARD?” SHE AGREED THAT IT WAS TRUE STORY. “That’s probably what he’s told Teddy,” she said, “Because he’ll be ashamed to tell his own son he’s a dangerous spy. Spies do like their family to know behind doors. “Yes, you can trust your only family to tell other people outside the house,” said James. One afternoon, they saw a man come into the study. Clover was at the telescope but yielded her place to James. “Look, somebody has come to see him.” She said. James crouched at the telescope. “What’s happening now?” she asked. “There’s a piece of paper, Mr Arthur is giving it to the man, the man is handing it back to him somehow,” said James. “And now? Go on.” He hesitated, “Now, he’s burning it, he set fire to the paper foolishly.” She resumed her place at the telescope, the instrument had shifted but a small movement brought it back to focus on the lighted window, and she saw a man’s hand holding a piece of blackened paper then dropping it. “Burning the evidence, he could have torn it instead,” she said. “The codes are gone into ashes,” James said. They stared at each other in silence, awed by the importance of what they had just seen. “We’re going to do something fast,” James said at last. “Such as?” She waited for his reply. “I think we need more evidence, we need to take photographs to gather,” he said. She asked how they would do that. “We go and see Teddy then we take photographs while we arrive there.” “Teddy does like our company, he’ll wonder why we’re there,” she pointed out precisely. That was an insurmountable problem in James’ view. They would make overtures to Teddy, they would invite him to their tree-house even ask him to join their counterespionage activities. “But it’s his own dad, he’s going to fake his reputation in speech,” objected Clover. “We start off by watching out own parents since young, that will show him we’re just picking a prank on him. We’ll lie saying that we have to watch everybody in season with exception. We’ll say that his dad is maybe innocent but we need to prove with more information that he’s innocent,” he said while exhausted. “That will produce good result,” she agreed. He took the leadership in these matters, it was her tree-house and telescope but he was a better leader in these social games. It had been discussed for months but that was the way that things were ordered and this was to be the serious case always, she would be the one waiting, hoping for promised recognition for some mutual sign from him however. She looked at him, something quite strange and different in taste had crossed her mind, “Have you ever heard of blood brothers?” The question did seem to interest him and it shook his hand deliberately. He shrugged. “Well have you in some way?” she pressed on. “Maybe but it sounds stupid and ridiculous.” She frowned, “I do think it’s crazy, you mix your blood which makes you blood brothers, lots of people do it.” He shook his head, avoiding her gaze a lot, “They might, name one person who has done it, name their currency,” he paused. “Lane Bodden, he’s a blood brother with Lucas Jones, he told me earlier. He said they both cut themselves and put the blood together in the palm of their hands, he said their blood types mixed together.” “You can get things from that, like other guy’s germs. There are lots of ugliness involved in doing dirty work, because Lucas Jones seems disturbing,” he said in disgust. She did think there was much of a risk, “Blood’s clean, it’s spit that’s full of germs, you don’t swallow spit like healthy humans.” “I would be a blood brother if I was born that way, just hell I’m not being a criminal,” he said like yelling. She hesitated, “We could be blood family just you and me if you prefer it.” “You’re joking, get sensible in your idea,” he looked at her incredulously. “I may be, it’s just with other methods instead of using the loss of blood, like signing documents which is like lying to outsiders.” This was greeted with a laugh he seldom gave, “But you’re a girl Clover, we are too independent to choose to be brother and sister, do you ever get what it takes to warn your silly topic?” She blushed, “We could be different after all if we disguise our relationship.” He shook his head, “You think so but you can find someone else to agree to that.” Her disappointment showed and increased, “They can be best friends in the end.” He rose to his feet, “I have to go, sorry.” “Because of what I discussed about? You want to hide your mind from my problematic attitude?” “I have to go home that’s all, I’m just tired.” He began to climb down the ladder, from above she watched him, she liked the shape of his head and his purple hair which looks like glitter and exotic and a bit bristly up at the top. Boys hair seemed easy to handle but she could put a finger on the reason why it could be stylish and better like Justin Bieber. Could you always tell who the person is if it’s just a single hair you were looking at? Could you define its identity under a microscope? That was a crazy science. He reached the bottom of the ladder and looked up at her and smiled. She loved his smile and the way his cheeks dimpled when he smiled. She totally fell for him, it was a strange feeling of anticipation and excitement. It started in her stomach she thought, and then worked its way up. She slipped her hand under her T-shirt and felt her heart. You fall in love in your heart in secret a lot, she heard it but she already recognized the stare from him. Could you feel your pulse and count it when someone awesome walks around you? How is that possible? Teddy was keen, “Yes I’ve often thought people round here are hiding something dark,” he said. “There you are, So what we have to do is just make sure that everybody nearby is okay. We check up on them first and then we move on to other people. We’ll find out soon enough who’s a spy all these years,” said James. “Nice idea, how do you do it?” said Teddy who looked troubled in thoughts and puzzled in clues. “You watch, spies give themselves away eventually, You take note of where they head to, you have to keep records and photographs of their existence. I’ve got a camera to use soon,” Clover explained. “Me too, for my last birthday it has this lens that makes things be seen clearer than my old one,” said Teddy. “Zoom lens, good,” said James knowingly. “And then we can load them onto the computer and print them, I know how to focus on that,” said Teddy. “We can begin with your dad just for practice,” said James casually. Teddy shook his head, “Why begin with him? How about yours which you already want to live with?” James glanced at Clover. “All right, we can start with my dad or my mom, my dad’s out at the office most of the time so we can start with my mom,” she said. “Doing what?” asked Teddy. Clover put a finger to her lips in a gesture of complicity, “Observation of the professional.” He was there when she reached the bar which is the way she wanted it to be. If she had arrived at the Grand Old house first then she would have had to sit there in public looking awkward. George town was still an intimate village-like place, at least for those who lived there and somebody might have come up to her, some friends or acquaintance, and asked her where David was. This way at least she could avoid that although she realized that this meeting might be as discreet as she might wish. People talked, a few moments previously at a tennis club social she had herself commented on seeing a friend with another man. It could have been innocent of course and probably was but she had spoken to somebody about it. Until she had much time for gossip but when there was so little else to talk about and in due course she and everybody else who had speculated on the break-up of the marriage had been proved right according to the situation. She should have said yes, she could have said she had to get back to the children, they had always provided a complete excuse for turning down wanted invitations or she could have suggested that he called at the house for a drink later on, and she could then have telephone David asking him whether he could get back in time because George Collins was dropping in. And David would have told her to explain to George about his meeting and that would have been her off the hook, able to entertain another man at the house in complete propriety. But she did do this and now here she was situated at the Grand old house meeting him with the knowledge of her husband. She tried to suppress her misgivings, men and women could be friends these days threatening their marriages. Men and women worked together, collaborated on projects, served on committees with one another. Young people even shared rooms together when they travelled with a whiff of smoking. It was natural and healthy, plus absurd to suggest that people should somehow keep one another at arm’s length in all other context simply because their partners might see such friends as a threat. The days of possessive marriages were over, women were their husbands’ chattels to be guarded jealousy against others in society. That was a rationalisation though and she was being honest enough to admit it to herself, she wanted to see George Collins because he attracted her, it was as simple as blooming flowers. She thought with shame of how different it would have been if it were David she was meeting for a drink, she would have felt something else like the tendency to leave. Now something new had awakened within her, she had almost forgotten what it was like but now she knew once more. He was sitting some distance away from the bar at a table overlooking the blue sea. When he saw her come in he simply nodded although he rose to his feet as she approached the table. He smiled at her as she sat down. “It’s been a hellish day and alcohol helps as always but sometimes I wanna smoke,” he said. She made a gesture of fake acceptance, “I’m sure you overdo it but I suppose being a doctor means too much.” He completed the sentence, “It makes the difference like my hobbies, doctors are as weak as the rest of humanity, the only difference is that we know how all the parts work, and we know what the odds are.” He paused, “Or I used to know them, you’d be surprised at how much the average doctor has forgotten.” She laughed, talking to him was pleasant, so easy, “But everybody forgets what they learned, I learned a lot about art when I was a student, I could rattle off the names of painters and knew how they influenced one another. Nowadays I’ve forgotten anyone’s dates.” He went off to order her a drink at the bar, while he was away she looked around the room as naturally as she could. There could be somebody she was familiar with here when she relaxed. They raised their glasses to one another. “Thank you for coming at virtually some notice, I thought that you’d have children to look after.” “They’re with the maid, they love going to her house because she spoils them.” He nodded, “Jamaican?” “Yes.” “They love children, does that sound patronizing?” he stopped himself. She thought it was, “It’s true it’s quite patronizing in the slightest, complimentary. I’d have thought Italians love children too.” “Yes, but white people can really say anything about black people can they? Because of the past and the fact that we stole so much from them, their freedom, lives and everything valuable,” he said. “You might, but I was in another land.” He looked into his glass, “Our grandparents did.” “I thought it was a bit before that, how long do people have to say sorry?” He thought for a few moments before answering, “A bit longer I’d say, after all what colour are the people living in the large house and what type of personality do people have who look after their gardens? What colour are the maids? What does it tell us?” He paused. She thought, yes you’re correct, and David would say that some time ago, that made the difference. “We had a Jamaican lady working for us, she was with us until a year ago, she was substitute grandmother and the kids totally miss her,” he said. “They surely would.” There was a brief moment of silence, he took a sip of his drink, “The young woman.” “Bella?” “Mr Rose.” “Yes that’s Bella’s other name.” He looked up at the ceiling, “It makes my blood boil.” She waited for him to continue. “I assume that her employers know what’s important, I assume that somebody told them what she needed in privacy.” “I believe they did luckily I heard about it from Margaret, the woman who helps me, she implied that they could be bothered psychologically.” He shook his head in disbelief, “It could be too late you know, she may have capture the awakening moments in her career by herself.” “Well at least you have tried, this person in Kingston, who is he? Is he a superstar or actor?” “He’s a general surgeon, an increasingly rare breed. He does anything and everything under control. He
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  I'm a creative and talented writer, wanting to get this writing job so that I can earn money daily.Part one: I have often wondered about the proposition that for each of us there is one greater love in our lives, and only one even if that is not always true - experience tells most of us it is not real - there are those in legend at least who believe there is only one person in this world whom they will ever love with all their heart sincerely. Tristan persisted in his love of Isolde in spite of everything that happened; Orpheus would not have risked the Underworld, one imagines for anyone but Eurydice instead. Such stories are touching but the cynic might be forgiven for saying: yes, yet what if the person you love does not reciprocate? What if Isolde had found somebody else she preferred to Tristan or Eurydice had been indifferent to Orpheus in the end? The wise thing to do in cases of incomplete and unsatisfying affection is to look elsewhere because you certainly cannot force another human being to love you so choose somebody else then. In matters of the heart though, as in human affairs, few of us behave in a sensible way. We can do without love of course and claim that it does not really play a major part in our lives. We may do that but we still hope diligently and daily. Seeming indifferent to all the evidence, hope has a path of surviving every discouragement no matter what setback or reversal we face for hope sustains our souls and enables people to believe they will find the person we have dreamed of getting along with all the time. Sometimes in fact, this is what happens exactly. This story started when the two people involved were children. It began on a small island in the Caribbean, continued in Scotland and Australia and came to a head in Singapore. It took place over sixteen years, beginning as one of those intense friendships of childhood and becoming in time, something quite different too. This is the story of a sort of passion, definitely a love story and like many love stories it includes more than just two people for every love has within it the echoes of other lovers. Our story is often our parents’ story told again and with less variation than we might like to think. The mistakes, however often or few, are usually the same wrongdoings our parents committed before as human problems so regularly are. The Caribbean island in question is an unusual place like fairytale. Grand Cayman is still a British territory by choice of its nations rather than by imposition, one of the odd corners that survive from the monstrous shadow that Victoria cast over more than half the world. Today it is very much in the sphere of American influence - Florida is only a few hundred miles away and the cruise ships that drop anchor off George Town normally fly the flags of the United States or are American ships under some other flag of convenience. But the sort of money that the Cayman Islands attract comes from nowhere; has no nationality nor characteristic smell. Grand Cayman is not exciting to look at either on the map where it is a pin-prick in the expanse of blue to the south of Cuba and the west of Jamaica or in reality where it is a coral-reefed island barely twenty miles long and a couple of miles in width. With smallness comes some useful advantages, among them a degree of immunity to the hurricanes that roar through the Caribbean each year. Jamaica is a large and tempting target for these winds and is hit quite regularly. There is no justice nor mercy in the storms that flatten the houses of the poor places like Kingston or Port Antonio, wood plus tin constructions which are more vulnerable than bricks and mortar of the better-off. Grand Cayman, being relatively minuscule is actually missed although every few decades the trajectory of a hurricane takes it straight across the island. Since there are no natural salients, big part of the land is inundated by the resultant storm surge. People may lose their own possession to the huge wind - cars, fences, furniture, fridges and beloved animals can all be swept out to sea and never be seen anymore; boats end up under the trees, palm trees bend double and are broken with as much ease as one might snap a pencil or the stem of a garden plant somehow. Grand Cayman is not fertile anyway, the soil which is white and sandy is not so useful for growing crops and the whole land is left to its own devices, would quickly revert to mangrove swamp. Yet people have occupied the island for several centuries and scratched a living there. The original inhabitants were turtle-hunters who were later joined by various pirates and wanderers for whom a life far away from the prying eye of officialdom was attractive. There were obviously fishermen as this was long before over-fishing was an issue, and the reef brought abundant marine life. Then in the second half of the twentieth century, it occurred to a small group of people that Grand Cayman could become an off-shore financial centre. As a British territory it was stable, relatively incorrupt (by the standards of Central America and the shakier parts of the Caribbean), and its banks would enjoy the tutelage of the City of London a lot. Unlike some other states that might have nursed similar ambitions, Grand Cayman was an entirely safe zone to store money. “Sort out the mosquitoes,” they said. “Build a longer runway that allows the money to flow in, you’ll see. Cayman will take off soon.” Cayman rather than the Cayman Islands, is what people who live there call the place an affectionate shortening with the emphasis on the man instead of the word cay. Banks and investors agreed and George Town became the home of a large expatriate community, a few who came as tax exiles, but most of them were truly hardworking and conscientious accountants or trust managers. The locals watched with mixed feelings since they were reluctant to give up their quiet and rather sleepy way of life when they found it difficult to resist the prosperity the new arrivals brought. And they like the high prices they could get for their previous worthless acres. A tiny whiteboard home by the sea which was nothing special could now be sold for a price that could keep one in comfort for the rest of one’s life. For many, the temptation was simply great; an easy life was now within grasp for many Caymanians as Jamaicans could be brought in to do the manual labour, to serve in the restaurants frequented by the visitors from the cruise ships, to look after the bankers’ children. A privileged few were given good status as they named it, and were allowed to live permanently on the islands, these being the ones who were really needed or in some cases who knew the right people - the type who could ease the passage of their residence petitions. Others had to return to the places from which they came which were usually poorer, more dangerous and tormented by naughty mosquitoes. Many children do not choose their own names but she did when she grew up. She was born Sally, and was called that as a baby girl but at the age of four, having heard the nice name in a story, she chose to be called Clover for real. Initially her parents treated this indulgently, believing that after a day or two of being Clover she would revert to being Sally. Children got strange notions into their heads; her mother had read somewhere of a child who had decided for almost a complete week that he was a dog and had insisted on being fed from a bowl on the floor. But Clover refused to go back to being Sally and the name stuck until now. Clover’s father, David was an accountant who had been born and brought up in Scotland. After university he had started his professional training in London, in the offices of one of the largest international accountancy firms. He was particularly capable - he saw figures as if they were a landscape, instinctively understanding their topography and this smartness led to his being marked out as a high flier. In his first year after qualification, he was offered a spell of six months in the firm’s office in New York, an opportunity he already seized enthusiastically. He even joined a squash club and it was there in the course of a mixed tournament that he met the woman he was eager to marry. This woman was called Amanda and her parents were both psychiatrists who ran a joint practice on the Upper East Side. Amanda invited David back to her parents’ apartment after she had been seeing him for a month. They liked him but she could tell that they were anxious about her seeing somebody who might take her away from New York. She was an only child and she was the centre of their world. This young man as accountant was likely to be sent back to London, would want to take Amanda with him and they would be left in New York. They just put on a brave face on the prediction and said nothing about their hidden fears; shortly before David’s six months were up though, Amanda informed her parents that they wanted to become engaged. Her mother wept at the surprising news in private. The internal machinations of the accounting firm came to the rescue. Rather than returning to London, David was to be sent to Grand Cayman, where the firm was expanding its office. This was merely three hours’ flight from New York - through Miami - and would therefore be less of separation. Amanda’s parents were mollified. David and Amanda left New York and settled into a temporary apartment in George Town, arranged for them by the firm. A few months later they found a new house near an inlet called Smith’s Cove, not much more than a mile from town. They moved in a week or two before their official wedding which took place in a small church round the corner. They chose this church because it was the closest one to their home. It was largely frequented by Jamaicans who provided an ebullient choir for the occasion, greatly impressing the friends who had travelled down from New York for the good ceremony. Fourteen months later, Clover was born. Amanda immediately sent a photograph to her mother in New York: Here’s your lovely grandchild, look at her eyes and stare at her beautiful smile. She seemed perfect at two days! “Fond parents,” said Amanda’s father. His wife studied the photograph. “No,” she said. “She’s right.” He replied, “Born on a Thursday,” “Has far to go…” He frowned, “Far to go?” She explained, “The song you remember it, Wednesday’s child is full of woe; Thursday’s child has far to go in fact…” “That doesn’t mean anything much.” She shrugged, she had always felt that her husband lacked imagination recently, so many men did, she thought. “Perhaps that she’ll have to travel far to get what she desires. Travel far - or wait a long time maybe.” He laughed at the idea of paying attention to such small things. “You’ll be talking about her star sign next, what a superstitious behaviour. I have to deal with that all the time with my patients.” “I don’t take it seriously,” she said. “You’re too literal, these things like horoscopes are fun - that’s all.” He smiled at her, “Sometimes it is, but not every time.” Part two: The new parents employed a Jamaican nurse for their cute child. There was plenty of money for something like this - there is no income tax on Grand Cayman and the salaries are generous. David was already having the prospect of a partnership within three or four years dangled in front of him, something that would have taken at least a decade elsewhere. On the island there was nothing much to spend money on, and employing domestic staff at least mopped up some of the cash. In fact, they were both slightly embarrassed by the amount of money they had. As a Scot, David was frugal in his instincts and disliked the flaunting of wealth; Amanda shared this as well. She had come from a milieu where displays of wealth were not unusual but she had never felt comfortable about that. It struck her that by employing this Jamaican woman they would be recycling money that would otherwise simply sit in an account somewhere. More seasoned residents of the island laughed at this. “Of course you have staff - why so told? Half the year it’s too hot to do anything yourself anyway. Did think twice about the matter it seems.” Their advertisement in the Cayman Compass drew two replies yet one was from a Honduran woman who scowled through the interview which ought to last longer. “Resentment,” confided David, “That’s the way it goes. What are we in her eyes? Rich, privileged, maybe we will find anybody related…” “Can we blame her?” David shrugged, “Probably however but you can have somebody who hates you in the house nowadays?” The following day they interviewed a Jamaican woman called Margaret, she asked a few questions about the job and then looked about the whole room. “I saw a baby and it is extremely adorable and lovely.” They took her into the room where Clover was lying asleep in her cot. The air conditioner was whirring but there was that characteristic smell of a nursery - that drowsy milky smell of an infant. “Lord, just be mesmerized by her glowing body!” said Margaret. “That little angel.” She stepped forward and bent over the cot. The child now aware of her presence, struggled up through layers of sleep to open her eyes. “Little darling and sweetheart!” exclaimed Margaret, reaching forward to pick her up again. “She’s still sleepy,” said Amanda, “Maybe…” But Margaret had her in her arms now and was planting kisses on her brow. David glanced at Amanda who smiled proudly and exaggeratedly. He turned to Margaret, “When can you start?” “Right now, I start right now.” she said. They had asked Margaret everything about her circumstances at the interview such as it was and it was only a few days later that she told them about he lifestyle. “I was born in Port Antonio, my mother worked in a big hotel and she worked hard frequently, always trustworthy I tell you. There were four of us - me, my brother and two sisters. My brother’s legs ran a lot somehow one day he got mixed up with the crew who dealth with drugs and alcohol and he went all the way they went. My older sister was twenty then, she worked in an office in town and had a great job, she did it well because she had learned the most of English, computers, internet and science and had high memory. Until one morning she came home and there was a special letter, a message about her career and we just sat there and wondered what important clues to think. Someone had seen her and heard that she was professional and strong. Then we watched a movie on a cold night where a person drove a flying car that operates using solar system which we obviously fancied much to own the moments feeling light on the sky. Every day I reminisce the talented gifts from God above who controlled the widest universe ever, I understand he has his famous reasons to grant people the best techniques and shiny cars.” She continued her touching story, “Then somebody older reminded me I should travel to Cayman with her, this lady was a sort of talkative aunt to me and she arranged it with some relatives I was familiar with. I finally came over and met my charming husband who is Caymanian, one hundred per cent. He is extraordinarily good at fixing government fridges including bridges. He announced that I did have to labour because I want to sit in the house after that to wait for him to come back joyfully so that’s why I have taken this job, you see it made sense right?” Amanda listened to this conversation and thought about how suffering could be compressed into a few simple words: Then one day she just woke up and found someone new sitting next to her. And so could happiness be explainable in phrases such as a good young man who fixes fridges. There was a second child, Billy who arrived after another complicated pregnancy. Amanda went to Miami on the last day the airline would let her fly and then stayed until they induced labour. Margaret only came with David plus Clover to pick her up at the airport. She covered the new infant with red kisses just as she had done before. “He’s going to be very sincere and proficient,” she blessed, “You can tell it straight away with a boy child you know, you look at him and say: this one is going to be truly favorable and praised. Amanda laughed out loud, “Surely you must hope and rejoice for that but you will celebrate it someday.” Margaret shook her head, “You watch the birds and they know they feel their feathers are the main reason they are light in air. So they get to tell you when a storm is on the way every time.” And she could tell whether a fish was infected with ciguatera by a simple test she had learned from Jamaicans who claimed it always brings them up and enlightened. “You have to watch those reef fish,” she explained, “If they have the illness and you eat them you will get really sick and vomit. But you know who can tell whether a fish is sick? Ants. You eat the fish when it is thoroughly cooked or fried before ants let their sensitive gang gather around the tasty and delicious meal. You already know this fact as you learned in class.” Amanda said to David, “It could have been very different for Margaret.” “What could?” “Life, everything she had the chance to education was easy.” He was steady, “It’s early, she could go to school and the were relevant courses.” Amanda thought this was likely to occur, “She works here all day and there’s Eddie to look after and those dogs they have all this time.” “It’s her own life, if that’s what she craves for.” She kind of thought so, “Do you think people actually want their lives to the fullest potential? Or do you think they simply accept them? They take the lives they’re given mostly I assured you.” He had been looking at a sheaf of papers like figures and he put them to the talk, “We are getting philosophical are we?” They were sitting outside by the pool. The clear water reflected the bright sky, a shimmer of light blue lingered. She said, “Well these things are important otherwise.” “Yes?” “Otherwise we go through life knowing what we want or mean and that feels enough.” She realized that she had talked to him regarding these things they were doing so she suddenly saw he had something secret in his mind like questions. It was a single moment that she identify as the precise point when she used to fall in love with him. He picked up his papers, a paper clip that had been keeping them together had slipped out of position and now he manoeuvred it back. “Margaret?” he asked, “What about her? Will she have her children of her own?” She did answer him at first and he shot her an interested glance. “Need to tell? Has she spoken to you elsewhere?” he said. She had done so one afternoon but after extracting a promise that she would tell her heart there had been shame and tears. Two ectopic pregnancies had put paid to her hopes of a family. One of them had nearly killed her, such had been the loss of blood. The other had been detected earlier and quietly dealt with. He pressed her to reply, “Well? Even with me along.” “Yeah, I could discuss it later.” She looked at him, the thought of what she had just felt the sudden and expected insight that had come to her appalled her. It was like wind of faith must be for a priest to preach; the moment when he realises that he believes in many gods and everything he has done up to that point - his entire life really has been based on something that is visibly there; the grasp of time, self-motivation now all for the prize. Was this what happened in marriages? She had been fond of him and she had imagined that she would love him but now quite suddenly like a provoking incident it was as if he were a stranger to her - a disguised stranger. She relaxed her hands and seen him as an outsider so tall, well-built man who used to have everything in his way because others looked like him had the similar experience. But he might also be seen as a rather exciting person of habit, interested in figures and money and much more creative filming in between. She got dizzy at the thought of what, years of satisfaction ahead? Clover was eight now that Billy was four, fifteen years to go? She answered the riddle, “I swore to her I would mention it to anyone near that I assume you intended to know.” He agreed, “People think that spouses know everything and they usually do, people keep things from their spouses sometimes in cases of privacy.” She thought there might have been a note of criticism in what he said even of reproach but he even smiled at her and she was asking herself at that fast moment whether she would ever sleep with another man, while staying with David. If she could, then who would it be? “A bit, I mean she probably judged that you knew,” she said. He tucked the papers into a folder, “Silly woman, she loves kids too much and she is acting unfair and impolite.” There was an old sea-grape tree beside the pool and a breeze cool air from the sea, making the leaves sway just a little. She noticed the shadow of the leaves on the ground shifting, and then returning to where it was before. George Collins, if anyone, it would be with him. She felt the surge of disgust and disgrace, and found herself blushing shyly. She turned away lest he should notice but he was getting up from his reclining chair and had begun to walk over towards the pool. “I’m going to have a dip, it’s getting cozy, I hate this heat,” he said. He took off his shirt; he was already wearing swimming trunks. He slipped out of his sandals and plunged into the pool instantly. The splash of water was in that Hockney painting she thought, as white against the blue as surprised and sudden as that. George and Alice Collins had little to do with the rest of the expatriates. This was maybe because they were stand-offish or thought themselves a cut above the rest - it was more of a case of having different interests. He was a doctor but unlike most doctors on the island he was quite interested in building up a lucrative private practice. He ran a clinic that was mostly used by Jamaicans and Hondurans who had very little insurance and were eligible for the government scheme too. He was also something of a naturalist and had published a check-list of Caribbean flora and a small book on the ecology of the reef. His wife Alice was an artist whose watercolours of Cayman plants had been used on a set of the island’s postage stamps. They were polite enough to the money people when they met them on social occasions - inevitable in a small community, everybody eventually encounters everybody else but they did really like them at the same time. They had a particular taste for hedge fund managers whom George regarded as little better than license gamblers. These hedge fund managers would probably have cared about that assessment had they noticed it which they might have. Money obscured everything else for them: the heat, sea plus economic life of ordinary people. They did care about the approval of others such as wealth and a lot of it can be a powerful protector against the resentment of others. Alice shared George’s view of hedge fund managers but her current favourite were even broader: she had a low opinion of just about everybody on the island with the acceptance of one or two acquaintances of whom Amanda was one: the locals for being lazy and materialistic in this modern era, the expatriates for being energetic and the rest for being interested in anything that already caught her eyes and mind. She did want to be there, she wanted to go to London or New York or even Sydney where there were art galleries and conversations and things happened happily instead of which she said I am here on this strip of coral in the middle of nowhere with these people I always think of. It was a mistake she told herself, ever to come to the Caribbean in the first place. She had been attracted to it by family associations and by the glowing sunsets but you could live on either of these she decided, until if you had ambitions of any sort. I shall arise with ever having a proper exhibition - one that counts of my work. Neighbours will remember me anytime. The Collins house was about half a mile away from David and Amanda’s house and reached by a short section of unpaved track. It could be glimpsed from the road that joined George Town to Bodden Town but only just: George’s enthusiasm for the native plants of the Caribbean had resulted in a rioting shrubbery that concealed most of the house from view. Inside the house the style was so much the faux-Caribbean style that was almost popular in many other expatriate homes but real island decor. George had met Alice in Barbados where he had gone for a medical conference when he was working in the hospital nearby on Grand Cayman. He had invited her to visit him in the Caymans and she had done so. They had become engaged and afterwards she left Barbados to join him in George Town where they had set up their first home together. Much of their furniture came from a plantation house that had belonged to an aunt of hers who had lived there for thirty years and built up a collection of old pieces. Alice was Australian; she had gone to visit the aunt after she had finished her training as a teacher in Melbourne and had stayed longer than she intended. The aunt who had been childless had been delighted to discover a niece whose company she enjoyed. She had persuaded her to stay and had arranged a job for her in a local school. Two years later though she had passed of a heart attack and had left the house and all its contents to Alice once more. These had included a slave bell of which Alice was ashamed that was stored out of sight in a cupboard. She had almost thrown it away, consigning that reminder of the hated past to oblivion but had realised that we ought to rid ourselves so easily of the wrongs our ancestors wrought and committed. They had one obedient son, a boy who was a month older than Clover. He was called James, after George’s own father who had been a professor of medicine in one of the London teaching hospitals. Alice and Amanda had met when they were pregnant when they both attended a class run in a school hall in George Town by a natural childbirth enthusiast. Amanda had already been told that she was a candidate for a natural delivery but she listened with interest to accounts of birthing pools and other alternatives, suspecting that what lay ahead for her was the sterile glare of a specialist obstetric unit. Friendships forged at such classes like those made by parents waiting at the school gate can last and Alice and Amanda continued to see one another after the birth of their children. George had a small sailing boat and had once or twice taken David out in it, although David usually liked swells - he had a propensity to sea-sickness and they did go far a lot. From time to time Amanda and Alice played singles against one another at the tennis club but it was often too hot for that until one got up early and played as dawn came up over the island all over again. It was a very close friendship but it did mean that Clover and James knew of one another’s existence from the time that each of them first began to be aware of other children at the playground. And in due course they had both been enrolled at the small school, the Cayman Prep favoured by expatriate families. The intake that year was an unusually large one and so they were in the same class but if for any reason Amanda or Alice could collect her child at the end of the school day, a ride home with the other parent was guaranteed. Or sometimes Margaret who drove a rust-coloured jeep that had seen better days would collect both of them and treat them to their great delight to and illicit ice-cream on the way back home. Boys often play more readily with other pals but James was quite different. He was happy in the company of other boys but he seemed to be equally content to play with girls and in particular with Clover. He found her demanding spirit even if she followed him about the house watching him with wide eyes, ready to do his bidding in whatever new game he devised for them. When they had just turned nine, David who fancied himself as a carpenter made them a tree-house, supported between two palm trees in the back garden and reached by a rope ladder tied at one end to the base of the tree-house and at the other to two pegs driven into the ground. They spent hours in this leafy hide-out, picnicking on sandwiches or looking out of a telescope that James had carted up the rope ladder. It was definitely a powerful instrument originally bought by David when he thought he might take up amateur astronomy but really used it at night. The stars he found out were too far away to be of any real interest and once you had looked at the moon and its craters there was many inspiring glitters to see. But James found that with the telescope pointed out of the side window of the tree-house, he could see into the windows of nearby houses across the generously sized yards and gardens. Palm trees and sprays of bougainvillea could get in the way obscuring the view in some directions but there was still plenty to look at. He found a small notebook and drew columns in it headed House, People and Things Seen. “Why?” asked Clover as he showed her this notebook and its first few entries. “Because we need to keep watch,” he answered, “There might be spies you know. We had seen them from up here.” She nodded in agreement, “And if we saw them, what will happen?” “We’ll have the evidence,” he said, pointing to the notebook. “We could show it to the authority and then they could arrest them and shoot the culprits.” Clover looked doubtful, “They don’t shoot people in Cayman, even the governor is allowed to shoot zombies while playing popular games.” “They’re allowed to shoot spies,” James countered. She adjusted the telescope so that it was pointing out of the window and then she leaned forward to peer through it. “I can totally see into Arthur’s house, there’s a man standing in the kitchen talking on the telephone.” “I’ll note that down, he must be a spy,” said James. “He might be, It’s Mr Arthur, Teddy’s father.” “Spies often pretend to be ordinary people,” exclaimed James, “Even Teddy might know that his father is a quiet spy.” She wanted to please him and so she kept the records assiduously. Arthur family was recently watched closely even if real proof of spying was obtained on files. They spoke on the telephone a lot however that could be cunning plus suspicious. “Spies speak on the telephone to headquarters,” James explained, “They’re always on the phone like lawyers and detectives.” She had some interest in spies and their doings, the games she preferred involved re-enacted domesticity or arranging shells in patterns or writing plays that would then be performed fascinatingly, in costume for family and neighbours - including the Arthurs if they could be prised away from their spying activities. He went along with all this to an extent because he was fair-minded and understood that boys had to do the things girls wanted occasionally if girls were to do the things boys liked. Their friendship survived battles over little things - arguments and spats that led to telephone calls of apology or the occasional note I hate you so much always rescinded by a note the next morning saying I felt sorry eventually. “She’s your girlfriend, is she?” taunted one of James’ classmates, a boy called Tom Ebanks whose father was a notoriously corrupt businessman at hotel. “Well she’s just a normal friend.” Tom Ebanks smirked, “She lets you kiss her? You put your tongue in her mouth like this and wiggle it all around?” “I told you honestly, she’s just a friend.” “You’re going to make her pregnant? You know what that is, how to do it secretly?” He lashed out at the other mate and cut him above his right eye. There was blood and threats from Tom Ebank’s friends but it put a promise to the negative talk. He did care if they thought she was his girlfriend. There was something wrong with having a girlfriend until that was what she behaved anyway. She was alike any of the boys really, a true friend indeed. She had always stayed around, so simple as storybooks’ characters. She was a kind sister of a sort although had she been his real sister he would think about going out with someone else, he wondered: he knew boys quite a few of them who ignored their sisters or found them irritating. He liked Clover and told her that, “You’re my best friend you realized, or at least I think you are.” She had responded warmly, “And you’re definitely mine too.” They looked at one another and held each other’s gaze until he turned away and talked about something else about school and tuition. Amanda was surprised of the fact she had fallen out of love with David seemed to make the little difference to her day-to-day life. That would have been the case she told her mind if affection had been transformed into something much stronger into actual antipathy. But she could dislike David who was generous and equably tempered man. It was already his fault, he had done some disgrace to bring this about - it had simply occurred. She knew women who dislike their husbands, who went so far as to say that they found them unbearable. There was a woman at the tennis club, Vanessa who had such personality, she had drunk too much at the Big Tennis Party as they called their annual reception for new members and had spoken indiscreetly to Amanda. “I just try hard to stand his attitude you hear of, I find him physically repulsive and headstrong, can you imagine what that’s like? When he puts his hands on me?” Amanda had looked away when she wanted to say that you should ever talk about marriage bedroom but she could define it the tough way instead. That’s embarrassing and private of course but it sounded approving. “I’ll command you,” went on Vanessa sipping at her gin and tonic and lowering her voice. “I have to close my eyes and imagine that I’m beside somebody else for it’s the only easy way out.” She paused, “Have you ever done that?” The other woman was looking at Amanda with interest as if the question she had asked was entirely innocuous, an enquiry as to whether one had ever read a particular colourful book at the library or bookstore. Amanda shook her head, but I did, she thought. “That’s the only way I can bear to sleep with him,” Vanessa said, “I decide who it’s going to be and then I think of him.” She paused, “You’d be surprised to find out some men I’ve slept with, even yours crazily. In my mind I’ve been very socially successful.” Amanda stared at the sky and it was evening, they were standing outside, most of the guests were on the patio. The sky seemed clear, white stars against dark velvet. “Have you thought of leaving him behind at the woods or forest?” Vanessa laughed sarcastically, “Look at these nearly naked people.” She gestured to the other guests around. One saw the gesture and waved excitingly, Vanessa smiled back. “Every one of the women, I could speak for the handsome wild men but every one of those lucky women would probably leave their past husbands if it was for one hopeful thing.” “I could assume this topic would go far.” “If I tell you it’s true,” The gin and tonic was almost finished now just ice and lemon was left. “Money keeps them all the time, it’s proven at statistics and votes.” “So much true, surely women have wide options nowadays. Careers and you would have to stay with favourite man you deserve to get along with.” “See you’re wrong, you have to stay because you can do otherwise right? What does this tennis club cost? What does it cost to buy a mansion or tall house here? Two millions dollars for something vaguely habitable. Where do women get that much money when it’s men who’ve chased up the famous jobs?” She glared at Amanda for an answer, “So it’s real?” “It’s very good.” “Yeah, it’s a selective choice to choose.” The dull conversation had left her feeling depressed because of its sheer hopelessness, she wondered if Vanessa was at a further point on a road upon which she herself had now embarked. If that were really true, she decided she would leave fast before she reached the stage level. And she could, there were her parents back in New York City, she could return to them right away and they would accept her again. She could bring along the children and bring them up as Americans rather than as typical expatriate children living in a place where they did belong and where they would always be sure exactly who they were. There were plenty of children like that in places like Grand Cayman or Dubai and all those other cities where expatriates led their detached, privileged lives knowing that their hosts merely tolerated them, always loved or received them into their care. But she thought then she had so much difficulty living with David. She did dislike him all along, he did annoy her in a way he ate his breakfast cereal or in the things he said. He could be amusing, he could say witty things that brought what she thought of as guilt-free laughter, there was a victim in any of his stories. He did embarrass her with philistine comments or reactionary views as another friend’s husband did. And she thought too that as well as there being some positive reasons to leave, there was a very good reason to stay and that was so that the children could have two parents. If the cost of that would be her remaining with a man she did love then that was a great price to pay. “What an amazing woman,” said Margaret one morning. “She’s going to achieve high goals day by day.” “What woman?” asked Amanda. Margaret was one of those people who made the assumption that you knew all their friends and acquaintances. They were standing in the kitchen where Margaret was cooking one of her Jamaican stews. The stew was bubbling on the cooker, giving off a rich earthly smell that attracted her hunger. “She works in that house on the corner, the big fancy one. She’s worked there a long time but they treat her like a stranger.” The story could be assembled together through the asking of the correct questions but it could take time. “Who does treat her right? Her employees?” “Yes, the people in that house, they make her work all the time and then she gets sick enough and they say it’s got something with do with her behaviour. She twists her leg at their place you see and they still say it’s got something to do with her balance. Some people say something related to do with their prank, big or small at their own place too.” “I consider.” “So now the leg is fixed by that useful doctor. He kills more people than he saves at the pool that one. The Honduran type, all those Honduras people go to him when they get sick because he says he was a big man back in Honduras and they believe his lies. You predict what they do in life. They believe things you and I would laugh at somehow the Hondurans believe them. They cross themselves and so on and believe all the fake stories that people write, more questions to ask.” She elicited the story slowly. A Honduran maid, a woman in her early fifties had slipped at the poolside in the house of a wealthy expatriate couple. They were french tax exiles, easily able to afford for their maid to see a reputable doctor but had washed their hands of the matter. They had warned her about wet patches at the edge of the pool and now she had accidentally injured herself. It was cruelly her fault like their pain. The maid had consulted a cheap honduran doctor who was licensed to practise in the Cayman Islands but who did so in the back of his shipping chandlery. Now infection had set in the bone and progressed to the point that the public hospital was offering a service. There was an ulcer that needed dressing too. The leg could be saved, Margaret said but it would be extravagant. “You could ask Dr Collins,” she commented, “He’s a good man who could perform tricks.” “Has he seen her?” Amanda asked. Margaret shooke her head, “She’s too frightened to go and see him. Money is the ultimate solver. Doctors are busy when you sit at their waiting room so eagerly.” “He acts like that, so clever.” “Well as they say, but this woman is too frightened to go.” There was an expectant silence. “All right, I’ll take her on my own,” said Amanda. It was onerous, and she realized that she wanted to see him in her dreams. She had always been into his clinic - the glittering building past the shops at South Sound but she had seen the beautifully painted sign that said Dr Collins, Patient’s at back. She knew that he was responsible for the apostrophe that was the fault of the sign-writer and she knew too that it remained there because the doctor was too tactful to have it corrected. The sign-writer was one of his patients and always asked him with pride if he was happy with his work and cherished it. “Of course I am Wallis, I would change a word of it” the doctor said to Alice. Margaret arranged for her to pick up the honduran woman, Bella of fairytale. She did so one evening waiting at the end of the drive while the maid who was using crutches limped towards her intently. “My legs are running,” she said as she got into the car. “Swollen, I’m sorry it smells bad too, I try to help myself with healing it.” She caught her breath and there was an odour, slightly sweet but sinister too; the smell of physical corruption of infection. She wondered how this could go untreated in a place of expensive cars and air conditioning. But it did of course, illness and infection survived in the interstices even where there was money and the things that money bought. All they needed was human flesh, oxygen and indifference or hardness of heart perhaps. She reached out and put a hand onto the maid’s forearm. “I did mind and I noticed your smile.” The maid quickly looked at her, “You’re very aware of my situation.” Amanda thought, am I? Or would anybody do this chess game surely anyone like it? She drove carefully, the road from the town centre was busy and the traffic was slow in the late afternoon heat. She tried to make conversation but Bella seemed to be willing to speak out loud and they completed the journey in safe mode. The clinic was simple, in a waiting room furnished with plastic chairs, a woman sat at a desk with several grey filing cabinets behind her. There was a noticeboard on which government circulars about immunisation had been pinned tidily. A slow-turning ceiling fan disturbed the air sufficiently to flutter the end of the larger circulars. There was a low table with ancient magazines stacked on it, old copies of the National Geographic and curiously a magazine called Majesty that specialised in articles, essays and long fiction about the British royal family at England. A younger member of that family looked out from the cover. Exclusive, claimed a caption to the shiny picture: we tell you what he really feels about history and duty for self-accomplishment. Amanda spoke to the woman at the desk sucking in the air-condition. She had previously phoned her and made the appointment and this had been followed by a conversation with George now there was a form to be filled in. She offered this to Bella who recoiled from it out of ancient instinctive habit. And that must be a sign of how you feel if you have always been at the bottom of the heap, thought Amanda carefully. Every form, manifestation of authority, came from above was a potential threat. “I’ll fill it in for her,” she said tiredly, glancing at the receptionist to forestall any objection. But there was mystery. “That’s fine, as long as we have her name and date of birth, easy to deal with.” said the woman politely. They sat on adjoining chairs, she smiled back at Bella, “It’ll be all right.” “They said at the hospital like that.” She stopped her, “Be mindful of what they announced, we are ready to see what Dr Collins says, right?” Bella nodded fakely and miserably then she seemed to look brighten, “You’ve got those two children, madam.” “I’m only Amanda for real, be justified.” “Same as my type, two, boy and a girl. You have that Clover? I’ve seen her so pretty and delightful.” “Thank you for praising kid, yours?” “They’re with their grandmother in Puerto Cortes, in Honduras.” “You must miss them in time.” “Yes every moment especially now I do.” A consequence of the expatriate life, Amanda judged or of another variety of it. The door behind the receptionist’s desk opened. A woman came out, extremely gorgeous, young, tall with light olive complexion of some of the Cayman islanders. She turned and shook dependably the doctor’s hand before walking out, eyes averted from Amanda and Bella actually. “Mrs Rose?” He nodded to Amanda, they had spoken on the phone about Bella when he had agreed to see her just now. Bella looked anxiously at Amanda, “You must come too.” Amanda caught George’s eyes. “If she wants you in, that’s fine, all right? Mrs Rose she can come in with you anytime.” he said naturally. They later went into the doctor’s office. The receptionist had preceded them and was fitting a fresh white sheet to the examination couch. Amanda felt what she always keened to feel in such cozy places: the accoutrements reminded her of mortality. The smooth couch, the indignity of the stirrups, the smell of perfume, the gleam of medical instruments, all of these underlined the seriousness involved in our plight. Human life, enjoyment individually and collectively hung by biological thread. Bella lay on the couch wincing as she stretched out her legs. Amanda shook back, she wanted to look away but found her gaze drawn back to the sight of George moving the dressing like dancing fella. His touch looked gentle, he stopped for a moment when Bella gave a grimace of pain. “I’m quite surprised that this is very nasty,” he said awkwardly. The wound made by the ulcer was yellow, she had expected that before to be red. He probed gently with an instrument. She totally noticed the watch he was wearing, a square watch of a sort the advertisers claimed as thirties retro. She noticed that the belt he was wearing had been correctly threaded, missing a loop at the back. She thought of him dressing up for work in the sunny morning, dressing up for his encounters with his patients, dressing up for whatever the day might bring him to, the breaking of bad news, the stories of physical comfort and luxury, while David dressed up for cold meetings, his daily stint in the engine room of money, she looked at the back of his neck at his shoulders. Suddenly Bella reached out a hand towards her. She had been on the other side of the room, only a few feet away, but crossed over immediately like hell and took the extended hand. She saw that there were tears in the honduran woman’s eyes. George turned away from Bella and addressed Amanda. “She needs proper hospital treatment. Intravenous medicines at the very late night. There might need to be some surgical implant of tissues and skins. They’ll need to get the infection under control.” She whispered, “There’s problem solved soon, they will send her off-island.” He shook his head, “There are some good people in Kingston. Medical missionaries from Florida. They have a first-class surgeon who knows all about these infections. I’ve used them in history class. If we can get her to hold them.” He looked down at Bella and laid his hand on the sofa. While the hand was held by Amanda, the three of them were like close friends. “I’ll try betting for free. It sounds easy, nice and cute.” “Awesome, that’s active of your spirit. They’ll continue to take care of the rest.” He let go of Bella’s hand and turned to the receptionist. “Can you put on a clean dressing please, Annie?” He drew Amanda aside, “Why has this been allowed to get to this tough point? Was there anybody knowledgeable?” She shook her head, “The employers washed their hands of it, you probably know their technique. That french couple on the corner are part of the issue.” He suddenly raised his eye brows, “They’re truly wealthy.” “That’s for sure like all the time.” He sighed, “You said that it happened at work? In the housing area?” “She slipped at work.” He asked whether she could get to the lawyer. “There are enough of them, this place is crawling with lawyers upstairs.” “They work for the banks.” “Yeah, they work with precise and accurate talent, how challenging this society is.” After the dressing had been changed, George helped Bella off the couch. He explained that he would try to make an appointment for her to see somebody tomorrow who would make arrangements for her to go to a hospital in Jamaica. Bella said okay fine but nodded her assent. “A drink to please?” said George as he showed Amanda out. She felt her heart leap in decision, “Why yes after I’ve taken Mrs Rose home.” “Great, the Grand Old House? An hour’s time at evening?” he suggested with a grin. “I could have been there for ages, the mansion seems crowded.” The grand old house was a top restaurant and bar on the shore near Smith’s cove. At night you could sit out at the front and watch the lights of boats on the water. The staff tipped food into a circle of light they purposely created in the water and large grey fish swam in to snap up the morsels in the shallows. She thought about the invitation as she drove home. She should call David in the beginning perhaps and inform him and something would have been done prepared for the children before midnight. They were with Margaret somehow at her huge house and they could stay there for hours maybe until she returned home. Margaret fed them pizzas and other junk food, they really loved eating there like owners. So she would have called David, he said he was likely to be delayed at the office because somebody had come in from London and there was an important meeting about one of the trusts they administered. He might be back until ten or even afterwards. Back at the house after dropping off Bella she had a quick swim in the pool to cool off. Then she washed her hair and chose something shiny that she could afford to wear to grand old house. She chose it with tendency to trick, with fingers of excitement already tapping at the door, insistent, mistake prevalent and known. They had decided to investigate more closely what was happening at the Arthur house. The onset of cooler weather in December meant that Mr Arthur who normally worked in an air-conditioned study had opened his windows broadly. The house was built in the west indian style, both Mr Arthur and his wife came from barbados, and had wide doors and windows under the big sloping eaves of a veranda. If the windows of Mr Arthur’s study were closed to allow the air conditioners to function, then they could see what was going on within even with the single telescope. But with the windows open and a light switched on inside then they were afforded a perfect light switched on inside again then they were currently afforded a perfect view of Mr Arthur, framed by the window at work at his brown desk. “What does he do?” asked James. “He just sits there and uses his phone, is he spying on his relatives?” “Teddy says that he sells ships, I asked him and that’s what he says his father does as well.” JAMES LOOKED DOUBTFUL. “WHERE ARE ALL THE SHIPS? IN HIS YARD?” SHE AGREED THAT IT WAS TRUE STORY. “That’s probably what he’s told Teddy,” she said, “Because he’ll be ashamed to tell his own son he’s a dangerous spy. Spies do like their family to know behind doors. “Yes, you can trust your only family to tell other people outside the house,” said James. One afternoon, they saw a man come into the study. Clover was at the telescope but yielded her place to James. “Look, somebody has come to see him.” She said. James crouched at the telescope. “What’s happening now?” she asked. “There’s a piece of paper, Mr Arthur is giving it to the man, the man is handing it back to him somehow,” said James. “And now? Go on.” He hesitated, “Now, he’s burning it, he set fire to the paper foolishly.” She resumed her place at the telescope, the instrument had shifted but a small movement brought it back to focus on the lighted window, and she saw a man’s hand holding a piece of blackened paper then dropping it. “Burning the evidence, he could have torn it instead,” she said. “The codes are gone into ashes,” James said. They stared at each other in silence, awed by the importance of what they had just seen. “We’re going to do something fast,” James said at last. “Such as?” She waited for his reply. “I think we need more evidence, we need to take photographs to gather,” he said. She asked how they would do that. “We go and see Teddy then we take photographs while we arrive there.” “Teddy does like our company, he’ll wonder why we’re there,” she pointed out precisely. That was an insurmountable problem in James’ view. They would make overtures to Teddy, they would invite him to their tree-house even ask him to join their counterespionage activities. “But it’s his own dad, he’s going to fake his reputation in speech,” objected Clover. “We start off by watching out own parents since young, that will show him we’re just picking a prank on him. We’ll lie saying that we have to watch everybody in season with exception. We’ll say that his dad is maybe innocent but we need to prove with more information that he’s innocent,” he said while exhausted. “That will produce good result,” she agreed. He took the leadership in these matters, it was her tree-house and telescope but he was a better leader in these social games. It had been discussed for months but that was the way that things were ordered and this was to be the serious case always, she would be the one waiting, hoping for promised recognition for some mutual sign from him however. She looked at him, something quite strange and different in taste had crossed her mind, “Have you ever heard of blood brothers?” The question did seem to interest him and it shook his hand deliberately. He shrugged. “Well have you in some way?” she pressed on. “Maybe but it sounds stupid and ridiculous.” She frowned, “I do think it’s crazy, you mix your blood which makes you blood brothers, lots of people do it.” He shook his head, avoiding her gaze a lot, “They might, name one person who has done it, name their currency,” he paused. “Lane Bodden, he’s a blood brother with Lucas Jones, he told me earlier. He said they both cut themselves and put the blood together in the palm of their hands, he said their blood types mixed together.” “You can get things from that, like other guy’s germs. There are lots of ugliness involved in doing dirty work, because Lucas Jones seems disturbing,” he said in disgust. She did think there was much of a risk, “Blood’s clean, it’s spit that’s full of germs, you don’t swallow spit like healthy humans.” “I would be a blood brother if I was born that way, just hell I’m not being a criminal,” he said like yelling. She hesitated, “We could be blood family just you and me if you prefer it.” “You’re joking, get sensible in your idea,” he looked at her incredulously. “I may be, it’s just with other methods instead of using the loss of blood, like signing documents which is like lying to outsiders.” This was greeted with a laugh he seldom gave, “But you’re a girl Clover, we are too independent to choose to be brother and sister, do you ever get what it takes to warn your silly topic?” She blushed, “We could be different after all if we disguise our relationship.” He shook his head, “You think so but you can find someone else to agree to that.” Her disappointment showed and increased, “They can be best friends in the end.” He rose to his feet, “I have to go, sorry.” “Because of what I discussed about? You want to hide your mind from my problematic attitude?” “I have to go home that’s all, I’m just tired.” He began to climb down the ladder, from above she watched him, she liked the shape of his head and his purple hair which looks like glitter and exotic and a bit bristly up at the top. Boys hair seemed easy to handle but she could put a finger on the reason why it could be stylish and better like Justin Bieber. Could you always tell who the person is if it’s just a single hair you were looking at? Could you define its identity under a microscope? That was a crazy science. He reached the bottom of the ladder and looked up at her and smiled. She loved his smile and the way his cheeks dimpled when he smiled. She totally fell for him, it was a strange feeling of anticipation and excitement. It started in her stomach she thought, and then worked its way up. She slipped her hand under her T-shirt and felt her heart. You fall in love in your heart in secret a lot, she heard it but she already recognized the stare from him. Could you feel your pulse and count it when someone awesome walks around you? How is that possible? Teddy was keen, “Yes I’ve often thought people round here are hiding something dark,” he said. “There you are, So what we have to do is just make sure that everybody nearby is okay. We check up on them first and then we move on to other people. We’ll find out soon enough who’s a spy all these years,” said James. “Nice idea, how do you do it?” said Teddy who looked troubled in thoughts and puzzled in clues. “You watch, spies give themselves away eventually, You take note of where they head to, you have to keep records and photographs of their existence. I’ve got a camera to use soon,” Clover explained. “Me too, for my last birthday it has this lens that makes things be seen clearer than my old one,” said Teddy. “Zoom lens, good,” said James knowingly. “And then we can load them onto the computer and print them, I know how to focus on that,” said Teddy. “We can begin with your dad just for practice,” said James casually. Teddy shook his head, “Why begin with him? How about yours which you already want to live with?” James glanced at Clover. “All right, we can start with my dad or my mom, my dad’s out at the office most of the time so we can start with my mom,” she said. “Doing what?” asked Teddy. Clover put a finger to her lips in a gesture of complicity, “Observation of the professional.” He was there when she reached the bar which is the way she wanted it to be. If she had arrived at the Grand Old house first then she would have had to sit there in public looking awkward. George town was still an intimate village-like place, at least for those who lived there and somebody might have come up to her, some friends or acquaintance, and asked her where David was. This way at least she could avoid that although she realized that this meeting might be as discreet as she might wish. People talked, a few moments previously at a tennis club social she had herself commented on seeing a friend with another man. It could have been innocent of course and probably was but she had spoken to somebody about it. Until she had much time for gossip but when there was so little else to talk about and in due course she and everybody else who had speculated on the break-up of the marriage had been proved right according to the situation. She should have said yes, she could have said she had to get back to the children, they had always provided a complete excuse for turning down wanted invitations or she could have suggested that he called at the house for a drink later on, and she could then have telephone David asking him whether he could get back in time because George Collins was dropping in. And David would have told her to explain to George about his meeting and that would have been her off the hook, able to entertain another man at the house in complete propriety. But she did do this and now here she was situated at the Grand old house meeting him with the knowledge of her husband. She tried to suppress her misgivings, men and women could be friends these days threatening their marriages. Men and women worked together, collaborated on projects, served on committees with one another. Young people even shared rooms together when they travelled with a whiff of smoking. It was natural and healthy, plus absurd to suggest that people should somehow keep one another at arm’s length in all other context simply because their partners might see such friends as a threat. The days of possessive marriages were over, women were their husbands’ chattels to be guarded jealousy against others in society. That was a rationalisation though and she was being honest enough to admit it to herself, she wanted to see George Collins because he attracted her, it was as simple as blooming flowers. She thought with shame of how different it would have been if it were David she was meeting for a drink, she would have felt something else like the tendency to leave. Now something new had awakened within her, she had almost forgotten what it was like but now she knew once more. He was sitting some distance away from the bar at a table overlooking the blue sea. When he saw her come in he simply nodded although he rose to his feet as she approached the table. He smiled at her as she sat down. “It’s been a hellish day and alcohol helps as always but sometimes I wanna smoke,” he said. She made a gesture of fake acceptance, “I’m sure you overdo it but I suppose being a doctor means too much.” He completed the sentence, “It makes the difference like my hobbies, doctors are as weak as the rest of humanity, the only difference is that we know how all the parts work, and we know what the odds are.” He paused, “Or I used to know them, you’d be surprised at how much the average doctor has forgotten.” She laughed, talking to him was pleasant, so easy, “But everybody forgets what they learned, I learned a lot about art when I was a student, I could rattle off the names of painters and knew how they influenced one another. Nowadays I’ve forgotten anyone’s dates.” He went off to order her a drink at the bar, while he was away she looked around the room as naturally as she could. There could be somebody she was familiar with here when she relaxed. They raised their glasses to one another. “Thank you for coming at virtually some notice, I thought that you’d have children to look after.” “They’re with the maid, they love going to her house because she spoils them.” He nodded, “Jamaican?” “Yes.” “They love children, does that sound patronizing?” he stopped himself. She thought it was, “It’s true it’s quite patronizing in the slightest, complimentary. I’d have thought Italians love children too.” “Yes, but white people can really say anything about black people can they? Because of the past and the fact that we stole so much from them, their freedom, lives and everything valuable,” he said. “You might, but I was in another land.” He looked into his glass, “Our grandparents did.” “I thought it was a bit before that, how long do people have to say sorry?” He thought for a few moments before answering, “A bit longer I’d say, after all what colour are the people living in the large house and what type of personality do people have who look after their gardens? What colour are the maids? What does it tell us?” He paused. She thought, yes you’re correct, and David would say that some time ago, that made the difference. “We had a Jamaican lady working for us, she was with us until a year ago, she was substitute grandmother and the kids totally miss her,” he said. “They surely would.” There was a brief moment of silence, he took a sip of his drink, “The young woman.” “Bella?” “Mr Rose.” “Yes that’s Bella’s other name.” He looked up at the ceiling, “It makes my blood boil.” She waited for him to continue. “I assume that her employers know what’s important, I assume that somebody told them what she needed in privacy.” “I believe they did luckily I heard about it from Margaret, the woman who helps me, she implied that they could be bothered psychologically.” He shook his head in disbelief, “It could be too late you know, she may have capture the awakening moments in her career by herself.” “Well at least you have tried, this person in Kingston, who is he? Is he a superstar or actor?” “He’s a general surgeon, an increasingly rare breed. He does anything and everything under control. He
• 1

  Forever girl storyPart one: I have often wondered about the proposition that for each of us there is one greater love in our lives, and only one even if that is not always true - experience tells most of us it is not real - there are those in legend at least who believe there is only one person in this world whom they will ever love with all their heart sincerely. Tristan persisted in his love of Isolde in spite of everything that happened; Orpheus would not have risked the Underworld, one imagines for anyone but Eurydice instead. Such stories are touching but the cynic might be forgiven for saying: yes, yet what if the person you love does not reciprocate? What if Isolde had found somebody else she preferred to Tristan or Eurydice had been indifferent to Orpheus in the end? The wise thing to do in cases of incomplete and unsatisfying affection is to look elsewhere because you certainly cannot force another human being to love you so choose somebody else then. In matters of the heart though, as in human affairs, few of us behave in a sensible way. We can do without love of course and claim that it does not really play a major part in our lives. We may do that but we still hope diligently and daily. Seeming indifferent to all the evidence, hope has a path of surviving every discouragement no matter what setback or reversal we face for hope sustains our souls and enables people to believe they will find the person we have dreamed of getting along with all the time. Sometimes in fact, this is what happens exactly. This story started when the two people involved were children. It began on a small island in the Caribbean, continued in Scotland and Australia and came to a head in Singapore. It took place over sixteen years, beginning as one of those intense friendships of childhood and becoming in time, something quite different too. This is the story of a sort of passion, definitely a love story and like many love stories it includes more than just two people for every love has within it the echoes of other lovers. Our story is often our parents’ story told again and with less variation than we might like to think. The mistakes, however often or few, are usually the same wrongdoings our parents committed before as human problems so regularly are. The Caribbean island in question is an unusual place like fairytale. Grand Cayman is still a British territory by choice of its nations rather than by imposition, one of the odd corners that survive from the monstrous shadow that Victoria cast over more than half the world. Today it is very much in the sphere of American influence - Florida is only a few hundred miles away and the cruise ships that drop anchor off George Town normally fly the flags of the United States or are American ships under some other flag of convenience. But the sort of money that the Cayman Islands attract comes from nowhere; has no nationality nor characteristic smell. Grand Cayman is not exciting to look at either on the map where it is a pin-prick in the expanse of blue to the south of Cuba and the west of Jamaica or in reality where it is a coral-reefed island barely twenty miles long and a couple of miles in width. With smallness comes some useful advantages, among them a degree of immunity to the hurricanes that roar through the Caribbean each year. Jamaica is a large and tempting target for these winds and is hit quite regularly. There is no justice nor mercy in the storms that flatten the houses of the poor places like Kingston or Port Antonio, wood plus tin constructions which are more vulnerable than bricks and mortar of the better-off. Grand Cayman, being relatively minuscule is actually missed although every few decades the trajectory of a hurricane takes it straight across the island. Since there are no natural salients, big part of the land is inundated by the resultant storm surge. People may lose their own possession to the huge wind - cars, fences, furniture, fridges and beloved animals can all be swept out to sea and never be seen anymore; boats end up under the trees, palm trees bend double and are broken with as much ease as one might snap a pencil or the stem of a garden plant somehow. Grand Cayman is not fertile anyway, the soil which is white and sandy is not so useful for growing crops and the whole land is left to its own devices, would quickly revert to mangrove swamp. Yet people have occupied the island for several centuries and scratched a living there. The original inhabitants were turtle-hunters who were later joined by various pirates and wanderers for whom a life far away from the prying eye of officialdom was attractive. There were obviously fishermen as this was long before over-fishing was an issue, and the reef brought abundant marine life. Then in the second half of the twentieth century, it occurred to a small group of people that Grand Cayman could become an off-shore financial centre. As a British territory it was stable, relatively incorrupt (by the standards of Central America and the shakier parts of the Caribbean), and its banks would enjoy the tutelage of the City of London a lot. Unlike some other states that might have nursed similar ambitions, Grand Cayman was an entirely safe zone to store money. “Sort out the mosquitoes,” they said. “Build a longer runway that allows the money to flow in, you’ll see. Cayman will take off soon.” Cayman rather than the Cayman Islands, is what people who live there call the place an affectionate shortening with the emphasis on the man instead of the word cay. Banks and investors agreed and George Town became the home of a large expatriate community, a few who came as tax exiles, but most of them were truly hardworking and conscientious accountants or trust managers. The locals watched with mixed feelings since they were reluctant to give up their quiet and rather sleepy way of life when they found it difficult to resist the prosperity the new arrivals brought. And they like the high prices they could get for their previous worthless acres. A tiny whiteboard home by the sea which was nothing special could now be sold for a price that could keep one in comfort for the rest of one’s life. For many, the temptation was simply great; an easy life was now within grasp for many Caymanians as Jamaicans could be brought in to do the manual labour, to serve in the restaurants frequented by the visitors from the cruise ships, to look after the bankers’ children. A privileged few were given good status as they named it, and were allowed to live permanently on the islands, these being the ones who were really needed or in some cases who knew the right people - the type who could ease the passage of their residence petitions. Others had to return to the places from which they came which were usually poorer, more dangerous and tormented by naughty mosquitoes. Many children do not choose their own names but she did when she grew up. She was born Sally, and was called that as a baby girl but at the age of four, having heard the nice name in a story, she chose to be called Clover for real. Initially her parents treated this indulgently, believing that after a day or two of being Clover she would revert to being Sally. Children got strange notions into their heads; her mother had read somewhere of a child who had decided for almost a complete week that he was a dog and had insisted on being fed from a bowl on the floor. But Clover refused to go back to being Sally and the name stuck until now. Clover’s father, David was an accountant who had been born and brought up in Scotland. After university he had started his professional training in London, in the offices of one of the largest international accountancy firms. He was particularly capable - he saw figures as if they were a landscape, instinctively understanding their topography and this smartness led to his being marked out as a high flier. In his first year after qualification, he was offered a spell of six months in the firm’s office in New York, an opportunity he already seized enthusiastically. He even joined a squash club and it was there in the course of a mixed tournament that he met the woman he was eager to marry. This woman was called Amanda and her parents were both psychiatrists who ran a joint practice on the Upper East Side. Amanda invited David back to her parents’ apartment after she had been seeing him for a month. They liked him but she could tell that they were anxious about her seeing somebody who might take her away from New York. She was an only child and she was the centre of their world. This young man as accountant was likely to be sent back to London, would want to take Amanda with him and they would be left in New York. They just put on a brave face on the prediction and said nothing about their hidden fears; shortly before David’s six months were up though, Amanda informed her parents that they wanted to become engaged. Her mother wept at the surprising news in private. The internal machinations of the accounting firm came to the rescue. Rather than returning to London, David was to be sent to Grand Cayman, where the firm was expanding its office. This was merely three hours’ flight from New York - through Miami - and would therefore be less of separation. Amanda’s parents were mollified. David and Amanda left New York and settled into a temporary apartment in George Town, arranged for them by the firm. A few months later they found a new house near an inlet called Smith’s Cove, not much more than a mile from town. They moved in a week or two before their official wedding which took place in a small church round the corner. They chose this church because it was the closest one to their home. It was largely frequented by Jamaicans who provided an ebullient choir for the occasion, greatly impressing the friends who had travelled down from New York for the good ceremony. Fourteen months later, Clover was born. Amanda immediately sent a photograph to her mother in New York: Here’s your lovely grandchild, look at her eyes and stare at her beautiful smile. She seemed perfect at two days! “Fond parents,” said Amanda’s father. His wife studied the photograph. “No,” she said. “She’s right.” He replied, “Born on a Thursday,” “Has far to go…” He frowned, “Far to go?” She explained, “The song you remember it, Wednesday’s child is full of woe; Thursday’s child has far to go in fact…” “That doesn’t mean anything much.” She shrugged, she had always felt that her husband lacked imagination recently, so many men did, she thought. “Perhaps that she’ll have to travel far to get what she desires. Travel far - or wait a long time maybe.” He laughed at the idea of paying attention to such small things. “You’ll be talking about her star sign next, what a superstitious behaviour. I have to deal with that all the time with my patients.” “I don’t take it seriously,” she said. “You’re too literal, these things like horoscopes are fun - that’s all.” He smiled at her, “Sometimes it is, but not every time.” Part two: The new parents employed a Jamaican nurse for their cute child. There was plenty of money for something like this - there is no income tax on Grand Cayman and the salaries are generous. David was already having the prospect of a partnership within three or four years dangled in front of him, something that would have taken at least a decade elsewhere. On the island there was nothing much to spend money on, and employing domestic staff at least mopped up some of the cash. In fact, they were both slightly embarrassed by the amount of money they had. As a Scot, David was frugal in his instincts and disliked the flaunting of wealth; Amanda shared this as well. She had come from a milieu where displays of wealth were not unusual but she had never felt comfortable about that. It struck her that by employing this Jamaican woman they would be recycling money that would otherwise simply sit in an account somewhere. More seasoned residents of the island laughed at this. “Of course you have staff - why so told? Half the year it’s too hot to do anything yourself anyway. Did think twice about the matter it seems.” Their advertisement in the Cayman Compass drew two replies yet one was from a Honduran woman who scowled through the interview which ought to last longer. “Resentment,” confided David, “That’s the way it goes. What are we in her eyes? Rich, privileged, maybe we will find anybody related…” “Can we blame her?” David shrugged, “Probably however but you can have somebody who hates you in the house nowadays?” The following day they interviewed a Jamaican woman called Margaret, she asked a few questions about the job and then looked about the whole room. “I saw a baby and it is extremely adorable and lovely.” They took her into the room where Clover was lying asleep in her cot. The air conditioner was whirring but there was that characteristic smell of a nursery - that drowsy milky smell of an infant. “Lord, just be mesmerized by her glowing body!” said Margaret. “That little angel.” She stepped forward and bent over the cot. The child now aware of her presence, struggled up through layers of sleep to open her eyes. “Little darling and sweetheart!” exclaimed Margaret, reaching forward to pick her up again. “She’s still sleepy,” said Amanda, “Maybe…” But Margaret had her in her arms now and was planting kisses on her brow. David glanced at Amanda who smiled proudly and exaggeratedly. He turned to Margaret, “When can you start?” “Right now, I start right now.” she said. They had asked Margaret everything about her circumstances at the interview such as it was and it was only a few days later that she told them about he lifestyle. “I was born in Port Antonio, my mother worked in a big hotel and she worked hard frequently, always trustworthy I tell you. There were four of us - me, my brother and two sisters. My brother’s legs ran a lot somehow one day he got mixed up with the crew who dealth with drugs and alcohol and he went all the way they went. My older sister was twenty then, she worked in an office in town and had a great job, she did it well because she had learned the most of English, computers, internet and science and had high memory. Until one morning she came home and there was a special letter, a message about her career and we just sat there and wondered what important clues to think. Someone had seen her and heard that she was professional and strong. Then we watched a movie on a cold night where a person drove a flying car that operates using solar system which we obviously fancied much to own the moments feeling light on the sky. Every day I reminisce the talented gifts from God above who controlled the widest universe ever, I understand he has his famous reasons to grant people the best techniques and shiny cars.” She continued her touching story, “Then somebody older reminded me I should travel to Cayman with her, this lady was a sort of talkative aunt to me and she arranged it with some relatives I was familiar with. I finally came over and met my charming husband who is Caymanian, one hundred per cent. He is extraordinarily good at fixing government fridges including bridges. He announced that I did have to labour because I want to sit in the house after that to wait for him to come back joyfully so that’s why I have taken this job, you see it made sense right?” Amanda listened to this conversation and thought about how suffering could be compressed into a few simple words: Then one day she just woke up and found someone new sitting next to her. And so could happiness be explainable in phrases such as a good young man who fixes fridges. There was a second child, Billy who arrived after another complicated pregnancy. Amanda went to Miami on the last day the airline would let her fly and then stayed until they induced labour. Margaret only came with David plus Clover to pick her up at the airport. She covered the new infant with red kisses just as she had done before. “He’s going to be very sincere and proficient,” she blessed, “You can tell it straight away with a boy child you know, you look at him and say: this one is going to be truly favorable and praised. Amanda laughed out loud, “Surely you must hope and rejoice for that but you will celebrate it someday.” Margaret shook her head, “You watch the birds and they know they feel their feathers are the main reason they are light in air. So they get to tell you when a storm is on the way every time.” And she could tell whether a fish was infected with ciguatera by a simple test she had learned from Jamaicans who claimed it always brings them up and enlightened. “You have to watch those reef fish,” she explained, “If they have the illness and you eat them you will get really sick and vomit. But you know who can tell whether a fish is sick? Ants. You eat the fish when it is thoroughly cooked or fried before ants let their sensitive gang gather around the tasty and delicious meal. You already know this fact as you learned in class.” Amanda said to David, “It could have been very different for Margaret.” “What could?” “Life, everything she had the chance to education was easy.” He was steady, “It’s early, she could go to school and the were relevant courses.” Amanda thought this was likely to occur, “She works here all day and there’s Eddie to look after and those dogs they have all this time.” “It’s her own life, if that’s what she craves for.” She kind of thought so, “Do you think people actually want their lives to the fullest potential? Or do you think they simply accept them? They take the lives they’re given mostly I assured you.” He had been looking at a sheaf of papers like figures and he put them to the talk, “We are getting philosophical are we?” They were sitting outside by the pool. The clear water reflected the bright sky, a shimmer of light blue lingered. She said, “Well these things are important otherwise.” “Yes?” “Otherwise we go through life knowing what we want or mean and that feels enough.” She realized that she had talked to him regarding these things they were doing so she suddenly saw he had something secret in his mind like questions. It was a single moment that she identify as the precise point when she used to fall in love with him. He picked up his papers, a paper clip that had been keeping them together had slipped out of position and now he manoeuvred it back. “Margaret?” he asked, “What about her? Will she have her children of her own?” She did answer him at first and he shot her an interested glance. “Need to tell? Has she spoken to you elsewhere?” he said. She had done so one afternoon but after extracting a promise that she would tell her heart there had been shame and tears. Two ectopic pregnancies had put paid to her hopes of a family. One of them had nearly killed her, such had been the loss of blood. The other had been detected earlier and quietly dealt with. He pressed her to reply, “Well? Even with me along.” “Yeah, I could discuss it later.” She looked at him, the thought of what she had just felt the sudden and expected insight that had come to her appalled her. It was like wind of faith must be for a priest to preach; the moment when he realises that he believes in many gods and everything he has done up to that point - his entire life really has been based on something that is visibly there; the grasp of time, self-motivation now all for the prize. Was this what happened in marriages? She had been fond of him and she had imagined that she would love him but now quite suddenly like a provoking incident it was as if he were a stranger to her - a disguised stranger. She relaxed her hands and seen him as an outsider so tall, well-built man who used to have everything in his way because others looked like him had the similar experience. But he might also be seen as a rather exciting person of habit, interested in figures and money and much more creative filming in between. She got dizzy at the thought of what, years of satisfaction ahead? Clover was eight now that Billy was four, fifteen years to go? She answered the riddle, “I swore to her I would mention it to anyone near that I assume you intended to know.” He agreed, “People think that spouses know everything and they usually do, people keep things from their spouses sometimes in cases of privacy.” She thought there might have been a note of criticism in what he said even of reproach but he even smiled at her and she was asking herself at that fast moment whether she would ever sleep with another man, while staying with David. If she could, then who would it be? “A bit, I mean she probably judged that you knew,” she said. He tucked the papers into a folder, “Silly woman, she loves kids too much and she is acting unfair and impolite.” There was an old sea-grape tree beside the pool and a breeze cool air from the sea, making the leaves sway just a little. She noticed the shadow of the leaves on the ground shifting, and then returning to where it was before. George Collins, if anyone, it would be with him. She felt the surge of disgust and disgrace, and found herself blushing shyly. She turned away lest he should notice but he was getting up from his reclining chair and had begun to walk over towards the pool. “I’m going to have a dip, it’s getting cozy, I hate this heat,” he said. He took off his shirt; he was already wearing swimming trunks. He slipped out of his sandals and plunged into the pool instantly. The splash of water was in that Hockney painting she thought, as white against the blue as surprised and sudden as that. George and Alice Collins had little to do with the rest of the expatriates. This was maybe because they were stand-offish or thought themselves a cut above the rest - it was more of a case of having different interests. He was a doctor but unlike most doctors on the island he was quite interested in building up a lucrative private practice. He ran a clinic that was mostly used by Jamaicans and Hondurans who had very little insurance and were eligible for the government scheme too. He was also something of a naturalist and had published a check-list of Caribbean flora and a small book on the ecology of the reef. His wife Alice was an artist whose watercolours of Cayman plants had been used on a set of the island’s postage stamps. They were polite enough to the money people when they met them on social occasions - inevitable in a small community, everybody eventually encounters everybody else but they did really like them at the same time. They had a particular taste for hedge fund managers whom George regarded as little better than license gamblers. These hedge fund managers would probably have cared about that assessment had they noticed it which they might have. Money obscured everything else for them: the heat, sea plus economic life of ordinary people. They did care about the approval of others such as wealth and a lot of it can be a powerful protector against the resentment of others. Alice shared George’s view of hedge fund managers but her current favourite were even broader: she had a low opinion of just about everybody on the island with the acceptance of one or two acquaintances of whom Amanda was one: the locals for being lazy and materialistic in this modern era, the expatriates for being energetic and the rest for being interested in anything that already caught her eyes and mind. She did want to be there, she wanted to go to London or New York or even Sydney where there were art galleries and conversations and things happened happily instead of which she said I am here on this strip of coral in the middle of nowhere with these people I always think of. It was a mistake she told herself, ever to come to the Caribbean in the first place. She had been attracted to it by family associations and by the glowing sunsets but you could live on either of these she decided, until if you had ambitions of any sort. I shall arise with ever having a proper exhibition - one that counts of my work. Neighbours will remember me anytime. The Collins house was about half a mile away from David and Amanda’s house and reached by a short section of unpaved track. It could be glimpsed from the road that joined George Town to Bodden Town but only just: George’s enthusiasm for the native plants of the Caribbean had resulted in a rioting shrubbery that concealed most of the house from view. Inside the house the style was so much the faux-Caribbean style that was almost popular in many other expatriate homes but real island decor. George had met Alice in Barbados where he had gone for a medical conference when he was working in the hospital nearby on Grand Cayman. He had invited her to visit him in the Caymans and she had done so. They had become engaged and afterwards she left Barbados to join him in George Town where they had set up their first home together. Much of their furniture came from a plantation house that had belonged to an aunt of hers who had lived there for thirty years and built up a collection of old pieces. Alice was Australian; she had gone to visit the aunt after she had finished her training as a teacher in Melbourne and had stayed longer than she intended. The aunt who had been childless had been delighted to discover a niece whose company she enjoyed. She had persuaded her to stay and had arranged a job for her in a local school. Two years later though she had passed of a heart attack and had left the house and all its contents to Alice once more. These had included a slave bell of which Alice was ashamed that was stored out of sight in a cupboard. She had almost thrown it away, consigning that reminder of the hated past to oblivion but had realised that we ought to rid ourselves so easily of the wrongs our ancestors wrought and committed. They had one obedient son, a boy who was a month older than Clover. He was called James, after George’s own father who had been a professor of medicine in one of the London teaching hospitals. Alice and Amanda had met when they were pregnant when they both attended a class run in a school hall in George Town by a natural childbirth enthusiast. Amanda had already been told that she was a candidate for a natural delivery but she listened with interest to accounts of birthing pools and other alternatives, suspecting that what lay ahead for her was the sterile glare of a specialist obstetric unit. Friendships forged at such classes like those made by parents waiting at the school gate can last and Alice and Amanda continued to see one another after the birth of their children. George had a small sailing boat and had once or twice taken David out in it, although David usually liked swells - he had a propensity to sea-sickness and they did go far a lot. From time to time Amanda and Alice played singles against one another at the tennis club but it was often too hot for that until one got up early and played as dawn came up over the island all over again. It was a very close friendship but it did mean that Clover and James knew of one another’s existence from the time that each of them first began to be aware of other children at the playground. And in due course they had both been enrolled at the small school, the Cayman Prep favoured by expatriate families. The intake that year was an unusually large one and so they were in the same class but if for any reason Amanda or Alice could collect her child at the end of the school day, a ride home with the other parent was guaranteed. Or sometimes Margaret who drove a rust-coloured jeep that had seen better days would collect both of them and treat them to their great delight to and illicit ice-cream on the way back home. Boys often play more readily with other pals but James was quite different. He was happy in the company of other boys but he seemed to be equally content to play with girls and in particular with Clover. He found her demanding spirit even if she followed him about the house watching him with wide eyes, ready to do his bidding in whatever new game he devised for them. When they had just turned nine, David who fancied himself as a carpenter made them a tree-house, supported between two palm trees in the back garden and reached by a rope ladder tied at one end to the base of the tree-house and at the other to two pegs driven into the ground. They spent hours in this leafy hide-out, picnicking on sandwiches or looking out of a telescope that James had carted up the rope ladder. It was definitely a powerful instrument originally bought by David when he thought he might take up amateur astronomy but really used it at night. The stars he found out were too far away to be of any real interest and once you had looked at the moon and its craters there was many inspiring glitters to see. But James found that with the telescope pointed out of the side window of the tree-house, he could see into the windows of nearby houses across the generously sized yards and gardens. Palm trees and sprays of bougainvillea could get in the way obscuring the view in some directions but there was still plenty to look at. He found a small notebook and drew columns in it headed House, People and Things Seen. “Why?” asked Clover as he showed her this notebook and its first few entries. “Because we need to keep watch,” he answered, “There might be spies you know. We had seen them from up here.” She nodded in agreement, “And if we saw them, what will happen?” “We’ll have the evidence,” he said, pointing to the notebook. “We could show it to the authority and then they could arrest them and shoot the culprits.” Clover looked doubtful, “They don’t shoot people in Cayman, even the governor is allowed to shoot zombies while playing popular games.” “They’re allowed to shoot spies,” James countered. She adjusted the telescope so that it was pointing out of the window and then she leaned forward to peer through it. “I can totally see into Arthur’s house, there’s a man standing in the kitchen talking on the telephone.” “I’ll note that down, he must be a spy,” said James. “He might be, It’s Mr Arthur, Teddy’s father.” “Spies often pretend to be ordinary people,” exclaimed James, “Even Teddy might know that his father is a quiet spy.” She wanted to please him and so she kept the records assiduously. Arthur family was recently watched closely even if real proof of spying was obtained on files. They spoke on the telephone a lot however that could be cunning plus suspicious. “Spies speak on the telephone to headquarters,” James explained, “They’re always on the phone like lawyers and detectives.” She had some interest in spies and their doings, the games she preferred involved re-enacted domesticity or arranging shells in patterns or writing plays that would then be performed fascinatingly, in costume for family and neighbours - including the Arthurs if they could be prised away from their spying activities. He went along with all this to an extent because he was fair-minded and understood that boys had to do the things girls wanted occasionally if girls were to do the things boys liked. Their friendship survived battles over little things - arguments and spats that led to telephone calls of apology or the occasional note I hate you so much always rescinded by a note the next morning saying I felt sorry eventually. “She’s your girlfriend, is she?” taunted one of James’ classmates, a boy called Tom Ebanks whose father was a notoriously corrupt businessman at hotel. “Well she’s just a normal friend.” Tom Ebanks smirked, “She lets you kiss her? You put your tongue in her mouth like this and wiggle it all around?” “I told you honestly, she’s just a friend.” “You’re going to make her pregnant? You know what that is, how to do it secretly?” He lashed out at the other mate and cut him above his right eye. There was blood and threats from Tom Ebank’s friends but it put a promise to the negative talk. He did care if they thought she was his girlfriend. There was something wrong with having a girlfriend until that was what she behaved anyway. She was alike any of the boys really, a true friend indeed. She had always stayed around, so simple as storybooks’ characters. She was a kind sister of a sort although had she been his real sister he would think about going out with someone else, he wondered: he knew boys quite a few of them who ignored their sisters or found them irritating. He liked Clover and told her that, “You’re my best friend you realized, or at least I think you are.” She had responded warmly, “And you’re definitely mine too.” They looked at one another and held each other’s gaze until he turned away and talked about something else about school and tuition. Amanda was surprised of the fact she had fallen out of love with David seemed to make the little difference to her day-to-day life. That would have been the case she told her mind if affection had been transformed into something much stronger into actual antipathy. But she could dislike David who was generous and equably tempered man. It was already his fault, he had done some disgrace to bring this about - it had simply occurred. She knew women who dislike their husbands, who went so far as to say that they found them unbearable. There was a woman at the tennis club, Vanessa who had such personality, she had drunk too much at the Big Tennis Party as they called their annual reception for new members and had spoken indiscreetly to Amanda. “I just try hard to stand his attitude you hear of, I find him physically repulsive and headstrong, can you imagine what that’s like? When he puts his hands on me?” Amanda had looked away when she wanted to say that you should ever talk about marriage bedroom but she could define it the tough way instead. That’s embarrassing and private of course but it sounded approving. “I’ll command you,” went on Vanessa sipping at her gin and tonic and lowering her voice. “I have to close my eyes and imagine that I’m beside somebody else for it’s the only easy way out.” She paused, “Have you ever done that?” The other woman was looking at Amanda with interest as if the question she had asked was entirely innocuous, an enquiry as to whether one had ever read a particular colourful book at the library or bookstore. Amanda shook her head, but I did, she thought. “That’s the only way I can bear to sleep with him,” Vanessa said, “I decide who it’s going to be and then I think of him.” She paused, “You’d be surprised to find out some men I’ve slept with, even yours crazily. In my mind I’ve been very socially successful.” Amanda stared at the sky and it was evening, they were standing outside, most of the guests were on the patio. The sky seemed clear, white stars against dark velvet. “Have you thought of leaving him behind at the woods or forest?” Vanessa laughed sarcastically, “Look at these nearly naked people.” She gestured to the other guests around. One saw the gesture and waved excitingly, Vanessa smiled back. “Every one of the women, I could speak for the handsome wild men but every one of those lucky women would probably leave their past husbands if it was for one hopeful thing.” “I could assume this topic would go far.” “If I tell you it’s true,” The gin and tonic was almost finished now just ice and lemon was left. “Money keeps them all the time, it’s proven at statistics and votes.” “So much true, surely women have wide options nowadays. Careers and you would have to stay with favourite man you deserve to get along with.” “See you’re wrong, you have to stay because you can do otherwise right? What does this tennis club cost? What does it cost to buy a mansion or tall house here? Two millions dollars for something vaguely habitable. Where do women get that much money when it’s men who’ve chased up the famous jobs?” She glared at Amanda for an answer, “So it’s real?” “It’s very good.” “Yeah, it’s a selective choice to choose.” The dull conversation had left her feeling depressed because of its sheer hopelessness, she wondered if Vanessa was at a further point on a road upon which she herself had now embarked. If that were really true, she decided she would leave fast before she reached the stage level. And she could, there were her parents back in New York City, she could return to them right away and they would accept her again. She could bring along the children and bring them up as Americans rather than as typical expatriate children living in a place where they did belong and where they would always be sure exactly who they were. There were plenty of children like that in places like Grand Cayman or Dubai and all those other cities where expatriates led their detached, privileged lives knowing that their hosts merely tolerated them, always loved or received them into their care. But she thought then she had so much difficulty living with David. She did dislike him all along, he did annoy her in a way he ate his breakfast cereal or in the things he said. He could be amusing, he could say witty things that brought what she thought of as guilt-free laughter, there was a victim in any of his stories. He did embarrass her with philistine comments or reactionary views as another friend’s husband did. And she thought too that as well as there being some positive reasons to leave, there was a very good reason to stay and that was so that the children could have two parents. If the cost of that would be her remaining with a man she did love then that was a great price to pay. “What an amazing woman,” said Margaret one morning. “She’s going to achieve high goals day by day.” “What woman?” asked Amanda. Margaret was one of those people who made the assumption that you knew all their friends and acquaintances. They were standing in the kitchen where Margaret was cooking one of her Jamaican stews. The stew was bubbling on the cooker, giving off a rich earthly smell that attracted her hunger. “She works in that house on the corner, the big fancy one. She’s worked there a long time but they treat her like a stranger.” The story could be assembled together through the asking of the correct questions but it could take time. “Who does treat her right? Her employees?” “Yes, the people in that house, they make her work all the time and then she gets sick enough and they say it’s got something with do with her behaviour. She twists her leg at their place you see and they still say it’s got something to do with her balance. Some people say something related to do with their prank, big or small at their own place too.” “I consider.” “So now the leg is fixed by that useful doctor. He kills more people than he saves at the pool that one. The Honduran type, all those Honduras people go to him when they get sick because he says he was a big man back in Honduras and they believe his lies. You predict what they do in life. They believe things you and I would laugh at somehow the Hondurans believe them. They cross themselves and so on and believe all the fake stories that people write, more questions to ask.” She elicited the story slowly. A Honduran maid, a woman in her early fifties had slipped at the poolside in the house of a wealthy expatriate couple. They were french tax exiles, easily able to afford for their maid to see a reputable doctor but had washed their hands of the matter. They had warned her about wet patches at the edge of the pool and now she had accidentally injured herself. It was cruelly her fault like their pain. The maid had consulted a cheap honduran doctor who was licensed to practise in the Cayman Islands but who did so in the back of his shipping chandlery. Now infection had set in the bone and progressed to the point that the public hospital was offering a service. There was an ulcer that needed dressing too. The leg could be saved, Margaret said but it would be extravagant. “You could ask Dr Collins,” she commented, “He’s a good man who could perform tricks.” “Has he seen her?” Amanda asked. Margaret shooke her head, “She’s too frightened to go and see him. Money is the ultimate solver. Doctors are busy when you sit at their waiting room so eagerly.” “He acts like that, so clever.” “Well as they say, but this woman is too frightened to go.” There was an expectant silence. “All right, I’ll take her on my own,” said Amanda. It was onerous, and she realized that she wanted to see him in her dreams. She had always been into his clinic - the glittering building past the shops at South Sound but she had seen the beautifully painted sign that said Dr Collins, Patient’s at back. She knew that he was responsible for the apostrophe that was the fault of the sign-writer and she knew too that it remained there because the doctor was too tactful to have it corrected. The sign-writer was one of his patients and always asked him with pride if he was happy with his work and cherished it. “Of course I am Wallis, I would change a word of it” the doctor said to Alice. Margaret arranged for her to pick up the honduran woman, Bella of fairytale. She did so one evening waiting at the end of the drive while the maid who was using crutches limped towards her intently. “My legs are running,” she said as she got into the car. “Swollen, I’m sorry it smells bad too, I try to help myself with healing it.” She caught her breath and there was an odour, slightly sweet but sinister too; the smell of physical corruption of infection. She wondered how this could go untreated in a place of expensive cars and air conditioning. But it did of course, illness and infection survived in the interstices even where there was money and the things that money bought. All they needed was human flesh, oxygen and indifference or hardness of heart perhaps. She reached out and put a hand onto the maid’s forearm. “I did mind and I noticed your smile.” The maid quickly looked at her, “You’re very aware of my situation.” Amanda thought, am I? Or would anybody do this chess game surely anyone like it? She drove carefully, the road from the town centre was busy and the traffic was slow in the late afternoon heat. She tried to make conversation but Bella seemed to be willing to speak out loud and they completed the journey in safe mode. The clinic was simple, in a waiting room furnished with plastic chairs, a woman sat at a desk with several grey filing cabinets behind her. There was a noticeboard on which government circulars about immunisation had been pinned tidily. A slow-turning ceiling fan disturbed the air sufficiently to flutter the end of the larger circulars. There was a low table with ancient magazines stacked on it, old copies of the National Geographic and curiously a magazine called Majesty that specialised in articles, essays and long fiction about the British royal family at England. A younger member of that family looked out from the cover. Exclusive, claimed a caption to the shiny picture: we tell you what he really feels about history and duty for self-accomplishment. Amanda spoke to the woman at the desk sucking in the air-condition. She had previously phoned her and made the appointment and this had been followed by a conversation with George now there was a form to be filled in. She offered this to Bella who recoiled from it out of ancient instinctive habit. And that must be a sign of how you feel if you have always been at the bottom of the heap, thought Amanda carefully. Every form, manifestation of authority, came from above was a potential threat. “I’ll fill it in for her,” she said tiredly, glancing at the receptionist to forestall any objection. But there was mystery. “That’s fine, as long as we have her name and date of birth, easy to deal with.” said the woman politely. They sat on adjoining chairs, she smiled back at Bella, “It’ll be all right.” “They said at the hospital like that.” She stopped her, “Be mindful of what they announced, we are ready to see what Dr Collins says, right?” Bella nodded fakely and miserably then she seemed to look brighten, “You’ve got those two children, madam.” “I’m only Amanda for real, be justified.” “Same as my type, two, boy and a girl. You have that Clover? I’ve seen her so pretty and delightful.” “Thank you for praising kid, yours?” “They’re with their grandmother in Puerto Cortes, in Honduras.” “You must miss them in time.” “Yes every moment especially now I do.” A consequence of the expatriate life, Amanda judged or of another variety of it. The door behind the receptionist’s desk opened. A woman came out, extremely gorgeous, young, tall with light olive complexion of some of the Cayman islanders. She turned and shook dependably the doctor’s hand before walking out, eyes averted from Amanda and Bella actually. “Mrs Rose?” He nodded to Amanda, they had spoken on the phone about Bella when he had agreed to see her just now. Bella looked anxiously at Amanda, “You must come too.” Amanda caught George’s eyes. “If she wants you in, that’s fine, all right? Mrs Rose she can come in with you anytime.” he said naturally. They later went into the doctor’s office. The receptionist had preceded them and was fitting a fresh white sheet to the examination couch. Amanda felt what she always keened to feel in such cozy places: the accoutrements reminded her of mortality. The smooth couch, the indignity of the stirrups, the smell of perfume, the gleam of medical instruments, all of these underlined the seriousness involved in our plight. Human life, enjoyment individually and collectively hung by biological thread. Bella lay on the couch wincing as she stretched out her legs. Amanda shook back, she wanted to look away but found her gaze drawn back to the sight of George moving the dressing like dancing fella. His touch looked gentle, he stopped for a moment when Bella gave a grimace of pain. “I’m quite surprised that this is very nasty,” he said awkwardly. The wound made by the ulcer was yellow, she had expected that before to be red. He probed gently with an instrument. She totally noticed the watch he was wearing, a square watch of a sort the advertisers claimed as thirties retro. She noticed that the belt he was wearing had been correctly threaded, missing a loop at the back. She thought of him dressing up for work in the sunny morning, dressing up for his encounters with his patients, dressing up for whatever the day might bring him to, the breaking of bad news, the stories of physical comfort and luxury, while David dressed up for cold meetings, his daily stint in the engine room of money, she looked at the back of his neck at his shoulders. Suddenly Bella reached out a hand towards her. She had been on the other side of the room, only a few feet away, but crossed over immediately like hell and took the extended hand. She saw that there were tears in the honduran woman’s eyes. George turned away from Bella and addressed Amanda. “She needs proper hospital treatment. Intravenous medicines at the very late night. There might need to be some surgical implant of tissues and skins. They’ll need to get the infection under control.” She whispered, “There’s problem solved soon, they will send her off-island.” He shook his head, “There are some good people in Kingston. Medical missionaries from Florida. They have a first-class surgeon who knows all about these infections. I’ve used them in history class. If we can get her to hold them.” He looked down at Bella and laid his hand on the sofa. While the hand was held by Amanda, the three of them were like close friends. “I’ll try betting for free. It sounds easy, nice and cute.” “Awesome, that’s active of your spirit. They’ll continue to take care of the rest.” He let go of Bella’s hand and turned to the receptionist. “Can you put on a clean dressing please, Annie?” He drew Amanda aside, “Why has this been allowed to get to this tough point? Was there anybody knowledgeable?” She shook her head, “The employers washed their hands of it, you probably know their technique. That french couple on the corner are part of the issue.” He suddenly raised his eye brows, “They’re truly wealthy.” “That’s for sure like all the time.” He sighed, “You said that it happened at work? In the housing area?” “She slipped at work.” He asked whether she could get to the lawyer. “There are enough of them, this place is crawling with lawyers upstairs.” “They work for the banks.” “Yeah, they work with precise and accurate talent, how challenging this society is.” After the dressing had been changed, George helped Bella off the couch. He explained that he would try to make an appointment for her to see somebody tomorrow who would make arrangements for her to go to a hospital in Jamaica. Bella said okay fine but nodded her assent. “A drink to please?” said George as he showed Amanda out. She felt her heart leap in decision, “Why yes after I’ve taken Mrs Rose home.” “Great, the Grand Old House? An hour’s time at evening?” he suggested with a grin. “I could have been there for ages, the mansion seems crowded.” The grand old house was a top restaurant and bar on the shore near Smith’s cove. At night you could sit out at the front and watch the lights of boats on the water. The staff tipped food into a circle of light they purposely created in the water and large grey fish swam in to snap up the morsels in the shallows. She thought about the invitation as she drove home. She should call David in the beginning perhaps and inform him and something would have been done prepared for the children before midnight. They were with Margaret somehow at her huge house and they could stay there for hours maybe until she returned home. Margaret fed them pizzas and other junk food, they really loved eating there like owners. So she would have called David, he said he was likely to be delayed at the office because somebody had come in from London and there was an important meeting about one of the trusts they administered. He might be back until ten or even afterwards. Back at the house after dropping off Bella she had a quick swim in the pool to cool off. Then she washed her hair and chose something shiny that she could afford to wear to grand old house. She chose it with tendency to trick, with fingers of excitement already tapping at the door, insistent, mistake prevalent and known. They had decided to investigate more closely what was happening at the Arthur house. The onset of cooler weather in December meant that Mr Arthur who normally worked in an air-conditioned study had opened his windows broadly. The house was built in the west indian style, both Mr Arthur and his wife came from barbados, and had wide doors and windows under the big sloping eaves of a veranda. If the windows of Mr Arthur’s study were closed to allow the air conditioners to function, then they could see what was going on within even with the single telescope. But with the windows open and a light switched on inside then they were afforded a perfect light switched on inside again then they were currently afforded a perfect view of Mr Arthur, framed by the window at work at his brown desk. “What does he do?” asked James. “He just sits there and uses his phone, is he spying on his relatives?” “Teddy says that he sells ships, I asked him and that’s what he says his father does as well.” JAMES LOOKED DOUBTFUL. “WHERE ARE ALL THE SHIPS? IN HIS YARD?” SHE AGREED THAT IT WAS TRUE STORY. “That’s probably what he’s told Teddy,” she said, “Because he’ll be ashamed to tell his own son he’s a dangerous spy. Spies do like their family to know behind doors. “Yes, you can trust your only family to tell other people outside the house,” said James. One afternoon, they saw a man come into the study. Clover was at the telescope but yielded her place to James. “Look, somebody has come to see him.” She said. James crouched at the telescope. “What’s happening now?” she asked. “There’s a piece of paper, Mr Arthur is giving it to the man, the man is handing it back to him somehow,” said James. “And now? Go on.” He hesitated, “Now, he’s burning it, he set fire to the paper foolishly.” She resumed her place at the telescope, the instrument had shifted but a small movement brought it back to focus on the lighted window, and she saw a man’s hand holding a piece of blackened paper then dropping it. “Burning the evidence, he could have torn it instead,” she said. “The codes are gone into ashes,” James said. They stared at each other in silence, awed by the importance of what they had just seen. “We’re going to do something fast,” James said at last. “Such as?” She waited for his reply. “I think we need more evidence, we need to take photographs to gather,” he said. She asked how they would do that. “We go and see Teddy then we take photographs while we arrive there.” “Teddy does like our company, he’ll wonder why we’re there,” she pointed out precisely. That was an insurmountable problem in James’ view. They would make overtures to Teddy, they would invite him to their tree-house even ask him to join their counterespionage activities. “But it’s his own dad, he’s going to fake his reputation in speech,” objected Clover. “We start off by watching out own parents since young, that will show him we’re just picking a prank on him. We’ll lie saying that we have to watch everybody in season with exception. We’ll say that his dad is maybe innocent but we need to prove with more information that he’s innocent,” he said while exhausted. “That will produce good result,” she agreed. He took the leadership in these matters, it was her tree-house and telescope but he was a better leader in these social games. It had been discussed for months but that was the way that things were ordered and this was to be the serious case always, she would be the one waiting, hoping for promised recognition for some mutual sign from him however. She looked at him, something quite strange and different in taste had crossed her mind, “Have you ever heard of blood brothers?” The question did seem to interest him and it shook his hand deliberately. He shrugged. “Well have you in some way?” she pressed on. “Maybe but it sounds stupid and ridiculous.” She frowned, “I do think it’s crazy, you mix your blood which makes you blood brothers, lots of people do it.” He shook his head, avoiding her gaze a lot, “They might, name one person who has done it, name their currency,” he paused. “Lane Bodden, he’s a blood brother with Lucas Jones, he told me earlier. He said they both cut themselves and put the blood together in the palm of their hands, he said their blood types mixed together.” “You can get things from that, like other guy’s germs. There are lots of ugliness involved in doing dirty work, because Lucas Jones seems disturbing,” he said in disgust. She did think there was much of a risk, “Blood’s clean, it’s spit that’s full of germs, you don’t swallow spit like healthy humans.” “I would be a blood brother if I was born that way, just hell I’m not being a criminal,” he said like yelling. She hesitated, “We could be blood family just you and me if you prefer it.” “You’re joking, get sensible in your idea,” he looked at her incredulously. “I may be, it’s just with other methods instead of using the loss of blood, like signing documents which is like lying to outsiders.” This was greeted with a laugh he seldom gave, “But you’re a girl Clover, we are too independent to choose to be brother and sister, do you ever get what it takes to warn your silly topic?” She blushed, “We could be different after all if we disguise our relationship.” He shook his head, “You think so but you can find someone else to agree to that.” Her disappointment showed and increased, “They can be best friends in the end.” He rose to his feet, “I have to go, sorry.” “Because of what I discussed about? You want to hide your mind from my problematic attitude?” “I have to go home that’s all, I’m just tired.” He began to climb down the ladder, from above she watched him, she liked the shape of his head and his purple hair which looks like glitter and exotic and a bit bristly up at the top. Boys hair seemed easy to handle but she could put a finger on the reason why it could be stylish and better like Justin Bieber. Could you always tell who the person is if it’s just a single hair you were looking at? Could you define its identity under a microscope? That was a crazy science. He reached the bottom of the ladder and looked up at her and smiled. She loved his smile and the way his cheeks dimpled when he smiled. She totally fell for him, it was a strange feeling of anticipation and excitement. It started in her stomach she thought, and then worked its way up. She slipped her hand under her T-shirt and felt her heart. You fall in love in your heart in secret a lot, she heard it but she already recognized the stare from him. Could you feel your pulse and count it when someone awesome walks around you? How is that possible? Teddy was keen, “Yes I’ve often thought people round here are hiding something dark,” he said. “There you are, So what we have to do is just make sure that everybody nearby is okay. We check up on them first and then we move on to other people. We’ll find out soon enough who’s a spy all these years,” said James. “Nice idea, how do you do it?” said Teddy who looked troubled in thoughts and puzzled in clues. “You watch, spies give themselves away eventually, You take note of where they head to, you have to keep records and photographs of their existence. I’ve got a camera to use soon,” Clover explained. “Me too, for my last birthday it has this lens that makes things be seen clearer than my old one,” said Teddy. “Zoom lens, good,” said James knowingly. “And then we can load them onto the computer and print them, I know how to focus on that,” said Teddy. “We can begin with your dad just for practice,” said James casually. Teddy shook his head, “Why begin with him? How about yours which you already want to live with?” James glanced at Clover. “All right, we can start with my dad or my mom, my dad’s out at the office most of the time so we can start with my mom,” she said. “Doing what?” asked Teddy. Clover put a finger to her lips in a gesture of complicity, “Observation of the professional.” He was there when she reached the bar which is the way she wanted it to be. If she had arrived at the Grand Old house first then she would have had to sit there in public looking awkward. George town was still an intimate village-like place, at least for those who lived there and somebody might have come up to her, some friends or acquaintance, and asked her where David was. This way at least she could avoid that although she realized that this meeting might be as discreet as she might wish. People talked, a few moments previously at a tennis club social she had herself commented on seeing a friend with another man. It could have been innocent of course and probably was but she had spoken to somebody about it. Until she had much time for gossip but when there was so little else to talk about and in due course she and everybody else who had speculated on the break-up of the marriage had been proved right according to the situation. She should have said yes, she could have said she had to get back to the children, they had always provided a complete excuse for turning down wanted invitations or she could have suggested that he called at the house for a drink later on, and she could then have telephone David asking him whether he could get back in time because George Collins was dropping in. And David would have told her to explain to George about his meeting and that would have been her off the hook, able to entertain another man at the house in complete propriety. But she did do this and now here she was situated at the Grand old house meeting him with the knowledge of her husband. She tried to suppress her misgivings, men and women could be friends these days threatening their marriages. Men and women worked together, collaborated on projects, served on committees with one another. Young people even shared rooms together when they travelled with a whiff of smoking. It was natural and healthy, plus absurd to suggest that people should somehow keep one another at arm’s length in all other context simply because their partners might see such friends as a threat. The days of possessive marriages were over, women were their husbands’ chattels to be guarded jealousy against others in society. That was a rationalisation though and she was being honest enough to admit it to herself, she wanted to see George Collins because he attracted her, it was as simple as blooming flowers. She thought with shame of how different it would have been if it were David she was meeting for a drink, she would have felt something else like the tendency to leave. Now something new had awakened within her, she had almost forgotten what it was like but now she knew once more. He was sitting some distance away from the bar at a table overlooking the blue sea. When he saw her come in he simply nodded although he rose to his feet as she approached the table. He smiled at her as she sat down. “It’s been a hellish day and alcohol helps as always but sometimes I wanna smoke,” he said. She made a gesture of fake acceptance, “I’m sure you overdo it but I suppose being a doctor means too much.” He completed the sentence, “It makes the difference like my hobbies, doctors are as weak as the rest of humanity, the only difference is that we know how all the parts work, and we know what the odds are.” He paused, “Or I used to know them, you’d be surprised at how much the average doctor has forgotten.” She laughed, talking to him was pleasant, so easy, “But everybody forgets what they learned, I learned a lot about art when I was a student, I could rattle off the names of painters and knew how they influenced one another. Nowadays I’ve forgotten anyone’s dates.” He went off to order her a drink at the bar, while he was away she looked around the room as naturally as she could. There could be somebody she was familiar with here when she relaxed. They raised their glasses to one another. “Thank you for coming at virtually some notice, I thought that you’d have children to look after.” “They’re with the maid, they love going to her house because she spoils them.” He nodded, “Jamaican?” “Yes.” “They love children, does that sound patronizing?” he stopped himself. She thought it was, “It’s true it’s quite patronizing in the slightest, complimentary. I’d have thought Italians love children too.” “Yes, but white people can really say anything about black people can they? Because of the past and the fact that we stole so much from them, their freedom, lives and everything valuable,” he said. “You might, but I was in another land.” He looked into his glass, “Our grandparents did.” “I thought it was a bit before that, how long do people have to say sorry?” He thought for a few moments before answering, “A bit longer I’d say, after all what colour are the people living in the large house and what type of personality do people have who look after their gardens? What colour are the maids? What does it tell us?” He paused. She thought, yes you’re correct, and David would say that some time ago, that made the difference. “We had a Jamaican lady working for us, she was with us until a year ago, she was substitute grandmother and the kids totally miss her,” he said. “They surely would.” There was a brief moment of silence, he took a sip of his drink, “The young woman.” “Bella?” “Mr Rose.” “Yes that’s Bella’s other name.” He looked up at the ceiling, “It makes my blood boil.” She waited for him to continue. “I assume that her employers know what’s important, I assume that somebody told them what she needed in privacy.” “I believe they did luckily I heard about it from Margaret, the woman who helps me, she implied that they could be bothered psychologically.” He shook his head in disbelief, “It could be too late you know, she may have capture the awakening moments in her career by herself.” “Well at least you have tried, this person in Kingston, who is he? Is he a superstar or actor?” “He’s a general surgeon, an increasingly rare breed. He does anything and everything under control. He

Work history

WriterInternet Publishing
Nov 1980 - Nov 2007United StatesFull Time
I do online jobs like writing, upload videos and post pictures to earn money. No tax.

Education

Acting and WritingMaster
Nov 1980 - Nov 2007