“Inez”

by Merle Hodge

(TW: domestic violence, misogyny)

Mrs. Henry was ready to call the police. The children and the dogs had to get breakfast, she

and Henry had to have their coffee, and the confounded1 girl was ten minutes late. And she had

warned her, two years ago when she started, that if she ever came late, every minute would be

deducted from her wages. This was the first time but it would also be her last.

And to think that the facety2 girl had, just the day before, put God out of her thoughts and

asked for an advance on her week’s pay. In the middle of the week!

“Only five dollars, ma’am.”

“Five dollars! But that is half your pay—you can’t get half your pay in the middle of the

week!”

When the clock struck eight, Mrs. Henry was seized with panic. Suppose she had been fool

enough to give her the five dollars! She had no idea where the girl lived, she knew nothing about

her, she would have disappeared like that with her five dollars.

Mrs. Henry now wanted to phone Matilda’s Corner Police Station and report an attempted

robbery.

***

The roll call revealed twelve absences. Praise be, sighed the teacher, God forgive my

thoughts. But see my trial if all fifty-five of them turn up here one morning. And thank you,

Jesus, Carlton didn’t find his way to school today again (forgive me, Lord). He must be in the

Plaza begging for five cents, or his mother must be catch him up there

1
confounded (adj): used for emphasis, especially to express anger or annoyance.
2
facety (adj): feisty, arrogant
yesterday and break his foot (I not wishing in on him, Lord).

But where is Maxine?

Maxine was very rarely absent, or late. She always arrived shining clean, her hair neat, her

uniform well ironed, although it had long lost its colour. Maxine with a wisdom beyond her

years. She was bright, bright, and would learn rapidly, if there was more time to teach her.

Yesterday Maxine had inquired of the teacher whether there was any way she could turn into

a boy.

It was because the Baby-Father had said to her mother that the Last One still didn’t look

much like him, so he wasn’t bringing one cent more, she could get his father to support him, and

furthermore he wasn’t bringing a cent more for Audrey either, though he wouldn’t say it wasn’t

his pickney3, but God strike him dead if he was going to raise any gal-pickney, for gal-pickney

grow into woman, and woman is a curse, don’t the Bible say so? All woman bad like Satan.

So Maxine wanted to turn into a boy as soon as possible.

Afterwards, Miss Williams had gone into the Principal’s office and looked into the records,

just to make sure. But she was not mistaken, Maxine’s date of birth made her seven years old at

her last birthday.

Where was Maxine today? The teacher felt a vague uneasiness. Then her heart sank, oh

God! Suppose…

Maxine had related to her how the Baby-Father had tried to box4 her mother (Maxine wasn’t

too sure why), and how when she picked up the kitchen knife he left, swearing he would bring

the police for her.

3
pickney (noun): child
4
box (verb): hit
 ***

The father of Maxine, Donovan, and Junie had posted his guard at the gate, as usual, for it

was the last day of the month. But the boy had not yet raised the alarm. Almost two hours and his

spar5 Nelson was still on standby, ready to take over his domino hand for him when he would

have to make a hasty exit.

There had been one false alarm. Out of the corner of his eye he had seen the little boy

coming into the yard and had sprung up from the bench--dominoes flying left and right--reached

round the side of the house and dived into Wally’s. But David had only come in to use the toilet.

Malcolm was beginning to relax--maybe the miserable woman wasn’t coming this month to

hold out her hand. How was a man supposed to feed himself and three pickney out of what he

got at the end of the month? He had told her to give the children to the Government, and that was

final. Let the Government feed them, they had money to buy thousand-dollar suit from England

for the Governor-General, so they must can feed the pickney them.

Presently David came back into the yard, reported that the Baby-Mother was still nowhere

in sight, and collected his ten cents.

It was dark now, she never came this late. Nice, thought Malcolm. She must be decide to

rest me. She must be decide to carry the pickney them go give the

Government.

Cho, she no just haffe box-down one of them, break them hand, for police to come charge

her ill-treatment and carry-way the whole of them?

***

5
spar (noun): close friend
 The landlord arrived, punctual as doom. The tenants paid, or tendered their excuses, and Mr.

James was waiting for Inez. It was seven o’clock and none of the tenants had any idea where she

was. The room was empty, and not a single one of her children was to be seen either. The yard

neighbour who kept an eye on them in the daytime had not seen them all day.

Inez owed three months’ rent. The door of the room was not locked. Mr. James opened it

and stood, dejected, looking in. He shook his head wrily6. It was a detestable business, what he

was going to have to do. For if he didn’t, his wife would come down and personally carry out the

operation, and then it would be even more unpleasant.

Mrs. James had no use for sluttish women who spent their lives breeding bastard children

and then expected you to feel sorry for them when they couldn’t pay their debts. She was always

willing to teach them a lesson.

He was all for selling the damn properties so he would never have to walk into a tenement yard

again, stepping over dusty, snotty children to confront the stone-faced hostility of their parents. He

would gladly sell all the properties. But over her dead body.

Now once again they were going to have to evict, seize... seize what? The Klim tin7 sitting

smoky and awry8 in the dead coals? The low, lumpy bed with the deep well in the

middle?

He wished with all his might that Inez could come through the gate this very minute,

bringing even part of the rent; then he could give her some more time--Mrs. James might not

object to that. Otherwise...it was a scene which he had never got used to; each time made him

6
wrily (adverb): in a dry, mocking way (also spelled wryly)
7
Klim tin (noun): a powdered milk container
8
awry (adjective): not in the normal position
years older. A shouting swearing woman, her children screaming, crashing of kitchen utensils,

crowd gathering, police…

***

The nurse on her way out noticed the same silent knot of children still sitting on the bench.

The waiting room was nearly empty now, most of the day’s crowd had been seen to, there were

not many numbers left.

She stepped back and went over to them. The younger ones drew closer round the girl who

sat clutching a paper bag and an empty rum bottle.

“Where is your mother?”

“She soon come, ma’am,” said the girl, without conviction.

“You have a number? One of you sick?”

“No, ma’am.”

“Then what you doing here?”

The children stared, mute. Maxine lowered her eyes. “Don’ know, ma’am,” she whispered.

The nurses fed them, bought them ice-cream, put the two youngest ones to sleep on an

examining table.

When the police came, Nurse Johnson asked one of the officers what they were going to do.

He threw her a glance of part weariness and part scorn as though she asked a naive and

unnecessary question.

“Look for the mother, ma’am,” he explained in a long-suffering voice, “and charge her with

abandonment.”

***
 The dogs had been barking at the edge of the gully9 for a full hour, an ominous,

nerve-racking sound, for it echoed down the gully and from the caves on the other side.

But now there seemed to be another noise that chilled your spine--a long scream or a baby

crying; and now it was all the dogs in the neighbourhood barking, shrieking at the edge of the

gully.

Mrs. Campbell pulled in her children, locked the doors and the windows, and sent the maid

down to the gully to look.

The maid flew back holding her head and screaming. Before she reached the house, Mrs.

Campbell was on the phone to the police.

She lay on the bottom of the gully, face downwards. The Last One lay cosy in the crook of

her dead arm, but he was crying now because his bottle had rolled away from his bottle of

cornmeal and water.

9
gully (noun): a trench which was originally worn in the earth by running water and through which water often runs
after rains; a small valley