Continental Drift полностью

Suddenly, they hear from the other side of the house the sound of a car, loud and blatting, a car without a muffler approaching the house rapidly, bumping across rocks and ruts and coming to an abrupt stop. A door slams, a man shouts, a harsh, loud voice that carries no sense to Vanise and Claude but is filled with the sound of anger and impatience. Robbie! Where de fuck you at, mon? Come get you out here, mon! You goddamn bumba-clot, me gwan tan you hide, mon! Then silence again, until the front door squeaks open and is flung shut, and the man hollers again, this time from inside the house. Robbie! Lazy sonofabitch! Me cyan leave dis house a minute widdout trouble.

Vanise and Claude do not move. They hear the sounds of someone rummaging through the house, hear pans clatter behind them, then silence. A moment passes, and the screened door at their backs opens, bangs against them, forcing them quickly off the short stoop, and when they turn, they face a large, coal-black man, balding on top, with a thick, bristly gray mustache and wearing a bright green safari shirt and khaki trousers. He puts his fisted hands on his hips and stares down at them. His large brown eyes are covered with a film, as if behind a pane of yellow glass, and several shiny scars lie across his cheeks and upper arms, raised and thick, like serpents. Vanise sees the cross-eyed dog peer across the yard at the man and flop its thin tail against the dusty ground.

Wal, now. Who dis? The man’s voice is low and comes rumbling from his chest, and he smiles with the expression of a man who has unexpectedly won a small prize. His two front teeth are rimmed in gold, his wide, full lips shiny like his scars.

Vanise and Claude examine the ground at their feet. The dog gnaws at the hambone, hurriedly now.

You Robbie’s woman?

Vanise knows he is speaking to her; she looks up and says nothing. The baby has awakened and turns uneasily in her arms.

C’mon, gal, talk to me. Where Robbie at? Him send you over here to say him sick again? Ras-clot, dat mon, me cyan deal wid him no more! Him s’posed to work dat patch by de salt flats, an’ me check him all day, an’ him never show once, lazy, simple sonofabitch. You tell him, sister, you tell him find himself another job. Me cyan deal wid him no more.

The man turns and swings open the screened door, stops and looks back at the woman. G’wan, now, nothin’ more to say. Go home, sister, and tell Robbie him fired.

Vanise stands there in silence, looking away from the man, waiting.

What your name, gal?

She says nothing, shifts her weight and looks down at her baby’s face. The man lets go of the screened door and takes a step toward her. For several seconds he studies the people before him, a young and pretty black woman with a baby in her arms, and a boy, and two baskets on the ground.

Suddenly, he smiles broadly. He knows everyone in town, practically everyone on the whole island, and he’s never seen this woman before, or the boy. He drives a taxi between the landing strip in Bottle Creek and the Whitby Hotel, and he moves around the island a lot, and these faces are new to him. They are strangers’ faces. You one of dem Haitians, dat’s what. Putting out his hand, he places it heavily on her narrow shoulder and says loudly into her face, Haytee? You from Hay-tee, gal? He removes his paw from her shoulder and turns to Claude. Hay-tee? C’mon, bwoy, you can tell me. Me nagwan do you no harm, bwoy. Me a fren, he says, pointing to his beefy chest. Me like Hay-shuns! Sonofabitch, fucking Haitians, dem, dey cyan understan’ English, even. Then to Vanise, Hay-tee, gal?

She nods her head slowly up and down. Haiti.