Lime Tree Can't Bear Orange by Amanda Smyth

Author:Amanda Smyth [Smyth, Amanda]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 978-0-307-46065-3
Publisher: Crown/Archetype
Published: 2009-10-19T04:00:00+00:00

THAT NIGHT, THERE was a party in one of the little houses at the back of the estate. There were a lot of candles burning in the yard as it was dark and there was no moon. Dolly’s son had returned from Sande Grande with his new wife and baby. Everyone who worked on the estate was there. I recognized some of the workers and they were friendly enough. Aunt Sula introduced me as her niece-from-Port-of-Spain. Cedar stood stiff as a post in front of me and in a stern voice said, “Good night.” She stepped forward. “We have the same name.”

“No, mine is Celia. Yours is Cedar like the tree.”

Then she bowed like a tree, bowing in the wind.

“You’re Sula’s daughter.”

“No, Cedar, I’m her niece.”

Later, I watched her tie a white sheet around her shoulders and fly around the yard chasing the younger children like a ghoul. When they screamed Dolly clapped her hands and shouted, “Ce-daaaaar!”

There was a large pot of stew that someone said was agouti. I had never eaten agouti before and the meat was tender. There was curried turtle, which reminded me of curried beef. Aunt Sula said they must have caught it up at Grande Riviere. There was breadfruit, trays of buttery dasheen, large bowls of rice and peas. After we had eaten, someone started hitting drums and there was singing from one of the women. She had a deep, rolling voice that sounded like it came from under the ground. I wasn’t sure I liked it. But then the music changed and people started clapping and singing songs more like the ones I knew in church.

I didn’t expect to see Joseph Carr Brown. He arrived after dinner, with Shadow, and a bottle of sorrell wine which he gave to Dolly’s son. He patted the young man on his back. “To wet the baby’s head,” I heard him say. “Mrs. Carr Brown sent this,” and he gave him something, which I later learned was a christening gown.

Aunt Sula told me that Joseph Carr Brown had helped Dolly with a small loan to send her son to study in San Fernando. “That’s how the boy come to be an engineer,” she said. “Mr. Carr Brown help a lot of people. His heart big like Trinidad.”

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