A little English education can be a dangerous thing. Alsana's favourite example of this was theold tale of Lord Ellenborough, who, upon taking the Sind province from India, sent a telegram ofonly one word to Delhi: peccavi, a conjugated Latin verb, meaning I have sinned. "The English arethe only people," she would say with distaste, 'who want to teach you and steal from you at thesame time." Alsana's mistrust for the Chalfens was no more or less than that.

　　Clara agreed but for reasons that were closer to home: a family memory; an unforgotten trace ofbad blood in the Bowdens. Her own mother, when inside her mother (for if this story is to be told,we will have to put them all back inside each other like Russian dolls, Irie back in Clara, Clara backin Hortense, Hortense back in Ambrosia), was silent witness to what happens when all of a suddenan Englishman decides you need an education. For it had not been enough for Captain CharlieDurham recently posted to Jamaica to impregnate his landlady's adolescent daughter one drunkenevening in the Bowden larder, May 1906. He was not satisfied with simply taking her maidenhood.

　　He had to teach her something as well.

　　The? He wan' teach me?" Ambrosia Bowden had placed her hand over the tiny bump that wasHortense and tried to look as innocent as possible. "Why he wan' teach me?""Tree times a week," replied her mother. "An' don' arks me why. But Lord knows, you could dowid some improvin'. Be tankful for gen' russ-ity. Dere is not required whys and wherefores when ahan sum upright English gentleman like Mr. Durham wan' be gen' russEven Ambrosia Bowden, a capricious, long-legged, maga village-child who had not seen aschoolroom in all of her fourteen years, knew this advice was mistaken. When an Englishmanwants to be generous, the first thing you ask is why, because there is always a reason.

　　"You still here, pickney? "Im wan' see you. Don' let me spit pon de floor and make you get updere before it dry!"So Ambrosia Bowden, with Hortense inside her, had dashed up to the Captain's room andreturned there three times a week thereafter for instruction. Letters, numbers, the bible, Englishhistory, trigonometry and when that was finished, when Ambrosia's mother was safely out of thehouse, anatomy, which was a longer lesson, given on top of the student as she lay on her back,giggling. Captain Durham told her not to worry about the baby, he would do no damage to it.

　　Captain Durham told her that their secret child would be the cleverest Negro boy in Jamaica.

　　As the months flicked by, Ambrosia learnt a lot of wonderful things from the handsome captain.

　　He taught her how to read the trials of Job and study the warnings of Revelation, to swing a cricketbat, to recite "Jerusalem'. How to add up a column of numbers. How to decline a Latin noun. Howto kiss a man's ear until he wept like a child. But mostly he taught her that she was no longer amaidservant, that her education had elevated her, that in her heart she was a lady, though her dailychores remained unchanged. In here, in here, he liked to say pointing to somewhere beneath herbreastbone, the exact spot, in fact, where she routinely rested her broom. A maid no more,Ambrosia, a maid no more, he liked to say, enjoying the pun.

　　And then one afternoon, when Hortense was five months unborn, Ambrosia sprinted up thestairs in a very loose, disingenuous gingham dress, rapped on the door with one hand, and hid abunch of English marigolds behind her back with the other. She wanted to surprise her lover withflowers she knew wouldremind him of home. She banged and banged and called and called. But he was gone.

　　"Don' arks me why," said Ambrosia's mother, eyeing her daughter's stomach with suspicion.

　　"Im jus' get up and go, on de sudden. Butim leave a message dat he wan' you to be looked after still.

　　He wan' you to go over to de estate quick time and present yourself to Mr. Glenard, a goodChristian gentleman. Lord knows, you could do wid some improvin'. You still here, pickney? Don'

　　let me spit pon de floor andBut Ambrosia was out the door before the words hit the ground.

　　It seemed Durham had gone to control the situation in a printing company in Kingston, where ayoung man called Garvey was staging a printers' strike for higher wages. And then he intended tobe away for three further months to train His Majesty's Trinidadian Soldiers, show them what'swhat. The English are experts at relinquishing one responsibility and taking up another. But theyalso like to think of themselves as men of good conscience, so in the interim Durham entrusted thecontinued education of Ambrosia Bowden to his good friend Sir Edmund Flecker Glenard, whowas, like Durham, of the opinion that the natives required instruction, Christian faith and moralguidance. Glenard was charmed to have her who wouldn't be? - a pretty, obedient girl, willing andable round the house. But two weeks into her stay, and the pregnancy became obvious. Peoplebegan to talk. It simply wouldn't do.

　　"Don' arks me why," said Ambrosia's mother, grabbing Glen and's letter of regret from herweeping daughter, 'maybe you kyan be improved! Maybe 'im don' wan' sin around de house. Youback here now! Dere's nuttin' to be done now!" But in the letter, so it turned out, there was aconsolatory suggestion. "It say here 'im wan' you to go and see a Christian lady call Mrs. Brenton.

　　"Im say you kyan stay wid her."Now, Durham had left instructions that Ambrosia be introduced to the English Anglican Church,and Glenard had suggested the Jamaican Methodist Church, but Mrs. Brenton, a fiery Scottishspinster who specialized in lost souls, had her own ideas. "We are going to the Truth," she saiddecisively when Sunday came, because she did not care for the word 'church'. "You and I and thewee innocent," she said, tapping Ambrosia's belly just inches from Hortense's head, 'are going tohear the words of Jehovah."(For it was Mrs. Brenton who introduced the Bowdens to the Witnesses, the Russellites, theWatchtower, the Bible Tract Society in those days they went under many names. Mrs. Brenton hadmet Charles Taze Russell himself in Pittsburgh as the last century turned, and was struck by theknowledge of the man, his dedication, his mighty beard. It was his influence that made her aconvert from Protestantism, and, like any convert, Mrs. Brenton took great pleasure in theconversion of others. She found two easy, willing subjects in Ambrosia and the child in her belly,for they had nothing to convert from.)The Truth entered the Bowdens that winter of 1906 and flowed through the blood streamdirectly from Ambrosia to Hortense. It was Hortense's belief that at the moment her motherrecognized Jehovah, Hortense herself became conscious, though still inside the womb. In lateryears she would swear on any bible you put in front of her that even in her mother's stomach eachword of Mr. Russell's Millennial Dawn, as it was read to Ambrosia night after night, passed as if byosmosis into Hortense's soul. Only this would explain why it felt like a 'remembrance' to read thesix volumes years later in adult life; why she could cover pages with her hand and quote them frommemory, though she had never read them before. It is for this reason that any root canal of Hortensemust go right to the very beginning, because she was there; she remembers; the events of 14January 1907, the day of the terrible Jamaican earthquake, are not hidden from her, but bright andclear as a bell.

　　"Early will I seek thee.. . My soul thirstethfor thee, my flesh longeth for thee in a dry and thirstyland, where no water is .. ."So sang Ambrosia as her pregnancy reached full term, and she bounced with her huge bulgedown King Street, praying for the return of Christ or the return of Charlie Durham the two menwho could save her so alike in her mind she had the habit of mixing them up. She was halfwaythrough the third verse, or so Hortense told it, when that rambunctious old rum pot Sir EdmundFlecker Glenard, flushed from one snifter too many at the Jamaica Club, stepped into their path.

　　Captain Durham's maid! Hortense recalled him saying, by way of a greeting, and receiving nothingfrom Ambrosia but a glare, Fine day for it, eh? Ambrosia had tried to sidestep him, but he movedhis bulk in front of her once more.

　　So are you a good girl these days, my dear? Gossip informs me Mrs. Brenton has introducedyou to her church. Very interesting, these Witness people. But are they prepared, I wonder, for thisnew mulatto member of their flock?

　　Hortense remembered well the feel of that fat hand landing hot against her mother; sheremembered kicking out at it with all her might.

　　Oh, it's all right, child. The Captain told me your little secret. But naturally secrets have a price,Ambrosia. Just as yams and pimento and my tobacco cost something. Now, have you seen the oldSpanish church, Santa Antonia? Have you been inside? It's just here. It's quite a marvel inside, fromthe aesthetic rather than religious point of view. It will only take a moment, my dear. One shouldnever pass up the opportunity of a link education, after all.

　　Every moment happens twice: inside and outside, and they are two different histories. Outsideof Ambrosia there was much , white stone, no people, an altar peeling gold, little light, smokingcandles, Spanish names engraved in the floor, and a large marble madonna, her head bowed,standing high upon a plinth. All was preternaturally calm as Glenard began to touch her. But inside,there was a galloping heart-beat, the crush of a million muscles that wanted desperately to repelGlenard's attempts at an education, the clammy fingers that even now were at her breast, slippingbetween thin cotton and squeezing nipples already heavy with milk, milk never intended for such arough mouth. Inside she was already running down King Street. But outside Ambrosia was frozen.

　　Rooted to the spot, as feminine a stone as any madonna.

　　And then the world began to shake. Inside Ambrosia, waters broke. Outside Ambrosia, the floorcracked. The far wall crumbled, the stained-glass exploded, and the madonna fell from a greatheight like a swooning angel. Ambrosia stumbled from the scene, making it only as far as theconfessionals before the ground split once more a mighty crack! and she fell down, in sight ofGlenard himself, who lay crushed underneath his angel, his teeth scattered on the floor, trousersround his ankles. And the ground continued to vibrate. A second crack came. And a third. Thepillars fell, half the roof disappeared. Any other afternoon in Jamaica, the screams of Ambrosia, thescreams that followed each contraction of her womb as Hortense pushed out, would have caughtsomebody's attention, brought somebody to her aid. But the world was ending that afternoon inKingston. Everybody was screaming.

　　If this were a fairy-tale, it would now be time for Captain Durham to play hero. He does notseem to lack the necessary credentials. It is not that he isn't handsome, or tall or strong, or that hedoesn't want to help her, or that he doesn't love her (oh, he loves her; just as the English loved Indiaand Africa and Ireland; it is the love that is the problem, people treat their lovers badly) all thosethings are true. But maybe it is just the scenery that is wrong. Maybe nothing that happens uponstolen ground can expect a happy ending.

　　For when Durham returns, the day after the initial tremors, he finds an island destroyed, twothousand already dead, fire inthe hills, parts of Kingston fallen into the sea, starvation, terror, whole streets swallowed up bythe earth and none of this horrifies him as much as the realization that he might never see her again.

　　Now he understands what love means. He stands in the parade ground, lonely and distraught,surrounded by a thousand black faces he does not recognize; the only other white figure is thestatue of Victoria, five aftershocks having turned her round by degrees until she appears to have herback to the people. This is not far from the truth. It is the Americans, not the British, who have theresources to pledge serious aid, three warships full of provisions presently snaking down the coastfrom Cuba. It is an American publicity coup that the British government does not relish, and likehis fellow Englishmen Durham cannot help but feel a certain wounded pride. He still thinks of theland as his, his to help or his to hurt, even now when it has proved itself to have a mind all of itsown. He still retains enough of his English education to feel slighted when he spots two Americansoldiers who have docked without permission (all landings must go through Durham or hissuperiors) standing outside their consulate building, insolently chewing their tobacco. It is a strangefeeling, this powerlessness; to discover there is another country more equipped to save this littleisland than the English. It is a strange feeling, looking out on to an ocean of ebony skins, unable tofind the one he loves, the one he thinks he owns. For Durham has orders to stand here and call outthe names of the handful of servants, butlers and maids, the chosen few the English will be takingwith them to Cuba until the fires die down. If he knew her last name, God knows he would call itout. But in all that teaching, he never learnt it. He never asked.

　　Yet it was not for this oversight that Captain Durham, the great educator, was remembered as afool Irwoy in the annals of the Bowden clan. He found out soon enough where she was; he foundlittle cousin Marlene amongst the throng, and sent her off with a note to the church hall where shehad seen Ambrosia last,singing with the Witnesses, offering thanks for the Judgement Day. While Marlene ran as fast asher ashen legs would carry her, Durham walked calmly, thinking the last act was done, to King'sHouse, the residence of Sir James Swettenham, governor of Jamaica. There he asked him to makean exception for Ambrosia-, an 'educated Negress' he wished to marry. She was not like the others.

　　She must have a place with him on the next outgoing ship.

　　But if you are to rule a land that is not yours, you get used to ignoring exceptions; Swettenhamtold him frankly there were no spaces on his boats for black whores or livestock. Durham, hurt andvengeful, inferred that Swettenham had no power of his own, that the arrival of American ships wasproof of that, and then, as a parting shot, mentioned the two American soldiers he had seen onBritish soil without permission, presumptuous upstarts on land they didn't own. Does the baby goout with the bathwater, demanded Durham, face red as a pillar-box, resorting back to the religion ofpossession that was his birthright, is this not still our country? Is our authority so easily toppled bya few rumbles in the ground?

　　The rest is that terrible thing: history. As Swettenham ordered the American boats to return toCuba, Marlene came running back with Ambrosia's reply. One sentence torn from Job: I will fetchmy knowledge from afar. (Hortense kept the bible it was ripped from and liked to say that from thatday forth no Bowden woman took lessons from anyone but the Lord.) Marlene handed the sentenceto Durham, and ran off into the parade ground happy as a clam, in search of her mother and fatherwho were injured and weak, on their last legs and waiting for the boats like thousands of others.

　　She wanted to tell them the good news, what Ambrosia had told her: It soon come, it soon come.

　　The boats? Marlene had asked, and Ambrosia had nodded, though she was too busy with prayer,too ecstatic to hear the question. It soon come, it soon come, she said, repeating what she had learntfrom Revelation; whatDurham and then Glenard and then Mrs. Brenton had taught her in their different ways; whatthe fire and earth-cracks and thunder attested to. It soon come, she told Marlene, who took her wordfor gospel. A little English education can be a dangerous thing.