Maxine Brown, ContributorMAS JOE'S feathered alarm did its usual ballet point, spread and crowed at four a.m.
It was a good thing the faithful rooster had got over its two-week bout of pip or they would have missed the Saturday market truck. The Rhygine session down at the dead yard in the district, several rounds of white rum, roasted breadfruit, some sprats doused in vinegar, peppers, and onions blended with grater, banjo and flute music until midnight interrupted the pattern of things.
The green Bedford truck laboured uphill; it had already made three stops. Six hands of green bananas, four bamboo baskets secured by crocus and several stalks of cane were stacked and tied on slats overhead.
'Stop, driver, Mas Joe an' Miss Pearl a' come,' one of the sidemen called, thumping on the top of the truck. The passengers, sitting facing backward, leaned forward, then settled as the truck came to a sudden halt. A passenger pulled up Miss Pearl by one hand while Mas Joe pushed her up from the rear, followed by two buckets of blood-red tomatoes separated by newspaper layers, two bags of sweet peppers, and some pears.
Miss Pearl placed herself between her husband and the woman, the one with the fulsome bosom which rested on her high stomach (button holes and buttons under pressure). She thought her husband took too much of an interest in the woman's personal affairs. Sweaters, hats and layers of clothing (some sent by families from England) to ward off the Manchester breeze were the order of the day. Usually there wasn't much talk on the truck; most tried to catch up on sleep.
At Darling Street, trucks from Trelawny, Portland and Falmouth were already lined up by the old train station. The vendors were unloading them when the air was suddenly split by cries of, Thief! Tief! Tieeeef! Tif! The a cappella choir cut through the already noisy atmosphere of the bustling Saturday morning at Coronation Market.
The boy with the blue bag tucked under his arm, in the cut-off jeans and plaid shirt, hurdled over Miss Myrie's wheelbarrow brimming with dewy, freshly-cut callaloo, knocking over a handcart, sending bright-coloured grapefruits rolling like bowling balls past the other vendors' carts stocked with sweet potatoes, long-stalked scallions, freshly cut yams and pumpkins. Poor Sunshine lay dazed on the ground, her stack of phone cards scattered around her.
'Where you going, boy, you no tired fi thief?' Corporal Stone ran behind the zinc fence and held on to the boy.
'Is not me corpie, me no do notin.'
'Whaah, the whole a' me money gaan! A jus' turn me back one minute and res' it right here so and it gaan .... whaah!' Miss Gloria was holding her head. Her blue cotton drawstring bag with her morning sales was missing. 'Is must be the fool-fool boy whey dem always hold fi pick pocket.'
'Anybody see what happen?'
Corporal Stone had taken the boy over the station for a search and was back taking statements.
'Heh, heh, heh.' Milton, who had already downed his third white rum, was rocking to and fro, shaking his forefinger. 'Dat boy a waste time a thief when him coulda sign up for the next Olympics and end up with gold like Asafa Powell or silver like Danny McFarlane; heh, heh, heh.'
Corporal Stone sucked his teeth and passed him. He went over to Nimrod, otherwise known as the 'yam man'. Yellow, white, renta, and Negro, Nimrod had the finest cuts in the market.
'Mi really see when him bend down and pick up something near Miss Gloria stall, then he look over on me and walk away,' the yam man said, turning down his transistor radio which was playing gospel music. 'But through me did busy, and him always a pick up cigarette butt off the ground, I didn't pay it no mind. It coulda him do it still, because him always a pick pocket. Him head not so righted,' Nimrod said.
Miss Myrie, who had nearly lost her callaloo, folded her arms and barely looked back at Corporal Stone, holding his yellow notepad in his bony hand with pen poised. She and her cronies (one of whom was the suspect's grandmother) had taken a dislike to Miss Gloria, whom they thought loved to even up herself and went out of her way to lure the high brow
St. Andrew ladies to her stall.
Before Corporal Stone could open his mouth, Miss Myrie spun around with arms akimbo. 'She too lie, through she know say him always do little pickpocket an' him head come and go. When she claim she miss her money, I see him over Juicy stall a sweep,' she said, pointing.
'Him grandmother always a' tek up for him, say him drop on him head as a little boy and that him suffer from fits,' Lionel, the sno-cone man, said. 'But I think I saw when him brush 'gainst Miss Gloria stall while her back turn. Him swift, you know, Corpie.'
'I wonder if she wants the boy's grandmother to give her back the money,' Miss Lou said.
Miss Lou always tried to speak the Queen's English. She claimed she had wanted to become a teacher, but had got pregnant. When the father left for England and never returned she had to open the little cook shop in the market to send her daughter to school.
'You know, I was wondering where he got the money from all of a sudden. I saw like he was helping Miss Gloria lift a bag with coconuts, then he came over and bought hominy corn, some sprats and hardough bread,' she said, counting the items on her fingers. 'The biggest breakfast he has every bought from me,' Miss Lou told Corporal Stone, raising her eyebrows.
The woman in the long white gown, headwrap and pencil kotched behind her ears lowered her torso and started to wheel and turn. 'No tief no dey, no tief no dey,' she chanted, sprinkling the blue water over the floor near Miss Gloria's stall.
The vendors usually stopped to listen and decipher her message. According to them, the last time she had chanted 'Rolling calf a come, rolling calf a come,' a big rock had rolled off the hill right into Miss Myrie's living room in August Town and smashed her new red velvet-covered settee from Courts.
'Massie Father! Corpie, me very sorry, so sorry. It look like when I bend over to take out the cabbage from the box, my hand bounce off the bag with the money on the ground behind that box,' Miss Gloria said sheepishly.
Corporal Stone went back to the station for the boy. They had found no cash in the bag, only two slices of bread left over from the breakfast he'd bought from Miss Lou's cook shop.
'Then why you badda run, boy?' Sergeant Stone asked.
'Through them say thief, I think is me dem was talking,' the boy lisped.
