Maggie Gee - My Cleaner

“Vanessa, Justin will take care of himself.” Mary Tendo is laughing, softly.

“Thank you, dear Mary, for everything.”

“For everything. It’s OK, Vanessa.”

On the swell of relief, Vanessa longs to be generous. She takes a deep breath before she speaks. “Oh, and Mary. I received a letter — a letter came from my friend the agent. The Christmas post is very bad. I think you may have, uh, accidentally included some of your writing with my students’…Of course it was a surprise to me. I would have encouraged you with your writing, but you didn’t tell me. Which is a pity. But in any case, the agent liked it.”

“The agent liked it. What did she say?”

“She said it was vivid. Really, you know, very promising, Mary. She definitely liked it.” For some reason, Vanessa finds this hard to say. “It was one of a few she especially picked out. And this, my dear, is a very good agent.”

“And will she sell it?” asks Mary Tendo, calmly.

“It’s early days, but who knows, maybe.”

“Who knows, maybe,” Mary laughs. “Thank you, Vanessa. We will see. First I will have to finish my book. I am tired now, Vanessa. I have to sleep.”

“Mary, the agent would like to meet you. And I–I would like to come and see you in Uganda.”

“Ah, in Uganda. Goodbye, Vanessa.”

Vanessa puts the phone down, and passes the news of their safe arrival on to Lucy.

She stands lightly brooding, looking out of the window at two sparrows skirmishing over a nut. She had thought Mary would be more excited. Why wasn’t she dazzled by the thought of an agent? Why wasn’t she, well, just slightly more grateful?

In fact, Mary is sitting in Vanessa’s front room with her feet up on the sofa, singing softly. The agent liked it. She especially liked it. She picked it out from the bazungu students. Mary finds she is singing herself to sleep. She holds Justin’s blanket against her chest. Even the mightiest eagle, she thinks, can sometimes come down from the treetops to rest.

“Are you all right, Mary? Oh, you’re singing. What did Mum have to say to you?”

“Nothing important. Just…something nice.”

“Mary, stop being mysterious. You know that I know all about you.”

“Not everything, Justin. You are still young. I know things you can never imagine.” She smiles at him. “Now, go to Zakira’s.”

Mary Tendo

Today is Christmas Day. It is a great day. The snow is still falling like mist in London. I think the sun is shining on Kampala. Soon we are going home to Uganda. God has smiled on his servant, Mary. Katonda Mulundi . He is really good.

£3,005.75! I have earned myself a small fortune. In every way I have been successful. There is a firm bulge of money under my carpet. I have counted it with my friend Charles, and we smiled as we reached £1,000, then £2,000, but the number kept rising, and when we got to £3,000,1 whooped with joy and danced on the landing. Over nine million Ugandan shillings! Soon the money will fly back with us to Kampala.

Before Vanessa returns, in three days, I shall be gone. She will learn to be a grandmother on her own. She is very lucky. Her grandson is a wonder. He looks a little like Trevor, and a little like Justin, and a lot like Zakira, except for his hair. And the colour of his skin is like shiny pink roses. He does not look white as old maize, like Vanessa. He is chubby, not skinny. His face is sweet and round. He cries like rain, and then stops in an instant. He does not screech and wail, like his grandmother.

And yet he looks clever, as his grandma does, and he has little bandy legs, like her, and busy, wriggly hands and ringers. Soon he will be playing with his mother’s amber necklace, which his father used to wear, when he was lonely. I think that the baby will make Vanessa happy. For the moment they call him Abdul Trevor. (I hope it is a joke; it is a very silly name. But the baby will make them more sensible.) Justin says they will welcome his mother home. Zakira will cook a big meal for her. Little Abdul Trevor will entertain her. Vanessa too shall have her party.

I am happy for her, since yesterday. For God has smiled on his servant, Mary. I have been blessed, I am full to the brim.

My happiness makes me want to sing, although I know I have a squawking voice, worse than mouse-birds squabbling in the mango tree. And it makes me want to shout, and then I shush myself.

I am so lucky I am almost afraid. The last shall be first, the least have most. I thought my fruit had returned to dust. Now I have been blessed, I have been renewed. Katonda anjagalanyo . Praise God!

Something I am holding safe under my rib-cage. Something that makes me hug myself, hard, and yet I must be gentle with myself.

It is almost too precious to share with anyone, although Charles knows, and his eyes became moist, something I had never seen before. He brushed the wet away, and said it was a fly. But he could not speak, and he kissed my belly.

And now I must get up, and walk around the house, this big strange house I have been living in, with its books, and its pictures, and its piles of paper, its dust, and its shadows, and its photographs, its heavy old radiators making the air warm, because the sun does not shine on England. I walk around, and I think about it all. I walk upstairs, slowly, and down again. I walk into Vanessa’s sitting room. There are so many Christmas cards, maybe a hundred, although Vanessa does not have many friends, but these people are so rich that to send a card is nothing, and perhaps these people do not really like her.

Today I like her. Today I nearly love her, although it might be different if she were here. But if she were here, I would have to tell her, and I am almost sure that Vanessa would kiss me, as she did at the airport, when I did not expect it, and I know I hugged her, as the planes flew over. When we do not think, we like each other. And maybe thinking does not always matter.

I have discovered why I felt sick before. When I came to England, I was already pregnant.

I was not being poisoned by the air of London.

I was not being poisoned by Vanessa.

I, Mary Tendo, am pregnant again .

My friend the accountant is kind and clever, though he is no good at family planning (but he just smiles and says the condom was faulty, and it is true that many condoms are faulty in Kampala). It was he who noticed that my body was different, that my nipples were larger, that I had a new belly. And then we found a chemist, the only chemist still open in this part of London, and bought the test, which was very expensive, but worth each penny, since it told us good news.

My friend the accountant is completely happy. “How many shall we have? Three, four?”

He doesn’t understand that one is a miracle. It is a world of change: from nothing to something. It is the future, leading us out of the past.

And there is something else that he does not understand. “Now you will no longer think about Jamie.” Of course, he says this because he loves me. He wants me to think about him and the baby.

I do think about them, and my heart swells with joy, but still, every day, I think about Jamie. I shall think about Jamie every day of my life. Till I know where he is, I shall carry him with me.

I have sent Charles to the kitchen to check on the chicken. He is very pleased that I’m cooking a chicken. Perhaps he thinks I have killed it for him. But in fact I took it from Vanessa’s freezer.

We are watching the television together. Soon we are going to see the Queen. It is a long time since I have seen her. Perhaps she will be thin and small, like Vanessa.

It is Christmas Day. It is the best day. It is the first of many great days. I took my friend the accountant to church, and we sat together, and looked at the stable, and he was happy because of the baby. “Mary, we will call him our English baby.”