SMALL ISLAND (by Andrea Levy)

PROLOGUE (Queenie)

Queenie has three younger siblings. All boys. She seems to be part of a wealthy butcher family.
Queenie thinks she went to Africa as it turns out that she just went to the great British Empire
exhibition in London. The exhibition is the destination for one of the yearly butchers’
association trips. Together with Mum, Dad and two of their workers Emily and Graham they see
a small version of the British Empire: loads of small houses each representing one of the
countries the British had once invaded. Queenie meets an African man, who she is scared of. She
speaks to him, shakes his hand and realizes that he seems to be just like every other human
being. Still, the encounter seems like a strong experience and quite traumatizing for the young
girl.

ONE (Hortense, 1948)

The chapter starts with a flashback to the childhood of a Jamaican woman called Hortense. She
listens to a friend named Celia, telling her about her plans for the future, about what luxury life
she is going to live in a few years in another country, in England. This friend of her never makes
it though. Instead of her, a few years later, in 1948 Hortense is crossing the Atlantic on a big
boat together with a lot of other Jamaican people. She would see her husband Gilbert, he would
be waiting at the dock filled with feelings of longing, as he wrote in a letter. As she arrives
nobody is there to receive her and after waiting for a long time she decides to take a cab to the
address Gilbert mentioned in one of his letters. When Hortense gets there all her expectations of
a happy clean beautiful English life start to crumble as she arrives at a tall shabby house. The
house belongs to a woman called Queenie, Gilbert has a tiny room in that tall house, a dirty
room filled with dust and broken furniture. Even Gilbert is not the man she remembers, he
seems different. She starts to complain about the whole situation as Gilbert tells her to be happy
with such a room in post war times.

TWO (Gilbert, 1948)

More people live in that big house. It is home to male twins called Winston and Kenneth and
another woman named Jean. Gilbert is tired after he finished his twelve hour working shift. It is
morning, six o clock. Now he could go to get his wife from the dock. As he gets there he has to
hear that she will only arrive at seven in the evening. So Gilbert decides he could go home and
tidy up the room a bit. He doesn’t get far and accidentally falls asleep. He misses the time of
Hortense’s arrival and wakes up as she is already stepping into the house. Now there she is, in
his room heavily unsatisfied with how he lives. She complains and complains about everything:
the tiny kitchen and the broken chairs.
His idea of a peeing bucket underneath the bed so he wouldn’t have to go all the way downstairs
to use the toilet absolutely disgusted her.

She keeps on talking that she wouldn’t live like that, she wouldn’t want to live like him, like an
animal, she complains until Gilbert loses his temper.

THREE (Hortense, before)

The book jumps back in time. Back to Hortense’s childhood. Her highly regarded dad is working
for the English government in Great Britain as Hortense gets born by her illiterate mom in a
small wooden hut somewhere in Jamaica. After her mom has to move to Cuba to earn money
Hortense and her mom’s mother go to her dad’s wealthy cousin to raise her there and make
sure that she becomes a lady of class. She grows up together with Michael, the son of Mr Philip
and Miss Ma. For her whole childhood she has to learn how a woman behaves, help in the house,
watch her manners and never make her clothes dirty, while Michael always wants her to play
with him in the garden. One day they have to go separate ways. Michael moves on to a boarding
school to become an educated man while Hortense stays home and has to leave school in order
to assist in a wealthy private school for younger children, which is run by a couple called the
Ryders. Michael occasionally comes to visit: his voice broke and he seems to be a knowledgeable
young man with character, a man that starts questioning his authoritative dad, which leads Mr
Philip to stop speaking to him. He is an adult now, a man that Hortense has feelings for. It seems
like Michael feels similar towards Hortense: when he is home he always companies her on the
way to school and back, arm in arm. Until one day Hortense finds out that Michael did all this
pretending „I-care-for- you" business just in order to see Mrs Ryder at school. He always just
called her Stella, her first name, a manner Hortense always found quite strange but never really
questioned. But that one day a hurricane breaks out and Mrs Ryder, Michael and Hortense seek
shelter together in the school building. To the question where Mrs Ryder left her husband
Hortense gets no answer. During the hurricane Mrs Ryder and Michael sit too close to each
other romantic, arm in arm. Hortense fills up with jealousy and anger and as soon as the
hurricane is over she runs outside as she has to discover a big crowd of people looking for Mrs
Ryder to show her what they have found: the devastating dead body of Mr Ryder. Just the
hurricane that killed him? Was it an accident? Hortense wonders. After telling the crowd where
Mrs Ryder is the whole married woman and young man affair comes out and makes Michael’s
parents furious and ashamed. Mrs Ryder leaves the island a few days after to move somewhere
far away, for her own good. Michael disappears from one day to another to England in order to
join the RAF, without telling Hortense a single word about it.

FOUR (Hortense, before)

Soon also Hortense’s time comes to leave home. Mr Philip and Mrs Ma seem not to care about
her moving somewhere else, it feels like they just forgot about her. The only person who waves
her goodbye, as she leaves in order to attend a teaching trainee school in Kingston, is her
grandmother Mrs Jewel.
The time in Hortense’s new school is quite intense: strict rules, cold showers, high academic
pressure and loads of not-listening kids in her practice classes.

The only thing which eases her day a bit is a third year trainee called Celia, she takes Hortense
under her wings, tells her that is important to go to breakfast first in order to get the best hot
chocolate and gossip with her about the authoritative teachers, Eventually they become good
friends.

Celia is quite concerned about all the young man going to war for England, she knits them loads
of warm woollen socks and tells Hortense it would be very important that these men have warm
feet. That they give their best in war to prevent that Hitler invades England and eventually
brings back slavery, which the dark skinned Celia is very scared of. One day the two friends go
to town together.

As soldiers pass by ready to depart for England suddenly Celia’s mom turns up, confused and
thinking one of the young men would be Celia’s dad, her husband who once was a soldier too.  
She runs up to the fellow and gives him a warm intense hug, which lasts until Celia and Hortense
put a lot of effort and force into dragging her away. Eventually the two girls manage to bring her
back into Celia’s aunt’s house, where she lives, unable to care for herself.  

Hortense gets called into the headmaster’s office. She is scared of being punished for breaking
the rules when she shouted and spit in public the previous day as she tried to help Celia to
control her mom. She feels relief as the intimidating welsh woman hands her a letter, which
according to her concerns Michael Roberts, the man Hortense grew up with. Her excitement of
hearing from Michael for the first time since he had left for the RAF, soon turns into deep grief
as she reads that Michael went missing.

FIVE (Hortense, before)

Hortense jumps back into the past, the past when Michael was still there.  She remembers
running after him as he rode a bicycle to a riot. It got quite violent there until the man who she
thought was Michael saved her from a through the air flying chair and carried her away. She
always just saw the man from the back until he finally turned around and Hortense gets a big
shock as she had to realize that that man was a stranger, he was not Michael. She is thinking all
that while she sits on the dock seeing former soldiers coming back from England. Waiting and
waiting for Michael who never arrives. What would he be doing now, where would he be?
Hortense wonders.

SIX (Hortense, before)

Teaching at the Church of England school in Kingston was always one of Hortense’s big dreams,
which falls apart after an interview with the school’s headmaster. Reason for not accepting her
is the education level and living standard of her mom, which makes her not worthy enough for
teaching the school’s light skinned high class girls. So Hortense has to be satisfied with being
employed in a low class parish school, the same place Celia, her trainee friend works at too.
Hortense now lives with a family called the Andersons, a place that she hates. Strange people
without manners she describes her host family to Celia.

Celia keeps talking and talking about her boyfriend, an RAF man, who would soon take her to
England for a better life. Hortense decides she really wants to meet this guy who would take her
friend to the other end of the world. So one day they get to know each other.

Hortense is shocked when she realizes that Celia’s boyfriend was the same guy who once
carried her away from the riot, a guy called Gilbert. A guy who talks and talks, who makes jokes
and is the only person laughing at them. As Gilbert starts talking about taking Celia to England
on the very next boat Hortense begins to wonder about who would take on all of Celia’s duties if
she would leave so soon. She asks Celia if she would have to take care of her confused mom. As
Hortense notices that Gilbert seems to know nothing about her mom’s state she starts
explaining. While Hortense talks Celia seems to feel quite uncomfortable and after she finishes
she whacks Hortense on the head and runs away crying.

SEVEN (Hortense, before)

Quite strangely, without any explanation Gilbert and Celia are not together anymore. And now
Hortense somehow took her friend's place and is going to marry Gilbert. Being together for five
days they decide to organize a wedding, a tiny ceremony in the local parish church. Hortense is
filled with excitement, excitement about a dream that Gilbert would make come true for her: an
English life in the mother country. He would sail there alone to make sure he had a nice place to
live, before asking Hortense to come after. The only problem was the money for the boat, Gilbert
had none. Hortense lend him some, convinced it would lead to a better life for her.

EIGHT (Hortense, before)

Six months pass by. Gilbert and Hortense have been writing letters and now decide that it would
be the right time for her to sail after. The port is far from the Anderson’s house so Hortense
decides to stay somewhere close to the sea to catch her boat in the early morning. She happens
to spend her last night in Jamaica with an old friendly lady who cooks for her and is rather
worried about Gilbert cheating on his wife after Hortense had told her that he had been there
alone for six months.

NINE (Queenie, 1948)

These blackies, they all come to live on our expenses, Mr Todd says, Queenie’s neighbour. He is
desperate about all those coloured people living in his street, ruining his home. He wishes,
Queenie’s husband would finally come home to set an end to all of that. Queenie wouldn’t have
anything against that she misses her husband too, still not knowing where he is, even though the
war office had ensured her they would have returned him from the RAF. Was that true? Did he
leave her? Was he even still alive? Queenie wondered.

The whole neighbourhood is complaining about Queenie’s international lodgers. Some wonder
if she is actually the respectable woman they thought she would be, while a former friend of her
just moves out, she couldn’t bear the appearance of black people in her street anymore.

TEN (Hortense, 1948)

Hortense spends her first night in England. She in bed. Gilbert in the broken armchair. She hates
this little room: having to watch your husband undress, being watched by your husband as you
undress and then in the middle of the night getting woken up by the noise of tiny rat feet above
the ceiling. While she is shocked by those things Gilbert seems to be used to them.

ELEVEN (Gilbert, before)

How did the British built empires if they only eat that water boiled tasteless grey stuff? Gilbert
had been in the RAF for a few days when he and his Jamaican friends are missing their fried up
spicy food a lot. They’re really pleased when they finally get to an American military camp for
war preparation.

Good food, sport courts and even a cinema is there on the campus open for being used. Gilbert
and his friends are able to live together with white soldiers as if they were the same. But just
because Jamaica is under British rule.

It is different with the American black people, they would behave like hungry animals, the
Officer tells them. Still during their whole stay at the camp the Jamaican RAF volunteers are not
allowed to step a foot into town, they might disturb the white Americans there. Why is he
fighting for this racist British? Gilbert wondered. What he’d heard of this Mr Hitler sounded
worse though. That’s why he would fight, Gilbert decides he would fight with the so called
„colony troops “to prevent Hitler from invading his country. Gilbert is very pleased when they
finally leave the restricted camp in Virginia to go across the sea for England, to fight.

TWELVE (Gilbert, before)

England sucks, Gilbert decides after a few days. Running outside the whole day.  Freaking cold
and no proper jacket to wear.

Having an asshole as a sergeant, who you can’t even argue with because you’re not white.
Sharing your sleeping space with four other men. The walls are thin, the windows leaky and it is
freezing. When you go into town, kids make fun of you, people asking if you are able to speak
English, if you come from Africa. And you are fighting for this state, this country full of people
who don’t even know that Jamaica is a country, people who look at you ungratefully like you’re
an animal.

THIRTEEN (Gilbert, before)

As somebody tells Gilbert’s favourite sergeant that he knows how to deal with cars, he gets
turned into a driver instead of the promised air engineer. Gilbert had learned how to drive when
he was ten. His dad was always drunk and didn’t manage to bring enough money home to keep
Gilbert, his mother and his other eight siblings alive. So together with his aunt his mom decided
to start a cake business. An idea which happened to be very successful. Their products very
super popular and known by people as the best cakes of Jamaica. His seven sisters helped to
bake in the kitchen while Gilbert and his brother were responsible for delivering to the
customers.

FOURTEEN (Gilbert, before)

Gilbert is driver now, driver and coal shoveler. One day he complains to his CO about that dirty
job as he gets offered to travel to the US base in order to collect some parts they always produce
for the British, sounds quite comfortable. As he reaches his destination there are no parts to
pick up. The American soldiers tell him that somebody came already to get them. But as he
listens to a quiet conversation next door he gets to know the real reason: they didn’t want to
give Gilbert the delivery because of his skin colour. So he has to return without success.

A long drive through the night accompanied by two black US soldiers who asked Gilbert for a lift
to some town on his way. On the ride they told him about the crazy American colour separation
rules. You always have to watch out in which town you are going. Some were for white soldiers,
others for the black ones.

You didn’t want to go into the wrong one, unless you were looking for trouble. As Gilbert tells
them that he shares his sleeping space with white people his two US friends wouldn’t close their
gaping mouth anymore.

FIFTEEN (Gilbert, before)

The man is still there. He followed Gilbert for ages. He couldn’t believe that he’s still there. As
they get into a cornfield Gilbert suddenly turns around and asks the man what he would want of
him. The guy looks a bit crazy, it seems like he isn’t able to talk and instead of a reply he hands
Gilbert a piece of paper which asks to bring him to some close by farm.

A pretty woman named Queenie Bligh opens the door and thank him for bringing back her
confused father in law. After joking around a bit and making the young woman laugh she invites
Gilbert inside to have a cup of tea with her.
SIXTEEN (Gilbert, before)

„ When you’re going back to the jungle?” some people shout across the street as Gilbert
suddenly spots a familiar face: it was Queenie, looking for her father in law. Again.

He invites her into a tea shop. Sitting in there they are watched by three US soldiers who turn
crazy because of how nice this white woman treats that black man.

At once Gilbert sees Queenie’s father in law outside on the street. So they are about to leave the
shop when the three Americans block the door. The waitress calls for the soldiers. Their food
would be ready. They go back to their table and Gilbert is able to leave the shop without getting
punched in the face. Queenie decides she would go to see the pictures together with her father
in law Arthur. Gilbert accompanies them. 

SEVENTEEN (Gilbert, before)

When they enter the picture house an employee tells Gilbert he would have to go to the back
where all the other coloured people are seated. As he refuses soon a big mess bursts out. Black
and white GIs first just screaming at each other. Then they start to punch and fight until
everybody has to leave the cinema. Out on the streets the situation calms down until the
American War Police arrives to heat the whole thing up again when they suddenly hear a
gunshot. As Gilbert curiously follows the noise he soon sees a big crowd of people surrounding a
US GI with a gun and the dead body of Arthur, Queenie’s father in law. Why did he shoot him?
Nobody knows.

EIGHTEEN (Gilbert, before)

The war had ended but Gilbert had to wait two years until he eventually finds a boat to bring
him back to Jamaica. When he arrives there all his siblings are gone. Off to do a job for good
money in some other countries. And his mom and aunty are about to go on a trip to visit them.
Gilbert wants to go and study law as the government promised him he would be able to once the
war had ended.  When he goes to the British to make their promise come true they just laugh at
him and offer him a job as a bread baker instead.

Clueless, not knowing what to do next he agrees to lend his cousin Elwood some money to buy
some bees and start of a honey business. All seems to go alright until one day Elwood’s mule
turns a bit crazy and destroys all the hives. All the bees vanish and together with them also
Gilbert’s money is gone. Gilbert is desperate and pissed about Jamaica and its not existing
possibilities. He wants to get out and go to a country with more opportunities. Back to England
maybe. For some reason he finds a woman called Hortense who is willing to give him all the
money he needs to catch a boat back to the mother country. He will pay her back, he promises.
But instead of getting her money back Hortense wants Gilbert to marry her for it would be the
perfect opportunity for her to leave the island as well. Gilbert thinks about it. But what was
there to think? Did he have any choice?

NINETEEN (Gilbert, before)

So Gilbert goes back to England on the next boat he finds. The first two weeks he spends
together with some chaps he had met on the boat.

Six of them squashed together in a tiny room somewhere in London. He can’t bear it anymore
and leaves the chaps behind to find a place where he could live on his own. He knocks on many
doors but nobody lets him in. He remembers the place where Queenie might live – his only
chance, he thinks.

TWENTY (Hortense, 1948)

Gilbert wakes Hortense up early in the morning. Hortense is confused. It couldn’t be morning
yet. The room is freezing, it is still dark outside and there are no birds singing.

That would be an English winter Gilbert explains to her. Asking Hortense to make him some
chips for dinner he eventually leaves for work.

TWENTY-ONE (Gilbert, 1948)

Everyday Gilbert leaves the house early in the morning. He sneaks on his tiptoes in order to not
disturb anyone. But Queenie always hears him and asks what he was doing and where he was
going. It seems to Gilbert a bit like she doesn’t trust him. She makes up a lot of rules for living in
her house and wants Gilbert to make her lodgers live up to them. Says it’s because of her
neighbours, who are upset about coloured lodgers.

TWENTY-TWO (Hortense, 1948)

Good that Celia can’t see her now, Hortense thinks. In her dirty cold room in a shabby house
together with a rude husband she barely knows. She decides to start cleaning the room to turn it
into a place she would be able to live in. Suddenly Queenie comes in. She wants to know all
about Hortense. Hortense doesn’t answer, not wanting Queenie to know her business. But
Queenie thinks she doesn’t reply because this Jamaican woman might not understand and keeps
asking, First thinking Queenie wants to be friendly Hortense soon gets annoyed at Queenie’s
rude manners. She proposes to show Hortense round town and that she wouldn’t mind being
seen with a darkie. What did she mean by that? Hortense wondered. She just wants Queenie to
get out of her room so she could continue with her cleaning business.

 
TWENTY-THREE (Queenie, before)

Christened Victoria everybody always calls the young girl Queenie. Her dad a butcher, her mom
a farmer. Her dad Wilfred had always wanted sons to help him with the butchering. As his first
child turns out to be a girl he is hugely disappointed. Queenie is raised by miner girls, who her
mom hired for she is always busy baking pork pies for the family’s shop in town. When Queenie
is six years old she gets a brother. One year later she gives birth to male twins. Wilfred is
pleased. He loves his sons. One of them dies young on the consequences of rheum fever. In the
mornings Queenie helps her mom with the pies. In the afternoon she looks after her brothers.
She goes to local elementary school. Is the teacher’s favourite. Has no friends, doesn’t want to
share her pie with anyone. After a few years father takes her out of school and makes her help
with looking after the poultry, selling eggs and cleaning. She is tired of it. She cleans while other
women wear beautiful dresses and dance with pretty boys. To her father’s anger she soon
becomes vegetarian. One day Queenie’s posh aunt comes to take her to London in order to teach
her the proper behaviour for an English lady.

TWENTY-FOUR (Queenie, before)

Now in London the big city, Queenie has elocution lessons and everything else auntie Dorothy
thought she would need to become a proper lady. Auntie Dorothy had run a sweet shop with her
husband, after he died it was just her and her little dog. Now Queenie worked there and auntie,
not the fittest person anymore could lie back and relax. Since a few days a man caught Queenie
attention, he is friendly and a proper gentleman, how Dorothy said.

Eventually Queenie is going out with him. She doesn’t really like it though thinks he has some
strange manners and doesn’t talk much. One day she tells him she thinks they should stop
dating.

Bernard starts to cry, tells her he just planned on proposing to her.

So Queenie leaves it how it was. One day they come back from one of their daily park walks and
find dead auntie behind the door, fallen onto her small dog, flattened him on the floor. On the
funeral mom tells Queenie she could come home there was loads of work to do. “No” queenie
says, she would get married to a man called Bernard.

TWENTY-FIVE (Queenie, before)

Sleeping with each other is not as enjoyable as Queenie thought it would be. It seems like only
Bernard gets pleasure from it. That’s not how it’s supposed to be the doctor tells her. She will
never get pregnant like that. There would be no kids as Bernard so desperately wants. Queenie
now lives in a big house together with Bernard and his dad Arthur. She gets to be the housewife
as Bernard doesn’t want her to go out and get a job. But she likes it and wants to put a lot of
effort in making the old tall house a nice place to live again. But strangely Bernard doesn’t like
any of her improvement ideas. Why? Queenie doesn’t know.
TWENTY-SIX (Queenie, before)

The war with Germany was inevitable it says in the news. And soon Bernard and Queenie hide
in their small self-dug shelter in the garden, being scared it would hit their house next, the
house where Arthur hid somewhere because he didn’t want to go down in the dark tunnel. They
take the German refugee lodger away. It would be to protect him, they say. Together they sit
down there day in day out in quiet, Bernard just reading his papers.

One day a bomb hits a house very close by and takes away the living place of a poor family who
had already been bombed out once before. Queenie convinces Bernard to let them live in their
house for a few days before she brought them to a treat centre where she gets herself a job.

TWENTY-SEVEN (Queenie, before)

Queenie works in the centre twelve, sometimes fourteen hours a day. Sometimes she even
sleeps there. Her job is it to find out what happened to those families who lost their loved ones,
their property, their houses. She really feels for these people and is full of wanting to help. She
shows them where in the centre to get clothes, a sleeping place and to one family she even gives
furniture of her house. Bernard’s really not pleased. Not only that she got a job, not only that he
is quite worried about her, that she doesn’t sleep at home but now she also gives parts of his
dads property to strangers. He didn’t understand.

TWENTY-EIGHT (Queenie, before)

He volunteered to join the RAF, overseas. Where? He never told Queenie. She’s worried as she
sees her thin husband leaving out the door. As she is alone with Arthur she gets to know him
better and realises that even though he doesn’t speak, he communicates with his eyebrows. He
cooks food for them and they soon realize that they are good company for each other. A woman
at the rest centre asks Queenie to take in a three RAF man for a few days. Their names are
Ginger, Kip and Michael Roberts, a coloured man from Jamaica with a big smile, a man Queenie
feels affection for and it seems like this feeling is coming back from him as well.

TWENTY-NINE (Queenie, before)

Queenie never thought that sleeping with someone would be that passionate. She never thought
she would feel pleasure instead of figuring out what to cook for supper while Bernard was doing
some strange movements on top of her.

Her three RAF guests leave early the next morning. When Queenie wakes up she discovers that
Michael had forgotten his wallet. As she runs to the train station in order to return it to him, she
suddenly hears a high pitched noise followed by a bright light and a strong force that makes her
fly up into the air. She was lucky they tell her in the hospital. 
Not many people survive a rocket attack with only a few bruises. Back home Arthur looks after
Queenie like a mother and for the first time ever she hears him speak. Tells her how happy he
was that nothing happened to her.

THIRTY (Gilbert, 1948)

With a RAF recommendation letter Gilbert walks from shop to shop, trying to find a shop. All he
hears is they couldn’t bear seeing a coloured chap working in their business. He eventually ends
up driving the Londoner post van in order to collect letters. But even there his boss treats him
with disrespect, his white colleagues don’t want to work with him and he has to drive his car
alone around the unknown city.

THIRTY-ONE (Hortense, 1948)

Hortense cleans the shabby room all day long and cooks dinner for her husband. All Gilbert does
when he gets home is telling her how bad the food is and that she couldn’t cook. He doesn’t
realize any of Hortense’s attempts of trying to make the room look acceptable. As he discovers
that the egg that Hortense gave him to eat has gone bad he jumps up, yells at her and leaves the
room slamming the door behind him.

THIRTY-TWO (Gilbert, 1948)

Gilbert leaves the room not knowing where to go. He feels like he just has to get away from his
wife for a little.

Heading down the street in the freezing cold he thinks of Jamaica, Elwood, Mangos and purple
sunsets as his body slowly fills up with regret. A woman approaches him, offers him a cough
sweet in order to keep him warm. Gratefully Gilbert saves the rare act of English kindness in his
pocket before buying some fish and chips for Hortense and him and returning back to the
shabby room.

THIRTY-THREE (Hortense, 1948)

Mrs. Bligh takes Hortense out to show her the shops. She tells her the name of every store as if
there were no such things in Jamaica. Hortense is amazed by how different all those British
people look like and is very disappointed as nobody seems to understand her English, which she
was so proud of. “Darkie!” “Jumbo!” some random people shout across the street as Hortense is
walking home. She wonders about these insults for no reason. Close to home Queenie suddenly
stops. There is a man trying to get into her house. Queenie sits down on the pavement and
mumbles something which reminds Hortense of the name Bernard.
THIRTY-FOUR (Queenie, 1948)

There in front of the door, it is Bernard, Queenie’s husband that she hasn’t seen for nearly five
years. He wears the same clothes as on the day when they first met. He approaches his wife
formally. As Queenie tells him that he would have been away for a long time, he answers with a
simple “Indeed”.

THIRTY-FIVE (Bernard, before)

India is full of people. People offering cakes covered with flies, men trying to sell their daughters
and beggars everywhere. On the way to the base Bernard and his team are cramped up together
with loads of people in a small train.

Bernard signed up for the RAF because he was scared that otherwise he would have to go to the
infantry. Also he enjoyed being part of a team. Thought the war would be a good possibility to
make Queenie proud of her husband.

Right after arriving at the camp Bernard has to jump in a small trench in order to not be killed
by Japanese bombs. The bombs would come every day at the same time, a guy called Maxi
explains. A few hours later a Japanese plane crashes near the base. The pilot survives. He looks
like a kid. They would have to shoot him, Maxi says. It is a war.

THIRTY-SIX (Bernard, before)

The guy called Maxi choses Bernard to accompany him on the way into the jungle hills in order
to find another crashed airplane up there. He wants to get some useful equipment out of the jet.
What exactly? Being just a low aircraftman, Bernard is not allowed to know. After a long way
through a jungle filled with crazy insects, it is already dark when they finally find the plane. In
the morning they have to realize that somebody had already entered the plane before them, as
there is nothing useful in there anymore. Back in the base the CO surprisingly offers them a beer
and tells them the news. The war with the Germans was over, Hitler dead.

THIRTY-SEVEN (Bernard, before)

Bernard is relieved to know Queenie was free from rockets and save. Soon after the Germans,
also the Japs surrender because of something called the atom bomb. It must be the weapon of
god himself everybody agrees. Most troops get sent back to England. Some have to stay back,
including Maxi and Bernard. The remaining chaps go on strike for a bit before being sent to
Calcutta.   

THIRTY-EIGHT (Bernard, before)

Normally it is always nice to have a short stay in Calcutta. There is good beer, clean beds and
sometimes a bit of dancing. But this time was different. There are shops on fire and dead bodies
filling the streets. The locals are rioting. Hindus against Muslims. Muslims against Hindus. The
British there to hold them apart. But there are thousands, and Bernard and his team just a few.
They approach the British truck and shake it. It is very close to flipping over when suddenly
police turns up in order to shoot lots of people and save the British.

THIRTY-NINE (Bernard, before)

Babies, women, men and Kids. Too many to be counted. They all die. Apparently those Hindus
and Muslims don’t like each other. Bernard and his English crew leave the Indians cleaning up
the bloody mess of the riot, while they go back to their tiny houses.

In the evening sometimes dozens of them meet in one tiny house to hang around: it’s hot, sticky,
smelly air and inappropriate conversations. Bernard hates it. 

These illiterate stupid Indians want to become independent, rule their country without the
British. Bernard has to march through the streets without a lot of sense. He should look fierce,
probably trying to show the Indians that the British will not just leave.

FORTY (Bernard, before)

As Bernard hates the overcrowded tiny house meetings he leaves in order to attend his night
guarding shift. He guards a hangar full of useful stuff that now that the war is over had finally
arrived. Accompanied by two Indians one of them with perfect English he sits there and talks.
He sees a lot of smoke in the distance when suddenly two men come running telling them that
the tiny house which had the meeting in it was on fire. When Bernard hears his friend maxi is in
there, he starts to run.

FORTY-ONE (Bernard, before)

Arriving there he sees the high flames, feels the unbearable heat and sees everybody panicking
not able to listen to his loud shouting of rescue ideas. On his suggestion that they should build
an effective water bucket line he just gets hasty punches in his face. Nobody is able to prevent
the house from collapsing. Not even some guys who pretend to be the fire brigade. And so it
burns down. Probably with Maxi in it as somebody else who managed to get out of the flames
tells him. Some Indians appeared to find it quite funny what happened. Bernard sees one of
them giggle. Probably it was him who lit the fire as a brutal strategy to get the British out of
India.

FORTY-TWO (Bernard, before)

Bernard gets brought to the CO for deserting his guard duty and just running to the burning
house. Apparently on the way he lost his rifle, which doesn’t make the situation any better. The
CO doesn’t understand how eight men were at the same time in that tiny house. He wants
Bernard to explain what they were doing. It had been a meeting to plan a strike. He had been
part of it. He couldn’t tell that to the CO. So he just sits there quietly.

FORTY-THREE (Bernard, before)

Maxi died in that small house on fire. His sons must be proud when they get to hear their dad
died fighting for his country. Bernard has to go to prison for two weeks. He sits their together
with four uncivilised brown men always watching him. He’s a bit scared. As he starts writing a
letter home he remembers his dad when he went to war. Bernard’s mom used to think her
husband is doing well in France based on the letters he writes home. She is shocked when he
eventually comes home, psychologically completely ruined. Seeing him as a father figure in that
state is for Bernard impossible. But when his mother dies an early death he is the one to look
after his dad.

FORTY-FOUR (Bernard, before)

As Bernard’s sentence is over he goes Calcutta to collect his uniform. In that city he meets a guy
called Johnny. He remembers him. He was the guy one CO got angry about and punished for
nothing. He was the reason Maxi and people had a meeting in the tiny house to plan a strike.
Bernard told him it was his fault that Maxi died. He gets angry at Johnny as he doesn’t want to
admit it, starts chasing after him tries to land a big punch on his nose when he eventually walks
away and leaves Bernard behind. He’s desperate and feels big need. Bernard finds a place to
satisfy his desire and brutally sleeps with a whore. When he afterwards realises she is not more
than a kid his feelings overwhelm him.

FORTY-FIVE (Bernard, before)

It is a long boring trip on the boat back home. Bernard gets seasick and vomits more than he
sleeps. One day he notices something weird in his pants. It starts itching and has strange
colours. He remembers the medical officer ones talking about what could happen if you have
sexual relationships with the wrong kind. It is called Syphilis. What would Queenie say? He
doesn’t want to imagine. It would be a way easier if he would just quietly jump across the railing
and disappear in the ocean. He thinks about that possibility for a long time but doesn’t manage
to convince himself.

FORTY-SIX (Bernard, 1948)

When Bernard arrives in Southampton he doesn’t go straight back home to see Queenie. He
rents a room in Brighton first. Works there a bit and spends a lot of time sitting next to his old
friend’s house watching Maxi’s wife and kids go in and out. Eventually, two years after his actual
return to England he decides to go back home to London. There he meets Queenie wanting him
to explain everything to her. But he says nothing, just not knowing how to. His father was shot
by some random guy, Queenie tells him. And in their house there were living two lodgers. Two
black lodgers, Bernard is horrified.

FORTY-SEVEN (Queenie, 1948)

Bernard doesn’t speak anything. He doesn’t seem to care about how his father died or how
Queenies time alone in England was. He is just disappointed when they sleep in separate beds.
Awkwardness all the time. And then Bernard suggests to Queenie that they should move and
find something with higher quality and without coloured people.

FORTY-EIGHT (Bernard, 1948)

Bernard talks about a dream he has. He and Queenie lie in the bad how they always used to
when he suddenly hears the noise of a plane. He knows it is da Jap. This Jap is coming for him.
He comes through the bedroom door with a blinking sword as Queenie suddenly wakes up next
to Bernard and welcomes him like a friend.

FORTY-NINE (Gilbert, 1948)

Gilbert sits in his room. Hortense tries to cook something as it suddenly knocks on the door. It is
one of the twins. First he says he’s Winston, the one Gilbert likes. But soon Gilbert has figures
out that it is the other twin Kenneth who was standing in front of him. He’s angry. Said
Queenie’s husband told him to leave the house by the next day because he doesn’t want to have
any coloured lodgers. He called Kenneth a blackie. Kenneth says he would come with some of
his friends to teach Bernard to treat Jamaicans with respect. Gilbert wants to avoid that by any
means and tells him he would sort that out with Queenie. After Kenneth leaves, Hortense
complains about Gilbert letting this rude man into their room. She tells him she would soon find
employment at a good school and wants to move to a more suitable accommodation for a
teacher like her.

FIFTY (Hortense, 1948)

Hortense dresses up in her best dress to go and find employment as a teacher. Because she
doesn’t know how to find the way she involuntarily takes Gilbert along. He says there would be
no chance for her to work as a teacher in England. Why? She doesn’t understand.
As she reaches the education ministry the woman there tells her that it doesn’t matter what she
did in Jamaica but she is not qualified to teach in England. She didn’t even pay attention to the
recommendation letters Hortense was so proud of. She just said goodbye and returned to her
paperwork.

FIFTY-ONE (Gilbert, 1948)

Hortense runs out of the education ministry building, weeping. She runs fast but Gilbert tries to
keep up with her until she screams “Nothing!” on his question what happened to her.

For some time Gilbert just thinks of leaving her and looking for another woman. But something
makes him stay with her and he asks her what happened again and for the first time she talks to
him normally she smiles and eventually even laughs. Hortense enjoys the ride on top of a bus,
astonished by London and its famous buildings. Gilbert invites her for some tea and cake while
they try together to figure out where Hortense could find employment if the teaching thing
wouldn’t work out. She tells him she could sew and that she used to be known for the good
cakes she bakes.

FIFTY-TWO (Bernard, 1948)

Bernard sees them leaving, those darkie lodgers. Now he would clean out their room so they
would leave as soon as possible. He enters their accommodation with his extra housekeeping
keys and is disgusted by how dirty the place looks like. He remembers this room as his moms. It
was a beautiful room. She used to sew in here in front of a cosy fire. Sometimes Bernard would
come to sit next to her and watch. As he dwells in his memories suddenly Gilbert and Hortense
come back, horrified to see Bernard. On the question what he was doing in their room he tells
them that it was his house and they would have to leave. Bernard starts insulting them and the
conversation gets louder and is close to violence as Queenie rushes through the door.

She tells them to calm down and shut up as she suddenly bends and screams out of pain. Why?
Nobody knows. As Bernard wants to help her she avoids him. She doesn’t want him to touch her
and insists that she Hortense’s help.

FIFTY-THREE (Hortense, 1948)

Hortense has to carry Queenie into the bedroom. And first thinking Queenie would suffer
because of some crazy wound she soon realises that after Queenie took off the strange bandage
around her belly it was growing. She was going to give birth to a child. Gilbert and Bernard are
knocking on the locked door and demand to know what’s happening, but Queenie pays them no
attention. Hortense doesn’t have any experience as a midwife but does what she can to help
Queenie to make that squeezing out of a tiny body easier. And after a few loud screams she
holds the new-born in her hands. It is a boy with ten fingers and toes. He has two nostrils, curly
hair and to Hortense’s surprise black skin, which Queenie doesn’t seem to care about.
 

FIFTY-FOUR (Gilbert, 1948)

As Hortense comes out of the room where Queenie has given birth she is full of blood. Gilbert
thinks she murdered Queenie until he sees her lying in bed together with a coloured new-born.
Bernard sees the baby first and thinking it was Gilbert who’s new son he just saw, he drags
Gilbert away and beats him up. All the time Gilbert tries to convince him that he would have
nothing to do with that whole business. But Bernard didn’t even try to listen. Bloody nose and
one shoe less when he finally lets Gilbert go. Gilbert goes back to his room, where he arrives just
in time to see his wife leave.

“You disgust me Gilbert Joseph” is all she says before walking off, her nose held high into the air..
When he finally finds a second shoe he chases after Hortense and finds her on a square where a
strange man tries to make her get into his car. Gilbert chases him away and looks into his wife’s
face who seems relieved to see him.

FIFTY-FIVE (Queenie, 1948)

Queenie waits for Bernard to come back as she thinks about how to choose the words to explain
him her baby which was not his son. Words, she thinks she should choose with great care. She
waits and waits and dwells away with the past. She remembers the day when Michael Roberts
knocks on her door again. All his friends died on an airplane crash and he luckily survived. He
came to visit her for a few days. Was on his way to Canada and stayed with her for a bit, after
which she knew she was pregnant. Wanted to go to Canada with him. Waited for him to ask her
but never happened. He left without her. She didn’t want anyone to know about her pregnancy.
Was not ashamed but scared. Put a thick bandage around her so nobody would notice. Suddenly
Bernard comes into the room and pulls Queenie out of her memories. He doesn’t look Queenie
in the eyes and “How could you do that?” are all the words that come out of his mouth.

FIFTY-SIX (Gilbert, 1948)

Gilbert hears a knock on the door. But it is not Bernard who he expects to beat him up again. It’s
Kenneth. That’s what he thinks first. But after some time the guy manages to convince him that
he is the other one of the twins, Winston. The one Gilbert actually likes.

He tells him he found a house and if Gilbert wants to help him to fix it up a little, he could come
and live there with Hortense.

As Gilbert shows Hortense the new place where they might move to he is really surprised that
Hortense seems to like that little bit shabby house. At the end of the day they are back in
Queenie’s house.
And for the first time ever instead of sleeping in the old armchair Hortense asks him to come
with her into the same bed. Gilbert thinks he’s dreaming as he lies with Hortense under the
same blanket.

FIFTY-SEVEN (Bernard, 1948)

Bernard lives in the room which used to be his dads. He just moves around in the house when
he thought Queenie to be sleeping. Trying to avoid her and awkwardness by any means. One
night he hears the baby screaming and because he knew the doctor told Queenie she needs a lot
of sleep he walks to calm the small boy. He soon stops screaming and starts suckling on
Bernard’s finger. What a beautiful little thing he was, this son who wasn’t his own.

Then all of a sudden Queenie wakes up and Bernard finally tells her all about what happened in
India: about the burning house, his stay in prison and why he went to Brighton instead of
coming home. In the end he apologizes for not being a good husband before he leaves the room. 

FIFTY-EIGHT (Queenie, 1948)

Queenie hears Gilbert and Hortense would move out. She catches them as they are about to
leave and invites them for a last cup of tea. She remembers Gilbert in the old days. Queenie and
he used to laugh together but now they were sitting on the table while the air was filled with
awkwardness. Queenie shows them her little son and to everyone’s surprise she asks Gilbert
and Hortense to take him with them and look after him well. She begs them. Saying two white
people couldn’t bring up a coloured child. Says that she thinks she would not be able to face all
the challenges which come along with having a black son. Otherwise she would have to give him
to an orphanage which she doesn’t want to. They also don’t like brown babies. They say those
ones would be sent over to America. Queenie wants Gilbert and Hortense, two people she trusts
to take her small son.

FIFTY-NINE (Hortense, 1948)

Hortense can’t believe what she sees: a white woman in front of two black people. Begging to
take her black son. Eventually Hortense and Gilbert decide to take little Michael with them.
What else could they do? They wanted the boy to have a good life. A good life, which according
to Queenie, she wasn’t able to give him.