Baxter's Folly -excerpts from a short story by Aystin Mitchell

Baxter’s Folly

a short story

by Austin Mitchell

          Clem Baxter groaned and threw the covers off himself. He must have been having a nightmare. He felt for Gwyneth but she wasn’t there. He was sure that she had slept in the bed last night. He got up off the bed. Her side of the bed was still made up and the pillow looked as if it hadn’t been slept on. He still felt drowsy and there was a gnawing feeling in his stomach, signaling that he was hungry. Had he been too drunk to know which woman was sleeping in his bed? He was sure that it had been Gwyneth but then it could have been Dorine. He felt under the bed for his money bag to go and buy some food down at Mindy’s shop. Clem panicked! The money bag was gone. He pushed the mattress off the bed. His money bag with three hundred and fifty thousand dollars was gone. It must have dropped under the bed. Clem grabbed a broom and began sweeping under the bed. Only some pieces of paper, dust, an old pair of socks came up.

           “Miss Agnes, Mass Albert, Gwyneth robbed me. She’s gone with all of my money,” Clem shouted to his next door neighbors and rushed outside.

             Mass Albert and Miss Agnes confronted him.

           “But it’s a long time that Gwyneth don’t come up here,” Miss Agnes said.

           “Clem after all this time, you still have the money that I gave you for the place, under your mattress why you never banked it?” Mass Albert asked.

          Both he and his wife were aware of the talk in the village that they had gotten Clem’s piece of land for a song at five hundred thousand dollars.

          “I don’t trust the banks because they want you to fill out too many forms,” Clem replied.

          Clem had sold the other piece of land also for five hundred thousand dollars and it had finished within a year.

          “You want some breakfast, Mass Clem,” Miss Agnes asked.

          “Yes, Miss Agnes,” Clem replied to the middle-aged woman.

          Clem ate the roasted saltfish, run down, roasted breadfruit, roasted yam and roasted dumplings. The Tulloch’s ate most of their food roasted. Clem drank two cups of coffee.

          “I have to report it at the police station. I’m sure it was Gwyneth,” he said as he finished the breakfast.

          Both Tullochs didn’t know which woman Clem had in the little back room last night as they hadn’t seen when he came in. They had afforded him the room after he sold out to them. They had big plans for the piece of land.

          Clem returned to his room to put on some better clothes to go out to the police station. He would have to go up to Berris’ bar to find out from Bull and Jack which woman had come home with him, but he realized that the bar wouldn’t be opened up until after ten o’clock.

          Corporal Distant was laughing as he took the statement from Clem.

          “You let another woman rob you again Clem after you sold out your place so cheap. The first one was Verna and you accused her of stealing one hundred thousand dollars from you and up to now we haven’t found her,” the corporal scolded him.

          Sergeant Rowe was coming over. While Distant was tall and thin and of brown complexion, Rowe was black and thick and at thirty years old was five years Distant’s senior.

          “Clem Baxter you again and I suppose it’s another woman gone with your money. I offered you seven hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the place, but you sold it to Albert Tulloch for two thirds of that,” the sergeant said disapprovingly.

          Clem knew it was true what the sergeant had just said. But the man had wanted to pay him off over a year while Albert was giving him the money one time.

          After Clem left the two policemen sat talking.

          “Who did he say took his money this time Leslie?” the sergeant asked.

          “One Gwyneth Douglas, but I know her and it’s a long time since I’ve seen her in Two Miles,” Leslie Distant replied.

          “He sold Jonas Hibbert the other piece and look how he built it up. I think Clem is crazy. I know some of his children. The three that I know are gown up. Two of them are away and in big jobs and the one in Jamaica is in a big job too,” Dalkeith Rowe said.

          Two Rivers had a high school and an all age school plus several churches. It was a developing community.

          It was no wonder that several persons were perplexed at the way Clem Baxter had sold off his properties. Now with the supposed robbery of the last of his funds people were already wondering about his future.

          “The Tullochs will soon turn him out,” Leslie Distant said as he went to attend to two women entering the station.

          The sergeant nodded before going to the jeep to drive up to

Hibbert’s Restaurant for breakfast.

          Clement Baxter was born in Richfield in the parish of St. Elizabeth. His parents migrated to the nearby Guango Ridge district in the fifties and Clem had grown up in the latter district. From a youngster Clem was good with his hands fixing almost anything. He bought a motorcycle and would ride around selling ice-cream and fudge among other things.  He courted Delpha Roberts and married her a short time later. Delpha made hats. Soon Clem had saved enough money to buy a quarter acre plot in Two Rivers. They moved there after Clem built a two bedroom house there and a board restaurant. Then the children started coming. Clem’s restaurant was doing a thriving business as was Delpha’s and they needed hired help.

          Several young ladies who were hired as assistants complained about Clem’s behavior.

          After twenty four years of marriage Delpha felt like she had enough. That Clem had been unfaithful to her, especially during the last ten years she had no doubt. He was getting more barefaced now, particularly since he had sold his motorcycle and bought a car. Many people and even her family had wondered why she stayed with Clem even though she knew what he was doing. But she had only stayed on for the children’s sake. But the older Clem got, the worse he behaved and Delpha had thought it would have been the opposite.

          “Clem, none of the girls want to stay here. What’s the matter with you?  You want to be friendly with every woman that comes here to work. You’ve no respect for me. Look how many children I have for you and you’re behaving as if you’re a single man. If you don’t behave yourself I’m going to move out,” she shouted angrily. Delpha knew that she and Clem had had this conversation dozens of times, but now she was determined to bring a closure to it all.

          “They are lying on me. It’s they who are trying to be friendly with me and when I refuse, they come to you with all sorts of stories,” Clem defended himself.

          “You got Claire pregnant and Lavene lost the baby she said she was carrying for you. I can’t stand it any longer Clem. I’m leaving you, ”Delpha told him.

Read the full text in 'Waiting to cross the Bridge' and in 'The Fire by the Wayside'.