Geronimo’s Panyard February 5
Some dressy city-slicker spreads a wide grin when she sees Gero at the Valley Harp Panyard. “Been so long since we bus’ a lime,“ she squeals, which is strange only because I see him all the time in Petit Valley. The two of them kiss on the cheek.
“Busy times,“ he says, giving her a tour of the Panyard with a roaming gaze, describing the condition of the steel drums that fill the hangar. He scratches his salt-n-pepper whiskers pensively. “Dee arranger here today. Seventy—seven-zed—t’at’s righ’, go come here at ten.“ I cannot help but notice that it is ten already, and only Gero and a few players have so far arrived. As it is Saturday, Antony, Avril, myself, and a few HS students from our school are also here, to do homework with the little ones from the public school and Saint Anthony’s.
“Not today,“ advises Gero, irritably checking the clock. He is a strict task-master. I have been chewed out by the man before, regarding respect of person and property, which I apparently lack, so I work extra hard to try to understand what he is saying. Today is the final rehearsal day under the corrugated roof. Tomorrow the bass section arrives, and the whole operation moves outside—at least, I think—onto the parking lot next to the church school. Steam tables and propane tanks are already set up for lunch. Busy times at the panyard, for sure.
The blood has been removed from the tarmac outside Coco Ja Mini-mart, across the tiny Morne Coco Road, where a young man was executed last Sunday. The little village is back to normal, because murder is a normal phenomenon in this poor rural suburb. Altogether folks breathe a sigh of relief. Bad business evidently needed to happen, and it is better to get it out of the way before Carnival heats up.
Moreover, if the dead guy is who I have been told, he is the last of three no-good brothers, and so good riddance. The other two also died by gunshot for making enemies of the drug lords with their obnoxious behavior. Consensus is they deserved to die. Of course, their mother may have thought otherwise, but she seems like some sort of chimera, as her sons are described as mixed-raced, literally—as in, “one look Asian, one look African, and one look like somet’in’ else.“
At the top of the hill, a few hundred feet above Coco Ja, sits the priciest home in town, a Spanish-style charmer with a pool and commanding view of Petit Valley. This is the palace of the king of the City of Rastafari, whom no one ever sees. When a cannabis order needs to be filled, his motley crew climbs up the hill to him. If a van shows up uninvited, the alarm is sounded and the crew runs in all directions. This is reportedly what the reefer lord commands.
“Gero’s short for Geronimo,“ says the grizzled maestro, searching his computer screen for the missing arranger. “Me name is Roland, but t’ey been callin’ me Gero since I’s a baby. Wild baby.“ He looks up and fixes me with a imperious glare. “Ya know who Geronimo is? He neva surrender, ya know.“
Yes, indeed, I do know who the hell Geronimo is. I am an American, sir. Geronimo is the last word uttered by a man about to jump.