Where's My Gardener?

I lost my gardener for three weeks. He has no phone and I couldn’t find him. He is one of these small wiry Trinidadian Indians, very passionate and vocal. At sixty he does triathlons and sometimes gets into trouble, usually with jealous husbands by his own coy admission.

So, after three weeks of no show, I’m thinking he’s gotten into some trouble, and started calling around. This morning he shows up finally, and sure enough, my gardener says to me;

“I go me ass lock up las week.”

Guess what? A jealous husband, an ex-marine, no less. Some very tall white guy married to a Polish woman who “loves her gardener.”

Now, this gardener always brings roses, maybe local fruit or some small gift to his clients. If there are children, he brings something for them too. If there is a husband, he is not excluded. This is a traditional West Indian custom, bringing some kind of gift.

This Polish woman and her tall ex-marine have known this man for some years, but ex-marine has been eating at his gut about the inevitable roses for some time and has decided that this gardener is fondling his Polish wife. Ex-marine also likes to drink a lot.

So anyway, some time last week, my gardener is invited in for a drink at the end of a long hard and hot day by the Polish wife. I always invite my gardener in for a cold beer or whatever he wants to drink after a tortuous day of work, sometimes a loooong ten-hour stint out there that I sure won’t do. Ex-marine joins them, gets a little drunk and moves in…

“You f*****g my wife?”

My gardener emphatically denies this in his heavily accented Trini dialect which becomes incomprehensible when he is nervous; desperate to preserve his friendship with the Polish wife, and his job.

“Menooowhaman?Nonono!”

He is invited back by the Polish wife a second and a third time after this afternoon of accusation, in spite of the suspicions of ex-marine husband, and the gifts of roses continue.

On the third visit, as the three of them are enjoying some cool rum on ice during a setting sun, ex-marine proceeds to get so drunk, mixing the alcohol in the gut already eaten by the thorns of roses, he suddenly jumps up, tears off all his clothes and runs out of the house. He runs down the street naked, through the middle-class neighborhood inhabited by “proper” middle-class people who are about to experience some excitement in their proper middle-class lives.

The neighbors come alive. Numerous 911 calls are placed, including one by the Polish wife. My poor gardener is beside himself and goes after ex-marine who then turns on him and starts swinging. After a series of failed attempts to persuade and cajole ex-marine into submission, my wiry little gardener gets tired of dodging fists, so grabs ex-marine by the balls and squeezes as hard as he can. Two wailing police cars arrive as ex-marine is writhing naked and moaning in agony on the ground. As my gardener tries to frantically explain in his over-heated Trini gibberish, he is promptly arrested and whisked away leaving the screaming ex-marine to the paramedics who arrive shortly after.

Polish wife, who remained cowering in the house, does not know her gardener has been arrested.

They let our gardener go after two days behind bars.

He pays a visit to the Polish wife who tells him that her ex-marine is in the hospital recovering from the ball squeeze, and we can assume as well, the effects of the flavored ethanol that had been excessively consumed, so our gardener pays a visit to ex-marine. They kiss and make-up.

And I got my gardener back.

I don’t know if there is a moral to this story, but if there is, perhaps it would be something like:

Tall drunken ex-marines with Polish wives, who wish to be fondled by their gardener, should not interfere when the gardener is a five foot, four inch, sixty-year-old Trini Indian who does triathlons.
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