They Were People Too # 4

I didn't know where he came from, this bulky man with an American accent lumbering through the streets of our little town obviously out of his mind. He soon  was given a name. King Kong. And pretty soon he was known all over the town for doing things just like the giant ape of 1933 which was at that time appearing in American made films shown at the Apollo Cinema. On St. Kitts, back then, we did not know what to do with the mentally ill. I doubt we know what to do with them today, but in those days, the mentally ill became the butt of bad treatment by people who were perhaps equally insane, and so King Kong was virtually emaciated by that society. He became the object of concocted stories, frightful imaginings and  physical abuse. Children stoned him, dragged him, stripped him and whipped him for no reason beyond being bored with nothing to do.
 The last haunting image of King Kong that I have, is of his skinny hand persistently trying to keep the sole window of a tiny room on the  southern wing of the island's only mental institution from closing in on his humid cell. I felt such pity for the man that even to this day the image is etched on my memory, for each time the strong  wind swung the window in, his thin hand emerged through the rusting bars to push it back.
 There is another image of king Kong in my mind too. It is an image of a young man who came here from America big and strong, and who in a rather short time  had withered like whittle in a flame. Sometimes I still find myself wondering if King Kong died, and whether he had a real human funeral.