Palmares

by Gayl Jones

  The white man, a very tall, blond-haired, fleshy man, with an English accent says, “This must be the place where the devil sucks.”

  “Blood or milk?” asks another, with a French accent.

  “It could be blood, it could be milk,” says the Englishman. “Sometimes milk will do, and other times the little devils need blood.”

  “How many imps do you have?” asks another man, with an accent I can’t place.

  “Is she the witch or the witch’s apprentice?” asks one of the masked men from Yorubaland.

  “I think she’s the apprentice,” says another masked African. “But it’s all the same.”

  “Hausa,” says Zibatra.

  “Why did you put her there in the place of a Jew or a Moor?” asks the Spaniard. “I’d rather examine a Jew or a Moor. Why should a witch replace a Jew? They’re the ones to examine, not this uninformed Negro.”

  “He’s right,” says the Italian. “Have you read Giovanni Antonio Andreoni’s ‘The Synagogue Undeceived’?”

  “Let’s get on with the witch trial,” says the Dutchman. “Witch-finder General, you ask the first question.”

  The Africans are silent, observing the woman. They converse among themselves in secret, while the Europeans speak loudly and move in closer to the woman.

  “It’s an endless process,” says the Englishman. “There’ll be witches till the end of the world.”

  “There were witches at the beginning of the world and there’ll be witches at the end of it,” says the Hausa.

  Then I notice that the white men walk about as if they don’t see or hear the Africans.

  “Either that or the Africans have made themselves invisible,” says Zibatra, again reading my thoughts.

  The white men go on speaking:

  “The witness said she rubbed herself with devil’s grease and made herself invisible.”

  “Another said the woman wandered into her dreams.”

  “Another that she changed herself into a lion and a serpent. People say she works only in secret and in the darkness, never in daylight.”

  “They’re afraid of the daylight. They’re all very solitary women. It’s at night when they revel and have their secret meetings. It’s at night when they enchant. It’s at night when their little imps come and suck. Don’t you see the extra teat on her face? Usually they’re hidden in some secretive place. But hers is there, plain as day.”

  “Yes, that’s true, Sir.”

  When the woman’s eyes seem about to close, he slaps her. “Don’t sleep. How many imps do you have?”

  The woman is silent. “I’ll put the boot to her.”

  “No, sleeplessness and lack of food should get her confession.”

  “I don’t think it’ll work. I’ve seen them dance all day and night and not get tired.”

  “Give her the water test.”

  “No, the water test is only for white witches not black ones.”

  “If I’d known it was going to be a black witch, I wouldn’t have come. Black witches aren’t my concern. I say hang her and be done with her.”

  “The Bible says to burn them. That’s the only way. Otherwise they’ll come back.”

  “In England we hang them.”

  “A black witch can’t be hanged. If you hang them they’ll still have control. They’ll get stronger.”

  “Answer me about your imps.”

  “She won’t confess. I’m an authority on witches. And I tell you they’re all the same. A witch is a witch. You were seen with a black man on a horse, were you not? What are the names of your imps?”

  Almeyda, what story do you refuse to tell? Who are you, Zibatra?

  I’m a woman from another time and another world.

  A goatskin draped about her shoulders. Mask of feathers. Laughing.

  The smell of almonds, coconuts.

  I am a spirit keeper, not a spirit catcher, no not me. I don’t eat souls. Do you think they’ll start a new Palmares?

  Here is a woman who forgets nothing. Speak so your words may endure forever. Speak to this man. Say something to him. Speak so that he will know you.

  The man looks at me. Is it Anninho? He comes toward me. I feel my mouth being opened, and his lips against mine. Then he is not there.

  But when he returns, he is carrying flowers.

  Josef de Azarza, or a Fate Remains Unknown

  WHEN OLD VERA ENTERED I was sitting in my corner in silence. She said as she had begun to say now, “What’s wrong with the woman?” which had become her way of greeting me. I nodded to her, but remained silent.

  “This old woman has been hunting,” she said. Were they squirrels she tossed on the table, or dark rabbits? She stood looking at me.

  “Yes, this one has become solitary and secretive now,” she said. “Even her spirit eludes me.”

  “There was a strange woman here,” I said.

  “Yes, and what strange woman besides these?”

  “She said her name was Zibatra. Do you know such a woman?”

  “I don’t know such a woman,” she said.

  “Have you heard her name before, or maybe she is from a place with that name?”

  “I have heard many names. Where is she now?”

  “I don’t know. She left.”

  “And was it a frightening experience for you or a humorous one?” she asked, turning away from me.

  “A fearful one. But I tried not to show it. At first I thought it was you in disguise.”

  “Perhaps I know such a woman,” she said, not turning to me. Was she skinning the animals she hunted? “Yes, she was a strange woman. A strange woman of strange women. Intelligent. Her body is as agile and elusive as your spirit. Yes, I have heard tales of such a woman who wanted to remain unknown but there was a certain Josef de Azarza who desired her and wished to know her. But each time he tried to know the woman her body would fly out from under him. Do you think it was some herb that she knew?” she said with a laugh. “You see, this Josef de Azarza, a landowner, got four of his men slaves to hold her down. She said no she did not like such a humiliating position, but they held her down anyway. But this time it was not her body that flew up but that of Josef de Azarza. Do you think it was some herb she gave him?”

  She turned toward me, holding one of the skinned rabbits. I shook my head.

  “To this day his fate remains unknown and she remains unknown,” she said with a chuckle and went back to her work.

  “I know what you’re thinking,” she said without turning around. “But this one has been known.”

  She thumped something. Her chest?

  “This one has been known . . . And he thought he was in hiding. He thought I left him alone. Ha. Ha.”

  She breathed deeply. “Was it your past or your future you wanted to know?”

  “My past,” I said softly.

  “Did you think that was safer?” she asked. I didn’t answer.

  “You won’t tell me anything,” she said. “But that doesn’t matter. Do you know what it’s like when the voice of a god speaks through a person? That’s the real talking. These dialogues of the spirit. That’s when we really learn to speak, and that voice goes outside time.”

  Art and Leisure

  IN THE DAYS THAT WE WAITED for Barcala’s brother Martim and his wife, and for the family of Martina Puerreydon, Barcala would sit in the early mornings at a table writing something. I had told him about my grandmother’s notebooks in Arabic, and he said he knew that language well and would translate the writings for me but he said that that would have to be when he was in another country. I said that I no longer had the notebooks, that I had returned them. That was when he produced the yellowed papers and said that my grandmother had given them to him to keep.

  “Did you see her? Where is she? Is she all right?”

  “I don’t know. I don’t know where she is. She gave them to me one moment and the next moment I didn’t see her.”

  He looked at me strangely. I kept watching
him. Then he began writing feverishly again. I asked him once what it was about and he said it was about an intruder. He did not say anything else and I didn’t ask him.

  He had very little paper and it was strange to see a man show such love for paper, saving every scrap. He said that when he finished the monologue he would give it to me to read. Unfortunately, he said it was only a secondary thing; it did not get into real actions, but only the speech of a certain character, and the relationships came only in speaking. Maybe, he said when he was in another country he would have time to put it on the first level. He said the kind of art he wished to write could only be written at a man’s leisure. He had seen enough of the old woman with blood in her teeth and the sepulcher of dead men’s bones, the silent old woman grinning at him, her gestures saying, “Come, Barcala,” but never a voice he could trust.

  He said he had spent some years with her and found her out. It was always in struggle. He had wasted days with the woman. The skulls all around her were all the same color, and it didn’t matter if the flesh around them had once been red or black or white or yellow. He believed in the spirit, that was the source of everything. But the woman was speechless. The closer he got to her the more exaggerated her traits, her personality in pantomime. And she had faces that could be taken off and put back on and shaped and reshaped.

  Well, he said, his brother would spend more years struggling with her, and present that fine woman, his wife, to the whore. No, there were no ordinary days here. He’d go anywhere where there were ordinary days. It was the same on the whole continent and the one above it. Oh, perhaps it was these kinds of days that provided the material for an art, but not the medium to produce it in. He wondered about the places where there was nothing but niceties. Were men treated with dignity? Did they treat each other with dignity?

  So he and his brother would go different places after the destruction of Palmares. His brother would join with others and seek a new Palmares, a new place of perpetual struggle. Would it be a new place to be destroyed in?

  “Why are you looking at me so?” he asked. “Why are you looking at me with such eyes? Are you thinking, ‘Not destroyed.’ Do you still believe in the immortality of such a man? And him? Which him, you ask. Well, let’s say it’s all of them, every one of them and your man too. Talk to me, Almeyda. Why are you looking at me with such eyes? Do you think I’m any man? Are you any woman? Where will you go? Oh, you’re the woman who’ll not leave this place and will waste your days in waiting. Yes, you’re that one. And have stopped talking. Maybe you’re the eternal symbol of sadism and masochism on this continent. What the writers speak of. How can I record the words of such a woman when there are none. I must learn some new method, some method applicable to the soul of such a woman, for digging in. Shall I use sex? No. Some means of psychic horror?

  “Tenderness? But I haven’t shown an excess of it? Talk to me, Almeyda. I’m not used to such a woman. Shall I stay here with you? But you won’t notice. It’s him.”

  I said nothing.

  “Perhaps you’re all of them. The fantasy of a lover I could never have. You’re hopeless. Would you let me kiss you? No? You’re as quiet as the moon. Look how I make hand monsters on the wall with moonlight. Shall I stay here with you?”

  Still I did not speak.

  “Am I making sense or nonsense? But even if you wanted me, the consequences are different for a woman. Am I making sense? When I first saw you, all these images passed before me. I told you that I grew up never seeing such tall, dark women. Did I ever tell you that? Maybe I never told you. And you fascinated me in a way I can’t explain. They took me to Europe as a boy and I grew up there, so for me, you’re the exotic woman. I came here to meet a mysterious woman, and so I did. I watched Old Vera rubbing you with her medicines, crushing leaves and mixing it with honey and your own menstrual blood. I’ve seen you and I’m still here. And I’ve seen the old woman take the shape of tigers and lions and flowers and fish and trumpets, and I’m not afraid. But I’ve wasted a sum of days here, and you want to keep me, staring into your eyes. Are they the eyes of a madwoman? See how they make slits now and now they’re huge and round and lovely. I’d like to get a brush and paint you. I’ll paint you in my mind. My writing now is mostly history—about people, events, and conversations. But eventually I’ll get outside space and time. Speak to me. What are you? Your hand to your mouth now. What are you hiding? It’s down, you smile at me. The first time you’ve shown me a smile. Now a sneer? No. A smile, and genuine. It’s good to see it. But still no words for me? How shall I translate that smile? And it’s you now who makes the shape of a lion? Agile and wary. What did she say of you? That you’ve had the chance to be a mystic and drink from the eternal vine, but you refused it. Can you get it back, reclaim that sum of days? But you’re a laughing head now. At me? No?

  Yourself? And now your forehead is ornamented with painted design. A pyramid? A bird? Your hands move so quickly I didn’t see. But did they move? No, I’m not a crazy man or even a true romantic. And what’s that? An eye? Another one? It’s Old Vera playing tricks on us. Yes, it’s Old Vera, making patterns of light move about you, and you can’t see yourself. Am I changing too? Do you see things I don’t? A man you’ve seen before and loved? Has she made me that one?”

  “Anninho,” I started to call, but kept my silence.

  “You look beautiful and happy. No harm done. Do you think I’m a fool and a false artist? An illegitimate artist? Can’t a man decide whether he wants to paint his mother or his country or the world or the universe, and how? Say something to that. But no. I keep asking the woman and she won’t speak to me. Give me your hand. No? Am I in love with you? So the patterns keep changing. Now the bird’s elongated, distorted, mutilated and now she’s whole again and staring at me with that incredible, magnificent eye. What kind of woman are you? A screen to lay with patterns on? What spirit makes the hand monsters on your forehead and now lovable creatures? Give me a kiss. No? So I’ll go to another country, and in my leisure make a full description of the woman. You say nothing, but you understand. Or perhaps it’s all my presumption. And what do the gods presume. No, with them it’s what they know.”

  “Hush,” said Old Vera.

  “No, let me speak to her. I’ll change this man’s world, though we live in the same one, my brother and me. He’ll stay here to help create this new Palmares, and I’ll change my world from a dangerous one to a fortunate one. Here I’m a dangerous man, and remain accused, but there I’ll be a decent and respected man, or so’s my hope. What kind of man do you think I am? You say nothing, but you understand. You didn’t say whether you still believe in his immortality. But you won’t tell me. How might I set you talking, Almeyda? What is the right, the eternal question to a woman? Old Vera says that certain spirits have chosen to seek you out, but you deny them. You refuse and abandon them. Are they face to face with you now? Why do you tremble? But now the tremble’s stopped, you’re calm again, your forehead in total colors. The reproduction of what soul?”

  He paused. I thought Old Vera would tell him to hush again, but now, sitting in her hammock, she leans forward, with interest.

  “So they intend to form a new Palmares?” She nods.

  “I’ll go with them, then go my own way. Anyway, Old Vera, you’ve predicted the destruction of that one. I’d like to take this woman with me, but she won’t come.”

  “You knew that before you started speaking.”

  “This is a land of saints and devils. Words still have magic for me.”

  “I see how you look at her,” said Old Vera. “Perhaps you shouldn’t look at her that way. You’re tired. Lie down in your hammock and sleep.”

  I don’t know whether she’s speaking to me or the man. Is it true he stood speaking to me so long? Now I see him lying calmly across the room in his hammock, staring wide at the ceiling, his chest moving up and down, heavy, now calmer. Does he close his eyes and sleep? Now he’s up and writing something. I drift in and out o
f sleep. Is it some herbs I’ve drunk to cure the wounds on my body? Has it had some effect on my spirit? Now I see him, a handsome, bearded man, resting, his broad chest moving gently. Did he really speak to me?

  The Force of Imagination

  I HEARD THEM OUTSIDE THE HUT before they entered, though the only voice I recognized was Barcala’s. I could make out none of the words. Now for some reason Barcala had started calling me “The Madwoman” and whenever he would introduce me it would be as “The Madwoman.” I heard him say, “Only ‘the madwoman’ is inside.” There was another voice, a deep man’s voice and a delicate woman’s voice, but I could not make out what they were saying. Then the door burst open and they entered.

  I closed my eyes against the first burst of sunlight and then opened them. My eyes first focused on a very tall, broad-shouldered man in an elegant dark suit and short cape. His eyes were as black as ebony and large. He had a high forehead like his brother Barcala, for I knew this to be the brother I had heard so much of but never seen. He wore his hair brushed back and long. He was darker than his brother—a ruddy, dark red-brown complexion. He had a medium-sized, rounded nose and full lips and wore a beard and mustache. He looked straight at me. He nodded but did not speak.

  “Almeyda,” the woman said and came and kissed me. Her shoulders were rounded and graceful and looked as if they had been polished. She was wearing gold earrings, a green silk dress, and her hair had flowers in it.

  “Don’t you recognize me?” she asked. “I am Martim Aprigio’s wife.”

  I held my arms out to her and we hugged and I kissed her but remained silent.

  She stood back and looked at me with a sad expression. “Barcala told me what’s been done to you. I am very sorry.”

  I was silent, but looking at her, I felt, with affectionate eyes.

  “Come have a seat, Joanna,” Barcala said. “She won’t speak to anyone.”