The Dark Secret of Josephine

by Dennis Wheatley

  Roger raised a smile as he repeated: ‘The past week! It seems more like a year since the pirate barque attacked our ship off the coast of Porto Rico. But now that I have slept my fill I should thoroughly enjoy talking for a while; so, Monsieur, I will willingly oblige you.’ He then proceeded to give a graphic description of the perils he and his party had survived.

  When he had done de Bouçicault said: ‘That you should be alive to tell this tale thanks must be rendered to le Bon Dieu, but it is due in part at least to the courage displayed by yourself and your companions, and I am honoured to make your acquaintance. I need hardly say that you are all welcome to remain here for as long as you wish; but without intending any discourtesy I should be glad if the ladies could be transferred to Mole St. Nicholas as soon as they are sufficiently recovered to travel.’

  ‘I am sorry that you should find it inconvenient to let them stay here until my wound is healed and we can all leave together,’ Roger replied in some surprise.

  ‘No, no! You must understand me, ’de Bouçicault rejoined hastily. ‘Surely you know that war, revolution and civil war are all now tearing this island apart; so that no white persons, particularly defenceless women, are really safe anywhere in it except in the towns held by British troops. It is the certain knowledge of the ghastly fate which would overtake your ladies did they fall into the hands of the revolted negroes that causes me to urge their removal as speedily as may be possible.’

  14

  The Terror-ridden Island

  Roger’s face fell, then he admitted a shade apologetically to his host: ‘I fear I am but sadly ill-informed about West Indian affairs, my appointment came as a surprise and I had little time to study them before I left England. I knew, of course, that as a result of the Revolution in France there had been revolts among the slaves in all the islands, and that here they were said to have been particularly serious; but I imagined that they would have been put down ere this seeing that, as in Martinique, the planters had called in the English to aid them against the Terrorists.’

  ‘Far from it,’ de Bouçicault sadly shook his head. ‘There are British garrisons in the capital, Port-au-Prince, at Mole St. Nicholas, which is only about thirty miles away, and in most of the coastal towns; but they can do little more than aid our army of colonists and loyal mulattoes to hold its own. The greater part of the interior of the country is still at the mercy of the negroes and infested by marauding bands of slaves turned brigand.’

  Having condoned with his host on this unhappy state of things, Roger said: ‘Pray enlighten me if you can, Monsieur, as to why matters should have gone so much worse here than in the other islands.’

  ‘Perhaps because it was the largest, richest and most progressive of all the French possessions in the Indies, and therefore more closely en rapport with popular feeling in the mother country. Possibly, too, because we had here a higher proportion of slaves than in any other colony. In ’89 there were half a million negroes and sixty thousand mulattoes to only forty thousand whites. Although, as a matter of fact, it was not the blacks but the mulattoes who initiated our long chain of troubles.’

  ‘How so, Monsieur?’

  ‘Looking back I am inclined to think that we colonists were largely to blame, for having stubbornly refused to advise our government in France to rectify the anomalous situation of these half-castes. Had we confined ourselves to taking their women as concubines, as you English do, that would have been regarded as a normal privilege of the ruling caste, but many of us married them; yet we still refused to receive their families or grant them any political rights. A high proportion of them were free men who between them owned about ten per cent of the land and some 50,000 slaves. Naturally they bitterly resented such contemptuous treatment. A group of the more intelligent among them began, as early as ’88, an agitation in Paris for equal rights; and coupled with it there started a movement for the abolition of both the slave trade and slavery.

  ‘While the monarchy remained absolute these agitations for reform made no headway, but soon after King Louis summoned the States General and it had formed itself into a National Assembly, it issued its famous Declaration of the Rights of Man. Mulattoes and negroes alike instantly seized on that as their Charter, and unrest here became widespread. In March 1790, alarmed by the urgent representations of our Governor, the Assembly passed a resolution to the effect that the Declaration applied only to France and not to her colonies. On that, a mulatto delegate named Vincent Ogé, who arrived back here in the following autumn, called on his fellows to secure their rights by force of arms. It was thus there started the appalling bloodshed which has since drenched this country.’

  ‘You interest me greatly. Do please continue.’

  Acceding to the request, de Bouçicault went on: ‘Ogé was soon defeated and took refuge in the Spanish part of the island. But he afterwards surrendered and was executed by being broken on the wheel. By then the revolution in Paris was gaining momentum, and the news of Ogé’s martyrdom, as it was termed, provoked a great outcry. In consequence, in May ‘91, the law was amended giving coloured people born of free parents in the French colonies equal civil rights, including that of sitting in our Assemblies.

  ‘For the white minority to submit to a decree which might later lead to their being governed by negroes was unthinkable. We decided to ignore it; but the news of it soon got about and set the whole island in a ferment, which culminated on the unforgettable night of August the 23rd.

  ‘A Jamaican negro named Boukman assembled a large number of slaves in the forest. He was a giant in size and a Houngan, as the priests of Voodoo are termed. After sacrificing a pig and drinking its blood the mob he had collected set out to slay and burn. The movement spread like a prairie fire through the north and west, and for a week or more there ensued the most appalling butchery of the white planters and their families. Not content with killing the men and raping the women, the blood-maddened negroes put their victims to the most excruciating tortures—such as binding them between two planks and sawing them in half. In their senseless fury they also attacked inanimate objects, setting fire to houses, barns, crops and forest, until the blaze was such that the inhabitants of distant Bermuda were puzzled and alarmed by the red glow in the sky.

  ‘In the second week troops arrived from the south, the surviving whites formed themselves into armed bands, and with our superior brains and weapons we began to stamp out the revolt. On hearing of the massacres the Governor of Jamaica also sent a contingent of British troops to help us restore order.

  ‘As France and England were then at peace he did so on humanitarian grounds and without any ulterior motive; but his generous gesture showed us that whereas our own government in Paris had callously thrown us to the black horde, his government considered it their duty to protect the lives and properties of white colonists. It was this which led that autumn to our repudiating the rule of France and sending delegates to London to offer our country to Britain.

  ‘Unfortunately, at that time, your Mr. Pitt was maintaining a policy of strict neutrality with regard to matters connected with the Revolution in France; so on those grounds he rejected our offer. In the meantime, fearing to lose France’s richest colony, the National Assembly had rescinded its decree of the previous May; but its action came too late to put a stop to the bloody vendetta that the decree had started. Its only effect was to divide the colonists on the question of severing their relations with the mother country or remaining loyal to her.

  ‘That question was finally decided for them in the spring of ‘92. By then the extremists in Paris were gaining the upper hand and they forced a new decree through the Assembly. It gave absolute equality of rights with whites to both half-castes and blacks, and Commissioners were sent out with full powers to see the decree enforced. Our Governor refused to place the white population politically at the mercy of the blacks, so the Commissioners called on the revolted slaves to support them. In addition a high proportion of the French troops had become i
mbued with revolutionary ideas, so sided with the fire-brands from Paris. Thus a civil war within the civil war began, in which whites, mulattoes and blacks were fighting on both sides.

  ‘That we survived the desperate year of ‘93 is nothing short of a miracle, but somehow we managed to keep the republicans and blacks from overwhelming us. At times though there were happenings of such horror that they beggar description. At midsummer the negroes succeeded in breaking into the fine city of Cap Français, slaughtered the entire white population of four thousand, then burnt it to the ground.

  ‘Repeatedly we had appealed again to Britain to take the colony over, and as by then she had entered on war with France an agreement was reached that she should do so. But she had heavy commitments in other theatres and for many months could not spare forces to send to bur assistance. That autumn, in despair, we begged further aid of the Governor of Jamaica and he nobly answered our appeal. In September the British reinforced our great stronghold at Mole St. Nicholas and they have since sent large numbers of troops who are now acting as garrisons in our principal towns. But the war continues and, alas, I see no end to it.’

  Having concluded his account de Bouçicault fell silent, and after a moment Roger said: ‘As it is now over a year since British forces landed here in some strength it surprises me that they have been able to do no more than protect a few ports. After all, in Jamaica they have a base that is no more than two days’ sail distant; so they should have no difficulty in securing ample arms and stores for the waging of an offensive, whereas the negroes must be ill-armed and their supplies from revolutionary France have long since been cut off. If well directed, a few battalions of our troops ought to have made mincemeat of such a rabble.’

  The big Frenchman shook his blond head. ‘My friend, if you think that, you are sadly ignorant of conditions here. It is true that we have been greatly disappointed in the lack of initiative shown by your countrymen; but they are by no means altogether to blame for that. Yellow fever has killed ten British soldiers for every one that has fallen a victim to the blacks. Hundreds of them have died of it, and when I was last at Mole St. Nicholas, a fortnight ago, I learned that the garrison had been reduced to a mere three hundred and seventy-eight, of whom one hundred and sixty-six were sick.

  ‘Again you are quite wrong in your assumption that the negroes are lacking in a source of supplies with which to continue the war. Although Spain is the ally of Britain in her war against France, here she is secretly stabbing your country in the back. As you must know, this whole island was for the first two hundred years after its discovery a Spanish possession. The western, and by far the most valuable, third of it was ceded to France only under the Treaty of Ryswick in 1697, and then became known as Saint-Domingue to distinguish it from the part retained by Spain known as Santo Domingo. The Spaniards have never given up hope of regaining the lost third with its richer plantations, and in this terrible civil war of ours they see their opportunity.

  ‘One of the boldest, and by far the most intelligent, of the negro Generals is a man named Toussaint l’Ouverture; and he has had the good sense to make a pact with the Spaniards. They treat their slaves comparatively well, but all the same a great part of them would revolt if urged to it. He has promised to refrain from stirring up trouble among them provided their masters furnish him with the necessities of war. That suits the Spaniards, and each time the negroes suffer a defeat they retire across the frontier where our men dare not follow them; for to do so would mean having to fight Spanish troops as well as the negroes. Then when Toussaint has rested and re-equipped his forces he suddenly appears again, overruns a great area of the country and launches an attack on one of our towns.’

  Roger nodded. ‘It is a grim picture that you paint, Monsieur; and I am truly sorry for you and the other loyalists here who have suffered so grievously. Pray tell me now, what is the present situation?’

  ‘Toussaint is on this side of the border, somewhere to the east of us, and it is thought that he contemplates an assault against the port of St. Louis du Nord; but no one can say for certain. The mountains and the forests provide him with excellent cover for his troops, no whites dare any longer to live in the interior, and no blacks would betray his movements; so one of his columns might appear with only the briefest warning almost anywhere. That is why I am anxious to get the ladies away to Mole St. Nicholas as soon as they are fit to travel.’

  ‘But what of yourself? If you fear that one of Toussaint’s columns might suddenly appear in this neighbourhood, it surprises me that you should remain here risking death or capture.’

  ‘It is a risk I have long run; and as the blacks have very few mounted men, even were the house surrounded, the odds are that by taking to horse I should manage to break through and escape.’

  Roger made a half rueful, half comic, grimace. ‘Until my wound is fully healed I fear that I should be in no case to do likewise.’

  ‘I trust Monsieur le Gouverneur does not suggest that I would leave him to be murdered by these wretches,’ retorted de Bouçicault with a sudden stiffening of his manner.

  ‘I was but joking,’ Roger hastened to assure him. ‘It was a stupid remark, as I have no doubt whatever that you would do your utmost to save me.’

  ‘And I have little doubt that I should succeed. But to undertake the getting away of four helpless females at the same time might well prove beyond my capabilities. It was for that very reason that long ago I sent my own wife and daughters away to live at Mole St. Nicholas.’

  ‘It must be very lonely for you living here without them. As you are in no situation to protect your property I wonder that you continue to do so.’

  ‘Ah, but I can protect my property! To some extent at least. And as it constitutes almost my entire fortune, the inducement to stay on in the hope of better times far outweighs the attractions of safety with my family at the price of permanent beggary.’

  ‘The estate would remain yours.’

  ‘That is true; but the slaves who worked it have gradually drifted away, and ever since the Boukman revolt my plantations have become more and more derelict. In the tropics it needs only a few years of neglect for fields of coffee, cotton, cacao and sugar cane to be swallowed up by the jungle. Mine would now be of little value. But I still have the house, with its stables and a great range of outbuildings equipped for handling the produce of the estate. They are the nucleus of the property and my sole hope of preserving them lies in staying on here.’

  Since your house servants appear to have remained loyal to you, could you not have left them in charge. In the event of a determined attack, whoever was occupying the place would be compelled to abandon it anyhow, and they would run far less risk of being maltreated by other negroes than would you.’

  De Bouçicault shook his head. ‘If you are to govern the island of Martinique successfully, my friend, you will do well to learn something about negro mentality; for there too their status has now become a problem, and will require skilful handling. In spite of what I have told you of the excesses they have committed here you must not suppose that they are all evil and sadistic by nature. It is simply that their minds are much more childlike than ours. Few of them have as yet developed any reasoning powers, so they react swiftly to every primitive impulse of the moment, and are easily led by stronger personalities for either good or ill. Normally, they respond to kindness as readily as those of us who have been blessed with white skins; and during the terrible week of the initial revolt. I and my family owed our lives to the fact that we had always treated our slaves as human beings. They protected us and refused to allow the revolted slaves from neighbouring plantations to set fire to the house.

  ‘Yet the crux of the matter is that they took that stand only because we were present, and could exert a stronger influence on them than could comparative strangers whom they had no reason to regard as in any way superior to themselves. Had we been absent they would almost certainly have joined the insurgents and gleefully participated i
n the atrocities committed by others of their race.

  ‘ ’Tis, of course, because I was little more than a cipher to the majority of my estate slaves that most of them were suborned by tales of easy plunder and ran away believing that the country was about to become a black man’s paradise. The house slaves, on the other hand, considered themselves to be well off where they were, and I was in a position to counter any idea that by becoming outlaws they would enter into a Utopia. Nevertheless, did I depart, their minds would become fluid and subject to the first plausible rogue who sought to induce them to abandon their trust.

  ‘Probably they would at first refrain from plundering my belongings; but were they confident that I did not intend to return until the disturbances were over they would not prevent their relatives from doing so, and soon they would persuade themselves that they were behaving stupidly in letting others get away with all the loot. Within a few weeks the house would be as bare as if it were a mule’s carcass that had been picked clean by vultures, yet would be crammed to capacity with negroes of both sexes and all ages.

  ‘That is what has happened to all the big houses in the interior. They have been stripped even to the door knobs, and become reeking tenements which are best described by the term human ant-heaps. Banisters, cupboards and everything burnable in them is used to light fires because the inmates are too lazy to go out and collect more wood than they have to in the forests. The roofs may leak, the plaster crack, the paint peel from the walls and the floors become charred from the several cooking fires that are lit by different families daily in every room. It is no one’s responsibility to maintain or repair the structures, and if their owners ever regain these places they will find that the gracious homes they left have become smoke-begrimed barren shells. That is what would happen here if I went to live in Mole St. Nicholas.’