But on following her out he didn’t recognize her in the crowd of Negroes and leading citizens gathered around the hut. He thanked the old man, who bowed without a word. Then he left. The Captain, behind him, resumed his explanations and asked when the French company from Rio could begin work and whether or not the jetty could be built before the rainy season. D’Arrast didn’t know; to tell the truth, he wasn’t thinking of that. He went down toward the cool river under the fine mist. He was still listening to that great pervasive sound he had been hearing continually since his arrival, which might have been made by the rustling of either the water or the trees, he could not tell. Having reached the bank, he looked out [178] in the distance at the vague line of the sea, the thousands of kilometers of solitary waters leading to Africa and, beyond, his native Europe.
“Captain,” he asked, “what do these people we have just seen live on?”
“They work when they’re needed,” the Captain said. “We are poor.”
“Are they the poorest?”
“They are the poorest.”
The Judge, who arrived at that moment, slipping somewhat in his best shoes, said they already loved the noble engineer who was going to give them work.
“And, you know, they dance and sing every day.”
Then, without transition, he asked D’Arrast if he had thought of the punishment.
“What punishment?”
“Why, our Chief of Police.”
“Let him go.” The Judge said that this was not possible; there had to be a punishment. D’Arrast was already walking toward Iguape.
In the little Garden of the Fountain, mysterious and pleasant under the fine rain, clusters of exotic [179] flowers hung down along the lianas among the banana trees and pandanus. Piles of wet stones marked the intersection of paths on which a motley crowd was strolling. Half-breeds, mulattoes, a few gauchos were chatting in low voices or sauntering along the bamboo paths to the point where groves and bush became thicker and more impenetrable. There, the forest began abruptly.
D’Arrast was looking for Socrates in the crowd when Socrates suddenly bumped him from behind. “It’s holiday,” he said, laughing, and clung to D’Arrast’s tall shoulders to jump up and down.
“What holiday?”
“Why, you not know?” Socrates said in surprise as he faced D’Arrast. “The feast of good Jesus. Each year they all come to the grotto with a hammer.”
Socrates pointed out, not a grotto, but a group that seemed to be waiting in a corner of the garden.
“You see? One day the good statue of Jesus, it came upstream from the sea. Some fishermen found it. How beautiful! How beautiful! Then they washed it here in the grotto. And now a stone grew up in the grotto. Every year it’s the feast. With the hammer you break, you break off pieces [180] for blessed happiness. And then it keeps growing and you keep breaking. It’s the miracle!”
They had reached the grotto and could see its low entrance beyond the waiting men. Inside, in the darkness studded with the flickering flames of candles, a squatting figure was pounding with a hammer. The man, a thin gaucho with a long mustache, got up and came out holding in his open palm, so that all might see, a small piece of moist schist, over which he soon closed his hand carefully before going away. Another man then stooped down and entered the grotto.
D’Arrast turned around. On all sides pilgrims were waiting, without looking at him, impassive under the water dripping from the trees in thin sheets. He too was waiting in front of the grotto under the same film of water, and he didn’t know for what. He had been waiting constantly, to tell the truth, for a month since he had arrived in this country. He had been waiting—in the red heat of humid days, under the little stars of night, despite the tasks to be accomplished, the jetties to be built, the roads to be cut through—as if the work he had come to do here were merely a pretext for a surprise or for an encounter he did not even imagine but which had been waiting patiently for him at [181] the end of the world. He shook himself, walked away without anyone in the little group paying attention to him, and went toward the exit. He had to go back to the river and go to work.
But Socrates was waiting for him at the gate, lost in voluble conversation with a short, fat, strapping man whose skin was yellow rather than black. His head, completely shaved, gave even more sweep to a considerable forehead. On the other hand, his broad, smooth face was adorned with a very black beard, trimmed square.
“He’s champion!” Socrates said by way of introduction. “Tomorrow he’s in the procession.”
The man, wearing a sailor’s outfit of heavy serge, a blue-and-white jersey under the pea jacket, was examining D’Arrast attentively with his calm black eyes. At the same time he was smiling, showing all his very white teeth between his full, shiny lips.
“He speaks Spanish,” Socrates said and, turning toward the stranger, added: “Tell Mr. D’Arrast.” Then he danced off toward another group. The man ceased to smile and looked at D’Arrast with outright curiosity.
“You are interested, Captain?”
“I’m not a captain,” D’Arrast said.
[182] “That doesn’t matter. But you’re a noble. Socrates told me.”
“Not I. But my grandfather was. His father too and all those before his father. Now there is no more nobility in our country.”
“Ah!” the Negro said, laughing. “I understand; everybody is a noble.”
“No, that’s not it. There are neither noblemen nor common people.”
The fellow reflected; then he made up his mind. “No one works? No one suffers?”
“Yes, millions of men.”
“Then that’s the common people.”
“In that way, yes, there is a common people. But the masters are policemen or merchants.” The mulatto’s kindly face closed in a frown. Then he grumbled: “Humph! Buying and selling, eh! What filth! And with the police, dogs command.”
Suddenly, he burst out laughing.
“You, you don’t sell?”
“Hardly at all. I make bridges, roads.”
“That’s good. Me, I’m a ship’s cook. If you wish, I’ll make you our dish of black beans.”
“All right.”
[183] The cook came closer to D’Arrast and took his arm.
“Listen, I like what you tell. I’m going to tell you too. Maybe you will like.”
He drew him over near the gate to a damp wooden bench beneath a clump of bamboos.
“I was at sea, off Iguape, on a small coastwise tanker that supplies the harbors along here. It caught fire on board. Not by my fault! I know my job! No, just bad luck. We were able to launch the lifeboats. During the night, the sea got rough; it capsized the boat and I went down. When I came up, I hit the boat with my head. I drifted. The night was dark, the waters are vast, and, besides, I don’t swim well; I was afraid. Just then I saw a light in the distance and recognized the church of the good Jesus in Iguape. So I told the good Jesus that at his procession I would carry a hundred-pound stone on my head if he saved me. You don’t have to believe me, but the waters became calm and my heart too. I swam slowly, I was happy, and I reached the shore. Tomorrow I’ll keep my promise.”
He looked at D’Arrast in a suddenly suspicious manner.
[184] “You’re not laughing?”
“No, I’m not laughing. A man has to do what he has promised.”
The fellow clapped him on the back.
“Now, come to my brother’s, near the river. I’ll cook you some beans.”
“No,” D’Arrast said, “I have things to do. This evening, if you wish.”
“Good. But tonight there’s dancing and praying in the big hut. It’s the feast for Saint George.” D’Arrast asked him if he danced too. The cook’s face hardened suddenly; for the first time his eyes became shifty.
“No, no, I won’t dance. Tomorrow I must carry the stone. It is heavy. I’ll go this evening to celebrate the saint. And then I’ll leave early.”
�
��Does it last long?”
“All night and a little into the morning.”
He looked at D’Arrast with a vaguely shameful look.
“Come to the dance. You can take me home afterward. Otherwise, I’ll stay and dance. I probably won’t be able to keep from it.”
“You like to dance?”
“Oh, yes! I like. Besides, there are cigars, saints, [185] women. You forget everything and you don’t obey any more.”
“There are women too? All the women of the town?”
“Not of the town, but of the huts.”
The ship’s cook resumed his smile. “Come. The Captain I’ll obey. And you will help me keep my promise tomorrow.”
D’Arrast felt slightly annoyed. What did that absurd promise mean to him? But he looked at the handsome frank face smiling trustingly at him, its dark skin gleaming with health and vitality.
“I’ll come,” he said. “Now I’ll walk along with you a little.”
Without knowing why, he had a vision at the same time of the black girl offering him the drink of welcome.
They went out of the garden, walked along several muddy streets, and reached the bumpy square, which looked even larger because of the low structures surrounding it. The humidity was now dripping down the plastered walls, although the rain had not increased. Through the spongy expanse of the sky, the sound of the river and of the trees reached them somewhat muted. They were [186] walking in step, D’Arrast heavily and the cook with elastic tread. From time to time the latter would raise his head and smile at his companion. They went in the direction of the church, which could be seen above the houses, reached the end of the square, walked along other muddy streets now filled with aggressive smells of cooking. From time to time a woman, holding a plate or kitchen utensil, would peer out inquisitively from one of the doors and then disappear at once. They passed in front of the church, plunged into an old section of similar low houses, and suddenly came out on the sound of the invisible river behind the area of the huts that D’Arrast recognized.
“Good. I’ll leave you. See you this evening,” he said.
“Yes, in front of the church.”
But the cook did not let go of D’Arrast’s hand. He hesitated. Finally he made up his mind.
“And you, have you never called out, made a promise?”
“Yes, once, I believe.”
“In a shipwreck?”
“If you wish.” And D’Arrast pulled his hand away roughly. But as he was about to turn on his [187] heels, he met the cook’s eyes. He hesitated, and then smiled.
“I can tell you, although it was unimportant. Someone was about to die through my fault. It seems to me that I called out.”
“Did you promise?”
“No. I should have liked to promise.”
“Long ago?”
“Not long before coming here.”
The cook seized his beard with both hands. His eyes were shining.
“You are a captain,” he said. “My house is yours. Besides, you are going to help me keep my promise, and it’s as if you had made it yourself. That will help you too.”
D’Arrast smiled, saying: “I don’t think so.”
“You are proud, Captain.”
“I used to be proud; now I’m alone. But just tell me: has your good Jesus always answered you?”
“Always . . . no, Captain!”
“Well, then?”
The cook burst out with a gay, childlike laugh.
“Well,” he said, “he’s free, isn’t he?”
At the club, where D’Arrast lunched with the leading citizens, the Mayor told him he must sign [188] the town’s guest-book so that some trace would remain of the great event of his coming to Iguape. The Judge found two or three new expressions to praise, besides their guest’s virtues and talents, the simplicity with which he represented among them the great country to which he had the honor to belong. D’Arrast simply said that it was indeed an honor to him and an advantage to his firm to have been awarded the allocation of this long construction job. Whereupon the Judge expressed his admiration for such humility. “By the way,” he asked, “have you thought of what should be done to the Chief of Police?” D’Arrast smiled at him and said: “Yes, I have a solution.” He would consider it a personal favor and an exceptional grace if the foolish man could be forgiven in his name so that his stay here in Iguape, where he so much enjoyed knowing the beautiful town and generous inhabitants, could begin in a climate of peace and friendship. The Judge, attentive and smiling, nodded his head. For a moment he meditated on the wording as an expert, then called on those present to applaud the magnanimous traditions of the great French nation and, turning again toward D’Arrast, declared himself satisfied. “Since that’s the way it is,” he concluded, “we shall dine this [189] evening with the Chief.” But D’Arrast said that he was invited by friends to the ceremony of the dances in the huts. “Ah, yes!” said the Judge. “I am glad you are going. You’ll see, one can’t resist loving our people.”
That evening, D’Arrast, the ship’s cook, and his brother were seated around the ashes of a fire in the center of the but the engineer had already visited in the morning. The brother had not seemed surprised to see him return. He spoke Spanish hardly at all and most of the time merely nodded his head. As for the cook, he had shown interest in cathedrals and then had expatiated at length on the black bean soup. Now night had almost fallen and, although D’Arrast could still see the cook and his brother, he could scarcely make out in the back of the but the squatting figures of an old woman and of the same girl who had served him. Down below, he could hear the monotonous river.
The cook rose, saying: “It’s time.” They got up, but the women did not stir. The men went out alone. D’Arrast hesitated, then joined the others. Night had now fallen and the rain had stopped. The pale-black sky still seemed liquid. In its transparent dark water, stars began to light up, low on [190] the horizon. Almost at once they flickered out, falling one by one into the river as if the last lights were trickling from the sky. The heavy air smelled of water and smoke. Near by the sound of the huge forest could be heard too, though it was motionless. Suddenly drums and singing broke out in the distance, at first muffled and then distinct, approaching closer and closer and finally stopping. Soon after, one could see a procession of black girls wearing low-waisted white dresses of coarse silk. In a tight-fitting red jacket adorned with a necklace of varicolored teeth, a tall Negro followed them and, behind him, a disorderly crowd of men in white pajamas and musicians carrying triangles and broad, short drums. The cook said they should follow the men.
The hut, which they reached by following the river a few hundred yards beyond the last huts, was large, empty, and relatively comfortable, with plastered walls. It had a dirt floor, a roof of thatch and reeds supported by a central pole, and bare walls. On a little palm-clad altar at the end, covered with candles that scarcely lighted half the hall, there was a magnificent colored print in which Saint George, with alluring grace, was getting the better of a bewhiskered dragon. Under [191] the altar a sort of niche decorated with rococo paper sheltered a little statue of red-painted clay representing a horned god, standing between a candle and a bowl of water. With a fierce look the god was brandishing an oversized knife made of silver paper.
The cook led D’Arrast to a corner, where they stood against the wall near the door. “This way,” he whispered, “we can leave without disturbing.” Indeed, the hut was packed tight with men and women. Already the heat was rising. The musicians took their places on both sides of the little altar. The men and women dancers separated into two concentric circles with the men inside. In the very center the black leader in the red jacket took his stand. D’Arrast leaned against the wall, folding his arms.
But the leader, elbowing his way through the circle of dancers, came toward them and, in a solemn way, said a few words to the cook. “Unfold your arms, Captain,” the cook said. “You are hugg
ing yourself and keeping the saint’s spirit from descending.” Obediently D’Arrast let his arms fall to his sides. Still leaning against the wall, with his long, heavy limbs and his big face already shiny with sweat, D’Arrast himself looked like [192] some bestial and kindly god. The tall Negro looked at them and, satisfied, went back to his place. At once, in a resounding voice, he intoned the opening notes of a song that all picked up in chorus, accompanied by the drums. Then the circles began to turn in opposite directions in a sort of heavy, insistent dance rather like stamping, slightly emphasized by the double line of swaying hips.
The heat had increased. Yet the pauses gradually diminished, the stops became less frequent, and the dance speeded up. Without any slowing of the others’ rhythm, without ceasing to dance himself, the tall Negro again elbowed his way through the circles to go toward the altar. He came back with a glass of water and a lighted candle that he stuck in the ground in the center of the hut. He poured the water around the candle in two concentric circles and, again erect, turned maddened eyes toward the roof. His whole body taut and still, he was waiting. “Saint George is coming. Look! Look!” whispered the cook, whose eyes were popping.
Indeed, some dancers now showed signs of being in a trance, but a rigid trance with hands on hips, step stiff, eyes staring and vacant. Others quickened their rhythm, bent convulsively backward, and began to utter inarticulate cries. The [193] cries gradually rose higher, and when they fused in a collective shriek, the leader, with eyes still raised, uttered a long, barely phrased outcry at the top of his lungs. In it the same words kept recurring. “You see,” said the cook, “he says he is the god’s field of battle.” Struck by the change in his voice, D’Arrast looked at the cook, who, leaning forward with fists clenched and eyes staring, was mimicking the others’ measured stamping without moving from his place. Then he noticed that he himself, though without moving his feet, had for some little time been dancing with his whole weight.
But all at once the drums began to beat violently and suddenly the big devil in red broke loose. His eyes flashing, his four limbs whirling around him, he hopped with bent knee on one leg after the other, speeding up his rhythm until it seemed that he must eventually fly to pieces. But abruptly he stopped on the verge of one leap to stare at those around him with a proud and terrible look while the drums thundered on. Immediately a dancer sprang from a dark corner, knelt down, and held out a short saber to the man possessed of the spirit. The tall Negro took the saber without ceasing to look around him and then whirled it above his [194] head. At that moment D’Arrast noticed the cook dancing among the others. The engineer had not seen him leave his side.
Exile and the Kingdom Page 12
