Master of the Crossroads

by Madison Smartt Bell

  “Les caciques,” Toussaint said, with a half-turn of his head, as if Moustique had asked the question aloud. The Indians. They were dead now, all of them, their line extinguished. Nearly so. Once, before the insurrection, a band of maroon blacks had passed the little church on the Massacre River, and Moustique’s father had pointed out among them a mestizo: the glossy black hair completely straight, the flat, coppery patina of his face. His father had kept a box of small stone objects made by those extinguished Indians, ax heads, laughing and groaning faces, phalluses and animal figures all in a jumble. He was dead now too, Moustique’s father.

  To the north side of the road, the jungle opened into a sudden, long declivity, which gave view to a fertile valley far below. Beyond were more mountains, chains of them receding from green to distant blue, to the warped misty line of the horizon. Moustique imagined he could see the ocean, or smoke rising faintly over Cap Français, where his father had been executed on the public square, bound and broken on a wheel. The jungle closed over the road again, shut off the view, but Moustique saw in his mind’s mirror the executioner’s hammer falling to break a shin or elbow, and his father’s voice shouting in reply: Domine, non sum dignus! He would not weep, and his mother was equally iron-faced, standing beside him in the crowd, only she had bitten through her lips until the blood ran out the corners of her mouth, as if she’d just been killing something with her teeth. Both before and afterward Moustique had been stoned by other boys of his own age and often of his color too; they mocked him for being the son of a priest. That day he felt nothing from the stoning, though afterward he wondered at the wild rainbows of color the bruises raised on his gold skin.

  He stopped thinking, let the memory drop. He had learned this, since those terrible days in Le Cap, this emptying, like the passage from dream to sleep, though his eyes were open, all his senses present; he could remark land crabs clinging to the narrow boles of trees, a green parrot gliding silently across the roadcut up ahead, was half aware of the mutual sweat that glued his knees to the donkey’s sides, and grateful for the woven straw saddle, round and soft like a coil of bread. A wooden saddle would have broken his hips in the course of the afternoon, he imagined. They rode briskly, with only two brief halts, once to water the animals and drink themselves from a small spring, a second time for Toussaint to dismount and gather herbs.

  In the late afternoon, with the air suddenly, ominously cooling, they broke from the road and went down a trail-less jungled slash in the mountainside, so steep that Moustique thought the white horse must surely fall or break a leg, but Bel Argent managed nimbly as a mule, Toussaint remaining mounted all the while. They climbed the other side of the gorge and struck a well-worn trail on the opposite height, a red wound in the dirt deep as the knees of Moustique’s donkey. Some passages seemed impossibly steep, but the white war horse went up them like a man mounting stairs. The wind stepped up, sudden and sharp; the trees swayed back away from it, and Toussaint looked over his shoulder to grin briefly at Moustique, the white plumes dancing on his hat, then squeezed and leaned and urged his horse a little faster up the slope.

  The wind whistled, carrying a couple of crows over their heads like string-cut kites, and a black pig broke from the undergrowth and stared at them and ran the other way. Not a wild pig, Moustique took note; it was round and complacent, domesticated. A first raindrop came horizontal, like a bullet, and exploded on his cheekbone. Then they had gained a saddle of the ridge and were surrounded by the barking of two tiny savage dogs that snapped from behind a patchy fence of cactus, guarding a small mud-walled case planted on a flat area of bare packed earth. Toussaint slipped down from his horse at once. Moustique hesitated—he was afraid of the dogs, but an old woman appeared and cursed the dogs in Creole so that they stopped barking and slunk behind the house.

  Toussaint had already stripped saddle and bridle from his horse. He improvised a halter with an end of rope and tied Bel Argent to a sapling’s trunk. All around them, the trees were tossing in a whirlpool turbulence; higher on the ridge Moustique saw the crown of a mapou tree thrashing among the others. A younger woman snatched up an iron cauldron from an outside fire and carried it into the shelter of the house. Toussaint grinned and gestured, and Moustique pulled the saddle from his donkey. The bridle was rope, which rain would not harm; he used the reins to fasten the donkey to another tree.

  The young woman met them in the doorway, kissing Toussaint at the corner of his mouth for greeting. “Bon soir,” she said, and offered Moustique the same formal kiss. The straw saddle kept their bodies separate as lips brushed cheek. She was younger than he’d thought, perhaps even younger than he. Inside the case it was quite dark and full of a rich, warm smell from the stewpot. No sooner had they crossed the threshold than the rain dropped down outside like a waterfall.

  “N’ap manje,” the old woman said out of the darkness. We’ll eat.

  She passed them halves of hollow gourd and they ate without speaking, sitting crosslegged with the gourds on their knees: a stew of goat meat and brown beans well spiced with small, piquant yellow peppers, and chunks of cassava bread to sop round the edges of the bowl. The girl sat near enough the door that she was covered by the gray rain-streaked daylight, more visible than the others. For every mouthful she swallowed herself she carefully chewed a bite of goat meat and laid it on a piece of bread for the old woman beside her to take in her gums.

  When they had finished eating, the old woman stared at the wall of water beyond the doorway for some minutes and then remarked that it was raining. Toussaint agreed that this was true. The old woman waited a few minutes more and then said that they must stay and rest during the rain; Toussaint agreed with this proposal also.

  One of the small spotted dogs had crept out of the corner and made itself as agreeable to Moustique as it might, licking the stew scent off his fingers. He lay down on his side, head pillowed on the straw saddle. Through the open door he could see the rain coming down in rivers, and Bel Argent moving a little restively on his tether. The donkey stood still, head lowered mutely under the flow of rain. Its whole near side was covered by an enormous R cut long ago with a hot coutelas, the mark of a onetime owner. The little dog curled against Moustique’s stomach, and he covered it with his hand, feeling the hot quick pulse of its heart under his fingers, but he was thinking about the girl, watching her breasts rise and recede under the faded blue fabric of her shift as she breathed. The torrent of rain on the thatched roof was no more than a hush.

  He did not know that he had slept until Toussaint shook his shoulder to rouse him. The rain had stopped long since and the yard round the case was bathed in the light of a moon just short of full. Bel Argent had provided a heap of manure, and Toussaint took a chip of wood and shoveled the droppings into the bush, away from the house.

  Moustique saddled the donkey, climbed aboard and followed Toussaint away from the clearing. As they went, he heard from behind him a tap of drums, hollow and uncertain, in the area of the mapou tree. They rode, sometimes startling animals—pigs or goats or perhaps large lizards which made huge noises scattering from their path. So Moustique tried to tell himself, though he was fearful, remembering tales of loup-garou, or evil bokors who wore the skins of animals to travel in the night. They went on, speechless in the silver night, barred by shadows of the trees. By some trick of acoustics the drumming followed them a long way through the involutions of the mountainside, disappearing and then coming clear again, joined by the sound of singing voices. Moustique wondered if the girl were there among the hounsis, if she were dressed in white.

  In the moonlight the plumes of Toussaint’s hat rode tranquilly as a sail before an easy wind. Even after moonset he kept on at the same urgent pace, through the total darkness. Moustique could see nothing, nothing at all, but his donkey still seemed able to follow. He was numb, sleepy, still a little apprehensive; he wanted to speak but was afraid of being heard. At last a pallor began to dilute the general darkness, and cocks were crowing up
and down the mountainside. Then the daylight appeared suddenly from all directions and they were riding into the village of Dondon.

  The women of the little town had risen and begun the business of the day, and a few men also went to and fro in the dirt street—all of them black or colored, for the French colons had fled the place, those who had not been killed in the insurrection. Some of the men were dressed in oddly assorted rags and tags of European military uniforms. Toussaint halted one of these he seemed to know.

  “Koté Jean-François?”

  “L’allé...” The foot soldier’s reply bespoke an eternity of absence, who-knew-where.

  Toussaint rode directly to the church, a modest wooden building on a stone foundation. He hitched his horse and entered, sweeping off his hat at the threshold. Moustique tied the burro and followed him, blinking at the change of light. In place of candles they were burning torches of bois chandel; the pitchy smoke playing the part of incense. A few black women were scattered on the benches, and a pair of mulattresses dressed in penitential white. Two blancs in the uniforms of Spanish officers loitered just inside the door. At the altar stood l’Abbé Delahaye, his arms upraised to consecrate the host.

  Toussaint dropped his hat on a backless bench and knelt before the altar, pulling off the yellow mouchwa têt he always wore and crumpling it in his left hand. Moustique looked curiously down on his grizzled hair, the bald spot toward the back. Never before had he seen Toussaint bareheaded. Then he remembered to kneel himself, but he still watched Toussaint sidelong, under his lashes, wondering at the docile, lamb-like manner with which he took communion. Next the priest moved toward him with the chalice and the bread, and Moustique closed his eyes completely and received.

  After the service, l’Abbé Delahaye entertained his parishioner in the front room of the small house he occupied behind the church. A young black woman came into the room to serve them coffee—she had remained in Delahaye’s service of her own volition, though she was no longer a slave. There were no longer any slaves in Saint Domingue. Delahaye smiled privately at the thought, groped in the sack of herbs Toussaint had presented to him, and began to spread the contents on the table: sonnette, giraumon, tabac à Jacquot, then something that he didn’t recognize. He raised the leaves in his hand and turned to Toussaint.

  “C’est quoi, ça?”

  “C’est thym à manger.”

  “Et ça sert à quoi?”

  Toussaint was spooning sugar into his coffee, a great deal of sugar. “It is used,” he said, “by women who wish that their children would not be born alive.”

  Delahaye straightened, stiffened, adjusted his stole.

  “Monpè,” said Toussaint, “it must be said that oftentimes it is desirable to know of things which one does not intend to use.”

  Delahaye raised his eyebrows, then nodded, somewhat reluctantly. He opened a notebook, picked up a stick of charcoal, and quickly sketched the herb and its flower on the first blank page. When he had finished, he closed the notebook over the leaves and laid his hand on the cover to flatten it.

  “My son,” he said to Toussaint, “I see by your uniform that you are still given to the service of kings.”

  Toussaint didn’t answer. His long-jawed black face was almost leadenly impassive. Delahaye had the impression that his sentence had overshot the mark and gone flying out the open door behind his guest, into the yard where the colored youth Toussaint had brought crouched on his heels, chatting idly with the black maidservant. That same mute impassivity was frequent among all those who had been slaves, whether African or Creole, but in this case it could not be assigned to stupidity or incomprehension. In the face of Toussaint’s stillness, Delahaye felt utterly at sea. With some difficulty he kept his own silence.

  Presently Toussaint loosened a button on his uniform coat and inserted his hand, as if to produce something from an inside pocket. But when he drew forth the hand, it was empty. From outside the door came the faint twittering cry of a swift darting over the case.

  Delahaye sighed. “I have seen, for example, a letter which you addressed to the republican commander Chanlatte some months ago, wherein you denounce the commissioners, and the republican forces generally, for various cruelties in the field which you allege, but most especially for the cruelty of having executed King Louis XVI in France. In conclusion you say that it is not possible for you and your followers to recognize the commissioners until they have enthroned another king.”

  “As you know, monpè,” Toussaint said, “I am merely the junior officer of my generals Biassou and Jean-François—”

  “Yes, my son,” Delahaye broke in, “I know this even too well, for it was I who spoke to your generals on behalf of the commissioners of the Republic, to which they replied that they had never done anything since the world was made except to carry out the will of kings, and thus they too could not recognize the commissioners until France had enthroned another king.”

  “It was not I who composed those phrases,” Toussaint said.

  “Perhaps it was not,” said Delahaye. He sighed again and scratched his stiff graying hair, cut carelessly short in the manner of a Roman soldier. “And yet their similarity to those you did compose is remarkable.”

  “Not so remarkable as the power of your memory, monpè.”

  Delahaye grimaced at the compliment, thin lips tightening against his teeth. “It is true that I study your correspondence with interest whenever it comes my way. In your letter to Chanlatte, for example, you claim that your own party—that is to say, the party of the Spanish and their king—is the only one to truly serve Divine Justice and the rights of man. And yet, if you pride yourself (as your letter also suggests) on the fidelity of your news from Europe, you must also know, or at least suspect, that enthusiasm for the rights of man has overthrown kings, rather than upholding them.”

  Toussaint had turned his head slightly, so as to look through the open door. Delahaye studied his profile, the durable set of his underslung jaw.

  “It is difficult for me to understand you as a warrior for the ancien régime,” he said. “No doubt you have considered the role played on the coast by the English—good royalists all, and they serve slavery even as they serve their king. As do your Spanish masters, who have not set free their slaves.”

  Toussaint faced him. His hand rose and covered his mouth, as if to block an impulse to reply. Still he did not speak, but Delahaye felt the quickening of his attention.

  “Meanwhile,” he continued, “the black leaders of the early rebellion have found shelter in the mountains. I think, for example, of Macaya, and of his reply to the commissioners. I am the subject of three kings: the King of the Congo, Lord of all the Blacks; the King of France, who represents his father; the King of Spain, who represents his mother. The three kings are the descendants of those who, led by a star, went to adore the Man-God. Therefore I cannot serve the Republic, as I do not wish to be drawn into conflict with my brothers, who are the subjects of these three kings.”

  “Yes,” Toussaint inclined his head. “I have heard that he spoke in that way.”

  “Indeed,” said Delahaye. “I will not call Macaya a savage—I should say, he is a man certainly, yet not a man of your gifts, nor of your attainments. I had thought that you were better instructed than to enter into the simplicity of his thought. Yet you find yourself in agreement with him.”

  “I have not said that my purpose is the same as his.”

  “Nor have you said that it is not.” Delahaye permitted himself a smile, which Toussaint seemed vaguely to return. “But perhaps your purposes are not the same as those of Biassou and Jean-François either, nor those of the Spanish throne—which, I may observe, is allied with the English against France.”

  “The Generals Jean-François and Biassou enjoy a higher rank than my own in the army of his Spanish Majesty,” Toussaint said, “but I do not answer to their orders. My force is separate from either of theirs.”

  “That is well,” Delahaye said. �
�You may know—I believe that you must know—that those two generals of yours continue the traffic of slaves. That men and women and children have been taken even on the borders of this town, and brought down to the coast in chains, then loaded like cattle—onto Spanish ships.”

  “I have heard report of this, but my own eyes have not seen it.”

  “Yet you support such an abomination?” Delahaye searched the dark face for a sign of reaction.

  Toussaint looked at him mutely, waiting. The priest folded his hands and closed his eyes for a moment, breathing slowly.

  “My son,” he said, “I am convinced that you will find the rights of man of which you have written better served by the French Republic than by any of these nations still ruled by kings. And as you set such store by the quality of your information, I think it would very much interest you to know that the proclamation of Commissioner Sonthonax has been confirmed by the French National Assembly: Slavery has been abolished, once and for all, throughout all our French colonies.”

  “Is it true?” Toussaint said eventually.

  “It’s I who tell you.”

  “Monpè, I give you my most perfect confidence.”

  “Come home to France, my son,” breathed Delahaye. “The arms of the Republic are open to receive you.”

  “Doucement,” said Toussaint. “Doucement allé loin.”

  “Oui, toujours,” said Delahaye.

  Toussaint set down his coffee cup with a deliberate clatter. “But today I have come on another errand,” he said. “The boy—his name is Jean-Raphael, though everyone knows him as Moustique. He is the son of the Père Bonne-chance who was executed at Le Cap for having assisted in the tortures committed by Jeannot against the blancs and for having procured white women to be raped by—in any case it must be said that in truth Père Bonne-chance did none of these things, that he was a good and godly man and that his identity was mistaken by the blancs who judged him.”