by D R Sherman
“We do not talk, eh?” he said softly.
“We do not talk about nothing,” the man affirmed.
“Well then we will talk about something,” Pierre Vigot said. He smiled with malicious pleasure. “It is a little matter of the rent.”
“It is not due for another ten days,” the man said quietly.
“That is so,” Pierre Vigot admitted hesitantly.
He was a good actor. His face registered dismay and surprise, and then just when the other was beginning to relax he held up his hand abruptly. The smile on his face was one of cruel triumph.
“That is so,” he smirked again. “But I am talking about the rent for the last two months, of which you have paid nothing as yet.”
“But you told me the last time that M’sieur Morel had agreed that I should pay it when I could.”
“That is correct, but he has changed his mind since then.” Pierre Vigot laughed, and the sound of it boomed from his chest. “M’sieur Morel,” he said with grand formality, “has asked me to tell you that unless you pay him half of all the money which will be due him at the end of this month, he will be forced to have you removed, and he will find a tenant who is able to pay promptly.”
“But it is sixty rupees!” the man said aghast. “Where can I find half of such a sum when I am not able to work?”
Pierre Vigot ignored the outburst. “M’sieur Morel further added that though it grieved him, he was not prepared to permit lazy fishermen to take advantage of his good heart.”
The man was shocked. In his time he had been called many names by many men and many women, but no one had ever called him lazy. His face flushed with anger, and red blood darkened his brown cheeks. He started to rise, his eyes sparking, and he thought to himself that it was a long time since he had been in a good fight. His unwieldy leg reminded him instantly that he was not in a position even to stand up properly, let alone fight. He sank back, and the red mist in front of his eyes began to clear.
“I am not lazy,” he asserted calmly.
“Then why have you not been able to pay your rent?” “Am I to go fishing with a leg which I cannot even bend?” the man asked sarcastically.
“And what of the rent you did not pay in the month before you broke your leg?” Pierre Vigot shouted angrily.
“In the vent du sud-est?” the man asked scornfully. “Even you who used to be a stupid fisherman know that the fish do not bite and that most of the time there is too much wind to take a small pirogue far out to sea where the tunny and bonito swim.”
“So I used to be a stupid fisherman!”
“Yes, you were a stupid fisherman,” the man said flatly. “And I think you are also lying.”
Pierre Vigot almost danced with rage and astonishment. “Do you think I would come all the way up this miserable hillside if I did not have to do it?”
“It is true perhaps that M’sieur Morel wants his money,” the man pointed out evenly. “Because that is understandable. But you are certainly lying when you say that he called me a lazy fisherman who wished to take advantage of his patience and kindness.”
Pierre Vigot stiffened. “Are you really calling me a liar, Roger?” he asked quietly.
The seated man returned his stare insolently. He braced himself, getting ready to use his hands and his one good leg.
“You were always a fat pig of a man when you were a fisherman,” he said. “But since you gave it up to become an errand boy for Jean Morel you have become much fatter, and what is more, you have also become a liar.”
Pierre Vigot gasped. His eyes glared wildly, and then a second later he roared like a strangling bull. He shot one contemptuously estimative glance at the boy and then started for the man.
The boy snapped the heel of the pistol grip on the spear-gun hard in against his stomach. He braced the muscles of his belly and then hauled back on one pair of the thick circular rubbers which drove the harpoon. He jammed the wire tongue into the last of the three notches which were spaced along the top of the harpoon shaft and then swung the gun up and hooked the index finger of his right hand over the trigger.
“Wait!” he cried fiercely.
Pierre Vigot came to a sudden halt, not really knowing why he did. There was something about the shrilled command, about the tone of it, which did not make sense. He turned and stared at the boy. He saw the fury in his green eyes, and in that instant he realized why he had been puzzled. It was not what he had heard, but what he had been expecting and had not heard: there had been no fear in the boy’s voice.
His glance dropped to the gun in the boy’s hands. He took in the harpoon which was pointing straight at him and the tautly stretched rubbers which were still vibrating slightly. The blood left his face and the healthy black color of it changed to a brownish-gray.
“Mon Dieu, Paul,” he breathed. “You—”
He tried to go on, but his throat shut tight and his tongue was so dry it seemed to be filling his whole mouth. He wrenched his gaze from the terrible fascination of the quivering rubbers and the barbed harpoon which had the barbs ringed flush with the head and waiting to spring open the moment it penetrated. He looked up at the boy’s face, and what he saw made him even more afraid: there was an expression of indecent eagerness on it.
“Paul—” he whispered.
The boy lifted the gun a little. “You had better go,” he said.
Pierre Vigot nodded shakily. He backed off warily, and when he reached the edge of the terrace he spun round quickly and jumped down onto the sloping hillside. He ran a little way, and when he thought he was out of the speargun’s range he paused and looked back across his shoulder.
“You will be sorry for this,” he called softly, and then his voice rose in sudden fury. “Both of you!” he screamed. He turned away, and then he did a strange thing. He crossed himself furtively and superstitiously as he went on down the hill.
Child of the devil, he thought fearfully, with his one leg shorter than the other.
“And you remember!” the boy shouted back at him. “There are still ten days to the end of the month!”
He waited for Pierre Vigot to go on down the hill, and then he turned towards the man. There was a look of shock on his face. He could still hear the words he had spoken ringing in his ears, and they were full of a rage and hate he had not known was in him. He unloaded the speargun numbly, doing it mechanically and without thought.
“My God, Papa!” the boy exclaimed softly. “He would have killed you!”
“Perhaps,” the man replied calmly. “But even with my leg as it is I would have hurt him very badly.”
“Are you mad, Papa?” the boy asked incredulously, angrily, and suddenly he felt his legs begin to shake with reaction. “He makes three men of your size.”
“There are certain ways to almost kill a man with one single blow,” the man explained to the boy. “I learned them as a young man long ago when I sailed for a while on the Arab dhows out of Mombasa, and I have never forgotten it.”
Yes, he thought, I have never forgotten it, as I will never forget the sharp agony of a blow dealt to the throat by the edge of a man’s hand, or the veiled women of Arabia with only their eyes showing above their veils, and all the terrible wet heat till we got down to Karachi and Bombay and Cochin where the women did not wear veils but smiled their brown smiles with the rice on their foreheads and the glitter of rubies set in their pierced nostrils. It was a long time ago, he remembered, and through all of it he could not forget her.
He came out of his reverie to see the boy shaking his head in disbelief. “It is so,” he said. “Even if you do not believe it now, it is so.”
“Will you show me when your leg is well?” the boy challenged.
“I will do it,” the man said.
The skin under the plaster on his thigh began to itch maddeningly. He dug his fingers in under the cast and scratched furiously, and when he drew them out again there was dead skin embedded beneath his broken fingernails. He worked it out with t
he thumbnail of his right hand and then he brushed his hands off against his patched shorts. He looked up suddenly at the boy.
“It is a terrible thing, this, Paul,” he said quietly. “I have lived in this house many years, and it is also the house in which you were born to me. I have many memories of it.”
The boy stared silently at the man. He saw the sadness on his face, and far back in his eyes he saw the glitter of something which he had seen once in the eyes of a large tomcat. Its back had been up against a wall, and three snapping mongrels had been closing in on it. He watched the man, feeling a strange pain in his chest, and he could think of nothing to say.
“I think Pierre must have talked M’sieur Morel into doing this thing,” the man said suddenly.
“But why?” the boy cried. “You have not had words with him, not until today.”
The man rubbed thoughtfully at his gray stubbled chin. “That is true, but I have never liked him and he has known it.” He compressed his lips suddenly and then went on in a grave voice. “I think perhaps he envies me, because I am still a fisherman with my own pirogue.”
“Ahhh!” the boy breathed.
Even now this was something he could understand. When once a man had known the sea and fished it he was bound to it forever. When a man was no longer a part of it, through circumstance or even choice, there was always regret, and more often than not, envy of those who still belonged.
“Perhaps M’sieur Morel would change his mind if you explained our position to him,” the boy said. He spoke without conviction, because he had seen M’sieur Morel, and he did not think he was a man who would change his mind when once he had made it up.
“No!” the man exclaimed, and he was suddenly proud and fierce. “I explained it to him the first time, and now it would be begging. I have never done it, and I will not do it now.”
“Well…” the boy said uncomfortably.
“I wish that M’sieur Duvalier were still the propriétaire,” the man said wistfully. “And I wish that lie had sold his property to anyone but Jean Morel.”
“Well,” the boy said again, “I think it is time for me to go and shoot some fish.”
“You will not take any line?” the man asked.
The boy pointed out to sea, waving his hand at the broken water with a gesture of futility. “It would be a waste of my time, I think,” he said.
The man was thoughtful for a while, and then he nodded. “Take care though,” he warned. “And do not go out beyond the reefs.”
Like most fishermen he did not know how to swim. He cursed the sea, and sometimes he came very close to hating it, but it was only the hate that comes from the sorrow and despair of watching a loved one misbehave. He loved the sea for many things, for its fierceness and its gentleness, and for the fishes which it gave him, but the thought of entering the water itself was quite abhorrent to him. He gazed at his son with a pride that was tempered with awe.
“We have no more credit at the store, do we?” he asked suddenly.
He knew very well that they could no longer get credit at the store, but he felt, as before, that it was a necessary preliminary.
“Not any more,” the boy answered. “Not even with that old thief of a bearded Chinaman.”
“Then perhaps you could try the other store for some tobacco,” the man said gravely.
There was no other store. The boy opened his mouth to protest, but then he became aware of the strange alertness in the man’s eyes. He understood, and he felt a sudden sorrow and pity for his father.
“I will,” he said, keeping up the pretense. “Perhaps they might oblige me.”
He turned away and started down the hill, and he was thinking that he had learned many things about the man since he had broken his leg which he had not known of before.
“There is one thing, Paul,” the man called, and then when the boy paused he went on again: “I think I must thank you for my life. If Pierre Vigot had not taken it, he would have hurt me badly, perhaps so badly that I might never have fished again.”
There, it was out, for all his earlier show of foolish bravery and defiance.
“It was nothing,” the boy said gruffly, trying to hide his embarrassment. “You did more than that for me when you gave the life in my body your name.”
He stared blindly past the man. He saw the small house perched on a ledge of the hillside, and beyond it he saw the green of the mountain going on for as far as he could see till he could see no more through the trees which grew thick and green against its side. He turned away silently and started down the hill again.
And a purpose to my life, he thought, because already I am a good fisherman.
“Perhaps you will be lucky and spear a big fish,” the man called after him. “One so big that we can sell its meat for more than sixty rupees.”
He did not believe it, because even on a strong line it took a long time and much sweat to boat a fish that would sell for that much money. He knew it was really impossible, but he thought about it for a long time, even after the boy was no longer in sight.
Such a boy, he thought, and then he pushed himself up off the steps, his left leg stretched out stiffly at an awkward angle as he rose. He stood for a moment looking down the hill, and then he turned and stumped across the veranda and into the room which he shared with the boy. He saw the ends of his crutches sticking out from under the foot of his bed, and he felt glad that he had learned to walk without them. He walked over to the table, and even though he knew the tin ashtray was empty he could not help himself from peering into it with a little flutter of hope.
The boy limped along the winding, well-trampled path which snaked round huge boulders and tall trees and all the way down the side of the hill. In some places it was very steep and slippery from the rain, and he turned side-on, so that the right side of his body with the longer leg was forward and then he slithered and slid taking short quick steps till he could walk normally once again.
As he worked his way down the side of the mountain he was thinking of the things which had just happened, and he remembered what he had said to his Papa when the man had spoken that foolish nonsense about saving his life.
It was nothing, he told himself, because you have given me more than my own mother and father gave me.
For a brief instant he hated them, that unknown man and woman, but then he pulled himself together. The emotion in him was fierce, and the strength of it made him tremble.
I am Roger Paul Mistral, he thought defiantly, and there was anger and pride and happiness all mixed up in his thoughts.
“Roger Paul Mistral!” he whispered aloud, sounding the names experimentally.
When he realized what he had done he glanced round with a nervous start of guilt. But he was quite alone and, sure of his privacy, his embarrassment vanished. He tried it out again.
“Roger Paul Mistral!” he said, his voice ringing loud and confident on the lonely side of the hill.
He walked on, drawing great comfort from the sound of his full name, and then suddenly he wondered what it would be like to be able to say Maman. He had never used the word though, and because the man had been his mother as well, the thought was not with him for long.
Passing a cinnamon bush he tore off a green sprig and began chewing on it. The smooth bark was still wet with the rain of the night. He came to the bottom of the hill, running the last few yards. He walked on, and a little farther he crossed the sandy road and continued across the fiat land which sloped gently down to the sea on the other side.
Through the thickly clustered coconut palms he caught glimpses of the big house of Jean Morel. It was about a hundred yards to his left, on a high grassy clearing which overlooked the beach.
He wondered whether he would see the girl. He had seen her yesterday, for the first time in a long while, but that did not mean that he would see her today. He remembered then that it was the time of the school holidays, and his heart began to beat a little faster. He wondered whether she would
be sitting on the seawall where he had seen her yesterday, or whether she would be inside the house and out of sight.
His father’s pirogue was anchored where he had left it yesterday, in the shallow tidal waters fifty yards beyond the highwater mark. If he had walked on in the direction he was taking he would have come out on the beach right opposite it. Without consciously changing his direction he started angling off to his left. When he realized where he was going a few seconds later he halted suddenly. He thought about it for a while, and then he straightened his shoulders abruptly with a shrug of defiance.
He walked on a little bit farther, and then through the trees he saw the high land of the open clearing and the seawall which had been built up ten feet tall from the beach and three feet above the level of the land. The girl was sitting on it.
He halted, undecided and unsure of himself now that he had actually seen her. The nervous tempo of his pounding heart increased. He studied her for a moment longer, and then he made up his mind abruptly. He turned and ran straight down towards the beach, dodging in and out among the coconut palms, fearful now that she might decide suddenly to move.
He broke through the grove of coco palms fifty yards to the right of where she sat. He vaulted the low seawall without breaking his stride, landing on the soft damp sand on the other side. He stood breathlessly still for a moment, watching her and hoping that she had not noticed him. His toes curled unconsciously and dug into the moist sand.
He started forward and then halted again, and for one petrifying moment he was so nervous and appalled by what he was contemplating that he almost turned back. He had never spoken to a girl before, not at any rate with his mind full of the vague and unformed longing that was now making his head spin. He took a deep breath, and holding it for a while steadied him. He glanced down at the speargun in his hand, and the sight of the beautifully pointed harpoon sent a surge of confidence through him. He tossed his head, feeling angry and full of contempt for his cowardice.
He limped forward again, forcing himself to breathe more slowly, but before he had covered half the distance to her his breath was once again coming in short little gasps. He hugged the seawall, and twice he splashed through little pools of water which the tide had left behind in shallow depressions against the wall.
