Day is rapidly waning in this apocalyptical setting. Once again I’m walking around in the back of English Bay in quest of some object, some trace that might have escaped the hurricane. I look everywhere, but everything has already completely changed, become unrecognizable. Where is the pile of stones that mirrored the Southern Triangle? And these basalt rocks near the slope, are they the ones that first led me to the mooring rings? The dying day is the colour of copper, the colour of molten metal. This will be the first time that the seabirds will not fly across the bay to go back to their roosts. Where have they gone? How many of them survived the hurricane? This will also be the first time the rats have come down into the valley bottom, driven from their nests by the mudslides. They are bounding about me in the dusk light letting out sharp little alarming cries.
In the middle of the valley, near the river that has broken its banks, I find the tall slab of basalt upon which, before leaving for the war, I engraved the east-west line and the two inverted triangles of the mooring rings that form the star of Solomon. The slab has resisted the wind and the rain, it’s simply sunken a little deeper into the ground, and standing in the middle of this ravaged landscape it looks like a monument from the origins of the human race. Who will find it one day and understand what it signifies? The valley of English Bay has clapped its secret shut, closed the doors that had opened momentarily for me alone. On the cliff to the east, lit by the beams of the setting sun, the entrance to the ravine draws me over one last time. But when I get closer I see that, with the heavy water runoff, part of the cliff has collapsed, barring access to the corridor. The torrent of mud that poured out of the ravine devastated everything in its path, uprooting the old tamarind tree, whose soothing shade I so loved. In a year there will be nothing left of its trunk, only a mound of earth topped with a few thorn bushes.
I stay up there for a long time, until nightfall, listening to the sounds of the valley. The river rushing down, hauling earth and trees along with it, the water trickling from the schist cliffs and, far away, the constant thundering of the sea.
I spend the two days I have left gazing out over the valley. Every morning I leave the narrow room in the Chinese hotel early and go up to the Commander’s Watchtower. But I don’t go down into the valley any more. I just sit in amid the underbrush, near the ruins of the tower, and contemplate the long red-and-black valley, where all traces of me have already disappeared. Out at sea, hanging on the coral reef, the unearthly stern of the Zeta remains motionless amid the crashing waves. I think of Captain Bradmer, whose body hasn’t been found. They say he was alone aboard his ship and did not try to save himself.
It’s the last image I’m taking away with me from Rodrigues, as I stand on the deck of the new Frigate heading out to sea with all of its iron plating vibrating in time to its straining engines. The Zeta stands facing the tall, barren mountains shimmering in the morning sun, as if it were balancing for all time on the brink of the deep water. A few seabirds are circling over it, exactly as if it were the carcass of a whale washed up by the storm.
Mananava, 1922
Since my return, everything at Forest Side has grown to be unfamiliar, silent. The old house – the shack, as Laure calls it – is like a ship taking on water everywhere, patched up as best as possible with bits of sheet metal and tarpaper. The humidity and the karyas will soon get the better of it. Mam doesn’t speak, doesn’t move, hardly even eats any more. I admire Laure’s perseverance, she stays at Mam’s side night and day. I haven’t got the strength. So I walk out along the paths through the cane fields, over by Quinze Cantons, over where you can see the peaks of Trois Mamelles and what the sky looks like on the other side.
I have to work and, following Laure’s advice, I’ve mustered up the courage to apply for a job at W. W. West again, which is now managed by my cousin Ferdinand. Uncle Ludovic has grown old, he’s withdrawn from the business and lives in the house he had built near Yemen, where our lands once commenced. Ferdinand welcomes me with scornful derision, which would have made me angry in the past. Now it just doesn’t faze me.
When he says, ‘So you’ve come back to your old…’
I suggest, ‘Haunts?’
And even when he speaks of ‘war heroes the likes of which we see every day’, I don’t bat an eye. In the end he offers me a job as foreman on their Médine plantation and I have to accept. Now I’ve become a sirdar!
I live in a cabin over by Bambous and every morning I ride around the plantation on horseback to oversee the work. I spend the afternoons in the racket of the sugar mill, supervising the arrival of the cane, the bagasse, the quality of the syrups. It’s exhausting work, but I prefer it to the suffocating offices of W. W. West. The manager of the sugar mill is an Englishman by the name of Pilling, sent from the Seychelles by the Agricultural Company. In the beginning Ferdinand had tried to pit him against me. But he’s a fair man and our relationship is excellent. He talks about Chamarel, where he hopes to go. If he’s sent over there he promises to try to have me come along.
Yemen is lonely. Mornings, the field workers and women wearing gunny cloth move through the immense fields like a ragged army. The whooshing sound of the cane knives makes a slow, regular rhythm. At the edge of the fields, over by Walhalla, men are breaking ‘teeth’ or heavy stones to make the pyramids. I ride across the plantation, heading southwards, listening to the sound of the cane knives and the yapping of the sirdars. I’m streaming with sweat. In Rodrigues the burn of the sun made my head reel, I saw sparks firing on the stones, on the screw pines. But here the heat just adds to the loneliness in the dark-green stretch of the cane fields.
I think about Mananava now, the only place left to me. It’s been within me for so long, ever since the days when Denis and I would walk up to the entrance of the gorges. Suddenly, as I ride along the paths of the cane fields, I glance southwards and imagine caches at the source of rivers. I know that’s where I must go in the end.
I saw Ouma today.
They’ve started cutting the virgin cane, high up in the plantations. The men and women have come from all parts of the coast, with anxious faces, because they know that only a third of them will be hired. The others will have to go back home with hungry bellies.
On the way to the sugar mill a woman in gunny cloth is standing to one side. She turns halfway towards me, looks at me. In spite of her face being half-hidden by the long white veil, I recognize her. But she’s already disappeared in the crowd that is separating on the paths between the fields. I try to run over to her, but bump into field hands and women who’ve been turned away, and everything is covered with a cloud of dust. When I get to the fields all I can see is the thick, green wall undulating in the wind. The sun is burning down on the dry earth, burning down on my face. I start running along one of the paths, shouting, ‘Ouma! Ouma…!’
Scattered women in gunny cloth raise their heads, stop cutting the grass between the cane. A sirdar calls out to me in a harsh voice. Looking somewhat disoriented, I question him. Are there Manafs here? He doesn’t understand. People from Rodrigues? He shakes his head. There are some, but they’re in the refugee camps down by the Morne, at Ruisseau des Créoles.
I look for Ouma every day on the road that brings the gunnies and in the evening in front of the accountant’s office at pay time. The women have already caught on, they make fun of me, call out to me, jeer at me. So now I don’t venture out on the paths in the cane fields any more. I wait for night and cross the fields. I pass children gleaning. They aren’t afraid of me, they know I won’t turn them in. How old would Sri be now?
I spend my days riding around the plantation in the dust, in the sun that makes my head spin. Is she really here? All the women in gunny cloth resemble her, frail figures stooped over their shadows, working with their sickles, their hoes. Ouma has only shown herself to me once, as she used to by the Roseaux River. I think about the first time we met, when she fled between the shrubs in the valle
y, when she climbed into her mountains as agile as a young goat. Did I dream all of that?
That’s how I make the decision to give everything up, get it all out of my system. Ouma showed me what I need to do, she told me, in her own way, simply by appearing before me like a mirage, in the middle of all those people who come to work on land that will never belong to them: black people, Indians, half-breeds, every day hundreds of men and women here in Yemen, in Walhalla or Médine, in Phoenix, Mon Désert, in Solitude, in Forbach. Hundreds of men and women who pile rocks atop walls and pyramids, who rip out tree stumps, plough, plant young cane stalks, then, throughout the seasons, strip the leaves from the stalks, crop off the tops, clean the land, and when summer comes, move through the fields, patch by patch, and cut, from morning to night, stopping only to sharpen their cane knives, until their hands, their legs are bleeding, lacerated by the sharp leaves, until the sun makes them nauseous and dizzy.
Almost without realizing it I’ve gone all the way across the plantation to the southern end, where the smokestack of an abandoned sugar mill stands. The sea isn’t far, but you can’t see or hear it. You can, however, get glimpses of seabirds circling, freely, up in the blue sky. There are men working here, clearing new land. In the heat of the sun they’re loading black rocks on to carts, they’re digging at the earth, striking it with their hoes. When they see me they stop working, as if they are afraid of something. So then I walk over to the cart and start digging up stones too and throwing them on to the pile. We work without stopping, while the sun descends towards the horizon, burning our faces. When one cart is full of stones and stumps, another replaces it. The old walls stretch far into the distance, maybe as far as the seashore. I think of the slaves who built them, the people Laure calls the ‘martyrs’, who died in these fields, the ones who escaped into the mountains to the south, to the Morne… The sun is very near to the horizon. Today, just like back in Rodrigues, I feel as if its burn has purified me, has freed me.
A woman in gunny cloth walks up. She’s an old Indian woman with a shrivelled face. She’s brought sour milk for the workers to drink, dipping it from a pot with a wooden bowl. When she reaches me, she hesitates, then extends the bowl to me. The sour milk cools my throat, burning from the dust.
The last cartload of rocks rolls away. In the distance the sharp whistle of the boiler announces the end of the workday. The men take up their hoes and saunter off.
When I get to the sugar mill Mr Pilling is waiting for me in front of his office. He looks at my sunburned face, my dusty hair and clothing. When I tell him that I want to work in the fields from now on, harvesting, clearing, he interrupts me, snapping, ‘You aren’t capable of doing that, and at any rate it’s impossible, no white man ever works in the fields.’ He adds in a calmer voice, ‘In my view, you are in need of rest and you have just turned in your resignation.’
The discussion is closed. I walk slowly down the dirt road, deserted at this hour. In the light of the setting sun the cane fields seem as vast as the sea and, scattering into the distance, the smokestacks of other sugar mills resemble ocean liners.
The rumour of a riot has once again brought me over to the arid lands around Yemen. They say the fields are burning in Médine, in Walhalla, and that men who are out of work are threatening the sugar mills. Laure tells me the news without raising her voice, so she won’t worry Mam. I dress hastily. Despite the morning drizzle I go out wearing my military shirt, without a jacket or hat, barefooted in my shoes. When I’m up on the plateau, near Trois Mamelles, the sun shines down on the wide-open fields. I can see columns of smoke rising from the stands of cane around Yemen. I count four fires, maybe five. I start to climb down the cliff, cutting through the underbrush. I think of Ouma, who’s undoubtedly down there. I remember the day when I saw the Indians throw the field manager into the bagasse furnace and the silence of the crowd when he disappeared into its flaming mouth.
I reach Yemen around midday. I’m soaked with sweat and covered with dust, my face scratched from the underbrush. The people are crowded around the sugar mill. What’s going on? The sirdars have contradictory stories. Some men have fled in the direction of Tamarin after having set the hangars on fire. The mounted police are on their trail.
Where is Ouma? I move closer to the refinery buildings surrounded by the police, who refuse to let me in. In the courtyard, guarded by militiamen armed with rifles, men and women are squatting in the shadows, hands on their heads, waiting for their fate to be decided.
So I start running across the plantation again, heading for the sea. If Ouma is here, I’m sure she would seek refuge by the sea. Not far from me, in the middle of the cane field, heavy smoke is wafting up into the sky and I can hear the cries of the men fighting the fire. Somewhere, deep in the field, rifle shots ring out. But the cane stalks are so high I can’t see over the leaves. I run through the cane, not knowing where I’m going, first one way, then another, listening to the crash of rifle shots. Suddenly I trip, stop, out of breath. I can hear my heart skipping in my chest, my legs are trembling. I’ve reached the boundary of the property. Everything is silent here.
I climb up a pyramid of rocks, I can see that the fires have already gone out. Only one column of light smoke is rising over by the sugar mill, indicating that the bagasse furnace is functioning again.
It’s all over with now. When I get to the beach of black sand I stand still among the tree trunks and branches washed up by the storm. I do this so that Ouma will see me. The coast is deserted, wild, like English Bay. I walk along Tamarin Bay in the light of the setting sun. I’m sure that Ouma has seen me. She’s following me without making a sound, without leaving a trace. I mustn’t try to see her. It’s her game. One day when I told her about Ouma, Laure said, in her mocking voice, ‘Yangue-catéra! She put a spell on you!’ Now I believe she’s right.
I haven’t been here in so long. It’s as if I were walking in my own footprints, the ones I left when I used to watch the sun slip into the sea with Denis.
At nightfall I’m on the other side of the Tamarin River. I can see the twinkling lights of the fishing village across the river. Bats are flying around in the pale sky. It’s a warm, calm evening. For the first time in a very long time I’m preparing to sleep outdoors. In the black sand of the dunes, at the foot of some tamarind trees, I make my pallet and lie down, hands behind my head. I lie there with my eyes open, watching the sky growing more beautiful. I listen to the gentle sound of the Tamarin River mingling with the sea.
Then the moon appears. It moves through the middle of the sky, the sea is sparkling below. Then I see Ouma, sitting not far from me in the glowing sand. She’s sitting like she always does, arms around her legs, face in profile. My heart is beating very hard, I’m trembling, from the cold perhaps? I’m afraid that it’s only an illusion, that she’ll disappear. The breeze is rising, awakening the sounds of the sea. So then Ouma comes over to me, takes my hand. Just like in the old days in English Bay, she takes off her dress, walks down to the sea without waiting for me. Together we dive into the cool water, swim against the waves. The long rollers coming from the other side of the world pass over us. We swim for a long time in the dark sea, under the moon. Then we come back to shore. Ouma pulls me over to the river, where we wash the salt from our bodies and hair, stretched out on the pebbles of the riverbed. The air coming from the open sea makes us shiver and we talk in whispers, so we won’t wake up the dogs in the vicinity. As in the old days we sprinkle black sand on each other and wait until the wind makes it slip off our stomachs, our shoulders, in little rivulets. I have so many things to say, I don’t know where to begin. Ouma talks to me too, she tells me about death coming to Rodrigues with typhus, her mother’s death on the boat that was taking the refugees to Port Louis. She tells me about the camp in Ruisseau des Créoles, the salt fields in Black River, where she worked with Sri. How had she learned I was in Yemen, by what miracle? ‘It’s not a miracle,’ says Ouma. Suddenly her voice is almost angry. ‘I waited for
you every minute of every day, in Forest Side or I went to Port Louis, to Rempart Street. When you came back from the war I’d waited so long I could wait a little longer and I followed you everywhere, all the way out to Yemen. I even worked in the fields, until you saw me.’ I feel a sort of dizziness coming over me and my throat tightens. How could it have taken me so long to understand?
Now we aren’t talking any longer. We’re lying close to one another, holding each other tightly, so we won’t feel the chill of night. We’re listening to the sea and the wind in the needles of the she-oaks, for nothing else exists in the world.
The sun rises over Trois Mamelles. As in the past, back in the days when Denis and I would go roaming, I see the blue-black volcanoes against the bright sky. I remember I always loved the southernmost peak, the one that looks like a fang, the one that’s the axis around which the sun and the moon turn.
I wait, sitting in the sun, facing Le Barachois, watching the river flow peacefully along. The seabirds are skimming slowly along the surface of the water – mangrove herons, cormorants, quibbling seagulls – flying out to meet the fishing pirogues. Then I go up the Boucan River until I reach Panon, walking very slowly, carefully, as if over a minefield. In the distance, through the leaves, I can see the Yemen chimney that is already smoking and I can smell the mellow odour of cane juice. A little higher up, on the other side of the river, I also see Uncle Ludovic’s very white, new house.
The Prospector Page 29
