Maryse Conde - Who Slashed Celanire's Throat? - A Fantastical Tale

“But this woman really was a saint, don’t you think?” Celanire insisted, trembling with emotion.

Elissa burst out laughing. A crackpot who thought she was Jesus Christ in person! Listening to this caustic answer, Celanire pulled a sour face. She seemed to think twice about letting her in on a secret and, turning to the women, began conversing with them in a low voice. They listened to her in raptures while Elissa tapped her foot in exasperation. Finally the group broke up.

Meanwhile the night had deepened. The tallow candles and oil lamps glowed in the huts, where the women served a thin soup to the children. In the rum shops, the men slapped down their dominos with such force, it sounded as though they wanted to smash the wooden tables. Elissa tried to keep up with Celanire’s hurried strides. She sensed she had deeply hurt her, but she couldn’t understand why. What had she said? What had she done? Surely, knowing her as well as she did, Celanire couldn’t possibly hold it against her that she had not swallowed the gullible women’s tale and their ramblings about Sister Tonine’s sainthood.

They arrived back at the widow Poirier’s, where a hearty dinner was waiting for them. Celanire lingered in the dining room to chat with the widow Poirier while Elissa went to bed, tortured by troublesome thoughts. She had alienated her friend. But why? Emboldened by the dark, the rain was now stamping angrily on the zinc roof. The smell of humus and leaves from deep in the woods and the moans of wild animals in heat seeped in through the shutters. Suddenly the wind veered toward Montserrat.

Two days later in Basse-Terre, Celanire turned her back on Elissa. Both the doors to the governor’s residence and the Gai Rossignol were closed to her. The letters pleading for an explanation went unanswered. Up till then Elissa had never been abandoned, and had never been disappointed in love. Her epistles therefore were tinged with anger and hurt pride. She would perhaps have accepted matters if another had taken her place in Celanire’s favors. But her spies were adamant. The only person she saw in a tête-à-tête was Bishop Chabot. To find out what was going on, therefore, Elissa defiantly turned up at the Gai Rossignol and, catching Celanire unawares, locked herself up with her in her office for four long hours. What the two friends talked about never leaked out. Some pupils claimed they heard Elissa crying. What we do know for sure is that as a result of this conversation, the two friends were reconciled, and from that moment on Elissa attended every meeting with Bishop Chabot. The three of them studied plans for a mausoleum that Celanire wanted for Sister Tonine. As bold as ever, she had drawn an edifice of white marble inspired by the Taj Mahal. Bishop Chabot, however, had little liking for these pagan monuments. He preferred the tombs of the kings of France in the basilica at Saint-Denis. As for Elissa, she had no opinion. Celanire, Bishop Chabot, and Elissa, however, all agreed on the cathedral that should replace the humble log church at Ravine-Vilaine. The stones for the facade would come from the banks of the river Moustique. The high altar would be designed by a wrought-iron craftsman from Grande-Anse. The frescoes would be painted by a cousin of Elissa’s, a mulatto from Capesterre with the looks of an Inca. All this was to be financed by donations. Alas, despite the public display of devotion for Sister Tonine, this was not enough. Then something extraordinary happened: the governor levied a special “solidarity” tax that allowed the work to begin.

To supervise the building site, Celanire and Elissa left Basse-Terre and moved in with the widow Poirier, whom we have already met. Strange how the presence of Celanire wherever she went caused a commotion. It was as if she were back in Bingerville with Tanella and the widow Desrussie, where she was the only topic of conversation. The inhabitants of Ravine-Vilaine, at first well disposed toward her — Wasn’t she a firm believer in Sister Tonine’s sainthood? Wasn’t she turning their village into one of the jewels of Guadeloupe? — soon turned against her. A girl who cleaned for the widow Poirier declared that the three women were as intimate as husband and wife. Three Zanmis! Something unheard of in these parts! They spent their nights and siestas under the same mosquito net. They bathed together in the same tub, scouring each other’s backs with kisses. All day long it was a litany of sweet talk and brazen lovemaking.

Then something else cropped up! A hunter who had gone into the woods to catch thrushes and ortolans claimed that just before dawn he had come across Celanire apparently waiting, sitting under a wild cherry tree, her lips smeared with blood. At first he hadn’t recognized her and just stood there looking at her. Then it was only his presence of mind that saved him. With Celanire in hot pursuit, he had climbed to the top of an ebony tree. Apparently, she didn’t know how to climb trees and had paced up and down below in her rage. This little game lasted until the sun came up, when she scampered off back to Ravine-Vilaine.

Up against such gossip, the good that Celanire was doing went unnoticed. Yet she opened a kind of dispensary where, assisted by Elissa and the widow Poirier buttoned up in white-and-green-striped overalls (let us not forget Celanire likes uniforms!), she distributed basic medication free of charge such as asafetida, tincture of arnica, and paregoric elixir, and recommended infusions and poultices made from local plants. She also began evening classes for the women. She taught these women, whom society had forgotten, how to read, write, and count, and generally educated them, hammering into their heads her favorite slogan: “There’s more to life than serving a man like a slave.” She also taught them to sing Vivaldi a cappella.

In next to no time the cathedral in Ravine-Vilaine was completed. One had to admit it was an edifice fit to rival the most grandiose buildings on the island, and even in Martinique. In an exceptional gesture, Bishop Chabot, in all his pomp, left Basse-Terre on Advent Sunday, followed by a considerable crowd, to say mass there. He also chose this particular day to proclaim loud and clear the name of the new building: the cathedral of Sainte-Antonine, which popular belief soon transformed into Saint-Sister-Tonine. While Celanire sobbed in the front pew, her head on Elissa’s shoulder, her hand in widow Poirier’s, the bishop climbed up into the pulpit and delivered a poignant homily on the subject — death is a snare that only afflicts the unbeliever. The Providence and Goodness of the Lord are boundless. Likewise God gave His only Son to save the world, so He took Sister Tonine, but gave her daughter to save the wretched of Guadeloupe.

He didn’t say any more. And left everyone guessing what he meant!

In early February Celanire, Thomas, and Ludivine embarked on the SS Veracruz for their journey through the empire of the Incas. Elissa insisted on coming with them. She too had read the Peregrinations of a Pariah and greatly admired Flora Tristan. Moreover, she could speak Spanish. But Celanire absolutely refused. On the day of departure, under a floppy, wide-brimmed hat she wore a cream-colored wild silk ensemble and a burgundy fichu on which lay a heavy gold chain necklace weighing at least five hundred grams.

Ludivine, at the difficult age of fifteen, had momentarily lost her beauty. Only a pair of dark, velvety eyes remained that never took their gaze off her stepmother. Her hatred toward her had never relented. She told herself it might take her years, but she didn’t care, one day she would uncover the truth.

When the ship’s siren announced that visitors should disembark, Celanire and Elissa embraced, clearly demonstrating their passion for each other. Thomas looked at them tenderly and benevolently, like a father looking at his daughters, priding himself on their beauty. And it’s true they were beautiful, forming a perfect contrast, one black-black, the other almost white, one tall and the other short, both of them lithe and slender.