Dany Laferrière - Heading South

“Madame Hunter?”

“Yes.”

“Somebody left this package for you last night.”

“But I don’t know anyone here.”

“A man who says you helped him with his horse.”

“So I did. He didn’t seem too happy about it.”

“He’s always like that.”

“Ah,” says Becky, her interest aroused, “you know this man?”

“I’ve seen him around. I don’t know his name. He never speaks to anyone. They say he comes from a village in the northern part of the country. They’re a proud people up there.”

“What’s he doing down here?” Becky asks, a little sharply.

“I don’t know. . Nobody knows. . Look, madame, you can see his little shack from here. .”

“Which one?”

“That one. . he built it himself, barely a month ago. Around here, when a man builds a house, it’s usually for a woman.”

“Oh?”

“But he doesn’t have a woman,” the innkeeper adds, wearily.

Becky opens the package.

“Oh!” exclaims the innkeeper. “Those are scented herbs.”

She takes a handful of the herbs and presses them to her nose.

“Smell them,” she says. “They smell awfully good.”

Becky finds herself suddenly inundated with the aroma of the Caribbean.

“Whatever am I going to do with them?” she says, her voice at once delighted and astonished.

“Put them everywhere about yourself, madame. . In your bath, in your room, on your bed, on your clothes.”

“But why did he give me this gift?”

The fat innkeeper bursts out laughing. Her whole body shakes.

“Here, when a man gives you scented herbs, it means he wants you. .”

“Wants me for what?” Becky asks, panicking slightly.

“He wants you, madame.”

She continues laughing. Becky gets up from the table a bit shakily, like an inexperienced boxer who’s been rabbit-punched just as she turned to the referee.

THE LITTLE TRIBE spent the day at the beach. They sang all the way back to the hotel.

“What the devil does he want, I wonder?” John mutters sullenly.

“Who?” asks Becky.

“Him, he’s been following us. He seems to want to talk to you.”

“Maybe he wants something. .”

“He doesn’t look like a beggar or whatever they call them down here,” John says. “And I don’t like the way he smiles,” he adds.

“I don’t know him,” Becky says, almost casually.

“I’m going to ask him what he wants.”

“Oh, leave him be, John.”

“What he wants,” she thinks, and the thought frightens her, “is your wife.”

AS SOON AS they enter their room, Becky calls out:

“Everyone in the shower, and be sure to wash your hair thoroughly.”

“Yes, Mommy,” says one of the twins. “Salt water is bad for your hair.”

“You’ve told us often enough,” says the other one.

“I don’t like you being so sassy,” Becky says in mock anger. “John-John, try not to get sand everywhere.”

“But Mommy. .”

“No ‘but Mommy,’ please. I have a terrible headache. .”

“Come on, Becky,” says John. “Relax. We’re on vacation.”

“Easy for you to say,” Becky spits at him. “With your nose stuck in a magazine all day.”

The children decamp to the bathroom.

“What’s got into you?”

“Nothing. It’s just seeing your face. It depresses me.”

“Why? What have I done?”

“Nothing. . I’m just having one of my migraines.”

“Is it your period, dear?”

“Damn it, John!”

THE CHILDREN APPEAR to have finished their showers.

“I want you to tidy up the bathroom. . I don’t want to find hair all over the place, do you hear me?”

“Yes, Mommy,” in chorus.

“Dry your hair thoroughly, and when you’re finished you can run me a bath.”

“If it’s all right with you,” John says, “I’d like to take a shower first.”

John heads for the bathroom. Becky stares at her shaking hands. “Good Lord,” she thinks. “What’s come over me?”

“Bring me a comb and a brush and I’ll do your hair now. . John-John, dry yourself properly, you’re not a baby anymore. .”

John-John’s sad look. Three days ago Becky would have taken him in her arms and consoled him. Now she is unmoved. And John-John senses the change: he dries himself methodically without taking his eyes off his mother.

“That enough. Go get dressed now. And no squabbling, you three!”

John’s voice from the bathroom. And the sound of his electric razor.

“Would you like me to run your bath, my dear?”

Becky decides not to answer him.

“I asked if you still want to take a bath.”

Silence.

“Have you changed your mind, or do you still want a bath?”

“Damn it, John!”

“Can I not even talk to you anymore?”

“I have had it up to here with your stupid questions!”

“I’ve never seen you behave this way before. Are you nervous about something?”

Becky tightens her grip on the comb and brush to stop her hands from trembling. She exhales through her mouth, a thin stream of air.

“Are you pregnant?”

“By whom would I be?”

“What a question!” John exclaims, laughing.

An embarrassed laugh.

THREE SMALL RAPS on the bathroom door.

“Who is it?” she says dryly.

“It’s me, Mommy,” comes John-John’s small, frightened voice.

“Come in, sweetie.”

John-John opens the door and remains in the doorway, his eyes filled with tears.

“What is it, John-John?”

“You don’t love me anymore.”

Becky isn’t prepared for this stab in the back.

“Why do you say that? It’s just that Mommy’s tired.”

John-John’s sad, closed expression.

“You don’t love us anymore.”

“But what makes you say such a thing?”

“You’re not here. . You’re not with us. .”

“But look, here I am, sweetie! How can you say such a thing? Whatever do you mean?”

John-John remains silent, having nothing to add. He has said everything. Now there is only his limitless sadness.

“Come here, my sweet, come and give Mommy a hug. . There, can you feel Mommy’s here now?”

John-John smiles.

“It smells good in here, Mommy.”

“It’s these scented herbs, my little sweetie-pie.”

“Am I still your sweetie-pie?”

“Of course you are, my darling. .”

AT LAST BECKY is alone. She thinks about what her mother told her about the fact of being a woman. A woman alone with a man. With a man who wants her. She also thinks about the little house on the side of the blue mountain.

She feels like a traveller who, after an absence of many years, has finally come home. Having seen all the wonders of the world, the only thing that still has the power to move her is her little house.

Becky finds herself wondering if perhaps nature has nothing to do with things that happen on the surface. Things like colour, race, nationality, class, social structure. It does what it does. Deep below appearances. Unconcerned with surfaces.

She feels that everything is pulling her away from John, pulling her towards this man whose name she doesn’t even know. Could this be possible?

Maybe people’s names are also meaningless? Nature is deaf, dumb and blind. Then why did it put me in London and give me blonde hair and green eyes, if, in reality, I’m nothing but a simple peasant from the south of Haiti?

Nature makes no reply to that question, either.

JOHN SENSES THAT Becky is no longer beside him in bed. Without opening his eyes he runs his hand over her cold pillow. “She’s probably in the bathroom,” he thinks. When they were first married she would often spend a large part of the night sitting on the toilet seat, holding her head in her hands. When he would ask her what she was doing she would invariably reply that she couldn’t breathe lying next to him.