Marie Vieux-Chauvet: Love, Anger, Madness

“It smells like a prison around here,” Simon wakes up and exclaims.

“Maybe it’s the chamber pot,” André answers, rubbing his eyes.

“Prison! It was so filthy!” Simon says again. “I would rather deal with an army of devils than go back there.”

“Don’t talk about them,” André advises quietly.

“About whom?”

“The devils,” André answers.

“But where are they? Your devils. You haven’t told me yet.”

“Don’t joke about them,” I caution him.

“We’re old friends, aren’t we, René? I’m not used to holding back anything from you. So! These devils of yours, me, I don’t believe in them. I’m an atheist, don’t forget that. And an atheist accepts neither the idea of God nor the devil.”

“This is not the best time for blasphemy,” André whimpers. “We’re already in debt to the loas since René touched the syrup, so don’t force God to turn from us as well.”

He traces a large cross on his chest and sniffles.

“I am not trying to hurt anyone,” Simon says. “To each his convictions. But that syrup, if you would permit me, I’ll lap it up in front of you without leaving a drop.”

“Don’t touch it,” André yells.

“Pass me the bottle of clairin and calm down. I will drink it only if you permit me to do so. And, one way or another, you will. Me, I don’t know how to live without eating and I’ll be hungry soon enough.”

“You’re drinking all the clairin” André protests.

“Say what you will, but this is the good life,” says Simon, lying down on the floor. “Even if it stinks, this is the good life. Too bad it smells a bit like jail. The bastards! They almost had our hides! Things like that could make you go crazy. Do you remember how they woke us up with kicks one day and told us we were going to be executed? And that other time when they amused themselves by slapping us and making us crawl naked on all fours like dogs. No doubt about it, they persecute poets here. Even French poets. They have no regard for foreign nationals. It’s our ambassadors’ fault; they land on this island like Robinson Crusoe… Do you remember what the commandant said to me when I protested and threatened to invoke my flag? He said, ‘Shut your dirty trap, white trash, or I’ll make you swallow your teeth along with your tongue.’ No respect for me, a French citizen marooned here of my own accord, who boasts and sings Haiti’s praises in poems that may be published one day throughout the four corners of the world… As a matter of fact, we never did recover from the commandant’s blows. But probably the most vicious were the ones who were helping him. Never seen anything more diabolical than the expression on their faces!”

“Be quiet!” André yells.

“Why? We are locked up. No one can hear us. This is stupid!… Poor Jacques getting hit in the head by one of them! Bap and bap and bap until his nose and eyes were bloody. What’s wrong, René? I’ve never seen such a grin on your face! Why are you looking at me like that? You’re scaring me. You look like a wild beast. Get a hold of yourself, my friend!”

“I don’t like to hear you lie,” I whispered furiously “You’re talking about things I don’t remember. If Jacques had indeed been hit in the head, how could I ever forget that?”

“I don’t remember much either anymore,” André admitted sadly, voluptuously scratching the scar on his forehead.

“What scheme are you two hatching? Or are you trying to make me think I’ve gone completely nuts? You, André! Where did you get that scar?”

“I don’t know, I don’t really know… I fell, I think, when I was little, just like that…”

“Like that, really!”

“And anyway, leave us alone,” I shouted.

“I have the right to talk about it, hell and damnation!” he shoots back. “I’ve had my fair share of beatings and getting slapped around, just like you. No point blubbering. They won’t come looking for us where we are. And anyway, were we arrested for a political reason? We weren’t, were we? So then? We’re not doing anything wrong. We are locking ourselves up to get drunk and that can’t bother anyone, not even the devils you pretend you’ve seen… Oh! Oh! Oh! You bunch of pranksters!…”

“Don’t laugh at them,” I say to him.

“Gosh! You’re looking dangerous there. Thin as a rail but standing on his spurs like a fighting cock. Say, old friend, you’re not going to beat up a poor drunk white guy, are you, your poor drunk white buddy?”

“Don’t talk about them or you’ll draw them out.”

“About whom must I no longer speak?”

“The devils.”

“But I wasn’t talking about them,” he protests. “I don’t believe in them, I tell you.”

“You get everything mixed up and you don’t understand a thing,” André tells him. “Take René’s advice. In reality, you’re just a white man and our country’s mysteries are beyond you. Take René’s advice. He’s the boss.”

“The boss of what?”

“The boss!” André adds without any further explanation.

“Shit then,” Simon exclaims. “Me, I can’t keep up with you anymore.”

“That’s because you are just a white man,” André answers.

“Oh! Really now,” he protests. “Fuck off with your white man bullshit. Aren’t the four of us brothers who go way back, yes or no?”

“Yes,” I reply, “but there are things in our country you will never understand.”

“What, for example? That I’m forbidden to drink your syrup even if I am croaking of hunger, because you’ve supposedly already offered it to your loas? Hold on! Watch this! I am going to swallow your syrup, you watch me…”

“No!” André shouts.

“I am a white man,” Simon yells, “and I’m hungry.”

He leans over the trunk and grabs the dishes.

“Double dishes of baked clay!” he says with admiration. “Joined like Siamese twins! Bugger me! They’re full of syrup! I could never swallow that much! Nothing can make a man as sick as sugar after alcohol. I’m going to barf and I don’t like barfing… Him, why is he sleeping like that? Hey, Jacques! Wake up, sonny. He’s still as a dead man. Anyway, here’s your syrup. Looking at it makes me nauseous. Dear loas , I return to you what’s yours. Ah! Ah! Ah! Bugger me! I like clairin better. Why is he sleeping like that? Hey! Wake up…”

I see him suddenly put the dishes down on the trunk and lean over Jacques. He finds his heart and puts his ear to it. He looks so funny in that posture that I burst out laughing.

“He’s dead,” he tells us and gets up staggering, goes toward André and puts an arm around his neck.

“He’s dead,” he says again.

“You’re mad,” André says coldly.

“He’s dead, I tell you!” he yells.

And he begins sobbing noisily, like a big child, fists in his eyes.

Pain suddenly hit me, sinking into my skull like a knife and swelling in my brain. A thousand red-hot needles pierced my right temple and a gong resounded in the distance, mournful and deafening.

“The signal,” I cried out.

“What signal?” Simon asked.

I threw myself on the wall, trembling, barely able to stand on my legs. The gong resounded a second time, then a third. I saw a multitude of devils coming out of the ground. They were naked this time and all black with red horns and tails. They were moving in rhythm as if to the beat of some strange, stylized voodoo dance. I saw one of them climb a beam up to Cécile’s balcony with the agility of a monkey. He broke open the door to the living room and came out carrying her under his arm like a small package. He jumped over the balcony and let himself slide to the ground, where he put her down. He tore off her clothes, leaving her naked. I seized my weapons. I shoved five bottles into my pockets, struck a match and lit the sixth.