The grandfather got up, took the child in his arms and walked past Rose as he made for the stairs.
She slowly went up after them and pulled the door to her room shut. She fell to her knees, doubling over, head nearly touching the ground, arms crossed on her stomach as if it ached. Then she took off her clothes, holding them using the tips of her fingers in disgust, and ran to the bathroom.
When the mother went into the bedroom, she was resting, dressed in a clean white nightgown, lying on her side, eyes closed and breathing evenly. She looked at the girl pensively for a moment and then went to her son’s room.
“She slept with that dirty dog,” he said with revulsion.
“I will never believe that.”
“That’s it, keep lying to yourself, keep seeing only what others tell you, and the rest of your life they’ll keep telling you the moon is made of green cheese.”
“No one has ever fooled me, you know that, not even your father.”
“So why do you refuse to face the truth?”
“As long as she won’t say anything about it, I won’t accuse her. What right do I have to judge my daughter when she shows more courage than I do?”
“Mama!”
“She dared to confront these wild beasts for your sake, for our sake, and we should scorn her for it?”
“I’ll kill him! I’ll kill him!”
“Calm down, Paul!”
There was barely a year’s difference between him and his sister and they had been friends since childhood. “My sister! My sister!” he kept repeating to himself, as a bitter taste filled his mouth. “Rose Normil! The lovely Rose Normil. Paul’s sister, don’t you know her?” people used to say. And he would smile without answering, smile with pride. The way she carried her head high with her nose in the air as if the whole world smelled funny to her! “I am going to kill him,” he said again, and imagined an enormous knife sticking out of the back of the little man with gorilla hands as he thrust it in to the hilt.
The next day, he went to Dr. Valois’ house and saw Anna again. He had to wait for some time as she was helping her father at his clinic, where she was a nurse. When she came out, pure and beautiful in her immaculate smock, all that weighed on his heart seemed to melt. She exists, you simply have to remind yourself that such women exist in order to reconcile yourself with life, he told himself. As for my mother, poor woman, my father has neglected her so much that she’s fallen in love with Dr. Valois. I saw it in how she looked at him. And that’s normal. Absolutely normal. Exactly like his daughter, he’s seductive in a way that’s not just a matter of looks but something deeper. And this thing that one feels in their presence is like an intoxicating per-fume. They are solid and impermeable. Their nature is like an immutable boulder planted in the earth for thousands of years. A dangerous proposition. Anna! If I should smash my forehead into her, it would open up and drain all the blood from my body. And I would die of it. Good! What do I care! Death for the sake of death!
They stayed in the living room chatting for a long time. Not once did she bring up the question of the land, and she seemed to have forgotten he had left her on the day of the fair without saying goodbye. All the better, he thought then. He had come to her for a bit of happiness and comfort. And miraculously, he felt happy and comforted. A few minutes before he left, Dr. Valois came out to shake his hand.
“I will come by your house soon,” he promised. “I’ve been very busy and neglected my little patient. How’s Claude? Still has that temper of his?”
He, too, said not a word about the land. You’d think he knew nothing about it. Paul went home, his soul lighter, as if bathed in clear light. Such tact! he told himself. How they went out of their way to avoid embarrassing me or hurting my feelings! How I love Anna!
CHAPTER ELEVEN
The wall rose a meter above the ground. But when she looked at it the mother felt as if it was higher than the house. A horrible nightmare had just torn her from her slumber and she sat up, breathless and shivering: she had just seen her children chained to a multitude of poor starved souls, walking skeletons, half-naked, feet bleeding. The invalid on Paul’s back was crying, but she could not budge and saw them moving farther and farther away even as the sound of the rattling chains grew more intense. Hand on her heart, she looked at the man sleeping by her side. Was she going to die in this bed helpless? She leaned toward him and called him quietly, but he didn’t move. So she got up and walked to the window. Her keen senses picked up the acrid smell of the stonework and the still-fresh cement, as well as that of the leaves and flowers of the lemon trees that covered the grave. She left the window, cautiously opened the door to the bedroom and felt her way downstairs. She had no trouble finding the bottle of rum in the cupboard. She brought it to her lips and took one gulp after another. She coughed and immediately felt the warmth of the alcohol spreading through her. I want to feel drunk, she told herself. For the first time in my life, I need to feel drunk! She drank again and went upstairs clutching the handrail. From time to time she would burst into a choked laughter, grotesque and loathsome.
She walked into the bedroom and fell on the bed. Everything spun before her and her arm came down clumsily on her husband’s face. Startled, he woke up and saw her with her mouth open, wild-eyed, and he smelled rum on her breath.
“You were drinking?” he asked her, his eyes wide with the surprise, and then shoved her away, overwhelmed with disgust.
She fell back in bed and then got up staggering. She made a clumsy dash for the window and, leaning out, began to throw up in silence. She remained in this position as long as he said nothing.
“You were drinking?” he repeated. “Walking in your father’s footsteps. But what got into you?”
She straightened up slowly and turned around. Without answering, she took a pitcher of water that was on her bedside table and poured herself a glass.
“I’m thirsty,” she finally said.
“What got into you?”
“How should I know?”
She sat on the bed, hand on her heart, which was beating at a wild, irregular rhythm.
“It helps,” she added. “For a moment, I forgot about it all, you, me, the children and everything else. When I’m intoxicated I become my double. In any case, I’ve learned one thing at least: I’m still capable of laughter.”
“Have you lost your mind?”
“That’s just it! For a brief moment I was crazy. That must be what people who fall into drink discover. Madness! Madness!”
She erupted in a short-lived cackle that, because this time it was conscious, became atrociously desperate. They were speaking in hushed tones, and in the darkness he saw her as a shadow veiled in a transparent nightgown that traced her nipples.
“Come on, go back to bed,” he ordered. She lay down with her back to him, only to get up again a short while later.
“Don’t worry about me,” she said, “sleep, don’t worry about me.”
He said nothing in response and pretended to sleep. But she knew he was awake this time and that he was tormented because of her, and she felt a dark sense of satisfaction. Standing at the narrow window, she saw the sky gleaming beneath a multitude of stars. Its splendor made the profound darkness of the yard even more sinister by contrast. The flowers are falling from the oak trees already, and so are the lemon flowers, she told herself. And suddenly, in the light of the new moon, the grave appeared, white in the midst of the mass of trees. Something moved a few paces from the stakes and she saw the outlines of a man and of an animal clumsily moving around with strange little hops. A shiver ran through her and she heaved over, hands reaching out, mouth open as if about to cry out.
“How long has this been going on?”
It took her a moment to understand.
“When did you start drinking?”
She got up slowly, her eyes still filled with the spectacle in the yard, and looked over at this man she had forgotten buried under the sheets, his head resting on a pillow.
“I’ll keep doing it,” she said dryly. “I’ll keep doing it.”
“You will die like your father. Wasting away from drink.”
“You have to die from something.”
“Spare your children at least.”
“My children! What children? They are already dead. Don’t you know that? Don’t you see that?”
“Quiet!”
“What’s a drunk mother to them after what they’ve been through? They couldn’t care less. Rose already stinks of death.”
“Quiet!”
He jumped on her and grabbed her by the throat.
“That’s it! Kill me! Kill me!”
He loosened his fingers and noticed their livid faces in the mirror.
“My God!” he whispered, imitating her inadvertently.
They went back to bed, each pulling on the sheets as if they could separate themselves from each other that way. In the distance, the crazed barking of a dog broke and accentuated the horrible silence. A slight gust shook the trees and fresh air flowed into the room along with the strong smell of the soil and the trees.
She heard the stairs creaking, footsteps on the landing whispering and the closing of the grandfather’s door. But she didn’t budge. And if there’s such a thing as fate, she told herself, then what can I do about it? Let things run their course, wait, let others act, then wait a little more. In other words, resign myself. I can’t do anything, nobody can do anything. That’s the really hopeless part about it. Should I fold my arms and wait? Or fly off the handle and end it all? In any case, choosing will resolve nothing. Caught like rats in a trap.
She thought she saw the father’s shoulder tremble, and fixed her eyes with curiosity upon this body so close to hers. What would he do if she suddenly touched him?
With that thought, she could see herself again when she was twenty, in her wedding gown, kneeling before a priest blessing their joined hands. Meaningless gestures but, when they were young, gestures that seemed to guarantee a future full of happiness. Her illusions had faded one by one and in the void carved out by their loss, old age slowly traced its way. The illness that would keep old age from overstaying its welcome made its presence felt, and she watched for it now without dread and even with a certain desperate complicity! Will I die at their hands or will I be good and dead on my own soon enough? she wondered again. Will my eyes be the first to close or will life force me to watch my children go in the ground one after the other, even though I already have one foot in the grave? Would she play such a dirty trick on me? A dying mother outliving her loved ones! My existence hangs by a thread, I know that, and yet I may have to see them all die. Sinking into her sweat-soaked pillow, fingers clutching the left side of her chest, she lay still and listened to her groaning heart and thought: We think we can fight back, but that’s all wrong. Rose and Paul don’t know it yet. They’re too young and don’t know it yet. They convince themselves otherwise out of pride. They tell themselves: we’re fighting back, we’re doing something, we’re making decisions, but they’re just drunk with their own words. There was a time when I too was drunk with my own words. But that’s over. I’m not moved by illusions anymore. I’ve come to be sufficiently acquainted with these criminals to learn that you can’t fight fate. We’ve been delivered over to their hatred, bound hand and foot. Utterly lost. Every last one of us. Rose dishonored! And Paul fixing his own demise!… No, I can’t go on living knowing all this and unable to do anything to save them. My God! My God!… If only I could leave it all in Your hands! To feel Your presence when misfortune strikes, to have the humility to kneel, beat my chest, and accept this as fair punishment! But I can’t, I can’t…
She saw the massive trees suddenly dashing themselves forward in a great leap as they smashed their thick branches against the roof of the house. The sky grew murky roiling with shapeless waves of blackening clouds. She gasped for air. Twitching feebly she passed out with the sensation of rough hands over her mouth and nose.
CHAPTER TWELVE
The mother went out early that afternoon. She walked for a long time under the sun, worn out from fatigue and fear. What she had decided to do was beyond her strength, she knew that, just as she knew nothing would stop her from doing something, even if it killed her. Doing something for absolutely no reason, perhaps, but still doing something, such is what life demands from human beings. Faint whiffs of hope would stir up illusions she had thought quite dead. So this is what helps, she told herself as she walked. So this is why suicide cannot be the normal culmination of a human life. I am going to try to do something. I’m going to try to believe that I can still make myself useful. She looked at the sky, the trees, the flowers, the people, as if she were seeing them for the first time. She opened her handbag and put money in the hands of beggars; confronted with a skeletal mother and her four starving, crying babies, she took stock of her own sufferings and found them acceptable. Men in black uniform accompanied by women bejeweled like princesses in luxury cars sped by at extravagant speeds, horns honking; several others on foot greeted them with respect, lifting hand to helmet in salute, beggars groveling at their feet. How had she climbed this steep slope without any help? At the top of the hill she could see the gigantic outline of a fortress protected by cannons, their charred muzzles like forbidding tunnels from a distance. A deafening drone swelled around her, which she mistook for engine noise. A dreary siren began to wail. What she saw then took her breath away: hundreds of thousands of men were emerging from every corner of the mountain. They gathered in close ranks, every one of them in boots and a helmet, and again the same drone. This time she understood it was no engine noise but the blurred voices of hundreds of thousands of mouths, all of them yelling in unison: “Hail to the chief of the Blackshirts!” The mother was shaking but bravely and slowly started climbing up the rocky roadside. Soon, she was on all fours. She could hear her heart pumping blood through her neck and in her temples but forgot to listen for the rattling in her chest. Breathless, she climbed, fell, got up again, then crawled flat on her stomach. “My God! My God!” she pleaded. She climbed higher and higher as her nails broke and her hands bled on the rocks. She could see them more or less clearly. They were a compact mass that reminded her of the cluster of trees in the yard in the dark. She still had a long way to go and the slope kept getting steeper and the fortress more and more out of reach. Suddenly she was unable to breathe, and, closing her eyes, she felt her strength draining out of her. She rolled back down, slowly at first, then faster and faster, and finally she lost consciousness. When she opened her eyes and found herself at the foot of the hill again, she yelled: “I want to get up there, I have to see their leader, I have to talk to him, I have to tell him what’s going on. He must not know how badly those he has armed and dressed in black abuse their privileges. He’ll learn the truth from my lips. My God! Help me! Help me!”
This time, she was startled by the unmistakable noise of an engine. She turned around: a truck approached, loaded with men in black. Terror rekindled her strength and she crawled up to hide behind a tree. She opened her handbag, found a handkerchief to wipe her face and hands, and brushed the dust off her dress. She walked slowly, head down, arms folded on her breast, and then she turned toward the hill. She stood for a while like that, gazing at the fortress. “No one besides them will ever get inside,” she heard herself whisper.
She had barely emerged from the deserted road when she was snagged by a delirious crowd shouting and singing a Carnival merengue. The drums beat to the step of the masked dancers. Dressed in yellow, the whippers led the parade, cracking their long lashes; then came the Indians walking with open arms, shaking their wigs and feathers. A group of half-naked devils with scarlet horns threatened the spectators with their gilt pitchforks. Two rows of giant laughing heads ran ahead of a queen of great beauty dressed in pink tulle blowing kisses to the crowd atop a float depicting the fortress in miniature. Other groups dressed in sparkling colors went into contortions, bottles in han
d, drunk off clairin [33] and drums.
The first day of Carnival and I had forgotten all about it! the mother said to herself. She moved forward, pushed and roughed up by the crowd, trapped in its froth. As she struggled in vain to get away, a “braided-ribbon” crew materialized behind the queen’s float. Hundreds of beggars in rags followed in its wake, arms in the air, swarming to the sound of a huge, colorful ribbon-draped drum pounded by crew members lurching to the rhythm. The ribbons swayed and interlaced to the beat of hips and feet. Eyes closed, delirious, the crowd shouted more and more, possessed by the drumming. Nothing existed anymore: not anger, nor fear, nor despair. The throng granted itself a reprieve through these ancestral rituals that, for the moment, offered a deceptive sense of freedom. Drumming, tafia, [34] music, song, dance, cries, erotic ferment, all of it helped let off steam, like the idea of being possessed by African gods in voodoo ceremonies.
The mother finally managed to get away from the crowd. She slowly walked the nearly deserted streets to her house. The grandfather was sitting on the veranda with the invalid.
“Did you see the Carnival?” the child asked. “Are there a lot of people there?”
“Yes,” she answered simply.
“Did you see any nice masks?”
“Yes,” she said. “The beggars were the only ones without masks.”
“And was there a queen, and floats?”
“A very beautiful queen atop a fortress.”
“They reign like lords and masters!” the grandfather grunted as if talking to himself.
She stared at him in silence, then went to knock on Rose and Paul’s doors.
Where are they? she asked herself when no one answered.
The father was also gone.
She looked at herself in the mirror for a minute, brushed her face with her hand, sighed and sat on the bed, staring blankly at nothing.
So she had failed just as all of them would no doubt fail. Or would she start over tomorrow and then again, every single day until she died? Wasn’t it her role to shower her children with love, to quietly help them conquer their terror, to shut her eyes and let them take action, all with the conviction that they too would meet with failure? Just make their lives a little easier, cover their heads with maternal hands that they could grasp in their distress or hide their weeping faces in. To attempt again what she had done today, wasn’t that, in truth, giving in to the pride of a death justified by them and by her? Should she run straight into suicide, cut short the days she had left? For they would surely murder her, she knew that much. They’d shoot her before she could even open her mouth to speak.
Love, Anger, Madness Page 25