The Dream of the Celt: A Novel

by Mario Vargas Llosa

  “Fine, mon père,” said Roger. “I’ll take them with me on the Henry Reed until they’re away from here. But only to the closest French shore.”

  “God will reward you, Consul,” said Father Hutot.

  “I don’t know, mon père,” replied the consul. “In this case you and I are breaking the law.”

  “Man’s law,” the Trappist corrected him. “We are violating it, and rightly so, in order to be faithful to God’s law.”

  Roger shared the monks’ frugal vegetarian supper. He spoke with them for a long time. Dom Jesualdo joked that in his honor the Trappists were violating the rule of silence that governed the order. The monks and lay brothers seemed oppressed and defeated by this country, just as he was. How could it have come to this, he reflected aloud with them. And he told them that nineteen years earlier he had come to Africa filled with enthusiasm, convinced the colonial enterprise was going to bring a decent life to the Africans. How was it possible that colonization had become this horrible plundering, this dizzying cruelty, with people who called themselves Christians torturing, mutilating, killing defenseless creatures and subjecting them, even children and the old, to atrocious cruelties? Hadn’t we Europeans come here to put an end to the slave trade and bring the religion of charity and justice? Because what occurred here was even worse than the slave trade, wasn’t it?

  The monks let him unburden himself, not saying a word. Was it because, in spite of what the abbot said, they didn’t want to break the rule of silence? No: they were as confused and wounded by the Congo as he was.

  “God’s ways are inscrutable to poor sinners like us, Consul,” Dom Jesualdo said with a sigh. “The important thing is not to fall into despair. Not to lose faith. That there are men here like you encourages us, returns hope to us. We wish you success in your mission. We will pray that God permits you to do something for these unfortunate people.”

  The seven fugitives boarded the Henry Reed at dawn the next day, at a bend in the river, when the steamboat was already some distance from Coquilhatville. For the three days they were with him, Roger was tense and anxious. He had given the crew a vague explanation to justify the presence of the seven mutilated natives and thought the men distrusted and looked with suspicion at the group, with whom they had no communication. At Irebu, the Henry Reed approached the French side of the Congo River and that night, while the crew slept, seven silent silhouettes slipped away and disappeared into the undergrowth on the bank. Afterward no one asked the consul what had become of them.

  At this point in his journey, Roger began to feel ill. Not only morally and psychologically, but his body, too, was showing the effects of lack of sleep, insect bites, excessive physical effort, and perhaps, above all, his state of mind as rage alternated with demoralization, the desire to complete his work with the premonition that his report would do no good because in London the bureaucrats in the Foreign Office and the politicians in His Majesty’s service would decide it was imprudent to antagonize an ally like Leopold II, that publishing a report with such serious accusations would have detrimental consequences for Great Britain, since it would be equivalent to pushing Belgium into the arms of Germany. Weren’t the interests of the Empire more important than the plaintive laments of some half-naked savages who worshiped felines and serpents and were cannibals?

  Making superhuman efforts to control the squalls of depression, the headaches and nausea, the deterioration of his body—he felt he was losing weight, because he had to make new holes in his belt—he continued visiting villages, posts, stations, questioning villagers, functionaries, employees, guards, rubber harvesters, doing his best to overcome the daily spectacle of bodies martyrized by whippings, hands chopped off, and nightmarish accounts of murders, imprisonments, extortions, and disappearances. He began to think the generalized suffering of the Congolese had saturated the air, the river, the vegetation around him with a particular odor, a stench that not only was physical but also spiritual, metaphysical.

  “I believe I’m losing my mind, dear Gee,” he wrote to his cousin Gertrude from the station at Bongandanga on the day he decided to turn around halfway and return to Leopoldville. “Today I’ve begun my return to Boma. According to my plans, I should have continued on the Upper Congo for a few more weeks. But the truth is I already have more than enough material to show the things that occur here in my report. I’m afraid if I continue to scrutinize the extremes to which human evil and ignorance can go, I won’t even be able to write it. I’m on the verge of madness. A normal human being cannot submerge himself for so many months in this hell without losing his sanity, without succumbing to some mental disturbance. Some nights, in my sleeplessness, I feel it happening to me. Something is disintegrating in my mind. I live with constant anguish. If I continue so close to what occurs here I too will eventually give whippings with a chicote, lop off hands, and murder Congolese between lunch and dinner without feeling the slightest pang of conscience or losing my appetite. Because that is what happens to Europeans in this damned country.”

  Yet that very long letter did not deal primarily with the Congo, but with Ireland. “This is why, dear Gee, it may seem like another symptom of madness to you, but this journey into the depths of the Congo has been useful in helping me discover my own country and understand her situation, her destiny, her reality. In these jungles I’ve found not only the true face of Leopold II. I’ve also found my true self: the incorrigible Irishman. When we see each other again you’ll have a surprise, Gee. It will be difficult for you to recognize your cousin Roger. I have the impression that, like certain ophidians, I’ve shed the skin of my mind and perhaps my soul.”

  During all the days it took the Henry Reed to sail down the Congo River to Leopoldville–Kinshasa, where it finally docked at dusk on September 15, 1903, the consul barely said a word to the crew. He had remained in his narrow cabin or, if the weather permitted, lay on his hammock in the stern, the faithful John settled at his feet, still and attentive, as if the sorrow in which he saw his master submerged had infected him, too.

  Simply thinking about the country of his childhood and youth, for which he had suddenly felt profound nostalgia during this entire journey, pushed out of his mind the images of Congolese horror bent on destroying him morally and perturbing his psychic equilibrium. He recalled his early years in Dublin, spoiled and protected by his mother, his school years in Galgorm, his outings with his sister Nina in the northern countryside of Antrim (so tame compared with Africa!) and the happiness afforded by those excursions to the peaks guarding Glenshesk, his favorite of the nine glens of the county, summits raked by the winds where he could sometimes see the flight of eagles, their great wings spread and crests erect, defying the sky.

  Wasn’t Ireland a colony too, like the Congo? Though for so many years he had insisted on not accepting a truth that his father and so many Ulster Irishmen like him rejected with blind indignation. Why would what was bad for the Congo be good for Ireland? Hadn’t the English invaded Ireland? Hadn’t they incorporated it into the Empire by force, not consulting those who had been invaded and occupied, just as the Belgians did with the Congolese? Over time the violence had eased, but Ireland was still a colony whose sovereignty disappeared because of a stronger neighbor. It was a reality that many Irish refused to see. How would his father react if he had heard him saying such things? Would he pull out his small chicote? And his mother? Would Anne Jephson be scandalized if she knew that in the desolation of the Congo her son was becoming, if not in deed at least in thought, a nationalist? On those solitary afternoons, surrounded by the brown waters of the Congo River filled with leaves, branches, and tree trunks, Roger made a decision: as soon as he returned to Europe, he would obtain a good collection of books dedicated to the history and culture of Ireland, which he hardly knew.

  He spent barely three days in Leopoldville, not seeking anyone out. In his current state he didn’t have the heart to visit authorities and acquaintances and speak to them—lying, of course—about
his voyage along the Middle and Upper Congo and what he had seen during those months. He sent a telegram in code to the Foreign Office saying he had enough material to confirm the accusations of mistreatment of indigenous people. He requested authorization to move to the neighboring Portuguese possession to write his report with more serenity than he would have subject to the pressures of consular service in Boma. And he wrote a long denunciation that was also a formal protest to the Prosecutor’s Office of the Supreme Court of Leopoldville–Kinshasa regarding the events in Walla, requesting an investigation and sanctions for those responsible. He carried his document personally to the Prosecutor’s Office. A circumspect functionary promised to inform the prosecutor, Maître Leverville, of everything as soon as he returned from an elephant hunt with the head of the city’s Office of Commercial Records, M. Clothard.

  Roger took the train to Matadi, where he stayed only one night. From there he went down to Boma in a cargo steamer. In the consular office he found a pile of correspondence and a telegram from his superiors authorizing him to travel to Luanda to write his report. It was urgent that he write it, and in the greatest detail possible. In Britain, the campaign of accusations against the Congo Free State had reached a frenzy and the principal daily papers were taking part, confirming or denying “the atrocities.” For some time, in addition to the denunciations of the Baptist Church, there were those of Edmund D. Morel, the British journalist of French origin and Roger’s secret friend and accomplice. His publications were causing a great deal of agitation in both the House of Commons and in public opinion. There had already been a debate in parliament on the subject. The Foreign Office and Lord Chancellor Lansdowne himself were impatiently awaiting Roger’s testimony.

  In Boma, as in Leopoldville–Kinshasa, Roger avoided government people as much as he could, even breaking protocol, something he had never done in all his years in the consular service. Instead of visiting the governor-general he sent him a letter, apologizing for not going in person to pay his respects and claiming problems with his health. He didn’t play a single game of tennis, billiards, or cards and didn’t give or accept invitations to lunches or dinners. He didn’t even go to swim early in the morning in the backwaters of the river, something he usually did almost every day, even in bad weather. He didn’t want to see people or have any social life. Above all, he didn’t want to be asked about his journey and find himself obliged to lie. He was sure he could never describe sincerely to his friends and acquaintances in Boma what he thought about everything he had seen, heard, and experienced on the Middle and Upper Congo in the past fourteen weeks.

  He devoted all his time to resolving the most urgent consular matters and preparing his trip to Cabinda and Luanda. He hoped that by leaving the Congo, even though he went to another colonial possession, he would feel less oppressed and freer. Several times he tried to begin a rough draft of the report but couldn’t. Not only his dejection stopped him; his right hand contracted in a muscle spasm as soon as he began to move pen on paper. His hemorrhoids returned. He barely ate and his two servants, Charlie and Mawuku, concerned at seeing him in such bad health, told him to call the doctor. But even though he, too, was uneasy about his insomnia, lack of appetite, and physical ailments, he didn’t because seeing Dr. Salabert would mean speaking, remembering, recounting everything that for the moment he wanted only to forget.

  On September 28 he left by boat for Banana and there, the following day, another small steamboat transported him and Charlie to Cabinda. John the bulldog stayed behind with Mawuku. But not even the four days he spent there, where he had acquaintances with whom he ate dinner and who, since they knew nothing about his trip to the Upper Congo, did not oblige him to speak about what he wished to keep silent, made him feel calmer and more sure of himself. Only in Luanda, where he arrived on October 3, did he begin to feel better. The British consul, Mr. Briskley, a discreet, obliging person, furnished him with a small room in his suite of offices. There he began at last to work morning and evening, sketching the large contours of his report.

  But he felt he was beginning to be really well, to be the man he had been before, only three or four days after arriving in Luanda, one afternoon as he sat at a table in the old Café Paris, where he went to eat after working all morning. He was glancing at an old newspaper from Lisbon when he noticed, on the street outside, several half-naked natives unloading a large wagon filled with bales of some agricultural product, perhaps cotton. One of them, the youngest, was very beautiful. He had a long, athletic body, muscles that appeared on his back, legs, and arms with the effort he was making. His dark skin, gleaming with sweat, had a blue tinge. With the movements he made as he carried the load on his shoulder from the wagon to the interior of the storehouse, the light piece of cloth he wore around his hips opened and offered a glimpse of his sex, reddish and dangling and larger than normal. Roger felt a warm surge and an urgent desire to photograph the handsome porter. It hadn’t happened to him for months. A thought animated him: I’m myself again. In the small diary he always carried with him, he wrote: “Very beautiful and enormous. I followed him and persuaded him. We kissed hidden by the giant ferns in a clearing. He was mine, I was his. I howled.” He breathed deeply, in a fever.

  That same afternoon, Mr. Briskley handed him a telegram from the Foreign Office. The lord chancellor himself, Lord Lansdowne, ordered him to return to England immediately to write his Report on the Congo in London. Roger had recovered his appetite and dined well that night.

  On November 6, before boarding the Zaire, which left Luanda for England with a stop in Lisbon, he wrote a long letter to Edmund D. Morel. They had been corresponding secretly for six months but had never met. He first learned of his existence in a letter from Herbert Ward, who admired the journalist, and then in Boma, listening to Belgian functionaries and other random people commenting on the extremely harsh articles loaded with criticisms of the Congo Free State that Morel, who lived in Liverpool, was publishing, denouncing the abuses that victimized the natives of the African colony. Discreetly, through his cousin Gertrude, he obtained some pamphlets edited by Morel. Impressed by the seriousness of his accusations, in a bold gesture Roger wrote to him, sending the letter through Gee. He told him he had been in Africa for many years and could give him firsthand information for his righteous campaign, which he supported. He couldn’t do this openly because of his position as a British diplomat, and therefore it was necessary to take precautions with their correspondence in order to keep his informant in Boma from being identified. In the letter he wrote to Morel from Luanda, Roger summarized his most recent experience and said that as soon as he reached Europe, he would get in touch with him. Nothing made him more hopeful than a personal meeting with the only European who seemed fully conscious of the Old Continent’s responsibility for the transformation of the Congo into a hell.

  On the trip to London, Roger recovered energy, enthusiasm, and hope. Once again he was certain his report would be useful in putting an end to those horrors. The impatience with which the Foreign Office awaited his report demonstrated this. The facts were of such magnitude that the British government would have to act, demand radical changes, convince its allies, revoke the senseless personal concession to Leopold II of an immense Congo. In spite of the storms that shook the Zaire between São Tomé and Lisbon and caused half the crew to be seasick, Roger managed to continue writing his report. As disciplined as he had once been, and devoted with apostolic zeal to the task, he tried to write with the greatest precision and sobriety without recourse to sentimentality or subjective considerations, describing objectively only what he had been able to confirm. The more exact and concise the report, the more persuasive and effective it would be.

  He arrived in London on the first day of an icy December. He barely had time to look at the rainy, cold, and spectral city, because once he left his luggage in his Philbeach Gardens apartment, in Earls Court, and glanced at the accumulated correspondence, he had to hurry to the Foreign Office. For thre
e days there were meetings and interviews. He was very impressed. No doubt about it, the Congo was at the center of the news following the debate in parliament. The denunciations of the Baptist Church and Edmund D. Morel’s campaign had been effective. Everyone was demanding a statement from the government, which was waiting for his report before making one. Roger discovered that without desiring or knowing it, circumstances had made him an important man. In two hour-long presentations, before functionaries of the ministry—the director for African affairs and the vice-minister attended one of them—he could see the impact his words had on the audience. The initial incredulous looks turned into expressions of repugnance and horror when he responded to questions with new details.

  They gave him an office in a quiet spot in Kensington, far from the Foreign Office, and a young, efficient typist, Mr. Joe Pardo. He began dictating his report on Friday, December 4. News had spread that the British consul in the Congo had arrived in London with an exhaustive document on the colony, and the Reuters agency, The Spectator, The Times, and several correspondents for papers in the United States tried to interview him. But he, by agreement with his superiors, said he would speak with the press only after the government had made a statement on the subject.

  In the days following he did nothing but work on the report morning and evening, adding, cutting, and rewriting the text, reading over and over again his copybooks with travel notes he already knew by heart. At midday he ate a sandwich, and every night he had dinner early at his club, the Wellington. Sometimes Herbert Ward joined him. It did him good to talk with his old friend, who dragged him one day to his studio, at 53 Chester Square, and distracted him by showing him his sculptures inspired by Africa. On another day, to make him forget his obsessive preoccupation for a few hours, Herbert obliged him to go out and buy a stylish jacket of checked cloth, a French-style cap, and shoes with white spats. Then he took him for lunch to the favorite spot of London intellectuals and artists, the Eiffel Tower restaurant. During this time, these were his only diversions.