by Ted Oswald
— Yes, we must protect her, said an old man.
— Dumas will find a way to get her and we’ll all be in trouble. I’m telling you, this is a bad idea, said the dissenter.
— And it’s a bad idea for you to say another word, snapped the middle-aged woman. Or you’ll find yourself overboard with the other one.
She was tall and looked down at Libète from high up, like she was rummaging in Libète’s soul to see what she’d find, to see if the risk was worth it.
— No, we can’t hide her, the woman said. Everyone here will know where she is and someone — she glowered at the dissenter — would surely tell them.
Libète’s heart sunk low.
— No, the girl will walk off this boat with the rest of us.
Hope sprung up in Libète, but the woman’s idea was met with an uneasy silence.
— You know why? the woman said, louder than before. We saw what happens back there when we stand together. Instead of them pushing us around, we can push them around. Because we are strong. Because we are a force. Dumas cripples us all with fear. I don’t want to let him do it any longer. We can’t let him do it any longer.
— There’s good reason to fear! said a new voice.
— And there’s good reason for Dumas to fear us! she shot back.
— What are you saying then? What should we do? the old man asked.
The woman thought for a moment before a smile lit up her face. She placed her reassuring hand on the back of Libète’s neck, a welcome touch. Let’s not be meek, my friends. Let’s not be mild. Let’s not shrink back from this devil, my friends. Bat tenèb. Let’s beat back the darkness, together!
Bat tenèb.
Libète remembered the words as if they were just spoken by that tall, soulful woman on the ferry. She leapt over Davidson on the floor and picked up the flashlight from the corner, testing it by flicking it on and off. She stepped back over Davidson and rushed back out the door into the alley.
— Libète! Stop! Where are you going? he called after her. She looked at him with an intensity that frightened him, saying nothing before running into the dark with the flashlight off and returning to her vantage point at the mouth of the network of alleyways.
The tires still gave off plumes of black, sooty smoke. When she detected a momentary lull in the shooting, she was off. She sprinted across the street and flattened herself against the wall opposite her, sidling along until she reached her dead truck to crouch at its front end, still set diagonally against the wall with which it had collided. The gunfire between both sides had slowed to a trickle, the guns continuing to fire out of reluctant obligation.
Neither side knew what to do. No one was willing to commit suicide by trying to advance against the other. But both knew this had to end.
She pulled herself up and over the hood of the truck, making her visible and vulnerable. She straightened against the wall once more, her body shaking with greater tremors with each shuffle forward. A corpse, one that had made her swerve the truck and nearly collide with the wall, was not far, only about ten feet. She wondered if her fate would soon match his own.
She continued toward the end of the line of homes, a mere twenty feet from where the armored vehicles were trapped and forty feet from the barricade.
With her attention fixed on the massive white vehicles, she missed a gap in the ground and nearly fell, rolling her ankle. She cursed aloud and then clasped her hand over her mouth, wondering if her outburst would mean her end.
— Help me, came a voice. Girl, help me, please.
She leaped in surprise. The corpse, it turned out, was not dead. She looked more closely at him, her heart going out to the poor man. His face was obscured by blood, maybe from a wound to the head.
She shushed him. You’ll get me killed!
— Please, he pleaded again, reaching for her with a lifted arm. A gold ring on his hand caught the light. Her eyes stretched wide in horror.
Dear God! That’s not just anyone! That’s Touss!
The ferry pulls in close to the pier and the sky is near black. Men—intimidating men, tall men—can be seen looming, ready to receive them.
The passengers have divided into two groups.
On the bottom deck are those who want nothing to do with the little girl.
On the top, outnumbering those on the bottom, are those preparing to make a stand.
The large ship bumps into the pier, and nervous workers secure the ship’s lines. Dumas’ men—four of them, conspicuous because they wear the same aviator sunglasses despite the dark—close in on the gangplank as those on the lower deck begin filing off. The normal chatter and activity of disembarking is absent, the air laced with dread.
Libète stands in the middle of a large circle of protectors, unable to see what is happening. Suddenly, ululations cut through the air, a clarion call. The group lurches, moving as a united whole before turning into a single file line to make its way down the stairs and off the ship.
Percussion starts. Someone is clanging metal against the railing and sides of the ship, laying down a beat by which all in the group begin to shuffle. Others clap their hands as they have no pots and pans to join in. A voice breaks out, the middle-aged woman standing at the front of the line, with words to a song that all of them know well.
The familiar verses to La Dessalinienne, the national anthem, begin springing up.
For our country,
For our forefathers,
United let us march.
Let there be no traitors in our ranks!
Let us be masters of our soil.
United let us march,
For our country,
For our forefathers.
Women stood at the forefront of the group, the first to reach the lower deck and move toward the gangplank. The men with sunglasses were tense, and Libète could see at least one man reaching for what was probably a gun. She breathed deeply, joining in the song faintly, anything to quell the fear grasping at her throat as it tried to silence her voice:
For our forebears,
For our country
Oh God of the valiant!
Take our rights and our life
Under your infinite protection,
Oh God of the valiant!
For our forebears
For our country.
The long line halted near the end of the gangplank, the signal to stop passing down its members like falling dominoes. The singing and dancing ceased. Libète stood in the middle of the line. The ringleader, her friend, was mere feet away from Dumas’ lieutenant, a sneer on his face. Libète shifted, trying to peer around the man in front of her to see them staring the other down, him through his menacing black glasses.
— Give us the girl, he muttered, just loud enough for Libète to hear.
Rather than speak, she sang again, a single voice lashing out against the darkness. The others in line soon joined her, the words pulsing with strength:
For the flag
For our country
To die is a fine thing!
Our past cries out to us:
Have a strong soul!
To die is a fine thing,
For the flag,
For our country.
The man in front of Libète and one other behind hoisted her up so that grabbing her would not be so easy. Libète noticed a crowd of those already disembarked had amassed at the far end of the pier to watch what would unfold. Four of the women at the front remained standing face-to-face with their foes, unflinching. They continued singing, shaming the men with each new line and verse.
What happened next was unthinkable.
The singing continued, but the fear that had permeated every single moment up till now had dissipated. New songs started and the long line, now entirely off the vessel, broke into celebration on the pier. Dancing and jubilation took over, the two men bobbing up and down with Libète on their shoulders like the little girl was a reigning champion. Others at the end of the pier began to stream
down to meet the crowd as they danced together upon injustice.
All knew the situation could change in an instant. A gun could be drawn, a punch thrown and the joy would leave just as it had come. There were no illusions of this. But the people were reminded of a powerful truth: though the darkness could crash in again any second, they should shine their lights as brightly as they could, while they could.
The two men holding Libète up did not revel in the dancing for long. As the singing shifted to other songs and new instruments materialized out of nowhere, they took Libète quickly to the road where mototaxis and a large yellow bus waited for the late passengers.
— Take this girl to Cabaret as quickly as you can, one of her protectors said to a confused moto driver. Where are you going after that? the man asked Libète.
— Home. To Cité Soleil. The man nodded, reaching into his pockets to remove some money.
— No, Libète said. She popped open her metal jar and removed several notes. All three men and the nearby drivers looked with astonishment at the stash of money. She placed the notes in the driver’s hand, wary of the jealous stares of others.
— Back off everyone! said her principal protector. Nobody touch her or her things or you’ll have a fight on your hands!
The driver mounted his bike and tapped the seat behind him. Libète hopped on, mouthed a quiet thank you through glad and hopeful tears before speeding off into the night, back toward Twa Bebe, back to all she thought she had left behind. She listened to the sounds of light beating back dark, locking them tight within her memory to draw on for all the hard things she knew lay ahead.
Libète did not know what to do.
Touss, dying before her, moaned again, and she jumped. Quiet! she hissed.
She wanted to shout at him, to curse him for all the misery he had brought her, for the ways he had betrayed and terrorized and manipulated. The pity she had felt moments before for a man whose life was fading had evaporated.
— I’m dying, he sobbed. I’m dying.
Gunfire on both sides began to pick up at the sound of his cries, and she flung herself flat against the wall again. If she didn’t act soon, others—those guilty and innocent—would also die.
She thought of San Figi, the life seeping out of her before Libète’s horrified eyes all those years before. She had been paralyzed then, unsure how to comfort the old woman in her distress. She knew now what to do.
Libète dropped her flashlight and began to stretch out her hand toward him, but pulled back. Her heart lurched at the thought of even touching him, as if his baseness would spread to her like a disease. She sighed and breathed three times, bit her lip, and reached out to take his hand.
— Toussaint Laguerre, it is me, Libète Limyè, she whispered, using her chosen father’s name. Do you recognize me?
He was shocked and coughed, sputtering blood as he tried to nod. You have harmed me and others, she wished she could explain aloud. And I cannot forgive you for these things. But you do not deserve to die like this, alone and terrified. I pray for your soul, Toussaint, I really do.
She took his wrist with her other hand, feeling his pulse as she had learned to do at the hospital. Slower and slower. Everything within her told her to run back to the wall, to escape, to flee this danger, but she was beyond that now. She felt Touss’ pulse slip, the life disappearing from his body, his soul drifting away.
She slunk back to her flashlight, trying to summon the courage of others: her anonymous friend, that woman who led the march off the ferry; the Nurse whose name she had never learned; the vendor on the dock who had stood up and shamed the powerful when no one else would. Though she had no words for it, she knew the logic of violence had to be subverted, the cycle had to be interrupted. There was only one way to do that.
My life has been short, Lord.
You’ve hurt me very much and I am afraid to die.
But guide me now, whatever may happen, and use this for good.
To save my cousin, my friends, my home.
The song came before the light. She stepped out from her cover and sang, voice trembling, the lines that felt most appropriate.
To die is a fine thing!
Our past cries out to us:
Have a strong soul!
To die is a fine thing,
For the flag,
For our country.
Libète turns on the flashlight and waves it in wild circles. She keeps her eyes closed while still singing. Clenching her teeth, she waits for a bullet to strike her while praying it does not.
It takes a few moments to notice that the guns have ceased firing. She stands in the gap between the burning barricade, the U.N., and her cousin. The sound of the flaming tires, of rubber boiling, takes over. She quiets and hears shouting from both sides, rapid Kreyol and Portuguese being thrown at her. Among the words she understands, she hears them telling her to get out of the way.
She does not move.
Starting another verse to her song, she is elated at the momentary peace, a sense of the darkness around her retreating.
It catches her by surprise. A shot rings out, the bullet striking her before its heralding sound travels to her ears. She spins around, making a bloody pirouette before collapsing to the ground, one thought registering before blackness closes in upon her.
Jezi, make this count…
At Cabaret she had found another moto taxi, the only one still out in the late night. Still worried that Dumas’ men could be after her, she told him her destination.
— I will not go.
— I will give you $30 U.S.
The new driver paused.
— I will take you.
She got on the new bike, rest impossible for her rattled mind. It was her first opportunity to think upon Limyè, the shadow of the man he once was, and his story of the heavy oppression lingering over the island she had just seen challenged in a profound and miraculous way.
She would not speak of it yet, could not speak of these heavy, weighty things. She needed to understand them first.
Do the good put before me. The words reverberated in her head. Her thoughts drifted to Claire and Gaspar, Lolo in prison. She would press on till he was free and the mystery solved. She did not know how, or when, but she would tie these threads together until they were at an end.
The bike dropped her off on the edge of Twa Bebe. It was nearing midnight and she longed to return to the security of her tent’s frail walls. One task still remained.
Libète moved toward the open field, searching for her secret cache in the moonlight. She found the spot and reached under a nearby bush where she stored her pottery shard used for digging.
As she shoveled dirt, the shard snapped into two smaller pieces. Libète did her best to remove the last of it with the larger shard, placing the pottery in her bag once she finished.
It was only two days before when she removed the last of her savings from the pawned watch, never expecting to be back. She took out Limyè’s metal jar and transferred it to the unearthed bag, covering it once again with dirt. The money would not be safe in her tent, especially while she slept. She would return to it soon, maybe very soon.
When she opened the entrance to her tent, her Uncle stirred.
— Who’s there? I have a weapon!
— It’s me, Tonton. She thought about the strangeness of using the title now that she knew he was not her uncle at all, but decided to let the fiction remain.
— Libète? Where have you been?
— I needed to go away for a while.
— But you’re back?
— I am.
— Good. I was worried.
— Thank you, Uncle.
— Don’t go again without telling me first.
— I won’t. Libète took off her purple cap and laid down on her mat, never so happy to have done so before. She faded quickly into sleep, soon dreaming of a sprawling empty cathedral, talking stained glass, and the prodding specter of San Figi.
AT PEACE AND UNAFRAID
Tout sa ou pa konnen pi gran pase ou
All that you do not know is greater than you
A beat-up Land Rover rolls to a stop, and a lovely-sandaled foot steps down, gracing the dirt and gravel. The woman is majestic in her brightly patterned dress, her hair tightened into beautiful plaits that flow down to the middle of her back.
She walks to the grizzled doorman and tells him her situation. He looks at her in awe.
— I am here to see someone, she says. A man, and I need help to find him.
— What does he look like? the doorman stammers.
— I do not know, she replies, calm and measured.
He reaches to take her hand to guide her, and she does not pull it away from him.
She does not walk so much as float through the rows of hospital beds, her dress lit brilliantly by the streaming afternoon light. He takes her about, and she searches the faces of the sick, injured, and dying, looking for any glimmer of the man she once knew.
The doorman pauses when he senses subtle resistance. Her eyes water and heart crumbles at cholera’s toll. She sees a child, an infant really, emaciated and listless with an IV in her arm while an exhausted mother keeps watch next to the bed. There are rumors now that the disease was brought to Haiti by MINUSTAH troops from Nepal, a disease spread when their excrement was illegally dumped into the central plateau’s waterways, right into Haiti’s bloodstream. When will it end, she prays. When will it end?
She wipes her eyes with the shoulder of her dress, and he leads her on through the rest of the ward.
She pauses at first, unable to detect the resemblance behind his lidded eyes, layers of age, facial hair, and lost weight. If I saw the eyes, I’d know for sure.
She signals to her guide that this is who she looks for. He nods and leaves, knowing that remaining would be an intrusion.
— Elize, she nudges him once, touching his shoulder. She looks him up and down, his tall form covered by a yellowed sheet. Elize, I’ve come for you.