A Vision of Fire: A Novel

by Gillian Anderson

  “I understand,” Caitlin said. “I was asking about anything specific. Something that made you fearful, afraid?”

  Gaelle took a moment. Her pinched expression did not suggest someone who was trying to remember something. Rather, she seemed uncertain about what to share.

  “There are gangs who come out at night, from Port-au-Prince,” she said. “We go inside to escape the biting insects—but then the other hunters, they know where to find us.”

  Caitlin felt a wave of anxiety rise as she imagined being afraid to walk in the town at night, being afraid of strangers.

  “Were you hurt?”

  Gaelle shook her head brusquely.

  “Threatened?”

  “They touch, they push, they grab,” she said with disgust in her voice. “Sometimes too much. That is not new. I am all right.”

  Gaelle was not all right, and Caitlin hurt for her while resenting her own helplessness. But the psychiatrist accepted that she wasn’t getting anywhere with this conversation. And worse, she sensed that Gaelle was pulling up the drawbridge. She had to try something more direct.

  “Gaelle, are you familiar with therapeutic hypnotism? Using a trance to access your subconscious?”

  “A little. I researched psychiatry online last night.”

  “Because . . . ?”

  “I like to know things,” she answered evasively.

  “So do I.” Caitlin smiled.

  The girl sat stony-faced. She did not want to bond.

  “Gaelle, I have been using this technique with my other patient. I would like very much to try it with you.”

  Before she even made the request Caitlin knew that Gaelle would say no. This young woman had fought for control in a country that afforded little. Structured time and a structured mind were as close as she could come to feeling safe.

  “Before you answer,” Caitlin jumped in, “I want to explain that I am not asking this lightly. If I thought there was any other way to identify the cause of your episode, I would suggest it. This is emergency psychiatric medicine.”

  Gaelle stared at her, placed her chin in her hand. “Do you believe that I am mentally ill?”

  “I told you over the phone, I do not,” Caitlin said emphatically.

  Gaelle stared at her a little longer, then stood. “I will discuss it with my stepmother. Please come back in a half hour.”

  CHAPTER 15

  Caitlin spent the time watching waves slide across the beach. She had always enjoyed going to Coney Island or Jones Beach as a kid, but back then the ocean was an adventure. Now it was a mystery. She remembered her dream, the black wave rolling toward her.

  Is that the ultimate paradox of life, she wondered, that the universe should become less clear with age?

  Yes, she decided with a last, admiring glance at the sea as she dusted sand from her butt. She looked at a grain among grains on the tip of her index finger.

  “You were here before we were,” she said.

  Caitlin did not brush the sand away but left it, like a second skin, and headed back to the pale green house. Now, away from the fresh sea breeze, she was starting to sweat through her blouse. The afternoon heat surpassed 90 degrees, typical for October in Haiti. Sunset and stronger winds from the Caribbean would provide some relief in the evening, but then mosquitoes and fleas would become plentiful. The universe had a cruel sense of humor.

  A dozen people had clustered on the street by the Anglade office, not too close to the veranda. They were all Haitian and were loosely divided into two groups, those staring mutely at the house and those who were chatting with each other. Word had apparently spread about the Anglades’ visitors, but was it Caitlin or the Vodou clergy from the city who were attracting the attention? As soon as one person in the gathering saw her, they all turned their heads, fell into a stony silence, and watched her approach. There were no smiles, only cautious eyes and defensively lifted chins.

  A man in a priest’s collar called to her in French or Creole, she wasn’t sure which. She replied only, “Excusez-moi.” Although she heard him start again, Caitlin didn’t break her pace toward the door. It was not the time to engage with anyone else, not now.

  The door to the office was open, in keeping with tropical etiquette. Madame Langlois, her son, and Aaron had arrived before her. Houngan Enock had been speaking fervently to Marie-Jeanne; he stopped when Caitlin entered. The madame was perched in a corner holding her blue tarp bag on her lap with the patience of ages. Aaron was on his cell phone in the room behind the office. He was talking to the clinic and hydrating with a two-liter bottle of water.

  As Caitlin made her way across the room she watched Gaelle, who was sitting at her desk in a semblance of normal working life, a cup of jasmine tea losing steam in a saucer nearby. The young woman was drawing on a small notepad and Caitlin leaned in for a closer look. She saw crescent marks in the shape of triangles, grouped into one large triangle. The symbols meant nothing to her but she didn’t have long to examine them. Gaelle moved the notepad aside and pulled a brochure over it. Gaelle’s guard was back up, and Caitlin thought better of asking about the drawing she had just hidden away.

  “Is everything all right?” she asked instead.

  Gaelle nodded.

  “Have you had time to think on your own?” Caitlin did not emphasize the last three words but her meaning was clear. “This is your decision,” she added.

  Gaelle shook her head and seemed about to speak, but Houngan Enock interrupted. “We do not value loneliness in Haiti, doctor.”

  “What does that mean exactly?” Caitlin queried, restraining her increasing defensiveness.

  “What I said. We are here to help her with this important decision.”

  They heard an upswelling of noise from the street. Caitlin looked through the window. The group outside had increased in size and intensity.

  “You are certainly bringing a lot of ‘help,’ ” Caitlin said quietly.

  Gaelle gave her the ghost of a smile. At last, a connection, Caitlin thought.

  Gaelle’s stepmother spoke in Creole. Gaelle translated for Caitlin. “She is saying, ‘Don’t blame our visitors. Since the video was on the Internet, we have been seeing many strangers around. Some Haitian, some white.’ ”

  Caitlin spoke up. “Have they said anything to you, Gaelle? Done anything?”

  “Only talk,” the girl answered unhappily. “It doesn’t matter.”

  “Yes, it does. You should not have to live with that.” Caitlin cautiously moved a hand across the desk toward her. “Please let me help you.”

  “So they can talk more?” Enock challenged.

  “So I can help you stop an incident like the last one if it happens again.”

  Gaelle looked at Caitlin, then at her desk, and shook her head slowly. “I must say no, doctor.”

  “But why?”

  Gaelle’s stepmother said something quickly, made an axe-like gesture with her hand. Gaelle translated, though it was unnecessary. “The decision is made.”

  Enock smiled and placed himself on the edge of the desk, between Gaelle and Caitlin. He began to dig in his own plastic bag and pull out small boxes and bags. Caitlin tried to catch the madame’s eye but she was watching her son impassively.

  Caitlin stood and stepped to one side. It was becoming clear what was soon to happen.

  “Gaelle, is it your wish to seek help through a Vodou ceremony?” she asked.

  They heard a sudden chant from the people in the street and then several voices rose in a Christian hymn. Marie-Jeanne and Enock began to speak quickly in Creole but Gaelle cut them off.

  “No, I will go,” she said emphatically.

  Gaelle stood and glided toward the door with elegance. From the window Caitlin saw her approach the Catholic priest. There was no sign that he was of special significance to her but she was respectful and unafraid. The people nearest the priest shot the young woman suspicious looks.

  Aaron, now leaning on the doorjamb of the back room, s
poke to Caitlin. “People are on edge,” he said.

  “Clearly.”

  “It’s not just this,” he said. “In early November there is usually a severe spike in violence in Port-au-Prince. It’s the Vodou holy days. Grave robbers desecrate Vodou territory, throw rocks at their holy people, that kind of thing. Sometimes there are riots, though I think it’s really all a vent because of the poverty here.”

  Caitlin understood his point immediately: anything could spark off this crowd. Especially if they thought someone was possessed. That was why Gaelle had been so quick to deny it when they spoke.

  “And there is white bias,” Enock snapped. “They come here and tell us that we are primitive yet they have no knowledge of our faith. Frightened people spread outrageous lies—that it was Vodou that caused the earthquake, that we bargain with devils. We do not do this ‘black magic’!” He shot the accusation at Caitlin personally.

  “I would never say that you do,” Caitlin replied.

  “Your questions in the car were . . . superior.”

  “I never meant—”

  “No. Your kind has been like this!” He threw his chin angrily toward the crowd and the priest. “Your arrogant manipulation of reality is more black magic than ours!” He slammed a jar of red powder onto the table next to him. “We look farther into reality. You . . . you just twist it.”

  “How?” Caitlin asked, trying to stay focused and understanding.

  “You peck at it, like chickens at meal. You study the pieces instead of the whole. That is not a cure! That is”—he took a moment to search for the word—“what you call dissection. It is autopsy.”

  Against her will, Caitlin’s temper started to rise. But she kept her mouth shut.

  “From what I know of Vodou,” Aaron said to no one in particular, “it’s a way for people to gather, bring up their problems, share food, dance, and feel that they matter—that they’re part of something bigger.”

  “Your explanation is like the surface of the sea.” Enock scowled, moving his hand like rippling waves. “It is just what the white outsider sees.”

  “You misunderstand me,” Aaron said. “I think all of those things are essential for our souls.”

  “I tell you, you know nothing,” Enock sneered. “Either of you.”

  “Then educate us!” Caitlin said.

  Marie-Jeanne said something quickly to Enock that stopped him in his tracks. Enock paused and then casually translated for Caitlin.

  “She says she knows what caused Gaelle’s fou in the market.”

  All eyes snapped to Marie-Jeanne. She was rubbing her forehead and staring at the ceiling.

  Enock continued translating. “You do not need to hypnotize Gaelle. She will tell you. Three days ago a tourist fell from Marie-Jeanne’s boat. Marie-Jeanne dove in and rescued him but she nearly drowned herself. When Gaelle heard of this she was very upset.”

  Caitlin said nothing. She felt as if she’d been hit in the chest by one of those large breakers on the shore. This could not be a coincidence.

  They heard voices rise in a hymn from the street. Caitlin looked out the window and there were thirty-five or forty people outside the house. Gaelle, still in the middle of them, turned from the priest and entered the office, frowning.

  “They are children, sometimes,” she said. “Fighting, fighting, fighting about the business of others.”

  Caitlin heard but did not process what Gaelle was saying. Her mind was still on what Enock had translated. “Gaelle, I must talk to you. I came here initially to help my patient in New York, to learn—”

  “No!” the girl insisted before she even sat down. “Everything stops now. No confession, no hypnotism, nothing. I am not sick, except of all this nonsense!”

  “You’re absolutely right,” Caitlin said, with sudden inspiration. She had to convince Gaelle, had to show her what was at stake. “This is not illness. It’s an assault of some kind.” She pulled out her phone and scrolled through her files.

  “What are you saying?”

  “Please, I can show you . . .”

  Caitlin found the iconic picture of the girl from Hiroshima and handed the phone to Gaelle. A shade of empathy and fear crossed the young woman’s face.

  “Who is this?” she asked.

  “That is a girl who just survived a nuclear bomb. The look on her face, that intensity of suffering, is exactly what my patient in New York is experiencing. And what I believe you have experienced too.”

  Enock, Aaron, and Marie-Jeanne all looked over Gaelle’s shoulder. For a moment Caitlin thought Gaelle might weep. The young woman handed the phone to her stepmother and spoke in Creole.

  Enock stood peremptorily. “You are simply manipulating her. Sympathy is not a revelation,” he stated. “Nor is it action. I will show you both.”

  He grabbed the small jar he had slammed on the table, then moved two chairs to clear a space on the floor and closed the door to the veranda. The crowd outside immediately responded to his actions as if they knew what was coming next. Their tones of disapproval rose into almost a chant.

  But what was happening next? Caitlin thought she had tapped into something with Gaelle, that she was getting somewhere, but was this silence the girl’s only response? Was she going to submit to Enock?

  The Houngan began tapping red powder out of his jar in a long line down the floor. Caitlin caught a very faint, familiar scent. It was cayenne pepper. Enock finished the first line and started tapping out a second one perpendicular to the first.

  Caitlin was moving to confer with Aaron when Madame Langlois stood up and, handing her blue tarp bag to Caitlin, turned her fierce eyes on her son. In Creole, she snapped at him. He answered back defensively. Caitlin thought she recognized the word “papa” and asked Aaron about it.

  “Papa Legba is the loa that guards the gate between our world and theirs,” he whispered in her ear. “No spirit can come through without his approval.”

  “I don’t understand,” she whispered back. “Was Enock going to try to contact him?”

  “I don’t know,” he admitted.

  The madame suddenly marched into the back room and ordered her son to follow her. Enock huffed but turned and shoved past Aaron. Leaving the door to the back room open, they exploded into an argument in Creole. Gaelle looked slightly relieved.

  “What’s wrong?” Caitlin asked.

  “He was going to trace the Papa spirit’s symbol on the floor,” the girl explained. “His veve.”

  “Why did Madame Langlois stop him?”

  “It is always done with flour or cornmeal, not pepper. She is asking why he has so much cayenne in the first place. It’s expensive. He is saying it is more powerful.” Gaelle paused and listened. “She says that the power comes from the one who invokes, not the powder. Using cayenne will make him weak . . .” She searched for a word. “Forgetful.”

  Despite the drama of the moment, Caitlin could not help but smile. Theirs was like any family squabble in any corner of the world.

  “You’re brave,” Aaron said.

  Caitlin raised an eyebrow.

  “Holding the bag of a Vodou priestess.” He smiled.

  Caitlin had forgotten the bag, rapt as she was in the debate in the next room. Through the open door, she saw the madame lift her son’s hand with the ring, then fling it down. Caitlin wondered if this argument would make Gaelle more or less inclined to listen to the Houngan’s advice, if the madame might allow her a little more leeway.

  Suddenly, Caitlin’s eyes lowered to the blue tarp bag. She had felt it move. It had been infinitesimal but definitely real. There it was again, a little more lively this time. She gripped the bag tightly to keep from dropping it.

  “Madame,” she breathed, with no sound behind her breath.

  Madame Langlois looked in on Caitlin, sized up the situation in a glance, and entered the room immediately. Enock followed but she pointed at him with one finger and he sat in the nearest chair. Retrieving the bag, the madame hefted
it twice gently, like a grocer judging the weight of a bag of grapes.

  “This is very interesting,” the madame murmured to Caitlin. “Damballa is active in your life.”

  Caitlin did not know who or what “Damballa” meant and did not feel disposed to speak. She remained absolutely still.

  “He protects the weakened,” the madame continued. “This is why I brought him.”

  Caitlin noticed that she did not say “the weak” but “the weakened.” It was an interesting distinction. The woman placed her bag on Gaelle’s desk and reached into it. Slowly and with both hands, she brought out a clean white bag that looked like a hotel pillowcase. Its end was twisted, curled over, and secured with white ribbons.

  “Enock,” the madame said.

  Her son stood quickly, looked around, and seized the bottle of water Aaron had been drinking from. He took the saucer from Gaelle’s cold cup of tea and poured a few tablespoons of water into it. Then he placed the saucer near the madame and went back to his seat.

  As Madame Langlois unfastened the white ribbons, Caitlin felt cold fear grab her throat and heart.

  “Fear is respect,” the madame said, as if from a distance.

  She opened the pillowcase and slowly, almost lovingly, pulled out a tightly coiled snake.

  Caitlin was barely breathing.

  “The serpent is in pain,” the madame told Caitlin. Then she leaned toward the reptile and murmured, “Damballa is grateful for your sacrifice.”

  Caitlin could not pull her eyes from the snake. It was not very big, and its scales were a chalky gray with copper spots shaped like a leopard’s. She remembered from one of Jacob’s projects that a snake only coiled tightly when it was very afraid. She saw the faintest of trembles across the snake’s skin. Had that been what she felt through the bag? But the bag was too thick . . . The madame held the snake near the water but it made no move toward it, no flick of the tongue to sense its surroundings.

  “Why is it acting like this?” Caitlin asked. “Are you torturing it?”

  “These tiny hands cannot harm her,” the madame said. “She is doing Damballa’s work.”

  Madame Langlois slowly, stealthily stepped to Gaelle. The girl was crying silently and she craned backward as the snake neared her. Suddenly red liquid oozed from the snake’s eyes, nostrils, and mouth, dripping onto the floor. Caitlin felt bile rise in her throat. Some snakes, she remembered, could bleed from their orifices at will, in the presence of a predator. This snake was terrified . . . specifically of Gaelle.