Cross on the Drum

by Cave, Hugh

  Barry caught his breath. Who had told the Bishop that? Probably St. Juste, in a desperate effort to fend off those questions about vodun.

  "But—"

  He sensed a change in the Bishop's tone. His hands gripped his knees.

  "But," the Bishop went on, grimly now, "this progress I speak of was not made without cost, and the cost was great. I do not refer to a cost of gourdes and centimes. I mean something much more. In order to achieve the goals he set for himself, your minister has had to ignore, temporarily, his sworn duty to make war on the forces of evil in your midst."

  Oh God, Barry thought.

  Inexorably the Bishop's voice boomed on.

  "Perhaps this was necessary. I do not know. I myself would never have pursued such a compromise even to win your allegiance and build this fine new church for you. No matter. Your minister followed the course of action he thought best. But now you have your fine new church, and from this dedicated house of God the war against evil will be waged without mercy, I give you fair warning. No man among you can follow both God and the false deities. No man can believe in both Christ and vodun superstitions. None can kneel at this rail and obey the commands of the houngan. The period of compromise is over. You come to Christ with clean hands and hearts or you do not come at all."

  There was a sound of movement in the pews and Barry opened the eyes he had closed in torment. Catus Laroche had risen. He was in the aisle, on his feet, glaring. Barry had never seen such naked hate and fury on a human face before. If a man's gaze could destroy, the Bishop's legs would melt under him. But they did not melt. The Bishop stood as straight as Catus, stone against stone, will against will. Catus moved his head and directed his gaze at Barry.

  This was the end, Barry realized. The end of understanding, of hope, of everything he had worked for. He felt weak. His mind was overwhelmed, incapable of clear thought. He had the sensation of being in a huge empty room with the Bishop's words hurling themselves at him from the bare walls, stoning him. The layer of sweat under his vestments had turned cold and he was shivering. He could not stop shivering.

  Catus flung himself about and strode down the aisle. Almost to a man the congregation rose and followed him.

  The Bishop, as though nothing had happened, calmly concluded the service.

  "The Peace of God, which passeth all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the knowledge and love of God . . ."

  The Peace of God, Barry thought in an agony of bitterness. And this man thunders for war.

  19

  CATUS MUST HAVE GONE STRAIGHT to the hounfor. The drums began throbbing while Barry and the other clerics were taking off their vestments. The Bishop listened to the sound for a moment, and then turned a cold eye on Barry. "You see, he was no true friend."

  Barry was silent.

  "I know his sort," the Bishop went on. "He was only waiting to turn on you when you would least expect it. You're better off with your sword unsheathed, ready for combat."

  Do you have to talk like a Sunday-school pamphlet? Barry thought in his bitterness. Nevertheless he nodded. A response of some sort was required of him.

  He pushed aside the drape at his bedroom door—for the Bishop's coming the old Christmas tablecloth had at last been replaced—hung up his cassock, and went out to check on Lucy. His guests would have lunch here and then return to the mainland. Edith was waiting outside.

  She caught his hand. "Will it make a great deal of difference to you, darling?" she asked.

  He looked at her blankly. "Good God!"

  "But he had to say it, didn't he? I mean he is a Bishop, and the church does take a stand against these things. You'd have been obliged to declare yourself sooner or later."

  "Bishop Laxson," Barry said in a controlled voice, "is the biggest fool God ever made."

  "Barry!"

  "And if you are shocked by that statement, you haven't the faintest notion of what I've been trying to do here."

  She was shocked. "Barry, I don't understand you. It isn't like you—"

  "If there is such a place as hell, I wish your precious Bishop were in it right now, suffering all the assorted torments he deserves. You'll have to excuse me now, Edith. I've got to see that he's fed."

  He left her standing there, mouth and eyes wide in astonishment, and went into the kitchen. Lucy sat on a chair, weeping. Alma was the one looking after the lunch.

  She turned to face him, in one hand a knife with which she had been slicing tomatoes. "I'm sorry," she said quietly. "Would it do any good to cut his throat?"

  He almost smiled. "I'm afraid not. Would you like to?"

  "It would give me the greatest pleasure."

  "Thanks." He touched her arm, went past her, and put a hand under Lucy's chin. The housekeeper's crying surprised him a little. He hadn't known she had any feeling for him. Now he realized suddenly that she had not mentioned old Mitchell in quite a while.

  "Tears won't do much good, will they?" he said gently. "Hadn't you better set the table, Lucy?"

  NOTHING WAS SAID AT LUNCH about the Bishop's bombshell. The Bishop himself did not bring up the subject and the others were only too glad to leave it alone. The only person who appeared to be enjoying the meal was Warner Lemke. He, with a slight but un-wholesome sort of smile, kept glancing across the table at his wife as though waiting for her applause.

  There had to be talk of some sort, if only because the table had been set in the yard—the rectory's tiny dining room was hopelessly inadequate—and people were curiously watching from the edge of the clearing. Peter directed it by asking about the proposed school. Barry answered with feigned enthusiasm and a desolate feeling that the project, now, would never get beyond the words with which he explained it. When that subject was exhausted he told of his plan to introduce more and better coffee. The Bishop listened, ate and nodded, with the fixed smile of a crusader who had just destroyed a city of sin and was resting amid the ruins.

  On the way down to the launch, after lunch, Peter Ambrose contrived to drop back in line and speak to Barry alone.

  "I had a feeling something unpleasant would happen, Barry. I'm really sorry. The Bishop had a long letter from Lemke. It's fairly obvious now what was in it."

  "I see." So Alma had been right. Lemke was out to smash him. "I don't know what that man has against you," Peter said, shaking his head.

  "He had an affair with Anita before she came to work for you at Fond Marie. He thinks we found out about it and I told his wife." "Oh? Perhaps I should tell the Bishop that."

  "Perhaps you should, though it's too late now to do any good, isn't it? Anyway, I imagine Lemke was careful enough to stick to facts in denouncing me. Distorted to suit his purpose, no doubt, but still facts."

  Peter seemed old and very tired. The bright blue eyes had lost their luster. "It's a shame, a great shame," he said, sighing. "You were doing such a fine job here, boy."

  "Was I, Peter? Coming from you—"

  "I know, I know. At Fond Marie I called you immature and head-strong. I said you were wrong about a lot of things. But I've been thinking about you a good deal lately and I keep coming back to the greatest of all sermons and find you doing just as He instructed. 'But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you . . . All this time you've known Him better than I, it seems."

  Barry had to smile. It's in the Bible if you'll look for it, he thought. "Thank you, Peter. You're wrong, of course."

  The bony fingers clasped his hand. "I'm not wrong. You mustn't give up, boy. No matter what happens, you mustn't give up."

  THE BOAT BOY DROPPED HIS GAZE from an anxious examination of the sky and turned to Lemke.

  "Li pa bon, m'sieu. A bad storm may be coming, I think."

  Lemke thought so too, and revised his opinion of the radio warning. There was no danger, though. "We'll be back long before it hits," he said. "Get that line in and let's go."

  The channel was quite calm. Not even Peter Ambrose suffered as th
e launch sped toward the mainland. Barry sat as far from the Bishop as possible, longing to get the trip over with. He had already made up his mind not to return to the island with Lemke. A native sailboat was preferable to a return trip alone with this man who had defeated him and was now openly gloating.

  The boy took the craft as close to the mainland beach as he dared, and Barry dropped over the side into knee-deep water, lifting a hand to help the others. To Lemke he said, "Don't wait for me. I have some things to do in Anse Ange."

  Lemke only laughed.

  At the village rectory Barry said good-by to the Bishop, Peter, and Jeff, and emptied himself of a sigh of relief as the Fond Marie jeep rolled out through the gate. Courtesy demanded he spend a few moments with the Anse Ange rector, and then he departed and walked alone through the village.

  What was he to do now on his island?

  Catus, he realized, would probably not remain angry. At least not as violently angry as he must be at the moment. The understanding between them was built on too firm a foundation to be shattered by a third man's words. Sooner or later the houngan's rage would subside and he would wait to see what would happen next.

  For Barry there were two roads open. He could ignore the Bishop's thundering threat and go on as before, with the certain knowledge that if he did so, the Bishop would be informed of his disobedience by Lemke. Or he could unsheathe his sword, as the Bishop had so colorfully put it, and destroy himself and all he had thus far accomplished in a crusade against phantoms. Don Quixote charging the windmill.

  Two roads. Only two. Either led to destruction.

  He strolled through the market place, which on Sundays was a ghost city of small thatch shelters on crooked poles, inhabited only by a few scavenging dogs, dirty white and half starved like all the native dogs in St. Joseph. He trudged through Anse Ange's narrow, crooked streets with their open gutters and foolishly tight-packed houses and shops. The shops were closed. At this hour on a Sunday afternoon there were scarcely a dozen people abroad in the whole village. He lost track of the time.

  It was very hot in Anse Ange, hotter than it should be, he thought. Not a breath of breeze came off the channel or down from the mountains. The mountains had surrendered their sharp contours to something hazy in the atmosphere, like pictures drawn with pastels and then smudged. Even the sun seemed smudged. As he plodded through the town his shoes stirred up little puffs of dust that fell to the ground behind him as though weighted.

  A house door opened. A girl came out backward, laughing gaily and calling farewells to those within. At the sound of her voice Barry turned his head. She bounced down the steps and saw him.

  "Père Clinton!"

  It was Micheline.

  "What are you doing here?" he asked.

  "Oh, visiting one of my cousins." Her dark eyes regarded him curiously. "I'm going home now. Are you? You'd better if you don't want to spend the night here."

  It was late, he realized. Most of the boats would be gone. Their owners never liked to stay in Anse Ange much after midday.

  "I suppose I should." He had nothing to do in the village. He had stayed only to avoid the return passage with Lemke.

  They walked to the beach together, Micheline chattering about her visit. It was his turn to look curiously at her. Was it possible, really, that this child was or had been Warner Lemke's mistress? He found it hard to believe. Then he remembered his visits to the Cesar house and the way she had looked at him, the way he had felt when she looked at him. She was no child. Whatever else she was, and he suspected she was many things, she was no child.

  There were three boats at the shore. The owners of two flatly refused to make the trip. The third man, torn between his reluctance and the chance to earn money, peered dubiously at the sky and the distant island. His boat was one of the poorer craft, small and crudely made, with a sail that appeared to be little more than patches sewn together.

  "I am not sure," he said. "The other men think a bad storm may be coming."

  Barry awaited the decision in silence. He knew nothing of sailing and even less about weather signs. If a storm threatened, he preferred to spend the night at the rectory in Anse Ange rather than take a chance on this channel with its ugly reputation.

  Micheline reacted differently. Hands on hips, she bestowed on the poor fellow a grimace of disgust. "A storm! Why, there isn't enough wind to fill your sail, if you call that puzzle of patches a sail!"

  "That's the trouble," he grumbled. "If we start, we may be a long time getting there. Anything could happen."

  "What can happen? This sorry-looking boat of yours doesn't leak, does it?"

  "No, it doesn't leak."

  "Then what are you afraid of? If a wind comes up, we'll get there that much sooner."

  Two other women seeking passage across the channel had come along the black-sand beach to listen to the argument. They added their voices to Micheline's. It was important for them to get home, they insisted. Were they expected to remain here all night just because a cowardly boatman thought the sun looked a little queer? What would their men say?

  Barry listened and frowned. Had the fellow remained undecided a moment longer he would have turned away. But the man yielded. With misgivings, Barry waded out to the craft with the others and pulled himself aboard.

  He settled himself with his back against the weathered plank that served for a rail and hoped his apprehension was unwarranted. Micheline sat beside him, delighted with her victory. The other two, both older than she, both in white dresses he guessed were their Sunday best, smiled at her from the opposite side of the warped deck and at once began chattering to each other, bobbing their heads like a pair of birds.

  The boatman—his name was Telemaque, Barry had gathered from the conversation on the beach—reluctantly ran up his sail. He had no helper. Perhaps on a craft this small he had no need of one, but the presence of a crew would have made Barry feel a good deal safer.

  With its crazy-quilt sail barely flapping in a ghost of wind, the craft crept away from the shore. Not another sail was to be seen between Ile du Vent and the mainland. The water looked dark and stealthy. The heat was intense.

  "Well!" Micheline, lifting her bare arms, contentedly stretched herself. "Aren't you glad I was with you, mon Père?"

  "I'm sure I should be. I can't say I like the feel of this weather, though."

  "Oh, that Telemaque. He's crazy."

  "I hope you're right."

  "Do you like my dress, mon Père? It's new."

  Barry could see no polite way of refusing the invitation to look at her. It was a new dress, obviously. She must be very fond of new dresses, he told himself. This one was white and quite snug, with a wide belt of red plastic. She wore the green stone at her throat, he noticed, and a pair of rather large gold-plated hoop earrings.

  "You look very nice in it."

  "I bought it for the blessing of your church this morning. Then my cousin in Anse Ange sent word that another cousin would be visiting her today, one from Raphael that I hadn't seen for ages, so I couldn't go to the blessing after all. Was it a nice service?"

  "It was in the beginning," Barry said with a shrug.

  "Oh? Did something go wrong?"

  "The Bishop spoke very strongly against vodun and your brother walked out in anger. I'm afraid most of the people followed him."

  Micheline gazed at him in astonishment. "The Bishop offended my brother? Did he have a right to do that in your church?"

  "I'm afraid a Bishop can do what he pleases," Barry said unhappily.

  She took time to think about it while the boat continued its creeping, creaking progress and the two older women went on with their gossip. "You didn't speak out against vodun, did you?" she asked then.

  "No. "

  "But now you must?"

  He glanced at her sharply. She was intelligent, this girl. She had her brother's knack of going straight to the crux of a thing.

  "Let's just say I have a problem," he replied. "A very
troublesome problem. Unhappily it's one that I'll have to find the answer to by myself."

  "You don't want to talk about it, you mean?"

  "Not until I've had time to think it over, if you don't mind."

  She subsided. Barry took a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. The heat this time was real, not a product of his nerves as it had been in church this morning. He was beginning to feel suffocated.

  THEY WERE IN THE CENTER of the channel. The terrible heat and weight of the air had at last oppressed even the two chattering women by the opposite rail, and there was no sound other than the slapping of the sail and the oily murmur of the water along the boat's side. The journey thus far had required an hour and twenty minutes by Barry's watch. Telemaque, at the tiller, was plainly nervous.

  Suddenly the boatman's roving gaze fastened on something at the eastern end of the passage and Barry turned to see what had caught his attention. An odd black object moved on the sea's surface there: a shadow of some sort, arrow-shaped, with its point toward them. It approached rapidly, growing in size as it came. The boatman shielded his eyes from the hazy sun to peer at it.

  Bewildered, Barry scrambled to his feet. Something else was happening. The sultry air vibrated now to a high, thin whistling sound, faint but growing louder. He wheeled on Telemaque.

  "What is it?"

  "Wind!"

  Isle of the Wind, Barry thought. Channel of the Wind. But this was no ordinary breeze. The approaching blackness was a sea in upheaval, churned out of its lethargy by some tremendous force. He shouted at Micheline and the women to get hold of something and raced to the tiller to help the boatman.

  The whistling grew louder. It was a prolonged, ear-splitting shriek now, a sound to fill a man with panic. Suddenly it was directly overhead, an invisible train on a phantom trestle. With a single sharp explosion the sail filled and was torn to shreds. The boat heeled far over. Rain and sea struck at the same instant.