By Night the Mountain Burns

by Juan Tomas Avila Laurel

  No matter who the woman was, once she’d been discovered bathing on the beach she was judged to be connected to the Devil and became someone you had to avoid. She could no longer share anything with anyone, absolutely nothing at all. Of course it was possible some women were visited by that mysterious being at night and nobody ever found out. But it would have been unusual. It was more common for traces of the terrible heats to show up on their bodies. What’s more, it was common knowledge that after being visited by the being, the woman acquired powers she didn’t have before. And because the powers were connected to the Devil, they were powers she would use to evil ends. That’s why she was feared, and that’s why the governors ordered her confinement. And they were indeed special powers. For example, if a child passed by naked before the woman’s house, and she was seated at the door and saw the child, she could use her powers to send a piece of wood from the ground into the child’s body, or a piece of metal from the street. And from that day forth the child would complain of a pain in his or her side, or chest, or back, or wherever the old woman had sent the stick, the scrap of metal, the saucepan, whatever she’d had to hand when the child passed by. In the language of our Atlantic Ocean island there is a word we use for such women, a word that in Spanish would be witch or sorceress or she-devil, but that in our language means all three things. I’ll just pick one and say that those women were she-devils. Well those women could not only send objects into children, they could also poison their food or kill them with witchcraft. What’s more, and by some method only they knew about, those women could pass on the condition of being a she-devil. They could choose to pass the condition on to whomever they wanted, though only to women, or someone would be chosen for them by being visited with bad luck. And once a woman had been chosen, she’d be called upon by the mysterious being of the unbearable heats, and she became a she-devil too.

  The adults on our island have always recognised she-devils from their bathing naked in the middle of the night and sending objects into children with the intention of killing them, and also from their penetrating stare. If a she-devil thought nobody was watching her, she could often be caught staring at someone with unusual intensity. Or she’d be caught doing the sort of thing nobody would ever admit to, things no adult of sound mind would ever do if they knew there was a chance of being caught. Things that were obviously of evil intent. After being visited by the being that brought the heats, the woman seemed to have a constant need to cause harm to the rest of mankind. A normal person, normal in the sense of being a woman of adult age, would not spit in someone else’s bucket of water, for example, unless that someone else was her sworn enemy, and even then she’d only do it when she knew she wouldn’t be caught doing something so repulsive. And the she-devils did things like that, or so the adults said. I remember being told to avoid she-devils at all costs, but if I did catch one staring at me with unusual intensity, I was to hold her stare, because if you looked away, she’d send something into you, and then woe betide you. Can you imagine that? Hold the stare of a woman who everyone said was a she-devil and was therefore extremely dangerous. I understand very well why they had to be shut away in their houses. It was so that they couldn’t stare at you in such a dangerous way, and to avoid accusations of their sending pieces of stone or lumps of metal into children, for the she-devils were unable to resist the temptation. I heard cases of mothers taking their children to the house of a she-devil to demand that she remove the saucepan, the water cup or the whatever it was she’d sent into the child, because the child was dying from having it inside them. Yes, I’ve heard it talked about as if it were the most normal thing in the world.

  Did the she-devils ever leave their houses even though it was forbidden to do so? Yes, they did. The nature of life on our Atlantic Ocean island meant that most things were done outside. But, for example, any child would run home if a she-devil asked them to go and fetch a pail of water from the public tap, a request that no child could ordinarily refuse from an old person. But with the she-devil, you might take her the pail of water and then, overcome by the evil inside her, she might send the pail into you, and then woe betide you. Or a she-devil might ask you to bring her a bit of smoking kindling from your house, and then send it into your chest and you’d feel your innards burning from the fire inside you. Or you might perform the favour and she’d do nothing, but to thank you she’d give you a piece of yam, and you couldn’t eat the yam because the evil caused by her night heats made her put an invisible drop of poison in the yam, a potent poison that only she knew about. And because of all of this, they sometimes left their houses when they needed something, even though they knew they were not supposed to, and when they did they were targeted by children, children who remained innocent but who had heard about the evils of she-devils. All we did was throw stones at them and run away and hide, to avoid their curses or however else they might react.

  I’ve already said that the she-devils were what I most feared on the island. Yes, I was greatly curious about them during the day, when I hoped to see one, if only out of the corner of my eye, standing in the doorway of her house, or even just moving about inside, for I wanted to be able to think about what daily tasks a she-devil busied herself with. But that great curiosity disappeared as soon as night set in, and if I had cause to walk down a street where one of them lived when it was dark, I avoided that street and went down a different one. In fact I avoided the adjacent streets too, even if this meant having to go a very long way round.

  Any old lady might be a she-devil, and they filled us with great fear; they got the heats at night and became so tremendously hot that without thinking twice, or if they did think twice nobody knew about it, they took off their clothes and went to the beach, because they knew there would be nobody there, and they would go into the water, into the sea, into the darkness, in strict solitude. What nobody knew for sure, not even the adults, was what triggered the heats. What were the women doing when the heats invaded them? What did the mysterious being that visited them at night say? What did they talk about? Whether anyone knew the answers to these questions or not, it was considered bad luck for any man to catch a woman with the heats in the act of bathing. It was something best avoided. It can’t have been easy to ignore, for everyone knew that night bathing was the one sure sign that the island had a new she-devil in its midst. But those who witnessed such a thing didn’t always like anyone to know what they’d seen, for if you caught a woman in the act of bathing at night you had to weigh up the risks against you. That new she-devil, or newly discovered she-devil, for she might have long been one but nobody knew about it, would do everything in her power to make your life a misery if you denounced her. She would lay traps for you at every opportunity, traps to inconvenience you and ultimately to ruin your life. Being a witness to the incriminating night bath was, therefore, an uncomfortable and dangerous position to be in.

  First came the song about Nuestro Señor, the one they put a crown of thorns on, drove nails into and killed to save sinners. Back then I didn’t really understand who the sinners were. What’s more, in our island’s language, the language that very sad song was sung in, the word ‘sinners’ sounded very like ‘people’ or ‘folk’, and so in my innocence, I heard the words wrong. So what I understood was that the man who’d had nails driven into him on the cross had died to save us, us being the people of our island. I knew there were people in other places, but I only actually knew the ones on our island. And as we had so many needs, it seemed obvious to me that the man had died to save us. He had nails driven into him and he died to save us from the she-devils, from all the evils that could befall us, from the bad spirits of the land and the sea, from all the sickness, all the wickedness. But the saviour had died! That’s why the song sounded so sad to me. For at the time, whether because I hadn’t heard the song properly or didn’t understand the doctrina, I didn’t know about the promise that the saviour, who’d had nails driven into him after suffering so, would be resurrected. As far as I w
as aware, he was dead, and if he was dead he couldn’t save us from anything, least of all the terrible evils that afflicted us: the she-devils, the lack of soap kerosene matches clothes medicine, the terrible diseases, the lack of a man who was strong and tall and had a powerful voice to caution against anyone doing wicked things on the island. Know what the problem was with the doctrina? I only realised it many years later, as an adult. The problem was that every time anyone began preaching, they went back to the beginning and started the story from scratch. Nobody ever told the part about the saviour overcoming obstacles and saving us, it was always from the beginning, and then the nails, the thorns, the cross and death. And so those of us who were not familiar with the whole story and did not know the man was resurrected were left to wallow in a swamp of sorrow. Yes, I have seen a swamp before: there’s a village in the south of the island where it’s extremely swampy. Anyway, if I’d known the story was not about the Señor’s death but his triumph, I’d have known my worst fears wouldn’t come true. But the problem was, it was impossible to speak of triumph on our Atlantic Ocean island, given the conditions we found ourselves in. What we feared most was succumbing to our hardship, losing ourselves, disappearing, and then of course we heard our mothers sing the story of the Señor who had experienced the same hardships as us and died for his troubles. How could we imagine triumphing without anyone else’s help? I think I might already have mentioned it, but if it had been up to me, that song would not have been sung on the island at that time, though who knows whether it would have made any difference. For the thing was that everything happened in sequence, a chain of events, one thing after another: first, the Pico burned. Then they committed that act of awful wickedness with that woman, an unspeakable, truly awful act. Thrusting a stick into that woman’s femininity was a very big deal on our island. But it couldn’t be spoken of, not in normal conversation, though everyone agreed it should never have happened. And the moment it happened I knew everything would turn out for the worse. Then came the plague of death that brought the island to its knees. Throughout all this, I would have liked to hear what the Padre had to say for himself, to have heard him speak. He was a respected man, a venerated man even, and it would have been interesting to hear what he made of it all. But he was a man who spoke a language I didn’t understand – not because it was Spanish but because he didn’t know how to express himself properly. He was a terrible speaker, at least when not speaking in Latin, the Latin that released such an outpouring of pain and pity in the womenfolk of our island whenever a coffin was lowered into a grave. As the Padre was an incomer, I’d have liked to hear his explanations for the events I’m speaking of. The adults on the island did try to understand what was happening, otherwise they wouldn’t have gone around the island three times with the Maté Jachín. I see now that going round the island with the Maté Jachín, taking it to every accessible corner of the island, was more a matter of asking questions about what was happening than providing any kind of answer. For we died in droves, we suffered like the condemned, as if those thorns had been nailed to our heads, and then we lowered hundreds of coffins into hundreds of graves, graves dug by men to provide a final resting place for the dead. That thing about the departed coming home and making noise, I never saw it myself. In fact, I can’t imagine why the departed would come back to the house, if indeed they ever really did. It was said the deads could help the alives, and that was why they came back, but if that were the case, surely they’d have come to our aid during that terrible period. Although what was the point of a dead coming to the aid of an alive if the alive’s very problem was that the dead had died? Or that the alive’s own death was imminent? It would have made much more sense for the dead not to have died, or for the alive’s life not to have been in danger.

  So why did these catastrophes occur? There will never be an answer. The ministrants didn’t know the answer, and back then I thought they knew everything. There will never be an answer. What people sometimes know is how a story began, or rather they manage to work their way back to the origin of a catastrophe. Some draw comfort from the origin, from the first apparent cause, which is enough to satisfy their need for an explanation. Others curl their lips and frown when they get to the origin, the first apparent cause. And people routinely spoke of things that were not food and drink on our island, by which I mean things that were not necessarily tangible. I say all this in case anybody thinks I’m being too philosophical.

  By the time the sun pokes its nose over the horizon of a morning, life on our Atlantic Ocean island is already well under way. Most men will already have their paddles in hand and be gliding out into the waves. The many early risers among the women will already be on their way to the plantations. The women set off early if they’re going far, to the south of the island or to the mid part, and also if their journeys involve going up mountains into misty areas, places where the trees sit in the clouds. On our island, it’s said that if you get up with the sun, your feet are lighter, or your hands are lighter, depending on whether you’re a man or a woman, and travel by canoe or by foot.

  On our island, the birds fly when the sun comes up. I don’t mean nocturnal birds, which we pay little attention to and in fact curse. Life on our Atlantic Ocean island therefore starts early. Early morning is the time when everyone sees each other and greets each other, when people are full of hope that the day ahead will treat them well. That the fishing will be bountiful, that fully grown tubers will be found under the cassava plants. That the bunches of dates on the palm tree will be ripe, that the plantain will be ready to be cut. In the mornings, those heading in the same direction see each other, greet each other, cross paths. But sometimes there are people you don’t wish to greet, people you try to avoid if they’re taking the same route as you. Sometimes you might even change your plans if you bump into someone you don’t wish to greet, be it because you don’t like them or are afraid of them. And that’s what happened with the incident we all now know about, that horrible thing, the worst thing to ever happen to us, the most wicked thing we’ve ever done.

  A man who was father to many children and known to many people left home one morning to cut the ripe dates from a palm tree. Cutting the dates from a palm tree is a job only men do, at least when the palm tree is tall and its branches are high, rather than close to the ground where women might reach them. But this palm tree was tall and so the man set off with his axe and his machete, and the intention of making palm oil. The man left the house early, not knowing what the day would bring, and although people of all ages lived in his house, for he was father to many sons and daughters, cutting down the dates was a task only he could perform. Men on our island climb palm trees by making a special harness out of vines. The man makes a weave of thick vines and feeds it round the back of the tree. Then he pulls the two ends towards him and ties them together behind his back, so that he and the tree stand inside the loop of the harness. To climb the tree he leans back and lets the harness take his weight, then he transfers some weight to his feet, which support themselves in holds he cuts into the tree trunk with his axe. It’s an exercise I’ve seen done many times and a technique that’s taught to all males on the island, once they’ve reached a certain age. So the man leans back in the loop of his harness, sticks his feet in the holds he excavates in the trunk and walks up the tree two steps at a time. And of course he carries his machete and his axe, for he isn’t climbing the tree just to prove he was taught to climb palm trees as a boy, he’s doing it to gather dates for his wife, or any other woman who might have asked the favour of him. Or he might be doing it to extract palm wine, the succulent juice found inside palm trees. For on our Atlantic Ocean island, you don’t chop a palm tree down and kill it to extract the wine: you climb the tree and tap it. Not a drop of wine would reach a single throat if it weren’t for men proving their skills with harness, axe and feet. And with body and eyes too, for it’s an artisan’s job, a job that would be done anywhere else in the world, anywhere other than an island
that had nothing, using some kind of eye and face protection, because all manner of things can fall from above.

  Anyway, the man left his house and reached wherever it was he was going. He saw the palm tree, he saw the ripe palm dates at the top, and he prepared the harness, all very calmly. He made a quick sign of the cross, stood in the loop of the harness and fastened himself in. The boy passed him his axe … We forgot about the boy. I was talking as if the man had gone there on his own, which would have been very unusual. For one thing, who would have shown the man where the tree was, for men hardly ever went to the plantations on our island? And who would have carried the dates once the bunch had been cut? True, the man himself could have carried them for, though he had a slight limp, he could still walk. But it was more typical for a boy from his house to go with him and for the boy to carry the load on his head. And, before that, the boy would pass the man his axe, and before that he would fasten the man into his harness. The boy did all this, but that’s where the story ends, the story of the man climbing the palm tree, the story of his life. We were never told whether the man did or didn’t cut any dates, whether he reached the top of the tree or not; all we were told was that the man, father to many sons and daughters, fell from the palm tree and landed with the full force of his weight on the ground. Such a tremendous blow shook him to the core and, though his soul wasn’t ripped out of his body there and then, very little life was left in him. It’s said he lived just long enough to utter his dying words to his family. The boy ran to get help and the man was carried home, a man who was at death’s door but for now remained father to many children. And then, as I’ve said, what little life there was left in him expired. And everyone was informed, and everyone went to his house for the wake, for he wasn’t just a father to many children, he was also one of the main ministrants of the island. His death was similar to the death of the doctor: we had lost a man with the power to heal us and we felt orphaned without him, without his care. Yes, I remember now, he was the senior ministrant. Other senior ministrants had died before him and passed the responsibility on to him. So he was no ordinary old man. The wake at his house, ‘his deathplace’, as we call it in our language, was a sight to behold, or rather not to behold, something that was best avoided. At least so I was told. I did pass by the house and I saw a lot of people there, and I heard the laments, though I didn’t know at the time whether the man was alive and injured or already dead, for nobody told me. But I imagine he was already dead. I only passed the house very briefly, for I wasn’t supposed to go because of my age. I went because I was looking for my grandmother, seeking her comfort, and she was there because she knew how to do some of the things the ministrants did. I didn’t really understand why the whole village was there at the time but there were a number of reasons: first and foremost, he was an important figure, because he was the senior ministrant, but there was also the fact that his death had been a tragedy. Looking back I see there was a major barrier between adults and children, and that barrier meant, for example, that I never knew what injuries he died of. The adults never told us. Whether his head was smashed in, or his feet and hands, or his entire body, I couldn’t say; we children never knew. Nor does it matter particularly: the fact is he died. He was buried, and I know nothing about his funeral either, for only the adults went.