Who Slashed Celanire's Throat?

by Maryse Conde

  That evening thirty pairs of eyes saw her untie her apron and walk out arm in arm with Yang Ting around ten o’clock. Behind their backs, tongues began to wag. Some of the regulars wondered whether Yang Ting had heard of the incident in the valley of Canete, when over a thousand Chinese had been massacred in a single day because one of them had dared lay hands on a zamba. Others had no scruples making offensive comparisons between the sexual performance of the Chinese and the blacks, who were more hot-blooded, more virile. And others recalled that the Chinese were nasty pieces of work, making up whole battalions in the Chilean army.

  At dawn Yang Ting’s arrieros, who had come to pick up their instructions for the day, were surprised to find the doors and windows of their boss’s house smashed in. The modest dwelling sitting under its cluster of trees could not possibly hide any treasure likely to attract bandoleros. With machetes handy, they cautiously walked around the house before going in. Yang Ting’s bedroom was a vision out of hell. It was as if a furious battle had been waged. The walls and floor were smeared red with blood. The blankets and bedsheets were in shreds. Yang Ting’s body was naked, covered with bite marks, deep gashes, scratches, and bruises. But the horror was capped by the sight of his male member, which had been ripped off and stuffed into his half-open mouth like a cigar. The regulars from La Wiracocha crowded into the police station to make their statements, and the police ran around looking for Amparo, who was probably the last person to see Yang Ting alive. To their amazement nobody with this name lived at the address she had given—Jirón Paruro 394. Although they repeated her description over and over again to the men, women, and even the children, none of the callejón’s inhabitants had ever seen the likes of her. They looked for her in vain throughout the city of Lima, going through the labyrinth of its shacks with a fine-toothed comb. A court summons was then issued the length and breadth of Peru, and the police in Chiquian, Pisco, Ica, Ayacucho, and Cuzco were put on high alert. After a year they reluctantly closed the matter. She must have slipped into Chile or Bolivia, whose borders with Peru were wide open. In order to recuperate the cost of burying Yang Ting, even though he had been thrown like a dog into a common grave, the municipality of Lima helped themselves to his house. They did it up very cheaply and rented it out to some Chinese railroad employees who cleared out in fright after only one week. Every midnight a terrible racket broke out in the two bedrooms—moans, screams, groans, and the sounds of a struggle. The next tenants did not stay longer for the same reasons. Neither did the next. Soon the rumor spread, and nobody wanted to live there. The house finally fell into ruin, and it came to be known in the neighborhood as the Casa de Los Espiritus, the House of the Spirits. During the daytime people quickened their step along its sidewalk. At night they made a wide detour by the Calle Las Dallias to avoid it.

  In our countries, where imagination reigns supreme, popular curiosity is not satisfied with a mystery. Everything has to have an explanation, preferably supernatural. Mama Justa, a black woman from the region of Ica on the south coast known for the clairvoyance of its seers, soon furnished one. After having drunk a cup of worm-grass tea, which sharpens the vision, she fell asleep and had a dream in which she saw Yang Ting as a young man on his island, unrecognizable with a full head of hair and a perfect set of teeth. The life of shame he had led there was revealed to her, and when she awoke, the whole matter became crystal clear. She then told his story to anyone who cared to listen. The young Yang Ting had committed a crime against two women—a terrible, unspeakable crime, worse than a robbery or a murder, which has a motive and never fails to have extenuating circumstances; one of those crimes which nobody can forgive, not even the most generous-hearted. He thought he was safe in Peru, where he had been hiding for fifteen years, turning into an old bag of bones. But that was an illusion! You can run and hide wherever you like; the earth is not big enough, God’s justice has eyes like a hawk, you can never escape your sins.

  One of the victims on whom he had wreaked so much harm had taken the shape of Amparo and got her revenge.

  2

  This voyage to South America that Thomas de Brabant had counted on to change his wife’s mood was not the success he had hoped for, since it was dramatically cut short by illness.

  In order to satisfy a last-minute whim by Celanire, Thomas had to completely rearrange the order of things, and the journey had started with Peru instead of ending there. Given such short notice, he had quickly studied the country’s three major regions—northern, central, and southern Andes. In Lima they stayed at the Hotel Raimondi, one of the capital’s most luxurious establishments, famous for its azulejos as well as its carved, gilded ceilings. Very quickly it became obvious that Celanire’s interest in Peru was extremely limited. She seemed to forget all about Flora Tristan. She never as much as glanced at the travel accounts or historical narratives Thomas had obtained, nor even leafed through a magnificent work of art entitled The Andes: From Prehistoric Times to the Incas. Thomas endeavored in vain to arouse her interest in a minority of African descent in Peru that was as dynamic and fascinating as other such communities of the Americas in Brazil, Colombia, Cuba, and Haiti. His life with Celanire had, in fact, completely transformed him, and he had become an ardent defender of black cultures. He had so much to tell her about Peru after reading the major work by Enrique León García called Las razas en Lima: Estudio demográfico with the abundant help of a dictionary. Alas! She paid no attention whatsoever to what he was saying.

  So what in fact did she do?

  She disappeared for days on end and even a good part of the night. It was as if she were looking for someone. She was seen scouring the working-class neighborhoods situated on the other side of the Puente de Piedra. She bought nothing during her endless rambles, and apparently had little liking for all those trivial knickknacks tourists are so fond of, such as altarpieces, miniature clay churches, poker-worked calabashes, and gold or silver filigree jewelry, for every evening she returned to the hotel empty-handed. Only once did she make a purchase, bringing back a dog-eared little book for which she said she had paid a small fortune—La bruja de Ica. It was the extraordinary tale of an eighty-year-old black witch, Jesús Valle, a slave belonging to the former marquis of Campocumeno, who had great trouble preventing the workers of a hacienda from transforming her into a living torch.

  Forsaken and abandoned by his wife, Thomas came to detest Lima, and his mood turned morose. Compared to the blazing sun of Guadeloupe, the garúa became unbearable, and Thomas remained holed up all day long under the gilded ceiling of his room, reading grammar book after grammar book with the aim of improving his Spanish. A maniac for organization, he also began preparing the next step of the journey. So much for Bolivia! It was too far south! After Peru they would head north, traveling via Ecuador and Colombia. To get there they would take a horse-drawn carriage as far as Pucallpa. There they would embark on the Rio Ucayali, then the Rio Marañón, and finally the royal Amazon. He had been assured that throughout the journey the landscape would take their breath away, not only his but his entire family’s. As a result, he filled Ludivine’s head over the dinner table with a description of the dazzling sights they would soon be seeing. After passing a spectacular landscape of fields rising in terraced rows up the sides of the mountains in the manner of the Incas, their boat would sail between sheer walls of granite, masked here and there by the thick foliage of the tropical forest. Thomas could embellish these descriptions as much as he liked; Ludivine, who thought him a terrible bore, did not listen to a single word. She was bored by Lima—at her age they are bored by everything—and sulked in front of her ceviche de camarones, a speciality that the chef was particularly proud of. Deep down, Thomas wondered why Celanire had insisted on bringing her along. She completely neglected the teenager in Lima, and the girl was left to her own devices for days on end. Only once had she taken her to mass in the cathedral and had her admire its collection of gold-embroidered chasubles. To him such behavior seemed quite out of line. />
  The day before they were due to leave for Pucallpa, Thomas had Ludivine stay behind in the dining room and tried to get her interested in the Paracas and Nazca cultures. He was telling her how in the sixth century the whole of Peru had been the scene of a major upheaval when Celanire came and joined them. She was unrecognizable—almost frightening to look at. Her complexion had turned sallow. Her eyes, usually so sparkling, had glazed over, circled by octopus-colored rings as big as a hand. Her cheeks were sunken, her walk unsteady. It was as if she had just waged a battle that had completely drained her. She collapsed onto a chair and contorted her face into a smile for Ludivine. She seemed incapable of uttering a single word. Her hands were shaking, and the precious anthropomorphic clay jar that Thomas wanted her to admire slipped from her grasp. She sat staring stupidly at the pieces scattered over the floor. After a while, still without uttering a sound, she withdrew to her room. One of the most striking features of Thomas’s character, like that of so many men, was his obstinacy. A few minutes later, when he went up to his room to find Celanire collapsed on the bed, as if felled by an invisible hand, it did not occur to him to change their plans. Celanire spent a bad night. In her sleep he could hear her moan and cry out even, and had great trouble waking her up.

  Around five in the morning the de Brabant family finally managed to leave the Hotel Raimondi and was seen off by a host of bellhops already up and about. Outside was total darkness. A sliver of a moon slumbered on its back above the rooftops, which were flattened like pancakes. The carriage quickly drove through the outskirts, left the city behind, and, turning its back to the sea, galloped toward the mountains in the shape of upturned funnels. A bitter wind frayed the blankets of fog unfurled against the black sky.

  After they had journeyed for an hour in a subterranean darkness, the mountaintops began to turn pink, and gradually the tiny silhouettes of peasants appeared in the distance. Some of them scampered down the steep slopes as if in child’s play, bent double by their enormous loads. They were probably on their way to sell their corn and beans in the nearby markets. Others emerged as dots on the immense patchwork of fields, driving their oxen in front of them. Farther on miniature herds of sheep and cows gamboled, chased by dogs and children wielding sticks. Her left hand tucked into Thomas’s paw, Celanire seemed to be fighting to keep her eyes open and wore a mask of extreme drowsiness. Thomas carried blindly on as if he were oblivious to her condition, and in the glow of a lantern read to her a poem dedicated to Pachamama translated from Quechua:

  Calling your name,

  I crawl toward you, Mother Earth,

  On bloody knees,

  Here I am, Mother Earth,

  Scattering flowers of “panti,”

  I bow to you, Mother Earth,

  Golden nugget, rainbow robe,

  Star flower, Mother Earth.

  When he had finished, she managed to murmur a few words of admiration. Then she curled up in a corner, immediately fell asleep, and began to snore. Thomas had no other choice but to continue reading in silence. In the meantime Ludivine was passing the time as best she could with a card game. One of the waiters at the hotel had taught her the secrets of a game of patience, and she was annoyed she could never get it right.

  They hardly ever drove through a village. As far as the eye could see stretched the mosaic of fields. Around one in the afternoon the coachmen drew to a halt in the small town of La Oroya. They were taken to an inn called the Blue Ceiling, a peculiar name, since the place was whitewashed. In spite of its elegant appellation it was nothing but a dusty, unswept tavern. Celanire, who usually surprised everyone by wolfing down tons of cakes, whole chickens, and platters of red meat, while remaining as slim and lithe as a gazelle, did not touch a thing. She pushed her plate away with a tired hand and dolefully asked for a glass of milk. Just as the grouchy mulatto waitress slammed it down in front of her, Celanire slipped off her chair and collapsed on the earthen floor. It was all over in a few minutes. In the time it took for Thomas to stand up in a fright and for the mulatta to grab a bottle of chichi and skillfully pour a few drops between her clenched teeth, Celanire had already opened her eyes again. But what eyes! Two bottomless holes devoid of any gleam of life. Her brow was covered in sweat, and her body was as limp as a rag doll. The waiters hurriedly carried her behind a curtain into a room crawling with flies adjoining the restaurant while one of them ran to fetch the only doctor in the place. Through the window Ludivine could see people walking to and fro on the sidewalk, oblivious to the fact that Celanire was so sick.

  Around four in the afternoon, when Thomas was beside himself with waiting, the doctor, an Indian half-caste strapped in a military-style riding habit, arrived, clutching his black leather bag. Thomas antagonized him considerably by throwing himself on him, babbling in French, and forgetting every word of Spanish he had ever learned. By way of an answer the doctor articulated every syllable of his Spanish, signifying clearly that he was not French-speaking. Finally the two men found themselves on common ground, speaking a sort of pidgin English. The doctor was categorical. Celanire’s asthenia was a complete mystery to him, and he had never seen such a serious case, except in instances of dysentery when the patient drains herself from top to bottom. The only thing he could think of was to give her a shot of camphorated oil so that her heart did not give out. It was obvious she couldn’t continue such a risky journey, and he advised them to return straightaway to Lima to consult with a specialist.

  To her dying day Ludivine would never forget the return journey over unfamiliar roads in a carriage suddenly transformed into a hearse. Daylight was fast dwindling. An icy wind blew down from the encircling mountains, which became increasingly oppressive. The horses galloped on, snorting and whinnying like mad, and flocks of buzzards flapped along the branches of the trees, shivering as they huddled against each other. Celanire seemed dislocated. At the same time she had never looked so beautiful as her husband hugged her in his arms, as fragile as a cameo. Suddenly Ludivine realized how much Celanire meant to her. She wondered whether her feelings toward her weren’t to a large extent tinged with tenderness. She had always imagined she hated this woman, who perhaps had killed her mother. But she had been constantly wrapped in her affection. From an early age it was Celanire who had taken care of her when she was ill, dried her tears, calmed her tantrums, who had given her the taste for a certain type of music, a certain type of poetry, and taught her it was not a curse to be born a woman. What would become of her if she lost her? If she lost too that overriding obsession to unmask her identity and bring about her punishment? What meaning would there be to life if there was nothing left to do but drink, eat, sleep, get married, and have children? Surprised at herself, she began to cry as she hadn’t cried for ages.

  Finally the horses arrived on the sprawling outskirts of Lima, where the wretched of every color were crammed together. The din of their hooves woke the roosters, who, thinking it morning, began to crow. Once they had crossed the Puente de Piedra, there was a sudden crackling of fireworks, and yellow and silver streaks zigzagged across the sky. Our weary travelers realized that this third Saturday in February was also the first day of Carnival, and that the population of Lima was jumping for joy. Dancers disguised as devils dressed in extravagant costumes adorned with hawks’ feathers, bulls’ horns, and snake tails cavorted around their carriage. On the Plaza de Armas, groups of black musicians played the tejoleta. Amid a general outburst of commiseration, Thomas found his suite again at the Hotel Raimondi. Clutching Celanire like a baby, an old black servant climbed the grand staircase and carried her up to the second floor while another went to fetch the best doctor in town. Ludivine lay down on a corner sofa. Exhausted, she very quickly fell asleep. But her sleep was disturbed by repeated images of bloody piles of dead fowl lying plucked and eviscerated in a cockpit. She finally opened her eyes and saw a man with oily hair and a conceited look in deep conversation with her father. Dr. Iago Lamella seldom paid house calls, especially after eight in th
e evening. But when he heard it was a Frenchman, he made an exception, because he had studied in France, was a frequent visitor to Paris, and had great admiration for the birthplace of the Rights of Man. And then his governess had been French. He was explaining to Thomas in a laboriously refined French that after having examined Celanire, he remained extremely perplexed. He could diagnose no illness. The liver, the kidneys, the heart and the lungs, every organ in the body, was in perfect working order. The blood and the lymph were circulating freely. It was simply as if the patient had lost all her strength. All her vital functions had slowed down, and if this continued, the outcome was anyone’s guess. He suggested massive doses of cod-liver oil and shots of camphorated oil in order to reactivate the organs.

  However improbable such a treatment may seem, it had an effect. Around midnight Celanire emerged from her wasting disease. She opened her eyes as distant as stars and in a tiny voice clearly said:

  “Thomas, take me back to Guadeloupe. I have nothing more to do here.”

  The port of Lima is called El Callao, and it isn’t much to look at.

  Fishermen’s boats bob on the milky, melancholic sea next to a few old steamships whose hulls are eaten away with rust. Thomas had had the good fortune to find two first-class cabins de luxe on board the SS Pachacamac leaving for Esmeraldas in Ecuador. From there he hoped to continue on to Cartagena in Colombia by land, then sail to Caracas in Venezuela, and finally find his way through the Caribbean to Guadeloupe. At dawn they set sail out of the harbor, and all the passengers assembled on the shiny wooden decks to gaze at the sinister Fronton jail, where during the wars with Chile so many enemy soldiers had been tortured. Then the open sea began to parley with the ship’s prow as it tore through its belly. Traveling first-class on the SS Pachacamac, you rubbed shoulders with the usual crowd of tropical aristocrats, owners of haciendas and fincas who had made their fortune from sugarcane, cotton, and coffee, and who all had their hands stained with the blood of black slaves. Their black or mestiza nurses accompanied them in fourth class but came up to join them at six in the morning to look after their spoiled, pasty-faced children. There were also a few priests traveling to Rome and some retired generals. The news that the wife of a senior French civil servant, confined to her cabin, needed constant nursing, quickly spread around the ship. As a result numerous good souls came to offer Thomas their help, although he had never asked anyone for anything. He received them in the small sitting room adjoining the cabin so that he could keep an eye at the same time on the lifeless shape that was his wife. He agreed to Madame Eusebio because no sooner had she entered the cabin than Celanire aroused herself out of her comatose state, propped herself up against her pillows, and held out her arms, smiling like a child who finds a familiar face waiting for her after school. Madame Eusebio looked like nobody on this earth. She was from Borbón, a small town in Ecuador at the mouth of the Rio Cayapas inhabited mainly by descendants of African slaves. In Quito she had looked after the five children of a Peruvian diplomat, who had been so satisfied with her services he had taken her with him to Lima. Suffering from homesickness, she had saved up enough money and was now returning home.