“My friends,” he said, “it is the only way I have to satisfy myself that you receive your fair share. Now, I see you have a small store of rats. I have here the playing cards. How about a game of vingt-et-un or piquet?”
“I’m for that,” said Treadwell. To Négraud he said, “Let’s have a round of vingt-et-un, then, shall we?” To me he said, “Harder for him to cheat at twenty-one, I expect. If I can amuse him enough, maybe I can keep him from simply confiscating the lot, eh?”
“I guess you’ll want me to translate.”
“I should think not,” he said. “Gaming is the universal language. But do you tip me the nod if I win too many rats once I’ve figured out how he’s marked his cards. Watch and learn, sir, watch and learn.”
I yawned. “Not this child.” Gaming is one depravity at least that I never had much appetite for. “Lieutenant Négraud, I’d like to stretch my legs.”
“Oh, sure, sure,” he said, waving me away. “You have the run of the entire floor. Stay off the stairways and probably no one will take it amiss.” He cut a king to Treadwell’s three.
I asked Juge to keep an eye on things, and took myself for a stroll. There were fewer inmates than the day before, and no new ones. They were all of them black men, and eyed me with suspicion, but race was the smallest thing that separated us. Walking among them was like walking through a feedlot of doomed beeves. Except beeves don’t know they’re going to die, and their death serves at least some purpose.
I saw a man I recognized, an immensely tall officer of the line. “Bonjour, monsieur le capitaine,” says I, all chipper and good cheer. “How are you today?”
“Sa pa gade-w,” he replied, which was the only thing he ever said to me. I assumed it was an insult. I thought letting myself be insulted was the least I could do. I considered it a kindness, I guess.
“’Voir,” I said, and walked on down the corridor. Later I learned he’d only been asking me to mind my own business.
I stepped against the wall to let a pair of guards pass. They dragged a black man between them. He’d been beaten pretty well, and glared at me through swollen eyelids as they hauled him away. A welcome breeze puffed through the northern windows, and I put my face against the bars to breathe it in. But that also gave me a view down into the courtyard between the prison and Fort Beliotte. A naked black man knelt there. Soldiers forced him face down in the dirt. I jerked my face away from the window so I couldn’t see what they did next. I had thought Négraud was exaggerating when he talked about the utility of prisoners, but I knew better now.
I returned to the cell in time to see Négraud gathering up his cards and chuckling over the brace of rats he’d won. Treadwell hung his head in defeat—and slipped me a wink while the lieutenant’s back was turned.
General Pétion sat in an elegant carved chair behind a paper-covered desk. Behind him, the brilliant tropical daylight shone in through a pair of south-facing doors that had once been set with glass panes. They led out onto an iron-railed balcony, which would have had a view of the sea if someone hadn’t put a prison in the way.
“I am sorry to say I cannot countenance your complaints,” he said, showing me into a straight-backed wooden chair. Like many mulatto officers, he had attended one of the military colleges in Paris and spoke handsome French. “We are all hungry here. We are all prisoners here.”
“Perhaps then we should all leave, sir,” I said. “General Dessalines has promised you safe passage, has he not?”
He waved aside the notion of believing any promises made by Dessalines. “I am no more free to leave than you are, Lieutenant Graves. What would you have me do? I cannot exchange you because our countries are not at war. Dessalines will not take the town by storm, because our position is too strong; and we will not surrender because he will put all in the town to the sword, no matter what he says while we are safe and sound behind our guns and redoubts. So they must starve us out, barring the arrival of more artillery. You will starve alongside us if we do not shoot you or hang you first. I say this not to frighten you, my young friend, nor to insult you. I can see you are not afraid. You are young and have not yet learned that fear is your friend.”
He walked over to the double doors of his office, looked into the corridor at the guards, and then closed the doors. He led me out onto the balcony. It looked out over the same courtyard that was visible from the prison. Beyond the courtyard’s far wall was the bloody lane.
“I have forty-five hundred troops at my command—as long as I fight for Rigaud,” he said, so low I could barely hear him. “My officers are rabid supporters of his cause and would not hesitate to slit my throat were I to hesitate in my conduct of our defense. Dessalines had nine thousand troops when we began: six thousand of the line and perhaps three thousand of militia. Henri Christophe has two demi-brigades. If he is up to strength, that is another six thousand men. Odds of three to one in Dessalines’ favor. He needs perhaps twice as many men as he has to storm this place, I think, but he could not feed or arm them even if he had them. So I am not angry about the presence of a few British and Americans. Fear not. I will keep you and your friends alive as long as I can.” He patted my shoulder. “So let us not complain anymore about the food, as long as we have some, hein?”
“But sir,” I said, “all we had yesterday was boiled grass!”
“And many of my troops had not the fuel to boil theirs.” He waggled his finger. “Let us not complain, for fear of getting something worse. Now, surely you do not wish to use your time with me to complain about the cuisine.”
He had sent for me, of course, but you don’t point out that kind of thing to generals. “When I was captured, sir,” I said, “the soldiers stole my epaulet and my watch. The epaulet was gilt, not gold. It is of little worth, but a friend gave it to me and it has sentimental value. It is the same with my watch, a silver one with an engraving of an American sailor crushing the English tyrant’s crown beneath his foot. It has my initials on it and the date, Christmas 1799. A friend gave me that, too, and I would like it back if it turns up.”
He shrugged. “When one’s life has been spared, Mr. Graves, one must not complain of being relieved of a few trinkets. It is the way of war. Besides, one cannot eat a watch or an epaulet. No doubt these things have changed hands many times by now. Why bother me with this?”
“Mere trinkets, as you say, sir,” says I, throwing my helm over and coming around on the other tack. “What I mean to say, sir, is that when I was captured I was left four things of value.”
“In addition to your boots and your life, you mean?”
I gulped. “Yes, of course.” I pulled my papers from my coat pocket and held them like a hand of cards. I played the first. “This is my passport signed by Mr. Blair, the assistant United States consul at Port Républicain. You see it has been countersigned by General Dessalines.”
“No doubt he signs many such documents before they are filled out, to save himself time and effort.” He looked it over. “Ah, but it is written in French and English both. All to the good.” He examined the French part of it before turning it over to the English side. “This man,” he said, flicking at Blair’s signature with a pink nail, “he calls himself assistant consul. But your Dr. Edwards in Le Cap, surely his senior, claims to be no more than a commercial agent charged with looking after American business interests in the island—if smuggling arms and ammunition in exchange for coffee and sugar can be said to be a legitimate business interest. This Blair, France does not recognize him. He is no ambassador or anything like.”
“Yes, sir. And between you and me, he is what in English we call a scrub.”
“The scroob?” he said, trying out the word. “I do not know this term.”
“It means a coward and a liar, an ungentlemanly fellow.”
“Ah. Him you do not like. We are in accord. And yet you wish me to trust what he says in this paper?”
“That paper, sir, is what gives me permission to travel in this island.”
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br /> “This paper gives you permission to travel in those parts of the island held by the rebel Toussaint. But Toussaint, he does not hold this part of the island.”
“Well, yes, but of course,” I stammered, looking for a way out of my blunder. “But I accepted it in good faith, and it was not my intention to come here—into the citadel, I mean. I came entirely against my will, I assure you. My arrival was as much a surprise to me as it was to you, sir.”
“And yet you were caught fighting on the field of battle—in that very street below,” he said, pointing to the bloody lane.
“I was swept up in it against my wish, sir, as I said. But once I was in it, naturally I defended my life.”
“And you think any common soldier would do less? And yet for them . . .” He drew a finger across his throat. Then he crooked the finger at me and I followed him back indoors.
“You make my point exactly, monsieur,” I said. “I’m not a soldier, I’m a sailor. I’m no horseman. I was on my way to that ship in the bay when my horse bolted toward your lines. I fell off and spent most of the battle sitting in the mud with a headache.”
“The headache? Yes, the din of battle is frightful—all that shouting and bashing of heads. And it was all your horse’s fault. And yet, and yet. Ah,” he said as I played my next card. “This is your credential as a lieutenant of vessels, is she not?”
It was easy enough for him to guess—lieutenant is the same in French, and it was wrote in large capitals among the spidery script.
He handed me back my commission and passport. “Very good,” he said. “You are an officer in the United States Navy and your government thinks you have some business here. I did not suspect otherwise.”
He held out his hand again. I put my third set of papers in it.
“These are my orders from Commodore Gaswell, sir. He requires me to make my way overland to this place, where I am to report to the squadron that was—that was supposed to be offshore.”
“The squadron that was supposed to be blockading this port, you mean. Such a thing is illegal without a declaration of war, my young friend.”
“But that’s my point exactly, sir: we are not at war. Despite their outrageous treatment at the hands of Citizen Talleyrand, who demands millions of dollars merely to sit with them, our emissaries do their utmost to straighten out this unfortunate misunderstanding.”
“At war, act of war—” He shrugged. “It is the tiny difference.”
“But it is the great difference, General Pétion!”
“It all depends on one’s perspective. The bucket does not contain a great deal of water compared to the ocean, you agree? Yet the bucket contains a great deal of water when one’s head is thrust into it. As yours may soon be if you do not say something soon to convince me you are not a spy.”
He had shed his bantering friendliness as you might blow out a candle. It was all I could do to keep the shaking in my legs and out of my voice.
“But I cannot be a spy, sir. I came here in uniform with my commission and orders in my pocket, not sneaking around pretending to be something I am not. I am here to find out the facts as they are, not as one might wish them to be. It is right there in my orders, sir.”
He chewed his mustache, considering. “What kind of facts do you hope to find?”
“The commodore wishes to know what the situation is here. He cannot trust Dessalines or even Toussaint to tell him honestly. They want to put the best appearance on things, of course.”
“For why does he wish to know?”
I gave him my best French shrug. “I can’t speak for him, of course, but perhaps the president wants to know which horse to bet on.”
He laughed. God, what a happy sound that was. “You have turned the tables around me. This is the American idiom, yes?”
“Yes, sir, ha ha. You have it right exactly.”
“Of course his Excellency Mr. Adams wishes to know who is the stronger—not for liberty, equality and fraternity, but for the fat pockets, hein? I begin to believe you. But my little friend, you are so young. Tell me how it happens that you of all your commodore’s officers are given this important mission.”
“Because I am of mixed blood, sir.”
He stared at me a moment, a skeptical smile on his lips while the word sang-mêlée hung in the air between us. Then he said, “I was unaware a man of color would be welcomed among your officers. In the ranks, yes. But among gentlemen? Surely they would not countenance it.”
“If they knew of it, certainly. The commodore knows because he is a friend of my father, and he keeps it to himself because he is my patron.”
“He keeps it to himself so he can use you for his own purposes, I think,” said the general. “But, la—it is so fantastic it may be true. Your father loves you very much to see you have a career! Not many do as much for their natural sons.”
Natural son was the polite way of saying bastard. “No, sir, he hates me. But he loved my mother.” A dark pain crept into my head.
“Ah. Your mother was his slave, yet he loved her. I know this to happen, even in America.”
“Yes, sir, I believe he did—but you mistake me again, if you’ll pardon my saying it. She wasn’t a slave.” Not that I knew of, anyway. I rubbed my temples. The light from the balcony was blinding. “I express myself poorly. I am told she was a Creole woman from Louisiana. I never met her.”
“Ah me! You were taken from her as a babe in arms.” His voice softened. “Or perhaps she died in the childbed, hein?” He clucked his tongue. “Either way, it makes no difference. We men of color see things differently, having one foot in the white world and the other in the black. One day, with God’s infinite justice, we shall have our boots on both their necks, hein?”
If that’s what he thought I thought, I wasn’t about to set him straight.
Again he held out his hand. “And now your last paper, if you please.”
I gave it over, wishing I had read it first. “This, sir, is a letter from one of your officers, whom we captured near Cap Dame-Marie last month. It was his wish that I see it delivered safely to his wife here in Jacmel.”
He glanced at the address. “To Madame Villon Deloges in the Rue Rigole-Haut? But there is . . . ah ha! Very good! You have read this letter, of course?”
A sickening lurch had overtaken me when he read the address aloud. Rigole haut, which I had assumed referred to a high ditch or channel, was also a pun. Rigolo meant odd, funny, a sham. “Of course I have not, sir,” I managed. “A gentleman does not read letters not addressed to him.”
“No, no, of course not. A shocking thought.” He tucked the letter under his blotter. “This I will see put into the proper hands. Now we may turn our minds to more interesting matters. Tell me what you know about Citizen-General Buonaparte’s coup d’état . . .”
I caught Pétion up on news from the outside world as best I could, spending what would have been a pleasant hour if I hadn’t been so worried about the contents of that damn letter. As aides came and went with papers to be signed or words to be whispered in the general’s ear, we sat at his desk feasting on turnips stewed with their greens and a tiny scrap of salt pork. There was also a dish of what Pétion called polenta; I called it cornmeal mush.
“What was it the Englishman said in his dictionary?” said Pétion, doing me the honor of spooning the last of it onto my plate. “That the oat is a grain fed to horses in England and to men in Scotland? So too it is with you Americans and your Indian corn, I think.”
The coffee that we drank afterwards was mostly chicory, but I’d grown up drinking chicory and eating cornmeal mush, and was acquiring a taste for turnips. It was home-cooked fare as far as I was concerned, and I would have felt right at home if my guts hadn’t been chasing themselves around my spine.
“Regard the cigarro,” said Pétion, running a cheroot under his nose after we had finished eating. “A Spanish introduction, got from the Indians. The cigarro becomes quite the popular method of taking one’s
tobacco. But of course I forget that you would be familiar with them. It is said the Spanish colonies enjoy a great deal of commerce with the United States, despite the Spanish law.”
“The puertos habilitados are always eager for business,” I said, “especially as prices are better in the illegal ports. And even women and boys smoke cigars during the yellow fever epidemics, to keep the bad air away. It is where I picked up the habit,” I added hopefully.
The thin black cigar he gave me was as fragrant as burning rope, of the kind that cause men to sniff the air in envy and women to ask who’s burning garbage. With reluctance I quit smoking it halfway down, trimming off the ash with Pétion’s knife.
“By your leave, sir, I would like to save the rest for later. We have no tobacco, and I know Lieutenant Treadwell craves something for his pipe.”
He nodded behind a puff of smoke and waved a hand over his cedar box. “Pray take your friends each a cigarro with my compliments. I would entertain Mr. Treadwell but he is ill, and I would even entertain your staff officer friend if these were still revolutionary times. But as he is a nigger and I am a man of color, the situation demands other sorts of entertainment for him.”
There were only five cigars in Pétion’s cedar box, but he frowned when I hesitated.
“I am still commandant here,” he said. “Do you think I cannot smoke every cigarro in the city if I choose?”
“But of course, General. Perhaps fate will allow me to return your kindness someday.”
“Hospitality is an honor, not a hardship,” he said, watching with muted sadness as I tucked the cigars into my pocket.
Twelve
The War of Knives Page 16