The Sugar Islands Page 11

  He patted her affectionately on the shoulder. Take it for all in all, she was an admirable wife.

  His only real source of worry was his children. They were daughters which was in itself a disappointment. He would have liked a son. All the same they had been rather appealing when they were young. They were like puppies, affectionate, helpless things that needed you. It was a pity they could not have remained like that. So soon they became self-willed, self-important persons with ideas and ambitions of their own.

  It was their ambitions that Roger found particularly galling. The elder of them, Claudine, had very grand ideas. She had had them from the moment she could speak. On her fifth birthday she demanded a slave for her private use. At seven she began to criticize her home.

  ‘It’s a pity we’re so poor,’ she remarked one day.

  Her mother bridled.

  ‘We’re not poor.’

  ‘Then why do you and father wear such shabby clothes?’

  She eyed her parents contemptuously.

  ‘At Everard’s home,’ she said, ‘they have silver knives and forks.’

  At the age of ten she became dissatisfied with the actual fabric of her home.

  ‘You say we are not poor, and yet we live in a wooden house. All my friends have stone houses.’

  Her mother was, on this point, inclined to agree with Claudine. She examined her accounts and decided that a limestone house was within their means.

  It was a decision that for a year added little to Roger’s comfort. The wooden bungalow was consigned to a mulatto overseer. And a large stone house was built, with a courtyard and an imposing gateway. It was draughty in the wet season and very hot in August. The immense mahogany table that ran down the centre of the dining-room was profuse with silver. At one end of it sat Sara, very fashionably and uncomfortably clothed after the manner of the French ladies of the court. Across the other end of it Roger reclined negligently in an open-necked shirt and sleeves rolled above his elbows. The long table was the one thing in the new house of which he thoroughly approved. It was so long that conversation was impossible.

  For the most part he ignored his family. Their demands for a higher social standard he accepted in the same spirit that he accepted the irritating sallies of a mosquito. They could give their parties if they chose. But on the whole he was definitely relieved when Claudine announced that she was going to marry an officer in the French Marine and return with him to France.

  The nuptials were amply celebrated. Sara wept copiously.

  ‘We shall never, never see her again,’ she said.

  ‘No,’ said Roger, ‘I don’t suppose we shall.’

  He had hoped that life would be easier with Claudine away.

  It wasn’t much.

  His second daughter, Averil, had very similar ideas to her sister. There was the same talk of clothes, of parties, of the right thing, and the right people. Roger supposed that it amused them. He was content enough as long as they left him quiet.

  One day Sara came to him in an agitated state.

  ‘Averil,’ she announced, ‘is going to have a baby.’

  The announcement quite interested Roger.

  ‘I wonder if it’ll be a boy,’ he said.

  It was rarely that Sara got annoyed with Roger. This was one of the occasions on which she did.

  ‘That isn’t the point.’

  ‘Isn’t it?’

  ‘Of course, it isn’t. The point is that the young man’s got to marry her.’

  ‘Who is the young man?’

  ‘André Gastoneau.’

  Roger ruminated.

  ‘Is that the weak-looking young fellow with too much money, who was sent out here because Paris had got too hot for him?’

  ‘That’s it.’

  ‘But she can’t possibly want to spend the rest of her life with him.’

  ‘It’s not a question of what she wants. She’s got to marry him.’

  ‘I don’t see why.’

  ‘Roger, don’t be dense.’

  Roger shrugged his shoulders.

  ‘Oh, very well then. Have the young fellow up for dinner.’

  It was a good dinner on which Roger concentrated in whole-hearted appreciative silence. He did not speak till the last dish was cleared away. Then he turned to his black butler.

  ‘Have my pistols brought in here, and that priest.’

  To the astonished young man upon his left he explained that there was going to be a marriage ceremony. The young man was too astonished to protest.

  ‘You can make your home here if you like,’ said Roger, when the service was at an end.

  History proceeded to repeat itself. Roger’s grandchildren were very like his children. They were boys, that was the only difference. The younger, Edouard, was well enough. He seemed happy, pottering round the plantation, talking to the negroes and overseers, going down into Port de Paix to chatter with the sailors in the bars. But the elder, Louis, was a combination of his

  mother and his aunt. He had the same grand ideas.

  §

  To Roger life seemed little different from what it had been a generation back. Sara and himself were a quarter of a century older. There were two young boys instead of two young girls. Of his son-in-law the climate had taken speedy toll. There was, in Averil, an extra woman, but that was all. In just the same way that his aunt and mother had, Louis, seated half-way down the long table, looked with disgust at Roger’s open shirt. He had persuaded his grandmother to dress reasonably. She had not, in fact, needed very much encouragement. He wondered how soon he would be qualified to take his grandfather in hand sartorially. ‘I must wait,’ he thought.

  He waited till his eighteenth birthday. It was then through his grandmother that he approached him.

  ‘Couldn’t you do something about grandpa’s clothes?’ he asked.

  There was to be a party on the occasion of his birthday. It was most important that his family should not be a discredit to him.

  ‘He just can’t sit down to dinner like that, can he, Granny? And he could be made to look quite presentable. He’s not bad looking. Couldn’t you persuade him?’

  Sara was more frightened of her grandson than of her husband; reluctantly she set about her task.

  ‘We’re having a dinner party for Louis’s birthday,’ she explained. ‘It will be rather an occasion. They will all be coming in elaborate clothes. We were afraid that if you came in those clothes, you would feel out of things. You would, now, wouldn’t you?’

  Roger fixed her with a slow, long glance.

  ‘No,’ he said at length.

  ‘But you’d be happier, surely, looking like everybody else.’

  ‘Why?’

  A helpless expression came into her face.

  ‘Please, darling, please,’ she said. ‘If only to please me.’

  He nodded his head. If she put it that way, all well and good. But if she imagined this decorating business was going to be any fun for him—

  ‘Darling,’ she said, and kissed his forehead. ‘Now it would be best, wouldn’t it, if we asked Louis what he thought about it.’

  It was the cue Louis had been waiting for. He was fecund with suggestions. He knew exactly the shade of green that his grandfather needed; the type of stocking; the pattern for the brocaded waistcoat; the buckled shoe.

  Roger listened indulgently. Sara had let him have the kind of rum he wanted. She was entitled to make him wear the kind of clothes she wanted. He surrendered himself into her hands.

  As a result of that surrender, he found himself a week later in a collar that was stiff and tight against his throat; in padded clothes that weighed upon his shoulders; in pointed leather shoes that pinched his toes; seated at the head of a long table with a comely, soft-scented, languid-eyed woman on either side of him; with Sara, extravagantly coiffed and extravagantly clothed, seated at the other end. In between them was a row of elegantly attired men and women. More glasses and more knives than a whole ship’s company
could need were set in front of him. Behind each chair stood a white-coated, bare-footed figure. His plate had been piled high with food. His wineglass sparkled. He drank two glasses hastily, but they left him in much the same condition that they had found him.

  He tweaked the calf of the nearest servitor.

  ‘Bring me some rum, quickly.’

  Warm, sweet, mellow on the tongue, it flowed reassuringly along his veins. He felt better after that. First the lady on his right, then the lady on his left addressed a series of remarks to him. The remarks did not seem to call for any particular answer, so he made none. The ladies turned away and began to talk to the men on the other sides of them. There was a great volley of talk, swelling, loudening and softening like the sea on a fair day. As half a century back he had lolled in his cabin listening to the sea, Roger sat now in his high armchair, savouring content.

  Every few minutes the white-coated negro at his side set some fresh dish in front of him. He had never imagined there could be so many varieties of food. They could do what they liked to his plate as long as they replenished his glass at seemly intervals. He would have been very happy had not the collar been so close about his throat, nor the coat so heavy on his shoulders, nor the shoes so tight about his toes. He was very hot. The sweat ran in long streams down his cheeks. Most of the guests were in a similar plight. The faces of the women were scarlet. Each man’s forehead was beaded heavily.

  ‘I wonder if their feet hurt as much as mine do,’ he thought. Had he been less stout he would have bent down and flicked them off.

  Interminably the meal ran its course. There was a scraping of chairs. The women rose to their feet. Roger at the head of the table remained seated. He always remained seated at the table. He did not like drawing-rooms and padded chairs. He liked to lean across the table on his elbows, a glass in front of him, a decanter at his side, and sit there brooding till he fell asleep and his servants carried him upstairs to bed. He always felt easier when Sara had left the room.

  ‘Take off my shoes, there’s a good fellow, Jean,’ he said to the negro who was filling up his glass.

  He felt happier when his feet were free. Then he broke the clasp of his collar and eased his throat. It was only the heaviness of the coat that irked him. The room was cooler now that the women were away. He leant forward on his elbows, the glass clasped between his hands. From the end of the table came a murmur of talk, like a tide ebbing. He dozed a little, to be aroused by the tap of Louis’s hand upon his shoulder.

  ‘Grandpa, hadn’t we better go into the other room?’

  Roger blinked at him uncomprehendingly. To leave the table. What an extraordinary suggestion. Yet it was very clear that Louis was not joking. There was almost a critical expression on Louis’s face.

  ‘We should join the ladies.’

  ‘why?’

  ‘It’s late.’

  ‘Is it?’

  Roger could not understand what had occasioned the solemnity in his grandson’s face. If Louis wanted to go, why shouldn’t he. But there he was pleading fretfully for his grandfather to accompany him.

  ‘We can’t stay here for ever. And we can’t go without you. You must see, surely.’

  Roger did not see. He grunted and leaned forward on his elbows. Louis left him. Presently the murmur of talk at the end of the table ceased. He leaned his head forward on his hands, and snored.

  Next morning, Sara explained to him the enormity of his conduct.

  ‘You shamed us all. It was Louis’s birthday party. We had some very smart people here. People who’ve never been to the house before. Who’d come all the way from Dondon. Particular people, too, who know the way things should be done. And what do you do? Take no notice of the ladies you’re sitting next; not address one remark to them the whole evening. And then, when we’d left the room, you sit there at the end of the table and get drunk; leave the men to come in by themselves and never say good-bye to a single guest. I felt so ashamed. Now, next time, to please me, you will, promise me you will, do better.’

  She explained in detail in what way she expected him to improve.

  She repeated her explanation in greater detail a month later on the second experiment in entertainment.

  It was an August day, hot and airless. Nightfall brought no breeze with it from the hills. Roger eyed with misgiving the clothes that had been set out for him. He lifted the coat. It was very heavy. He ran his finger meditatively round the collar. He held the waistcoat up against the window. There was a moon. But no light shone through the opaque fabric. He edged his foot into the pointed, buckled shoe. He had been riding all day. His feet were swollen.

  ‘Oh, what the hell!’ he thought. He had not lived all this while to wear clothes like that.

  Quietly and breathing softly he tiptoed down the stairway; made his way round to the stable; mounted his unsaddled horse.

  A tide of peace flowed about his heart as he saw the lights of Cap François twinkling round the bay. From the waterfront the guttered street ran straight and narrow to the hills. It wasn’t much of a place. No one lived there whose job and income did not force him to. There were lawyers there and traders and officials; the houses were for the most part owned by half-castes and ‘poor whites’. Still there were sailors and a number of taverns where the rum was good. With his arms bare, his shirt open at the throat, he sat, his legs thrust out in front of him, breathing slowly the warm, fragrant air.

  A couple of sailors were lounging over an adjoining table. One of them was supporting in his lap the head of a comely mulatress. It was very like one of the taverns in Marseilles. However his life had gone, it would have finished up, he supposed, in some such place as this. With the half of his attention he listened to their talk of ships and seafaring. For an hour or so he sat there, brooding. Then a hand fell upon his shoulder.

  ‘They were worried up there about you, Grandpa. I was sent to look for you.’

  It was Edouard, whose social equipment was not yet considered adequate for a large party. In his young, handsome, proud-held head there was a nervous look.

  His feelings for his grandfather were of mingled respect and awe. They had seen extremely little of one another. Edouard was uncertain of his reception.

  He need not have been. His grandfather signed to him to take a seat, had a glass brought up, and filled it half full of rum. For half an hour or so they sat in silence. Then Roger turned to Edouard with a smile.

  ‘This is nice,’ he said. ‘We must come down here again.’

  Edouard’s heart beat with pride. His grandfather was a hero to him. Already the boucaniers of Tortuga had taken their stand in history. The world was becoming too well policed for that earlier empiry. The successors of Morgan were for the most part brutal and callous cut-throats hiding in whatsoever secluded bay they might chance upon. They had scattered, some of them to the Gulf of Darien; others to Terra Nova and the north; there were those who had gone east as far as Madagascar. Roger belonged to the Homeric days. His grandson honoured him.

  ‘You must have had an exciting time, Grandfather, in those old days,’ he said.

  Roger pondered. Exciting? Well, he supposed it had been if you chose to look at it that way. But he had an idea that life in the end amounted to much the same. You had too much of a thing or too little of it. You were either on the Equator, with the sweat running down your face and the fo’castle too hot to sleep in; or you were soaked with Antarctic seas, shivering with cold, with your food sodden, and sleep only possible in uncertain snatches.

  For days on end you would be cruising in the Caribbean, tacking to desultory July winds, bored, weary, listless. Then suddenly you’d sight a sail; you’d give chase to it. There’d be the noise of cannon and the clash of steel; the sockets of your arms would ache with fighting, so that you could cry with the pain of it.

  For weeks on end you wouldn’t see a woman; the thought of women would run maddeningly, inflamingly through your brain; then there’d be a sacked city; and suddenly half
a dozen exquisite creatures would be yours for the taking, but with yourself so full of liquor that you could scarcely deal satisfactorily with one of them. Too much of a thing, or too little of a thing. Whatever the framework of your life, that was the way life went.

  ‘You must have enjoyed life in those days, Grandfather,’ his grandson was repeating.

  Roger shrugged his shoulders. Yes, perhaps he had. He had found life pretty good all through. But perhaps those days in Tortuga had been his best.

  ‘They weren’t bad,’ he said. ‘We wore a pretty comfortable kind of shoe.’

  The Black Republic

  from HOT COUNTRIES

  Written in 1929

  When I told my friends that I was going to Haiti they raised their eyebrows. ‘Haiti,’ they said. ‘But that’s the place where they kill their presidents and eat their babies. You’d better buy yourself a large-sized gun.”

  I did not buy myself a gun. It is those who go through the world unarmed who stand the best chance of passing unmolested. But it was certainly with the feeling that drama and adventure awaited me that I saw from the deck of the Araguaya the blue outline of the Haitian Hills. I was familiar with Haiti’s story, a long and dark story—so long and dark that no historian can trace to its certain source the river of black merchandise that flowed during the early years of the eighteenth century to the slave factories of the Guinea Coast.

  In large part it was composed, that merchandise, of weaker tribes that had been subjugated by their neighbours. There were, however, others of a different caste: proud princes of Dahomey taken in battle, in raids instigated by the slave traders—the conditions of slavery had made highly profitable the spoils of war—men of authority, used to the dignity and exercise of power; men of war, fearless and skilled in battle; the best that Africa could produce; fitted to match a colonial civilization that luxury and easily come-by wealth had weakened; men who were to write Haiti’s history.

  During the latter half of the eighteenth century and the early years of the nineteenth, pamphlet after pamphlet, debate after parliamentary debate, expressed the horrors of ‘the middle passage’. But the clearest picture of slave conditions that I have seen is to be found in a small handbook, published in 1811, on the treatment of negro slaves. [I very foolishly did not take a note of the publisher of this book and have not been able to trace it.] It was written for the young planter, and was not unlike those tips for the newly joined subaltern that were issued in the war. It consisted of practical advice. The anonymous author regarded the negro as so much machinery for the management of estates. His concern was the development of that machinery to the highest level of efficiency. One of the early chapters describes the treatment necessary for slaves on their arrival. He assumes as a matter of course that for days they will be unfit for work. They will be sick, weak, poisoned. He catalogues the diseases from which as a result of their journey they are likely to be suffering. They will need very careful treatment. He presents his facts without comment: he accepts the conditions as a matter of course. He intends no criticism; the criticism that is implicit in that acceptance is a more potent witness than the statistics of a thousand pamphleteers.