The Salt Roads Read online

  In a little while a young quarteronne, beach-sand-coloured, pushed the heavy wood doors open little bit and peered through. Her eyes took in Father León, his black prisoner, the woman with them, then got big as she saw the rest of the ill-matched crew shuffling its shod and bare feet on her master’s verandah.

  “Well, child?” Father said impatiently.

  “Sorry, Father,” she whispered. She bobbed her head, pushed the door open, and held it for them to pass through. As Tipingee made to get in the door, the girl blocked her way. She barely glanced at Tipingee, as one might at a stray dog scrabbling in a midden. “All of them, Father?” she said, looking to him as a sunflower would to the sun.

  Chuh. Tipingee sucked her teeth in disgust. Little bit of girl forgot that part of her was African.

  “Yes, girl,” Father said impatiently. “Step aside.”

  A triumph, but it was like clay in Tipingee’s mouth. She wanted to talk of it to Patrice, but Father would probably object. So she bit on her lips and stepped for the first time inside the great house where her daughter toiled every day, but where Tipingee had never been.

  She heard Mer gasp, saw her look around her, the amazement on her face like one who’d died and gone to the land beneath the waves. The smith took his cap off, clutched it to his chest. He managed to make himself look smaller. Tears sprang to Tipingee’s eyes. The smell inside the master’s house; that smell, where did she know it from? Why did it make her want to weep? No weeping. Not here. She wondered would she see Marie-Claire. She thrust her chin higher and looked all around her at the high ceilings with their massive wooden beams, at the yards and yards of lace covering the long, tall windows. How many hours of toil to weave all that lace? Enough fabric to make dresses for her and Mer and Marie-Claire for the rest of their lives. White dresses. Or maybe the blans had machines to do that work for them. And an army of Ginen, doubtless, to work the machines. Wondering, Tipingee barely felt herself being nudged further into the foyer as the rest of the crowd piled in with them. She heard Mer behind, shushing the three small children.

  Father gathered everyone around him into a little knot. “At my word, now,” he said, “you begin to sing.” Then he turned to the young quarteronne. “Lead us to Monsieur Simenon.”

  Looking doubtful, she turned. They started off after her. “Now,” said Father, and except for the book-keeper and the smith, who had stepped back a bit from the crowd and were nudging each other and laughing, the group began a tattered chorus of “Venez, Divin Messie.”

  “Sauvez nos jours infortunés . . .”

  They went deeper into the house. The Ginen’s words began to falter as they gaped around, taking in the sights of Simenon’s home. A narrow brown face peeked out of an open door. Marie-Claire! The child saw her father Patrice and made to run to him. A stern voice from inside the kitchen called her back. Marie-Claire watched them go, her face drawn with longing and worry. Tipingee ached for them all.

  The group drew level with another open room. Tipingee looked in, to sounds of consternation. A gaggle of white women, swan-pale, odd, gaped back at them. The women were raising cut-crystal glasses, clear as water, to their narrow lips to drink cask-aged wine. No burning rum for them. Their delicate hands were gloved, white throats exposed. Their gracefully bustled behinds would put any African woman’s high, round rump to shame. And their hair! Twisted, piled, and pinned. Tipingee found herself touching her own hair and flushing hot at the cane-rowed plaits that Marie-Claire had spent the evening doing for her. Hers looked nothing like the spider-web creations that were the hair of the backra women. She had been so proud of them, but now they felt like turds on her head.

  The women kept staring. One of them started forward. “What . . .” She was slim as cane stalks, her bosom full and firm.

  “My apologies, ladies, for disturbing your apéritif,” said Father.

  The book-keeper and the smith were red in the face from laughing, though they straightened up and dipped their heads when they saw the backra woman. “’Day, Mum,” they mumbled. She never answered them.

  Even the damned wench leading the group of them was biting her lips. Father scowled at them all and nodded to the white women. “Just some quick business with the master of the house, and we’ll be on our way.” The blan woman frowned, and withdrew back into the room. With one long, smooth hand she closed the door in their faces. But Tipingee could still hear the room of women laughing, their voices tinkling as though someone had thrown all the crystal glasses to the floor.

  The group moved on, their singing only a lonely whine now: come, Divine One; come.

  Ah! descendez, hâtez vos pas,

  Sauvez les hommes du trépas,

  Secourez-nous, ne tardez pas.

  Venez, venez, venez.

  And now they could hear the deep voices of men, drunken men. Father’s lips were moving as he silently implored his white god. Tipingee clung to Patrice’s hand, reached unhappily behind her for Mer’s. She could have sobbed when she felt the dry rasp of Mer’s palm against hers. She held on, held on to her loves.

  An explosion of mirth came from that room of men; the deep, sure voices were full with assurance, with power. They spoke in arrogant France French, not the Saint Domingue French, and not the Kreyòl for the daily work of cutting cane and weeding and whispering to your fellows when the book-keeper was out of earshot. The sound of those voices struck Tipingee like shot; and not her only. The clump of pauvres blans and black slaves gathered in closer.

  “The accursed man thinks that he can get sugar from beets,” said one voice.

  “He never does!” exclaimed another. “Why, what will we do then?”

  Father took a deep breath, and led them into the room.

  “Wai!” Patrice murmured under his breath. Tipingee understood his wonder. Even dreams were not so odd. Tipingee could never have dreamt the extravagance of the velvet and cord justaucorps jackets that corseted the figures of the nine or ten backras standing or sitting around the empty fireplace. Some of the men even wore black! So much money for strong black dye. Damask and linen shirts exploded forth like froth from under their gilets. They all wore white wigs, pigeon-winged or pony-tailed, and small tricorne hats. A bevy of blans, as embroidered as their women. Ten backra men, all dressed as fine as any city ruler, but bleached as bodies pulled from weeks under the river. Tipingee’s skin prickled. All heads had turned as Father had entered with his entourage. Which one was Simenon? She had never seen him.

  “Ah,” said a man from the armchair where he lounged, a glass of something deep red in his hand. Not blood, Tipingee remembered, but a kind of wine. “Father León, is it? And what a flock you have brought with you.”

  This must be their master. The other men smiled and laughed at his joke, slapping each other’s shoulders. Simenon’s demon’s eyes of sky glittered. Father bowed his head slightly. “A good Christmas day to you, gentlemen. I was pleased to see some few of you in church this morning on this blessèd day of our Lord.”

  One of the men coughed. “Ah, yes. Indeed. Fine sermon, Father. Most uplifting.” Another glanced sideways at one of his fellows. They both grinned.

  Father seemed to stand taller. “If you came away uplifted, it was God’s work, not mine. As I do God’s work now, Seigneur Simenon.”

  Simenon only lifted an eyebrow. “As I suppose you must, since Mother Church so zealously commands it. What is that fellow you have brought with you, Father?”

  Patrice tilted his chin up high and bit his lips together. So the Ginen did rather than say words that would condemn them. Tipingee clutched her loves’ hands tight.

  Father put an arm around Patrice’s shoulder. “This, Seigneur, is one Patrice, of your plantation, a runaway since last Christmas, he tells me.”

  “The devil you say!” Simenon leaned forward and looked hard at Patrice. “This is that Patrice? A year this wretch has had my men searching for him! Do you know how much I paid to find you, you brute? Eh? Do you?”

 
“No, sir,” Patrice mumbled. He cast his eyes down.

  “Seigneur,” Father said, “Patrice regrets the mischief he has caused. But it is no more than must be expected when you allow the slaves in your charge to lack for Christian instruction.”

  Simenon glared at the priest, and now it was Father’s turn to draw his chin up in the air. Father continued: “Patrice wishes to return to his labours, and he has bade me to make intercession for him on this most holy of days.”

  One of the blans made an angry noise. “The nerve of the devil, Simenon! He takes advantage of Christmas day to run away, and now he wants to take advantage of it again to return? You’ll never let him, will you?”

  “Hmm,” was all that Simenon replied.

  Gods, you gods, it was all going to go wrong. They were going to kill her Patrice, or maim him. Tipingee couldn’t stop the two tears that rolled down her face. Mer touched her shoulder, gently.

  A timid knock came from outside the door, and in came Marie-Claire, bearing a tray, silver, with the clear-water crystal on it; dishes, this time. Eh. These backra lived in little islands of heaven, a magical world that Tipingee had never before conceived.

  “Ah,” said a man in a deep grey justaucorps as he took one of the desserts from Marie-Claire, “Mango fool.” Eager pink hands reached for the dishes.

  Father frowned a little as he regarded the confection of spiced, puréed mangoes and sweetened milk. “Truly? I would call that ‘Mango divinity.’”

  Again that raised up eyebrow from Simenon. “Much of a muchness perhaps, eh Father? They sometimes say that the maddest fools have been touched by God.” He leaned back in his chair, legs wide, and began to spoon the confection out of its dish. Tipingee watched yellow mango disappear into his maw as he ate of the good of his plantation. Simenon looked at Patrice as he chewed, considering. The Ginen huddled closer together. Marie-Claire kept darting glances over to her mother and Patrice, but the child needs must stay where she was, at service to the men, eyes bowed down.

  Simenon ate the last spoonful of sweetness from his dish and let the spoon fall back into it with a ringing clatter. The tinkling echoed and swooped in Tipingee’s head, round and round. Marie-Claire rushed to take the dish onto the silver tray. Simenon licked his lips. “What must I do with such a brazen runaway? Must make an example of him.”

  “Exactly,” said one of the fine gentlemen in his turkey-buzzard suit of black. He gave Patrice a long look. “Set him to dance at the end of a whip. Teach him obedience.” The others nodded, murmured, except one, who looked silently out the window at the butterflies dancing there, frowning.

  “Christ forgave the sinners in the temple,” Father León said bravely. Another blan clattered his spoon into his dish.

  “I am not so holy, Father,” growled Simenon. “There’s no profit in it, and France clamours always for more sugar, more rum, more indigo, and taxes me past bearing. I cannot have compassion on a wretch who flees his labours to gallivant in the bush.”

  Tipingee shut her eyes tight and prayed for Aziri to deliver Patrice, prayed for miracles she feared would not happen. She could hear Mer behind her, whispering in her own tongue to Lasirèn. They said the names of their gods together, and the chiming of spoons on crystal came a third time as a few more of the blans finished their desserts. Venez, venez, venez. Come. Save us.

  The door creaked, the same note as the spoons on the glass. “Ah,” said a high woman’s voice with amusement in it. “It seems you brave fellows are having your own entertainment here.” Master Simenon looked up, and the frown fell from his forehead as a salted slug falls from a leaf. He stood, smiling, and extended his hand. Marie-Claire, bustling about to collect the used ware, looked to see who had come in. Dismay creased her brow.

  The collected crystal tinkled like the gossiping river, and to its music, a lady white as the moon was wafting towards Simenon, almost gliding in her beautiful lace-trimmed dress. She laughed gently, waved a languid lace fan before her face. With the light behind the vision of her, she seemed a thing of another world. The scent of sweet perfume came with her. The door whispered shut behind her, and in the faint breeze of it Tipingee thought she could just smell the sea. Tipingee closed her eyes. How strange a day this was! She opened them again, and finally recognised the lady; one of the backra women who had been in the first little room. But she was different now. Her eyes were too intent, as though they looked on more than men’s eyes could see. And so odd, the way she moved! Like when Ti-Bois got piles of sticks and called them soldiers, and walked them with his hands to make them march.

  The lady’s gown rustled as she moved. She put her hand, white and slim as candles, into Simenon’s own. Carefully, she said, “It is so dull in that parlour with the other women.” She looked around again with those wide eyes; eyes drinking everything in as though for the first time. “Monsieur Simenon,” she enquired, “what matter is at hand here?” She looked with a hungry curiosity from face to face. She fanned herself, gracefully.

  “Please sit down, my dear,” said Simenon. “You look a trifle overwarm. Do you feel well?”

  One of the other backra men rushed to offer her his chair. “Oh, entirely well, Monsieur.” She floated over to the chair, graceful now, as a manmzèl floats on the air, and folded herself and her wide skirts into the seat.

  Simenon sat again, still smiling at her. He gestured at Patrice. “This fellow is a runaway. Can you imagine, my dear; a whole year of labour he has cost me! And now—”

  “Now,” interrupted Father León, “he has repented of his marronage and wishes to return.”

  The lady rapped her fan delightedly against the heel of her hand. “And you intercede for him, Father! On this holy day! How Christian of you.”

  Father bowed his head a little. “Thank you, my lady. Christian charity is my duty and my calling. I would instruct the blacks on this plantation in the ways of our Lord, for then I am sure that they would be less restless, but Seigneur Simenon claims that he cannot spare their time of a Sunday.”

  The lady turned wide eyes to Simenon; eyes blue as the shifting sea. “Is this true, my darling? Do your slaves work on Sundays as well?” She fanned herself, and the breeze from the fan made wisps of curls shift prettily about her face. Tipingee wondered at how that hair flowed like water. Backra women’s hair was cornsilk fine.

  Simenon looked uncomfortable. He grumbled, then: “Of course not, dearest. They have one day of rest each week. It is law,” he admitted.

  “Seigneur,” said Father quietly, “it is also law that they should receive the word of our Lord. Please allow me to conduct chapel here on Sunday mornings. It will cost you nothing, I promise you, and will make your slaves more meek and ready to accept God’s saving grace. A profit to yourself and to God.”

  Simenon didn’t reply. He weighed Patrice out with his eyes; transparent demon eyes. Oh, you gods. When Tipi had been young, her mother telling her stories back home, back home where her name had been another name that she couldn’t remember now, for that name had drowned in the salt sea of the Middle Passage; back home, listening to her mother’s voice, could Tipingee ever have imagined that the monsters from the old tales were real? Yet here she was, living that nightmare tale, while a demon decided what to do with her beloved husband.

  “What was it like?” Simenon asked Patrice.

  “What, sir?” Tipingee could feel how still Patrice had gone. Was it a trap?

  “You had a year in the bush,” Simenon said softly. “You came and went as you pleased.”

  “Sorry, sir,” said Patrice imploringly, but Simenon spoke over him.

  “You transported yourself free as any wild beast in that bush for a whole year, mocking your master.” And Master Simenon leaned closer, so close it seemed he might tumble from his armchair. “What was it like?” he whispered. “Was it glorious? No fretting about how many acres of cane harvested, or how many lazy wretches you need to buy to replace the ungrateful ones who’ve died on you? What was it like to be
free? To dig in the soil with sticks for your food, or to hunt wild beasts of the bush for your meat?”

  “Sir?” said Patrice uncertainly.

  “Simenon, what ails you?” asked the turkey-buzzard man. He put his hand on the master’s shoulder. Got it shrugged off for his pains. The backra who had been silent was smiling a little now.

  “No juggling and juggling to make the books balance,” Simenon said. “No weevils in the flour, eh? No accursed frock-coats plastered to your body in this hellish heat and no mildew in your wig! No wig, for that matter, eh? Eh? Come now, you can tell me! Was it not fine?” And the master laughed, regarded Patrice as though he might be a dear friend to sit and share palm wine and stories with.

  The backra must be insane! Tipingee saw Patrice’s eyes go wide. He opened his mouth to reply, but no words came out. It was the lady who laughed like the tinkling of bells. “Then you will grant him clemency, my dear! I thought you might!”

  Simenon looked surprised, as did the men around him. He frowned at the lady, who reached a long white hand to him. “Oh, what a fine man I have picked for my fiancé!” she said.

  And so Tipingee learned that their master was taking this woman into his house. Then Simenon was smiling again, grinning at his men friends and puffing himself up like the toad who has croaked and croaked and found him a wife. “All right, dearest,” he said. “I will let him keep his ears. And yes, Father, you may have your nigger church.”

  Patrice would be all right. Tipi’s body went cold with the relief of it. She marked the sudden drop of Patrice’s shoulders from about his ears. Father sighed and made the sign of the crossroads on his chest. The backra men coughed and shuffled, but they said nothing to gainsay their friend.