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She had barely emerged from the deserted road when she was snagged by a delirious crowd shouting and singing a Carnival merengue. The drums beat to the step of the masked dancers. Dressed in yellow, the whippers led the parade, cracking their long lashes; then came the Indians walking with open arms, shaking their wigs and feathers. A group of half-naked devils with scarlet horns threatened the spectators with their gilt pitchforks. Two rows of giant laughing heads ran ahead of a queen of great beauty dressed in pink tulle blowing kisses to the crowd atop a float depicting the fortress in miniature. Other groups dressed in sparkling colors went into contortions, bottles in hand, drunk off clairin6 and drums.

The first day of Carnival and I had forgotten all about it! the mother said to herself. She moved forward, pushed and roughed up by the crowd, trapped in its froth. As she struggled in vain to get away, a “braided-ribbon” crew materialized behind the queen’s float. Hundreds of beggars in rags followed in its wake, arms in the air, swarming to the sound of a huge, colorful ribbon-draped drum pounded by crew members lurching to the rhythm. The ribbons swayed and interlaced to the beat of hips and feet. Eyes closed, delirious, the crowd shouted more and more, possessed by the drumming. Nothing existed anymore: not anger, nor fear, nor despair. The throng granted itself a reprieve through these ancestral rituals that, for the moment, offered a deceptive sense of freedom. Drumming, tafia,7 music, song, dance, cries, erotic ferment, all of it helped let off steam, like the idea of being possessed by African gods in voodoo ceremonies.

The mother finally managed to get away from the crowd. She slowly walked the nearly deserted streets to her house. The grandfather was sitting on the veranda with the invalid.

“Did you see the Carnival?” the child asked. “Are there a lot of people there?”

“Yes,” she answered simply.

“Did you see any nice masks?”

“Yes,” she said. “The beggars were the only ones without masks.”

“And was there a queen, and floats?”

“A very beautiful queen atop a fortress.”

“They reign like lords and masters!” the grandfather grunted as if talking to himself.

She stared at him in silence, then went to knock on Rose and Paul’s doors.

Where are they? she asked herself when no one answered.

The father was also gone.

She looked at herself in the mirror for a minute, brushed her face with her hand, sighed and sat on the bed, staring blankly at nothing.

So she had failed just as all of them would no doubt fail. Or would she start over tomorrow and then again, every single day until she died? Wasn’t it her role to shower her children with love, to quietly help them conquer their terror, to shut her eyes and let them take action, all with the conviction that they too would meet with failure? Just make their lives a little easier, cover their heads with maternal hands that they could grasp in their distress or hide their weeping faces in. To attempt again what she had done today, wasn’t that, in truth, giving in to the pride of a death justified by them and by her? Should she run straight into suicide, cut short the days she had left? For they would surely murder her, she knew that much. They’d shoot her before she could even open her mouth to speak.

She could hear the distant, muffled echoes of Carnival. She tilted her head and listened to her heartbeat. It was panting, breathless, worn out like an old animal on its last legs. I have to go easy on it, she finally told herself, go easy on it so I can outlive all of them; there, that’s the point of my life. To shoulder their sufferings, extend my days and live on to carry my cross and theirs …

Part Two

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Doubt has worked its way into me. It’s horrible. I’m having doubts about Anna now. Dr. Valois came by with her last evening. All of a sudden, they’ve become overly generous, overly kind. I don’t like that. They had found out like everyone else did,