Love, Anger, Madness_ A Haitian Trilogy - Marie Chauvet [25]
Cry with me. It won’t last long, you’ll see. Trust your charms. You’ve got everything you need to seduce him. You can pierce his armor. He’s proved that much to you. You have to persevere. You are experienced. At fifteen you had a mind of your own, and you were already scrambling for a male. You stole my first fruits. I am going to torture you, torture you both, until I hear you beg for mercy …
“It’s your birthday next month. I will throw a little party. Invite anyone you want …”
“You’re talking to me as if I were a kid,” she protests.
My offer seems childish, but my goal, hardly. I want Annette to get her act together again, I want her to dance and laugh before Jean Luze’s very eyes. I will bring her to the limit of what she can endure. Suffering does not move, it provokes pity or annoys. I, usually so stingy, have now made up my mind to blow a lot of money on this party.
Morning, noon and night, the couple is with us, more united than ever. Félicia revives as her stomach grows more deformed. She is as serene as a statue. Jean Luze eats with a healthy appetite. He doesn’t smoke at the dinner table anymore under the pretext that the smell of tobacco bothers his wife.
“Pregnancy suits you nicely,” he tells her with a kiss.
Each time he shows her affection in my presence, I hate her for settling so easily for this bourgeois, measured feeling she inspires in him.
I swear I will shake him out of its tepid indifference. I will light his fuse. It won’t be too long. I will melt his ice. He looks at us too sweetly, all smiles. I like to see that dimple dig into his chin and his lips curl above his teeth.
The church bells have been ringing incessantly since morning. There I am, dressed as a Daughter of Mary. I look like a nun in the dress Jane Bavière made for me. I can’t reproach her; the worker always tries to please the master. I am the one who insisted on the long sleeves and the high collar. I look rather good, compared to the others in the procession. What a hideous cohort of shriveled old maids! All the same, I am the best among them. All old maids stand out. At least, the real ones do. Not those who, like me, were once torches and have become embers. The tangled webs of veins on their limbs, their pursed lips and darting glances, give them away. The dissatisfaction in their faces is unmistakable. Looking at them, I can’t feel so proud of my part, though I am the leading lady in this spectacle. This pious banner seems heavy to bear. Children’s heads crowned in white are moving in front of me; eyes cast down, they throw handfuls of flowers from their baskets. All the balconies are decorated, and garlands of artificial flowers made by the nuns sway slowly between the trees in the street. This is a festival for the young in which we should not be taking part. The Virgin, radiant, resting on a pedestal carried by four young men, is proof of this. We belong in the ranks of penitents. In the procession, we stand out like grumpy owls9 in a flock of turtledoves. This is the last time in my life that I will make such a spectacle of myself. We sing Father Paul’s choral arrangement while we wait. “May God above shower us with the goodly rain of His sweet blessing and may His Holy Name be blessed.” Up above, the blows of axes rain upon the trees. It seems to lend rhythm to our hymn. The prefect and the mayor, clad in their gray wool suits, sweating blood and water, watch the procession go by and cross themselves before the Holy Sacrament. Calédu and M. Long stand outside the door of the Cercle. The priest blesses them all. Jacques the madman comes running.
“The gates of hell have opened their mouth to devour you,” he screams, flailing. “God has cursed us. He has opened the gates of hell upon us …”
The singing dies down. Calédu frowns. He brings a whistle to his