Love, Anger, Madness_ A Haitian Trilogy - Marie Chauvet [34]
From my room, I can hear the Creole mutterings of our Augustine, who has served the Clamonts for thirty years—the past ten of them for me, Claire the abolitionist, who claims to be restoring justice to the kingdom of this world, at least in my own modest way. I pay her, whereas she worked for my parents for free. What more can she possibly want? Perhaps she finds solace in talking to herself, but I don’t want her spittle on my dishes. We are both crabby. Does she also live without a man? What’s bothering this poor ignorant black woman from the hills? We live with daggers drawn. She is careless and I am obsessive. A character flaw in old maids—although I know that a few of us do live like pigs. I am enraged by a speck of dust. I sniff the tableware and the dishes with suspicion, something that exasperates her; I ignore her petty thefts. I am not naïve: a servant is faithful when it is in her interest.
“You’re poisoning everything,” Félicia protests when I chase mosquitoes from the nooks and corners of the house with DDT.
Like all idle women, she is a member of the live-and-let-live school of housekeeping, and thinks that everything is in order just because she’s embroidering clothes for her future child.
The truth is that tracking down dust distracts me. And what’s more, I take pride in being an impeccable housekeeper. When Jean Luze’s ash falls on the carpet, I go down on my knees to pick it up. Since his wife’s pregnancy I am the one who mends all of his clothes, and he turns to me for this more and more.
“Claire, can you sew this button, please?”
And there I am, caressing the fly of his pants where I am sewing the button. He thanks me by letting his gaze linger on me. His eyes are like precious stones in a velvet box. I will adore the wee one if he ends up looking like him, and that will be my cross, to fight a feeling I would rather suppress out of pride.
“Drink less and try to lead a decent life,” Félicia said severely to Annette this morning.
“What do you mean by a decent life?” she replied with impertinence.
“Félicia is giving you advice for your own good,” I added for good measure.
“Ah!”
Her butterfly-wing eyes flashed and she took the bottle of rum to pour herself another glass.
Jean Luze looked at her coldly, as if making an effort to conceal his disapproval, his contempt! He does not love her, it’s unmistakable. It’s true she has been acting like a little whore. Beautiful as she is, a man like him will never love her. And yet, how many love affairs he must have had! Maybe that’s what has made him choosy. All the easy conquests probably made him wary. He knows what he can expect from women. Maybe that’s why he picked the blandest of the three, the least interesting sister.
It was two in the morning and I was in deep sleep when someone knocked on my door. It was Jean Luze. Worried and distressed, he begged me to come help Félicia. She was wet with sweat and writhing in pain.
“We need Dr. Audier,” I said to him.
Jean Luze left, and in silence I put away the clothes draped on the furniture. Félicia moaned, crying and calling out to me:
“It hurts, Claire, oh how it hurts!”
A moment later, Dr. Audier, hurrying as much as his bent little feet and paunch permitted, was leaning over my sister.
“She’s in labor,” he declared to Jean Luze.
“But she’s only seven months along!” Jean Luze exclaimed without hiding his anxiety.
Audier tilted his head before responding:
“Many a powerful man was born before term!”
Jean Luze bent over his wife. He pressed her against him with infinite tenderness and wiped her brow:
“Be brave,” he said to her.
“Boil some water, Claire,” the doctor ordered me, “and have some clean linen ready.”
And turning to Jean Luze:
“You leave the room,” the doctor said softly. “She’ll hold up better if you are not here. The husband’s presence always complicates things.”
“Claire, don’t leave her,” he begged me.
“What’s going on?” Annette yelled from the landing.
“Félicia is having the baby,