Love, Anger, Madness_ A Haitian Trilogy - Marie Chauvet [54]
Demosthenes went to Lion Mountain by himself because I refused to go.
“Think how angry your father will be, Claire,” my mother repeated to me. “Think how angry.”
But I stood my ground.
Well before my father’s return, we learned that Tancrède Auguste20 had been elected. Father returned from the capital looking old, demoralized and nearly ruined. He was welcomed by his diehard supporters, who ranted against the new president, whom they called incompetent.
In less than two years, the country saw four other heads of state come and go well before their terms were up, due to the unremitting anarchy, poverty, killings, and the constant uprisings by the Cacos21 of the North. The insurrections completely drained state funds. The political climate in our province as well suggested that the country was rolling through one disaster after another on its way into an abyss. The government of Vilbrun Guillaume Sam22 was cornered and appealed to the Americans for financial assistance. That day I saw my father’s faction give in to their anger, roaming the streets, drawing crowds. They seemed to have gone mad.
“Incompetent!” my father yelled. “All of them, incompetent! They are leading us straight to our ruin. You will soon see Americans in charge of all our institutions. They are waiting for the right moment to jump at our throats. They want to run our financial affairs. They will get control of customs. They’ll throw a noose around our necks. If we keep fighting and spilling our blood in fratricidal struggles, we’ll see an army of American soldiers land on our soil. Haitians don’t know what they need. The only man who can save them from this disaster, they will never choose him, they will never put him in power.”
“Long live Clamont!” the crowd cried out. “Long live Henri Clamont!” He was carried off in triumph this time, and my mother, despite her tears, had to give him another bag of money, which he distributed to a group of strangers who were asking for an audience and who called him the future president. More and more optimistic, he neglected his plantations. His fixation with power gnawed away at him. He was always leaving for Port-au-Prince, by boat and on horseback, each time returning more disappointed and visibly older.
“We have only a few hundred acres left,” my mother complained. “We are nearly ruined! What will become of our children?”
“Oh, my wife!” my father vituperated, “give me your support instead of your recriminations. Do you think that all those who have assumed the presidency just crossed their arms and put their feet up before their election?”
“But you will never be elected president,” my mother tried to reason with him.
“Enough!” my father ordered. “I will take you to Port-au-Prince just so you can witness my popularity with your own eyes. I bask in praise there, and my speeches are applauded with such force that I choke up with emotion. They don’t want brawlers and rebels anymore, they will choose an honest tiller of the soil like me to save the country from disaster. We are weighed down by debt. After I presented my plan for economic independence the audience carried me away in triumph. My wife, are you listening? In triumph I was carried away, and not by a band of flea-bitten bums but by men of culture who represent the cream of Port-au-Prince, the only sensible, capable and representative class of people.”
He noticed me, came toward me and said:
“Even though you refused to help me, you will choose the man of your dreams, I promise you that.”
He twirled his mustache, stuck out his chest and left.
“Down with Clamont!” we heard.
“Who dared say that?” my father roared.
Tonton Mathurin, dressed in his old houpland and beret, stepped out of the bushes where he was lying in wait.
“Me,” he shouted. “Clamont, you are nothing