Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [411]
“Have you any men fit enough to bear arms?”
“Very few,” said the doctor, startled.
“Turn them out, whoever you have—the Captain-General’s order.” Cyprien looked over his shoulder. “Look to your own weapons too—it is a general muster—army, militia, everyone.”
“Are we under attack?” The doctor unchained the gate for Cyprien to come in, and went to get his pistols from a bag that hung on a stob of a tree above his hammock.
“Toussaint has arrived,” said Cyprien. “To surrender—they say—but he has brought a great many men with him for that purpose, and they seem to have invested the Government House.”
The doctor canvassed the pick of his malaria and dysentery cases, and with this escort of unfortunate conscripts they went staggering through the blazing heat across Rue Espagnole. A stronger contingent of troops was filing down from the barracks higher on the hill. All halted below the gate of the Government, where the doctor found Tocquet and Arnaud waiting by the gate along with Major Maillart.
“Well met,” said Tocquet. He pulled the doctor to him and kissed his cheeks. “We have not returned an hour from La Tortue, and what do we find? It looks like a double encirclement.”
The doctor peered through the bars of the gate. What he saw made Tocquet’s remark seem quite reasonable. Hundreds of Toussaint’s guardsmen stood in ranks in the courtyard, holding their sabers bare. They stood in pairs by the smoke-stained trunk of every palm that lined the avenue and lined the stairway that rose to the main entrance of the building. The gathering French troops, meanwhile, were all without, and had filled every street on the square surrounding the Government compound.
“And Leclerc?” said the doctor.
“He has already gone in,” Arnaud said.
“And let us follow,” Tocquet said, with a glance at Maillart, who pushed the gate inward. No one opposed them. Cyprien followed them through, though he pushed the gate back against other French soldiers who might also have come in. They walked slowly up the avenue of palms. With every step the pistol butts scraped awkwardly under the doctor’s loose shirt, and the stony eyes of Toussaint’s guardsmen inclined him to hold his breath. The brilliant sunlight reflected on the edges of those naked blades. It was quiet, too quiet—even the crows in the high palm crowns had ceased all palaver. But on the steps the doctor recognized Riau and Guiaou, and they smiled and took his hands briefly when he offered them.
The Government building had been much restored, though it still smelled faintly of soot and smoke. But in the grand salon a number of attendants were laying long tables for a meal, and there the stronger smell was of spiced beef. They went on down the corridor to a doorway to the Governor’s cabinet, where others had clustered. The hall was crowded but by standing tiptoe the doctor could see Leclerc’s small form, puffed as full as a rooster’s but overshadowed by the Generals Hardy and Debelle on either side of him. Leclerc inclined his blond head to the oath of loyalty to France that Toussaint was reciting to him in a low but quite clear tone.
“He’s actually submitting,” Tocquet breathed in the doctor’s ear. “It astonishes me.”
“Why?” the doctor whispered, without turning his head.
“He was winning,” Tocquet said, then fell silent.
When Toussaint had finished his oration, Leclerc raised his voice to address him:
“General, one can only praise and admire when one has seen how well you have borne the burden of the government of Saint Domingue. Your presence in this city is proof of your magnanimity and your good faith. Our reconciliation will make this island, of which you have been the restorer, flower again, and will consolidate the new institutions which are the fundamental basis for the liberty and happiness of all.”
Toussaint passed a hand over his mouth and replied, “Since the people of Saint Domingue had just triumphed in a foreign war—both for France and for themselves—they did not think that they would ever have to resist the protective power of France.