Stone That the Builder Refused - Madison Smartt Bell [68]
They tied their horses and built a small fire, though there was nothing to be cooked. Guerrier brought some dried beef out of his bundle—there was much smoking of beef at the hatte he had come from. Guiaou had some morsels of cassava bread wrapped in a rag inside his shirt, and Couachy brought out two shriveled, pulpy mangoes. They shared the food and ate it slowly, reserving about half of the dried beef for the next day.
After eating, Couachy and Guiaou reclined on their elbows beside the fire, while Guerrier sat up crosslegged, caressing the barrel of his musket intently, as if it were a cat. The knobs of his knees stuck out from the faded rags of his tricolor trousers. He told them how he had once been a slave on a coffee farm in the hills above Ouanaminthe, how he had run away across the Spanish border and lived for years as a maroon in the mountains near Santiago. When Couachy and Guiaou did not volunteer anything about themselves, Guerrier asked how they had come to know each other.
“Nou tuyé blan ansanm,” Couachy grunted, rolling up on one hip to scratch his back. We killed whites together.
“Wi, blan ak milat, nou tuyé yo.” The words sounded from his mouth without Guiaou’s intention—Yes, whites and mulattoes, we killed them . . . He had first met Couachy during a raid on the English on the outskirts of Saint Marc, a long time ago before Papa Toussaint had chased all the English out of the country. In those days Guiaou had had an especially lively hatred of mixed-blood people—he still did when he thought about it—and that day he and Couachy had been able to kill many of them up close with their knives. That raid was led by Moyse, who was dead now, shot by a firing squad at Port-de-Paix, because he had dared to raise a rebellion against his uncle, Papa Toussaint.
It took Guiaou some time to think all of these thoughts, and during that time no one said anything more. There was no sound except the whine of the mosquitoes, which were plentiful here in the mangrove swamp. Couachy sat up to put a damp, leafy branch onto the fire. The smoke thickened, but it did not discourage the mosquitoes very much. Guerrier coughed and spat to one side.
“Why did the general give you two letters?” he said.
“Let-sa-a bay manti,” Couachy answered, pulling out a corner of the letter he carried in his outside pocket. This letter tells lies. He moved his hand to pat the second letter, which he held hidden under his shirt. “This is the letter which tells the truth.”
“What does the letter say truly?” Guerrier said. “And what does the letter say which is not true?”
Guiaou felt that Guerrier asked too many questions, and asked them too directly. He would never have asked such questions himself, not even in his thoughts, but Couachy did not seem unwilling to answer and Guiaou found that he himself was curious to know.
Couachy brushed his outer pocket. “This one says that the General Paul must welcome the French as brothers and friends and do all that they say.” He smiled and tapped the letter tucked into his waistband. “This one says that he must burn Santo Domingo City, kill the blancs and retreat to Saint Raphael.”
At that Guerrier only nodded and stretched out on the ground beside his musket. The fire burned down to its last coals. Guiaou lay with his eyes closed, listening to the plop of frogs in the swamp, the horses snuffling at the brackish water along the edge of the mangroves, finally the familiar sound of Couachy’s snoring. After a blank period his eyes came open on the mist of a gray dawn. The others slept, but one-eyed Ghede was there,