The Farming of Bones_ A Novel - Edwidge Danticat [53]
He pointed to Joel’s mat and asked me to sit down.
“Sebastien went with Mimi to the chapel,” he said. “They went there to meet you. Others tell me that army trucks came and took them away.”
“Is it true?” I was not so ready to believe.
He lifted one of the pots in the middle of the room and took out a lemon. He cut the lemon and pressed both halves to the bridge of my nose.
“It will keep you from shedding more blood.” He gave me the rest of the lemon to rub over the cuts on my legs. Gritting my teeth, I rubbed.
“And where is it thought they’ll be taken?” I asked.
“If they don’t kill them at once, they’ll bring them to the border prison near Dajabón.” He spoke in a distant voice, as if death no longer meant anything to him. “They used to take us to prison near Dajabón, then bring us to the bridge at the border and let us go. I don’t know if they’ll let them go this time. Sebastien’s friend Yves is at that Doña Sabine’s house. They did not take him. He’s the one who came to tell me about Sebastien and his sister. He wanted me to go with him to Doña Sabine’s house. I told him I’m staying here, and if need be, I’ll die here.”
A few ants were still crawling over my scalp, hiding in the short tresses of my hair. I scratched furiously, trying to frighten them out. There was blood under my fingernails when I pulled them out of my hair.
“I am going to Dajabón, then,” I said.
“You certain you don’t want to stay here?” he asked. “We are more protected here in the mill compound.”
“I want to go to the border,” I said.
“Do you know how to reach it?”
“I hear there are roads through the mountains.”
“You follow the stream up the mountains. There are grottos and caves to sleep in at night. This is how I came here again and again many times, in the beginning. When you come down from the mountain, you know where to cross the river? Very shallow in some places, that river. This time of year, it’s most shallow near the bridge.”
“I will remember this,” I said.
“There might be soldiers in the mountains,” he added. “I heard from a man here in the compound that they’re burning Haitian houses in the mountain villages.”
“Before I go, I need to speak to Yves,” I said.
He looked down at my bundle and saw the silhouette of his son’s death mask in it. “Don’t go through the cane again. I’ll show you another way.”
We tiptoed out and turned the corner through Sebastien’s yam garden. I paused there for just a moment, thinking how much pleasure it gave Sebastien to plant and grow things for himself after he had been working the cane all day for someone else. I crawled under a wooden fence that opened to a narrow footpath leading to a side gate at Doña Sabine’s house. Kongo took the hidden trail back to the mill without saying anything more.
I waited until I thought he was back at the mill, then walked to the front gate of Doña Sabine’s house. I had to pound on it with a rock before my knock was heard. I was afraid the noise would be detected by soldiers somewhere farther up the road, but I had no choice.
Félice peered through the grille at the entrance, then pushed the metal door open and dragged me in. There were no watchmen at the gate.
“Your face?” she asked, the birthmark rising and falling with every movement of her lips.
“A scratch.” I reached up to touch the bridge of my nose. “Where are the watchmen who were here before?” I asked.
“Don Gilbert and Doña Sabine sent them away,” she said. “They were afraid the watchmen would change their allegiance and turn on them. Doña Sabine sent the people they were guarding and her young relations off to Haiti yesterday.”
Félice pointed to the steps in front of the main house, where clusters of men and women were craning their necks trying to make out what was happening at the gate. A couple—an older woman and a young man who looked like they might be related—moved towards the entrance.
“I hear it was terrible on the road. We could hear all the noise coming from there,” Félice said. “Is that where you were hurt?”
“They took Unèl and many of his men,” I said.
“Anybody die?