Feast of All Saints Read Free

turn. Monsieur Philippe loved the sound of his own voice.
    And when Christophe was thirteen, a final guest arrived who stayed, though forever shrouded in mystery, a black veteran of the Haitian wars.
    “You remember him, that old man.” Monsieur Philippe bit off the tip of his cigar and spat it in the grate. Marcel knew those subtle sounds by heart. Like the chink of the neck of the bottle hitting the rim of the glass, and that soft breath of satisfaction after each drink. “Of course we were suspicious of him, who needs these rebel slaves from Haiti…Haiti! It was Saint-Domingue when my great-uncle owned the biggest plantation on the Plaine du Nord. Ah, but the point is, the man was abroad so long, money in Paris, New York, Charleston…banks here, uptown. Hardly the one to set fire to every sugar plantation on the coast and lead a band of ragged blacks to cut our throats.”
    In the mirror, Marcel saw his mother shudder; she rubbed the backs of her arms, her head to one side, eyes on the lace tablecloth. Ragged army of blacks to cut our throats, the words struck some sudden excitement in Marcel, what was Monsieur Philippe talking about? But it was Christophe that interested him, not that mysterious history of Haiti of which Marcel got bits and pieces at odd moments, never enough to make a picture of anything except rebel slaves and blood.
    And he was old besides, this black Haitian, and crippled. And soon sick of seeing Christophe feast on chocolates and white wine, accustomed to sleep in his mother’s bed when he chose, and permitted to lie on the sloped roof at night, three stories above the street to study the stars, he sent the boy abroad.
    Christophe was fourteen when he left, and people argued about the rest. It was uncertain, some saying he boarded in England for a while, others that no, he went to Paris, having
in loco parentis
the white family of a hotelkeeper who kept him in a veritable closet under the stairs, without even a candle let alone heat on winter nights. He was beaten there some insisted, others that, spoiled as always, he had had his own way, lashing out at these poor bourgeoisie any time they tried to restrain him.
    But one thing was sure, that at sixteen he had run away to Egypt, wandered through Greece and returned to Paris in the company of a wealthy Englishman, white of course, to become an artist. He’d written of these exotic lands, Monsieur Philippe had an article somewheresent home by his young brother-in-law, Vincent, where was it (what Marcel wouldn’t have given to lay hands on it). But back to those times when he was wandering, and slaves over the back fence said the old Haitian, now bedridden, had disowned him. What claim had he over that beautiful Juliet, who could imagine? She with that pale golden skin and delicate face…but Philippe merely touched on that lightly, she had died on the vine. Cecile nodded.
    And they said she drank sherry and fell to merely watching the rain.
    And that she was mean to the old Haitian in the last year of his life, yes, Cecile had heard that too, when paralyzed he had to lie there to be fed softboiled egg with a spoon. The blinds were shut forever. Children of five and six thought the house haunted and loved to run past it squealing. Ah, look at it now, a jungle behind those cracked brick walls, and a peeling hulk on the busy corner.
    But at just this time, across the sea, Christophe’s star rose.
    Marcel could remember the rest.
    And long after Monsieur Philippe had let the tale drop, he traced the thread in his own memory—how people had gathered to watch the old man’s casket come out because of the son’s fame. And only when it was all over, and a ghastly, worn Juliet walked back from the cemetery in the scorching sun, did people begin to whisper the truth. It was on the tombstone. The old Haitian had been her father!
    So didn’t he have some rights over the boy, his own grandson?
    But what would she do now, take lovers? Get new servants