“My daughter Maria, who brought you here, is the eldest. She takes the place of her mother, who left us five years ago with a gold prospector. I’d just as soon tell you that myself, before you hear it from someone else.”
Maria poured coffee for us. Now I could look at her more closely, because she had taken a seat next to her father, right opposite me. The three sisters stood behind her. They looked closely at me, too. Maria was a girl of the tropics, with big, black, almond-shaped eyes. Her jet-black curling hair, parted in the middle, fell to her shoulders. She had fine features, and although you could detect the drop of Indian blood from the color of her skin, there was nothing Mongolian about her face. She had a sensuous mouth and splendid teeth. Every now and then she revealed the tip of a very pink tongue. She was wearing a white, flowered, wide-open blouse that showed her shoulders and the beginning of her breasts, covered by a brassiere that was visible under the blouse. This blouse, a little black skirt, and flat-heeled shoes were what she had put on for the holiday--her best. Her lips were painted bright red, and she had penciled two lines at the corners of her huge eyes to make them seem even larger.
“This is Esmeralda [Emerald],” she said, introducing her youngest sister. “We call her that because of her green eyes. This is Conchita; and the other is Rosita, because she looks like a rose. She is much lighter than the rest of us, and she blushes at the least thing. Now you know the whole family. My father’s name is José. The five of us are the same as one, because our hearts beat all together. And what’s your name?”
“Enrique.” * [* Enrique is the Spanish form of Henri.]
“Were you in prison long?”
“Fourteen years.”
“Poor thing. How you must have suffered.”
“Yes, a great deal.”
“Papa, what do you think Enrique can do here?”
“I don’t know. Do you have a trade?”
“No.”
“Well then, go to the gold mine. They’ll give you a job.”
“And what about you, José? What do you do?”
“Me? Nothing. I don’t work--they pay you very little.”
Well, well, well. They were poor, sure enough; yet they were quite well dressed. Stiff, I couldn’t very well ask him what he used for money--whether he stole instead of working. Wait and see, I said to myself.
“Enrique, you’ll sleep here tonight,” Maria said. “There’s a room where my father’s brother used to sleep. He’s gone, so you can have his place. We’ll look after the sick man while you go to work. Don’t thank us; we’re giving you nothing--the room’s empty in any case.”
I didn’t know what to say. I let them take my little bundle. Maria got up and the other girls followed her. She had been lying: I could tell the room was in use, because they brought out women’s things and put them somewhere else, but I pretended not to notice anything. In the room there was no bed, but something better, something you often see in the tropics--two fine wool hammocks. A big window with just shutters--no glass-- opened onto a garden full of banana palms.
As I swung there in the hammock I could hardly believe what had happened to me. How easy this first day of freedom had been! Too easy. I had a free room and four sweet girls to look after Picolino. Why was I letting myself be led by the hand like a child? I was at the world’s end, to be sure; but I think the real reason I let myself be managed was that obeying was the only thing I understood after being a prisoner for so long. I was just like a bird that, when you open the door of its cage, doesn’t know how to fly anymore. It has to learn all over again.
I went to sleep without thinking about the past, exactly as the humble man of El Dorado had advised me.
I had just breakfasted off two fried eggs, two fried bananas covered with margarine, and black bread. Maria was in the bedroom, washing Picolino. A man appeared in the doorway; he was wearing a machete in his belt.
“Gente de paz,” he said. Men of peace, which is their way of saying, I’m a friend.
“What do you want?” asked José, who had had breakfast with me.
“The chief of police wants to see the men from Devil’s Island.”
“You don’t want to call them that. Call them by their names.”
“Okay, José. What are their names?”
“Enrique and Picolino.”
“Señor Enrique, come with me. I am a policeman, sent by the chief.”
“What do they want with him?” Maria asked, coming out of the bedroom. “I’ll come, too. Wait while I dress.”
In a few minutes she was ready. As soon as we were in the street she took my arm. I looked at her, surprised, and she smiled at me. When we reached the little administrative building, there were more police, all in plain clothes except for two in uniform with machetes hanging from their belts. A black man with a gold-braided cap presided over a roomful of rifles. He said to me, “You’re the Frenchman?”
“Yes.”
“Where’s the other?”
“He’s sick,” Maria said.
“I command the police. I’m here to help you if you need it. My name’s Alfonso.” And he held out his hand.
“Thanks. Mine’s Enrique.”
“Enrique, the chief administrator wants to see you. You can’t go in, Maria,” he added, seeing she was about to follow me. I went into the next room.
“Good morning, Frenchman. I am the chief administrator. Sit down. Since you’re in compulsory residence here in El Callao, I sent for you so that I could get to know you. I’m responsible for you.” He asked me what I was going to do--where I wanted to work. After we had talked a while he said, “If there’s anything at all, come and see me. I’ll help you work out as good a life as we can manage.”
“Thank you very much.”
“Oh, there’s one thing. I must warn you that you’re living with very good, honest girls; but their father, José--he’s a pirate.”
Maria was outside, at the station door, settled into that attitude Indians adopt when they are waiting, neither moving nor talking to anyone at all. She was not an Indian, but because of that little drop of Indian blood she had, the race came out. We took another way back to the house and walked through the whole village, her arm in mine.
“What did the chief want with you?” Maria asked, calling me by the familiar pronoun for the first time.
“Nothing. He told me I could count on him to help me find a job or in case I was in a hole.”
“Enrique, you don’t need anyone now. Nor does your friend.”
“Thanks, Maria.”
We passed a peddler’s stall, full of women’s trinkets--necklaces, bracelets, earrings, brooches, etc.
I took her over and picked out the best necklace with matching earrings, and three other, smaller sets for her sisters. I gave thirty boilvars for these tinselly little things, paying with a hundred note. Maria put the necklace and the earrings on right away. Her big black eyes sparkled and she thanked me as though the jewels were really valuable.
When we got back to the house, the three girls shrieked with delight over their presents. I went to my room, leaving them. I had to be alone to think. This family had offered me their hospitality with a splendid generosity; but should I accept it? I had some money, after all, not to mention the diamonds. Reckoning it all together, I could live four months and more without worrying, and I could have Picolino looked after.
All these girls were lovely, and like tropical flowers they were surely all warm, sexy, ready to give themselves only too easily, almost without thinking. I had seen Maria looking at me today almost as if she were in love. Could I resist so much temptation? It would be better for me to leave this too welcoming house before my weakness brought trouble and suffering. I was thirtynine, although I looked younger, and Maria was not quite eighteen, her sisters younger still. I ought to go, I thought. The best thing would be to leave Picolino in their care, paying for his board, of course.
“Señor José, I’d like to talk to you alone. Shall we go and
have a rum at the café in the square?”
“All right. But don’t call me señor. You call me José and I’ll call you Enrique. Let’s go. Maria, we’re going out to the square for a minute.”
“Enrique, change your shirt,” Maria said. “The one you’ve got on is dirty.”
I went and changed in the bedroom. Before we left, Maria said, “Don’t stay long, Enrique; and above all, don’t drink too much!” And before I had time to step back she kissed me on the cheek.
Her father burst out laughing. “That Maria,” he said, “she’s in love with you already.”
As we walked toward the bar I began, “José, you’re a man, so you will understand that if I lived among your daughters it would be hard for me not to fall in love with one of them. But I’m twice as old as the eldest, and I’m legally married in France. So let’s go and have a drink or two together, and then you take me to some cheap little boardinghouse. I can pay.”
“Frenchman, you’re a real man,” José said, looking me straight in the eye. “Let me shake your hand like a brother for what you’ve just said to a poor guy like me. In this country, you see, almost nobody’s married legally. You like one another, you make love, and if there’s a child, you set up house together. You join up as easily as you leave one another. It’s very hot here, and on account of the heat the women are very full-blooded. They mature early. Maria’s an exception; she’s never had an affair although she’s nearly eighteen. I think your country’s morality is better than ours, because here many women have children without a father, and that’s a very serious problem. But what can you do about it? The good Lord says you must love one another and have children. So although I see you are surrounded by temptation all the time, I ask you again to stay with us. I’m glad to have a man like you in the house.”
We were in the bar before I answered. A dozen men were sitting around. We drank a few rum-and-Cokes. Several people came up to shake my hand and bid me welcome to their village, and each time José introduced me as a friend who was living at his house. We had a good many drinks. When I asked what they came to, José became almost annoyed; he wanted to pay for every. thing. Still, I finally managed to persuade the bartender to take my money instead.
Someone touched me on the shoulder. It was Maria. “Come home. It’s lunchtime. Don’t drink anymore; you promised me not to drink too much.”
José was arguing with another man; she said nothing to him, but took me by the arm and led me out.
“What about your father?”
“Let him be. I can never say anything to him when he’s drinking and I never come to fetch him from the café. He wouldn’t have it, anyway.”
“Why did you come and fetch me, then?”
“You’re different. Be good, Enrique, and come along.” Her eyes were so brilliant, and she said it so simply, I went back to the house with her.
“You deserve a kiss,” she said when we got there. And she put her lips to my cheek, too near my mouth.
José came back after we had had lunch together at the round table. The youngest sister helped Picolino eat, giving him his food little by little.
José sat down by himself. He was high, so he spoke without thinking. “Enrique is frightened of you, my girls,” he said, “so frightened he wants to go away. I told him that in my opinion he could stay, and that my girls were old enough to know what they were doing.”
Maria gazed at me. She looked astonished, perhaps disappointed. “If he wants to go, Papa, let him. But I don’t think he’d be better off anywhere else than he is here, where everyone likes him.” And turning to me she added, “Enrique, don’t be a coward. If you like one of us, and she likes you, why should you run away?”
“On account of he’s married in France,” her father said.
“How long since you saw your wife?”
“Fourteen years.”
“The way we see it, if you love a man you don’t necessarily marry him. If you give yourself to a man, it’s to love him, nothing more. But it was quite right of you to tell our father you were married, because like that you can’t promise any of us anything at all, aside from just loving her.” And she asked me to stay with them without committing myself. They would look after Picolino and I would be more free to work. She even said I could pay a little, as if I were a boarder, to ease my mind. Did I agree?
I had no time to think properly. It was all so new and so quick after my years as a convict. I agreed.
“Would you like me to go with you to the gold mine this afternoon to ask for a job? We could go at five, when the sun is lower. It’s a mile and a half from the village.”
“Fine.”
Picolino’s movements and his expression showed how pleased he was that we were going to stay. The girls’ kindness and their care had won his heart. My staying was chiefly on account of him. Because here I was pretty sure I’d have an affair before long, and I wasn’t sure it would suit me.
With all that had been going on inside my head these last fourteen years, with all that had kept me from sleeping all those nights in prison, I was not going to drop everything as quickly as all this and settle down in a village at the far end of the world just because of a girl’s pretty face. I had a long road in front of me, and any stops must be short. Just long enough to catch my breath. Because there was a reason why I had been fighting for my liberty these fourteen years and there was a reason why I had won the fight; and that reason was revenge. The prosecuting counsel, the false witness, the cop: I had a score to settle with them. And that was something I was never to forget. Never.
I wandered out to the village square. I noticed a shop with the name Prospéri over it and figured the owner must be a Corsican or an Italian. Indeed, the little shop did belong to the descendant of a Corsican. Monsieur Prospéri spoke very good French. He kindly suggested writing a letter for me to the manager of La Mocupia, the French company that worked the Caratal gold mine. This splendid man even offered to help me with money. I thanked him for everything and went out.
“What are you doing here, Papillon? Where the hell have you come from, man? From the moon? Dropped by parachute? Come and let me kiss you!” A big guy, deeply sunburned, with a huge straw hat on his head, jumped to his feet. “You don’t recognize me?” And he took off his hat.
“Big Charlot! I’ll be damned!” Big Charlot, the man who knocked off the safe at the Place Clichy Gaumont in Paris, and the safe in the Batignolles station! We embraced like two brothers. Tears came into our eyes, we were so moved. We gazed at one another.
“A far cry from the Place Blanche and the clink, pal, huh? But where the hell have you come from? You’re dressed like an English lord: and you’ve aged much less than me.”
“I’m just out of El Dorado.”
“How long were you there?”
“Over a year.”
“Why didn’t you let me know? I’d have got you out right away, signed a paper saying I was responsible for you. Christ above! I knew there were some hard cases in El Dorado, but I never for a moment imagined you were there, you, a buddy!”
“It’s a miracle we should meet.”
“Don’t you believe it, Papi. The whole of Venezuelan Guiana is stuffed with convicts making a break. And as this is the first bit of Venezuelan territory you come across when you escape, there’s no miracle in meeting anyone at all between the Gulf of Paria and here--every last son of a bitch comes this way. All those who don’t come apart on the road, I mean. Where are you staying?”
“With a decent fellow named José. He has four daughters.”
“Yes, I know him. He’s a good man, a pirate. Let’s go and get your things: you are staying with me, of course.”
“I’m not alone. I’ve got a paralyzed friend and I have to look after him.”
“That doesn’t matter. I’ll send a donkey for him. It’s a big house and there’s a Negrita who’ll look after him like a mother.”
When we had found the donkey we went to the girls’ house. Le
aving these kind people was very painful. It was only when we promised to come and see them, and said they could come and see us at Caratal, that they calmed down a little.
Two hours later we were at Charlot’s “chateau,” as he called it. A big, light, roomy house on a headland looking out over the whole of the valley running down from the hamlet of Caratal almost to El Callao. On the right of this virgin forest was the Mocupia gold mine. Charlot’s house was built entirely of hardwood logs from the bush: three bedrooms, a fine dining room and a kitchen; two showers inside and one outside, in a perfectly kept garden. All the vegetables we had at home were growing there, and growing well. Besides a chicken run with more than five hundred hens, there were rabbits, guinea pigs, two goats and a pig. All this was the fortune and the present happiness of Charlot, the former crook and safecracker, specialist in very delicate operations worked out to the second.
“Well, Papi, how do you like my shack? I’ve been here seven years. As I was saying in El Callao, it’s a far cry from Montmartre and the clink! Who’d ever have believed that one day I’d be happy with such a quiet, peaceful life? What do you say, pal?”
“I don’t know, Charlot. I’m too lately out of stir to have a clear idea. It sets me back a little, seeing you quiet and happy here at the back of beyond. As far as I’m concerned, you see, I don’t feel up to it yet.”
When we were sitting around the table in the dining room and drinking Martinique punch, Big Charlot went on, “Yes, Papillon, I can see you’re amazed that I live by my own work. Eighteen bolIvars a day means a modest life, but one not without its pleasures. A hen that hatches me a good brood of chicks, a rabbit that brings off a big litter, a kid being born, tomatoes doing well... all these little things we despised for so long add up to something that gives me a lot. Hey, here’s my black girl. Conchita! Here are some friends of mine. That one’s sick; you’ll have to look after him. This one’s called Enrique, or Papillon. He’s a friend from France, an old-time friend.”