Drum (19 page)

"Gracias, Rachel." Tamboura was quite ready to forgive the woman even though her attitude toward him had not warmed. He was quite sure that she would eventually succumb to him although the necessity of wooing a woman with soft-talking was a new experience to him. He shucked off the white coat and shirt together but she, without pausing as much as a moment to admire his charms, had turned to leave. He felt that some word was necessary to make her turn around for he had a feeling that an appraisal, even by her

cold eyes, of the swelling muscles of his chest would cause a change in her attitude. "I am hungry, Rachel"—now he really was soft-talking her—"and I think you are a good cook. I shall hurry."

She did turn around but her eyes were as coldly uninterested as before.

"You shall have enough to eat, hombre, but let us get one thing straight while we are yet quite new to each other. I am Madame's personal slave and you are don Cesar's. Your status is equal to mine and you have an equal right to be here. I shall feed you well. If necessary I shall wash and iron your clothes. We shall say 'buenos dias' in the morning and 'buenas noches' at night and that will be the end of our conversation. When you are ready to come to the kitchen, your food will be waiting." She turned abruptly and left, making her way in the darkness down the steep ladder.

"Ay, que mujerr Tamboura sensed a dangerous lessening of his power over women. He had never been so completely rebufiFed before. Even the little mestiza at Las Delicias had finally fallen imder his attack. Despite her own pain and her sorrow at the shrieks of her brother under the whip, she had succumbed. And now this tall, bright-skinned woman had paid no more attention to him than she might have awarded to the black horse he had been riding. Ayl she would be a problem but one he was sure he could solve in time.

He undid the leggings, and removed the heavy boots after bumping his buttocks halfway around the loft. At one time he felt he must call Rachel to help him with the pendejos but to do so would reflect on his abUity as a man, so he struggled imtil he freed himself from them and was able to shed his breeches. After washing himself from the bucket of water and drying himself on the rough towel, he dressed, feeling again the joy and assurance the black suit always gave him and welcoming the pliancy of the slippers after the imprisonment of his feet in the boots. Don Cesar had given him a discarded red sash and this brightness appealed to his love of color. He wound it tightly around his waist, sucking in his belly to make it even slimmer, and admired the colorful contrast between the white shirt and the shiny black mohair of his pantaloons. Now that Rachel saw him dressed in all this elegance, she would certainly melt before his splendor. What negrita could resist him, cock-proud and rooster-elegant as he now looked?

But she didn't meltl The meal she served him was one of

the best he had ever eaten, but he had to eat it alone and in silence, for after putting the food on the table, she was gone. He sat solitary in the kitchen, feeling very sorry for himself, until he found the heat from the stove oppressive and decided to move his chair out into the dark patio behind a clump of greenery. It was fine to be don Cesar's groom and dress in these nice clothes but he wished now he was back at Mama Baba's in his ragged old pantalones, sitting outside the bohio with Pia beside him and M'dong and Omo laughing and joking with him. He was troubled, too, at the thought of having to sleep alone in the big dark loft above the stables. Never in his life had he slept alone before. Even the crowded deck of the slave ship would be better than the phantom-peopled blackness of the lonely loft. On the ship he had had the warm assurance of Omo in front of him and M'dong behind him. Far better it seemed to him to remain sitting in the patio aU night with the comfort of the lights on the floor above him and the reassuring sound of the far-off voices of don Cesar and the woman who was with him.

Tamboura had been saving further thoughts about her for such a time as this when he was alone and could more thoroughly savor them. At long last he had finally seen the woman he had dreamed about. She was no longer the dimly remembered girl he had so briefly glimpsed in his passage through the city two years ago. Neither was she like the statue in the chapel at Montalvo. This flesh and blood reality was far greater than either of these. But she belonged to his amo. As such, she was sacred and he must never raise his eyes to look at her. Furthermore she was white and there was absolutely no bridge between black men and white women. Between black women and white men, yesl Even though his whole being cried out for her Tamboura knew if he even as much as looked at her, let alone touched her, don Cesar would not hesitate a moment to have him flogged to death.

With his eyes fixed on the lighted windows above he relinquished all claim to the amo's white woman. But ... if he could not have her, he could at least think about her. Don Cesar might own his body but only Tamboura owned his thoughts. Nobody could punish him for his thoughts because nobody could know about them. Even the omnipotence of don Cesar could not read the thoughts that spun in Tam-boura's head. Let don Cesar possess her once a week— Tamboura could possess her daily, even hourly.

The perfumed darkness, the canopy of vines which hid his chair and the steady drip of the fountain all contributed to his somnolent phantasy. Later, when the lights went out in the windows above, he sensed why they were extinguished. He pictured a bed, such as he had been on at Las Delicias, and on it a flesh far whiter and more beautiful than even the tawny curves of Julita. Although he knew that don Cesar formed the other part of the pictiu^e, he banished him and substituted his own black body in the place of his amo. For all that don Cesar might hold the actuality of that flesh in his arms, Tamboura held something more; the woman he held, albeit not substantial, was far lovelier, more pliant and yielding than any reality could ever be.

He closed his eyes, the better to visualize the picture, shutting out the shadowed patio, and the noises that came from the street through the grilled gate. From the kitchen, he heard snatches of a song in an imknown language. The words were strange, but the rhythm was barbaric and sensual, and stirred his blood. His fancied joy became greater than anything he had ever experienced in Mama Baba's hut or in the bedroom at Las Delicias. The cherished image had come to life and even though he might not satisfy himself with the reality, now there was an actual substance on which to base his dream. She was! She existed! His eyes had seen her!

Something about the blue eyes, as they had regarded him over don Cesar's shoulder, seemed to justify his right to dream of her. Now those eyes were looking at him again but they were closer this time for his own lips were pressed tightly against her lips and the paleness of that face Reamed whitely beneath the dark shadow of his own. His dream continued in a strange substance of reality.

"Tamboura!" The dream faded with the voice of don Cesar.

"Rachel!" Tamboura stood up at the sound of the senora's voice.

Don Cesar and the object of Tamboura's recent desires stood together in the patio, don Cesar holding aloft a heavy silver candelabrum in which the flames of a dozen candles flickered in the soft night air.

Tamboura stood up and walked out into the circle of light, just as Rachel approached from the kitchen.

"Yes, amo?" Tamboura spread his big hands awkwardly in front of him for he realized he was in no condition to appear before a white lady. "I am here."

"And I, madame. You called me?" Rachel made a deep curtsey.

"I did, Rachel, but it is don Cesar who would speak with you." Alix looked somewhat perturbed.

But not don Cesar. There was a certain jovial condescension in his words, as when an adult talks to children, offering them a treat and assiu-ed beforehand of their joyous acceptance.

'The Condesa and I are retiring for the night and she will no longer need yoiu- services, Rachel, nor shall I need those of Tamboura. The Condesa agrees with me that it would be expedient if Tamboura shared your bed with you tonight. You are a fiuQC-looking woman, quite worthy of Tamboura in every way, and as he will be here often from now on, it seems only right that you two should employ yourselves to add to your ama's prosperity."

Rachel's face contorted in startled agony as she stared at Alix, then with a quick glance she observed don Cesar's unaffected joviality. She sensed there was no appeal but her words came spouting forth in a torrent of French which she knew don C6sar did not understand.

"But, madame, you promised me."

Alix shrugged her shoulders, and replied in French.

"It is not for me to say. This is don C6sar's idea and you must obey him." Then lapsing into Spanish, she continued. "You must speak Spanish, Rachel, out of courtesy to don Cesar."

"And now both of you"—don Cesar was going to award both his children—"we shall light you to your room. After all, it is not every night that we can celebrate a luna de miel here and we shall be yoiu- sponsors." He handed the candela-bnmi to Rachel. "You go ahead and light the way and Tamboura you follow. For once we shall yield precedence."

Rachel's hand trembled violently when she took the candelabrum and she spilled hot wax on don Cesar's wrist, but in his jovial mood he did not upbraid her for her carelessness. Bearing the light, she led him across the tiles and around the flower beds through the kitchen door. With a backward glance as if to confirm the awful certainty that Tamboura and the others were behind her, she crossed the kitchen and lifted a cloth curtain that led to a smaller room. The candles illuminated its cleanness and simplicity. Tamboura saw a low bed with a smoothly stretched sheet over the mattress, an orderly line of cotton garments hang-

ing from nails on the wall, a plain rush-seated chair, a small mirror and a niche in the wall with a collection of bottles and boxes. There was nothing else.

Cesar looked at the narrow bed and laughed.

"Hardly wide enough for Tambovu^a's shoulders, is it? But you'll manage—this is a case where two will take up no more room than one. Work well tonight, Tamboura. If the cachorrito is a good one, we'll take it out to Montalvo and raise it." He pressed Alix's arm. "And I'll buy you the emerald ring you admired in the window on Obispo Street in exchange for the child."

Tamboura grinned. "It will be a good one, amo. Mine always are."

"You're a braggart, Tamboura, but you do speak the truth. And now we'll leave you. Light your candle, Rachel, and we'll light our own way back across the patio." He held up the curtain for Alix and they left with don Cesar's laughter still ringing in the night. "Ay, Alix," he said, "yovir Rachel will bless me in the morning."

Rachel stood grimly in the middle of the floor and her look of intense hatred wiped the grin from Tamboura's face.

"Your amo has ordered that you stay here with me and my mistress has sanctioned it. So, you shall remain but you win not touch me. This is my bed and here I shall sleep but I shall sleep alone."

"You would be happier with me," Tamboura's grin returned. He felt confident. The amo had spoken and must the woman not obey? It was unthinkable that anyone should disobey the amo.

Rachel reached under the pillow and drew out a small knife whose sharp blade glinted in the candlelight.

"If you touch me, I shall use this," she threatened.

Tamboura laughed. "Your hands are weak, mujer." He spread out his fingers to show the enormity of his own hand. "Think you that I am afraid of that little knife?"

"I would wait imtil you are asleep."

"With you I would not sleep, mujer." Tamboura reached out his big arms to envelop her but she eluded him and slipped to the far side of the room. From the niche in the wall she took a small box and opened it. She withdrew something from it and threw it to the floor. The strange object fluttered from her hand as though it were alive, circled slowly in the air and landed softly on the floor at Tamboura's feet. He jumped back in terror. The Uttle object did not move;

it was nothing but a few cock's feathers, red, white and black, tied together with a red string. But it struck fear in Tam-boura's heart.

"Nahigo!" he exclaimed and he could feel his tongue dry against bis lips.

"In St. Domingue we call it voodoo." Her thin lips made a straight line. She pointed to it with one slender bronze finger and as if obeying her direction, it caught an errant breeze and moved on the floor.

"Step across that, hombre, and you will die. The gods of Africa are powerful, as you know, and they obey my bidding. Remain on your own side and you wUl be safe. I shall not use the knife on you when you sleep as much as I would like to. You will find the floor hard but that is not my fault. Do we understand each other?"

Tamboura stepped away from the ouanga on the floor.

"I understand, Rachel."

"Bien, and when morning comes, you will tell don Cesar, should he ask, that you passed a very happy night."

"As you wish, but it will be the first time I have ever lied to my amo."

"There is always a first time. The second time you will find it less difficult."

"You are a strange woman, Rachel." Tamboura spoke with deep respect. "Why do you hate me so much? I have never done anything bad to you."

"Because you are a man, Tamboura, and I hate all men. It is not you I hate, only that vUe thing you possess."

"Others have not called it vile. Others have enjoyed it."

"But not I." She blew out the candle. "Take off your clothes or you will muss them and don Cesar will suspect that you have not undressed. Herel" In the darkness she reached up and took a robe from one of the nails. She threw it at him and he felt the soft cloth enveloping his face. "Sleep on that, it will soften the hardness of the floor a little."

"Take away the ouanga, Rachel," he pleaded. "I fear that if I sleep I might roll on the floor and touch it."

"It will not harm you, unless you cross it. Now sleep and I shall wake you in the morning."

Tamboura removed his clothes and folded them carefully as he had been taught to do, placing them on the chair. He spread the thin robe as close to the wall as possible and lay down. The whisper of the bed rope and the rustle of straw in the mattress were the only sounds of another person in

the room. Then there was silence, broken only by the hum of insects in the patio outside.

He sighed, wishing once again that he were back in the bohio of Mama Baba's with the delighted squeals, the harsh breathing, the raptured moaning, the smell of sweaty bodies near him. But he was not alone—for that he was grateful. For all the menace of the ouanga on the floor, Rachel was near and he was not alone. Now, lymg naked in the darkness, he was again free to indulge in the dream that had so satisfied him in the patio—the dream of white skin and black skin. Ayl let Rachel sleep on her bed, the other was with him and she was true, right under the same roof with him. Why should he desire the skinny mestiza who didn't want him when in his dreams white arms enfolded lum and pink lips touched his own. Ay, ay, ay! The vision mounted until it vanished m a long strangulated breath that drained his lungs. His hands fell to the floor. He slept

In her narrow bed, protected only by the httle bunch of chicken feathers tied with a red string, Rachel did not sleep. She lay still, scarcely moving all night until, in the first dim light of dawn, she looked across the room to where Tam-boura sprawled on the floor. She closed her eyes and shuddered. He was even worse than she had unagined.

"Thank you, Maman Erzulie," her lips moved silently in impassioned gratitude, "for protecting me this night. Protect me from him always and I shall repay you well." She fell; asleep and slept soundly after her long vigil.

Rachel was not the only one who found no rest that night.; Alix waited imtil don Cesar's sonorous snores assured her that he was sleeping soimdly. She edged carefully away from his paunchy body, loathing it, and thinking only of the muscled ebony that Rachel must be enjoying, for surely with; Tamboura beside her, she must have long since overcome her silly prejudices. Alix had a wild impulse to slip down the stairs and across the patio, into Rachel's room, order her to leave, and pre-empt her place beside Tamboura. But no, she must be careful and let her head not her heart rule her action.

She quit the bed slowly and noiselessly and sought the couch in the sala. Here she could think. She was certain her fertile brain would devise some plan whereby she could have don Cesar and Tamboura too. She must consider it well and she did. from all possible angles.

When dawn came she went barefooted out onto the balcon, down the stairs and across the chilly tiles of the patio. Should

she be seen, her excuse was already fabricated—she was ill and needed Rachel and Rachel had not answered the bell. But nobody saw her and she entered the kitchen and stopped to listen. In that moment of pause, she could identify Tam-boura's powerful breathing and between his deep respirations, those of Rachel. Her hand, trembling with expectancy of what she might see, raised the curtain. Rachel was lying on her bed, her hands folded across her chest, sleeping peacefully. Tamboura was stretched out on the floor with Rachel's robe wadded beneath him.

Alix stood in the doorway, caressing his black body with her eyes. Mon Dieu! Did her eyes deceive her? Was this true? Could such a miracle be real? Her fingers itched to prove by touch the overwhelming evidence that her eyes saw. The man was sleeping soundly and he would never know. Her feet made no noise on the tiles as she advanced two steps into the room and stood over him. She knelt, reaching down one hand. And now, having touched, could she ever relinquish her hold? She must, she must, but she could not. Tam-boura's eyes opened slowly and she quickly withdrew her hand. Her finger, laid across her lips, commanded silence. He understood and smiled back at her. Then, without glancing back, she left, hurrying across the patio and up the stairs, through the sala and into her room. Don Cesar was still sleeping and she edged herself carefully back into the bed. Her plan was now fully formed, and she knew that nothing in heaven or hell, or on earth, could keep it from its eventual and, she hoped, quick fulfillment.

chapter xiv

Never in her life had Alix been more charming, possibly because she had never made so great an effort to please. Don Cesar was doubly enamored. Once he had been somewhat doubtful—as all wealthy men are wont to be when a yoimg and beautiful woman appears in their middle age. He had been afraid that Alix might be interested only in his money. But after her worry over his safety last night, and particularly after the imexpected j5re and passion which she had so willingly volunteered this morning and which had i left him quite breathless, his last doubts and fears were I dispelled. Now, with her undeniable beauty facing him across the breakfast table in her bedroom, he was sure that her love for him was genuine. He was certain that she would i grace the Finca Montalvo with all the dignity and beauty] he might demand from a Senora Montalvo. |

With Alix as his wife, he could even hope for another sot which would make up to him for the lone granddaughtd who was all that Gregorio and the priest-ridden Beatriz ha< produced for him. He knew there would never be any more for if Gregorio came within ten feet of the marriage bed Beatriz collapsed with one of her numerous ailments. With ai son by Alix, the Montalvo name would be carried on and the Finca Montalvo would not have to be changed to some name like Hernandez, or Alvarez or Gonzales, by the mar-r riage of his granddaughter. All Cuba would approve anq marvel at his marriage with a French condesa. It would enn rich the Montalvo blood and bring an authentic aristocracy to the Montalvo name which even the overbearing Spanis could not ignore. He must give the matter of marriage som^ very serious consideration. In the meantime and for this vei present moment, he would enjoy Alix.

They were served by a rather sullen Rachel who, despiti her long face, had assured don Cesar with all politeness that Tamboura had quitted himself most admirably; she

thanked him formally for his goodness in thinking of her. Alix tried hard to read some message in Rachel's impassive face. Had she enjoyed Tamboura or had she not? The question, however, would be answered when they were alone together. She was quite certain from the fact that Tamboura was on the floor when she had spied on them, that Rachel was still untouched. She hoped so. From now on, she was determined to share Tamboura with nobody. But first the foundations of her plan must be carefully laid.

The thin pink robe de chambre she was wearing was a most important part of her plan and she could sense that it was already producing the desired results on don Cesar. For all the ardor that she had inspired in him an hour ago, she could see that another wave was beginning to rise. His eyes were curiously glazed and his tongue kept continuously making the circuit of his lips. With a graceful gesture, she poured him a steaming cup of coffee from the silver urn, taking care to let the thin sleeves fall away from her arms and bending just enough to give him a glimpse of her breasts. As though she had been serving him for many years, she added hot milk in the quantity she knew he favored with the three spoonfuls of sugar he liked, and handed the cup to him, realizing that it made a touching picture of domestic bliss. With a pretty little wrapping of the thin robe around her, she rose and took a pillow from the bed and placed it at his feet, only to sink down upon it, her head against his knees, her face looking up at him most demurely and her hand resting warm and provocative on his linen-clad leg.

"Querido mio." In any other woman it would have been a kitten-like purring but Alix was a more consummate actress. "Could any woman ask for more than this? You and I here togetherl I rich in my happiness and you—I hope —in yours. Ay, Cesar, I wonder if you have any idea of just how much I really love you."

"I think you showed me this morning, mi alma. After that could I ever doubt you?"

"You shall never need to, C6sar. But something is worrying me and I would hesitate to tell you if it were not. . . ." Her hand fluttered on his leg and she snuggled up even closer to him, sighing contentedly.

"If it were not for what, Alix?" He sipped the coffee, which was exactly to his taste. Caramba! Few women knew how a man liked his coffee. His first wife had always put in too much milk.

"If it were not for your generosity, querido, which is al-l ready too great, and if it were not for the fact that last night you promised me an emerald ring in return for Rachel's baby, if it comes—"

"Do not concern yourself about that, Alix," he smiled. "It's as good as yours in another nine or ten months. That Tamboura never fails."

The pink lips pursed themselves in a pretty little moue which Alix knew Cesar would find most charming. "But I do not want or need the emerald, Cesjir. It is frightfully expensive. Oh, it is a pretty bauble and it would be most becoming on my finger but there is something I need far more and I need it so badly I cannot wait nine months for it. It costs much less than the emerald so I am emboldened to ask for it."

"And what does my Alix need that she doesn't already have?" His gratifying experience of the morning, so unanticipated and so freely given, had made him indulgent.

"A volante, dearest, and a slave to drive it. Have you any idea of how difficult it is always to have to ride in a hired carriage; to sit on greasy upholstery which perhaps some woman of the streets has sat on only five minutes before; to entrust myself to strange drivers? Whenever I go out it is the same story. Rachel must run down the street to find a stray vehicle and always, yes, always, Cesar, it turns out to be a ramshackle afifair with rope traces and some evil-visaged black cochero who frightens me nearly to death if we leave the city gates. Oh, Cesar, since those terrible things in St, Domingue, all niggers frighten me." Her underlip started to tremble and she managed to squeeze out one large, perfectly formed tear which trickled slowly down her cheek.

"Hush, darling, I know, I know."

"But you cannot know, Cesar. You did not see the brutisl lust on those black faces. You did not see them hack at m^ husband with their machetes. You did not have to run fron them in terror of your life and hide from them, expecting every minute to be discovered and used by one and anothei and another in their unbridled brutality."

"But darling, if you have a carriage, you will have to hav« somebody to drive it and although Rachel seems most cap^ able, she could hardly do that." He had already decided in his own mind to give her the carriage. It was little enough to repay the joy she had so recently given him. "I do agree with you that a woman of your position does need her own

carriage. It was stupid of me not to think of it before."

"No, Cesar, for you already knew my aversion to having a male slave around the house and yet lately I have felt most insecure here while you were away—just Rachel and me, alone and unprotected. Why, darling, the other night a crowd of drunken young men came out of the Mendoza palace after the verbena on your aunt's saint day. They were roistering in the streets, shook the gates of the patio so that I thought they would part from the hinges, all the time shouting and demanding admittance. I was petrified, fearing that perhaps Rachel might have forgotten to lock the gates, but of course she had attended to them. Yet I could not help but think what might have happened had they been left unlocked. My position here in Havana is, to say the least, equivocal. Alone, a foreigner and unprotected."