The Witching Hour (59 page)

As for the household retinue, they are sleek, overly dressed, privileged, and audacious to hear the local merchants tell it; five maids alone attend Charlotte. Some sixteen slaves keep the kitchen; and no one knows how many maintain the parlors, music rooms, and ballrooms of the house. The famous Reginald accompanies the master everywhere that he goes, if he goes anywhere at all. And having much free time, these slaves appear often in Port-au-Prince, with gold in their pockets, at which time all shop doors are open to them.

It is Charlotte who is almost never seen away from this great preserve, which is named Maye Faire by the way, and this is always written in English as I have spelled it above, and never in French.

The lady has given two splendid balls since her arrival, during which her husband took a chair to view the dancing, and even the old man was in attendance, weak as he was. The local gentry, who think of nothing but pleasure in this place for there is not much else to think of, adore her for these two entertainments and long for others, with the certainty that Charlotte will not disappoint them.

Her own Negro musicians provided the music; the wine flowed without cease; exotic native dishes were offered, as well as splendid plain-cooked fowl and beef. Charlotte herself danced
with every gentleman present except of course her husband, who looked on approvingly. She herself put the wineglass to his lips.

As far as I am able to learn, this lady is called a witch only by her slaves and in awe and respect on account of her healing powers which have already gained a reputation but allow me to repeat—
no one here knows anything of the occurrence in France.
The name of Montcleve is never spoken by anyone. The history of this family is that it has come from Martinique.

It is said that Charlotte is most eager for all the planters to join together to create a sugar refinery here, so that they may reap higher profits from their crops. There is also much talk of driving our Dutch ships out of the Caribbean, as it seems we are still most prosperous, and the French and Spanish envy us. But no doubt you know more of that than I do, Stefan. I did see many Dutch ships in the port, and have no doubt that my return to Amsterdam will be a simple matter, as soon as my work here is done. As “a Dutch merchant” I am certainly treated with every courtesy.

This afternoon, when I grew tired of my meanderings, I came back here to my lodgings, where there are two slaves to undress me and bathe me if I should allow it, and I wrote to the lady and said that I should like to visit her, that I have a message for her which is of the utmost importance and comes from someone very dear to her, dearer perhaps than any other, who entrusted me with the proper address on the night before her death. I have come in person, I said, because my message was too important to be enclosed in a letter. I signed my full name.

Just before I began this entry, the reply arrived. I should come to Maye Faire this very evening. Indeed a carriage will be waiting for me at the entrance of the inn just before dark. I am to bring what provisions I need to stay the night, and the night after, as suits me. This I intend to do.

Stefan, I am most excited and not at all fearful. I know now, after having given it the greatest thought, that I go to see my own daughter. But how to make this known to her—whether to make it known—deeply troubles me.

I am strongly convinced that the tragedy of the Mayfair women will come to an end in this strange and fertile place, this rich and exotic land. It will come to an end here with this strong and clever young woman who has the world in her grasp, and surely has seen enough to know what her mother and her grandmother have suffered in their brief and tragic lives.

I go now to bathe and properly dress and prepare for this adventure. I do not mind at all that I shall see a great colonial plantation. Stefan, how shall I say what is in my heart? It is as
if my life before this were a thing painted in pale colors; but now it takes on the vibrancy of Rembrandt van Rijn.

I feel the darkness near me; I feel the light shining. And more keenly I feel the contrast between the two.

Until I pick up this pen again,

Post Script: copied out and sent by letter to Stefan Franck this same evening. PVA

Port-au-Prince  
Saint-Domingue

Dear Stefan,

It has been a full fortnight since I last wrote to you. How can I describe all that has taken place? I fear there is not time, my beloved friend—that my reprieve is short—yet I must write all of it. I must tell you what I have seen, what I have suffered, and what I have done.

It is late morning as I write this. I did sleep two hours upon my return to this inn. I have also eaten, but only that I may have a little strength. I hope and pray that the thing which has followed me here and tormented me on the long road from Maye Faire has at last returned to the witch who sent it after me, to drive me mad and destroy me, which I have not allowed it to do.

Stefan, if the fiend has not been defeated if the assault upon me is renewed with mortal vigor, I shall break off my narrative and give you the most important elements in simple sentences and close and seal this letter away in my iron box. I have already this very morning spoken to the innkeeper, that in the event of my demise he is to see that this box reaches Amsterdam. I have also spoken with a local agent here, cousin and friend to our agent in Marseille, and he is instructed to ask for the box.

Allow me to say, however, that on account of my appearance these two men believe me to be a madman. Only my gold commanded their attention, and they have been promised a rich reward upon delivery of the box and this letter into your hands.

Stefan, you were right in all your warnings and presentiments. I am sunk now deeper and deeper into this evil; I am beyond redemption. I should have come home to you. For the second time in my life I know the bitterness of regret.

I am now scarcely alive. My clothes are in tatters, my shoes broken and useless, my hands scratched by thorns. My head
aches from my long night of running through darkness. But there is no time to rest further. I dare not leave by ship this very hour, for if the thing means to come after me, it will do it here or at sea. And it is better that it make its assault on land so that my iron box will not be lost.

I must use what time I have left to recount all that has taken place … 

 … It was early evening on the day I last wrote to you when I left this place. I had dressed in my finest clothes and went down to meet the coach at the appointed time. All that I had seen in the streets of Port-au-Prince had prepared me for a splendid equipage, yet this surpassed my imaginings, being an exquisite glass carriage with footman, coachmen, and two armed guards on horseback, all of them black Africans, in full livery with powdered wigs and satin clothes.

The journey into the hills was most pleasant, the sky overhead stacked with high white clouds and the hills themselves covered with beautiful woodland and fine colonial dwellings, many surrounded by flowers, and the banana trees which grow here in abundance.

I do not think you can imagine the lushness of this landscape, for the tenderest hot house blooms grow here in wild profusion all year round. Great clumps of banana trees rise up everywhere. And so do giant red flowers upon slender stems which grow as high as trees.

No less enchanting were the sudden glimpses of the distant blue sea. If there is any sea as blue as the Caribbean I have never beheld it, and when it is seen at twilight, it is most spectacular, but then you will hear more of this later, for I have had much time to contemplate the color of this sea.

On the road I also passed two smaller plantation houses, very pleasing structures, set back from the road behind great gardens. And also just beside a small river, a graveyard laid out with fine marble monuments inscribed with French names. As we went very slowly over the little bridge I had time to contemplate it, and think about those who had come to live and die in this savage land.

I speak of these things for two reasons, the important one to state now being that my senses were lulled by the beauties I saw on this journey, and by the heavy moist twilight, and by the long stretch of tended fields and the sudden spectacle of Charlotte’s plantation house before me, grander than any I had beheld, at the end of a paved road.

It is a giant colonial-style mansion, and by that I mean it has a great pitched roof with many dormers, and beneath there are
porches stretching the length of it, supported by mud-brick columns which have been plastered over to look not unlike marble.

All of its many windows extend to the floor and are decorated with very green wooden shutters which can be bolted both against enemy attack and against storms.

A heady profusion of light came from the place as we approached. Never have I seen so many candles, not even at the French court. Lanterns were hung in the branches of the trees. As we drew nearer. I saw that every window was open to the porches both above and below, and I could see the chandeliers and the fine furnishings, and other bits of color gleaming in the dark.

So distracted was I by all this, that with a start I beheld the lady of the house, come out to the garden gate to see me, and standing among the many flowers, waiting, her lemon-colored satin dress very like the soft blooms that surrounded her, her eyes fixing me harshly and perhaps coldly in her young and tender face so that she appeared, if you can see it, a tall and angry child.

As I climbed down with the aid of the footman onto the purple flags, she drew closer, and only then did I judge her full height to be great for a woman, though she was much smaller than I.

Fair-haired and beautiful I found her, and so would anyone else looking at her, but the descriptions of her could not prepare me for the picture she presented. Ah, if Rembrandt had ever seen her, he would have painted her. So young yet so like hard metal. Very richly dressed she was, her gown ornamented with lace and pearls and displaying a high full bosom, half naked one might say, and her arms were beautifully shaped in their tight lace-trimmed sleeves.

Ah, I linger on every detail for I seek to understand my own weakness, and that you may forgive it. I am mad, Stefan, mad over what I have done. But please, when you and the others judge me, consider all that I have written here.

It seemed as we faced each other that something silent and frightening passed between us. This woman, her face sweet and youthful almost to an absurdity of tender cheeks and lips and large innocent blue eyes, studied me as if a very different soul lurked within her, old and wise. Her beauty worked like a spell upon me. I stared foolishly at her long neck, and at the tender slope of her shoulders and again at her shapely arms.

It struck me stupidly that it would be sweet to press my thumbs into the softness of her arms. And it did seem to me that she regarded me very much as her mother had regarded me many
year ago, when in the Scottish inn I had fought the devil of her beauty not to ravage her there.

“Ah, so, Petyr van Abel,” she said to me in English and with a touch of the Scottish to it, “you have come.” I swear to you, Stefan, it was Deborah’s youthful voice. How much they must have spoken together in English, why, it might have been a secret language for them.

“My child,” I answered, in the same language, “thank you for receiving me. I have made a long journey to see you, but nothing could have kept me away.”

But all the while she was coldly taking my measure, as surely as if I were a slave on the auction block, not disguising her appraisal as I had taken pains to disguise mine. And I was shocked by what I saw in her face, a thin nose and deep-set eyes, for all their size very like my own. Cheeks a little low and full, very like my own. And her hair, though it was a glorious mane of pale gold, brushed straight back from her forehead and held in place by a great jeweled comb, in color and texture very like my own.

A great sadness consumed me. She was my daughter. I knew that she was. And there came to me again that terrible regret I had known in Montcleve. I saw my Deborah, a broken puppet of white wax on the stones before the church of Saint-Michel.

Perhaps my sadness was felt by Charlotte, for a shadow fell over her countenance, and she seemed determined to defy this feeling as she spoke:

“You are as handsome as my mother told me,” she said, half musing, and half under her breath and with a slight raise of one eyebrow. “You are tall and straight and strong, and in the fullness of health, are you not?”

“Mon Dieu, madam. What strange words,” I said. I laughed uneasily. “I do not know whether you flatter me or not.”

“I like the look of you,” she said. And the strangest smile spread over her face, very clever and disdaining, yet at the same time childishly sweet. She gave a little bitter stretch to her lips as a child might do it, almost to a pout, it seemed, and I found this unspeakably charming. Then she seemed lost in contemplating me, and said finally: “Come with me, Petyr van Abel. Tell me what you know of my mother. Tell me what you know of her death. And whatever your purpose do not lie to me.”

And there seemed in her then a great vulnerability as if I might hurt her suddenly and she knew it, and was afraid.

I felt such tenderness for her. “No, I haven’t come to tell lies,” I said. “Have you heard nothing at all?”

She was silent, and then coldly she said: “Nothing,” as if she
were lying. I saw that she was scanning me in the very way that I have scanned others when trying to pry loose their secret thoughts.

She led me towards the house, bowing her head ever so slightly as she took my arm. Even the grace of her movements distracted me, and the brush of her skirts against my leg. She did not even look at the slaves who flanked the path, a very regiment of them, all holding lanterns to light our way. Beyond lay the flowers glimmering in the darkness, and the massive trees before the house.

We had all but reached the front steps when we turned and followed the flags into the trees, and there sought out a wooden bench.