The Grandissimes Part 35

And then he said--and the echo came back from the Cannes Brulees--that the very bottom culpability of this thing rested on the Grandissimes, and specifically on their fugleman Agricola, through his putting the h.e.l.lish African upon him. Moreover, fever and death, to a degree unknown before, fell upon his slaves. Those to whom life was spared--but to whom strength did not return--wandered about the place like scarecrows, looking for shelter, and made the very air dismal with the reiteration, "_No' ouanga_ (we are bewitched), _Bras-Coupe fe moi des grigis_ (the voudou's spells are on me)." The ripple of song was hushed and the flowers fell upon the floor.

"I have heard an English maxim," wrote Colonel De Grapion to his kinsman, "which I would recommend you to put into practice--'Fight the devil with fire.'"

No, he would not recognize devils as belligerents.

But if Rome commissioned exorcists, could not he employ one?

No, he would not! If his hounds could not catch Bras-Coupe, why, let him go. The overseer tried the hounds once more and came home with the best one across his saddle-bow, an arrow run half through its side.

Once the blacks attempted by certain familiar rum-pourings and nocturnal charm-singing to lift the curse; but the moment the master heard the wild monotone of their infernal wors.h.i.+p, he stopped it with a word.

Early in February came the spring, and with it some resurrection of hope and courage. It may have been--it certainly was, in part--because young Honore Grandissime had returned. He was like the sun's warmth wherever he went; and the other Honore was like his shadow. The fairer one quickly saw the meaning of these things, hastened to cheer the young don with hopes of a better future, and to effect, if he could, the restoration of Bras-Coupe to his master's favor. But this latter effort was an idle one. He had long sittings with his uncle Agricola to the same end, but they always ended fruitless and often angrily.

His dark half-brother had seen Palmyre and loved her. Honore would gladly have solved one or two riddles by effecting their honorable union in marriage. The previous ceremony on the Grandissime back piazza need be no impediment; all slave-owners understood those things. Following Honore's advice, the f.m.c., who had come into possession of his paternal portion, sent to Cannes Brulees a written offer, to buy Palmyre at any price that her master might name, stating his intention to free her and make her his wife. Colonel De Grapion could hardly hope to settle Palmyre's fate more satisfactorily, yet he could not forego an opportunity to indulge his pride by following up the threat he had hung over Agricola to kill whosoever should give Palmyre to a black man. He referred the subject and the would-be purchaser to him. It would open up to the old braggart a line of retreat, thought the planter of the Cannes Brulees.

But the idea of retreat had left Citizen Fusilier.

"She is already married," said he to M. Honore Grandissime, f.m.c. "She is the lawful wife of Bras-Coupe; and what G.o.d has joined together let no man put asunder. You know it, sirrah. You did this for impudence, to make a show of your wealth. You intended it as an insinuation of equality. I overlook the impertinence for the sake of the man whose white blood you carry; but h-mark you, if ever you bring your Parisian airs and self-sufficient face on a level with mine again, h-I will slap it."

The quadroon, three nights after, was so indiscreet as to give him the opportunity, and he did it--at that quadroon ball to which Dr. Keene alluded in talking to Frowenfeld.

But Don Jose, we say, plucked up new spirit..

"Last year's disasters were but fortune's freaks," he said. "See, others' crops have failed all about us."

The overseer shook his head.

"_C'est ce maudit cocodri' la bas_ (It is that accursed alligator, Bras-Coupe, down yonder in the swamp)."

And by and by the master was again smitten with the same belief. He and his neighbors put in their crops afresh. The spring waned, summer pa.s.sed, the fevers returned, the year wore round, but no harvest smiled.

"Alas!" cried the planters, "we are all poor men!" The worst among the worst were the fields of Bras-Coupe's master--parched and shrivelled.

"He does not understand planting," said his neighbors; "neither does his overseer. Maybe, too, it is true as he says, that he is voudoued."

One day at high noon the master was taken sick with fever.

The third noon after--the sad wife sitting by the bedside--suddenly, right in the centre of the room, with the door open behind him, stood the magnificent, half-nude form of Bras-Coupe. He did not fall down as the mistress's eyes met his, though all his flesh quivered. The master was lying with his eyes closed. The fever had done a fearful three days' work.

"_Mioko-Koanga oule so' femme_ (Bras-Coupe wants his wife)."

The master started wildly and stared upon his slave.

"_Bras-Coupe oule so' femme_!" repeated the black.

"Seize him!" cried the sick man, trying to rise.

But, though several servants had ventured in with frightened faces, none dared molest the giant. The master turned his entreating eyes upon his wife, but she seemed stunned, and only covered her face with her hands and sat as if paralyzed by a foreknowledge of what was coming.

Bras-Coupe lifted his great black palm and commenced:

"_Mo ce voudrai que la maison ci la, et tout ca qui pas femme' ici, s'raient encore maudits_! (May this house, and all in it who are not women, be accursed)."

The master fell back upon his pillow with a groan of helpless wrath.

The African pointed his finger through the open window.

"May its fields not know the plough nor nourish the herds that overrun it."

The domestics, who had thus far stood their ground, suddenly rushed from the room like stampeded cattle, and at that moment appeared Palmyre.

"Speak to him," faintly cried the panting invalid.

She went firmly up to her husband and lifted her hand. With an easy motion, but quick as lightning, as a lion sets foot on a dog, he caught her by the arm.

"_Bras-Coupe oule so' femme_," he said, and just then Palmyre would have gone with him to the equator.

"You shall not have her!" gasped the master.

The African seemed to rise in height, and still holding his wife at arm's length, resumed his malediction:

"May weeds cover the ground until the air is full of their odor and the wild beasts of the forest come and lie down under their cover."

With a frantic effort the master lifted himself upon his elbow and extended his clenched fist in speechless defiance; but his brain reeled, his sight went out, and when again he saw, Palmyre and her mistress were bending over him, the overseer stood awkwardly by, and Bras-Coupe was gone.

The plantation became an invalid camp. The words of the voudou found fulfilment on every side. The plough went not out; the herds wandered through broken hedges from field to field and came up with staring bones and shrunken sides; a frenzied mob of weeds and thorns wrestled and throttled each other in a struggle for standing-room--rag-weed, smart-weed, sneeze-weed, bindweed, iron-weed--until the burning skies of midsummer checked their growth and crowned their unshorn tops with rank and dingy flowers.

"Why in the name of--St. Francis," asked the priest of the overseer, "didn't the senora use her power over the black scoundrel when he stood and cursed, that day?"

"Why, to tell you the truth, father," said the overseer, in a discreet whisper, "I can only suppose she thought Bras-Coupe had half a right to do it."

"Ah, ah, I see; like her brother Honore--looks at both sides of a question--a miserable practice; but why couldn't Palmyre use _her_ eyes?

They would have stopped him."

"Palmyre? Why Palmyre has become the best _monture_ (Plutonian medium) in the parish. Agricola Fusilier himself is afraid of her. Sir, I think sometimes Bras-Coupe is dead and his spirit has gone into Palmyre. She would rather add to his curse than take from it."

"Ah!" said the jovial divine, with a fat smile, "castigation would help her case; the whip is a great sanctifier. I fancy it would even make a Christian of the inexpugnable Bras-Coupe."

But Bras-Coupe kept beyond the reach alike of the lash and of the Latin Bible.

By and by came a man with a rumor, whom the overseer brought to the master's sick-room, to tell that an enterprising Frenchman was attempting to produce a new staple in Louisiana, one that worms would not annihilate. It was that year of history when the despairing planters saw ruin hovering so close over them that they cried to heaven for succor. Providence raised up etienne de Bore. "And if etienne is successful," cried the news-bearer, "and gets the juice of the sugar-cane to crystallize, so shall all of us, after him, and shall yet save our lands and homes. Oh, Senor, it will make you strong again to see these fields all cane and the long rows of negroes and negresses cutting it, while they sing their song of those droll African numerals, counting the canes they cut," and the bearer of good tidings sang them for very joy:

[Ill.u.s.tration: music]

An-o-que, An-o-bia, Bia-tail-la, Que-re-que, Nal-le-oua, Au-mon-de, Au-tap-o-te, Au-pe-to-te, Au-que-re-que, Bo.

"And Honore Grandissime is going to introduce it on his lands," said Don Jose.

"That is true," said Agricola Fusilier, coming in. Honore, the indefatigable peacemaker, had brought his uncle and his brother-in-law for the moment not only to speaking, but to friendly, terms.