The Hour and the Man Part 10

"However that may be, your immediate danger is from the Spaniards--is it?"

"Yes, I discovered that I was to be sent over the line to-morrow; so I was obliged to get here to-day in any way I could; and there was no other way than--pah! it was horrid!"

"No other way than by looking like a negro," said Toussaint, calmly.

"Well, now you are here, what do you mean to do next?"

"I mean, by your influence with General Hermona, to obtain protection to a port, that I may proceed to Europe. I do not care whether I go from Saint Domingo, or by Saint Iago, so as to sail from Port Plate. I could find a vessel from either port. You would have no difficulty in persuading General Hermona to this?"

"I hope not, as he voluntarily gave you permission to enter his territory. I will ask for his safe-conduct in the morning. To-night you are safe, if you remain here. I request that you will take possession of the inner apartment, and rely upon my protection."

"Thankyou. I knew my best way was to come here," said Papalier, rising.

"Therese will bring me some refreshment; and then I shall be glad of rest, for we travelled half last night."

"For how many shall the safe-conduct be?" asked Toussaint, who had also risen. "For yourself alone, or more?"

"No one knows better than you," said Papalier, hastily, "that I have only one servant left," pointing again to the couch. "And," lowering his voice, so that Therese could not hear, "she, poor thing, is dreadfully altered, you see--has never got over the loss of her child, that night." Then, raising his voice again, he pursued: "My daughters at Paris will be glad to see Therese, I know; and she will like Paris, as everybody does. All my other people are irrecoverable, I fear; but Therese goes with me."

"No," said Therese, from the conch, "I will go nowhere with you."

"Hey-day! what is that?" said Papalier, turning in the direction of the voice. "Yes, you will go, my dear. You are tired to-night, as you well may be. You feel as I do--as if you could not go anywhere, to-morrow or the next day. But we shall be rested and ready enough, when the time comes."

"I am ready at this moment to go anywhere else--anywhere away from you,"

replied Therese.

"What do you mean, Therese?" asked her master, sharply.

"I mean what you said just now--that I hate you."

"Oh! silence!" exclaimed Toussaint. He then added in a mild tone to Therese, "This is my house, in which G.o.d is wors.h.i.+pped and Christ adored, and where therefore no words of hatred may be spoken." He then addressed himself to Papalier, saying, "You have then fully resolved that it is less dangerous to commit yourself to the Spaniards than to attempt to reach Cap?"

"To reach Cap! What! after the decree? Upon my soul, Toussaint, I never doubted you yet; but if--"

He looked Toussaint full in the face.

"I betray no one," said Toussaint. "What decree do you speak of?"

"That of the Convention of the 4th of February last."

"I have not heard of it."

"Then it is as I hoped--that decree is not considered here as of any importance. I trusted it would be so. It is merely a decree of the Convention, confirming and proclaiming the liberty of the negroes, and declaring the colony henceforth an integrant part of France. It is a piece of folly and nonsense, as you will see at once; for it can never be enforced. No one of any sense will regard it; but just at present it has the effect, you see, of making it out of the question for me to cross the frontier."

"True," said Toussaint, in a voice which made Papalier look in his face, which was working with some strong emotion. He turned away from the light, and desired Therese to follow him. He would commit her to the charge of one of the suttlers' wives for the night.

Having put on the table such fruit, bread, and wine as remained from his own meal (Papalier forbidding further preparation, for fear of exciting observation without), Toussaint went out with Therese, committed her to safe hands, and then entered the tent next his own, inhabited by his sons, and gave them his accustomed blessing. On his return, he found that Papalier had retired.

Toussaint was glad to be alone. Never had he more needed solitude; for rarely, if ever, in the course of his life, had his calm soul been so disturbed. During the last words spoken by Papalier, a conviction had flashed across him, more vivid and more tremendous than any lightning which the skies of December had sent forth to startle the bodily eye; and amidst the storm which those words had roused within him, that conviction continued to glare forth at intervals, refusing to be quenched. It was this--that if it were indeed true that the revolutionary government of France had decreed to the negroes the freedom and rights of citizens.h.i.+p, to tight against the revolutionary government would be henceforth to fight against the freedom and rights of his race. The consequences of such a conviction were overpowering to his imagination. As one inference after another presented itself before him--as a long array of humiliations and perplexities showed themselves in the future--he felt as if his heart were bursting. For hour after hour of that night he paced the floor of his tent; and if he rested his limbs, so unused to tremble with fear or toil, it was while covering his face with his hands, as if even the light of the lamp disturbed the intensity of his meditation. A few hours may, at certain crises of the human mind and lot, do the work of years; and this night carried on the education of the n.o.ble soul, long repressed by slavery, to a point of insight which mult.i.tudes do not reach in a lifetime. No doubt, the preparation had been making through years of forbearance and meditation, and through the latter mouths of enterprise and activity; but yet, the change of views and purposes was so great as to make him feel, between night and morning, as if he were another man.

The lamp burned out, and there was no light but from the brilliant flies, a few of which had found their way into the tent. Toussaint made his repeater strike: it was three o'clock. As his mind grew calm under the settlement of his purposes, he became aware of the thirst which his agitation had excited. By the light of the flitting tapers, he poured out water, refreshed himself with a deep draught, and then addressed himself to his duty. He could rarely endure delay in acting on his convictions. The present was a case in which delay was treachery; and he would not lose an hour. He would call up Father Laxabon, and open his mind to him, that he might be ready for action when the camp should awake.

As he drew aside the curtain of the tent, the air felt fresh to his heated brow, and, with the calm starlight, seemed to breathe strength and quietness into his soul. He stood for a moment listening to the dash and gurgle of the river, as it ran past the camp--the voice of waters, so loud to the listening ear, but so little heeded amidst the hum of the busy hours of day. It now rose above the chirpings and buzzings of reptiles and insects, and carried music to the ear and spirit of him who had so often listened at Breda to the fall of water in the night hours, with a mind unburdened and unperplexed with duties and with cares. The sentinel stopped before the tent with a start which made his arms ring at seeing the entrance open, and some one standing there.

"Watch that no one enters?" said Toussaint to him. "Send for me to Father Laxabon's, if I am wanted."

As he entered the tent of the priest--a tent so small as to contain only one apartment--all seemed dark. Laxabon slept so soundly as not to awake till Toussaint had found the tinder-box, and was striking a light.

"In the name of Christ, who is there?" cried Laxabon.

"I, Toussaint Breda; entreating your pardon, father."

"Why are you here, my son? There is some misfortune, by your face. You look wearied and anxious. What is it?"

"No misfortune, father, and no crime. But my mind is anxious, and I have ventured to break your rest. You will pardon me?"

"You do right, my son. We are ready for service, in season and out of season."

While saying this, the priest had risen, and thrown on his morning-gown.

He now seated himself at the table, saying--

"Let us hear. What is this affair of haste?"

"The cause of my haste is this--that I may probably not again have conversation with you, father; and I desire to confess, and be absolved by you once more."

"Good. Some dangerous expedition--is it not so?"

"No. The affair is personal altogether. Have you heard of any decree of the French Convention by which the negroes--the slaves--of the colony of Saint Domingo are freely accepted as fellow-citizens, and the colony declared an integrant part of France?"

"Surely I have. The General was speaking of it last night; and I brought away a copy of the proclamation consequent upon it. Let me see," said he, rising, and taking up the lamp, "where did I put that proclamation?"

"With your sacred books, perhaps, father; for it is a gospel to me and my race."

"Do you think it of so much importance?" asked Laxabon, returning to the table with the newspaper containing the proclamation, officially given.

"The General does not seem to think much of it, nor does Jean Francais."

"To a commander of our allies the affair may appear a trifle, father; and such white planters as cannot refuse to hear the tidings may scoff at them; but Jean Francais, a negro and a slave--is it possible that he makes light of this?"

"He does; but he has read it, and you have not. Read it, my son, and without prejudice."

Toussaint read it again and again.

"Well!" said the priest, as Toussaint put down the paper, no longer attempting to hide with it the streaming tears which covered his face.

"Father," said he, commanding his voice completely, "is there not hope, that if men, weakened and blinded by degradation, mistake their duty when the time for duty comes, they will be forgiven?"

"In what case, my son? Explain yourself."

"If I, hitherto a slave, and wanting, therefore, the wisdom of a free man, find myself engaged on the wrong side--fighting against the providence of G.o.d--is there not hope that I may be forgiven on turning to the right?"