A Troubled Dawn
Maribé just woke up with a start.
For a while something has been going on outside. She tries to catch my eye, but my gaze is riveted to my notebook. She checks that the door and windows are properly shut. She scurries around the whole house. I tell her to stay calm. She knows I won’t budge from my corner for any reason whatsoever.
I have to finish this book; it needs to happen.
I’ve hardly slept at all since yesterday evening. I woke a number of times in the night with images of Mam’Soko and her hasty burial. She was smiling at me. She was coming toward me. Her cane was gone, and she had recovered from her chronic rheumatism. Her head was swathed in a sort of light. Her feet did not touch the ground. The old lady was levitating, arms spread. Behind her I could see the shade of her husband, the chief and hunter Massengo. A tall, thin, slightly stooped man. But I couldn’t make out the features of his face.
In the same night, several times I touched the photograph of Christiane and Gaston. They spoke to me. At times it seemed to me that Christiane had her eyes closed and that Gaston was telling me to leave this house at once. I turned to look at the image, which I’d fastened to the wall. I was thirsty; I couldn’t stop drinking. I raised the gourd over my head, and the water flowed down my chest. My forehead was streaming with sweat, as if I were climbing a mountain. I was shaking. My feet no longer supported me. So I turned around and around and bit my pencil. I checked that things were in order for our departure the next day. All was confusion inside me; it was as if I was plunged in dizziness. I heard noise, voices, footsteps. Then I went back to my corner to carry on writing this notebook. I lacked inspiration. Gaps in my memory yawned. I flipped through the pages, reread aloud what I’d just written. For the first time I’d crossed out so much that nothing was legible. I tore out those pages, then recopied them diligently. I used several candles, which burned down one after another. I knew I wouldn’t be able to sleep that night, the last.
It must be about six in the morning.
This is the time we planned to leave.
The earth is moving, as if our house were about to collapse at any moment. The sound we hear outside is not the crows, even though it’s coming from the sky. It’s deafening. It sounds like iron clanking. Motors working in fits and starts.
I’m not mistaken: it’s a helicopter that has just touched down near the entrance to Louboulou. We can also hear automobile horns on the other side of the village. Jeeps, for sure.
Maribé peeps through a chink in the window that looks out onto the main road.
“They’re here! They’re here!” she exclaims.
Volleys of gunfire sound close by. It’s a way the Negro Grandsons have of announcing themselves. Firing in the air.
Maribé is crying.
She comes toward me. I remain impassive, my eyes still fixed on my notebook. I don’t know why, but I consider it a weapon, a shield against those who are about to burst into this house.
“Mâ, they’re here!”
“I know, Maribé, I know. We’ve lost, but I’ve not said my last word. They’ll find me sitting down, the way they found Christiane the day after they’d committed their barbaric acts. I will not leave the house. I’m doing it for Christiane, my friend, my sister, who showed me what courage is. The time has surely come for me, but not for you. I don’t see how fate could throw you to the ravenous lions. Quick, climb out the back window and hide by Mam’Soko’s grave. The old lady will protect you against these fanatics, I’m telling you. Once they leave the village, walk, keep walking, and one day you’ll make it to Pointe-Rouge, then Oweto. Don’t worry about me. Go now.”
“No, I won’t leave you alone here!”
“No, Maribé! This is not the time to disobey me! You are the proof of my existence on this earth. You’ll make it, but without me at your side. I’m going to give you this notebook, you’ll take it with you. And you’ll take the photograph of Christiane and Gaston. Behind the frame there’s an important slip of paper: it’s the address for Léopold Mpassi-Mpassi, who I don’t know. He’s Christiane’s brother. At least he’ll know what happened to his sister, even if he’s turned his back on the country. At the first opportunity you have, send this notebook to him in France.”
Scribbling My Last Words
Maribé is weeping.
I can hear war cries from relentless men. I try to scribble my last words.
Have I told everything? I don’t think so. There’ll always be things to add. I could spend my whole life writing our story. I really must stop.
I take the photo of Gaston and Christiane from the wall. They’re sad. Perhaps they don’t approve of what I’m doing. Their image is in front of me. I turn it over. There’s Léopold Mpassi-Mpassi’s address: Rue du Congo, 75012 Paris. I don’t know Léopold Mpassi-Mpassi’s house number, but Christiane, who worked for a long time in the post office, often said that the French are good at finding a residence.
I have the feeling that my notebook will make it to France and that Léopold Mpassi-Mpassi, despite what Christiane told me about him, will take the time to read it and to have many other people read it. With that in mind, I’m accompanying these pages with a general word of introduction to our country, Vietongo, in case those who read what I’ve written have trouble locating it on a map of the continent . . .
A Title for This Notebook
Maribé is crying more and more.
I get up. I hear footsteps in front of the house. They’re here. They’re trying to break down the door.
Maribé cracks open the window. She slips nimbly outside. I’m handing her the photo of Christiane and Gaston, the scrap of paper from Léopold Mpassi-Mpassi, and this notebook. I write on it the first title that comes to mind:
The Negro Grandsons of Vercingetorix . . .