What Became of the White Savage (21 page)

My interlocutors were careful not to press their arguments any further and I surmised that this meeting had been carefully prepared in advance by the three interested parties. As befitted the tenor of the exchange, I took my time to absorb the implications and did not offer an immediate response. The curate went to the cabinet to select a bottle of liqueur and we joined together in lamenting the fate of the unfortunate Narcisse.

When I had finished my drink, I ventured a cautious suggestion; it was not rejected and the discussions were deferred for the evening, to be concluded at a more convenient time. My hosts understood that I had discerned their meaning: they wanted Narcisse to leave with me.

He would of course always be welcome in Saint-Gilles, as would I. Old Monsieur Pelletier was careful to stress that Narcisse would naturally be entitled to his share of the family inheritance.

In any case, there was no need to make a decision immediately. We would have to wait and see how matters evolved: it had been a mere five months since Narcisse had returned to the white man’s world, a week since his arrival in France and he had only been in Saint-Gilles for one day. The important presentation of which I had informed them, and of which they felt great pride on Narcisse’s behalf, meant that we would soon be leaving for Paris. There was no pressing need to come to any decisions.

Although initially unconvinced, I found myself in agreement. For eighteen years, family life had continued without Narcisse. He had been pronounced dead and all had grieved for him. The cycle of the seasons had passed many times in his absence. The child that Narcisse had been, the three year old who spent most of his days in his uncle’s arms, meant more to Narcisse’s father than this grown man returned from beyond the River Styx.

We parted on friendly terms and I stepped outside to enjoy the soft night air and take a turn around the sleeping village. The crescent moon was rising above the church. I walked as far as the river and on my way back, as I approached the church I came upon Narcisse, kneeling in a ditch, weeping and vomiting. He told me, between sobs, that he had gone with his three childhood friends to the café where he had finally accepted the glass of wine they had been pressing upon him since that morning. And then he had accepted another and another, he’d lost count. The three revellers had tired of Narcisse’s reticence, finding him no more communicative even when in his cups and had gone off in search of wine elsewhere, leaving him alone and before long, sick. I helped him to get up and clean himself off and tried to console him. But he did not need consoling; as far as I could tell, he was not feeling any shame or regret. Such sentiments were entirely foreign to him. He wished only to understand what had happened and I explained to him as best as I could. The others were drinking wine, enjoying it in great quantities, but Narcisse was unable to tolerate it. For him, wine was akin to poison, and made his head spin. His old friends had not wished him any harm; they had simply not understood. He had a headache now, but it would be gone by tomorrow. Abstinence suited him and he should continue to abjure wine. My remarks seemed to calm him. I took him back to his parents’ house, where they were waiting for him, and left discreetly.

Narcisse had been offered wine before, in the governor’s prison by a soldier intent on making mischief. He had refused it then and I wondered if he remembered it now.

Last night, as I lay in bed in my modest quarters in the rectory, sleep eluded me for a long time. I pictured Narcisse being sick in the ditch outside the church, weeping for his adoptive mother that day in the hotel in London, repelling Bill’s advances in our retreat outside of Sydney, escaping to the far side of the garden in the governor’s residence in Sydney to catch a glimpse of the sea beyond the walls. An astonishing idea came to me: what if I had been wrong from the outset? What if the right decision would have been to hire a vessel, whether the governor approved or not, and return Narcisse to the beach where the whole affair had begun?

An absurd notion of course: who would be so hard-hearted as to return to his cell a man who has escaped from a prison so perverse and cruel that the prisoner no longer sees it for what it is. To send Narcisse back after these weeks spent in the white man’s world would have been to plunge him for a second time into a world that was not his. Would he have been strong enough to forget the
John Bell
and the dinghy, the port of Sydney, my recitations of Racine, the European clothes and food? Would he have been able to return to life with the tribe, to become completely a savage once again? No, such cruelty would have been inhuman, barbarous. The path that Narcisse follows must be pursued in one direction only, upwards towards the heights. We must never forget that this is not an easy path and that Narcisse has nothing to guide him. Like Ulysses, he must overcome a thousand trials before his return to Ithaca. So it must be. Narcisse is not a child, and I had never promised him that his road would be easy.

He is suffering from a headache today, but what does this matter when weighed up against all that is at stake?

Next Tuesday, I shall introduce you to Narcisse Pelletier and you will be able to judge for yourself how much progress has been made.

I remain your faithful servant…

When he had first signed on as a cabin boy his father had gone with him to Nantes. It had taken them two days to get there, trundling through the countryside in an uncomfortable wagon. He’d spent most of that time staring avidly out of the window at the scenery unfolding before them, clutching his bag tightly with both hands. His father spoke little to him, and then only to repeat his advice to obey orders and work hard, or to wonder aloud about the price and quality of the various leathers he wanted to buy for the workshop.

His mother had made him a cake. It would keep for a while, she said, and he would be able to take a bite of it in the evenings when he felt overcome with homesickness. She had hugged him for a long time, something that he was not used to. His mind turned to the traveller’s tales his uncle had told him: how he had been a grenadier in Napoleon’s Grande Armée and walked across most of Europe before being injured in Prussia at the Battle of Eylau, and coming back to the village. Thinking of this only served to convince Narcisse that he had made the right choice. He was always arguing with his older brother, he had no desire to become a cobbler or a farmhand. There was no future for him on land.

They’d stayed with a cousin in Nantes. His father had given the cake to her, claiming that it would only have made Narcisse a laughing stock with the crew, the little cabin boy allaying his sorrows with his mummy’s cake. There would be no comforts for him aboard ship and he might as well get used to it from the moment they set sail.

He gazed in amazement at the elegant houses and churches in Nantes, at the throngs of people and the ladies’ dresses. But most of all, he marvelled at the spectacle of the port: ships as far as the eye could see, their masts as high as trees, carts, ropes, casks, hoists, porters, piles of merchandise and wood, sailors speaking in a babel of tongues, a black man, the first he had ever seen with his own eyes.

His father bought him a pair of trousers and an oilcoat from a second-hand-clothes merchant before taking him to be introduced to the captain of the brig
La Fidèle
. He was immediately handed over to the bosun, who was busy with preparations for the next day’s departure and had no time for the clumsy cabin boy and his gauche father. He showed Narcisse his hammock, told him where to stow his effects and went off to oversee the loading of the freight.

Narcisse had been expecting to sleep that night at his cousin’s house, but his father ordered him to stay on board the brig. He should spend his first night there, watching and learning. The earlier he learned to settle in the better. He embraced his son, and pulling a hat out of his pocket, placed it on the boy’s head and walked away without turning back.

How different it all would have been if Narcisse had hit out at the second mate, or if he’d feigned madness, rolling his eyes, drooling and jabbering nonsense. What if he’d thrown himself into the Loire or fallen down in the ’tweendecks and broken his leg? If he’d come out in a rash and suddenly started coughing and spitting up green mucus, or if he’d broken in to the captain’s cabin and helped himself to all the bottles of alcohol? Or if, snivelling and beset by dark forebodings, he’d simply turned round and left with his father, if he’d abandoned this ship and all that was to come after it…? But no, he’d done none of these things. Like a child discovering a new playground, he’d explored every corner of the ship. When the bosun saw him sauntering about with this hands in his pockets, he’d given him various small tasks to do – relaying an order, carrying a trunk, bringing a bucket and brushes, sweeping the bridge – he had ceased to be Narcisse Pelletier. He was the ship’s cabin boy now. And like every cabin boy before him, he was castigated by the old hands for being caught out by the vast repertoire of technical sailing terms: was there ever such a numbskull for a cabin boy! But he knew this was par for the course. The afternoon passed in a flash and before he knew it the evening soup was being served. That first night in his hammock in the belly of the docked ship he slept a deep and dreamless sleep.

The next day the new cabin boy scurried around amidst all the excitement of the preparations to get the ship under way. The last of the sailors came aboard, some of them looking the worse for wear, with furred tongues and strained features. His father did not return. At three o’clock that afternoon, as the tide went out and a light breeze picked up, the captain gave the order to cast off from the moorings. The other more experienced cabin boy took the new lad under his wing and showed him the ropes.

And so the days and weeks went by – port after port, sailing to one after another.

He should have jumped ship in the Cape. With a bit of luck, a modicum of skill and a few years of hard work he’d have been able to open a tavern there. Before long, it would have become a favourite haunt for all the French seamen who put in at the Cape. Chez Narcisse, with its shady terrace, lanterns suspended from the branches of the trees, the friendly landlord always ready to answer questions, jugs of good wine, a few musicians. And in the courtyard, the huts, each with a mat on the floor, a bed, a basin and a candle. The other side of the Pelletier business. His girls would have been the finest in the Cape, beautiful creatures full of life and ready to give pleasure at any time of the day or night. In his left ear, he would sport an impressive earring of real gold. The red lantern hanging above the tavern door would soon be famed across the oceans. And even if he’d failed in all these plans, even if he’d spent a few months or years lurking around the port, earning the smallest penny wherever he could, offering his services for the most menial of tasks, a petty thief, sleeping in a straw hut, happy to gnaw on a crust of bread given to him by a charitable fellow countryman, even then, he’d still have been right to jump ship in the Cape.

After the Cape the
Saint-Paul
had sailed southeast and headed into snowstorms and monstrous waves; for the first time in his life at sea he had been truly afraid. Why hadn’t he gone down to the hold at night with an auger, drilled holes in the hull and let the icy water come flooding in? He could have taken an axe to the rudder and smashed it. With the ship crippled, the captain would have had no choice but to turn back to the Cape. But the winds and the currents might have proved too strong and carried them further south towards those islands men spoke of in hushed tones. Treeless islands where giant birds nest and waterfalls tumble from basalt cliffs under leaden skies. They’d have struggled to run the ship to ground in some uncharted bay where they’d have built makeshift shelters with debris from the
Saint-Paul
. They’d have survived on what was left of the ship’s provisions and the seals they hunted; no one would know that he had sabotaged the ship. They’d have endured some difficult months, but the thirty men, with tools and everything they’d managed to salvage from the wreck, would have survived, eking out their meagre rations and clinging together to keep warm. The spring would have come, heralding the return of the American whalers and sealing ships that were everywhere in the southern oceans. One of the whalers would have discovered them by chance while exploring new hunting grounds and rescued them. He and his shipmates would have worked their passage, slaving away for six months and more. And eventually they would have landed safe and sound in America, in Rhode Island or Connecticut. Yes, sabotaging the
Saint-Paul
would have been the right thing to do.

His father had warned him about life at sea. There would be no comforts for him aboard ship.

And so Narcisse whiled away the afternoon, playing with Waiakh skipping stones across the water, and musing on what might have been.

Paris, 3rd September 1861

Monsieur le Président,

I write these lines to you today with conflicting emotions. Permit me to begin by saying what a great joy it was for me to find myself once again before you in your study today. It was a pleasure indeed to hear the warmth in your voice as you welcomed us and reiterated your compliments to me. What happiness to finally introduce you to Narcisse Pelletier, to hear you speaking to him and asking him questions with all the acuity of your perspective and your experience.

Perhaps we seemed a little ill-at-ease. I cannot deny that we conducted ourselves somewhat tentatively: Narcisse because he is shy and retiring by nature; and I because I was honoured to be accorded such a reception. Like a disciple in the presence of the master, I was anxious to hear what you had to say. My initial reserve was perhaps excessive, but I believe that during the course of the long audience you granted us, I did gradually depart from that reticence.

The principal difficulty is one which you yourself experienced. How to prompt Narcisse to describe the tribe of savages amongst whom he lived for eighteen years? He does not respond to direct questions, for reasons which still confound me: he cannot have forgotten everything about the world he left only six months ago! It must therefore be either because he does not wish to speak of these matters or because he is not able to. Can he not find the words? Surely he would have no need of abstruse language to say something about the details of his everyday life, to talk of hunting, marriages, meals or celebrations. I am more inclined to believe that there is a complex feeling buried deep within him, which forbids him to speak, and which I am at a loss to understand. Indeed I have noticed that sometimes, particularly in the heat of emotion, he lets slip a few morsels of precious information, almost in spite of himself, or so it would seem. I make a note of each of these revelations and try to make sense of them. It is of course too early yet to say, but it is not impossible that all this laborious work will some day form the basis of an academic study.