Birth of a Dark Nation (32 page)

"I'll be right back," he said to us, as he
hopped out of the buggy, leaving Dominique and I behind. I held
onto the reins of our horse and waited patiently while Dominique
read a book.

The sound of thunderous hooves soon filled
the air as about a dozen horses clomped their way down the street.
Horses never traveled that fast in the city. Dominique and I turned
around to see the men on horses charging toward us. White hoods
obscured their faces.

"Augustin?! What do we do?!" Dominique
shrieked.

"Get down!" I shouted, covering her with my
body. I glanced overhead to see a single can of kerosene fly over
our heads. A rag was stuffed into the opening and it had already
been lit on fire.

The can crashed through the window of the
pharmacy, immediately causing an explosion.

"Ariori!" Dominique screamed. Our horse
bucked and neighed.

"Damn it!" I shouted, hopping out of the
buggy while the men in white rode off down the street. Chaos
erupted all around us as the fire quickly spread through the
pharmacy. It already billowed out of the shattered glass front and
the door.

"We have to go in there!" Dominique
screamed.

"You can't, Dominique, stay back!" She tried
to push past me, but I stopped her in her tracks.

"I said stay back! I'll run around to the
back and—"

Suddenly, another explosion rocked the block
and threw us both down to the ground. Glass, bricks, and wood
showered down all around us. Dominique was knocked unconscious. Our
horse had run down the street without us.

I looked back at the pharmacy. It was already
burned down to a shell.

"Ariori?" I whispered. I began to hear nearby
church bells ringing, sounding the alarm.

I picked up Dominique and carried her in my
arms. I ran as far as I could to get her to safety even as the fire
raged on behind me.

We reached Pontalba in minutes. Eşusanya,
Aborişade, and Ogundiya were already at the corner, peering down
the street to see where the fire was.

"Aragbaye! What the hell happened?" Eşusanya
said.

"The Klan," I said. "They got Ariori."

"What?! What do you mean they got him?"
Aborişade said.

"They firebombed the pharmacy while he was in
there. I had to get Dominique to safety. We've gotta go back."

Ogundiya took Dominique from me and carried
her upstairs.

"'Baye…how bad is it?" Aborişade asked.

"It's terrible," I said. My voice cracked and
I began to sob.

"No you don't," Eşusanya said, grabbing my
shoulder. "It ain't over yet. Let's go."

We ran back downtown to see that the New
Orleans Fire Department was already on the scene, battling the
blaze to the best of their ability. Some men were holding back the
crowd while others held the hose in front of the building, dousing
it in water.

"Let me through! My brother's in there!"
Eşusanya shouted as he tossed people aside in the crowd.

"There's a body in the doorway," one of the
ladies in the crowd shouted. The panicked crowd screamed and
stirred as the firefighters and police attempted to hold them
back.

Eşusanya and I broke through the crowd and
ran to the doorway.

On the floor was a corpse, blackened to a
crisp, with swaths of pink flesh peeking through the soot. On the
left hand of the corpse was a gold wedding band, lightly etched
with the symbols of my people.

"No," I said. "No, no, no, no, no!"

Eşusanya punched a hole in the already
brittle wall.

Aborişade broke through the crowd and looked
at Ariori's corpse in horror.

"No. It can't be him," he said.

"It is," I confirmed. "The ring."

"Boy, you can't be in there! This is a crime
scene!" a police officer shouted at us.

"Leave me be!" Aborişade commanded. The
officer immediately stepped back.

"We can't leave him here," Eşusanya said.
"There's still hope."

Ogundiya appeared with our errant horse and
buggy.

"Where's Dominique?" Aborişade asked as we
loaded Ariori's body onto the buggy.

"At the house. Sleeping," Ogundiya said
softly, observing Ariori's body.

"Good," Aborişade said. "She can't see him
like this. Ogundiya, there's still hope. We've got to get him to
his lab at New Orleans University. Aragbaye, try to feed him some
of your blood. Now! Let's go!"

Ogundiya took off and I punctured a vein in
my wrist. I put it against the place on Ariori's face that used to
have lips. The blood dropped in slowly.

"Anything?" Aborişade asked. I shook my head.
"He'll have equipment in his lab. Let's go, hurry!"

We reached New Orleans University in minutes,
rushing past the Negro doctors and nurses. We carefully laid his
body on a worktable and I searched for anything to help us make
this process easier.

Breaking into a drawer, I finally found his
syringes. I stabbed myself in the arm, collecting as much blood as
the syringe would carry. I removed it, and blood spurted until the
hole healed itself seconds later.

"Put it in his neck," Aborişade said. I tried
to find a vein…anywhere.

"Just stick it in!" Eşusanya yelled. I
blindly jabbed anywhere and pushed the blood through. It
immediately seeped out the back of his neck, through some
previously unseen hole.

"Damn!" Aborişade said. "Try it again, do
me!"

I used the same syringe and gathered
Aborişade's blood. This time, I injected it directly in Ariori's
chest. This time, it didn't seep out.

"Now what?" I asked.

"We wait," Aborişade said.

Hours passed. Ariori didn't move.

"Go get Dominique," Aborişade commanded
Ogundiya.

"No," Eşusanya said. "She can't see him like
this."

"I'm already here," she announced. We turned
around to see Dominique standing in the doorway to the laboratory
with Babarinde.

We all backed away from the table and stood
aside so that Dominique could pass. She took small steps toward
Ariori. Her dress was still covered in soot from the fire and her
pale face was stained by her tears. She sniffed and reached her
hand out to touch Ariori's chest.

"Look what they've done to you," she
whispered. "My beautiful, sweet Ariori. They've finally done it.
Taken you away from me once again. Don't they know we were meant to
be? You were my hero twice over. Gave me a new life on Dominica.
Showed me that real love didn't need the same language, or color,
or beliefs. Our only belief was in love and in each other. You made
me safe. It never mattered how dangerous things might be because I
was safe as long as I was with you. I'm sorry I couldn't protect
you, my love. I wish I could have done more."

She bent down and placed her soft lips on his
blackened remains, kissing him one last time.

"Our vengeance will be fleeting. But our love
will live forever."

She pulled a sheet over his face and walked
back to Babarinde.

"I will cry no more," she said. "The men who
did this to my husband must be punished."

~

Soon after the burial of our beloved brother
Ariori, Dominique devised the kidnapping of her former chaperone,
Carmen. She would be the only person who knew the truth about
Ariori's assassination.

"That bitch goes to mass every Sunday. She'll
be there. I promise," Dominique said. It was true—she hadn't shed a
single tear since she said goodbye to Ariori. Although she had been
removed from school, she kept herself busy by meeting with the
girls in the sorority she was creating. We weren't privy to what
they discussed, but we knew it was helping Dominique get through
the immense tragedy.

As for us? We just wanted revenge. And we
were happy to carry it out.

At the end of the early afternoon mass, we
assembled outside of St. Louis Cathedral in disguise. It was
Eşusanya's idea to dress in nun's habits.

Yes, nun's habits.

Carmen exited the church with the same smug
look on her pug face that she always had, with seemingly no care in
the world, no thought about the murder that she had
facilitated.

We quickly stood up from the bench outside
and walked toward her as she walked toward Bourbon Street.

Dominique led the way. We walked through
throngs of parishioners trying to make their way home and none even
suspected that we were just clean-shaven men in habits.

Dominique walked next to Carmen with her head
bent down. We were immediately behind them.

Carmen brushed up against Dominique.

"Excuse me, sister," she said politely.

"You're excused, you murderous cunt," she
replied.

"What?" Carmen faced Dominique's sinister,
smiling face.

Before she even had time to gasp, we came
behind her, covered her mouth, and spirited her down an alley where
our carriage was awaiting.

"Make a sound and I will fillet you, my
dear," Dominque said, while producing a knife from underneath her
habit.

Carmen whimpered and lay down in the carriage
as we sped off.

We took her to our plantation, twenty miles
from the city. Nearby, there was an open field, far from the main
roads, unseen by all. There, Babarinde waited, along with several
of the brothers who lived at the house.

Eşusanya threw Carmen out of the carriage and
she hit the ground with a thud.

"What do you want from me?" she said,
scrambling up.

"Answers," Dominique said.

"I don't have any answers for you," Carmen
said. She began to run toward the road.

"I don't think so," Eşusanya said, appearing
before her. She turned and tried to run again, but Eşusanya grabbed
her and brought her to Dominique.

"Who arranged for my husband's murder?"
Dominique asked.

"I don't know," Carmen said.

"Wrong answer." Dominique produced her knife
and held it a centimeter from Carmen's face.

"Who is behind my husband's murder?" she
asked again.

"I don't know," Carmen said.

"Lies." Dominique slowly cut a gash from
Carmen's cheek to her chin. Blood oozed out and every Razadi
salivated. Carmen screamed.

"Alright, alright, alright," Carmen said.
"I'll tell you. Please don't cut me again."

"Talk," Dominique ordered.

"I wrote your father and told him about your
relationship. I told him everything I knew. I asked what I should
do."

"What did he say?"

"He told me to fix it. He told me to undo the
damage you did."

"That's it?"

"Yes, that's it," Carmen concluded.

"Lies!" Dominique shouted, slashing Carmen's
other cheek with the knife. Carmen screamed.

"I am not lying! Your father had nothing to
do with what happened to Armand!"

"Then who?"

"I can't…"

Dominique punched Carmen in the nose and the
blood gushed out. Eşusanya let her fall to the ground and Dominique
knelt down next to her.

"If you don't start telling me details, I
will begin cutting off appendages," Dominique threatened.

"I told the man I'm seeing, William
Beauchamp. I told him I had to take care of the situation. And he
told me not to worry."

"William Beauchamp? The janitor at
Newcombe?"

"Yes."

"You're fucking that old man?" Dominique
laughed. Carmen stared back.

"I love him."

Dominique spat in Carmen's face.

"And you know who I loved? My husband, you
cow. Now tell me the rest!"

"William went back to his friends and
explained that he had to get rid of Armand."

"Who are his friends?"

"The Knights of the White Camellia."

"Not the Ku Klux Klan?"

"No…the KKK is beneath them. They would
never-"

"Names. Now."

"William. His brother Eric Beauchamp, the
attorney. Stefan Archer, the pharmacist. He knew when Armand would
be visiting and told the rest. Edward Jones, the insurance agent.
Stefan took out a policy before they firebombed the pharmacy, so he
is a very wealthy man now. And he wasn't even there when it
happened. All he had to do was leave the door unlocked. Damon
Porter, the chemist, made sure some highly volatile chemicals were
in just the right place in the pharmacy so the whole thing would
blow right on cue. Sam Barnabas, the fire chief. He ensured that
the damage to the neighborhood would be minimal. And then there's
Jacob York."

"And who is Jacob York?"

"He's a civil war veteran and the leader of
the Knights. He's the one who recruited the seven young horsemen to
ride through the streets. He's a grand old man who delights in the
advancement of the white race. As should you."

Dominique grabbed Carmen's ear and sliced it
off. She screamed once again. Over those screams, Dominique
spoke.

"Carmen, in my previous life I was a French
girl on the island of Dominica during the colonial days. And I met
a man named Ariori. He was a Negro man and we fell in love. We
stayed together for years, until my father stole me away from him.
And then, in this life, I discovered my love once again. You know
him as Armand. But his name remains Ariori. And I fell in love with
him again and I married him again. And again, he was taken from
me.

"I am not one of those women who claims to
not see skin color. Of course I saw Ariori's skin color, just as
sure as I see your crimson blood. I saw his skin color and I loved
it. I loved every bit of what made him a man—a black man—my man.
And you facilitated his murder."

"I was just doing what your father thought
was best."

"Even if he explicitly said not to murder my
husband, you would have done it. You don't have a human bone in
your body."

"And evidently, neither do you, nigger-lover.
Look what you've done to me!"

"Yes. Look what I've done. My masterpiece of
blood. Carmen…when you meet the devil, please tell him that a white
woman did this to you."