Anyway, I was talking about being presented to the patron saint. It’s compulsory. You’re born in the big village and the first time you go to any smaller settlement on our Atlantic Ocean island, your mother has to take you to the little church before bedtime and present you to the patron saint. You go through the church door and your mother says a few words on your behalf, explaining that you’ve come to seek his protection. Then you go home and sleep in peace. If you don’t do it, if an adult doesn’t do it for you, it’s unlikely you’ll sleep at all that night. What’s more, in this case, the patron saint of the village we’d travelled to in the middle of the night was San Xuan. I suppose it’s like San Juan in Spanish. In any case, San Xuan is the most severe of all the patron saints on our island. He wears his severity on his face, if you look at the image of him that hangs in the little church. And so when that boy was choking and unable to sleep, they took him out of the house, thinking they’d take him to see San Xuan and ask for forgiveness, for it was too late for a presentation, that time had passed. But there were a number of factors working against them. First of all, the little church closed in the afternoon, and nobody on the island had ever seen anyone go into it or do anything inside it at night; there had never been a need to. And there was practically nothing on the island to make light with. There were a few seeds that burned with a flame, though finding them was another matter, and dry banana leaves were no good, for they flared as soon as you put a flame to them and the light they gave off would have burned out before being any use. So everyone knew that going into the church in the dark to speak to the saint was no easy thing, and nobody had ever done it before. For a start, few people would have the courage to. It’s thought the saint also rests at night and no man or woman should disturb him without good cause. Another problem was that the child, the boy who was frightened and choking, did not belong to anyone in the village and the adults who were with him did not know his real name, so they couldn’t speak to the saint, that very severe San Xuan, on his behalf. So, given the multiple problems of the night, the dark and his unknown name, it was decided that speaking to the saint to ask his forgiveness was an impossibility. But the child was choking, and he might die, and as far as they could tell from the crowing of the cocks, what few cocks there were in that little village, night had barely entered the small hours. So it was decided the boy must be taken to the big village by canoe. They found a man in the village who was willing to take him but, in order to do so, they’d first have to get the child to the nearest beach, and getting to the nearest beach from that village was one of the most difficult and hazardous tasks on the whole island. That’s because the nearest beach from that village could only be reached by a treacherous pathway. Even to reach the path itself required navigating difficult slopes. And the whole trip was considered extremely hazardous by day, never mind at night, never mind at night carrying a child who was choking because he hadn’t been presented to the patron saint, the very severe San Xuan! And there was more: the plan was to take the boy to the big village by sea, and this was the sea of the village of San Xuan! Only the very bravest canoemen lived in that village. Of all the island’s canoemen, they were the ones who most risked their lives, for it was very unusual for the waves to be still on that beach, a beach full of rocks and projecting cliffs, like all beaches in the south, but here there were so many it was more like a cave. Everything about that little village was dictated by San Xuan’s severity. At least that was my experience of the place as a child, and that’s what I heard the adults say about the dangers of that coastline and the moods of the patron saint. But anyway, they decided to take that boy to the big village, for otherwise he might choke to death or die from some other sickness. They were adults and that’s what they decided to do, though they knew it was a very difficult task. So they put that child on the back of one of the women and they started down the path, and the women said prayers behind them. This would have frightened me. Whenever there were prayers it was because there might be tears; that’s to say, if there were prayers there was danger. What’s more, those women prayed knowing that the whole drama was unfolding without the saint’s knowledge or consent. I think deep down those prayers were for San Xuan, that he might show them mercy and not cause their journey to end in catastrophe.
I didn’t go with the rest of them down to the beach, for I was a child and they wouldn’t have let me, and anyway I was asleep, but I know they encountered many problems. Many, many problems. It would have been a problematic journey if they’d done it by day and without the fury of the patron saint hanging over them. To be honest, I’d rather not say any more about that patron saint, for I’ve told you my religion and said that I’m a believer. Suffice to say, anything involving the patron saints filled me with fear as a child. Looking back, I see that everything filled me with fear as a child, even things that seemingly had nothing evil about them.
They went on saying prayers and they went on encountering many problems in getting that boy down to the shore and into a canoe, and in finding a moment of calm to push the canoe out into the water so that it might clear the rocks and other dangers. I know that beach well and I know you usually make several false starts before managing to launch out into the water, and to think they did it in the dark! And when I say dark, I’m not talking about any ordinary darkness. There was no moon and that beach was like a cave. I really think that to be an adult on our island back then was to live a life of extreme and constant danger.
They managed to get the canoe out into the water and the canoeman managed to paddle the child to the big village, the child who was choking because he hadn’t been presented to the patron saint. When we arrived in the big village the next day, around noon and after many hours of walking, I found out that the boy they’d taken in the canoe was my friend, the one I’d left stuck up the tree, shaking uncontrollably because of the lack of firm ground beneath him. The boy I’d gone to get help for was now in the house of the bone healer and, when I saw my friend, he was covered in bandages from head to toe, as if he’d broken every bone in his body. He couldn’t speak, but he heard my voice and he nodded his head. Only the inhabitants of San Xuan’s village knew how he’d ended up spending the night there, or not, as it proved. Because we’d become friends, he told me what happened once he got better, what happened to him after I’d left him stuck up the tree, inches away from wringing the neck of that bird we’d gone in search of because of our lack of fish. But in fact he knew nothing, or very little, about what happened. This might be because most of what happened happened in the dark. Or it might be because he had his eyes closed. The dark. It was something that always had to be taken into account on our Atlantic Ocean island. It was like an extra person. One of my main memories of the dark is that sometimes we’d be eating at night and an adult would take away the lamp. I didn’t like it because we carried on eating and by the time they brought it back I’d have nothing left on my plate. Eating in the dark wasn’t as satisfying as eating in the light. So when the lamp came back, I was tempted to ask for more food, because the food I’d put in my mouth in the dark didn’t count: it had been eaten in secret, or in hiding, and so I couldn’t feel it in my belly. So I sometimes waited for the light to come back before I went on eating because when I ate without it I felt cheated. It had nothing to do with whether what I was eating had bones in, or whether I was able to pluck the bones out in the dark without choking on them. It was just that I wanted to be able to see what I was eating. As far as I was concerned, eating in the dark was like going down a path in the dark. If for some reason you had to move about in the dark, you did it on all fours, to avoid dangers. It’s difficult to walk about upright in the dark, for there’s no knowing what obstacles you’ll encounter. You have to feel your way, keep touching the ground, reach out into the void. And it’s very frightening, so if you have to walk anywhere in the dark, let’s say down a deserted street, you put your hands wherever they make you feel safest. For example, by crossing your arms over your tummy and putting the palms of your hands on your sides, or by crossing your arms over your chest and putting the palms of your hands on your shoulders. This last one was the way we children felt most protected, the way we felt safest in the dark. The dark? We always thought something dangerous was lurking in the dark. Some of the littler children cried as soon as darkness fell. They screamed as if they’d been bitten. Bitten by the darkness. They felt they were in danger and they asked, they screamed, for the light to come back. And although we were afraid of the dark, we didn’t like the excessive light of the full moon either. As I’ve already said, on moonlight nights you felt too exposed. Things could see you from far away. So with the dark, you couldn’t see the danger, but with the moonlight you exposed yourself to the danger. Everything on the island brought fear. To be in the dark is to turn your back on life, for I don’t think anyone can really understand life in all its detail if kept in the dark. It’s like eating in the dark: you never get full, for you lose track of what’s on your plate. I think that the darkness in a person’s life is the darkest thing about living in hardship.