The Comedians

'It is well not to present introductions till you are sure your man is still alive.'

'I have a chit from the Haitian consul-general in New York recommending me …'

'We've been at sea three days, remember. A lot can happen in that time. The consul-general may have sought asylum …'

He said as the purser had done, 'I wonder what brings you back, conditions being what they are.'

The truth was less fatiguing than invention and the hour was late. 'I found I missed the place,' I said. 'Security can get on the nerves just as much as danger.'

He said, 'Yes, I thought I had had my fill of danger in the war.'

'What unit were you in?'

He grinned at me; I had played a card too obviously. 'Oh, I was a bit of a drifter in those days,' he said. 'I moved around. Tell me, what kind of chap's our ambassador?'

'We haven't got one. He was expelled more than a year ago.'

'The

chargй then.'

'He does what he can. When he can.'

'We seem to be sailing towards a strange country.'

He went to the porthole as though he expected to be able to see the land across the last two hundred miles of sea, but there was nothing to be observed except the light of the cabin lying on the surface of the dark swell like yellow oil. 'Not exactly a tourist paradise any longer?'

'No. It never really was.'

'But perhaps a few opportunities for a man of imagination?'

'It

depends.'

'On

what?'

'The kind of scruples you have.'

'Scruples?' He looked out into the rolling night and he seemed to be weighing the question with some care. 'Oh, well … scruples cost a lot …

Why did you suppose that nigger really wept?'

'I've no idea.'

'It was an odd evening. I hope we do better next time.'

'Next

time?'

'I was thinking of when this year ends. Wherever we may be.' He came away from the porthole and said, 'Oh well, it's time for shut-eye, isn't it? And Smith, what do you suppose he's up to?'

'Why should he be up to anything?'

'You may be right. Don't mind me. I'm going now. The trip's over. No getting out of it now.' He added with his hand on the door, 'I tried to cheer things up, but it wasn't much of a success. Shut-eye's the answer to all, isn't it? Or that,s how I see it.'

CHAPTER II

I WAS returning without much hope to a country of fear and frustration, and yet every familiar feature as the Medea drew in gave me a kind of happiness. The huge mass of Kenscoff leaning over the town was as usual half in deep shadow; there was a glassy sparkle of late sun off the new buildings near the port which had been built for an international exhibition in so-called modern style. A stone Columbus watched us coming in - it was there Martha and I used to rendezvous at night until the curfew closed us in separate prisons, I in my hotel, she in her embassy, without even a telephone which worked to communicate by. She would sit in her husband's car in the dark and flash her headlights on at the sound of my Humber. I wondered whether in the last month, now that the curfew was over, she had chosen a different rendezvous, and I wondered with whom. That she had found a substitute I, had no doubt. No one banks on fidelity nowadays.

I was lost in too many difficult thoughts to remember my fellowpassengers. There was no message waiting for me from the British Embassy, so I assumed that at the moment all was well. At immigration and customs there was the habitual confusion. We were the only boat, and yet the shed was fulclass="underline" porters, taxi-drivers who hadn't had a fare in weeks, police, and the occasional Tonton Macoute, in his black glasses and his soft hat, and beggars, beggars everywhere. They seeped through every chink like water in the rainy season. A man without legs sat under the customs counter like a rabbit in a hutch, miming in silence.

A familiar figure forced his way towards me. As a rule, he haunted the airfield, and I had not exp ected to see him here. He was a journalist known to everyone as Petit Pierre - a mйtis in a country where the half-castes are the aristocrats waiting for the tumbrils to roll. He was believed by some to have connexions with the Tontons, for how otherwise had he escaped a beatingup or worse? And yet there were occasionally passages in his gossip-column that showed an odd satirical courage - perhaps he depended on the police not to read between the lines.

He seized me by the hands as if we were the oldest of friends and addressed me in English, 'Why, Mr Brown, Mr Brown.'

'How are you, Petit Pierre?'

He giggled up at me, standing on his pointed toe-caps, for he was a tiny figure of a man. He was just as I had remembered him, hilarious. Even the time of day was humorous to him. He had the quick movements of a monkey, and he seemed to swing from wall to wall on ropes of laughter. I had always thought that, when the time came, and surely it must one day come in his precarious defiant livelihood, he would laugh at his executioner, as a Chinaman is supposed to do.

'It's good to see you, Mr Brown. How are the bright lights of Broadway?

Marilyn Monroe, lots of good bourbon, speak-easies … ?' He was a little out of date, for he had not been further than Kingston, Jamaica, in thirty years.

'Give me your passport, Mr Brown. Where are your luggage tickets?' He waved them above his head, pushing through the mob, arranging everything, for he knew everyone. Even the customs man allowed my baggage to pass unopened. He exchanged some words with a Tonton Macoute at the door and by the time I emerged he had found me a taxi. 'Sit down, sit down, Mr Brown. Your luggage is just coming.'

'How are things here?' I asked.

'All as usual. All quiet.'

'No

curfew?'

'Why should there be a curfew, Mr Brown?'

'The papers reported rebels in the north.'

'The papers? American papers? You don't believe what the American papers say, do you?' He leant his head in at the taxi door and said with his odd hilarity, 'You can't think how happy I am, Mr Brown, to see you back.' I almost believed him.

'Why not? Don't I belong here?'

'Of course you belong here, Mr Brown. You are a true friend of Haiti.' He giggled again. 'All the same many true friends have left us recently.' He lowered his voice just a tone, 'The government has been forced to take over some empty hotels.'

'Thanks for the warning.'

'It would have been wrong to let the properties deteriorate.'

'A kindly thought. Who lives in them now?'

He giggled. 'Guests of the government.'

'Do they run to guests now?'

'There was a Polish mission, but they went away rather soon. Here comes your luggage, Mr Brown.'

'Shall I get to the Trianon before the lights go out?'

'Yes - if you go direct.'

'Where else should I go?'

Petit Pierre chuckled and said, 'Let me come with you, Mr Brown. There are road-blocks now between Port-au-Prince and Pйtionville.'

'All right. Get in. Anything to avoid trouble,' I said.

'What were you doing in New York, Mr Brown?'

I replied truthfully, 'I was trying to find someone to buy my hotel.'

'You had no luck?'

'No luck at all.'

'No enterprise in such a great country?'

'You expelled their military mission. You had the ambassador recalled. You can't expect much confidence there, can you? My God, I completely forgot. There's a presidential candidate on board the boat.'

'A presidential candidate? I should have been warned.'

'Not a very successful one.'

'All the same. A presidential candidate. What does he come here for?'

'He has an introduction to the Secretary for Social Welfare.'

'Doctor Philipot? But Doctor Philipot …'

'Anything

wrong?'

'You know what politics are. It's the same in all countries.'

'Doctor Philipot is out?'