It was hard for Ruby to make out what they were saying because she had never heard the word before,
148
but she listened carefully, and she recognized it. They were saying:
"Samedi. Samedi. Samedi."
Suddenly, Ruby didn't feel like dancing anymore. A chill swept her body, a sense of nameless fear, and she remembered she was five years old and this was a graveyard and it was night and she was far from home, and she bolted and ran back to her grandmother.
The old woman comforted the frightened child in her big warm arms.
"What happened, child?" she asked. "What give you this fright?"
"What is Samedi, Granna?"
She felt the old woman stiffen.
"You was down de cemetery?" the old woman said.
Ruby nodded.
"Some things child just don' gotta know about, 'cep-pin' you stays 'way from de graveyard at night," her grandmother said.
She squeezed Ruby hard to her, as if to accentuate her order, and Ruby stayed there, feeling warm and loved and protected, but still wondering, and later when her grandmother tucked her into bed, she asked again.
"Granna, please tell me, what is Samedi?"
"All right, chile, 'cause I get no rest iffen I don' answer you. Samedi be the leader of them people you saw dancin' down there."
"Then why was I ascared?"
"Because those people not like us. Not like you and me."
"Why aren't they like us, Granna?" Ruby asked.
Her grandmother sighed in exasperation. "Because they be already dead. Now hush your face and go to
149
sleep." And the next day her grandmother would not speak about it anymore.
Ruby's mind was back in the cave and the old man Samedi was talking to her.
"Why would Corazon be here to kill me?" he asked.
"I don't know," said Ruby. "There are two Americans in town and he thinks that they're here to make you the ruler of this country."
"These Americans, they are with you?"
"No. We came separately to Baqia. They are now captives, so I am responsible for them. Corazon must want you dead so they will have no chance of succeeding in making you ruler."
The old man looked at Ruby with coal black eyes that sparkled even in the faint light of the cave.
"I don't think so," he said. "The government is Corazon's. The religious life is mine. It has always been that way and these mountains are far from Ciudad Natividado."
"But you thought enough of what I said to come to this cave with me to avoid Corazon," Ruby said. "You did not do that because you trust him as a brother."
"No. One must never trust Corazon too much. He killed his own father to become president. If he were to be leader of the island's religion he would rule for life. No one could oppose him."
"He has the army. Why hasn't he come for you before then?"
"The people of the island would not tolerate an attack on a holy man," Samedi said.
"But if they never knew? If you were one day just to vanish from the earth and Corazon made himself religious leader, he would be invincible. And as sure
150
as God made green apples, he would lead Baqia into disaster and maybe war."
"You overstate it," Samedi said. "He is not a good man. He is not to be trusted. But he is not the devil."
"He is the devil," said Ruby. "And that is why I want you to help me overthrow him."
Samedi thought for only a few seconds before shaking his head no. Over the very faint thump of distant drums, there were suddenly women's screams to be heard, drifting down from the mesa above their heads.
Samedi cocked his head toward the sound, then looked back at Ruby.
"Corazon is asking where I am," he said. "But they will not speak. The only words spoken in these hills are the words of the drums and they speak all words to all men. No. As long as Corazon does not attack me, I will not attack him."
They sat in silence. There was a sharp crack and another set of women's screams and then all was silence except for the faraway thumping and bumping of the drums, like slow lazy rubber hammers attacking the skull.
They continued sitting in silence until they heard a woman's voice. "Master, Master! Come quickly."
Samedi led Ruby out onto the hillside, then strode quickly up the hill to the grass huts. A woman waited for him at the top of the hill. Tears rolled down her black face, like glycerine drops on chocolate pudding.
"O Master! Master," she sobbed.
"Be strong now," he said, pressing her shoulder. "The general is gone?"
"Yes, Master, but..."
Samedi had walked away from her. He stood in the
151
center of the village, among men and women who were looking down at the ground where there was a greenish black oily slick.
Ruby pushed through the people and stood at his side.
Samedi looked around at all the faces. They were weeping quietly.
"Where is Edved?" he asked.
The silent weeping turned to sobbing and screams of anguish.
"Master, Master," one woman said. She pointed down at the green slick on the dry dusty dirt of the hilltop.
"Enough weeping. Where is Edved?"
"There," she said. She pointed at the slick of green. "There is Edved," and she let out a shriek that would curdle milk.
Samedi sank slowly to his knees and looked at the bile on the ground. He extended his hand as if to touch it, then withdrew it.
He knelt there for long minutes. When he rose and turned to Ruby there were tears in the corners of his eyes.
"Corazon has declared a war," he said slowly. "What is it you want me to do? I will do anything."
Ruby could not take her eyes off the green slick on the ground. The thought that somehow Corazon had reduced that giant young man to nothing more than a memory and a puddle made her shudder with loathing.
She looked into Samedi's eyes.
"Anything you want," he repeated.
And then he clapped his hands. Once. The sound reverberated like a pistol shot over the tiny village
152
and carried out into the bright afternoon air, like an order.
And the drums stopped.
And the hills and the mountains were silent.
153
CHAPTER ELEVEN
There were no streetlights in Ciudad Natividado.
The city square was pitchblack and still except for the throbbing in Remo's temple.
But it wasn't throbbing. He was awake now and he realized the throbbing came from outside himself. It was the drums and they were louder than he had heard them before. Closer.
He lay quietly in his cage, feeling the cool of the Baqian night. He could sense that the guards standing alongside the cages were edgy. They shuffled back and forth from foot to foot and they spun around nervously, looking behind them, every time a night animal cried.
And the drums were getting louder, growing in intensity.
Trying to make no sound, Remo slowly extended his fingers toward the nearest bar of his cage.
His fingers circled the inch-thick metal. He
155
squeezed, but felt no give of metal under his hand. He was still without strength. His body ached from the cramped position he had slept in.
He turned quietly in his cage, moving his head around to see how Chiun was.
His face was near the bars on the side of Chiun's cage. Through the bars he saw Chiun's face. The Oriental's eyes were open. His finger was at his mouth and he gave Remo a shushing gesture to keep him quiet.
They lay still and listened to the drums grow louder.
Louder and closer, louder and closer the distant thumping which had hung over the island like weather now was taking on a physical reality by its changing.