When Toussaint set foot on the deck of the _Heros_, on the evening of
the next day, the commander stood ready to receive him--and not only the
commander. Soldiers also stood ready with chains, with which they lost
no time in fettering the old man's ankles and wrists. While they were
doing this, Toussaint quietly said to the commander--
"By my overthrow, the trunk of the tree of negro liberty is laid low;
only the trunk. It will shoot out again from the roots; and they are
many and deep."
The moment the soldiers stepped back, and allowed access to him, Aimee
was in his arms; and Isaac, in great agitation, presented himself.
"I will never leave you more, father!" said he. "These fetters!
Nothing should have made me believe such treatment possible. I trusted
Leclerc as firmly as I trusted you. I have been living with him while
he meditated chains for you. I am humbled for ever! All I can do now
is to devote myself to you, as Placide did at the right time. Would I
were Placide! I am humbled for ever!"
"No, my son: not for ever. It is a common lot to be humbled for the
credulous confidence of youth. It is a safer and a nobler error, Isaac,
than its opposite. It is better than unbelief in the virtue of man."
"You torture me with your goodness, father!"
"I deal with you as with myself, Isaac. In the young days of my freedom
I trusted falsely, as you have done. I believed in Bonaparte, as you
have believed in Leclerc. We have both received a lesson; but I do not
feel humbled for ever; nor must you."
"Would I were Placide!" was all that Isaac could say.
"You are so good to Isaac and me," said Aimee, timidly, "that perhaps
you would (could you?) see Vincent."
"No, my child. Vincent is not like Isaac. He cannot be made wise by
experience; and his folly is scarcely to be distinguished from
treachery. I cannot see General Vincent."
No choice was allowed, however. Vincent rushed forward, knelt before
Toussaint, and clasped his knees, imploring, in a convulsion of grief,
pardon for the past, and permission to devote every hour of his future
life to the family whom he had ruined.
"My pardon you have," said L'Ouverture. "I should rather say my
compassion; for you never deliberately designed treachery, I am
persuaded."
"I never did! I never did!"
"Neither had you any good design. You have been selfish, vain, and
presumptuous; as far from comprehending my purposes as from having
criminal ones of your own. In the new circumstances in which negroes
are placed, many must fall, however firmly some may stand. You are
among the infirm; and therefore, however I may mourn, I do not resent
what you have done."
"Thank God! You pardon me! Thank God! Henceforth, with Aimee to watch
over me--with you to guide me--"
"No, Vincent! You cannot be with me. Aimee is free as she has ever
been; but you cannot be with me. I go to martyrdom: to fulfil what
appears to be the solemn vocation of the Ouvertures. I go to martyrdom;
and none but steady souls must travel that way with me."
"You scorn me," said Vincent, springing from his knees. "Your acts show
that you scorn me. You take that poor fellow," pointing to Mars
Plaisir, "and you reject me."
"My son's servant," said Toussaint, smiling. "He goes to his beloved
France, free to quit us for any other service, when ours becomes too
grave for his light spirit. I would not insult you by taking you on a
like condition. You must leave us, Vincent," pointing to the _Creole's_
boat, now about to put off from the _Heros_. "We will pray for you.
Farewell!"
"Aimee!" said her lover, scarcely daring to raise his eyes to her face.
"Farewell, Vincent!" Aimee strove to say.
In vain Vincent endeavoured to plead. Aimee shook her head, signed to
him to go, and hid her face on her father's shoulder. It was too much.
Humbled to the point of exasperation, Vincent throw himself over the
ship's side into the boat, and never more saw the face of an Ouverture.
"I have nothing left but you," sobbed Aimee--"but you and my mother. If
they kill you my mother will die, and I shall be desolate."
"Your brothers, my child."
"No, no. I have tried all. I left you to try. I loved you always; but
I thought I loved others more. But--"
"But," said her father, when she could not proceed, "you found the lot
of woman. To woman the affections are all: to men, even to brothers,
they are not. Courage, Aimee! Courage! for you are an Ouverture.
Courage to meet your woman's martyrdom!"
"Let me rest upon your heart, father; and I can bear anything."
"Would I could, my child! But they will not allow it--these jailors.
They will part us."
"I wish these chains could bind me too--these very links--that I might
never leave you," cried Aimee, kissing the fetters which bound her
father's arms.
"Your mother's heart, Aimee; that remains."
"I will keep it from breaking, father, trust me."
And the mother and daughter tasted something like happiness, even in an
hour like this, in their re-union. It was a strange kind of comfort to
Aimee to hear from her mother how long ago her father had foreseen, at
Pongaudin, that the day might come when her heart would be torn between
her lover and her family. The impending blow had been struck--the
struggle had taken place: and it only remained now to endure it.
"Father!" said Genifrede, appealing to Toussaint, with a grave
countenance, "you say that none but brave and steady souls must go with
you on your way to martyrdom. You know me to be cowardly as a slave,
and unstable as yonder boat now tossing on the waves. Do you see that
boat, father?"
"Surely--yes; it is Paul;" said Toussaint, looking through his glass.
"Paul is coming to say farewell."
"Let me return with him, father. Let me become his child. I am
unworthy to be yours. And he and I are so forlorn!"
Her father's tender gaze encouraged her to say more. Drawing closer,
she whispered--
"I have seen Moyse--I have seen him more than once in the Morne; and I
cannot leave this place. Let me stay."
"Stay, my child. Seek consolation in your own way. We will all pray
for you; we will all console your mother for your absence. We shall not
meet again on earth, Genifrede."
"I know it, father. But the time of rest--how long it is in coming!"
"My child, our rest is in the soul--it lies not either in place or time.
Do not look for it in the grave, unless you have it first in the soul."
"Then would I had never been born!"
"How different will be your cry when you have been a daughter to Paul
for a while! When you see him consoled, and reposing upon your care,
you will say, `I thank God that I have lived for this!' A great duty
lies before you, my dear child; and in the heart of duty lies rest--a
deeper than that of the grave. Shall I give you a duty to discharge for
me?"
"Oh, yes! I will take it as your blessing."
"Convey to Christophe my last message. Bid him rejoice for me that my
work is done. My work is now his. Bid him remember how we always
agreed that freedom is safe. I bequeath the charge of it to him, with
my blessing."
"He shall know this, if he lives, before the moon rises."
"If he does not live, let Dessalines hear what was my message to
Christophe. He will know how much to take to himself."
It was well that this message was given without further delay.
Toussaint was summoned to speak with some officers of Leclerc's council,
in the cabin below. At the clank of his chains upon the deck all eyes
were upon him, except those of his own family, which were turned away in
grief.
"Before your departure," said one of the officers, in the small cabin to
which Toussaint was conducted, "we would urge you to do a service to the
colony which yet remains in your power. You must not refuse this last
service."
"I have never refused to serve the colony; and I am as willing to-day as
ever."
"No doubt. Reveal to us, then, the spot in the Mornes du Chaos, in
which your treasures lie buried, and state their amount."
"I have before said that I have buried no treasures. Do you disbelieve
my word?"
"We are sorry to do so; but facts are against you. You cannot deceive
us. We know that you caused certain of your dependents to bury treasure
near the Plateaux de la Ravine; and that you afterwards shot these
servants, to secure your secret."
"Is it possible?"
"You see we have penetrated your counsels. The time for concealment is
past. You take your family with you; and none of you will ever return.
Your friends are, most of them, disposed of. A new order of things has
commenced. You boast of your patriotism. Show it now by giving up the
treasure of the colony to the uses of the colony."
"I have already devoted my all to the colony. I reply once more that I
leave behind me no treasure but that which you cannot appreciate--the
grateful hearts of my people."
The investigation was pressed--the inquiry made, under every form of
appeal that could be devised; and in vain. Toussaint disdained to
repeat his reply; and he spoke no more. The officers left him with
threats on their lips. The door was locked and barred behind them, and
Toussaint found himself a solitary prisoner.
During the night the vessel got under weigh. What at that hour were the
secrets which lay hid in the mountain-passes, the forest-shades, and the
sad homes of the island whose true ruler was now borne away from its
shores?
Pongaudin was already deserted. Monsieur and Madame Pascal had, by
great activity, obtained a passage for France in the ship which was
freighted with Leclerc's boastings of his crowning feat. They were
already far on the sea before the _Heros_ spread its sails. Leclerc's
announcement of Toussaint's overthrow was as follows:--
"I intercepted letters which he had written to one Fontaine, who was
his agent at Cap Francais. These afforded an unanswerable proof that
he was engaged in a conspiracy, and that he was anxious to regain his
former influence in the colony. He waited only for the result of
disease among the troops.
"Under these circumstances, it would be improper to give him time to
mature his criminal designs. I ordered him to be apprehended--a
difficult task; but it succeeded through the excellent arrangements
made by General Brunet, who was entrusted with its execution, and the
zeal and ardour of Admiral Ferrari.
"I am sending to France, with all his family, this deeply perfidious
man, who, by his consummate hypocrisy, has done us so much mischief.
The government will determine how it should dispose of him.
"The apprehension of General Toussaint occasions some disturbances.
Two leaders of the insurgents are already in custody, and I have
ordered them to be shot. About a hundred of his confidential
partisans have been secured, of whom some are on board the _Muiron_
frigate, which is under orders for the Mediterranean; and the rest are
distributed among the different ships of the squadron.
"I am daily occupied in settling the affairs of the colony, with the
least possible inconvenience: but the excessive heat, and the diseases
which attack us, render it an extremely painful task. I am impatient
for the approach of the month of September, when the season will
renovate our activity.
"The departure of Toussaint has produced general joy at Cap Francais.
"The Commissary of Justice, Mont Peson, is dead. The Colonial
Prefect, Benezech, is breathing his last. The Adjutant-commandant,
Dampier, is dead: he was a young officer of great promise.
"I have the honour, etcetera,--"