"They can not have heard the news yet, O! gracious Mamanloi! His vessel came ashore only a very short time ago. Since then he has been wandering, he tells me, trying to find the way to his friend, King Christophe."
It seems incredible that the natives of Haïti should have known so little of our country as to imagine that we were still under the sway of kings and princes from whom we fought to free ourselves in '76. But when you reflect how little they know of us at the present day, and how less than little we know of them, you will not think it strange that in the year 1820 the blacks of the country districts had heard nothing of our ways, customs, manners, or even where our continent was situated. Their only communication was with France. They were half French and half African, generally speaking, though there were modifications in the mixture of races. They were utterly ignorant, as what you will hear later will prove to you, and it is not a matter of wonder to me that they could be so easily gulled by my black friend.
"Have they anything to show that they are of our order?"
Suddenly a bright thought came to me. I looked at the interpreter.
"If the gracious Papaloi will allow us to retire to another apartment for a moment, I will prove to him that we are all that we say."
I was to try an experiment. It might succeed, it might not, but there was a chance for us.
The Mamanloi had arisen. She stood tall and straight upon the step of the throne, her slim foot, just protruding through the opening at the side of her robe of white, covered in open beauty with a sandal of exquisite make. This creature's taste was, to the outward view, refined.
I noticed some strange barbaric jewels upon her arms and neck. A blue and red girdle confined her slender waist, and about her head a red band was but a background to some flaming stones. She waved her graceful arm and pointed to the red partition behind the throne.
She spoke in a soft, sweet voice. It gives me a chill even to think of it. She looked at me as she spoke with those sickeningly sweet glances. They made me feel that I might save myself, although in such case I should have to own her for a protector and a friend.
"See that the doors are barred," she said, "and then escort the prisoners to the secret banquet hall."