"But that is not warfare, Atiba. That is vengeance." The old man persisted. "I have set a torch to the fields of an enemy—before you were born the Fulani once forced such a course upon us, by breaking the sacred truce during the harvest festival—but no Yoruba would deliberately burn the seed yams in his enemy's barn."
"This barn does not hold his yams; it holds the fruits of our unjust slavery. The two are not the same."
"Atiba, you are like that large rooster in my eldest wife's compound, who would not suffer the smaller ones to crow. My words are no more than summer wind to you." The old man sighed. "You would scorn the justice Shango demands. This is a fearsome thing you would have us do now.''
"Then I will bear Shango's wrath on my own head. Ogun would have us do this, and he is the god we honor tonight. It is our duty to him." He moved on ahead, leaving Tahajo to follow in silence. The thatched roof of the curing house was ahead in the dark, a jagged outline against the rosy sky beyond.
Without pausing he opened the door and led the way. All the men knew the room well; standing before them were long rows of wooden molds, containers they had carried there themselves, while a branco overseer with a whip stood by.
"These were placed here with our own hands. Those same hands will now destroy them." He looked up. "What better justice could there be?" He sparked the flint off his machete, against one of the straw bundles, and watched the blaze a moment in silence. This flame, he told himself, would exact the perfect revenge.
Revenge. The word had come, unbidden. Yes, truly it was
revenge. But this act was also justice. He recalled the proverb: "One day's rain makes up for many days' drought." Tonight one torch would make up for many weeks of whippings, starvation, humiliation.
"Mark me well." Atiba held the burning straw aloft and turned to address the men. "These pots are the last sugar you will ever see on this island. This, and the cane from which it was made, all will be gone, never to return. The forests of the Orisa will thrive here once more."
He held the flaming bundle above his head a moment longer, while he intoned a verse in praise of Ogun, and then flung it against the thatched wall behind him, where it splayed against a post and disintegrated. They all watched as the dry-reed wall smoldered in the half-darkness, then blossomed with small tongues of fire.