Nadine was now in her twenty-sixth week, and things were looking bad. The cramps recurred with increasing intensity, followed by gut-wrenching spasms that left her drenched in perspiration. She had been through a battery of medical tests, each one offering a prognosis worse than the one before; she would lose the baby.
Back home, winter had inundated the city like a frozen tide, but at these latitudes, changes in heat and humidity were barely ripples over time. Nadine was tempted to return to Quebec to escape the oppressive mugginess that had clung to her throughout the pregnancy, or simply to stand on the sidewalk and let the snowflakes numb her pain. Perhaps the doctors there could do something different. Maybe they had better tests or more sophisticated equipment, but her gynaecologist assured her that there was nothing his Canadian colleagues could do that he hadn’t already done. He had been trained at Oxford, and he had over a decade of experience in England, followed by another three here, in the Dominican Republic. He had access to the best medical equipment anywhere in North America.
Nadine’s final hope, however remote, rested with divine intervention. She sought the help of her childhood God within the pink stone walls of Santiago Apostol, but the imposing pair of Baroque copper-topped steeples left her cold. As her desperation grew, her prayers became louder, and still there was no sign. The normally vivacious woman slowly resigned herself to fate as all hope faded away. This would have been their first child – a girl she was certain – in a young and passionate marriage.
Her husband, a native Dominican, suppressed his own sense of loss, while doing everything in his power to exorcise her despondency. He doted on her every minute, but his reassurances, though appreciated, were inutile. When his work forced him away, he made sure that his mother was at home, and she too, watched as Nadine became more and more detached from the world around her.
“You’s see the woman in the mountain,” her mother-in-law insisted in her throaty Samana dialect. “She be the only one who can save your child. You been Fucú.” She saw that Nadine didn’t understand, and looked around the room for another word. “She will remove the malediction.”
Nadine shook her head in disbelief. No one believed in curses anymore. To be sure, rumours of vudu were whispered throughout the island, but it was only the poor and unfortunate who resorted to such foolishness, and of course, those who pandered to superstitious tourists. Charms and enchantments were not the solution for a catholic Canadian lawyer. She chuckled weakly under her strained breath.
“Non, listen to me. I’m got times I went, and she help. I will take you there myself. I show you the way.”
Nadine did not have the strength to argue for long, and eventually gave in to her persistent mother-in-law. Despite her doubts and fatigue, they set out together for a trek up the mountain. The mismatched couple followed the poorly paved macadam until it gave way to a packed washboard road, and finally devolved into cattle tracks. As the slope steepened, the path narrowed into a single overgrown track that seemed to meander randomly under a vast, oppressive canopy of vegetation. The path had almost disappeared into the tropical jungle altogether, when the travellers suddenly came upon a bright clearing along a narrow plateau, fully exposed to the midday sun.
A lonely palm-wood hovel crouched at the far end where the mountain resumed its ascent. Its woven slats were painted Sevre blue, like the sky itself the day before a storm. Strings of smoke seeped through the bone-bleached thatch as if the shack was smouldering under the sultry sun.
Nadine approached with trepidation, forced forward only by her mother-in-law’s sharp and prodding finger. When she finally ducked inside, day turned to night. The sun had no place here. It seemed to Nadine as if a thick woollen cloak had been cast over her head, only to be pulled away slowly as her vision crept back. She heard the crackling embers from the hearth before she saw their orange glow, but then her attention was drawn to five red paraffin candles sputtering against the far wall. She was pushed further into the shack and gradually, more details materialized all around her as if a new world was being created from nothingness before her very eyes.
She jerked her head nervously in response to a movement by the hearth, and saw a goat rearrange itself on some old straw tucked away in the corner. A well-worn stool and an old galvanized pail suggested a nanny-goat. Her eyes continued to drift across the packed mud floor and over the mystic shapes hidden in the dark, but she was inexorably drawn back to the candlelight. As her eyes adjusted, she began to distinguish an altar framed by the dim light. It was a simple table covered in colourful hand-woven cloth. There was an assortment of unfamiliar items scattered on it among the candles, each dancing with its shadow to some silent ritual melody.
On the wall behind the altar, framed in ornate gilt, were three old and faded prints of saints. Nadine easily recognized two of them: Saint Lazarus, the patron saint of the sick, and Saint Dominic, the guardian of the island. The third, though, was foreign to her. The subject was an African woman, young and nubile, with an enormous halo that disappeared into the frame on three sides. Despite the obvious religious motif, the subject exuded a sensuality that contrasted deeply with Nadine’s present mood.
She had scanned the dwelling twice before she saw the brujo. The healer had not budged since they arrived, but now Nadine saw the form of a prostrate woman emerging from the floor beside the altar.
“Dias, Brujo-Anna,” mother-in-law began timidly, as if afraid of being too intrusive. “We be needing your help. I’s bring you my nuera, she be sick.” Her hand was shaking in obvious fear of this woman’s reputation.
The shape rose from the earth in one slow but fluid movement. A shower of sparks convulsed from the fireplace towards the ceiling, fanned by the sudden movement. The shadowy figure motioned her guests closer to the fire. The features of the old woman crystallized as Nadine approached. Her dark leathery skin, wrinkled like an elephant, suggested that this crone could well have witnessed the arrival of the first Europeans, but the penetrating sparkle in her pale hazel eyes, evinced a contradictory youthfulness and innocence. Nadine frowned as she felt those eyes burrow into her stomach.
“You are with child my dear,” the brujo said in the Queen’s English. The fluency and eloquence surprised Nadine, as the subject and setting had led her to expect the same pidgin dialect that the other islanders spoke. This was not the stereotypical voice of a witchdoctor who had magical powers, but it did remove a little of Nadine’s scepticism.
“Ya, and the médico in the city say it will die,” mother-in-law interrupted, before Nadine could respond.
“Can you help me?” Nadine added doubtfully, still trying to absorb her new surroundings. This was her last hope, but it was so far from her reality. There were no doctors in white coats here, no smell of hospital disinfectant, or even any electricity to power an array of diagnostic equipment. What could this brujo offer, when God himself would not interfere?
“Call me Anna, darling,” the healer whispered, not once registering mother-in-law’s presence. Nadine flinched involuntarily as Anna reached out her old and crooked fingers towards her. “The child is weak already,” Anna continued. “It’s heart speaks to me of a curse.” Anna withdrew her hand sharply as if she had been scalded. “We must chase away the evil eye quickly.”
Despite herself, Nadine felt the urgency in Anna’s voice. “Tell me what to do.” Her anxiety began to surface.
Anna retreated to the altar and stared through the yellow flames into the eyes of the saints. Centuries of tradition had buried the ancient religion beneath the cover of Catholicism. When Anna sought help she did not pray to Lazarus or Our Lady of Las Mercedes, instead she entreated the old gods Babalz and Obatala. These divine guardians of Ocha were her true inspiration, but not many people knew of the old ways anymore. If people could see her thoughts, or if they had seen the warm chicken blood in the plastic cup on the altar, they would have concluded, wrongly of course, that Anna was some kind of vudu priestess, and persecution would undoubtedly have followed. It was better to keep the truth hidden, as her ancestors before her had done, so as to avoid any misunderstandings.
When she turned her attention back to Nadine, Anna explained what needed to be done. “First, your husband must go further up the mountains. He must cut off the fifth twig on the first lemon tree, and carve a cross on it. Then he must return here, where he will first prick the sprig with a needle, and then pierce your navel with it.” The brujo ignored Nadine’s evident discomfort. “You must keep it there, and on the fifth day you must come back to me.” Nadine listened incredulously at Anna’s orders. If she had felt stronger she would simply have turned around and walked away, but she could barely stand as yet another cramp seized her belly. Mother-in-law offered to go and get her son, and promptly disappeared through the threshold and into the distant sunlight. Nadine shuffled towards the stool beside the sleeping goat, while Anna crumpled some dried herbs into a blackened pot of boiling water hanging over the fire. She presently brought a spoonful to Nadine and then helped her onto the floor, careful to point her feet away from the door. The goat stirred at the encroaching activity, but soon settled back to sleep.
When Nadine woke up, her husband was kneeling beside her, stroking her hair with one hand, and holding a green twig of lemon in the other. The piercing was surprisingly painless. Perhaps the tea had included numbing agents, but it had not taken away the cramps. As her husband and mother-in-law prepared to take her home, the brujo reminded her to return on the fifth day.
“Keep the twig on your tummy all the time; it will protect you and your child from the evil eye,” Anna instructed. “Pay special attention to the number 3, it will guide you in the days to come.”
Nadine felt silly constantly wearing a lemon twig around, but she was bed-ridden most of the time anyway, and saw no one but her nearest family. She felt for the twig repeatedly until she began fingering it unconsciously, the way believers count their rosaries without a second thought. She found that she woke up at around 3 o’clock each night; a self-fulfilling prophecy, she thought. At that time of the morning, the sparkling stars in the dark sky reminded her of the flailing sparks in the brujo’s hovel. The gibbous moon was the halo surrounding the dark unnamed saint. She stood by the French windows and felt the cool ocean breeze wash over her body, and imagined the healer somewhere above, watching her from a distance.
The passing days did not bring her any relief, and Nadine began to doubt that anything as weird as this could actually help her, but her husband had commented that she seemed preoccupied, and anything that took her mind off the pain was better than nothing. She respected her husband’s traditions, and in the back of her mind she wanted to believe in the slightest chance that this ordeal would actually save her unborn daughter. She would stay the course for now. It couldn’t hurt. She would decide what to do when the time came.
On the fifth day Nadine felt for her lemon twig.
Zafa, It was gone!
She felt about her body. With increasing alarm, she dug under her clothes and even snapped her pantyhose to see if anything would fall out. She fell to the floor and searched beneath the bed, and under the table and chairs, to no avail. She traced back her steps since half past two, the last time she remembered touching the carved talisman.
Mother-in-law arrived, prepared to accompany her daughter to the healer, and joined in the anguished search. In a minute, Nadine had gone from curious indifference to utter panic. The primal part of her mind emerged triumphant, pushing aside all the civilized logic and rational western thought that had doubted the brujo. Now, as Nadine imagined her own failure at following the crone’s straightforward instructions, she also realized that she believed. The two continued the search unsuccessfully, but Nadine had already made up her mind. She would have to return to Anna and admit defeat, and perhaps beg for a second chance, if it was not too late.
“Are you in a position to return the cross to me?” These were Anna’s first words after Nadine had entered the hovel. The question elevated the sense of guilt and failure that Nadine already felt, but the woman’s tone was kindly and soothing.
“No, Anna. I lost it only this afternoon.” Nadine answered truthfully, tears welling up behind her eyes. Like a remorseful schoolgirl before the head mistress, she began to explain what had happened, but Anna interrupted her.
“It is good my dear. Do not be afraid. You see, the cross is used up and gone to the spirit world. It swallowed the curse, and blinded the evil eye. It had to take the bad spirits away from you.”
The room was silent. Nadine wasn’t sure she fully understood what Anna was saying, but a sense of relief washed over her.
“Your golden boy is well now. Go back home and rest.”
Nadine laughed to herself. Boy or girl, everything was going to get better. A brujo had healed her child where all of science had failed. The magic of the island had intervened where God would not.