human
You would remain here--you would hide yourself here with me for ever!
gpt
Here, or anywhere;--in the cottage at Breda;--in your father's hut on the shore;--anywhere, Moyse, where there is nothing to dread. I live in fear; and I am wretched.
human
What is it that you fear, love? Why do you not trust, me to protect you?
gpt
Then I fear for you, which is worse. Why cannot we live in the woods or the mountains, where there would be no dangerous duties, and no cares?
human
And if we lived in the woods, you would be more terrified still. There would never be a falling star, but your heart would sink. You would take the voices of the winds for the spirits of the woods, and the mountain mists for ghosts. Then, there are the tornado and the thunderbolt. When you saw the trees crashing, you would be for making haste back to the plain. Whenever you heard the rock rolling and bounding down the steep, or the cataract rising and roaring in the midst of the tempest, you would entreat me to fly to the city. It is in this little beating heart that the fear lies.
gpt
What then is to be done?
human
This little heart must beat yet a while longer; and then, when I have once come back, it shall rest upon mine for ever.
gpt
Beside my father? He never rests. Your father would leave us in peace; but he has committed you to one who knows not what rest is.
human
Nor ever will, said Moyse.
gpt
If he closed his eyes, if he relaxed his hand, we should all be sunk in ruin.
human
We? Who? What ruin?
gpt
The whole negro race. Do you suppose the whites are less cruel than they were? Do you believe that their thirst for our humiliation, our slavery, is quenched? Do you believe that the white man's heart is softened by the generosity and forgiveness of the blacks?
human
My father believes so, replied Genifrede;
gpt
Yes, he does,
human
You think him deceived?
gpt
No, I do not. It is not easy to deceive L'Ouverture.
human
You do not think--no, you cannot think, that he deceives the whites, or any one.
gpt
No. L'Ouverture deceives no one. As you say, he reveres the whites. He reveres them for their knowledge. He says they are masters of an intellectual kingdom from which we have been shut out, and they alone can let us in. And then again.--Genifrede, it seems to me that he loves best those who have most injured him.
human
Not best, she replied.
gpt
He delights to forgive: but what white has he ever loved as he loves Henri? Did he ever look upon any white as he looked upon me, when--when he consented? Moyse, you remember?
human
I do. But still he loves the whites as if they were born, and had lived and died, our friends, as he desires they should be. Yet more--he expects and requires that all his race should love them too.
gpt
And you do not?
human
I abhor them.
gpt
Oh! hush! hush! Speak lower. Does my father know this?
human
Why should he? If he once knew it--
gpt
Nay, if he knew it, he would give up his purposes of distinction for you; and we might live here, or on the shore.
human
My Genifrede, though I hate the whites, I love the blacks. I love your father. The whites will rise upon us at home, as they are always scheming against us in France, if we are not strong and as watchful as we are strong. If I and others leave L'Ouverture alone to govern, and betake ourselves to the woods and the mountains, the whites will again be masters, and you and I, my Genifrede, shall be slaves. But you shall not be a slave, Genifrede, he continued, soothing her tremblings at the idea.
gpt
The bones of the whites shall be scattered over the island, like the shells on the sea-shore, before my Genifrede shall be a slave. I will cut the throat of every infant at every white mother's breast, before any one of that race shall lay his grasp upon you. The whites never will, never shall again, be masters: but then, it must be by L'Ouverture having an army always at his command; and of that army I must be one of the officers. We cannot live here, or on the sea-shore, love, while there are whites who may be our masters. So, while I am away, you must pray Christ to humble the whites. Will you? This is all you can do. Will you not?
human
How can I, when my father is always exalting them?
gpt
You must choose between him and me. Love the whites with him, or hate them with me.
human
But you love my father. Moyse?
gpt
I do. I adore him as the saviour of the blacks. You adore him, Genifrede. Every one of our race worships him. Genifrede, you love him--your father.
human
I know not--Yes, I loved him the other day. I know not, Moyse. I know nothing but that--I will hate the whites as you do. I never loved them: now I hate them.
gpt
You shall. I will tell you things of them that will make you curse them. I know every white man's heart.
human
Then tell my father.
gpt
Does he not know enough already? Is not his cheek furrowed with the marks of the years during which the whites were masters; and is there any cruelty, any subtlety, in them that he does not understand? Knowing all this, he curses, not them, but the flower which, he says, corrupted them. He keeps from them this power, and believes that all will be well. I shall tell him nothing.
human
Yes, tell him all--all except--
gpt
Yes, and tell me first,