Papillon (54 page)

“You really think they believed no one else was involved?”

“No, but if they want to save their skins, they have to believe it. And if we don’t want trouble, we’d better believe it too.”

At seven the next morning they emptied every cell in the maximum-security section. There were over a hundred and twenty men. Nobody went to work, but all the buildings were open and the yard was full of
bagnards
talking, smoking, sitting in the sun or shade. Niston went to the hospital. Carbonieri told me that signs saying “Suspected of complicity in the revolt” had been hung on at least eighty of the doors.

Now that we were together once again, we learned what had actually happened. Filisarri had killed only one man, the other two had been shot by two young guards. The two cons had had their backs to the wall and, thinking they were about to be killed, they’d drawn their knives in the hope they could take at least one guard with them. The guards in turn felt threatened, so they shot them. That’s how the revolt, luckily aborted at the start, was transformed into an unusual form of suicide. This theory was officially accepted by everybody, Administration as well as cons. It has since remained part legend, part true story.

Apparently the burial of the three men killed in camp, plus Hautin and Marceau, was effected in the following manner: Since there was only one sliding casket, the guards put them all in the bottom of the boat and the five were thrown to the sharks together. The guards had calculated that, while the first was being devoured, the others would have time to sink to the bottom, since their feet were weighted down with rocks. But I was told that none of the five sank and that, as daylight faded, they staged a ballet in their white shrouds—like five marionettes manipulated by the mouths and tails of the sharks. It was a spectacle worthy of Nebuchadnezzar. The horror of it sent the guards and boatmen beating it back to shore.

A commission came and stayed almost five days on Saint-Joseph and two days at Royale. I was not singled out for special examination but was treated like all the rest. I learned from Warden Dutain that everything went smoothly. Filisarri, given leave until the start of his retirement, would not be returning. Mohamed got a reprieve. Warden Dutain was promoted.

Some malcontent, a con from Bordeaux, asked me, “What did it get us to be so helpful to the guards?”

I looked the
mec
in the eye. “Not much. Only that fifty or sixty cons won’t spend five years in solitary for complicity. That doesn’t seem like anything to you?”

Fortunately the storm died down. A tacit understanding between guards and cons completely undermined the investigating commission, which perhaps wanted exactly that—for everything to work itself out.

Personally I won nothing and lost nothing, unless you count my comrades’ gratitude. Some other good things happened: the hauling of rocks stopped—the work was now done by the buffaloes. The cons only set them in place. And Carbonieri was allowed back in the bakery.

I tried to get sent back to Royale. There was no workshop on Saint-Joseph, therefore no way of making a raft.

Pétain’s coming to power in France complicated relations between cons and guards. All the Administration people proclaimed themselves “Pétainists.” One Norman guard even told me, “You want to know something, Papillon? I’ve never even been a Republican.”

Nobody had a radio on the islands, so we were without news. On top of that, word went around that we were supplying German submarines at Guadeloupe and Martinique. There was no way of finding out the truth and arguments erupted all the time.

“Jesus, you want to know what I think, Papi? We should be staging a revolt now so we can give the islands back to de Gaulle and the Free French.”

“You think
le grand Charlot
needs the
bagne
? What for?”

“He gets two or three thousand extra men!”

“Lepers, half-wits, tuberculars, men with dysentery? Don’t make me laugh. He’s not such a fool he wants an army of cons on his hands.”

“What about the two thousand healthy ones?”

“That’s something else again. They may be men, but that doesn’t mean they’d be good for the firing line. You think war is like a knife fight. That takes ten minutes. A war lasts years. To be a good soldier you have to have a patriot’s faith. Whether you like it or not, I don’t think there’s a single
mec
here who’d give his life for France.”

“Why should we, after what she’s done to us?”

“So you agree with me. It’s a good thing old Charlot has other men besides you to fight the war. Though, goddammit, I don’t like the idea of having all those German bastards in our country! And to think there are Frenchmen who’ve gone over to the side of the Boches! All the guards here say they’re for Pétain.”

The Count de Bérac said, “It might be one way of getting pardoned.” No
mec
had ever spoken of trying to get a pardon. Now everybody—the underworld and the nonprofessionals both, even the hardened old criminals—was seeing flickers of hope on the horizon.

“How about staging a revolt so we can join up with de Gaulle, Papi?”

“I’m sorry, but I’m not looking for a pardon. Screw French justice and its ideas of ‘rehabilitation.’ I’ll be the one to judge when I’ve been rehabilitated. My duty now is to make a
cavale
and, once I’m free, to be a normal man who is not a threat to society. I don’t think there’s any other way to prove yourself. I’m ready to leave at anytime, but only so long as it’s on a
cavale
. I’m not interested in turning the islands over to
le grand Charlot
and I don’t think he wants them anyway. Besides, if we did such a thing, you know what the boys at the top would say? That we did it for ourselves, not for France. Anyway, do we really know which one is right—Pétain or de Gaulle? I sure as hell don’t. I suffer as much as the next guy, knowing that my country’s been overrun. I think about my people, my father, my sisters, my nieces …”

“What right have these bastards to ask us to go to all that trouble for a society that doesn’t give a damn about us?”

“It’s perfectly natural. The pigs, the French judicial system, the guards—they aren’t France. They’re a class apart, made up of people with warped minds. Just guess how many of them are ready to grovel before the Germans! Want to bet the French police are arresting their own countrymen and turning them over to the German authorities? I tell you again, I’m not taking part in any revolt for any reason. Except for a
cavale
.”

We had very serious discussions among our various factions. Some were for de Gaulle, some for Pétain. But actually we knew nothing because, as I said before, neither guards nor cons had radios. News reached us only by the boats that brought in our food supplies. To us the war seemed very far away and difficult to understand.

There was a rumor that a recruiter for the Free French Forces had turned up at Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni. We on the islands knew nothing—only that the Germans were all over France.

There was one amusing incident. A priest came to Royale and preached a sermon after mass in which he said, “If the islands are attacked, you’ll be given arms to help the guards defend French soil.” He actually said it! That was some priest, all right, and he must have had a pretty funny opinion of us prisoners. To ask us to defend our cells! What next?

For us the war reduced itself to this: twice as many guards as usual, lots of inspectors, some with pronounced German or Alsatian accents; very little bread—we were down to less than a pound a day—and very little meat. The only increase was in the penalty for a failed escape: death, because added to the regular charge of attempted escape was “Attempt to go over to the enemies of France.”

I succeeded in returning to Royale, where I made good friends with Dr. Germain Guibert. His wife, who was an extraordinary woman, asked me to plant a vegetable garden to supplement our restricted diet. I planted lettuces, radishes, green beans, tomatoes and eggplant. She was delighted and treated me like a close friend. The doctor had never shaken hands with a guard, whatever his rank, but he often shook mine and those of the few other
bagnards
he had come to know and respect.

Years later, when I was finally free, I made contact again with Dr. Guibert through Dr. Rosenberg. He sent me a photograph of himself and his wife taken on the Canebière in Marseilles. He was back from Morocco and congratulated me on my freedom. He was killed in Indochina trying to save a wounded soldier. He was an exceptional man and his wife was worthy of him. When I went to France in 1967, I thought about getting in touch with her, but decided not to. I had asked her for a letter of recommendation, which she had given me, but I hadn’t heard from her since. I don’t know why she stopped writing, but I still feel the deepest gratitude to both of them for the way they welcomed me into their home on Royale.

S
AINT
-J
OSEPH

Y
ESTERDAY MY FRIEND
M
ATTHIEU
C
ARBONIERI
was stabbed to death. His murder set off a whole series of other murders. He had been in the washhouse, naked, and his face was covered with soap when he was hit. When we showered, we were in the habit of opening our knives and hiding them under our clothes so we could reach for them quickly if a suspected enemy appeared. Carbonieri forgot to do this and it cost him his life. The man who killed him was an Armenian pimp.

With the permission of the warden and the help of another con, I carried my friend down to the quay. He was heavy and we had to stop three times to rest. I had a big rock attached to his feet and had used steel wire instead of the usual rope. That way the sharks wouldn’t be able to cut it and he’d sink to the bottom without being eaten.

The bell tolled as we reached the quay. It was six o’clock. The sun was setting. We got into the boat. In the all too familiar crate, under the closed lid, Matthieu slept his final sleep. For him it was all over.

“Let’s go. Start paddling,” said the guard at the tiller. In less than ten minutes we were in the channel between Royale and Saint-Joseph. Suddenly my throat tightened. Dozens of sharks’ fins were cutting through the water, whipping around in tightening circles. They were ready for their appointment.

Dear God, don’t give them time to get at him! Our oars were raised as if in farewell. We lifted the crate. Wrapped in flour sacks, Matthieu’s body slid into the water.

Jesus! He was no sooner in the water—for good, I thought—than he rose above the surface, lifted by, I don’t know, seven, ten, maybe twenty sharks. The flour sacks were torn off, and for perhaps two or three seconds Matthieu appeared to be literally standing on the water. His right forearm was already gone. With half his body out of the water, he was bearing down on our boat when an eddy caught him and he disappeared. The sharks shot under the boat and, as they hit its bottom, one of our men lost his balance and almost fell in the water.

Everybody, guards included, was terror-stricken. For the first time in my life I wanted to die. It wouldn’t have taken much to get me to throw myself to the sharks and leave this hell forever.

I walked slowly back to camp, alone. I was carrying the stretcher on my shoulder, and as I reached the place where Brutus had attacked Danton, I stopped and sat down. Night had fallen, although it was only seven, but in the west the sky was still glowing with a few licks of sunlight from below the horizon. Everything else was black but for the regular beam from the lighthouse. My heart was heavy.

Well, you wanted to see a burial and you saw one, the burial of your pal. O.K., you saw it, the bell and the whole bit. Now are you satisfied?

But I still had to get the
mec
who had killed my friend. When? Tonight? No, it was too early; he’d be on his guard. No point in moving too quickly. There were six men in his
gourbi
. How many men could I count on? Besides myself, four. O.K. We could do it. Yes, then if possible, I’d leave for Diable. On Diable, no rafts, no preparations, nothing—two sacks of coconuts and off into the sea. From there to the coast the distance was relatively short—twenty-five miles as the crow flies. With the waves, wind and tides, figure about seventy-five miles. It would be just a matter of endurance. I was strong, and I should certainly be able to last the two days astride my sacks.

I picked up the stretcher and continued on my way. When I arrived in front of the door, I was searched. Very unusual. That had never happened before. The guard removed my knife.