Put A Spell On You

Haiti is shaped like the pincers of a giant crab and sitting off the lower mandible is the Ila a Vache and on that island there are several splendid resorts.

Robbi Duvalier has lived on the lee side of the island since before the resorts came to the other side and is still as isolated as he wants to be.

Robbi Duvalier is the reputed great grandson of the venerated “Papa Doc” Duvalier, a brutal and eternally greedy dictator, exploiting an already impoverished and illiterate citizenry.

Robbi has closed the circle if he is in fact the fruit of Papa Doc. Voodoo is the religion of Haiti and Robbi is a houngan, a male priest. He is a casual priest, at that, mostly attending to daily priestly duties like healing, teaching, and predicting the future. Still, priests are considered magicians and have knowledge of black magic.

This day Robbi was reading of his country being called a “shithole” by a man whom Robbi had immediately seen as a dark force many months before and whose rancid aura was evident to gifted Voodoo eyes.

On the outskirts of Port Au Prince there is a neighborhood called Tete de L’eau, , a veritable warren of lanes and alleys and footpaths, even more of a morass now in the wake of the terrible wrenching of the earth those five short years ago, the pitiless deep shifting bringing chaos and searing tragedy to those who dwelt on its Haitian crust. Five years and there is still a pall. The earthquake was thorough.

It is here that Robbi devotes himself to tending to those still in need, working with his mentor, Rodney Dubois, a houngan venerated by all in Tete L’eau where he has lived all his long and honorable life. Robbie went there this day.

“So we are a ‘shithole,’ Rodney?”

“So it would seem to the dull-eyed and stupid.”

“Does this anger you like it does me, Rodney?”

“It is annoying, yes. Not worth the anger of an old man, though.  However, it does birth ideas of slight mischief, which might balm your anger. Let us go into the sanctum and combine our powers.”

As he laced up his pigskin golf shoes, he heard a voice several lockers over swearing good-naturedly. It made him think of all this bullshit about these fucking shithole countries. Fuck them. I’m the president and I deny it. Fake fucking news. Yeah. Yeah. Now for some golf.

As he headed out of the locker room, a horrible smell reached him, totally fecal and stomach-turning. He looked into the lavish bathroom and saw raw sewage flowing from under the doors of each stall.

He grabbed a wall phone and barked, “Get someone over here right now! All the fucking toilets are backing up! What? What? Jesus! I’ll be right there.”

Outside, a crowd of guests milled about. The same strong stench filled the air. His major domo, Trinny, rushed up, breathless. “Sir! Sir! It’s every toilet. They’re all backed up and it just keeps flowing. In some of the suites it’s already out of the bathroom. 

The rugs! God! And the people! Look, sir! They won’t go back in. The smell is overpowering everywhere. They want refunds! If it doesn’t stop it’ll be unlivable! It’s like a plague!”

A Haitian gardener nearby looked up from his work and smiled knowingly.