The Seeds of Fiction (25 page)

The presiding judge, a woman who later became a French Supreme Court justice, ruled partly in Papa Doc's favour. All scenes considered injurious to François Duvalier were to be cut from the film before it could be shown in France. So mutilated would the film have been that it would have been impossible to exhibit.

Even twenty-one years later Vaisse was ecstatic in recalling that portion of the judge's verdict. He was less enthusiastic about the rest of it. The court ordered that Duvalier be paid damages amounting to ‘one franc' — clearly a note of ridicule. Graham relished the irony of the one-franc victory and sent me a small clipping, a paragraph from
The Times
of 23 March 1970, under the headline: ‘One Franc Damages'.

Paris, March 22, 1970 — A French court has ruled that the film of Graham Greene's novel
The Comedians
was a libel against President Duvalier of Haiti, and parts of the film were ordered to be cut. President Duvalier, who asked for ten million francs (two million dollars) damages from the French distributors, was awarded symbolic damages of one franc.

Back in Haiti, ‘Great National Victory on the Soil of France. President-for-Life Dr François Duvalier wins his lawsuit against Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer,' blared the headline across the front page of
Le Nouveau Monde.
The newspaper waxed ecstatic over what it cast as Duvalier's triumph over
The Comedians.

A cable from Papa Doc's newly resurrected son-in-law in Paris, Max Dominique, whose death sentence for plotting against Duvalier had only recently been commuted, was published in full:

suppression of all offending parts Stop Recognition of wrong experienced by President Duvalier Stop Symbolic franc [granted] as damages and reparation of moral wrong to great personage Stop Report follows. Congratulations and affections from Dédé [Doc's daughter Marie Denise]. Respects Ambassador Max Dominique.

An unsigned editorial in
Le Nouveau Monde
— which would have been dictated in the Palace or on orders from the Palace — contained, in addition to the usual lavish praise of Duvalier, a not-so-veiled threat against Graham. Neither he nor I realized at the time the extent to which Duvalier seemed prepared to go to exact revenge.
Le Nouveau Monde's
editorial declared:

It is a political and moral victory from which we must draw the high meaning … There was no doubt that Haiti should have obtained damages against an organized defamatory action … by the American Secret Services, who have been able to find in the mercenary Graham Greene the agent who could be useful to feed their slanderous propaganda … Publication of the novel,
The Comedians,
followed briefly by a movie of the same name, had for its goal to intoxicate international public opinion against our Republic and its president and prepare a favourable ground for an invasion that was condemned to failure.

If one remembers that the regional president of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, for having produced a movie against Lebanon, was assassinated in the streets of Beirut as reprisal, one can see that Graham Greene and his accomplices managed to get off cheap, because on a simple order from President Duvalier he (Greene) could have been shot down like a wretch in any corner of the universe.

As was said by a man greater than we in a memorable circumstance: ‘For that we need only a stout-hearted man, and we have thousands of them.'

At the time Graham and I did not know of this apparent veiled warning. It was only after Graham's death, when I was looking over some old Haitian newspapers, that I discovered the editorial. Graham had good reason to fear Papa Doc.

No matter the cost to the Haitian treasury, in the end François Duvalier had undeniably won a symbolic victory. It was perhaps Papa Doc's best year, a year before his death; he had prevailed against both
The Comedians
and the Kamoken, whose leaders were slowly rotting to death behind bars in Fort Dimanche.

Graham wrote to me on 2 July 1971: ‘I thought of you naturally a great deal at the time of Papa Doc's death, and I am very sorry indeed to hear that things are as bad as ever.' There was no gloating on Graham's part over the passing of his old adversary. For all of Duvalier's attempts at retaliation for
The Comedians,
Graham just hoped that the tyrant's passing would finally bring change in Haiti. It was too much to hope for.

As the thirteenth year of his rule ended in 1970, Papa Doc had become more suspicious than ever of those around him. As his health deteriorated, his paranoia increased. By now the enigmatic but ruthless king of Haiti's political jungle was a tired and sick old man. Three French doctors were rushed to his bedside from Paris by his daughter Marie-Denise and son-in-law Max Dominique after Papa Doc suffered a mild heart attack on 12 November 1970, due to the deterioration of his vascular system. The French specialists found a wizened little figure wasting away in bed. Everyone was afraid to touch him. One of the French physicians recalled to a Haitian friend how he had sat Duvalier on his lap in order for technicians to X-ray his chest. Duvalier, said the French doctor, had pleaded, ‘Give me six months. That's all I ask.' But the physician said, ‘The
machine
[body] was a wreck. Diabetes has taken its toll.'

Duvalier had steadfastly refused to go abroad for specialized treatment that might have prolonged his life. None the less he got his six months, sufficient time to secure his successor in power and with it a Duvalier dynasty. Most high-ranking Duvalierists, and even some ambitious Macoutes, lusted after Papa Doc's throne. They refused to believe he intended to pass them by and instead name his nineteen-year-old son, Jean-Claude, to succeed him as President-for-Life. In a speech on 2 January 1971 Papa Doc gave a clear hint of his intentions when he declared that it was time for the youth to take the helm in Haiti. Then, with characteristic modesty, he took the opportunity to liken Jean-Claude to the Roman Emperor, Augustus, who ‘took the fate of Rome into his hands when he was nineteen years old, and his reign is still known as the century of Augustus'. (Gérard de Catalogne, who had become a close aide to Papa Doc, claimed he researched and wrote the succession speeches for him.)

Jean-Claude's friends claimed he would have been happier racing cars than ruling Haiti. Nevertheless, whether he liked it or not, the youth had no choice
but to obey his father. Papa Doc, a close aide later confided, took great pleasure in naming his son to assume power and cheating those around him who believed they should have been the chosen one. They could only watch in dismay as Papa Doc's mantle was handed to a uninterested young motorcycle enthusiast who, when he was told the anointment was official, left the room, went out on a balcony and cried. Jean-Claude had no illusions about his inheritance, which meant he would have to watch his back and regard his friends as possible traitors.

Following the announcement of his successor, and with his opposition imprisoned, disappeared or intimidated into silence, the only adversary Papa Doc had to face at the age of sixty-four was death itself. The old dictator held on to life until 21 April 1971. The death certificate read: ‘Dead of a myocardial infarction'.

The body of François Duvalier was placed (it was later removed) in a relatively simple blue-tiled mausoleum in the Port-au-Prince cemetery. A military guard was posted on round-the-clock duty at the tomb for the next fourteen years. In February 1986, after Jean-Claude Duvalier fled the country, crowds who hated Papa Doc broke open the tomb. It was empty. The whereabouts of Papa Doc's body remain a mystery to this day.

Haitians who had become afraid to leave their homes thanked God for an easing of repression. Many applauded the transition, but along with some Duvalierists they also believed that Baby Doc (as Jean-Claude was quickly nicknamed by the foreign media) would not last long as Haiti's new President. They were wrong. In spite of his flaccid leadership qualities, Baby Doc remained in power even longer than his father.

A number of factors contributed to the seeming paradox of Jean-Claude's political longevity. For instance, when the United States realized that Papa Doc was truly near death they began helping to facilitate a peaceful transition. Neither the United States nor Papa Doc's political heirs wished to see the embittered exiles return to exact revenge. It was arranged, through back-channel negotiations and the pro-regime US Ambassador Clinton Knox, that Jean-Claude Duvalier would receive US support. Repression was given a new face.

So change came — but only up to a point. In spite of the general easing of repression, political prisoners remained locked in filthy, crowded cells. The new government grandly announced an amnesty for all exiles, ‘except Communists and troublemakers'. The announcement effectively barred all exiles from returning.

Jean-Claude Bajeux, who had by then left the priesthood and was teaching at the University of Puerto Rico, decided to put the amnesty to the test. He requested permission to return home to give his mother, two brothers and
three sisters (who had been arrested and disappeared in 1964) a Christian burial. His request was ignored.

An exile by the name of Tony St Aude, who had returned from New York, was promptly arrested and sent to Fort Dimanche. The outcry over his arrest was so intense, however, that the regime had no choice but to release him and ship him back to the United States. On his return to New York St Aude reported that among those with whom he had shared a cell at ‘Fort Death' was Renel Baptiste. His brother, Fred Baptiste, was said to be in another cell. After hearing this news in December 1971 I informed Graham that both Fred and Renel were still alive but languishing in the putrid cells of Fort Dimanche. I told Graham I would try to confirm the news and make certain the Baptiste brothers were still alive.

Another exile who tested Baby Doc's regime was my wife, Ginette. She had not been home in almost a decade. In August 1972 she flew home from Mexico City to visit her parents. During her second week back, while she was enjoying the Haitian countryside at Frères with our three children, the police arrived and told her she had to go with them. They refused to answer any of her questions or allow any family member to accompany her. The children were left with her parents, and she was taken to the Casernes Dessalines where she spent three hours waiting until an officer, who introduced himself as the aide to Haitian Army General Breton Claude, said she would have to return the next day because the general was busy. She had to find her own ride home.

The following day she complied, and General Claude, who then headed the Duvalier regime's political police, appeared. He told her that the government of Jean-Claude Duvalier liked to keep in touch with returning compatriots, especially those who lived in Mexico, which he said was a centre of international communism. Then he began to question her. During the interrogation her attention was drawn to mugshot photos pasted on the wall of General Claude's office. The general noted her interest and explained, ‘Subversives, madame.'

A man in a sharkskin suit, later identified as the regime's strongman Luckner Cambronne, joined the interrogation. ‘It soon became obvious that they were not interested in me but my husband,' Ginette recalled.

‘Is it true your husband is writing a new book?' Cambronne asked, taking over the questioning from General Claude. Where General Claude had spoken in a patronizing manner, Cambronne was overbearing, and while he made an effort to control his anger he quickly began to parrot the new government so-called change of image — an image, he said, that was hardly a year old. ‘Any adverse publicity, especially in the form of another book, would not be helpful.'

‘He writes his books. I have my own work,' Ginette said.

Cambronne became visibly irritated and began to dispute Ginette's
suggestion that she had been arrested. ‘But surely you read his book on Papa Doc. He had the right to criticize the chief of state, but he was mean towards the Haitian people,' he said.

Ginette then realized Cambronne hadn't read
Papa Doc
and volunteered that at the moment I was working on a book about the 1961 assassination of Trujillo.

Cambronne left as angry as he had been when he entered the interrogation session. Then Breton Claude asked her whether she would ever come back to live in Haiti. ‘You heard what the man [Cambronne] said, General. My husband can never return,' she replied.

The General smiled. ‘But men change, madame.'

She was finally allowed to leave. In recalling the exchange after departing Haiti, Ginette was of the opinion that Breton Claude had meant that Cambronne could be changed. And indeed, a month later Luckner Cambronne, the first power behind the throne of Jean-Claude Duvalier, found the Palace gates closed to him. He sought refuge in a Latin American embassy and eventually went into exile in Miami, where he became a permanent resident and died in 2006. When he left, his home in Haiti was looted by partisans of the regime.

In a letter dated 12 October 1972, written from his apartment in Antibes — which by coincidence bore the name, Le Residence des Fleurs (The House of Flowers) — Graham wrote:

Your letter written on my 68th birthday came to me as quite a shock. Thank goodness, Ginette and the children came back safely from Haiti. What a brave girl she is to have attempted the visit. Your story of her being taken under guard to see Cambronne and Claude was terrifying. In Haiti on that last visit was to me quite a traumatic experience and I still at intervals dream of the place. My dreams even keep up to date — so that the last one I had Baby Doc was in charge and not Papa Doc.

He continued, ‘I suppose there's still no news of our friends who may be in Fort Dimanche?' There was no news. Graham was deeply affected by the imprisonment of Fred and Renel Baptiste and insisted that he was still ready with ‘my signature for any protest or appeal'. We waited.

Around that time I had complained to Graham about how many of the stories I wrote for
Time
magazine were being killed. In a March 1973 letter he addressed the issue: