Free A Wedding in Haiti by Julia Álvarez

Ennery” and with Piti “in Bassin-Bleu.”
    But twenty minutes later, we are still twisting and turning in the boxlike grid of unmarked city streets. Where on earth is the Hôtel Les Jardins de l’Océan? The pedestrians we ask look thoughtful, as if pondering a philosophical question, finally shaking their heads. But at last, we find a young man who knows exactly where the hotel is and offers to ride with us so we don’t get lost again.
    Even without knowing the city, we can tell when we’ve reached the Boulevard de Mer, and not just because it runs by the sea. Hotels, awash in lights, flanked by waving palms, line the street. Not quite Graham Greene, but there is a different feel to this area. I’m reminded of that moment in The Great Gatsby, when Nick wonders out loud what is so very special about Daisy’s low, thrilling voice, and Gatsby responds, “Her voice is full of money.”
    Okap has known the thrill of being “full of money.” Back in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Cap-Français, as it was known then, was the wealthy capital of the wealthiest colony in the world. But the city has also known its share of tragedies: having been destroyed three times by fire, in 1734, 1798, and 1802, then razed to the ground by an earthquake in 1842. Sic transit gloria mundi.
    But tonight, exhausted and hungry, we’re all ready for a little gloria mundi . According to Madison, the Hôtel Les Jardins de l’Océan is owned and run by a French woman, Myrième, and her chef son. “The restaurant is quite good,” Madison mentioned in one e-mail. Back in Vermont, I didn’t think much about this culinary tip. But now, it glows like the promise of paradise after a long stay in purgatory.
    The hotel is not right on the boulevard but up a dark, twisting side street. We turn into a parking area at the base of a steep outdoor staircase leading up to the large house, built into the hill. One by one, we emerge from the pickup, a dirty, ragamuffin group. By the time we are all out of the cab, two porters have descended the steps to unload our gear and show us where to park.
    We ascend to the lobby, single file, like weary mountain climbers. Past the entryway, we find ourselves in a large room, the restaurant at the far end with a terrace view of the ocean. Sitting at a long table like a spider at the center of her web is a large white woman with cropped gray hair. Not much can escape her notice: traffic in any direction must go by her post: to the restaurant ahead, to the kitchen behind her, to a staircase on her left leading up to the guest rooms. On the table beside her are three cell phones, a calculator, a record book in which she has been finishing up the accounts for the day, and a fat glass of something that might be alcoholic. Madame Myrième, I presume.
    Madame’s sharp blue eyes look us over. Hoteliers must develop an instinct about who will or won’t be trouble, especially in tricky, remote areas of the world. But Madame can’t figure out our story and that has to be worrisome. Are we harmless missionaries? Aid workers? Are we running contraband? What is our connection to the young Haitians? The darling baby? Are Bill and I a childless couple looking to adopt the child? Is the young redheaded man our son? And if so, why would we want a baby? And who the hell is Homero?
    The porters have finished bringing up our assortment of dusty luggage. It looks like we mean to move in for a while: three suitcases, several backpacks, a large cooler, an enormous cardboard box with our mosquito nets and other supplies spilling out of the top, two wedding cakes, an opened bottle of cheap champagne, and a plastic bag with a dirty diaper that has been doubling as Eseline’s barf bag. Is there a trashcan where we can throw it out?
    But the unforgivable affront to this French woman is that I should speak to her in English. Does she have any vacancies? She does not speak anglais, she tells me in français, shaking her head