The Jumbies

In this very brief chapter, narrative point of view returns to Corinne. Bouki cries out that something in the river grabbed his foot, and Corinne gently teases him. Bouki insists that it was not a fish that pulled on his foot; Dru becomes worried and wants to go home. Corinne tries to reassure her two friends, but then she feels something touch her foot as well. Like Bouki, she does not think it is a fish.

Corinne suggests they all swim to another section of the river. However, on the way, she feels something brush against her leg; she stops swimming but cannot see anything in the water. At this, she and Dru decide to swim to shore.

Narrative perspective shifts to the white witch, who is monitoring the jumbie as she watches the children in the river. The witch sees the jumbie turn invisible and slip below the water. She does not want to get involved, but when Bouki begins looking around and acting frightened, the witch turns herself invisible and dives into the river. She finds the jumbie and pins her to the riverbed. However, the transparent creature wriggles free, and the two struggle; the witch deals the jumbie a blow to the chest, but the jumbie breaks the witch’s arm. During their struggle, the children leave the river; the white witch has saved them, but she knows this rescue will come at a cost.

Narrative point of view shifts back to Corinne, and from the shore, the children watch as the water in the middle of the river mysteriously churns. When the churning stops, Corinne notices the white witch (returned to her visible form) in the river, struggling to swim to shore. Dru thinks it was the witch who was pulling on their feet, so she cries out in protest as Corinne dives back in to help her.

The witch snarls at Corinne after she pulls her from the water, telling her to get away from the river and go home. Her anger upsets Corinne, who thought the witch was drowning and grabbing at their feet for help. Corinne begins to cry as she dives back into the river to return to her friends.

The narrative returns to the white witch’s perspective as Corinne swims away. The jumbie calls out to the witch from the opposite shore: Since the witch helped the children, to keep things in balance, the witch must now help the jumbie.

Bouki and Malik return to their cave shelter in the hills, and Corinne walks a frightened Dru home to her village. When they arrive, Corinne meets Dru’s seven siblings. The narrator only introduces four: Dru’s brother, Arjun; her older sister, Fatima; her sister Vidia, who is Dru’s age; and another brother, Karma. Corinne meets Mr. Rootsingh, a sugarcane farmer, and Mrs. Rootsingh, who offers Corinne a glass of goat’s milk. Corinne also meets a neighbor boy, Allan.

The sky grows dark with rain clouds, and Mrs. Rootsingh warns Corinne to start her walk home soon. As Mrs. Rootsingh turns to go inside, a piece of her sari tears off on a nail. Corinne pockets the shred of silk and runs home as the rain begins.

When she arrives, she goes straight to the orange tree in her garden and plants the piece of sari between the tree’s roots. Corinne speaks to the tree as if it is her Mama, telling it she would have enjoyed meeting Mrs. Rootsingh. Corinne envisions her mother in her memory for a moment, then rises to go inside.

Once inside, Corinne is dumbstruck at the sight of the woman from the market chatting with Pierre. Pierre introduces her as Severine; he invited her to stay until the rain subsides. Corinne remarks that she remembers the woman from the market. Severine claims she had wanted to buy some of Corinne’s oranges, but she came too late. Corinne is skeptical, as the woman did not seem interested in oranges when she saw her at the market; nevertheless, she offers her an orange from her tree. Severine makes a similar claim about being at the wharf, where she met Pierre: She wanted to buy fish, but arrived too late. Corinne is standoffish toward Severine, who tries to ingratiate herself by complimenting the orange. The rain stops and Severine leaves, promising to see them again.

Corinne returns to the market to sell oranges the following day, and everyone there is talking about Severine. Corinne begins setting up her oranges near Mrs. Rootsingh, and Dru comes over to chat. Corinne tells her about Severine’s visit to her house the previous night; Dru is suspicious, especially since no one knows the woman and she is not related to anyone on the island. Corinne dismisses Dru’s suspicions, brushing the visit off as unintentional. Moments later, Severine arrives and heads straight to Corinne to buy oranges. Everyone stares and whispers to each other.

That afternoon, Corinne arrives home to find Severine cooking in her kitchen. Corinne is not surprised at Severine’s return, but the pot on the stove makes her worry. She shimmies between Severine and the stove, trying to see what is in the pot; it does not look familiar, nor does it smell right. Corinne tries to be nice and, insists that Severine, as a guest, should not cook. When Severine persists, Corinne grabs the pot and pitches its contents out the kitchen door and down the hill. Severine is annoyed. Corinne silently believes that, like the food, something is off about Severine.

Pierre comes in from cleaning fish and diffuses the situation by encouraging Severine to sit and watch Corinne cook. This makes Corinne feel less worried. Severine talks to Pierre about Corinne’s mother, who, he reveals, had always been fragile and died unexpectedly when Corinne was small. When Severine directs the conversation to Corinne, Corinne bristles and changes the subject, asking Severine how often she visits the witch.

Later that evening, Corinne reflects on how happy Pierre seemed at dinner. He tells her he likes Severine and enjoys her company. Corinne is undecided but resolves to try to like Severine for Pierre’s sake.

The next afternoon, Corinne accompanies Bouki, Malik, and Dru into the island’s rocky hills, where the brothers’ cave is located. As they walk, Bouki teases Corinne about Severine becoming her new mother and taking over her house. Corinne dismisses the jokes and chases Bouki. She tells him her house is her own, and Pierre does not need Severine. In a valley below, Bouki spots the white witch bent over a small cauldron. Corinne ducks out of view and badly cuts her leg on a rock.

The children help Corinne home, where Pierre promptly attends to her wound. Severine appears and draws close to the injured girl, mesmerized by the deep cut. When Pierre steps away for a moment, Severine places her finger in the wound, causing Corinne to howl in pain. Horrified, Dru and Malik get between Severine and Corinne as Pierre returns with a clean, wet cloth. Severine stares angrily at the children, as she says she knows how to help; she places her hand over the wound and begins muttering inaudibly. However, when Corinne sees Severine’s eyes flash yellow, she screams, and Pierre pushes Severine aside, believing she is hurting Corinne.

Severine angrily grabs the wax statue Corinne made on All Hallows’ Eve and throws it to the floor, breaking it in two. Then, Severine storms out of the house. Pierre does not notice any of this, as he is concentrating on Corinne’s wound. Dru, Malik, and Bouki chase after Severine but soon return, telling Corinne the woman vanished into the night. They deduce that she must have gone into the forest, where no human would venture in the dark of night. From this, the children realize the truth about Severine—she must be a jumbie.

This brief chapter follows the perspective of Severine, now returned to her jumbie form as she retreats through the forest. She has inhabited these forests for hundreds of years and easily navigates them, unbothered by either the total darkness or the prickers that scratch humans.

As she reaches the deepest recesses of the forest, the jumbie grows upset about how Pierre pushed her aside. The previous night, she thought she was making progress in getting the La Mers to trust her, but now, she feels they will never accept her as family. The jumbie cries muddy tears and vows as part of her revenge for losing her sister, she will rid the island of humans.

She thinks of Corinne and decides to give the girl the choice to join her. As the jumbie eats a small, furry animal, she reflects on the power she feels in Corinne. This is a power the jumbie wants for herself.

The next morning, Corinne’s injury has begun to heal. She sets off for the market with her oranges; on her walk, she thinks about the possibility that Severine is a jumbie. She tries to laugh off the idea, but her proximity to the mahogany forest gives her chills. Corinne still believes the island’s stories of jumbies are fiction, but she cannot make sense of the yellow eyes she saw in the forest on All Hallow’s Eve, nor the way Severine’s eyes glowed yellow the previous night.

Corinne decides to make a detour into the forest, leaving her basket of oranges near the dry well, though she pockets a few small ones to mark her path. As she walks, nothing seems odd or out of place, but then, she hears rustling in the bushes. She carefully investigates; moving aside some leaves, she finds a small child wearing a cone-shaped straw hat, playing in the dirt: “Oh!” Corinne cries out, and the child echoes her, as its voice grows deep and intimidating (90). Corinne steps back and realizes several other “little man-children” have surrounded her, all chanting “oh” (90).

The child had not been mocking Corinne, it had been beckoning its fellows: douens, a type of jumbie. Douens are the spirits of babies and children; they are notorious for kidnapping island children and turning them into jumbies. Corinne heard stories from other people on the island that douens’ feet face backward, and she screams when she notices this about the feet of her tiny pursuers. She tries to flee, but the jumbies’ droning makes it difficult for her to think straight. Suddenly, a frog appears and distracts the douens; it is the frog Corinne rescued from the well. It lures the jumbies away, and Corinne escapes, finally accepting that jumbies are real.