A TOKEN OF THINE SELF-RIGHTEOUS SWEETS…

"La vanite est un jeton ephemere de tes sucreries auto justes"

A Short Mystery Written by David Vollin

Whilst walking through the French Quarter they encountered a woman dressed in purple, so rich and dark so that it was almost blue.  She bore a small hand-woven basket with a shallow but wide basin that had a  broad orb of a handle to it as if it had been designed so that people might freely pick from it.  As she walked she looks straight forward holding the basket handle with both hands clasped, arms  folded beneath her breast.  Her hands shone diminutive but strong, black as a starless night beneath the dense canopy of  an ancient woods.  Her skin was rich and lustrous, only the thick reticulation of veins higly profiled against the feint outline of bone betrayed her years… Her face was absorbed beneath a veil of fine silk but as she spoke the feint glint of yellowed teeth and eyes shone through.  A short woman of merely 5 feet 6 inches her presence was none the less captivating than it was haunting…

She spoke no words and appeared not to focus on anything except the road before her yet her absence of gaze was felt all the more acutely.  The eye was inevitably drawn into the belly of the woven vessel before her as if it were the bare womb of a pregnant mother.  She paused before them speaking naught, still and patient beneath her robes as if waiting for them to take something from the basket in order to release her from pause.  The two couples obliged her reaching into the vessel and picking up what appeared to be identical trinkets, cruciform in shape, painted red and in fact tiny  boxes upon which was written in gold, “A JETON DE SUCRERIES toi-JUSTES, “ or in the vulgar tongue, “A TOKEN OF THINE SELF RIGHTEOUS SWEETS.”

No sooner had they selected from the basket did all find themselves privately absorbed in marveling at the intricate craftsmanship until when they had finally broke free of the enchantment the last inch of the woman’s purple robes could be seen to disappear around a left corner three blocks ahead.  They discussed the matter deciding she was an eccentric who had enjoyed beguiling visitors to the ancient city of New Orleans for many years with these cryptic trinkets. 

No sooner had beignet been served with the most exquisite coffee outside at Café du Monde did a glistening carriage roll by driven by two pristine black horses.  The carriage was the same purple as the woman’s robes trimmed in black with intricate brass fittings and fretwork.  Emblazoned on the side of the buggy was the phrase, “A JETON DE SUCRERIES toi-JUSTES. “  The couples all stared the coach into oblivion losing its distinct luster to the general haze and bustle of the days commerce many blocks after it had passed them. 

Nearly a block from their hotel the couples paused to listen to an elderly Black man playing the harp deliciously upon the sidewalk.  After his performance had concluded it became apparent that tithes should be forthcoming to summon more of his miraculous talent.  One of the couple obliged spilling the trinket from his shallow shirt pocket where it had lain as he reached down to pull the prudently hidden petty cash from the antique money clip in his sock.  The entire disposition of the minstrel changed as soon as he spied the cruciform box, even as the first centimeter peeked from its perch his eyes followed it as a marksman’s sight would prey; even as it rolled to settlement did his eyes follow its trajectory to its final resting place.  The mood became ominous; everyone was reluctant to entertain the minstrel’s obvious interest in the object.  Insomuch as the two couples had collectively decided to forgo an inquiry into the nature of the box the minstrel broke his silence having been the first to retrieve the trinket as it rolled to an unlikely terminus upon the very black leather of his boot-toe.   His shoe-black hands and fingers were like an old leather bag that had been painstakingly maintained, oiled and polished by generations of owners.  His face was tight showing no wrinkles save about his neck.  His lips were full and lively muscles trained and made supple and strong by years of harping on the New Orleans streets.  He examined the box as if it were a familiar theme but one that was often counterfeited with offerings bearing dubious hallmarks.  So long did he maintain his inspectors gaze, checking every crease, opening and closing the box examining the seams and the paint, tilting it in the light, viewing it from every angle and weighing it in his rough hands that the couples began to wonder themselves how they came upon so fine a gift for free.  Then the minstrel examined them all one by one and then as a group, measuring them from head to toe, looking back and forth as if estimating where they had come from.  He placed his harp into a fine old leather sac and placed it into the left pocket of his coat.  Then he positioned himself as if to speak, saying,

“Three other boxes were taken; they were not given because they were empty and now they must be retuned but only under the condition that they are filled.  They are reliquaries for the self-righteous sweets of mankind and they will not suffer to be filled with any other treasure.  You should not leave until they have been properly returned.”  The minstrel then reached his long arm out to the man who had dropped the box and as he placed it into the warm palm of his hand he squeezed his hand firmly but not impolitely fixing his gaze as if to read the man’s thoughts.  He politely nodded to them all and bowed in acknowledgement of the generous tithes they had bestowed upon him and them disappeared into the matrix of the ancient city of New Orleans.

When the couples returned to their hotel room one of them goggled the cryptic phrase written upon the box but no offering was bestowed upon them from that engine or any other.  Later that evening when they were leaving a restaurant where they had eaten dinner and had drinks they happened upon a cheesy souvenir shop buzzing with wild kids and wide eyed tourists looking to buy cheap mementos for their family and friends back wherever home was for them.  To their delight and amusement they found dozens of similar trinkets in various colors, sixes and with varying degrees of craftsmanship but none so fine and unique as those they took from the lady or the person whom they had assumed to be a lady.  None of the trinkets had the markings in French like the ones they had taken.  The shopmaster offered to buy them from the gentlemen for a considerable price and two of the men sold them to him at a considerable profit.  They did not even understand what the inscription meant nor did the shopmaster but he insisted that it was some form of Creole or an obscure Patwa phrase no longer in use.  It was clear that he was completely ignorant of the origin and meaning of the phrase so after patronizing his dubious historical assessment of the artifacts for nearly 16 minutes they bade him and his ridiculous historian swagger farewell…

It did not occur to them what the inscription could have meant until they visited the necropolises just outside of the French quarter.  One of the men was fascinated by the epitaphs inscribed upon the graves of the dead and he read them like sweet poetry in the sweet summer air, thick with the acid aroma of boxwood and juniper.  The mausoleum was set aside by itself amidst a large family plot bordered by finely wrought marble curbs with low cast iron tracery railings which still showed remains of gilding.  It was an older structure built in a stlye that was popular in the late eighteenth century derived from ancient Etruscan Temples along the Mediterranean coast.  The structure was a huge two-story columbarium for which the funerary urns had been fashioned in the likeness of none other than the reliquary boxes taken by the four men. 

From the heavy filigree of the bronze gates could be seen two levels of niches containing marble and granite urns some of which had never been used, their surfaces never inscribed to memorialize the name of one who had died to spend the ages locked within.  Sure as day was the inscription repeated over and over again and etched in smoothing bas relief o’er the heavy Tuscan lintel of the deep cut entry of the tomb, “A JETON DE SUCRERIES toi-JUSTES. “

Back in the hotel room the men goggled the history of the ancient family.  From the lack of recent graves they deduced the family had died off, the last urn bore the inscription:

 Innocence Du Coeur

Dort ici Innocence Du Cœur
Né dans les dix-sept an cent soixante dix neuf
Est mort en dix-huit an cent soixante-dix
La vanité est un jeton éphémère de tes sucreries auto justes

or in the vulgar tongue :

Here sleeps Innocence Du Cœur

Born in the year seventeen hundred and seventy nine

Died in the year eighteen hundred and seventy

Vanity is a fleeting token of thine self righteous sweets

The four men continued on their tour of the ancient necropolises of New Orleans delighting in the serenity of the landscape and beauty of the statuary but the inscription on the tomb of Innocence Du Cœur remained the primary focus of their collective consciousness.  In order to change to mood they left the downtown French Quarters and sat down for drinks at an elegant bar situated on a pier that punched into the calm waters of the Pontchartrain sipping the exquisitely balanced cocktails of the renowned beverage chef,  Sean-Paul Poinnard.  Sean-Paul Poinnard was a wealthy Black Creole man who had spent many years in Africa, Asia and other Tropical locations studying the ancient techniques for making beers, malts, liquors, spirits and elixirs.  He grew many of the rare ingredients on a large farm in the everglades.  Many of the ingredients were extracts and fruits from little known aquatic plants many of which had eluded Darwin and other botanists who first explored the Americas.  Sean-Paul was the descendant of freedmen who had flourished in New Orleans for over 300 years as business entrepreneurs.  His skin was smooth and flawless as the ebony lacquer of a Chinoiserie cabinet.  His nose, lips and forehead were wide and distinctive; there was a rustic and refined handsomeness to him and he spoke with a distinct Parisian accent.  Sean-Paul was an old school restaurant owner and host who ritually visited the tables of his fine guests, sitting down with them and engaging them in conversation in order to assure himself they were being properly pampered, and to discuss the provenance of the exotic ingredients and his culinary philosophy.  He also enjoyed hearing the traveling stories of the many tourists who came to New Orleans.  Because his family history was so intimately woven into the land he was a wealth of knowledge, in contrast to the shopkeeper of the souvenir shop.   

Before Sean-Paul left the four gentlemen’s company one of them hesitantly pulled out the reliquary box fearful of being pegged as a typical tourist who thinks he has stumbled upon a treasure only to discover it is merely a common tourist souvenir.  Sean-Paul sensed there was some urgency in his deportment and sojourned to relax the gentleman before asking if there was not one more thing he had wished to know about New Orleans.  The other three men cut a glance to the third man not to bother him with the trinket but by then it was so apparent that there was something of great importance they shared and wished to know they were compelled to reveal the object so as not to be thought of as strange or antisocial.  Sean-Paul examined the box without any emotion at all.  A manager waived to him to come deal with some detail and he signaled him that he would come in two minutes.  So without remark he placed the box on the table without any particular care or delicacy and bade the gentlemen not to leave until he could return.  A couple of free rounds of premium cocktails and jellied alligator, peacock and turtle terrine served in successive courses followed to entertain them while they waited for their host to return.

When Sean-Paul returned he bought a large leather bound book with him.  He turned the heavy pages of pigs hide until he found the page he was looking for.  The page showed the family crest they had seen carven into the frieze around the inside and on the outside on the entablature of the columbarium.  The family had owned a wealthy shipping business specializing in the importation of books, clothing and other commodities from Europe as well as slaves and the export of sundry products manufactured in and around New Orleans destined for Caribbean and European markets.  The shipping and slaving industry was a treacherous occupation with a high mortality rate.  Pirating was frequent and crews of stolen ships were seldom allowed to live to incriminate their captors.  The phrase, “La vanité est un jeton éphémère de tes sucreries auto justes,’’ or in the vulgar, “Vanity is a fleeting token of thine self righteous sweets,” was their family motto.  The family died out in the late nineteenth century but there was another side the family that continued to this day.  In New Orleans there are always two sides to every great family, a white side and a black side.  The box is a reliquary originally intended to store mementos of the person while living to be interred with them upon death as a reminder of the brevity  of youth and of life and of how meaningless our vanities are at the end of life when we are focused on correcting the many mistakes we made in our youth.  Vanity and pride is for the young but wisdom and humility is for the old and the dying.  The bigger our vanities the greater our fall when the ravages of old age take our suppleness and wit away replacing them with stiffness and senility, all that was once loved and coveted is forgotten  and none can be taken beyond the grave.  There were only a finite number of these reliquary boxes made at the time the mausoleum was built and this is one of the original 46 crafted in 1730.  For 283 years these reliquaries have been passed down first only to members of the family and then to others whom fate chose; but they have never left New Orleans in 283 years.  The legend says once a man has opened the casket he may not pass it on. Once a man has opened the casket he must humble himself until it becomes clear to him what offering he must place in the reliquary in order to free himself of the vanity of youth.  Our self righteous sweets are the aspects of our  constitution that cause us to challenge the omnipotence of god or whatever cosmological structure we envisage as the driving force behind creation.  In our youth and innocence they are sweetness that gives us our sense of value because we are then too ignorant to understand who we are and why we are.  We do not then respect our mortality nor do we comprehend how deeply responsible we are for the welfare of others.  We are nothing if not for our ability to serve and bring peacefulness and beauty to others.”

Sean-Paul excused himself and walked away from the men without explaining what they must do or how.  At this point it all seemed to be quite  too great of a coincidence for them not to take seriously the signs they had been given.  When they returned to the restaurant the next evening Sean-Paul had already left New Orleans to explore some remote tidal islands off the  coast of Guatemala.  From this point on they feared they were on their own. 

FIN

Written by David Vollin