Part Three: I, The Portents and II, Sans Souci Summary

In The Portents, Ti Noël, an old man, comes back to his old home. M. Lenormand de Mézy lost him in a card game to a Cuban plantation owner and shortly afterward died in poverty. By saving up Christmas money given to him each year by his new owner, Ti Noël gained passage on a ship to Santo Domingo, where slavery no longer exists. He walks toward the plantation where he was formerly a slave, giving greetings as he walks along, although he doesn't understand the language very well. He stops when he sees a voodoo offering to Legba, Lord of the Roads, at a tree. Ti Noël falls to the ground in thanks for being in a land where pacts with the...