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significant silence of race: La Cousine Bette and "Benito Cereno", The
Comparative Literature, Summer 1994 by Colatrella, Carol
When Captain Delano meets the injured Benito Cereno, the American captain sees the Spanish captain and his crew as embodying aspects of the master-slave relationship that appear to flatter the slave at the expense of the master. The always present Babo acts as a loyal and faithful servant ready to do his master's bidding at a moment's notice. The naked women who fawn over their children are seen by Delano as loving examples of maternity. The appearance of the chained Atufal seems to indicate that Cereno is a harsh taskmaster who brutalizes the slaves on board the ship. Cereno's own tension indicates to Delano that the Spanish captain might be hiding something; Delano suspects that the Spaniard might be a pirate and that his agitation might only veil his intention of entrapping the American ship.
Even when Delano observes scenes between blacks and whites on the ship that demonstrate the violence of the slaves against the white crew, he reads those dramas as revealing Cereno's lack of effective leadership. These incidents include his observations of a black boy hitting a white boy, the fear of the Spanish sailors when blacks are present, and the occasionally odd remark of Babo. Cereno's story, that he lost crew and slaves to bad weather and disease, elicits a compassionate offer of help from Delano, but Cereno's ungrateful response offends the American captain. At the end of his visit, when Delano is about to leave the San Dominick and hears the ominous sound of the ship's bell, he tries to determine what is going on and whether he is threatened by Cereno. Questioning the meaning of Cereno's actions, Delano doubts what he has observed on the foreign ship. Focalized by Delano, these doubts and questions reveal more about his own "superstitious suspicions" than they do about the object of his observations.
In Delano's mind every action of Cereno becomes ambiguous and offers only uncertain readings of events that are articulated as questions:
Why was the Spaniard...now heedless of common propriety in not accompanying to the side his departing guest? Did indisposition forbid? Indisposition had not forbidden more irksome exertion that day. His last equivocal demeanor recurred. He had risen to his feet, grasped his guest's hand, motioned toward his hat; then, in an instant, all was eclipsed in sinister muteness and gloom. Did this imply one brief, repentant relenting at the final moment, from some iniquitous plot, followed by remorseless return to it? His last glance seemed to express a calamitous, yet acquiescent farewell to Captain Delano forever. Why decline the invitation to visit the sealer that evening! Or was the Spaniard less hardened than the Jew, who refrained not from supping at the board of him whom the same night he meant to betray? What imported all those day-long enigmas and contradictions, except they were intended to mystify, preliminary to some stealthy blow? Atufal, the pretended rebel, but punctual shadow, that moment lurked by the threshold without. He seemed a sentry, and more. Who, by his own confession, had stationed him there Was the negro now lying in wait? (96)
