BLUE BAYOU ~ Book I (historical): Fleur de Lis (13 page)

As the females were shuttled toward the parade ground, the Place d’Armes, her nose wrinkled at the stagnant stench of the refuse floating in the open ditches. The Place d’Armes faced the river, and on the opposite side of the muddy parade grounds, also facing the river, stood a rude log church with a presbytery on the left and a guardhouse and prison on the right.

The log church was to be their final destination that evening. The demoiselles of the demimonde were locked up here for the night under the watchful eyes of the two Ursuline nuns, supposedly to preserve their chastity. As usual, she slept apart from other females, who openly ridiculed her lofty demeanor.

Their attitude bothered her very little. It was her immediate future that bothered her a lot
. The next day would see the beginning of the courting process.

“I want a military officer for a husband,” came a
whispered declaration through the darkness. Solange’s voice. “They make good wages and will have pensions.”

Natalie snorted to herself, thinking of the ragged uniforms of the provincial soldiers.

“Ah, but I have my eye out for an officer of the
compagnie
," said another female voice. “Just imagine the amount of property their concessions will have.”

Swamp property, fit only for miasma, mosquitoes, and alligators, Natalie thought, this time with a certain pity for the woman’s hopeful dreams that were soon to be shattered. Could they not see that only the strongest of females would survive in the godforsaken wilderness?

The fortunate few would be those who made their way back to France and the bordellos. She would be one of those who returned to France—when the timing was right, when the Duc d’Orleans was regent no longer.

As for her own dreams that night, they were foolish ones of creeping vines growing through the open windows and curling about her neck to strangle her. How she hated that jungle
-like land!

Early the following afternoon, the twenty-three brides, led by
Sister Marguerite, promenaded through the city streets. They were dressed in their best, one of the two dresses provided in their cassettes. The dresses were not very gay as they were made of brown or gray lutestring. Over these the women wore their cardinal cloaks with the hoods folded back, of course, to expose their pulchritude, such as that might be.

Natalie preferred her own gown, tattered though it was, and her own cloak. They were all she had to remind her that she had once been a human and not an animal.

The feminine entourage walked along the rue de Quai, a tree-shaded walk that led along the riverbank to where a small embankment had been thrown up to hold back the Mississippi’s floodwaters. Across the river on the other bank towered dark, dense forests that abounded, so the soldiers said, with leopards, bears, and panthers. But fear of the wild animals didn’t prevent the inhabitants from sleeping outdoors most nights.

It was on the rue de Quai that the men of the colony gathered in the late afternoons and evenings to sit and talk of far-off France, as the bright tropical moon hung above the forest on the opposite shore.

That afternoon the men did not talk of France but of the various attributes of the casket girls who coyly sashayed close by so that the bachelors could appraise them and make a choice. The women had the privilege, of course, of refusing any candidate, and they did not hesitate to ask questions of the embarrassed swains who paused in front of them.

“How many acres do you have cleared?”

“How many rooms are there in your house?”

“Does it have wooden floors? How many windows? Does the hearth draw well?”

“Have you a proper bed and plenty of linens?”

“Have you a horse? How many cows, pigs, and sheep? How about chickens?”

“How much money have you saved?”

Soldiers were posted at street comers to break up the periodic quarrels that broke out among the men over the casket girls. Solange, whose narrow face possessed pretty but brittle features, flirted openly with the cretinous serge
ant who had accosted Natalie on the beach.

Standing apart from the others, Natalie studied the local suitors. Within the palisaded walls was a motley crew of Frenchmen, a few Swiss and Germans, and
a sorry lot of abandoned aristocrats. She found most of them undersized, emaciated, and scorbutic. The more robust Canadians, who had come with Bienville and his brother to build the capital, were in truth more stalwart and they stepped out with a vigorous stride that the tropics-enervated Frenchmen lacked, but these men from the cold north all appeared to be unkempt churls who sported wild beards.

With a mere look, she refused the men who dared to approach her. If worse came to worst, she would become a domestic.

Seldom, however, did the other women chance refusing a suitor. They had come out for husbands and did not want to be among those who were passed over by the shuffling, staring males. An unwanted casket girl would be a tragedy, a fate sadder than that of a confirmed spinster, for she had publicly proclaimed her willingness to be chosen.

Ironically, the more comely of the demoiselles were passed over in favor of the plumpest girls. The bachelors wanted healthy partners who could be depended on to do their share, or a little more, of the work. A bad compl
exion or a squint could be overlooked if the figure was buxom.

This selection process continued over several days, with the men and women attracted to one another pairing off and wandering as far away as possible from the strict surveillance of the Ursuline sisters. Each day’s outing brought forth a lesser number of females as the chosen brides were married off by the Carmelite priest in the crude little log church.

During this time, Natalie had ample opportunity to study the colonial society, and concern mounted in her as she began to realize that there was no demand for linguists. Or domestics, for that matter; slaves, better suited to the climate, were imported from the sugar stronghold of Saint-Domingue or the West Indies to do both field and house work.

When at last she admitted to herself what her only option was, her concern turned to fear, which lay heavy as sin in her heart. A fraudulent marriage.

On her fifth day in New Orleans, she surveyed what remained of the suitors. With so many bachelors in the vast colony, she still had her pick, though the combination of riffraff from French prisons and crude Canadians made for a doubtful selection.

She narrowed her choice to one man, whom she had noticed watching her each afternoon. Like herself, he had remained apart from the others.

Curiously, she selected a man as different from Philippe in appearance and actions as New Orleans was from Paris. He was dressed in a worn deerskin shirt decorated with porcupine quills that had broken and fallen off and fringed leggings. His black hair was too shaggy, and his bronzed face—clean-shaven, she noted—was so harshly angled that even the most generous could not have said it was a handsome one. Formidable was all that came to mind. The dolt was obviously tongue-tied, for he managed no more than a few mumbled words when, the day before, she passed him by, bestowing a somewhat formal smile on him.

In spite of these
challenging drawbacks, the man had a prepossessing air about him that had initially caught her eye. When she overheard a prospective groom tell his curious bride-to-be that the man was a Canadian half-breed who owned property far north of New Orleans, Natalie settled on her choice. Claude Fabreville, should he ever learn of her second escape, would never track her down to the hinterland that stretched beyond New Orleans.

That the man she selected was a half-breed bothered her not at all. His character was of more concern, though it was pointless to worry if he was a wife beater or was stingy—or what he would demand of her in the marriage bed. Philippe had been loving. At least she had known joy in that part of marriage. If this man was at least kind, it was all she could hope for.

But how was she to make him choose her in marriage over the remaining
filles à la cassette?

§
CHAPTER TEN §

Silently and eloquently Nicolas cursed François and the man’s injured leg. If he hadn’t felt responsible in a way for François falling onto the ax head, he would never have allowed his friend to badger him into such an idiocy, this enterprise on behalf of Hymen.

Accustomed to the silence of great forests or the thunder of mighty rivers that flowed through them, he disliked the shrill cacophony of New Orleans and its fulsome odors. For five days, he had endured the town while he inventoried the casket girls. A poor selection it was. Most of the women had to paint and rouge to hide the ravages of time and vice on their faces. The few who did not behave like strumpets were a frumpish-looking lot.

And François expected him to find a virgin for a wife from among these women who were to build a new world?

Toward afternoon, he once more stationed himself beneath the spreading shade of a cypress that bordered the rue de Quai. Soon, the
filles à la cassette
, accompanied by their strict duennas, the Ursuline nuns, ventured forth. As was becoming a habit, he looked for one certain woman. A drab, left all eyes by the hardship of the voyage. Her skin was yellow, and her dingy hair was almost the same washed-out shade.

Nevertheless, she interested him over the others. She made no
effort to attract a husband to herself. And she walked like a queen, trailing her bedraggled, cast-off velvets through the muddy streets.

However, she was frail, almost skeletal. Totally unsuitable for the Louisiana wilderness. Also, she was too old to be out of one of the public orphanages, whose charges were at least given a modicum of training for housewifery.

Still, there was something about her. The way she walked . . . Without ever looking down, she moved as if she expected the ground to be ready and waiting for her. The smudges of dirt didn’t conceal the fine bone structure. Her haughty carriage, the arrogant tilt of chin with that intriguing cleft in it—everything proclaimed her to be familiar with the
haut monde
. Perhaps a lady-in-waiting.

He had dallied long enough; better to settle on another while there was still an adequate selection. The wench behind her smiled invitingly at him. Her teeth were bad, but at least she was not as frail. He was impatient to be on his way back to Natchitoches. He made up his mind that when the wench passed by, he would engage her in conversation.

The opportunity was cut off by a cocky soldier, his hide permanently burned by the intense sun. Nicolas had noticed him earlier at one of the sooty taverns that hunched along the rue de Bourbon. The smoke-hazed rumhole was frequented by the buccaneers out of Saint-Domingue, men contracted by Bienville to help hack a town out of the cypress jungle.

Not twenty feet from him, the man stepped before the drab, blocking her progress. “Still too good, eh, for the likes of Sergeant Jacques-Girard Laval, fifteen years in the marines.”

She shrank away from him, but her chin tilted proudly. “You are a magpie of men, monsieur.”

The soldier’s eyes narrowed with speculation, his voice dropped to a low mumble as
if talking to himself. “Mayhap what I hear is right. A marquise is hidden among the recruited
filles à la cassette.
"

“No!” she gasped. Recollecting herself, she whined servilely, “I am here to seek a husband like the rest of the women.”

The soldier’s grimy hand latched onto her wrist. “Who would have skinny baggage like yourself?”

“He will.” Her gaze swept in Nicolas’s direction, her large eyes imploring. “He has spoken for me.”

The burly, dark-skinned soldier swerved toward Nicolas. “What have we here?” he jeered. “One of the Canadian woodsmen, no less. And a half-breed to boot! You are not overly particular, demoiselle.”

At that, Nicolas stepped sof
tly out of the shadows. The sergeant was brawnier than he but not quite as tall. It would be an even match. “You wish to settle the dispute over the damsel?”

Jacques-Girard spread his hands congenially. “As you see, I’m unarmed at the moment.” He nodded at the two weapons visible above Nicolas’s sash, a tomahawk and knife.

“That can be remedied,” he told the soldier.

“The tomahawk then,” Jacques-Girard growled. “I know of the
coureur des bois's
skill with it and want it in my hand rather than in yours.”

Without taking his gaze from the soldier’s eyes, he removed first the knife, then the tomahawk, tossing it haft first to the other man. Jacques-Girard caught it easily and began sidestepping, circling warily around him. Nicolas did the same but crouched more, balanced on the balls of his feet.

Beyond the soldier, some of the casket girls had gathered, along with their suitors, a nun, and several other curious citizens, including the drab responsible for the fight.

Nicolas, knife in hand, returned his concentration to his opponent. The soldier feinted with the ax several times, trying to draw him into a foolish lunge. Nicolas wanted to end the fight soon, before any of the soldier’s comrades came to join the fracas. He taunted the sergeant with a swift parry that only nicked the flesh of the shoulder with a thin, red line.

Enraged, the man lashed out with the ax in a broad arc. Nicolas heard the sharp gasp of the woman in question. At the same time, he nimbly backstepped. A mere distance of less than an inch separated his chest from the ax blade. Foolishly distracted by her, he had not tested the ground behind him. His heel caught on an exposed cedar root. He went tumbling. Someone screamed. Like a tree cat, he rolled to his feet. His knife lay at the foot of the cedar.

Jacques-Girard smirked. “Just try to go for it, you
fils de putain
."

Slowly, Nicolas backed toward the tree. The soldier grinned triumphantly and sent the ax spinning at him. He ducked. The
blade cut into bark but didn’t hold. With a soft, deadly thud, it tumbled onto the ground.

Jacques-Girard had just made a mistake that a skilled woodsman would never make: he gave up his weapon. Nicolas snatched up the hatchet and advanced inexorably on
his opponent. The soldier’s eyes rounded with alarm. His stricken gaze darted toward the knife. Nicolas kicked it beyond reach. With that, the soldier reconsidered the odds and dashed into the midst of the surrounding bystanders.

Some of the women tittered, but most of the onlookers quickly shuffled back, clearing a path for Nicolas. He halted before the drab. She smelled of bilge water and needed a bath. Her eyes flickered from his face, no doubt appalled by its fierce look, to the ax in his hand. When her gaze lifted to his once more, he was certain that she was disgusted by it all, which surprised him sligh
tly. Who was she to be contemptuous of him?

To his own disgust, he found himself tongue-tied again; he, who could quote Aristotle with a mouthful of p
ebbles as articulately as Demosthenes. He said simply, “Your ladyship?”

Her eyes snapped at the mockery that had worked its way into the tone of his voice. Only then did he notice their color, the shade of a lagoon at moonrise.

She looked about her with that lofty set of her head, and the remaining bystanders sheeped away. After they were out of earshot, she glanced back at him, twisted her hands about each other, stared down at her worn shoes with their tasseled drawstrings, then looked back up at him. Her eyes held a wealth of anguish.

Pity prompted him to assist her in speaking, but his own words seemed to trip over his tongue. “Marriage? You wished to marry?” Once again, without intending to, he sounded mocking.

Her eyes flashed a hot green. “
Mais non
, my lord!” she said, her voice dripping with its own sarcasm. “I’ve only come to this barbarous backcountry because I was bored at court.” She snapped her fingers imperiously. “
Oui
, I wish to marry!”

He was struck by her curiously husky voice. A cultured voice; it held a quality one didn’t forget. When he didn’t immediately reply, she drawled, “Well?” For all the insouciance in her voice, her eyes, too large for the small oval face, betrayed her anxiety.

“My partner,” he fumbled, seeking the right words and cursing his sudden lack of fluency, “is seeking a wife. He’s injured his leg—and is waiting at Natchitoches. Several days’ journey away.”

The way she watched him while he spoke . . .
Merde
, she must find him dull-witted! “I’m to select a wife for him . . . and marry by proxy,” he finished up. He waited for a barrage of questions.

She frowned. “Several days’ journey, you say. How many days? Is this ‘Naqui—’ Is this place difficult to reach?”

He blinked, trying to digest the essence of her questions. Not one about the man’s name, his worth, his age, what he looked like. Not any interest in the potential husband at all. “Seven days. Perhaps eight. And,
oui
, it is very difficult to reach.” Perhaps that would dissuade her.

“I will marry this man.”

Her alacrity to marry incurred his suspicion. It was his turn to question. “Do you wear the fleur-de-lis on your shoulder?”

“Mais non,” she said, indignation hoisting her chin another notch.

“Are you . . . a maiden, my ladyship?”

“Of course.” So she could blush. “
Monsieur le Sauvage
,” she added testily.

His lips twitched at her reference to his Indian heritage. And his white heritage? All the anger and bitterness and hurt came flooding back to him like the St. Lawrence after the spring melt. Somewhere in France, a male du Plessis, a Philippe du Plessis, held title to the Fur Company of Canada, to what Nicolas had rightfully earned for his own. That in itself was negligible. It was the right denied him to call himself a du Plessis that twisted inside his guts like a worm destroying an apple.

He studied the young woman’s face, which was turned up to his disdainfully. She was no dormouse. The church’s claim that the bride convoy contained only reputable young women was ludicrous. One had only to listen to the guttural French of the women to be certain of their previous environs. But this one, with her cultured voice, its smoky quality . . . Perhaps she was bagged with the other strumpets by mistake. He shrugged mentally. He was in haste to have done with his errand.

The next morning, the nupti
als were performed with all dispatch at the little Church of St. Louis by the Carmelite priest, with one of the Ursuline nuns as a witness. The casket girl’s face was pale as first Nicolas, then she, repeated the words that married her by proxy to François de Gautier. She looked as if she would cry at any moment. He supposed that all women felt like crying when they married.

If he were marrying, he knew he would certainly feel like crying. He was a true wanderer; he felt driven to move about. The same faces, the same things, day after day—for him, nothing could be deadlier.

She gave the
curé
her name, Angelique la Croix, in a low, almost inaudible voice.

When it came time to sign the register and he expected the woman called Angelique—Angelique de Gautier now—to make her signature with an X, he was surprised at the flourish with which she wielded the quill. Her hands, he noted, were slender and without calluses, but the nails were dirty and jagged.

He made no comment, merely lifted his brow. François had a surprise due him. His bride was certainly an enigma.

When his turn came, he scrawled first the name of
François de Gautier and then his own, as proxy, using the surname of Brissac. This time, it was she who was surprised by his obvious education, her mouth opened, then she shut it and, like him, said nothing. She gave him a quick sidelong glance as sharp and penetrating as the point of a needle.

With her small dowry chest flung over his shoulder and her hurrying to keep up with his long strides, he set out for the palisade’s rear gate, which led to Bayou St. John less than half a league away.

New Orleans was an island in a vast wilderness uninterrupted except for a scattered archipelago of modest plantations and hamlets. Somewhere canebrake was being burned to clear acreage for a concession. The burning cane crackled like rifle shot, and the young woman drew closer to him. His lips twisted wryly. François would repent of his impulsive desire to marry ere the month was out.

Nicolas found the canoe where he had cached it beneath a layer of tough, fibrous cane laid horizontal by the tropical typhoons that periodically blew in off the Gulf of Mexico. He pulled the canoe from its matted covering and pushed it off the bank into the bayou, where it rocked gently. Inside, along with blankets,
his leather “possibles” bag, and a fine French pistol of large bore, was his rifle, swaddled in hide to protect it. He thrust the pistol through his sash.

He moved the rifle aside and held out his hand to
François’s bride, this time with mocking gallantry. “Your ladyship.”

Automatically, she placed her small hand in his big one and, lifting her skirts, stepped aboard. How calmly she accepted his homage, his exaggerated attention, as if it were only her just due.

He shoved the canoe, which could almost float on dew, out into the sluggish water. With her sitting straight-backed in the prow as if it were a throne, he paddled along the shoreline, past the cattails that lined the bayou, the wisteria, and the sweet olive, whose delicate fragrance filled the air. Fortunately for the woman, the mosquitoes were few because of the wind, which quickened and sucked down between the forest-banked shores and encouraged the leafy tops into a susurration of gossip.