Distant Fires (16 page)

But such was not to be. Long past any familial link with the colony, he had simply chosen to stay on, expressing neither political aspiration nor the raging military ambition of his counterparts, satisfied instead to keep a low profile as Captain of the garrison in Montreal, in a role that most suited his temperament and sense of adventure. Surrounded by what he loved best, he was pleased to be of service to a growing land, obstructing external forces that threatened to assail or divide it, he was, in this environment, a man among men; common, in sense of purpose and commitment, separate, only by degree.   
 

Renault, an obstreperous soldier known for his outspoken antics, tottered over to the Captain, nearly careening with an officer, in his wobbly gait.
 

 “To our leader, Captain,” he slurred, in toast. “May he guide us into many more travails... Err…trails, “a laugh went up, “...And may he send us off with as good a drink, the next time!”  
 

He swung the tankard enthusiastically and splashed some of the contents onto his boot, which he bent to lick, and in doing so tumbled forward, collapsing on another soldier, to the hilarity of the crowd.  
 

            Cheering wildly through their drunken haze, Nicholas acknowledged the light-hearted scene, and with a hearty laugh, looked round at the smiling faces. All, but one, a rugged, dark-haired soldier, familiar only by sight, stared fixedly into the fire, his indifference so marked that Nicholas wondered if the fellow were unwell. He remembered him as a soldier transferred to his battalion from Quebec in the past year, but as this was his first assignment in some time, he had rarely seen or got to know the newer soldiers on a first name basis. It was only now, the strangeness of his behaviour so striking, that Nicholas became conscious of a contrast in the soldier throughout the mission. He seemed aloof, very much a loner.                                     
 

Belying their tired and drunken state, the revelry continued, rising to a drunken chorus of songs about the Courier de Bois, and continuing with tales of Indian encounters, both real and imagined.
 

“Who is that man, in the dark toque” he whispered into the ear of his sergeant, alluding to the woollen, tasselled hat, pulled over the dark curls that framed the ruggedly handsome face and serious expression.    
 

 “Benoit, Private Benois, sir”, Valcour replied, quickly. “He’s the one who did so well in that incident up in Trois Rivieres. Strong boy, but not too much up here,” he tapped his temple, “still, I wouldn’t want to grapple with him if I didn’t have to ... Nearly killed a drunken Indian in a fist fight once.  He’s quiet, but he’s the kind you sure want to have on your side.”
 

The name and the incident struck a chord. That was several months back and much talked about at the time. And he recalled the mention of his cocksure attitude, his muscular physique, and sullen look that secretly set men against him, and women into rapture. He looked at Nicholas, or was it his imagination? Yes, a cold stare, and Nicholas self-consciously turned away, clasping the blanket more tightly across his chest. He would look into his background. And much as he wished to waylay this inevitability, they were within roughly 2 days journey of Fort Frontenac along the St. Lawrence, and soon after, Montreal, and the conflicting sense of responsibility that had become anathema to him.  
 

It had been the effort to avoid these problems that led him to undertake this mission, resulting in the successful capture of three French traders, allegedly responsible for a series of thefts and misdealing with Montreal merchants, and the subsequent murders of two soldiers.
 

After a number of leads took them into the interior, bordering on English preserves, they headed north and chanced upon a small French outpost, where the hapless traders had been recently incarcerated, following a further attempt at robbing their stores of furs.   
 

Though ‘Frontier Justice’, was often employed in remote locations, resulting in a quick disposal of suspects, by noose, the case had been different. Those apprehended had confessed to their part in the seizure of a sizeable cache of stolen furs, dumped at an undisclosed location near Montreal, and thus spared this drastic action until further investigation and recovery of goods.
 

The capture had been fortuitously simple, and with the prisoners under guard, Nicholas could now savour the last few days of his freedom, until he, himself, was returned to incarceration. He had always felt better surrounded by wilderness, than amidst the lavish walls of a large abode, or in his administrative chambers at the garrison. The past months had been difficult, depriving him of contact with what he held most dear, replaced by a feeling of impotence and redundancy that shackled him more strongly than the bounds of his captives.
 

This debacle in his private life ached like a cankerous legion in his heart and mind, destroying what little hopes he had of inner happiness. Before it, he had found little to complain. Here in this adopted land, his dreams had been realised, through friendships and the willingness to strengthen the colony, and he had never regret his choice to remain. There were the usual political
problems, consistent with a triumvirate system of government: frictions, arising from the separate interests of church, justice and state, but on the whole, the three heads, Bishop, Intendant, and Governor, managed to keep the country running quite smoothly.
 

Notwithstanding the ongoing economic and cultural rivalries between New France and the Iroquois/English alliance, along with the unrelenting harshness of the climate, he had no desire to return to the soft life; his estate in France, long inhabited by his mother, was there for the taking, but the mindless predictability and worthless ambition granted an ancestral seat, for a life at court, held no allure. He missed nothing of his former land, and having returned but once in the ensuing years to assume his father’s title, he found, to his sobering expectation, many estates falling to ruin. Thereto, the effort of his counterparts, to seek a life at court and win the favour of their sovereign, were an objective he found abhorrent.
 

In that time, he had given little thought to France, outside of the military interests which affected them both, and the separation from his mother and her young charge, both of whom he dearly missed.  
 

They wrote, of course, at regular intervals when the ship arrived from France, and he was certain to receive his mother’s missives, relating to business of the estate, or the years of increased profit on their vineyards, far exceeding those of poor produce due to blight or frost. Within her
capable hands, the estate was flourishing, and he was pleased for her success. Occasionally, he would receive word of her intention to return to the colony, but she never did, and all he really had was held in her miniature, sent this past year. He felt more than a pang at the sight of her still beautiful, but changing, face, and yearned to bury his troubles in her consoling arms, for the fool that he had been.  
 

Under her sure hand, the chateau was running at the peak of production, producing a record crop in both grapes and mushrooms, over a five-year period.  
 

According to her long, much anticipated letters, the child, Shanata, still the apple of her mothers’ eye, excelled herself as a bright student. Fluent in French, she had been educated by a tutor, formerly from the court. She was now a well-turned young lady, and his mothers’ letters were full of praise for her goodly nature and pride at her accomplishments.
 

He had not seen a picture of the child, but he understood, from his mother, that she had lately commissioned a work, and that a miniature was forthcoming. He looked forward to seeing the pretty child he had only fleetingly known.  
 

Strange, the way events unfolded, he thought, certain he had made the right decision in taking the child to his mother, rather than placing her with the Ursulines or a native family. But for the language he had learned from a turncoat Iroquois trader, years before, and his peripheral
involvement in a Mohawk skirmish against a patrol, he had virtually, no contact with them, generally understood, to be a ruthless, ignorant people, by the French, possessed of little to no redeeming characteristics—a mutual hatred, despite their uneasy truce.  
 

Luckily, the child had been saved from this fate. If nothing else, he had given this poor girl a chance to find a moral, civilized nature in French society. For this, he told himself in self-satisfaction, she would someday be grateful.              
 

Plans to visit France for some time had always been postponed. Recently though, some troubling information had come to light, involving his mother, and, much as he denied it, they coloured his impressions, most painfully, in a need to need to either dismiss or validate them.  
 

Life had taken a downswing over the past year. And no one could be blamed but himself. In a single act of stupidity, he was caught in a morass of rancour and obligation that harnessed his conscience, and continually filled his days with self-approbation.
 

What might have been a time to rejoice, had become for him, a bane of relentless self - reproach and ultimately, servitude.
 

But how this came to be and by what means it was attained, began innocently enough, on the night of the first summer ball, in the great hall of the Governors house, in the Chateau de Ramzay.
 

                                                     ..........................
 

Following the installation of the new Governor and Intendant of the colony years before, Monsieur Girald resumed his former position as Governor of Montreal, languishing, once again, to the chagrin of his socially ambitious daughters, in the much less prominent seat of the colonial hierarchy.
 

Time passed, and each of the daughters, in turn, married reasonably well—all, that is, with the exception of Sophie, who, through pursuit of title and social standing, refused any hand that was offered.    
 

Nicholas, having courted a few young daughters of men in local political office, notably, one Jose Beaupres, who left him for the affections of her cousin, a wealthy plantation owner returning to Haiti, he was living the life of a free-Spirited bachelor, more interested in career than a social life.  
 

And so, at twenty nine, he found himself without a woman on his arm, arriving at the chateau, looking charming and elegant in his best uniform, every inch the handsome and eligible bachelor son, of Louise de Belaise, as the gaze of every young lady, looked longingly, his way.
 

Chatting with the amiable Madame Girald and her son, his friend, Alexandre—now a town merchant and married to a tradesman’s’ daughter—was somewhat unpleasantly surprised by the sudden appearance of the inimitable Sophie, making her entrance in a decidedly conspicuous manner and who often seemed to find some pretext to enjoin him in conversation.
 

Due to her often brash statements, he usually found a need to extricate himself, but on this occasion, she appeared almost demure, and somehow distressed.
 

 “May I have a word with you, Nicholas,” she pleaded quietly, nearly masking the reediness in her voice, as she briskly unfolded her fan, to speak with greater intimacy. “I am in a dreadful state over...a certain something relating to...our family, and I was wondering if you might do me a kindness...”
 

He looked around the crowded room. Socializing was now over and the ball was about to commence.
 

He had noticed a number of attractive ladies with whom he had hoped to dance, but this problem with Sophie, would not go away. He found her most annoying at the best of times, but he was also aware of that she was known to be unremittingly persistent when she wanted something.
 

Still, perhaps, the look of strain on her face, betold a legitimate problem, which he was capable of resolving. He should hear her out, he reasoned, but how, in light of present company?
“Mademoiselle Sophie, while I would like to help you in any way possible, I do not think that this is either, the time or the place …”
 

“You do not understand,” she said in a desperate, but quiet tone, “not here, not now... later…after the ball.”  She leaned nearer, and he could smell the heavy odour of pomade wafting unpleasantly, from her wig.
 

“Meet me in the summer house.  There we can speak more freely...please,” she added, pouting her rouged lips, in encouragement, “I do entreat you to come as soon as is heavenly possible...I am beside myself with worry...”
 

He nodded. She daubed her eye with her neatly embroidered handkerchief, collapsed her painted fan, and swept past him the dainty steps made awkward by her height, to a position near her sister, at the patisserie table.   
 

Nicholas had few dances, and instead, found himself imbibing more than his usual share of brandy. His curiosity was piqued. Each time he glimpsed Sophie, he found her soberly looking down, and quite perturbed. What, he wondered, could have taken place within the family, to engender such worry?
 

Sometime after midnight, the soiree ended, the revellers filing out.  
 

Madame Girald approached him. “Nicholas, if you have need, you may take one of the guest rooms, they have been prepared...”
 

“No, merci bien, Madame, it is not necessary. I will be leaving momentarily.”
 

She gave him a tired smile, and was moved to note a resemblance to his mother.  Helene often thought about her, wondered how she was keeping in her loneliness, and with the burden of her secret...