The Canadian Civil War Volume 2- The Huguenots Arrive

by William Wresch

To say it took me a while to wake up the next morning is an understatement. I was exhausted, and my ribs hurt like hell. My left side was so stiff I could barely move. Elise, meanwhile was up, and sitting in the living room reading the morning paper and eating a room service breakfast. She brought me a piece of toast when she saw I was awake.

  “So the big show begins August 1st.” She pointed to the headlines on the morning paper she carried in her other hand. The headlines were so big you would have though Lindbergh had landed again. “I wondered if they would try something before the election. Did they say anything last night about how many people would participate?”

  I struggled to a sitting position, trying not to show how much pain I was in. “As near as I can tell, if you wear a blue arm band, attendance is compulsory. I would expect to see a pretty big crowd walking along the highway.”

  “And it says here that Soisson addressed the historians. How did they react?”

  “Yes, Soisson spoke, but that was no more an historical society meeting than the local topless bar is a dance studio. It was a room full of blue arm bands and friends. As for Soisson, watch out for him. That man can give a speech. He had that room at the verge of hysteria.”

  “What do you know about topless bars?” Elise leaned over to give me a kiss, which was nice, but she also leaned right into my ribs, which was not so nice. I flinched. “What’s wrong?” But before I answered she pulled the sheets down to look at my chest. My ribs were actually pretty impressive. I doubted any were broken, but the skin was interesting shades of blue and red. It also appeared Captain Whatsis wore a ring, because the skin was broken at one point and a few drops of blood had scabbed up. All in all it was a much more interesting bruise than I had ever gotten playing soccer or baseball. “What happened to you?” Elise, unfortunately, was taking the thing all wrong. She was genuinely concerned.

  “I just got into a wrestling match with one of the blue arm band guys. He claimed lacrosse players are better athletes than baseball players.” I probably could have pulled off that line with some bravado, but I also tried to move at the same time and the expression on my face sent a totally different message.

  “We need to get out of here. These people are dangerous. I have two ex-colleagues to visit today, but you should stay in the hotel and rest up. I will be back by late afternoon, we can pack, and then grab some sleep before we get the fathers tomorrow morning. Promise me you won’t leave the hotel room.”

  “I promise I will only leave the hotel to go to the library. And if you had seen the security at the library these days, you would know I will be safer there than here.” Elise quibbled a bit, but how can you argue against a trip to the library? Eventually we agreed on how we would spend our day and when we would meet back at the hotel. Then she was off to make her visits, and I was free to move around and try to loosen up my left side. After about ten minutes I could turn without grimacing and raise my left arm almost to shoulder height. The nice thing about having big brothers is that I had been punched before and understood the recovery process. This one seemed about half a day maximum. If that was the captain’s best punch, he never wanted to meet my brother Paul.

  It was after eleven by the time I got to the library, so late that DuBois wondered if I had left town. We spoke for a few minutes and he offered to pull microfilm for me, but I had a different subject today. It occurred to me that I was not the only historian resident in Canada. I was fairly sure that Henri Messier, who knew more about French history than I ever would, had been called and asked to check for prime dates too. I suspected many others in and out of government were checking to see what historical antecedents might be used for political purposes by the LNA and the Heritage Party. If there were other dangerous dates, they would be found.

  I decided to research something no one else would be checking – the mysterious Mr. Foster and the Plymouth Foundation. DuBois sat me down at the highest speed internet terminal the library had, and I began my search. I couldn’t check for Foster without a first name, so I began with Plymouth Foundation. They had a fairly typical web page. Their mission statement explained that they supported various kinds of research, but listed history among the first categories. They also listed recent recipients of grants.

  Here things got interesting. Over the last three years they had funded a number of historical and geographic projects, with the vast majority being in Virginia and Pennsylvania, mostly up in the mountains. As for Canada, there was no mention of any grant to reenact any wagon ride, nor were there other instances of foreign grants. It didn’t appear the foundation had ever spent a dollar outside the country before. So why start now?

  What were they funding up in the mountains? Just as Foster had said, much of it was re-enactments. It appeared any local historical society that wanted to dress up a militia and parade around, found money for uniforms and expert consultants. All of the projects were small, too small for me to have heard about them before. I searched for a pattern, something to hint at a conspiracy to invade Ohio, but the re-enactments were scattered all over the mountains and involved everything from local feuds to a small whiskey tax rebellion. That apparently was the most successful re-enactment, with a local distiller now providing refreshments after the battle.

  There was only one re-enactment that had any relevance to Ohio. A small community in the mountains celebrated a rear-guard battle fought the second time Washington was defeated at Fort Duquesne, this time leaving the British General Braddock dead behind him. The grant was large, but the participation was small. How many people want to waste a perfectly good weekend celebrating a defeat?

  I started looking around the web site to see what I might learn about Mr. Foster. Under “History of the Foundation” I learned that the foundation had been created as a bequest from Tilden Foster Junior who had founded New England Concrete when concrete was new in the mix of building materials, and rode the construction boom of the 1890s to 1920s to significant riches. Since the motto of the company had been “Concrete hard as Plymouth Rock,” the foundation took its name from that. Initial deposits had been twelve million dollars, but investment returns over the last century made the foundation worth over a billion dollars now.

  Now for the mysterious Mr. Foster. The board of directors named three Fosters among the officers: Daniel, Tilden, and Jeremiah. There were no bios provided about any of the men, but I moved to the Who’s Who web site and only needed five minutes to find the huge smiling face of my friend – Tilden Foster. Age 48, he served on several boards, including New England Concrete, was a member of several private clubs, and was currently unmarried. At Yale he had majored in history and French, and later he had taken an executive MBA at Harvard. His hobby was sailing, and he had won the annual Chicago to Mackinac Island race three times, which surprised the heck out of me. Why was he racing on the Great Lakes rather than on the Chesapeake or around Long Island like his Yale classmates? This guy had spent more time in Canada than I had. This was all very interesting.

  By now it was past lunch time and I decided I had done enough work for my last day in New Orleans, and the last day of my “vacation.” I spoke to DuBois for a few minutes and explained that I would be returning to Green Bay. He gave me his card in case I wanted to contact him later with questions, an offer I could see he meant. Thank God for librarians.

  Within an hour I had grabbed a small lunch and was back in my hotel room pounding away at my laptop. I had one file I called “random notes” and I poured in everything I could think of from my last several days. “Random” was a good title for the comments because it occurred to me I had covered a lot of intellectual ground since coming down just over a week ago to read up on the Huguenots. I had learned about French Kings, Huguenot settlers, tariffs and Jolliets, and now about wealthy Americans. I type fast, but it still took me two hours to enter my observations.

  Elise found me at the keyboard when she got home around four. “Sha
wn, look who I have with me.” She stood at the door and motioned with her head. In walked President Jolliet. I jumped to my feet, nearly tripping over the coffee table I was using for a desk. As I took the three or four steps needed to reach him and shake his hand, four very large men hurried into the room. While one closed all the drapes in the suite, the other three checked every corner of the room.

  “Mr. President. It is good to see you again.”

  “Hello, Shawn. I see I am interrupting you at your work. Do you mind if I come in?”

  “Of course not.” I motioned him toward a chair in the living room. Elise took my hand and sat with me on the couch.

  “First, I want to thank you for attending that historical society meeting last night. But Elise tells me you might have had a little trouble there.”

  “Not really. It was just boys being boys. I have been trading insults with a member of the LNA. Last night things heated up a bit and we traded punches. It was all over in a few seconds.”

  “Are you certain you are safe here?”

  “Certainly. But we will be leaving tonight anyway,” I began, but there was a look on his face that made me wonder if maybe there had been a change of plans. I looked over at Elise, and she tightened her grip on my hand, but wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  “I have come to ask you a very large favor. I know you and Elise were planning to return to Green Bay tomorrow, but I wonder if you would be willing to stay on and observe the re-enactment of the walk from Biloxi to New Orleans.” Since he used the singular form of “you” I understood I would be doing this alone. I looked over at Elise, but before she could answer, Jolliet answered for her. “I have asked Elise to return to Green Bay with the other senior administrators. You would have to do this on your own, probably until the middle of August.”

  “I don’t understand what I could do. I assume you will have other people watching the walk.” I was not being modest. I really could think of nothing I could add. There would be reporters around, and probably a host of spies.

  “I am sure Soisson will have endless TV coverage arranged, and he will have the local newspapers there. But you are a professional historian. You will have insights into this event that few others can have. I am sure you will see things that they will miss.”

  “And what would you like from me? Reports? Private correspondence?” I had a bad feeling about where this was leading.

  “No, I want nothing private.” He must have read my mind. “I would like you to think of this as the kind of report you would give to your students at the university, the kind of log you might put in the campus web site. In fact that would be a good place for it. You are trained, you are impartial, just tell the story as you would to students.”

  “Yes, I suppose I could do that.” Actually I was interested in how they were going to pull off this re-enactment. It might be fun to watch. But I didn’t like the idea of being away from Elise for another month, and I had one other worry. “If I do this, I would need to leave here by mid-August. Something is going to happen here August 24th. I don’t know what it is, but I don’t want to be around here when it happens.”

  “We also know about August 24th. We are on the alert for whatever they are planning. But I agree, you should be back in Green Bay before then. Elise will miss you, and you will want some time to get ready for classes in the fall.”

  “May Elise and I talk about this and get back to you later today?”

  “Ah, you are already learning to think like a married man. That is excellent.” Then he was up, shook my hand, hugged Elise, and was out the door with secret service people racing ahead of him. Elise and I sat back down on the couch and didn’t say anything for a very long time. She took both my hands, put them in her lap, and laid her head on my shoulder. I found it very hard to think in that position. In a minute she was kissing me, and then one thing led to another. An hour later she had her head on my chest while we lay in bed.

  “I saw Uncle Claude at a lunch meeting we had and he asked about your historical society meeting.” She was talking quietly, just above a whisper. “The meeting was in the headlines, so that is what everyone at lunch was talking about. They are really afraid of how this whole thing could be manipulated. If Soisson can turn himself into some kind of latterday Moses, re-leading his people out of Biloxi and into the wilderness, it might give him much more credibility than he has now. At least that is what everyone was saying. Uncle Claude asked to speak with me later, and it was then that he asked me about this new plan for you to stay here as a kind of witness. I told him I hoped you would say ‘no’. I don’t like us being apart that long, and I am worried about you getting into more fights with these bigots.”

  “There are lots of reasons for me to say “no,” and of course you are the first. If I were in Green Bay at least I would see you evenings and Sundays.”

  “Thank you.”

  “The best reason to stay would be to represent history. I have great sympathy for what the original settlers went through. I have no sympathy for the blue arm band nuts. I could see putting together some notes and some pictures so my history students could get another perspective of this event.” We didn’t talk much after that. My decision was made. We just held each other, aware that it would be a long time before we were together again.

  By seven we were getting hungry and started talking about our last evening in town. I was really tempted to just order up room service, but it seemed best to enjoy the city while we could. We put on our best clothes, asked Anton to bring the car around, and headed for one of the better restaurants along the river. As we drove, we called Jolliet and I explained that I would be staying on. In truth I owed him a favor or two for all the time he had spent with me over the past year, and I was curious about this re-enactment. Jolliet was grateful, talked with Elise a few minutes and thanked her too, and wished us well on our last evening in New Orleans.

  Our choice of restaurant was easy. We wanted to be right along the river, and LaFayette’s has a long glass wall right on the water’s edge. Given Elise’s usual impact on matre d’s, we were given a table right along the water. We could see across at the lights on the south side of the river, and of course we could also watch boat traffic going past us. I had trouble looking at anything other than Elise. She had given up her white dresses for the night and was wearing a very low-cut red satin gown. She held my hand through dinner and we talked about friends and family and a bit about the wedding, anything except the primary topic on both our minds – our impending separation. The waiters were attentive, the food was good, and so was the wine. It was a very pleasant evening.

  Somewhere between courses I happened to look up and noticed we were being stared at by a couple with blue arm bands. She looked really stupid with a blue band on the sleeve of her loose while dress, and he looked not much brighter. They were both busily talking on cell phones. I wondered how long you had to be married before you could sit across from a woman and talk to someone else. And it appeared that was all they were doing – calling other people. Occasionally they looked over at us, and then they were back to their calling. What a sorry pair of people.

  Midway through our next course I saw another group of arm bands going to their table – my old friend captain Whatsis and the three stooges. They spoke with the couple for a few minutes, and stared over at me, apparently working up the energy to come over and start another fight. I was in no mood. The food and the wine had relaxed me to the point where I could have melted into my chair, and there was Elise to think about. This was the wrong time and the wrong place.

  Then things got worse. The soldiers from the consulate showed up, also staring at me. It was clear from their expressions they were still angry. Had they been looking for me since our argument last week? Had David Starr sent them? They were far scarier than the LNA goof balls. Whatever they were still angry about, I was in no position to take them all on. It was time t
o leave.

  Anton must have seen what was going on, because he suddenly appeared at our table. “Doctor DuPry,” he said, “Please come with me.” She looked confused, and I got a couple of words out about trouble coming, before Anton took over. “Doctor DuPry, we need to leave now.” Elise still hesitated, and suddenly Anton just picked her up and carried her out. I stood up and started following, but Captain Whatsis moved pretty fast to cut off my exit.

  “There’s no security tonight to save your butt, altar boy.” He and his boys were winding through the tables, coming in single file. I noticed the soldiers had also started toward me, but it was clear the arm bands would get first crack at me. OK, so be it. At least I could get in a punch of two. I stood my ground, waited for Whatsis to get near, and then started throwing punches before he could say another word. I hit with a left to his face, but missed with my right, and left myself open to two really good punches to my ribs, including one right where he had hit me the day before. That one really hurt. I stepped back, dropped my arms, and tried a punch my big brother had taught me – a punch right to his diaphragm. I don’t know if I was more surprised by how much it hurt my hand, or by the fact that big brother’s advice actually worked. It knocked the wind out of Whatis and left him standing pretty defenseless. I then used big brother punch number two and hit him as hard as I could in the nose. He went down and stayed there.

  I stepped back to take on the next thug and saw that there weren’t going to be any more. Two were on the ground with soldiers pounding on them pretty hard, while the other two were held restrained by the man with the big biceps and another soldier. When I look confused, Big Biceps said,

  “I told you last week our job is to protect Americans.” All I could think to say was “thank you.”

  “This isn’t over,” said thug number two. I noticed he wasn’t struggling too much with Biceps. I was sure he didn’t want to join his friends on the floor.

  “I understand that. I don’t know what is wrong with you guys, but you won’t have any trouble finding me.” I nodded to each of the soldiers and walked out of the restaurant. Anton had parked the car right by the front door. I could hear Elise screaming at poor Anton about how he had to go help me.

  “His job is to protect you, and he did it well.” I pulled open a back door, got in and thrown back into the seat as Anton pulled away from the curb and demonstrated how quickly he could accelerate from zero to sixty. For a French car, this one moved pretty well.

  “Are you hurt?” Elise asked.

  “No, it turns out I made fewer enemies than I thought last week. Some American soldiers taught the arm band guys what real soldiers can do.” At that point Elise was all over me, which was good, and not so good. I enjoyed having her in my arms, but I was not completely sure I didn’t have broken ribs this time. I was going to have to protect myself better in the future. I was also going to have to call Paul and tell him that in all those years of childhood roughhouse, at least one thing he taught me actually worked. I suspected he would be as surprised as I was.

  What happened the rest of the evening? We went back to the hotel and Elise put ice on my ribs. You have no idea how much that hurts. It also tickled like crazy as it melted. Good thing. Once I started laughing she couldn’t hold the ice against me any longer and we were both able to get a few hours sleep.

  Chapter 13

  Elise Leaves; I Stay