Duty to the Crown

by Aimie K. Runyan

  She never expected the angel would become her foster mother. Never dreamed that she would learn the answers to her childish queries. Nicole did not dine on fatted goose every night or drink dewdrops from lilies in the morning. She had a small circle of friends and spent her life in toil like the rest of the world. Nicole transcended from angel to woman, but it did not break Manon’s heart. It was much easier to love someone on your own plane of existence.

  Even so, the French were supposed to have the answers to these things.

  Manon slammed the most recent medical text shut, but resisted the urge to throw it against the wall. She placed it back atop the towering stack and pinched the bridge of her nose against the thrumming rush of blood behind her eyes. She leaned back in the chair and closed her eyelids, and immediately Heno’s chiseled face swirled into view as she shut out the rest of the world.

  He had stood behind his father, the Chief, as he banished her from the clan. He promised to speak to his father when his anger abated. Begged her to leave Tawendeh—Théodore, damn the French anyway—with them. Despite all of his professions of love, his main concern was to keep Tawendeh, the young hunter, with the tribe. It was a trait of an excellent chieftain, but also one of a thoughtless lover.

  She chased Heno from her thoughts when possible, but she could not help but occasionally seek the solace of the memory of his embrace. He had dared to love her when Mother Onatah and Tawendeh were the only people in the tribe who cared for her. Leaving Heno was almost as hard as saying good-bye to her beloved mother. The lack of finality, somehow, made it worse. Had he replaced her with a good, traditional woman who would uphold their ways and give him the brood of little hunters he longed for? In her heart, she knew the answer, but was loath to acknowledge it.

  She thought of Théodore playing in the nursery two doors down and wondered, daily, if she had made the right decision in taking him from their people. His place in the tribe had never come into question. His uncle was the Chief, his cousin would become chief after him. Théodore would be Tawendeh of the Big Turtle Clan, respected and honored among his people. He enjoyed his playmates now, but how long would it last?

  Frédéric was mended from their mishap with the snowberries, Pierre had barely felt the ill effects by the following day, but how soon before the innocent young boys would notice that Théodore was different? How long before those differences mattered? But her last words to Mother Onatah had been to promise she would care for Théodore until he was a man. There was no part of her that could go back on such an oath, even if she worried that she was tearing him from his heritage.

  I must get out of this house, if only for a few hours; I must escape.

  Just as Manon was about to escape through the front door, Nicole thrust a basket and her marketing list for the week into her hands. Their cook, Madame Yollande, was renowned in their small town, but age and rheumatism kept her from doing the marketing. Nicole usually took the task upon herself. It was a chance for her to visit with Alexandre’s tenants and to mix about in town, but a charitable function at the church claimed her time that week.

  In the five years since Manon had left the settlement, the town had grown like a healthy sapling. There were more buildings, robust and made from stone, much like the Lefebvre house. They were built to last the ages, against weather, fire, and other calamites. Not like the wooden longhouses that could be rebuilt in a few weeks if the need arose. There was no sense of permanence with her tribe, and perhaps it was a more natural state in which to live. People were much more like the longhouses of her people. They would come and go, be expanded or rebuilt as needed. Just as no man would live forever, neither would his home. The French so dearly loved to think their towering buildings and monuments, churches that soared to the heavens, would make them immortal.

  Almost as soon as she entered the town streets she realized that her outing was ill planned. She expected that her presence in town would be met with little interest, but the settlement was still small enough that the comings and goings of one of their elite families was not something to be overlooked. A few people who recognized her from her youth stopped to greet her and enquire after the seigneur and Dame Lefebvre. Politeness. Small talk. One made the remark that she must be happy to be back in town and comfortably settled, to which Manon smiled and nodded as she’d seen Nicole do a million times before. They do not know I was banished. They do not know that Onatah of the Big Turtle Clan ever existed. They simply imagine that my quarters with the Lefebvres must be more comfortable than a drafty longhouse.

  Unable to endure more conversation with the townspeople, Manon decided to finish Nicole’s errands without any deviation from the required stops and return home. The cheese monger was the last of her errands and not too far from the Lefebvre house. If she were fortunate, she would be able to purchase the cheese and return home without any more than the exchange of a few words with the merchant.

  A round-faced woman with thinning gray hair and a broad bosom tended the shop. The smell that emanated from the wares reminded Manon distinctly of the stink from the hunters’ moccasins after they had come home from a weeklong trek in August. The shopkeeper waited on the woman in front of Manon, a tired-looking mother of four who contended with two of the youngsters tugging on her ragged skirt as she tried to conduct her business. The shopkeeper shot the weary woman the indulgent smile of one who remembered the exhausting days of child-rearing with fondness, but who was glad her brood was raised up.

  The instant the young mother left the shop, the old woman’s expression became as sour as the milk she curdled for cheese. She looked up and down at Manon’s taut frame and fine clothes. Spite. Envy. Hatred.

  “We’re closing,” the woman announced.

  “It’s only one in the afternoon,” Manon countered. Shops would be open for hours yet. But Manon remembered the Beaumonts usually closed briefly for their midday meal, and the woman was perhaps overdue for food and a few moments of respite, so she clung to her civil tone. “Would you be kind enough to fill my order quickly if you’re just closing for your luncheon? Madame Lefebvre sent me in her stead.”

  “And the King himself runs the butchery next door. Be gone with you. We’re closed for the day.” The woman slammed a massive round of cheese down in the case with no more trouble than if she had been laying a freshly laundered apron in a bureau drawer.

  Manon cast a bitter scowl at the hateful shopkeeper. Her clothes and manner of speaking demonstrated readily enough that she spoke the truth. This woman remained obdurate out of sheer meanness of spirit.

  “How wonderful your business thrives so, Madame Lagrange.” Claudine’s voice rang through the shop, assuming the condescending civility that her older sister adopted when speaking to those who had caused her some offense. Emmanuelle and Gabrielle stood to either side, Gabrielle losing the battle to hide a sly grin. “I know of few merchants who can boast such success. And you so new to our settlement, too. I am sure my brother-in-law will be pleased to know that one of his tenants has done so very well. I’m sure all your accounts must be paid in full, and interest paid, with such a flourishing business that allows you to close a full half day before every other merchant in town.”

  “Mademoiselle Deschamps, what an unexpected surprise.” The old woman stammered and took a step back. Debt was the curse of the newly settled. If Alexandre pushed her to pay off the money she and her husband had borrowed to set up shop, she’d be scrubbing floors at the Lefebvre house by morning.

  “It would seem so. I don’t suppose you could go to the trouble of remaining open for just a few more minutes to wait on our new houseguest,” Claudine purred with insincere flattery. Though Manon loathed these social games, this one time it was amusing to see them played out.

  “Of course, the young lady must have misunderstood me. We won’t be closing for a good while yet.”

  “Of course, a misunderstanding. These things do happen.” Claudine offered the woman a smile that read very clearly: Yes, these thin
gs do happen, but they had better not happen again.

  Manon relayed Nicole’s order and left with her parcels nestled in her basket and a bouquet of flowery apologies from the cheese monger—all directed toward Claudine.

  “Thank you,” Manon said once out of earshot.

  “Oh, that Madame Lagrange is the rudest old hen that ever lived. Glad to have an excuse to scare some courtesy out of her.” Claudine chuckled in chorus with the other two. “Now hurry home with that basket. We were sent to find you and take you to lessons at Aunt Rose’s. Nicole wanted to surprise you. Though after spending all morning with your books, I can’t see why you’d care to keep on with them this afternoon.”

  “Rose Barré?” Manon asked. Rose had been her first teacher when she’d come with Nicole into town. She had learned French, arithmetic, catechism, embroidery, and music at Rose’s side in exchange for lessons in Wendat. She was one of the few French who had showed any interest in her culture at all.

  “Rose Lefebvre for years now,” Emmanuelle corrected. “She was married to Alexandre’s nephew Henri long before you left, wasn’t she?”

  Manon nodded. She preferred to remember things as they had been early on during her stay with the French. When she was a child, people overlooked her presence. As she grew into a young woman, they grew weary of her. Her lessons did not raise her in their estimation then, nor would they do so now. But like a drunkard with his ale, or a glutton before a feast, Manon was no more capable of refusing lessons than those weary souls could refuse their vices.

  * * *

  Rose presided over her little classroom with a smile. It was nothing like the glory days when she had a dozen Huron pupils in her charge, but Manon could see that Rose was only too delighted to have a fourth pupil in addition to the Deschamps girls and Gabrielle. Rose’s four children kept her busy as well, but she confessed to the girls that relinquishing the diaper-changing duties to the nanny for a few hours each week in favor of more stimulating responsibilities did not disappoint her.

  Manon sat back in her chair, the French on the page swirling like a cyclone. Poetry was nothing like the straightforward prose of the medical texts, and her brain was swimming in the metered lines. Too many years without using the language. Too long parsing out Alexandre’s books this morning.

  “Perhaps some time for embroidery,” Rose suggested.

  “On Thursday you should take the morning off so you can be fresh for lessons,” Claudine said, throwing Manon a sidelong wink. “Too much of a good thing?”

  Manon nodded and pulled out her embroidery case with the others. It wasn’t her favorite task in the world, but the even stitching and forced concentration seemed like good mental exercise. Like prayer. Like meditation.

  Emmanuelle and Gabrielle chatted companionably as they did their needlework, but Claudine focused intently on the pink flowers she embroidered on her soft woolen shawl. Manon favored small, well-ordered geometric patterns that resembled the beading the women of her tribe used to adorn their deerskins. She used soft pastel threads to make the effect less “foreign-looking,” but it soothed her to have something familiar about her clothes and possessions.

  At the end of the lesson, good-byes were exchanged, but Rose took Manon gently by the elbow as the others exited the room.

  “You must pay Claudine no mind,” Rose said. “She’s the silliest girl in New France.”

  “I won’t argue with you.” Manon gave Rose a small smile as she packed her books.

  “I’m so very glad you’re back with us, my dear.” Rose patted Manon’s arm as she used to do after difficult lessons. “Of course, I am sad to learn the reason why. I know you’re grieving terribly for your mother.”

  The first person to acknowledge Mother Onatah. But then again you understood the ways of my people better than anyone. And more, you know what it is to lose a mother.

  “Thank you, though I am afraid you’re in the minority.” Manon snapped her bag shut a bit more forcefully than she intended.

  “Everyone who matters is happy to see you,” Rose said as she walked with Manon to the door, taking a slow pace.

  “Even the great Seigneur Lefebvre?” Manon asked. “You think he’s truly pleased to be housing a Huron girl? And her brother in his very nursery?”

  “Has he been unkind?” Rose asked.

  “He wouldn’t be to my face, would he? He’s a gentleman and a politician. There’s no profit in being openly rude.”

  “True,” Rose said, rolling her eyes. “He’d do well to be grateful for your presence. You might be a good influence on his hoydenish sister-in-law.”

  Manon, for the first time since she returned to the French, gave a genuine laugh.

  “You must never repeat what I said, but you’re worth a dozen flippant girls like Claudine. Though I hope deep down she’s made of better stuff than she lets on.”

  “I sincerely hope so.” Manon wrapped her arm around Rose briefly and took her time walking home in the mild sunshine.

  Before retreating to the candy-pink oasis that was her bedroom, Manon made one of her frequent trips to the nursery. Tawendeh-now-Théodore gleefully surrendered his Huron moniker as easily as he’d traded his buckskin breeches for woolen ones. He sat playing alongside Frédéric, Sabine, and Hélène as naturally as if they were his own siblings. Despite the linguistic challenges, the quartet made themselves understood through a secret language, sacred unto small children.

  At that moment young Théodore knew not that he lived among a people who widely despised him, or would, once he was old enough to be of consequence. The Lefebvre children were unspoiled by the prejudices of their society and welcomed the raven-haired boy as an equal—much valued—playmate.

  May this last for many years to come, my dear brother. And may you cherish the time. God knows you will remember the day you realize you are not a part of this world, and it will bruise your spirit if you’re strong. If you’re weak, it will break it.

  “Soldier!” Théodore presented his sister with a wooden soldier, painstakingly carved and meticulously painted.

  “Very good!” Manon kissed his cheek in praise of his improving French.

  “Maman asked me to help him along.” Hélène, the eldest in the nursery and uncontested chief of its residents, placed her doll lovingly in the tiny cradle and approached Manon. “I hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all, my dear,” Manon said, rewarding her as well with a kiss on her cherubic cheek. She was growing lither by the minute, but she still had the round face of a child. She was eight years old—just the right age to be an idol to Théodore and not too old to be disinterested in the roughhousing of children.

  “I’m glad you’ve come back to stay with us.” Hélène did not quite meet Manon’s eyes.

  “I’m happy to see you again, dear girl.” Manon chose her words carefully. Children’s ears are too precious for the burden of untruths. They will have many adult years to hear lies and there is no sense starting them off too early on the wrong course. Though sometimes the truth hurts worse. To confess I am not happy to return would be unspeakably cruel to this lovely child who has never been anything but a loving sister to me.

  Manon recalled that day, shortly before she returned to her people, when she overheard Alexandre admit to Nicole that he did not care for Manon as a daughter, even though he welcomed Hélène without question. Manon had known that particular truth for years, but to hear it enunciated from his lips was far too much for her twelve-year-old heart to bear. That was the night that she decided to return to her people and find her place among them. It wasn’t much later that she learned she had no real place with them, either.

  “May I call you ‘sister’ again, as I used to?” Hélène’s bright blue eyes looked up expectantly at Manon. She could not dash the girl’s hopes as Alexandre had done to her.

  “Of course you can, sweet girl. Of course.”

  CHAPTER 5

  Claudine

  June 1677

  Hold yo
ur head high. Give a small, serene smile. Move as though you own the room and the adoration of everyone in it.

  “You look beautiful, dear,” Nicole breathed as Claudine descended the staircase. “Yellow certainly suits you.” Claudine smiled at her sister, serenely, she hoped. It was her night—the night she’d been longing for—the night Nicole and Alexandre would introduce her to the small inner circles of Quebec’s elite. She had to be perfect. Elegant. Refined. None of the things she was raised to be, but all the things she longed for.

  Claudine had left Emmanuelle upstairs, entrenched in study; this night was the elder sister’s privilege. Emmanuelle would have her chance next year. Debuts in the New World were nowhere near as formal as the grand affairs in Paris, but Nicole had made a fair attempt for Claudine’s sake. Manon might be offered the same opportunity, but Claudine couldn’t imagine her taking it.

  “Thank you.” Claudine accepted a small glass of wine from Alexandre. “Gabrielle is a treasure.”

  “The Giroux girl made your gown?” Alexandre asked. “Remarkable talent for one so young.”

  “The question, brother dear, is how do you think I look in it?” Claudine asked. “I would very much like a man’s opinion.”

  “Like a ray of sunshine, my dear. You’d be the beauty in the greatest salons in Paris, I assure you,” Alexandre said, bowing gallantly, his smile a bit exaggerated as he cast an ill-concealed wink at his wife.

  “Just what a lady wants to hear,” Nicole said, returning the wink and turning to her sister. “Now remember to dance with everyone who asks. Be sweet to all, regardless of your feelings. You’ve nothing to gain by breaking hearts—just yet.”

  “Spoken like a true politician,” Alexandre said, a hand fluttering to his heart.

  “Am I anything else?” Nicole let out a less-than-ladylike laugh. Really, sister. People could hear you.

  “A great many things,” Claudine supplied, her tone dripping in honey.