“I can’t remember,” replied François.
“I don’t believe you,” said Radisson. “Tell me, please tell me, François. Give it a try.”
“I don’t feel like it.”
“You have to teach me Algonquin, François! I want to learn Algonquin. Say something in Algonquin, anything at all. Talk to me, I’m listening.”
SPRINGTIME HAD COME at last. Ever since the ice on the St. Lawrence gave way with an almighty crack one night in April, Radisson felt a fever building up inside him. Every day he pestered Jean Véron about when they would be leaving for Québec, as he’d promised. At the very least he yearned to get out of the fort to hunt the Canada geese that filled the skies. It drove him wild to see the geese flying over the village and landing on the St. Lawrence in their thousands, just beyond the stockade, where they fed, then flew off again only to be replaced by still more.
But instead of seizing the chance to feast on such an abundance of fresh meat after Lent— which the Jesuits had seen was observed to the letter —Pierre Godefroy ordered everyone to remain in the village until further notice. He had heard from a settler from Montréal that the Iroquois were back. Apart from Godefroy, nobody in Trois-Rivières believed a word of it, since the Iroquois had never before arrived so early in the season. But for the captain of the militia, this was no time for taking risks. Radisson wouldn’t have minded if they had gone to Québec immediately to get their orders from the governor. But they hadn’t moved. Everything was at a standstill: no hunting, no travelling to Québec, nothing. Jean Véron was tying himself in knots, putting off the trip for one unlikely reason after another. Radisson would have done anything to put an end to the standstill that was eating away at him.
One morning, to his great surprise, he saw that Jean Véron was nowhere to be found. “Where did he go?” he asked his sister, apprehensively. At first Marguerite didn’t dare tell him the secret she’d been reluctantly guarding for the past few days. Then she gave in: her husband had left by canoe during the night with Pierre Godefroy and Claude Volant to meet the governor in Québec. They’d decided to leave alone in secret for reasons of safety, she explained. Radisson exploded with rage.
“Liar!” he shouted, slamming his fist down on the table. “He’s a damned liar! He promised he’d take me with him.”
Marguerite tried to calm her brother.
“There was no choice, Radisson. We have to be more careful than ever. The Iroquois have already killed enough of us as it is. Pierre and Jean didn’t want to take any risks. They kept the whole thing a secret.”
“I’m stronger than any of them, you’ll see!” said Radisson, not listening. “If they’d taken me with them, we’d already be in Québec by now!”
“It takes more than strength to paddle,” Marguerite replied calmly. “You’ve hardly even been in a canoe, Radisson. You don’t know the first thing about it. It’s not as easy as it looks.”
“How am I going to learn when nobody wants to show me? All I want is to learn to paddle. Like I learned to shoot. At least give me a chance! But oh no, it’s always the same old story: wait your turn, lad, you’re not old enough yet. Véron is a damned liar! What kind of life is this? If I could at least go hunting! Tell me why we’re not allowed to hunt? Nobody believes the Iroquois are here! Somebody’s messing with us!”
“It’s safer that way,” Marguerite replied, but without much conviction.
Far from convinced the Iroquois were an imminent threat, she looked for a way to cheer her brother up. He was moping more and more with every passing day.
“Perhaps you could go hunting just opposite the fort with your friends,” she suggested. “There are so many geese! You’re bound to hit three or four of them. And I can’t wait to eat fresh meat…”
Her offer had an immediate effect on Radisson, who jumped to his feet, full of enthusiasm.
“Seriously?” he cried, raring to go. “Can I really?”
“Why not? I think Jean would agree. As long as you stay within sight of the fort and François and your friends go with you. You’re well armed and not too far away— you should be fine.”
“Great idea! I’ll run and see if François is game. I’ll be back right away.”
Radisson dashed outside like the wind. His first stop was at Mathurin Lesueur’s house. Even though he found him a little dull and rather awkward, Radisson had made him his friend since they were both the same age. There were so few young people in Trois-Rivières. Radisson quickly told him about his sister’s plan.
“Marguerite says we can go hunting opposite the fort,” he told him. “She wants us to bring back enough for everyone! Your mom is going to be so happy, Mathurin. Get ready and I’ll go find François. See you in a minute!”
But Radisson had more trouble convincing François Godefroy.
“My dad says we’re not allowed out of the fort,” he said, confidently. “There’s no way I’m going. It’s not your sister that calls the shots around here, or her husband— it’s my dad.”
“It’s for the common good, François!” argued Radisson, using his full powers of persuasion. Everybody’s tired of eating rotten turnips, tasteless onions, and salt pork. Just listen to the geese! They’re calling to us, all day long! They want us to come feast on them! Have you ever heard of someone turning up his nose at what God has been good enough to send him every spring? It’s practically a sin, staying here instead of going out hunting!”
“Our safety is at stake,” countered François. “All my dad wants is to keep us safe from the Iroquois.”
“Maybe. But who ever saw an Iroquois round here in early May? No one. Nobody believes the garbage that guy from Montréal was spouting! The Iroquois are doing exactly what we should be doing, François— they’re out hunting geese while they’re still around! It’ll soon be too late. There’s nothing to worry about— we won’t be far. We’ll stay opposite the fort. The guards will see us from the palisade. Marguerite has been living here five years, you know! And your dad made Véron, her husband, first officer of the militia. My sister knows what she’s talking about. Come on, François! Mathurin and I are going anyway. But you’re the one with all the experience, and you’re a better hunter than we are. Come on, François. It’s for the common good…”
At that moment, a flock of geese flew just over their heads in a V, filling the bright, clear sky with their cackling. François’ mouth watered at the thought of all the tasty roast goose he’d ever eaten. His resistance weakened.
“My brother Jacques did leave this morning with the Algonquins to go up the Saint-Maurice River…”
“You see! Anyway, all the officers have gone except Dandonneau. Nobody will be angry we went hunting. No way! Your own mom will be thanking you for bringing fresh meat home. Come on, François— we’re going!”
“Fine. I’m in as long as we stay within sight of the fort. We’ll be safe if we do that. We’ll kill a goose or two each and then come back.”
“Great!”
Radisson was over the moon. He’d done it! At last he would be able to get outside and make himself useful. Marguerite would have preferred there be more of them, but she trusted the three, especially with the experienced François, and didn’t go back on her word. Radisson put his greased moccasins on as fast as he could, then picked up his musket, powder horn, and pouches of lead shot. It was a perfect day for hunting: warm and sunny. Radisson was wearing only a linen shirt and pants. Marguerite watched him get ready without saying a word, delighted to see him back in high spirits after so much disappointment. She gave him only one piece of advice:
“Whatever you do, don’t go wandering off from the fort. That’s what we agreed. Just be patient, little brother. You’re sure to bring back plenty of geese.”
“Don’t worry. You can start getting your pots ready. I promise you we’re going to have a real feast tonight!”
“Here, take a loaf with you,” added Marguerite, handing him a big hunk of fresh bread. “It’ll keep you goin
g all day.”
Radisson stuffed it into his shoulder bag and left the house, but an idea flashed before him and he went back to take Véron’s musket from above the hearth, in addition to his own.
“I’m borrowing your husband’s musket,” he explained. “He owes me that at least. Two muskets will mean more geese for everyone. See you later!”
Marguerite was only too happy to have solved the problem. The hunting would do her little brother good: he really was beginning to get fidgety feet. “Just so he doesn’t stray too far,” she thought.
THE GUARD keeping watch over the fort’s main gate at first refused to let the three young men through. They reminded him of the need to bring back fresh food, orders or no orders. To convince him, they promised to bring him back the fourth goose they shot, if fortune smiled on them, that is. The guard didn’t believe the Iroquois would have come so early in the season and would have liked nothing more than to go hunting himself, so he let them pass. “Provided you stay close by and don’t tell anyone it was me who let you out.”
The three companions left the village, crying out with springtime glee. Radisson felt as free as the geese flying overhead. In a few hours, he’d be bringing a mouth-watering meal back to Marguerite and would give some of the meat to his sister Françoise who worked for the Jesuits. Everyone would be happy and proud of him.
In no time at all they reached the edge of the meadow that surrounded the village, heading for the St. Lawrence. Undergrowth separated them from the shore, which was further away than it looked. It took them a few minutes more to reach the last thickets, just steps away from the riverbank. What better place to surprise the geese, even though, for the moment, they were all still too far away. All they had to do was wait… wait… and wait some more… Staying still for so long quickly began to grate on Radisson’s nerves.
After an hour, not a single bird had come within musket range. Radisson could make out a huge white patch of thousands of geese out on the water, much further away. “All the geese are over there,” he argued. “We’ll have to flush them out. There’s no point waiting around here.”
François and Mathurin didn’t agree. They’d given their word to stay within sight of the fort. But they finally gave in to their friend. The three of them started walking along the shoreline. Soon the palisade of Trois-Rivières was nothing more than a faint line above the brushwood. Young vivid green leaves masked their surroundings. The three companions could now see only a short distance in front of them. Soon it became clear that no one would be able to see them from Trois-Rivières.
“Hey! We’ve lost sight of the village!” protested Mathurin. “We said we wouldn’t go far. We’ll have to go back.”
“Chicken!” replied Radisson, without even turning round. “We’re almost there. In fifteen minutes we’ll have bagged two or three geese each and be on our way back. Come on!”
Mathurin stopped for a moment, looking carefully around him. He would have liked to see the reassuring sight of the palisade, but it had disappeared. Fear took hold of his stomach. Even the bushes seemed threatening; he thought he could see Iroquois hiding all around him. But Radisson and François were already in the marsh grass, on their way to the river. Reluctantly, Mathurin ran to catch up with them, scared of being alone. The three made slow progress through deeper and deeper water, crouching down so as not to scare the geese. Mathurin couldn’t help showing his distress once more: “It’s dangerous,” he managed to stutter, his voice trembling.
“Shut up!” Radisson retorted. He was leading the way, and stood up straight to face Mathurin. “You’re going to scare the geese!”
At the same time, a first goose took flight in the distance, then another, then ten, then a hundred, then a thousand all at once! A whole white cloud of them swelled, banked, then pitched to the west in one exquisite movement. Radisson ran in their direction, took aim, and fired… But they were too far away. Their highly coveted prey remained beyond their reach. François didn’t even bother firing. Radisson turned round angrily and upbraided Mathurin: “It’s your fault! If you hadn’t said anything, we’d have been close enough to get at them!”
“You’re the one who shouted!” retorted Mathurin. “It’s your fault! You don’t even know how to hunt! I’m not taking lessons from you!”
The two friends pushed and shoved each other for a moment. François stayed to one side. He was the only experienced hunter among them and he knew that patience was the key— a quality that Radisson still lacked. When peace reigned once again between the two companions, he asked them to walk back to within sight of the fort and work out what to do next. When Trois-Rivières was once again close by, Radisson again convinced them to return to where the geese were. And so they headed westward again, this time following François’ lead, which meant walking across the cleared fields tilled by the rare farmers who lived outside the Trois-Rivières stockade, a route that François believed would be safer.
No sooner had they gotten close to the first farm house than a man shouted out to them from inside the building: “Halt!” A middle-aged habitant with a stoop unbolted his door and came out carrying a musket. “You young ’uns are all mad! The Iroquois are out in droves— you’re going to get yourselves massacred! Now clear off before I fill your hides full of lead!”
The threat set the three lads back on their heels: now they didn’t know what to think. But François recognized the farmer and remembered that he had a bad reputation: it was Old Man Bouchard, who sold alcohol to the Wildmen, even though the Jesuits didn’t allow it. And he didn’t seem to be all there. Mathurin, who was already scared stiff, believed every word he said, but François wondered if he’d been drinking and wanted to see if what he was saying really made sense.
“Where did you see them then?” he asked.
“Down by the river,” replied Bouchard, pointing to the water. “Right down there at the far end of my field!”
Radisson stared into the distance, even less convinced than François.
“Sure you can see that far, old man?” he asked arrogantly.
“Dead right I can, boy! No mistaking an Iroquois. Saw a hundred of them, I did. With feathers sticking out of their heads. Now get back home before they eat you up for dinner!”
“We’re going, we’re going,” said Mathurin, his voice shaking.
“Over there?” Radisson asked. “Right where I can see the Bogeyman?”
“Go to hell, you little brat! Too bad for you if they scalp you. I warned you. Now goodnight all!”
And with that the farmer disappeared back into his house just as quickly as he’d come out. They could hear him sliding the bar back across his door. Two seconds later his worried face reappeared in the tiny window overlooking the St. Lawrence. He was still holding his fowling piece.
“If you ask me, we should go look for footprints,” suggested François. “May as well be clear about it in our own minds. If they are here, we’ll go warn Dandonneau right away. Muskets at the ready, lads. We need to be careful.”
“Oh, no!” Mathurin sighed.
Once they reached the edge of the forest separating the cleared field from the river, the young adventurers peered long and hard into the bushes, then inspected the ground for footprints. They listened to the wind whistling through the branches, the cracks of vegetation, and the far-off cackling of wildfowl. Nothing appeared to be out of place.
“We’ll keep going as far as the river,” announced Radisson, walking deeper into the woods.
Ready for anything, they moved slowly from one tree to another. Terrified, Mathurin fell behind, following his companions reluctantly, shaking. Radisson and François motioned to each other. They pointed out a tree, a grove, or a shadow, and covered each other. Fifty feet further on, when they at last reached the shoreline, Radisson let his guard down: “See? No Iroquois here. The old fool was wrong!” François, who was less certain, continued to scan the ground, searching apprehensively for the slightest evidence that would confirm his i
ntuition.
“Just because we haven’t seen any Iroquois doesn’t mean they’re not here,” he said at last. “They’re masters of concealment.”
“Whatever,” Radisson replied. “They’re not ghosts, you know— just Iroquois!”
“That shows you don’t know them,” François answered, continuing to examine their surroundings, as though he felt like he was being spied on. “There’s nothing more cunning than an Iroquois. You’d better learn that quickly or you won’t last long in New France.”
“Perhaps. But at the minute all I see is thousands of geese right over there. Follow me! This time we’re not going to miss out!”
“No way!” said François. “I’m going back to Trois-Rivières. We’ve already gone much further than we wanted to. It’s dangerous out here. We need to warn Dandonneau that Old Bouchard has seen Iroquois.”
“Is there something wrong with your head?” Radisson was starting to lose his temper. “We have no more than a hundred paces to go and then we can kill as many geese as we like. Old Bouchard is half mad. We haven’t seen the slightest trace of any Iroquois. And you want to go running back to your mommy? You’re nothing but a chicken, François Godefroy! I promised Marguerite I would bring back goose for tonight’s dinner and by God that’s exactly what I’m going to do! So long, scaredy-cats! Get yourselves laughed at, if you like. I’m going on.”
Radisson turned on his heels and moved rapidly toward the geese, bent over so as not to scare them again. Mathurin couldn’t wait to get back to the fort, but François hesitated for a long while, his teeth clenched and his pride wounded. Finally he decided that he was duty bound to return to the fort and warn Dandonneau, and headed back toward Trois-Rivières.
“Let’s go,” he whispered to Mathurin. “We’ll go back along the shore. If we’re lucky, we’ll run into the geese along the way.”
IT TOOK RADISSON a few minutes to reach the geese he’d thought were much closer. Thousands of geese and ducks were resting nonchalantly in the middle of a huge expanse of partially submerged bulrushes. He walked slowly toward them, bent double, so as not to frighten them away. The cold water rushed into his moccasins and was soon up to his knees. He kept going, careful to keep the powder in his shoulder bag dry. His second musket was slung across his shoulder, hampering his progress, but he was glad he had brought it. He’d be able to shoot twice each time and bag more birds.
Adventures of Radisson Page 2
