Hunting for the Mississippi

by Camille Bouchard

  “No, my friends,” says Joutel, to everyone’s surprise. “We’re not going upriver from the Mississippi, but directly to its mouth—via the Caribbean Sea!”

  6

  THE CEREMONY

  UNDER THREAT

  Half hidden by the huge canoe in the middle of the deck, three sailors pass by Marie-Élisabeth, Pierre, and me with a laugh. One of them covers his mouth to stifle his guffaws. Six more of their friends help them fill barrels with sea water.

  “Sshh! Be quiet,” one of them says, but is himself unable to suppress a chuckle.

  “What are you doing?” asks Marie-Élisabeth.

  “Drat! Kids!”

  “I’m not a kid,” I reply, putting a little more into it than I need to.

  Because I’m not really angry. I’m used to it by now.

  “You need to keep a secret! Can you do that?”

  “Oh yes! Oh yes!” exclaims Pierre Talon.

  He really is a kid.

  “Come on, you’re not going to tell them, are you?” one of the sailors protests.

  “They’re too young. We won’t baptize them.”

  “Yes, we will!” vows a third. “Otherwise parents won’t pay us for their kids. But we’ll go easy on them. Just a few drops.”

  “There are already lots of people crossing the line for the first time… ha! ha!”

  He finds the whole thing so funny that he can’t go on. It’s clear to look at Marie-Élisabeth, Pierre, and me that we don’t have a clue what they’re on about. So a sailor puts an arm around us and takes us to one side as he sees three passengers crossing the deck.

  “You promise not to say a thing?” he asks us.

  “I promise,” I reply confidently, both to convince him and to show him that I’m the eldest, the leader of the trio.

  “The ships will soon be crossing the line. And we—”

  “The line?”

  “The equator. The Earth’s centre. Well, listen, so it’s not really the line. We won’t be that far south, but… ha! ha! ha! We’ve just come up with our own version of the old custom for the Tropic of Cancer. It’s too funny! You won’t want to miss a ceremony like this.”

  “And what exactly is the ceremony?”

  “Tradition has it that each time a ship crosses the line, anyone who’s already crossed it must ‘baptize’ those crossing it for the first time. They pour a little water over them, more if they kick up a fuss. Anyone who pays off the old hands is treated with more consideration and we sprinkle them—ha! ha!—a little less! The newly baptized must swear an oath never to let another soul cross the Equator—or in our case, the Tropic of Cancer—without being treated to the same rite of passage. Anyone who refuses to take part in the ceremony, well, let’s just say we’ll give them a good… ha! ha! ha!”

  “Stop! Stop!”

  Surprised, we turn around. I notice that the other sailors gathered around the barrels of water also stop what they’re doing. They look puzzled. Two non-commissioned officers are approaching with an infantry lieutenant who is normally aboard Le Joly, but who came onto our ship this morning for something to do with supplies.

  “What’s going on here?” asks the sailor who had been explaining the baptism ceremony to us.

  “What’s going on is that the ceremony has been cancelled,” the lieutenant replies.

  “What?” The cry of surprise goes up as one from basically all the crew within earshot.

  “But why?” one of them wonders.

  “Mr. De La Salle says it is childish,” replies an officer. “Passengers should not be subjected to a custom that serves only to take money from them. Especially since we are not crossing the Equator.”

  “But it’s such fun!” another of the sailors protests.

  “I am sorry, my friends,” the lieutenant says, visibly disappointed. “We tried to explain your point of view to Mr. De La Salle, but there’s nothing we can do.”

  “You can see he’s no seafarer,” a sailor grumbles, running an irritated hand across his bald head. “A true sailor wouldn’t dare put an end to a tradition that dates back to… to…”

  He motions with his hands to show that it’s been going on too long for anyone to remember when exactly it started. What he doesn’t mention is that the initiative to change the very same tradition for crossing the Tropic of Cancer was dreamt up by him and his friends.

  “I’m very sorry, men,” the lieutenant says again. “Please conduct yourselves according to the orders that come down from the leader. And those orders are to cancel all preparations for the ceremony.”

  The sailors had been having such a great time and now when the non-commissioned officers and the lieutenant leave they fly into a rage.

  “No way! We can’t let the passengers cross the line without getting baptized.”

  “We have no choice. Didn’t you hear?”

  “We swore at our own baptism not to let—”

  “That was for the Equator. Not the Tropic of Cancer.”

  “That makes no difference! The tradition…”

  “A plague on these dandies, on the minions of the court who rub shoulders with nobility and the king!”

  “What an ass De La Salle is!”

  “The Chinaman, you mean?”

  As Marie-Élisabeth, Pierre Talon, and I walk away from the raging men, it saddens me to hear them speak ill of our expedition’s leader.

  Little do I know that, as the days and months go by, I’ll hear worse, much worse, about him.

  7

  THE HAPPIEST

  TWO SETTLERS

  One night I am woken up by the first cries of a newborn baby. I am lying against a pile of sails propped up by what’s known as the ship’s web frame. In the nook beside me, half lit by oil lamps held by two women, I can see the mother’s back. It’s dark, but more light is out of the question because of the risk of fire. Fire is what all sailors are most afraid of. One of the two shipmasters in charge of L’Aimable has told us to be careful I don’t know how many times.

  But it was unthinkable for Mrs. Talon to give birth out on deck in plain view. And so the women are huddled around her in this corner of the hold. The ship’s surgeon is also hovering in the background in case he might have to slice her open with a barber’s razor. Sometimes the babies refuse to come out, that’s what the midwives say. With the fate that lies in store for them if ever their mothers were to be widowed, I must say I can’t blame them.

  “It’s just a boy, Stache!” Marie-Élisabeth says, leaving the group of women to come over to me.

  She shrugs and rolls her eyes. Her father has just been given the news and is being patted on the back. He raises his fist in victory.

  “So? Won’t a little brother be great?”

  “Ugh!” she pouts, dropping down to sit beside me. “I already have three brothers. And you’re my boyfriend. That’s plenty of boys around me as it is.”

  Her boy…? She said I was her boy…friend?

  “And I have only one sister. Another girl would have been nice to help me give Mom a hand.”

  Her boyfriend? Her boyfriend?

  “Just imagine, father to a son who’s going to be given a seigneury,” three or four passengers are saying, spreading the news around Mr. Talon.

  I’m Marie-Élisabeth’s boyfriend! I’m the happiest settler in the world. Happier even than Mr. Talon. Who’s still celebrating with his friends.

  A woman walks past the group, muttering to herself. I know her. She’s the wife of Mr. Barbier, the pilot of L’Aimable.

  “We’ll see,” she says. “Royal privilege was for the first child born in the colony. We’re still on our way there. We’re not in Louisiana yet.”

  “She’s just jealous,” a man mumbles once she has gone.

  “Is it our fault if the ships have been delayed?” a second ma
n pipes up.

  “Or if God decided the babe be born two weeks ahead of time?” chips in a third.

  Mr. Talon is too happy that Providence has given him a fourth son for the words of a jealous woman to dampen his excitement. He continues to celebrate.

  “And Mr. De La Salle has agreed to be the godfather,” he tells the crowd. “We will call him Robert.”

  Mr. Talon happens to catch my eye. He raises his fist in victory. I do the same.

  We’re the happiest two settlers in the world.

  8

  RAISED VOICES

  All is not well on board. Conditions are rough and the sailors are worried that what’s known as a “hurricane” in these parts might be on its way. We don’t know the like of such storms in Europe.

  “The winds can lift a ship and flip it right over, drowning everyone on board.”

  The sailors pray, the passengers and soldiers vomit, and the pigs have a great time of things.

  Worse still, fifty or so people are suffering from all kinds of illnesses. They include not only the surgeons, but Mr. De La Salle himself.

  “We’re running out of fresh water,” Lucien Talon tells his wife and my mom. “The sailors say we’ll have to land on the island of Saint-Domingue soon. We’ve been at sea for close to sixty days. It’s time we arrived.”

  “This morning I overheard two Recollects say that Captain Beaujeu passed by Port-de-Paix overnight. They say we’re much further on,” replies Isabelle Talon, her newborn on her breast.

  “We’ve already passed Saint-Domingue?”

  “Not the island, just Port-de-Paix. We’re going to moor at Petit-Goâve, or so they say.”

  “Without Mr. De La Salle’s go-ahead?”

  “That’s what the Recollects were saying.”

  “But why would Captain Beaujeu have done such a thing?” asks Mom.

  Isabelle Talon shrugs, causing the baby to lose her nipple for a moment.

  “Things are tense between both men,” her husband replies, shaking his head. “I think they’re both jealous of each other.”

  “Let’s hope things get back to normal soon,” Mom sighs, “before it disrupts our colony.”

  Especially since I myself have seen our leader rebuked more than a few times. I hope things don’t get any worse.

  But my mom doesn’t look fearful or worried.

  Ever since we left La Rochelle, she’s been happy. At least, she’s been much calmer than back when we were begging on the street. She finds plenty to keep her busy with the Talons, which helps her forget about my dad and little brother. And even though the food could be better, we can eat every day without having to demean ourselves. Without having to endure the scorn on the faces of passersby or the priest’s lecherous advances.

  She extends an arm to me and holds me tight. It’s been happening more and more since Armand died. I can’t stand it: it feels like she’s still treating me like a child. And Marie-Élisabeth might think I’m the one asking to be hugged like a big baby.

  But I know Mom is doing it to replace the hugs she will no longer get from my younger brother. And perhaps also to enjoy these moments of affection we share together in case I might die, too.

  So I might not like it, but I let her act like my mom. I owe her that.

  * * *

  Mom and I are very excited. For the first time in our lives we see forests of strange trees, plants with huge leaves, remarkable exotic fruit, colourful birds that make unusual sounds, monkeys, crocodiles, and other animals I don’t know the first thing about.

  We marvel at everything each time we get the chance to go ashore. And even from the deck of L’Aimable, we can wonder at the explosion of flora and fauna that is completely foreign to us. The Talons might already be familiar with North America, but they’re just as excited as we are.

  But not today. Today, no one is admiring anything at all.

  We’ve been docked at the port of Petit-Goâve for a week now and the birds’ cheeping is suddenly drowned out by raised voices. Even from our ship, L’Aimable, we can hear Mr. De La Salle laying into Captain Beaujeu on Le Joly. The captain remains impassive, claiming not to take offence, although I’m sure that inside he must be furious with our expedition leader.

  “I wonder if docking in Petit-Goâve rather than Port-de-Paix is really so detrimental to our undertaking,” a Recollect wonders out loud, leaning against the gunwale.

  I’m close by him, sitting on the rat line, holding on to the shrouds of the main mast—the webbed rigging that links the top of the masts to the railing.

  “It’s more about obeying a superior’s orders,” replies Henri Joutel, not sounding as though he cares one way or another.

  Captain Beaujeu says that, as the man in charge of the vessel, it is up to him to determine the best places to dock. Mr. De La Salle counters that he is responsible for everything. Who’s right and who’s wrong? I don’t like seeing the men leading our expedition arguing, especially not in public. No good can come of it.

  “Either way, Captain Beaujeu’s initiative has led to the Saint-François losing its way north of Saint-Domingue,” remarks a second priest just below me. “We can only hope we do not have to wait too long before the ketch finds us here.”

  I glance back down at the deck and see Marie-Élisabeth, not far from the forecastle. She’s holding Madeleine’s hand. I presume they’re coming back from the head, the place at the front of the boat where we go to the bathroom. The girls weave their way through the interlaced rigging that runs down from the top of the masts to the pin rails on the upper deck and the railing.

  Standing against the rigging, a huge hulk of a man with a thick bronze-coloured beard, long sunburned hair, and irises as grey as a stormy sea watches them pass by, not letting them out of his sight. He is clutching a knife, its blade polished like new, with a bone handle that is cracked in the centre. He’s using it to carve a piece of wood.

  I know that his name is Hiens. When I was on the wharf in Petit-Goâve helping the sailors move barrels of food, I heard him telling the big man who took on volunteers who he was. He was recruited, along with a few others of his build, to replace some of our own men who deserted as soon as we reached land.

  Hiens is from Germany, which explains his thick accent. When they asked him what he did for a living, he replied, “I kill. I was a freebooter on the boat that left me here.”

  His answer drew a laugh from Mr. De La Salle. He said he liked men like Hiens: they didn’t desert at the first sniff of danger.

  Despite the—debatable—qualities a freebooter could bring to an expedition like ours, I don’t like Hiens very much. I don’t like the way he ogles Marie-Élisabeth and Madeleine. I don’t like the gap-toothed smiles he gives them.

  And I especially don’t like the hand he tries to slip beneath their skirts when the two little Talon girls walk past.

  9

  GREY SPLOTCHES

  On this early October morning, still at the wharf in Petit-Goâve, terrible news is spreading: the Saint-François has been taken by a Spanish patrol. Mr. De La Salle and Captain Beaujeu are quickly at each other’s throats again. Mr. De La Salle is holding the captain responsible for the loss since he didn’t follow orders. The captain of Le Joly doesn’t have much of a defence: neither storms nor a difficult approach prevented him docking in Port-de-Paix. Just pride.

  “Our tools, equipment, nails... everything we needed to build our shelters,” despairs Mr. Talon with a shake of the head. “All because the ketch couldn’t keep up with the others. How stupid these officers and noblemen can be!”

  “I’ve already seen you build a lean-to with nothing but branches and a few loose ends of rope,” his wife consoles him. “You’re the finest carpenter I know.”

  “Mr. De La Salle looked high and low for men like you for a reason, Lucien,” says my mom. “He knows what you c
an do with the means at your disposal. It’s men like you that our expedition depends on, not our leaders.”

  “But they’ll get all the glory once the colony is up and running,” laughs Lucien Talon, with a hint of bitterness in his voice.

  I laugh with the three adults while Pierre and Jean-Baptiste, too young to understand the conversation’s nuances, make do with staring at us. Robert the newborn, lying in a blanket at his mother’s side, wakes and demands to be fed. As she puts him to her breast, Mrs. Talon asks Ludovic to go help Madeleine who has caught her foot in a pile of ropes she was trying to climb.

  “And Marie-Élisabeth?” she asks, leaning against the wooden frame behind her. “She’s taking her time coming back from the head. I bet some of the sailors have caught a fish or two and she’s bombarding them with her usual questions. Lucien, can you go get her before one of the fishermen throws her overboard?”

  “It’s fine, Mr. Talon,” I say. “I’ll go.”

  And I leap up before he has a chance to protest.

  “Of course he will. He loves her!” Pierre Talon shouts behind me.

  I can hear Mrs. Talon giggle as I reach the ladder up to the deck. She whispers to my mother, but loudly enough for me to hear.

  “It’s so nice to see. Perhaps they’ll be the first to wed in the colony.”

  Mom’s laughter is lost at my feet as I reach the top of the hatch.

  * * *

  “Have you seen Marie-Élisabeth?”

  “Your girlfriend?” the two sailors at the bow reply. “We did, not long ago. But she’s not here now.”

  “Have you seen Marie-Élisabeth?”

  “The little Talon girl?” asks the Recollect without looking up from the full basket of fish being hauled aboard. “No. Or rather, yes! A good quarter of an hour ago.”

  “Have you seen Marie-Élisabeth?”

  “Who? Your mom?” grumbles the quartermaster who has just been given his daily brandy ration and doesn’t appreciate being interrupted.

  “No, my friend Marie-Élisabeth.”