Bride of New France

by Suzanne Desrochers

  Unlike some of the more established Pointe-aux-Trembles families, Laure and Mathurin still don’t have any more furniture than they did the previous year. The furniture that comes in from the ships is designated first for the nobles and religious houses of Québec, then for the wealthier settlers of Trois-Rivières, and finally what remains is transported to the nobles and religious of Ville-Marie. It will take years before the ordinary people will have furniture in their cabins, except for those who can make their own rudimentary versions or buy pieces from the few furniture makers in the town.

  “Well, it looks like you have learned a thing or two in my absence. That smells good. I’ve been eating nothing but Savage stews for the past months. You know how foul those can be.”

  Laure nods. “Yes, day after day of eating that corn soup of theirs must be terrible.” Does Mathurin think she knows nothing about the Algonquins and their ways?

  Laure fills the two bowls with the broth and vegetables and carries them to the table. When she sets Mathurin’s bowl in front of him, he reaches for her breast and gives it a hard squeeze. The swift movement and sharp pain makes her spill some of the hot broth from her bowl onto his lap. For the moment he doesn’t try for anything more.

  After finishing his soup, Mathurin leaves Laure sitting at the makeshift table and crawls into bed. Before long he is snoring and the sound fills every crack in the room’s walls. Laure doesn’t have an appetite for her soup. She is reminded of the trouble that has been gnawing away any reassurance that the bountiful crops could have brought. She rises from her coffer, opens the door to the cabin, and retches beside the entrance. Her stomach is empty, and so she heaves out only air and deep animal sounds.

  Although it is still early, darkness is falling on the settlement and the air is sharp with the new cold. Looking out over the cabins, the most prosperous of which have lit extravagant early fires, and into the bare branches of the forest beyond, Laure can be fooled into believing that all is peaceful. The onset of the cold, already predictable and well prepared for, seems a trifling concern. Like death, winter is a certainty to be endured and ultimately surrendered to. Laure is accustomed to death, to the long trials of enclosement, to hunger, to the burying force of this country.

  It is the new thing that she cannot accept, that is making her sick. Even now, bile is rising into her throat. She forces herself to put aside for the moment what cannot be ignored for long. When her stomach feels a little settled, she closes the door and comes into bed beside her husband.

  In the morning she crawls out of the lit-cabane where Mathurin is still lying asleep and opens the cabin door again. The sickness is gone. Outside the sun has not yet risen and the air is cold and damp. The others in the seigneurie are still sleeping. With the crops all picked for the year, there isn’t as much reason to wake up early any more. Besides, these days the sun barely rises until late morning. Soon there will be snow.

  They say there are ways, even in New France, to procure the necessary herbs. If Laure were at the Salpêtrière, she could easily arrange to meet with one of these women by passing the message of her terrible dilemma from girl to girl. There has been rumour of a few abortionists practising their illicit trade in the colony. But these are only rumours. She certainly can’t ask anyone in Pointe-aux-Trembles to help her find an abortionist. There is not a soul that Laure can trust with her secret.

  For Laure, prayers are a last resort. Madeleine would tell her that she should turn to prayer first. Laure would answer that God, like a good dormitory officer, would expect his children to exhaust all their own means of coming up with a solution before bothering him. Besides, Laure did pray last summer that no child would come of the nights she spent with Deskaheh in Ville-Marie. By late September, she knew for certain her prayer had not been answered. Ever since, she has struggled to think of a way to explain to the others in Pointe-aux-Trembles how she can be pregnant even though Mathurin has been away since April. Even heaven, Laure fears, will have no solution to offer. She must pay the consequences, however grave, for making such a terrible mistake. How easy it is to regret now what she could only surrender to in August.

  Her prayer is simple. “Lord, there is a Savage baby growing within me. I ask only that you somehow take it from me and let me live. If you do this one thing for me, I will not disobey any of your commandments again.”

  Laure doesn’t know if the help comes from God or simply from her own mind turning over the problem for so long while Mathurin was away. Now that her husband has returned, there is one other option. It might not be too late. Babies often come early, after all. Of course this is only a temporary solution, for when the child is born, Mathurin will soon see that the baby does not belong to him. But many things could happen between now and then. Perhaps as Laure has been hoping for, there is still a chance that the beginnings of the child will fall out of her womb in a miscarriage, although with each passing week that becomes less likely. She has done vigorous work in the garden all fall to bring about this result. She has heard the French men say that it is the hard work of the Savage girls that keeps them from having so many children like the French women. But, even if the baby, which has so far seemed resistant to her efforts, is born after all, perhaps Mathurin won’t see the Savage origins of the child immediately. It might take years for the features to appear. At least for now Laure can buy herself some time by lying with Mathurin and in a few weeks claiming the pregnancy as his. Laure boils pine branches for the occasion and pours the perfumed water into her hair and over her chest.

  When Mathurin awakens, Laure is standing in front of him in her nightdress. She looks into his ruddy face and gives him her most seductive smile. He is surprised by this attention and pleased. At least the first part of her plan is easy enough to orchestrate.

  “I’ve wanted so long for you to be my wife,” he says, pulling her up against the soft weight of his body. “Laure, I’ve been waiting just for you.” He looks like he might cry, such is his agitation at her willingness to have him.

  She pats his back. She really wishes he wouldn’t make this more difficult by lying to her about the Savage women. She winces as he enters her, but pretends to feel pleasure.

  Two weeks later, Laure sits with Mathurin and announces to him that she is expecting his baby. By this time she is in fact three months pregnant and her stomach and breasts are so swelled that she can no longer wear her bodice.

  To celebrate the pregnancy, Mathurin has killed two squirrels. He chased a rabbit for a few minutes, but couldn’t shoot it. With her sickness now gone, Laure feels ravenous. Even Mathurin’s squirrels—strung upon a stick—look delicious. It is as if she needs to eat for the whole winter ahead, for all the past weeks of sickness. There is not enough food in the cabin to satisfy her, but she adds what she can to Mathurin’s catch. She prepares enough for six people. She boils one of the squirrels for several minutes, but can’t wait to eat it. The smell of it cooking drives her mad. She pulls it from the pot and throws the hot carcass across the table. She sits on her chest and eats the entire animal, its soft flesh and salty blood satisfying her like no food ever has. Mathurin watches her, a contented look spread across his wide features.

  21

  Laure’s fingers move along the stitches. She is embroidering a blanket. The baby will emerge naked into the cold of Canada and will need to be wrapped up, she tells herself. The child must be covered in something if it is to survive even an hour in this country. But does she really want the baby to live for an hour? Two hours? For a day? How long will Laure be able to hold the creature that has no future?

  Madame Tardif sits on a wooden chair across from Laure. Although it is rustic, without any carving or a smooth surface, the chair is a luxurious item purchased by Madame Tardif’s husband in Ville-Marie. Madame Tardif is a model colony mother, with children nearby as she works in the cabin. Her offspring are strong and her cabin is outfitted with the simple necessities. Heavy drapes cover the windows; there is a table and four chairs beside
s the one recently purchased by Monsieur Tardif. There are also cooking utensils and a wash basin. But it is the children, the beginning of a large family, that are the most obvious sign of Madame Tardif’s success.

  How much simpler it would be if Laure were having Mathurin’s baby. But what would she feel for the offspring of her pig husband? It would be some other baby that she half reviled and not this child twisting in her gut filling her thoughts with Deskaheh, God, animals, and her own passions.

  Mathurin stayed in the cabin with his pregnant wife until the middle of November, but grew more restless each day watching one fur-trade convoy after another being discussed, planned for, and departing Pointe-aux-Trembles. Finally, at the very last, Mathurin left, promising Laure that he would be back early in the spring, well before the baby was born.

  Madame Tardif took Laure in with more affection than she had shown her in the past, if such a shrewd woman could ever be described as affectionate. Surely she was relieved that Laure was finally pregnant. Having Laure stay with Madame Tardif was a courteous agreement between neighbours that was arranged by Mathurin, at Laure’s urging, before he left. Laure decided she could not face another winter alone with just the cabin’s fire and this new baby within her.

  Madame Tardif incorporated caring for Laure, the pregnant citadine, into her winter schedule. The Canadienne has three children in their two-room cabin, the youngest being barely weaned. She reassures Laure that having children is what a woman is meant to do. That they will come into the world less painfully than anticipated, unless of course you or the baby or the both of you die, but of course nothing can be done about that anyway, so there is no sense thinking about it. According to Madame Tardif, raising the children God gives you will be no harder than salting meat, darning socks, or weeding the garden. They are just another of the countless chores of colony life.

  She preaches to Laure throughout the day as they tend to the fire, the cooking, the needlework, and the care of the children. The wisdom and preoccupations that govern Madame Tardif’s daily existence are of a practical nature: What rate are the commanding officers paying this winter to have their uniforms and socks mended? How can firewood be made to last longer by turning in early at night and keeping the door to the cabin closed, the curtains drawn, and the children indoors throughout the day? How much broth can be had from boiling salted meats and fish bones to make a stew nearly as watery as the Salpêtrière broth? Laure appreciates the practical lessons she gets from Madame Tardif on being an efficient and careful colony wife. She can see that a decade or two of such toil could lead to a slightly less encumbered life, but there is certainly no room in Madame Tardif’s mind for dresses made of exquisite materials, for dreams of princes and royal courts, for letter-writing, for dangerous amorous relations with the Savages of this country.

  Laure wishes she could trade for Madame Tardif’s simple severity the vain curves of her creamy body, her gleaming eyes, the foolish thoughts in her head, and most of all, the sinful evidence of all her faults that now fills the space beneath her ribs.

  “I don’t know why you are spending your time making all those detailed designs,” Madame Tardif says. “A baby is a dirty creature who doesn’t have eyes for things such as embroidered flowers. You would do well enough to make a blanket using that grey wool I gave you.”

  Laure cannot imagine wrapping a new baby in such coarse material. She has taken apart one of the dresses she sewed last winter and is using the cotton to create a soft blanket for the baby.

  “I don’t know when you will finally understand that we are not in Paris, that Canada is nowhere near to the King’s court, and that practicality and economy are much more useful here than flower designing and expensive fabrics.”

  Laure continues with her embroidering.

  “You don’t want to tell your child from the moment they are born that life is easy. What is the point of getting them accustomed to fineries at such a young age when that blanket will be the only luxury they will ever know?”

  Better to have known something fine at least, to have tasted even for one moment that life is more than ugly coarse material and back-breaking hard work, Laure thinks, but she remains quiet. She is, after all, a guest in Madame Tardif’s home, and the winter outside is vicious and cold.

  “I do not possess the housekeeping skills that you do. Making fine clothing is all I know how to do.”

  When Laure has finished with the blanket for the day, she drapes it over the wooden box Madame Tardif gave her to use as a cradle. Laure cannot help but think that the box looks more like a coffin and that the blanket is like placing flowers on her baby’s grave.

  Madame Rouillard has come to the Tardif cabin to see Laure. It is February, and she is visiting Pointe-aux-Trembles as there are three pregnant women in the settlement. The Governor and Intendant are eager to hear her reports of all the pregnancies and births in the region of Ville-Marie so they can send the good news of the colony’s fertility back to France.

  Madame Rouillard is covered in furs and looks just like a coureur de bois. She removes her hat and overcoat and her cheeks are bright from the cold. She has travelled from Ville-Marie with an Algonquin convert named Louis and a young Canadien.

  “You aren’t paid very much to come with me, but I appreciate the company in those woods. Go back to the cabin we just came from and I’m sure they’ll empty their brandy stores for you. Leave me to my women’s business here and I’ll get you when I’ve finished.”

  The young men close the door behind them, eager to escape the presence of yet another pregnant woman.

  “You’re not expecting again, are you?” the midwife asks Madame Tardif.

  “No, it’s not for me.”

  “That’s a relief. I tell the women that nothing is more dangerous to mother and child than pregnancies spaced too closely together.”

  Madame Rouillard turns to look at Laure. She narrows her eyes as if trying to recollect where she has seen the face. “You’re not her sister?”

  Laure responds that she isn’t. She tells the midwife that Madame Tardif has simply been kind enough to take her in while her husband is off in search of furs. Madame Tardif is pleased by Laure’s words of praise, as they both know that news of her generosity will now travel to Ville-Marie.

  “Now that I hear you speak, I remember you. You’re one of those women who arrived from the Paris hospital. I was in the canoe with you from Québec, I think.”

  Laure nods. Madame Rouillard seems about to say more but instead reaches for the bag she’s brought with her. Laure starts to tremble as Madame Rouillard walks toward her. She will be discovered in front of Madame Tardif when the midwife easily discerns that Laure is actually six, rather than four, months into her pregnancy. Laure can feel the midwife’s eyes scrutinizing her face and body as if she knows her secret even before she touches her.

  Madame Rouillard is silent as she kneels next to Laure and brings the candle near. She asks Laure to come and lie down on a pelt she has unrolled onto the floor. Laure stiffens as the midwife’s hands slide over her belly. The older woman’s eyes remain focused on a point in the distance as she feels for the limbs of the child through Laure’s flesh. Laure fears that this woman will know so much about her just by touching her abdomen for a few moments. Finally Madame Rouillard puts an ear to Laure’s stomach and listens for the baby’s heart.

  “Your baby is strong, Madame—?”

  Laure tells her Mathurin’s surname.

  Madame Rouillard then asks Madame Tardif to fetch the boys at the neighbours’.

  The midwife sits quietly for a few moments. They are enveloped in the silence, the deep slumber, of winter. Only Laure is wide awake, alert and ready to hear what Madame Rouillard has to say.

  “You would be surprised to learn how many women have committed sins worse than your own.”

  Laure’s eyes widen. Madame Rouillard does remember her leaving the inn to be with Deskaheh.

  The midwife grows silent again.<
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  Laure wishes she could tell her that she feels true regret for her actions. Of course her life would be much simpler if she were pregnant with Mathurin’s child, or if there were no baby at all. But what could Laure hope for with such a life? She would grow swarthy and worn by work like Madame Tardif just the same. Only there would be no secret memories of Deskaheh, no Savage child within her. Laure would have tepid feelings, maybe even revulsion, toward her husband, her children, and her cabin in the woods of this rude country. How then can she feel any remorse for what she has done?

  “The problem is that you were not sent across the sea at the King’s expense to befriend Savage men.”

  “But the French men, including my own husband, are free to have relations with any woman they want.”

  “Yes, and that has only produced more Savage children and not a single French one. Only the women sent from France can give the King the French colony he wants to see in Canada. Besides, thinking about what the men do here isn’t going to help you any.”

  Madame Rouillard appears pensive. “They cannot know what you have done. You need the respect of women like Madame Tardif if you are to survive in Ville-Marie. You are lucky because everyone is trying to believe good things about the women in Canada. As you know, it is a different story in Old France. Even though you spend your days imprisoned and watched over every minute in the General Hospital, lies will circulate about the lascivious things you are doing. Here women are worth much more.”

  Laure hears Madame Tardif outside the cabin. Her eyes grow wide.

  “I will visit again soon with a plan for the baby. In the meantime, take care of yourself. I am not looking to please people like Madame Tardif and your husband. I do this work to make sure that mothers and their babies survive. God knows I already face enough challenges from nature.”