by Shirl Henke
She did compose a somewhat shorter letter to Micajah, explaining what had transpired on the Mississippi and in New Orleans. Governor Claiborne was to be the conduit for her mail to Samuel, but she felt reasonably secure in sending the letter upriver by regular post. However, just before mailing it, she decided on impulse to visit the governor’s office. There was no sense in taking chances. In the best of times the postal service was uncertain and with the war fever sweeping across the West, things were becoming exceedingly unsettled.
When her driver pulled onto the Place d’ Armes, the scene was one of bustling chaos, what she had come to associate with the lively international port city. If Samuel were here to share it with her, she would have enjoyed New Orleans. Several bold rather unsavory looking types wearing high boots, gold earrings and thin shirts bloused open in the warm morning sunshine, lounged against the pillars of the Pontalba, watching her with hooded eyes. Baratarians. Probably men in the employ of the mysterious Lafitte brothers.
As Olivia stepped down from the carriage beneath their scrutiny, she marveled at the bizarre contradictions of this city. Its Creole leaders were so civilized and precise in their social conventions, yet willing to tolerate pirates and smugglers boldly walking the streets of this town in open defiance of American authority.
The young soldier standing outside the governor’s palace bowed courteously and held the door open for her and Tonette. Olivia made her way to the governor’s outer office with the little maid following behind her. It appeared that the position of secretary to Claiborne had been filled. A slender young man sat writing busily away in a ledger. When he heard her enter, he looked up distractedly, then smiled, revealing straight white teeth. A heavy shock of silver-gilt hair fell artlessly across his forehead as he stood up to greet her. Olivia was struck by the perfection of his features. He was as handsome as a stage performer, yet something about him made Olivia feel uneasy.
“Good morning, mademoiselle. I am Governor Claiborne’s secretary, Edmond Darcy.”
Olivia returned his warn smile, feeling more at ease as she introduced herself.
“Ah, yes, the Durand heiress. Every cafe has been buzzing with the tale of your harrowing journey downriver. How may I be of assistance to you?”
“I don’t know if the governor has spoken to you regarding handling my mail?”
“As a matter of fact, he has, Mademoiselle St. Etienne,” he replied, smiling, one slender pale hand extended to take the missive from her.
Olivia gave it to him. “I’m ever so grateful, Mr. Darcy.”
“Would you care to see the governor? I believe he is between appointments with legislators about now.”
“No, that’s all right. I know he’s a busy man. Please give him my best wishes and tell him I am going to open the plantation house on Bayou Bienvenue next week. If all is as efficiently handled there as at my uncle’s city house, I shall be entertaining within the month.”
“I am certain the governor will eagerly await your invitation,” he said politely.
They bid each other good day and Olivia departed with her maid. Claiborne’s secretary stood watching the flame-haired woman as she walked through the door and vanished down the long hallway. Then he looked down at the thick letter addressed to Micajah Johnstone in care of Father Louie at Fort St. Francoise, Upper Louisiana Territory.
Smiling grimly, he slid the letter inside his jacket pocket. There would be time later on to read it at his leisure, then decide whether or not to post it upriver. However, all of Mademoiselle St. Etienne’s correspondence to Colonel Shelby was to be destroyed.
* * * *
Washington had changed in the year he was absent. Not the physical appearance, which still remained the raw unfinished dream of architect Pierre-Charles L’Enfant. The buildings were a peculiar accretion of splendid stone and higgledy-piggledy frame threatened by the unrelenting encroachments of the Virginia tidewater swamp. Rather, the difference in the city was a tension in the air that crackled across the seats of power, a restless malaise, fearful yet conversely eager. Washington wanted a war.
Secretary of State James Monroe did not. However, the situation between the Madison administration and the British government had deteriorated rapidly over the past months, and the flames of war had been fanned by the Western expansionists who saw opportunities to seize British lands in Canada as well as Spain’s colonies in Florida.
“If only Henry Clay and the rest of those posturing fools would stop prating about American honor,” Monroe said, looking down at the documents that Colonel Shelby had brought back from his mission in Boston.
“The Western congressmen are screaming about British confiscation of American ships, ignoring the fact that Napoleon has taken nearly as many,” Samuel replied with disgust, waiting for the methodical man’s assessment of the Henry papers.
James Monroe was superficially the opposite of his president in every way. A careful but plodding thinker who possessed none of the brilliant scholarly insights of Jemmy Madison, Monroe was physically tall and rawboned, a robust man of action beside the small older Madison whose frail health had been steadily worsening as the strain of the presidency took its toll. Yet appearances—like intellectual estimations—could deceive. Lifelong friends, the two men worked in complete accord, complimenting each other’s strengths and weaknesses. Monroe was nobody’s fool.
“As a spy, our Anglo-Irishman has much to learn,” the secretary of state said dryly.
“He’s an amateur, no doubt of it, but I don’t think his intermediary, the count, is.”
Monroe’s shrewd brown eyes fixed Shelby with keen interest. “What do you think—is he a French agent?”
“I made some discreet inquiries through old friends at the French embassy. They’ve never heard of a Count de Crillon, either before or after the revolution.”
“Napoleon’s secret police, then,” Monroe replied, nodding. “Yes, it would make sense. Things aren’t exactly going swimmingly for the little emperor these days—he needs a two-front war foisted on the British.”
“And we’re making it damnably convenient for him,” Shelby said sourly, knowing his father-in-law was one of the most vociferous advocates of war in the Senate.
“I’m afraid it’s too late to shift course now. The War Hawks in Congress have whipped the whole countryside into a frenzy. The only bastion of peace is in New England...and we see here how reliable they are.”
“We’ve known since Jefferson’s embargo how New England shipping interests felt about their commercial ties to England. No surprise in that, but the signed letters of instruction from the Canadian governor-general to Henry are a new element in the equation,” Shelby said thoughtfully.
“The Henry papers will not only add fuel to the fires of the War Hawks, they can also strengthen the administrator’s position,” Monroe replied, always carefully balancing both sides of an issue as was his wont.
“You mean because the New England British sympathizers mentioned in Henry’s reports are all members of the Federalist party?”
Monroe smiled grimly, his eyes taking on a hard glint as he replied, “Precisely so, Colonel. They’ve even been making noises about possible secession if war comes. Our administration may not be able to prevent the war, but we can damn well prevent the dismemberment of the federal union. You have once again done your country an inestimable service.”
“How soon until the president asks for a formal declaration of war?”
“Difficult to say. The president still hopes Prime Minister Perceval will agree to rescind the Orders in Council and end the Royal Navy’s attacks on American ships, but it’s rumored that Foreign Secretary Wellesberg will resign, and he is the strongest advocate of negotiating with us. If he does resign…” Monroe shrugged. “I expect we’ll have our hand forced by spring...”
Samuel waited, knowing Monroe would give him his next assignment in due course. For the present, he was simply instructed to remain available in the capital in case of any
emergencies. Given the precarious tenor of the times, Shelby knew there would be a surfeit of emergencies.
After the secretary had left the small hotel where the colonel had taken rooms, Samuel sat back and poured himself a brandy. It was approaching midnight. He had ridden hard from Boston, taking the slower overland route, fearing to take ship with such valuable papers when British men-of-war occasionally managed to stop American ships within sight of the United States coastline.
Exhausted and disheartened by the senseless wrangling of politicians and their governments, he polished off the brandy, relishing the warm soothing burn of it deep in his belly. He longed with all his being to return to Olivia in New Orleans but knew that could not be. They had already been separated for two months. Upon reaching the capital yesterday he had eagerly inquired about a letter from her but was disappointed.
Surely she must know by now whether or not she carried his child. Why had she not written? Of course, the letter could have been lost in transit, but dispatches from Governor Claiborne’s office had arrived on schedule. Nothing from Olivia had been included.
Rubbing his eyes, he picked up a pen and began to compose another letter to her, his third since leaving New Orleans. Why the hell don’t you respond, Livy? A deep-seated dread tightened his chest as the pen scratched along the page.
Chapter Twenty Five
“You are certain?” Olivia sat in Dr. Albert Freul’s office, her face ashen as she received the news which only two months earlier she would have greeted with unconditional rejoicing. “I mean, I haven’t felt sick in the mornings or had any symptoms.
The kindly old Alsatian Frenchman smiled gently. “Not every woman has the morning sickness, my dear. You are a very strong and healthy young woman. You should experience no difficulties carrying the child.”
“Except for the lack of a husband,” Olivia said baldly, too bereft by Samuel’s apparent desertion to care about propriety.
The big round-faced man’s normally florid complexion darkened a bit as he patted her hand sympathetically. Mademoiselle St. Etienne had been a generous patron of his hospital for the indigent, and volunteered long hours caring for sick orphans the nuns brought to him for help. The doctor admired her spirit and her kindness. If only there was some way to help. “The child’s father—he is not in New Orleans?” he asked gently.
“No. And even if he were, he could not marry me.” She raised her eyes to meet his. Finding no condemnation, only sympathy, she added, “He already has a wife.”
The elderly physician scratched the thick gray whiskers on his chin. “Ah, I see. And you have no family to turn to, my dear?”
“My parents preceded Uncle Charles in death. All our other relatives perished during the Terror back in France when I was a child. My only living family is an old woodsman up in the Missouri River country. I know he’d welcome me and I would love to go to him, but with the reports of new earthquakes, the river has been very dangerous. I couldn’t find anyone to take me, no matter how much money I offered them.”
She looked haunted and vulnerable. He knew what people would say when word got out that she was unwed and pregnant. Even the vaunted Durand wealth would not save her from being totally ostracized. “Perhaps...” he began slowly, “I could help...that is, if you do not wish to have the child...”
When his words registered, Olivia felt her hands go protectively to her belly. “No! That is—I do appreciate your concern but...”
The doctor smiled, relieved. “Then you want this man’s baby?”
Dr. Freul’s kindness was suddenly too much. All her defenses of pride and stoicism crumbled and Olivia suddenly found herself sobbing. “Yes, yes, I want the baby very much. It’s all I have left of him.” She scrubbed at her eyes with a lace handkerchief. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. I never cry.”
The hint of a smile touched his eyes as he said, “Heightened emotion is a symptom of pregnancy. Perhaps you are not as asymptomatic as we first believed. Now”—he rose, gently touching her shoulder in a fatherly fashion—“I am going to have Louise brew us some fine fresh coffee and then we will decide what is to be done for you and this little one.”
A short while later Olivia found herself seated in the Freuls’ cozy parlor sipping the fragrant French coffee everyone in New Orleans loved so well. The doctor and his spinster sister, Louise, were genuinely solicitous as they made her feel at home in the cheery little apartment above his business office.
“Now, you must tell me about this young man you’ve fallen in love with,” Louise said after insisting Olivia eat a thick wedge of rich golden pound cake generously slathered with butter. Mademoiselle Freul was a formidable lady, tall and buxom with heavy iron gray hair fastened securely in a no-nonsense chignon at the crown of her head, but her dark eyes were merry and kind and she laughed frequently. Olivia had worked with her over the past two months at the foundlings hospital and had often thought Louise should have married and had a dozen children of her own to love.
With such sympathetic listeners, Olivia found she was eager to unburden herself. She had endured a long and lonely silence, surrounded by strangers who only cared for her because she was the Durand heiress, or shy servants who spoke in monosyllables. Her meeting with Colonel Samuel Shelby and the events of the past year came rushing quickly to her lips. She told them everything.
When she described Samuel’s departure, her voice broke. “I...I fear something may have happened to him. His work is dangerous. He may have been killed.”
“We can’t be certain of that—after all, it’s only been two months and the mails are so uncertain. You yourself said he travels around a good deal. His letters to you and yours to him may be lost.”
Olivia shook her head. “Surely not all of them. I’ve written him so many times, and we agreed to post them through Governor Claiborne’s office. If he were alive, he would have written me. I’ve even tried to contact his sister in St. Louis, but she hasn’t answered. The governor assures me his dispatches arrive from Washington regularly, but the pouches contain nothing from Samuel.”
Dr. Freul paced, stroking his short curly beard as he cogitated. “We will not give him up yet. Maybe the president sent him abroad?”
Willing to grasp at any straw, Olivia nodded. “It is possible.”
“Well, that will still not solve our immediate problem,” Louise interjected practically. “The colonel has to secure a divorce. Even if he were here, he could not marry you.”
The doctor looked at his sister and said, “There are many fine young men in the city from good families. Perhaps—”
“No! That is, even if a man would be willing to accept me and my child, I could never wed anyone but Samuel. Not if there is the least chance he’s still alive...” She shook her head in despair. “Not even if I knew he was dead.”
“Then we shall just have to invent you a husband,” Louise said cheerfully.
Both Olivia and Dr. Freul looked at her, stunned.
“What devious scheme are you cooking up now, Lou-Lou?”
Louise raised her heavy dark eyebrows and regarded her brother fondly. He had not called her Lou-Lou since they were children. “I think the solution to our problem is straightforward enough. Olivia needs a temporary husband—one who will not burden her with marital duties, but who will offer the protection of his name for the coming child. If her colonel is alive and secures his divorce, she will be suitably widowed and can wed him.
“Yes, the very thing!” she continued, delighted with her own ingenuity. “A husband with the decency to die young! I think a Spanish officer would suit nicely. Hmm, yes, a don from a fine rich old family, stationed in Spanish Florida. We shall visit Pensacola. I have not seen Señora Valdez in several years, and I believe I shall require the companionship of an adventuresome young lady on the trip. Tell me, Olivia, are you up to a brief sojourn in Florida?”
Catching the drift of what Louise Freul was up to, Olivia’s spirits suddenly felt lighter. She smiled at the
merry twinkle in the older woman’s eyes and replied, “I’ve already traveled all the way down the Mississippi during an earthquake. I don’t believe the short sea voyage to Florida will be difficult.”
“Don Rafael Obregón!’’ Louise crowed triumphantly. “Yes, I like the name. What do you think, my dear?”
“I shall wed this mysterious Don Rafael in Pensacola, then be tragically widowed and withdraw to my estate at Bayou Bienvenue to mourn.”
As the two women plotted, Dr. Freul shook his head in perplexed admiration. The male, in his estimation, never possessed the tenacious survival instincts and toughness of the female of the species.
* * * *
Governor William Claiborne had just spent one hellacious morning placating a roomful of Creole planters who were frantic about the impending war with the British. Where was the American army to protect them against this ancient enemy whose ships sailed unchallenged along the Gulf as if they owned it? After reassuring them that all was secure, a fact he very much doubted, the governor finally succeeded in assuaging their vapors and sent them on their way.
With the bill for statehood before the Congress, it would not be long until those very same volatile Creoles would sit in a Louisiana legislature, plaguing his life even more. He rubbed his head wearily as his secretary knocked discreetly, then entered.
“What is it now, Darcy? More of those infernal Frenchmen—or another Spanish ship’s captain complaining about the Baratarian freebooters robbing them blind?”
The secretary smiled, producing a thick sheaf of papers. “Nothing quite so taxing, your excellency. Just a few official papers requiring your signature—the public notices you requested regarding that pirate, Jean Lafitte, the commutation of sentence for Enrique Salazar, a summons for Paul Schmitt and a series of requisitions for supplies and payments to the quartermaster.”