Louisiana History Collection - Part 1

by Jennifer Blake

  “This woman,” René said, “is Cyrene Nolté. There is reason to believe that she is the leader of this organization of illicit trade. You have before you, gentlemen, account books with entries made out in her hand.”

  Pierre shuffled forward, his chains swinging. “This charge is ridiculous!”

  René ignored him. “She was seen in active negotiation with Captain Dodsworth, the English commander of the vessel Half Moon, as we have heard from the witness Touchet. Moreover, the subterfuge that permitted the theft of the confiscated wares from the king’s warehouse bears the marks of a feminine hand most likely to have been hers, and she was heard giving orders by the lieutenant who very nearly captured her that night. It is my contention that she is precisely what she has been called, a lady smuggler, and as such she should be punished to the fullest extent of the law, lest men conceive the idea that it is an easy way to a fortune.”

  What was René doing? Of all the men present, he had the best means of knowing exactly what her place was with the Bretons, exactly how successful she had been in her trading venture with the English captain. Had his pride been so damaged by the way she had left him that he required to see her dragged as low as possible for revenge? Or was he playing a deeper game?

  “Cyrene has been with us only three years,” Pierre said. “Our trading goes back much further.”

  René made a contemptuous gesture. “It may be true that you traded in a simple way. But deny if you can that you have made your greatest profit since she began to lead your expeditions.”

  “She went with us, yes, but she did not lead,” Pierre said doggedly.

  He was trying to protect her, Cyrene knew; the question of who led them had no importance to Pierre.

  “Your profits have been greater these last few years, have they not? Answer, please, Jean Breton.”

  Jean looked miserable. At last he muttered, “Yes.”

  “Because this woman was with you?”

  “It may have been a part of it, but—”

  “Then I contend that she was the leader. That she has, in fact, been heard to call herself a lady smuggler.”

  “In jest only,” Pierre insisted. “The responsibility was not hers!”

  They were afraid for her, Pierre and Jean, afraid of how many more lashes of the whip she might receive, afraid she might be hanged. It was, she suspected as René continued to press the two men, exactly how he wanted them to feel. She had been brought before the court for that purpose and no other. She was sure of it when he put his next question.

  “If she is not responsible for your recent prosperity, then how do you explain it? There is only one other way possible. Who is your backer?”

  “There is no one,” Pierre said.

  “I think there is. I believe there is someone who has noticed your initiative, your modest gains, and sought to benefit. Tell us who that person is. Tell us who provided you with the funds for a larger operation, thereby assuring larger returns?”

  They were pawns, the four of them — Pierre, Jean, Gaston, and herself. René obviously suspected that someone with high political connections, most likely Madame la Marquise or else the intendant commissary, was providing funds to the Bretons. He hoped to use their affection for Cyrene, if not fear for their own lives, to force the name of that person from them, thereby helping to prove or disprove the charges against the governor and his wife. In effect, it was not the Bretons and Cyrene who were on trial there at all, but the Marquis and Marquise de Vaudreuil.

  Did the governor realize it? It was difficult to tell. Vaudreuil was a veteran of many political skirmishes. The blandly handsome façade of his face gave away nothing. Still, he knew who René was, must surely have seen his credentials as a special agent of the king. He was not a stupid man by any means, for all his smiling good grace.

  But did it matter, any of it? There was no one behind the Bretons, Cyrene would wager her very life on it. If they could not provide René with the information he sought, what would there be left to do but to convict them of the charges against them and carry out the sentences that must and would be passed?

  Pierre saw the implication of the questions directed at him also, for his voice was dull with despair as he repeated, “There was no one.”

  “I suggest that you lie,” René said softly. “Think carefully before you suffer, and allow those you care for to suffer, for the sake of some high-born man who cares only for lining his pockets at the expense of your sweat and blood.”

  “There is no one, I swear this to you on the grave of my mother.” Pierre’s voice was so low that it could barely be heard.

  “Why won’t you believe us?” Jean cried.

  Cyrene had heard enough.

  She lifted her head, her eyes flashing. “He won’t believe it because it isn’t what he wants to hear. He speaks of others using our sweat and blood but is willing to do the same to get what he wants, what he needs for his greater glory!”

  “Be silent!” René snapped, his gaze hard as he willed her to obedience.

  “Why should I, when it’s our lives at stake?” she shouted at him. “Who do you think you are to use us like this? Would you have us perjure ourselves to suit your ends? Do you know that here the punishment for perjury is death?”

  “Silence,” the intendant commissary said, but not loudly.

  “We are damned if we say the truth and damned if we lie. It seems that what is required is a scapegoat. Very well! I will give you one.”

  “Cyrene, no,” Pierre said, his eyes coming alive with anguish as he turned to her. He swung back to the table. “You must listen to me, and me only. I am not just a smuggler. I am also—”

  She could not let him speak. She raised her voice, infusing it with a cutting edge of sarcasm, her gaze blazing as she sought to hold their attention. “Hear me well! I am the leader of this desperate crew of smugglers! I, and no one else! There is no man behind us, high-born or not, and no other woman!”

  There was the scrape of a chair and Intendant Commissary Rouvilliere got to his feet to lean across the table. “Woman? Who spoke of another woman? What do you know of such? You will tell us at once or be put to the test!”

  Torture was not often used in the colony, at least officially, but the threat of it was always present in difficult cases. Cyrene heard Jean’s groan of helplessness, could feel the color leave her face, but she refused to be cowed.

  “There is no other woman, did you not hear me? I spoke of one because it is plain that—”

  “Cyrene!”

  It was the plea under the command in René’s voice that made her pause. It was in his face also, along with rage and exasperation and something more she did not understand.

  “It is plain,” Rouvilliere said, “that the scandalous conduct of Madame Vaudreuil makes her immediately suspect.”

  In the sudden quiet, the doors into the room swept open. There came the rustle of silk underskirts and the quick sharp tap of footsteps. Cyrene turned to see Madame Vaudreuil advancing into the chamber. The woman’s head was held so high that the ribbons of her coif flew in the breeze of her passage, and her lips were a tight line in her pale face. She did not stop until she stood before the council table. It was, perhaps, an accident that she stood next to Cyrene, but it was one she did nothing to rectify.

  “Madame,” the governor said to his wife, “why come you here? It is not your place. You may leave us.”

  “I believe that my good name is being impugned in this council. I would defend it.”

  “That isn’t necessary.”

  The marquise’s eyes narrowed. “I will speak.”

  No one attempted to deny her further. Madame Vaudreuil watched the intendant commissary slowly ease back down into his seat, turned her head to look briefly, almost with approval, at Cyrene, then swung around to René.

  “What this young woman says is true. I have never given money to her or her relatives for the purpose of trading with the enemies of France. I am a loyal subject of my
king. The laws promulgated by his ministers in their wisdom concerning this colony may not be intelligent or to my liking, but it would be a matter of stupidity in me, the wife of the governor, to flout them. I am not a stupid woman.”

  Madame Vaudreuil stared around her as if waiting for a comment so that she might squash it. When none was forthcoming, she went on. “I have been accused of many things. I know this, but what do I care? Anyone who thinks that people of consequence accept the governing of distant colonies, living in squalor and ruling over thieves, exiles, and misfits merely for the glory is an imbecile. An office is like an estate. There are great expenses that must be met if it is to be properly managed. But like an estate, it should give a return to those who invest their time and energies in it. If this Louisiane does not return a reasonable revenue to my husband and myself, then we might as well have remained in Paris in comfort. This concept should be easily understood by anyone of sense.”

  “Madame,” René began.

  “I am not finished! My husband is occupied at all times with the governing of this colony. It is not a sinecure, the office of governor, I assure you. It requires many long hours, much effort and patience, and the endless writing of reports for the lackwits in Paris who expect us to produce miracles. We are to enrich the coffers of the crown, keep the inhabitants of the colony safe and well and reasonably content, maintain peace and cooperation with the savages around us, prevent the incursions of the English to the east and the Spanish to the west, and all this with the outlay of a minimum from the king and with the constant meddling of men who have never set foot out of France and know nothing of conditions here. And who would not care if they did know! Since my husband concerns himself deeply with these affairs, it is left to me to see that we do not disperse our own fortune here with no return. This is my sole concern. My only connection with illicit trade was to invest in a venture or two before the late unpleasantness with England. Since then I have naturally abided by the conventions of war regarding such affairs. This is all I have to say on the matter.”

  René gave the marquise a straight look. “With all due respect, madame, what you have said cannot be so.”

  Madame Vaudreuil drew herself up, her eyes icy with rage. “Are you accusing me of being untruthful?”

  “If I am wrong, I ask a thousand pardons, but I had the felicity of overhearing your agent Touchet engaging in criminal trade in your name with Captain Dodsworth aboard the Half Moon.”

  “Never in my name!”

  “I fear so, madame. Also for hashish and other such substances.”

  Madame Vaudreuil turned slowly, her wide skirts swinging on their panniers in a majestic sweep as her gaze sought and found Touchet. “You worm,” she said, her voice virulent with scorn. “How dare you act without my orders? How dare you?”

  “But, madame,” Touchet said, his thin face dissolving in panic, “I thought… that is, you said… I understood any profit would be welcome.”

  “Not that which harms my husband, dolt. Not that gained in defiance of his most strict order. But where is this profit? I have seen naught of it! If you carried out this trade, it was on your own head, for your own gain. It was, in fact, a most flagrant case of smuggling!”

  “But, madame, please—”

  “Smuggling,” the marquise repeated to the room at large as she turned away in a gesture of disdain, “is a crime for which I suggest this man be bound over for trial.”

  Madame Vaudreuil was repudiating her henchman. Had Touchet, in truth, overstepped the authority given him as she claimed? Or was he being sacrificed, another scapegoat? Cyrene could not tell, though it seemed that the governor’s wife, having admitted so much concerning her pursuit of money, had little reason to cavil at this one last detail. Or perhaps that’s what they were supposed to think? It might be that the truth would be brought out when Touchet came to trial, if he ever did. Again, it might be that they would never know.

  Touchet did not seem hopeful of the outcome. He began to curse and scream as the intendant commissary voiced the reluctant order that sent the guards marching toward him. The strident, panicked sound of his voice echoed in the chamber as he was lifted and dragged away.

  When the door had closed upon Touchet and it was quiet once more, the governor’s wife gave a curt nod, then swept around and positioned herself to one side of the room. That she did not intend to leave, and would deeply resent any suggestion that she do so, was plain. A glance passed between husband and wife, and the governor inclined his head in what might have been the smallest of bows to his lady.

  “We must thank Madame Vaudreuil for her contribution to these proceedings,” René said, his tone courteous though a little dry, “and for her condescension in giving them to us. I assume this issue is settled for the moment and we may now continue?”

  The intendant commissary, at whom the last was directed, shifted uncomfortably in his seat, then nodded with only the briefest glance in René’s direction.

  “Thank you.” René moved forward to stand between the council table and the prisoners. “If I may have the indulgence of the gentlemen of the council, it is perhaps time that I became something of a witness as well as prosecutor in this most irregular affair. You will permit?”

  “As you wish,” the governor replied, and there was no demur from the other members. It was evident from the glances they exchanged that they were all aware of the special status René was able to claim and had no wish to have it recorded that they had obstructed him in the pursuit of his duty.

  Cyrene, watching that byplay, felt a frisson of terror move through her. She had sensed before that René could be dangerous but never so strongly as at this moment. He was elegantly attired today in gray velvet with silver braiding. He also wore a wig, something that Cyrene had seen him without so often of late that in it he seemed a stranger. She thought fleetingly of the intimacies, the adventures, and the laughter she had shared with this man, and it was like a dream without substance, not quite real.

  René clasped his hands behind his back and swept them all with an assessing glance. “First of all, as you may all be aware, I was sent here to look into allegations of misconduct concerning the monies and management of this colony, with particular attention to the possibility of official participation in the trade with the English prohibited by the edict of the crown. When I arrived in New Orleans, the first step in my mission appeared to be to discover as much as possible about the smuggling that was so rife — how it was carried out, by whom, when, and where — before attempting to make a judgment of higher involvement. For this reason, I decided to set a watch for a time on the activities of some small trader suspected of smuggling. I singled out the prisoners as typical and began to monitor the flatboat where they lived and their comings and goings there. For the most part, I paid others to do the surveillance, though on occasion, over a period of nearly three months, I watched them myself in order to become thoroughly familiar with the situation.”

  It was difficult to think of René at such a nefarious undertaking, which only went to show how credulous and lacking in judgment she was, Cyrene thought. Still, his explanation of how he had come to choose to watch the Bretons was too glib. Something about it nagged at her, though she could not quite grasp what it might be.

  “One night while at this duty, I was attacked from behind, half stunned, then stabbed in the back. When I regained consciousness, I was in the river. I was rescued most fortuitously by Cyrene Nolté not for any humane reasons, since she thought I was quite dead, but for the sake of the braiding on the coat I wore.”

  A faint smile indented the corner of his mouth as he looked at Cyrene. She despised him for it and for so cleverly removing from himself any obligation to her for saving his life. He must not be thought ungrateful, heavens, no! But if he was willing to expose so much of the truth, what more would he tell? Would he, for instance, tell how he had come to join the Bretons?

  “My position, as an injured man living on the flatboat, could not
be bettered. My injuries were not major, but I exaggerated their effect in order to remain where I was. At the same time, I set myself to gain the confidence of the Bretons and Mademoiselle Nolté and succeeded to the point of being invited to join them in a trading venture.”

  Once more his gaze sought hers, or so it seemed. Cyrene looked away, the tide of relief that rose inside her carrying a stain of color to her cheeks. It was a moment before she could attend again to what he was saying.

  “The evidence against the Bretons was undeniable. They made little effort to hide their illegal trade. Added to this was certain other information that had been discovered in France concerning Pierre Breton that was damning, indeed. In fact, Breton is not his name at all. He, with his brother and his brother’s son, are members of a most respectable, one might even say illustrious, family well known for their contribution to the establishment of France in the New World.”

  Beside Cyrene, Pierre spoke out, his voice rough. “If it please you, m’sieur, there is no need to go further. I freely confess to the crime of smuggling. I am ready to say whatever you will and accept the fullest penalty if you will allow me to speak to you in private.”

  “You would perjure yourself? It isn’t required,” René said, and turned away to go on inexorably. “Pierre Breton, as we know him, was from New France, where his family had been from the earliest days. He had a young wife with a rich father in the fur trade and an excellent knowledge of the wilderness. He also had a trapping concession that he shared with a friend, a man named Louis Nolté. One winter the two men went out to trap. They had a rich harvest of furs, beyond their dreams. There was a blizzard lasting four days, a whirlwind of snow and ice. Pierre came out of the wilderness alone, with the furs. He had been separated from Louis in the storm, he said. He had searched for him when it was over, but he was not to be found. For months there was no news of the fate of his friend. Then in the summer Nolté returned, as from the dead, and accused Pierre of theft and attempted murder.”

  A murmur of comment went along the council table. The governor directed a fixed stare at Pierre, one that seemed to carry the light of recognition. It was, to Cyrene’s knowledge, the first time the two men had come face-to-face in Louisiane. Pierre had always avoided the town and the kind of crowds that gathered around Vaudreuil. That the governor might remember him from New France was not surprising since he had remembered her grandfather and her mother.