The King's Daughter by Suzanne Martel Read Free Book Online

her head. The little town answered the description she had read in
Real and Natural History
, written in 1663 by Pierre Boucher. Noticing Jeanne’s interest in her future homeland, Marguerite Bourgeoys had given her this book before she left Troyes. Better educated and brighter than her companions, Jeanne Chatel had showered her protectress with countless questions. This modest work written by the governor of Trois-Rivières had only partly satisfied her curiosity. She knew entire passages of it by heart.
    â€œQuebec is situated on the shore of the mighty St. Lawrence River, which at that spot is barely a league wide and flows between two heights. This fortress, the churches and monasteries and finest houses are built on top; other houses and stores are built at the foot of the hill, on the shore of the great river, to service the ships that stop there...”
    Sister Bourgeoys took her girls to Widow Myrand’s little house. The widow ran an inn in the Lower Town, and they would be staying there for the few days it took to prepare for the departure to Ville-Marie. They had to reserve the flat-bottomed boats and oarsmen who would row them up the current on the exhausting seven- or eight-day voyage.
    Widow Myrand, surly and not at all pleasant, showed her guests to rooms as small and overcrowded as those on the ship they had just left. No one complained. A spirit of self-denial was essential baggage for those who came to colonize the new world.
    Robust young men put the eleven girls’ trunks in the common room. They took their leave after sidelong glances and awkward salutations, pressing to their hearts the wool caps they wore even in summer. Jeanne examined them immodestly and mentally rejected them, one after the other. Not one of them met her excessive demands. Unknowingly, the sentimental girl was searching for Thierry de Villebrand in all the suitors’ faces. That was the best way to be disappointed, she knew, but she couldn’t help it.
    Despite the late hour, Sister Bourgeoys left her charges after cautioning them to be careful. They were not to go out. The Indians might be on the prowl. She didn’t say so, but the settlers and soldiers presented a much more tangible danger to these young turtle doves who were such a rare commodity in New France.
    The nun climbed the steep slope of Côte de la Montagne to pay her respects to the bishop’s delegate. Monseigneur de Laval, her old adversary with whom she had had difficult conflicts in the past, was currently in France. The authoritarian prelate would have been very happy to see this refractory nun subject to the rules of a cloister, like that of the Ursulines. Sister Bourgeoys refused, maintaining that her missionary work had to be done outside the cloister, and that by remaining secular and free to come and go as she pleased, she was better able to help the colony.
    The traveller would also visit the Ursulines where she would spend the night. Unfortunately, her good friend, Mother Marie de l’Incarnation, who had always been happy to welcome her, had died the previous April.
    Marguerite Bourgeoys’s latest absence had lasted two years. Many things had changed during that time. Intendant Talon and Monsieur de Courcelle, the governor, had been recalled to France. Monsieur de Frontenac, who was said to be energetic and courageous, was now occupying the Chateau Saint-Louis.
    The founder of the congregation painstakingly climbed the steep slope. She, too, was happy to be on solid ground once again, and was pleased she had brought back new recruits for this country she loved so much.

    8
    GRUMBLING , Widow Myrand served a frugal meal that seemed sumptuous after the salted meat, dried biscuits and rancid water that had been the girls’ menu on board ship.
    Jeanne, overexcited by the liveliness and noise of the town, still unaccustomed to feeling solid ground beneath her feet, asked for and received permission to sit on the doorstep