The Pelican Bride by Beth White Read Free Book Online Page A

bridegroom, trundling beside her like a wagon with a broken axle. Geneviève had been present at the betrothal agreement, when five eager couples had signed a series of documents joining their lives and estates. The legalities had been overseen by the three priests, Father Albert, Father Henri, and Father Mathieu, with Françoise keeping an eagle eye out for the women’s protection and provision. Three of the prospective brides were illiterate; each document must be read aloud in its entirety before the young lady fixed a large X on the signature blank. Geneviève, who had learned her letters from Jean Cavalier, couldn’t help being grateful that there was no danger of her or Aimée being taken advantage of.
    “My mother would like to immigrate next spring. She will help with the children.”
    Geneviève blinked, jerked out of her thoughts. At first she had the crazy notion Paul Loisel’s deep, shy voice had been directed to her, then realized that he was looking up at his open-mouthed bride.
    “What children?” Élisabeth finally managed to stammer.
    “The—the fruit of our union!” Loisel’s square face was nearly as painfully red as his waistcoat. “I want an heir or two, and you will need girls to help in the house. I can’t afford slaves, you know.”
    “Slaves?” Élisabeth’s voice was a squeak of confusion. “I don’t understand. What does this have to do with your mother?”
    Geneviève quelled Aimée’s giggle with a frown, but couldn’t help listening.
    Loisel gave his young wife a strained smile. “I came from Quebec with several other men, on the promise of rich estates with tobacco fields, fine houses, and a clutch of Indian slaves. The reality has been . . . less than promised.” He sighed. “But Bienville convinced us that it was but a matter of time before women would flock to theNew World from France. We would shortly be married, producing sons and daughters to people our estates. So we stayed, making the best of a difficult situation.” He smiled, squeezing Élisabeth’s hand. “And here you are. My lady, my Pélican girl.”
    Élisabeth gave him a blank look, swallowed, and kept walking.
    “Cabbage head,” Aimée muttered.

    Tristan picked up one of Madame L’Anglois’s sadly flat pastries and with a grimace put the whole thing into his mouth. It was the first Christian wedding he had attended since emigrating from Canada, and the jostling crowd made him long for the quiet solitude of his estate on the lower bluff.
    The bland pastry made him miss Sholani. Her corn bread had been famous throughout the Indian villages from the northern Little Tomeh to the nearby Pascagoula, from whence he had plucked her as a sixteen-year-old virgin beauty. She had been gone for two years now, and he could get through most days without thinking of her. Sometimes, though, he felt her absence with a visceral ache.
    “I’m surprised to see you still here, Lanier. You usually scuttle back to your little sand castle the moment business is concluded.”
    Tristan turned to find Nicolas de La Salle perusing the victual offerings at the other end of Madame L’Anglois’s imported buffet. He could not understand why everyone was so surprised to find him lingering at the settlement. True, he had not stayed for more than a day since Sholani’s death, but before that he had been Bienville’s right-hand man. And would be still, had he not decided to trade his plot of swampy Louisiane ground and move closer to his wife’s family.
    Ignoring the master supply officer’s sour comment, he allowed his gaze to sweep the bevy of young women fluttering amongst the men like parakeets. He would dearly love to have had a pencil and sheet of parchment in his hand and make a sketch. “Perhapsone of these ladies will be lucky enough to capture the hand of the settlement’s most eligible bachelor—excepting Bienville himself, of course. Does the commissary see anything he likes?”
    “My choice has long been