Authors: Pamela Clare
Love and thanks to my sister, Michelle, and to my good friends Sue Zimmerman, Kristi Ross, Libby Murphy, Ronlyn Howe, Suzanne Warren, and Jennifer Johnson for their tireless support and loving friendship.
And, as always, thank you to my family, especially my sons, Alec and Benjamin. I love you.
Table of Contents
PROLOGUE
July 8, 1758
Fort Carillon (Ticonderoga)
New France
A
malie Chauvenet straightened the gold braid on her father’s gray uniform, trying to hide her fear. “I will be fine, Papa. You’ve no need to trouble yourself on my behalf.”
In the distance she could hear the dull thud of marching feet and the scrape of metal against metal as thousands of British soldiers surrounded the fort’s landward side and prepared to attack. Certain
les Anglais
would capture the fort in a matter of hours, her father had come to escort her to the little chapel where he felt she’d be safest.
“If the fort should fall, stay close to Père François.” Papa’s dear face was lined with worry. “I will come to you if I can. If aught should befall me, Père François will take you to Montcalm or Bourlamaque. They will keep you safe.”
“Nothing will happen to you, Papa!” Her words sounded childish even to her own ears—a measure of her fear for him.
It had become the custom in this accursed war for both sides to shoot officers first in hopes of leaving the enemy leaderless and confused. But Amalie could not abide the thought of her father in harm’s way, a mere mark in range of some British soldier’s musket.
Papa lifted her chin, forced her to meet his gaze. “Listen to me! You are an officer’s daughter, Amalie, but in the rush of victory, even disciplined soldiers are wont to rape and pillage. Do not allow yourself to be found alone!”
She heard her father’s words—and understood the unspoken message beneath them. She was an officer’s daughter, but she was also
métisse
, her blood a mix of French and Abenaki. Though most French accepted her, the British were not so kind. In their eyes, a woman of mixed blood was little better than a dog—or so she’d been told. If the fort should fall, her standing as a major’s daughter likely would not keep her safe without a high-ranking officer’s protection.
“Oui, Papa.”
Dread spread like ice through her belly. “Is there no chance that we may yet prevail?”
“The British general Abercrombie commands a force of at least fifteen thousand, easily four times our number—and MacKinnon’s Rangers are with him.”
Amalie’s dread grew. Everyone knew of MacKinnon’s Rangers. There were no fiercer fighters, no warriors more feared or reviled throughout New France than this band of barbaric Celts. Unmatched at woodcraft and shooting marks, they had once crossed leagues of untamed forest in the dead of winter to destroy her grandmother’s village at Oganak, ruthlessly killing most of the men, burning the lodges, and leaving the women and children to starve. The French had put a bounty on the MacKinnon brothers’ scalps—but the Abenaki wanted them alive so they could exact vengeance in blood and pain.
Some amongst her mother’s people said MacKinnon’s Rangers could fly. Others claimed to have seen them take the forms of wolves or bears. Still others claimed they feasted upon the flesh of their dead. The stories about them were so astonishing that some believed these MacKinnon men weren’t men at all, but powerful
chi bai
—spirits.
But there were other rumors, stories of Rangers sparing women and children, tales of priests and nuns whom they’d shielded from British Regulars with their own bodies, accounts of mercy shown to French soldiers and enemy Indians alike.
But which stories were true?
Amalie did not wish to find out.
“Why did you not stay at the convent?” Her father’s brow folded into a frown. “At least there you would be safe.”
She smoothed a stray curl on his gray wig. “I came because you needed me, Papa.”
She’d journeyed all the way from Trois Rivières in April to care for him when he’d fallen ill with fever. He was her only true family. Though she had cousins and aunts amongst the Abenaki, she barely knew them. Her mother had died in childbed when Amalie was not yet two, and her father had parted ways with his wife’s kin, preferring to shelter his only child amongst the Ursulines than in the wild. And although Amalie was grateful for the care she’d received at the abbey, she had long chafed at the strict rules and rigid routine that shaped convent life, longing to see the world beyond the abbey’s stifling walls.
“Beware of seeking adventure,” the
mère supérieure
had warned her when Amalie had announced she was leaving. “You might not be prepared when it finds you.”
Amalie’d had no idea what the
mère supérieure
had meant—until yesterday, when hundreds upon hundreds of British boats had landed to the south on the shores of Lac du Saint-Sacrement, what the British called Lake George, disgorging thousands of soldiers dressed in blood red. Now battle was imminent, and only God knew what this day would bring.
Yet, despite the peril, she did not regret her decision to come to the frontier. She’d never spent more than a few weeks at a time with her father, and the months she’d lived by his side were amongst the happiest and most exciting she could remember. She’d found joy in nursing him back to health, cooking and cleaning for him, mending his uniform, heating his bath and filling his pipe, as any devoted daughter would do.
But there was more.
They’d laughed together, read Voltaire and Rousseau, discussed the latest ideas of the day, notions about society and liberty she’d not encountered at the abbey. Her father had let her speak her mind, even encouraged her to do so, never chastising her for asking questions as the
mère supérieure
had so often done. She’d come to know him as a father, to admire him as a man, to respect him as an officer. She’d come to love him.
She could not bear to lose him.
She pressed her palm to his cheek. “If the strength of our army should fail, it will not be long before the British reach Trois Rivières and Montréal. Then abbey walls will make little difference. I would not trade these months with you for something so small as safety.”
His gaze softened. “Ah, my sweet Amalie, I do need you. You have brought such sunshine to my life. If I had but considered it, I would have taken you from the abbey long ago. But if the breastworks cannot withstand Abercrombie’s artillery…”
His voice trailed off. Then he smiled and drew her close, surrounding her with his reassuring strength and his familiar scent—pipe smoke, starched linen, and brisk cologne. “It is in God’s hands,
ma petite caille
.”
My little quail.
And so Amalie went to await the outcome of the battle in the chapel, swallowing her tears and forcing herself to smile when her father took his leave of her to return to his duties at the breastworks.
“Be safe, Papa,” she whispered as he walked away, so smart in his gray uniform.
She knelt down with her rosary beside Père François and had just begun to pray when the battle exploded. Like thunder it seemed to shake the very ground, the din of cannon, musket fire, and men’s shouts almost deafening. She’d never been near a battlefield before, and her hands trembled as she worked her way through each bead, fighting to remember the words, her thoughts on Papa—and what might happen to all of them should the fort fall.
The soldiers would be imprisoned. Her father and the other officers would be interrogated and traded for British captives. And the women…
In the rush of victory, even disciplined soldiers are wont to rape and pillage.
“Notre Père, qui êtes aux cieux… Our Father, who art in heaven
…
She hadn’t been kneeling long when Père François was summoned to the hospital to comfort the wounded and anoint the dying. Impatient to help and mindful of her father’s warning not to be found alone, Amalie, who’d tended sick and injured women at the convent, asked to come with him.
“Are you certain, Amalie?” Père François looked down at her, doubt clouding his green eyes. “This is war. It will be gruesome.”
She nodded, braiding her long hair and binding the plait into a thick knot at her nape. “
Oui,
Father, I am certain. I have seen death before.”
But she’d never seen anything like what awaited them at the hospital.
The dead were so numerous that there was no room for them inside. Their bodies lay without dignity in the hot sunshine, moved hastily aside to make way for those still living. The wounded lay on beds, on the floor, against the walls. They muttered snatches of prayer, groaned through gritted teeth, cried out in agony, waiting for someone to ease their suffering. Monsieur Lambert, the surgeon, and his men worked as swiftly as they could, but there were so many. And everywhere, there was blood, the air thick with the stench of gunpowder and death.
Surely, this was hell.
Amalie thrust aside her childish fears and her tears, donned an apron, and set to work, doing what the surgeon asked of her. Outside, the battle seemed to come in waves, building until she feared the very sky should fall, then fading to silence, only to begin anew.
A soldier clutched at her skirts with bloody fingers. She took his hand, sat beside him, and knew the moment she saw the wound in his chest that he would perish. If only she could give him laudanum, ease the pain of his passing, but there was not enough. She’d been told to save it for those who at least stood a chance of survival.
He seemed about to speak, struggled for breath.
And then he was gone.
About her age, he’d died before she could utter a word of comfort, before Père François could offer him last rites, before the surgeon could tend him. She swallowed the hard lump in her throat, muttered a prayer, then drew the soldier’s eyes closed.
Another blast of cannon shook the walls of the little log hospital, making Amalie gasp.
“Those are French guns, mademoiselle.” The soldier in the next bed spoke, his voice tight with pain. “Do not be afraid. As long as they fire, we know the breastworks stand.”
Ashamed of her fear, Amalie covered the dead soldier with a blanket, a signal to the surgeon’s attendants to remove his body. How could she, who was safe behind the fort’s walls, allow herself to cower at the mere sound of war when all around her lay men who had braved the full violence of the battlefield?
“It is I who should be offering you comfort, monsieur.” She moved to sit beside him and checked beneath the bloodstained bandage on his right arm. The musket ball had passed through, but it had broken bone. Monsieur Lambert would almost certainly have to amputate. “Are you thirsty?”
“You are the daughter of Major Chauvenet, are you not?”
“Oui.”
“You are just as beautiful as the men say. I have never seen such long hair.” Then his eyes widened, his face pallid. “I hope you take no offense at my boldness. The battle seems to have loosened my tongue.”
Though she’d been at Fort Carillon for more than three months, she still hadn’t grown accustomed to the attention of men. Uncertain how to respond, she reached for her plait, which had somehow slipped free of its knot, its thick end touching the floor when she sat. Quickly, she bound it up again, lest it trail through the blood that was tracked across the floorboards. Then she pulled the water bucket close, drew out the ladle, and lifted it to the soldier’s lips.
“Drink.”
The wounded soldier had just taken his first swallow when there came a commotion at the door and Montcalm’s third in command, the Chevalier de Bourlamaque, was brought inside, bleeding from what looked to be a grave wound in his shoulder.
“How goes the battle?” someone called.
An expectant hush fell over the room.
Bourlamaque sat with a grimace, his white wig slightly askew. “We are prevailing.”
Murmurs of astonishment and relief passed through the crowded hospital like a breeze, and Amalie met the injured soldier’s gaze, her own surprise reflected in his eyes.
“For whatever reason, Abercrombie hasn’t brought up his artillery.” Bourlamaque gritted his teeth as a soldier helped him out of his jacket. “We are cutting down the enemy as swiftly as they appear, and their losses are grievous. Four times we have repulsed them. None have even passed the abatis to reach our breastworks.”