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Updated: July 14, 2025
"Yet you have spoken." He sighed and raised his hand. "The man the men down there would destroy our country. They are our enemies, and we do well to slay. But remember, Pierre 'What God hath joined let no man put asunder! To fight him as an enemy of your country well; to fight him that you may put asunder is not well." A look, half-pained, half-amused, crossed Iberville's face.
Jessica did not throw herself into her husband's arms. The position was too painful, too tragic, for even the great emotion in her heart. Behind Iberville's courtesy she read the deadly mischief. But she had a power born for imminent circumstances, and her mind was made up as to her course. It had been made up when, at the critical moment, she had called out Iberville's Christian name.
He looked for a moment, and then as Iberville and De Troyes came near, he gazed at Iberville in wonder, and all at once reached out both hands to him. Iberville took them and shook them heartily. There was something uncanny in the sudden death of the champion, and Iberville's achievement had conquered these savages, who, after all, loved such deeds, though at the hand of an enemy.
He paused. The priest had placed meat and wine on the table, and now he came and put his hand on Iberville's shoulder. "Pierre," he said, "I welcome you as one brother might another, the elder foolishly fond." Then he added: "I was glad you remembered our music." "My dear De Casson, as if I could forget! I have yet the Maggini you gave me. It was of the things for remembering.
According to Iberville's orders, and in conformity with the King's instructions, Bienville left Boisbriant, his cousin, with twenty men, at the old fort of Biloxi, and transported the principal seat of the colony to the western side of the river Mobile, not far from the spot where now stands the city of Mobile.
Through Iberville's mind there ran a hundred incidents of his life, one chasing upon the other without sequence phantasmagoria out of the scene house of memory: The light upon the arms of De Tracy's soldiers when they marched up Mountain Street many years before The frozen figure of a man standing upright in the plains A procession of canoes winding down past Two Mountains, the wild chant of the Indians joining with the romantic songs of the voyageurs A girl flashing upon the drawn swords of two lads King Louis giving his hand to one of these lads to kiss A lady of the Court for whom he might easily have torn his soul to rags, but for a fair-faced English girl, ever like a delicate medallion in his eye A fight with the English in the Spaniards' country His father blessing him as he went forth to France A dark figure taking a hundred shapes, and yet always meaning the same as when he Iberville said over the governor's table in New York, "Foolish boy!"
Iberville was the first to step on deck, and he was followed by Perrot and De Casson, who had, against Iberville's will, insisted on coming. Five others came after. Already they could hear the other party at the gate of the fort, and the cries of the besiegers, now in the fortyard, came clearly to them.
"Your charge is long is it finished?" A hard light came into Iberville's eyes. "And then, monsieur, you did me the honour to come to my own country. We did not meet in the fighting, and you killed my brother." Iberville crossed himself. "Then" his voice was hard and bitter "you were captured; no longer a prisoner of war, but one who had broken his parole.
"We have no Indians, we are all French," answered Iberville quietly, and sent the messenger away. At that moment Perrot touched his arm, and pointed to a man whose shoulder was being bandaged. It was Radisson, who had caught Iberville's sword when the abbe diverted it. "By the mass," said Iberville; "the gift of the saints!" He pricked Radisson with the point of his sword.
"Your excellency will remember," he answered, in a low, cold tone, "that I once was counselled to marry the sword." The governor laid his hand upon Iberville's shoulder. "Pardon me," he said. "I was not wise or kind. But I warrant the sword will be your best wife in the end." "I have a favour to ask, your excellency." "You might ask many, my Iberville.
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