Free Red Prophet: The Tales of Alvin Maker, Volume II by Orson Scott Card

her he loved her and promised to set her up in a house even nicer than the one he would build for his wife. If only she had come. Of course, she might have died of fever, the way his wife did. So perhaps it was all for the best. Was she still on the stage in Paris? Bonaparte would not know, of course, but one of his junior officers might have seen her. He would have to inquire.
    They supped at Governor Rainbow’s table, of course, since that was the only table on the canal boat. The governor had sent her regrets that she could not visit the distinguished French travelers, but she hoped her staff would make them comfortable. Frederic, supposing this meant anIrrakwa chef, had braced himself for another tedious Red meal of tough deer gristle—one could hardly call such fare
venison
—but instead the chef was, of all things, a Frenchman! A Huguenot, or rather the grandson of Huguenots, but he didn’t hold grudges, so the food was superb. Who would have imagined good French food in a place like this—and not the spicy Acadian style, either.
    Frederic did try to take a more active part in the conversation at supper, once he had finished off every scrap of food on the table. He tried his best to explain to Bonaparte the almost impossible military situation in the southwest. He counted off the problems one by one—the undisciplined Red allies, the unending flow of immigrants. “Worst of all is our own soldiers, though. They are a determinedly superstitious lot, as the lower classes always are. They see omens in everything. Some Dutch or German settler puts a hex on his door and you practically have to beat our soldiers to get them to go in.”
    Bonaparte sipped his coffee (barbaric fluid! but he seemed to relish it exactly as the Irrakwa did), then leaned back in his chair, regarding Frederic with his steady, piercing eyes. “Do you mean to say that you accompany foot soldiers in house-to-house searches?”
    Bonaparte’s condescending attitude was outrageous, but before Frederic could utter the withering retort that was just on the tip of his tongue, La Fayette laughed aloud. “Napoleon,” he said, “my dear friend, that is the nature of our supposed enemy in this war. When the largest city in fifty miles consists of four houses and a smithy, you don’t conduct house-to-house searches. Each house
is
the enemy fortress.”
    Napoleon’s forehead wrinkled. “They don’t concentrate their forces into armies?”
    “They have never fielded an army, not since General Wayne put down Chief Pontiac years ago, and that was an English army. The U.S. has a few forts, but they’re all along the Hio.”
    “Then why are those forts still standing?”
    La Fayette chuckled again. “Haven’t you read reports of how the English king fared in his war against the Appalachee rebels?”
    “I was otherwise engaged,” said Bonaparte.
    “You needn’t remind us you were fighting in Spain,” said Frederic, “We would all have gladly been there, too.”
    “Would you?” murmured Bonaparte.
    “Let me summarize,” said La Fayette, “what happened to Lord Cornwallis’s army when he led it from Virginia to try to reach the Appalachee capital of Franklin, on the upper Tennizy River.”
    “Let
me
,” said Frederic. “Your summaries are usually longer than the original, Gilbert.”
    La Fayette looked annoyed at Frederic’s interruption, but after all, La Fayette was the one who had insisted they address each other as brother generals, by first names. If La Fayette wanted to be treated like a marquis, he should insist on protocol. “Go ahead,” said La Fayette.
    “Cornwallis went out in search of the Appalachee army. He never found it. Lots of empty cabins, which he burned—but they can build new ones in a day. And every day a half-dozen of his soldiers would be killed or wounded by musketry.”
    “Rifle fire,” corrected La Fayette.
    “Yes, well, these Americans prefer the rifled barrel,” said Frederic.
    “They can’t volley