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courting her. Now she said, “I can surprise you, Papa.”
    “Of this I have no doubt,” Lucien said. “The question is, my little bird, do I want to be surprised?” He didn’t remember only what Marie had been like when he was courting her. He also remembered, all too well, what he had been like. He did not think the young male of the species likely to have shown any dramatic improvement over the intervening generation.
    And when Nicole answered, “Papa, I do not know,” his heart sank. She took a long, deep breath before going on, and that heart, seemingly a relentless gymnast, leaped into his mouth. Then she said, “I have been thinking of doing nurse’s work at the American hospital. It is very close, of course, and we could use the money the work would bring.”
    After all the dreadful possibilities he had imagined, that one seemed not so bad…at first. Then Lucien stared. “You would help the Americans, Nicole? The enemies of our country? The allies of the enemies of France?”
    His daughter bit her lip and looked down at the apron she wore over her long wool dress. To Galtier’s surprise, his wife spoke up for her: “If a man is hurt and in pain, does it matter what country he comes from?”
    “Father Pascal would say the same thing,” Lucien replied, which made Marie wince, because the priest at Rivière-du-Loup, whatever anyone’s opinion of his piety might be, collaborated eagerly with the Americans.
    “But, Papa,” Nicole said, “they
are
hurt and in pain. You can hear them moaning in the night sometimes.” Lucien had heard those moans, too. They had been sweet to his ears. He shook his head in dismay to discover his daughter did not feel the same. Nicole persisted, “You know what I think of Father Pascal. You know what I think of the Americans. None of that would change. How could it? And they would be giving money to people who despise them.”
    “You don’t even speak any English,” Galtier said. As soon as the words were out of his mouth, he knew he was in trouble. When you had to shift your reasons for saying no, you were liable to end up saying yes.
    And Nicole pounced: “I can learn it, I know that. It might even be useful for me to know if, God forbid—” She didn’t go on. She didn’t need to go on. Lucien had no trouble completing the sentence for himself.
If, God forbid, the United States win the war and try to make us all use English afterwards
. That was what she’d meant, or something very much like it.
    He didn’t try to answer on the spur of the moment. Believing Canada and France and England and the Confederacy could be defeated went dead against all his hopes and dreams. What he did say was, “How Major Quigley will laugh when he learns you are working for the Americans.”
    He spoke with more than a little bitterness. Nicole bit her lip. The French-speaking U.S. major had placed the hospital on Galtier land not least because Lucien would not collaborate with the American occupying authorities.
    Marie spoke up again: “Actually, that may be for the best. The major may believe we are coming round to his view of things after all, and so become less likely to trouble us from now on.”
    Lucien chewed on that. It did make a certain amount of sense. And so, instead of putting his foot down as he’d intended, he said, “We shall speak of this more later.” His wife and eldest daughter nodded, outwardly obedient to his will as women were supposed to be. He knew they both had to be smiling inside, though. Sooner or later, they would get what they wanted. Talking about things later was but one short step from giving in.
    At supper, he discovered he was the last one in the family to hear about what Nicole had in mind. That saddened him but didn’t unduly surprise him. For one thing, he did more work away from the farmhouse than anyone else. For another, he was the one from whom permission would have to come. Nicole would have wanted to know she had support from the rest