Read Online Unholy Alliance by Don Gutteridge - Free Book Online Page B

disturbing, then they must be said in this
very room to these very gentlemen.”
    “I did not mean to embarrass Mr. – ” Macaulay
began.
    But Tremblay cut him off. With eyes blazing,
he burst into speech. “I do not believe there can be any kind of
first step so long as the issue of reparations continues to be
ignored! All else is hypocrisy!”
    Marc had not finished translating when Hincks
said somewhat intemperately, “We cannot ignore a topic that has not
yet been introduced! We have just begun, sir. There is still local
government to consider, the postal service, regularizing the
currency, the need for charitable institutions and – ”
    “We take your point, Francis,” Robert said
evenly, waving off Marc’s translation.
    With just the faintest twinkle in his eye,
LaFontaine said in English, “And the point we have reached is the
subject of reparations, eh?”
    “It seems so,” Robert said. “As the most
contentious issue of ‘step one,’ I had planned to leave it till
near the end of this phase of our deliberations. But let us go at
it now. I would like to say by way of putting the topic into
context that the matter of compensating innocent parties for
property damage and personal losses as a result of the uprising
here in Upper Canada has already been raised in our own Assembly.
And met with outright dismissal by the Tory majority. In part, as
victors the Tories feel most of the razed barns and charred crops
were just punishment for those who, in their view, might not have
participated in the revolt but certainly condoned it. They are also
keenly aware that a reparations bill here would encourage the
notion in Quebec, and there they see the issue in even stronger
terms: all French-speaking farmers were de facto rebels and
richly deserve their fate.”
    Tremblay listened to the translation, his
lower lip quivering. “Let me tell you my story now,” he said with a
simmering anger, “and let it stand for a thousand others. I had a
small farm in the Beauharnois district. In ‘thirty-six and ‘seven
the drought came. We nearly starved, my family and me, but we hung
onto the only livelihood we had. We tried to borrow money for seed,
but the treasury was impounded during the political crisis and
there was no money for anyone. We begged the government for seed
and were told we were subversive, anti-English Papists, and turned
away. I slaughtered our milk-cows for food. My boys scoured the
woods for nuts and berries. When the uprising started, I had no
gun, but I also had no choice. I borrowed one and joined my
comrades. I was at St. Denis with Nelson when my borrowed rifle
exploded and blew most of this hand away.” He held up his mangled
appendage and let Marc finish his translation.
    “I spent six months in a Montreal prison,” he
continued. “My wife assumed I was dead. Men around me – ruined and
desperate farmers – were being tried by court martial and hanged. I
was freed only when Lord Durham arrived in June and Mr. LaFontaine
intervened on my behalf. I made my way back to my farm. There was
nothing left. Not a log unburned, not a stalk in the fields. My
family had fled to my cousin’s place farther up the river. There we
stayed, working with him to keep his farm alive. Somehow we
managed. We stayed clear of politics. But the patriots came back
that fall in greater force. Again, they were met with an even
greater force and even greater brutality. General Colborne marched
through the Beauharnois and this time scorched the very earth
before him. We were burned out a second time. We fled to the woods
and lived like primitives. Mr. LaFontaine began arranging small
loans for many of the dispossessed, and with his support, we have
begun yet again. But fancy words and political planks won’t help me
raise a new barn or buy a cow so my youngsters can have milk. I
take full responsibility for my own treasonous acts. I was
imprisoned and released. Why should my wife and children be made
beggars and