Dear Journal,
Now that we have returned to Bois-de-Bas and are getting settled in for the winter, I find that we have troubles I had not anticipated, the chief of which is overcrowding. We lost very few during the hostilities, and they were mostly from the outlying farms, not from the village proper. Onc' Herbert, whom I sorely miss, is chief among those.
But we also gained. Amelie and I have our Anne-Marie, growing every day, and other children have also been born, for life goes on, n'est-ce pas , and we also have Luc, my apprentice. Marc's travails among the other villages of our region brought no few outsiders to town, as troops and liaisons, and by the nature of things some of them met local girls and chose to stay. And not least, there are my own refugees, Madame Truc, Jacques-le-Souris, and Jean-Baptiste. And winter is coming, and simply isn't enough housing for everyone.
Luc, at least, is no great difficulty, for in time-honored tradition his sleeping place is under one of the work-benches in my work-shop. Even I had to do that during my apprentice years, and much pleasure did it give my father, I do think. And Jean-Baptiste is provided for, for he has both a place and a position. He is helping to run our shop, of course, and he and Brigitte are living with Brigitte's parents—no uncommon thing in Bois-de-Bas. But Madame Truc and Jacques-le-Souris are necessarily living with us. I fear it is a blessing and a curse, for we have only so much room and Madame and Jacques cannot possibly share one.
I have proposed to them that perhaps they should marry, for I know them to be devoted to each other; Madame's husband died decades ago, and Jacques, his closest friend, has been Madame's support ever since, and she his. I found them sitting one beside the other before the fire, playing with Anne-Marie, and put it to them. They both of them looked at me like I was mad.
"Moi!" cried Madame Truc, "Moi, become bound to this layabout, who has never done a good day's work in all his life long? Jamais! If he had been of the most diligent he would have saved my husband from death by le grand-blaireau and I should be married to this day. Non." And she shook her head.
"Les vaches!" cried Jacque-le-Souris, a look of terror in his eyes. "But she is la femme tres difficile. I should have no rest, no more comfort. Non, mon cher, I may not. It would be the death of me!"
"Vraiment," said Madame Truc. "He is quite right, him."
And they nodded at each other with great satisfaction, and continued to dandle my daughter on their knees.
"It is not so bad," said my Amelie to me that night. "Ma mère et mon père are gone, and yours are so far away and so—" and here she grimaced "—so formidable, it will be well for Anne-Marie to have les grand-mère et grand-père near at hand."
So I am resigned to it; but we shall have to extend the house yet again come spring. I do hope M. Fournier is able to supply our needs for books, or it shall be a bleak wait.
A little further afield, there are others of Marc's troops who are excited by my sky-wagons and other innovations and who have remained in town, buzzing about the outskirts. Some wish to buy a wagon; others wish to try out a sky-sled. They come by my workshop every day hoping to wear me down. But Marc and I have taken M. Suprenant's advice to heart. Le Maréchal is not here, and we are at peace, but the war continues elsewhere. We do not know how things will shift, or who our new masters will be, no matter what the ambitious decide in Mont-Havre. And so Marc's men have gathered up the sky-wagons, sleds, and chairs and gotten them all under cover on L'Isle du Grand-Blaireau where the ghost of Old Man Blaireau may keep watch over them. Our encampment there has also been prepared for winter most carefully; it will be there for us at need. Only two sky-sleds remain in all of Bois-de-Bas; I have one, as does Marc, and both are carefully hidden.
The time will come when we are truly at peace, and then, I think, Marc's vision may be realized; Bois-de-Bas will become a new mercantile center in Armorica, and may well eclipse Mont-Havre. But we must wait until the correct moment, when war does not rage across the Abyss. That time may not be soon.
Zymurgia House 