The Quebec Anthology: 1830-1990

"The Roussis' Fire" 1872

Narcisse-Henri-Edouard Faucher de Saint-Maurice Translated byYves Brunelle THE Roussis' FIRE Faucher de Saint-Maurice wasborn in Quebec City on April 18, 1844, and baptized Narcisse-Henri-Edouard Faucher. He attended the Petit Seminaire and the college Sainte-Anne-de-la-Pocatiere, becoming a clerk in the law firm of Henri Taschereau and Ulric-Joseph Tessier in 1860. His heart was evidently more with the armed forces than with the law;in 1862 he published his first work, Organisation militaire des Canadas: Uennemi! I'ennemU, a military pamphlet signed "Un Carabinier." The nextyear he wrote another pamphlet, Cours de tactique, and enlisted in the French Expeditionary Corps, which at the timewas fighting in Mexico against the revolutionary Benito Pablo Juarez. By 1867, however, he was back in Quebec, working as a clerk in the new Legislative Council—a position he maintained for the next fourteenyears. Faucher de Saint-Maurice (he took the name from his military ancestor and author, Leonard Faucher dit SaintMaurice , because he thought it sounded more refined) wasa prolific writer; in 1874 he published/I la brunante, a collection of short stories and legends; Choses et autres, a collection of literary criticism and essays;and a two-volume military memoir entitled De Quebec a Mexico. In 1881 he left his position as legislative council clerk to run forparliament, and was elected ConservativeMP for Bellechasse.He helped found the Royal Society of Canada,and from 1883 to 1885 was the editor-in-chief of LeJournal de Quebec. "Le Feu des Roussi," translatedhere by Yves Brunelle as "The Roussis' Fire," first appearedin two instalments in the journalL 'Opinion publique in 1872 under the title "A la veillee," which means "at twilight." It waslater included in the 1874 collection under its present title. A 22 NARCISSE-HENRI-EDOUARD FAUCHERDE SAINT-MAURICE fairly traditional tale involving werewolves, alcoholism, marital bliss and watery death, it is nonetheless a fine example of the way in which the literary and journalistic renaissance of Quebec in the 1870s and 1880s was reinventing the traditions of the past. Faucher de Saint-Maurice died on April Fool's Day, 1897, in Quebec City. "The Roussis' Fire" is reproduced from French Canadian Prose Masters: The Nineteenth Century (Montreal: Harvest House Ltd., 1978) and was originally published under the tide "Le Feu des Roussi" inL'Opinionpublique 3, no. 7 (1872); no. 8 (1872). THE Roussis' FIRE 23 1. Little Cyprien t the outset it must be said that Little Cyprien Roussi hadnot performed hisEaster duties forsix years an eleven months. The seventh year was near at hand, and, since it was the age when people in that sad condition were turned into werewolves or such creatures, the busybodies of the village of Good-St-Anne-of-the-North gabbed to their heart's content about the wretched man. "He who laughs last, laughs longest," Widow Demers was saying. "When he has to roam the fields, all night long, without being able to rest, he'll have time to mull over the remorse which alwaysfollows partying and godlessness." "Roam the fields! That would be good enough for him," Miss Angelique Dessaint, forty-eight-year-old spinster , added no less righteously; "but do we know what he'll turn into, poor Cyprien? I've heard it said that a bogeyman can be a bear, a cat, a dog, a horse, an ox, or a toad. It depends, it seems, on what evil spirit has gotten into his body. And, if you promised not to say a word, I could say something. ..." "Ah! for God's sake, me gossip? not on your life," asserted Old Lady Gariepy forthrightly, who was knitting in her corner. "That's all right for the merchant's wife: she's rich and has nothing else to do. Come on, speak up, Miss Angelique." "Well! since you want me to, I'll tell you that I have in my coop a little black hen that gives me a lot of trouble. It never roosts with the others, seldom cackles, and wouldn't lay for all the wheat Old Man Pierriche harvests on Sunday. Sometimes I feel like bleeding her; there's something suspicious about it." "Well, bleed her!" Widow Demers interjected. "Who knows? maybe in pricking her you'll free a poor bogeyman; because, to cut their punishment short, a Christian has to draw a drop of blood from them; that's what the...