“This must be why you come with the king’s girls to the marriage market.”
Her face burned in deeper flames.
“The court of Louis,” pursued Laval, “would furnish a better mate for you than any wild coureur de bois on the St. Lawrence.”
“I have not come to any marriage market,” she stammered.
“You are in the marriage market, Mademoiselle Laval. His Majesty, in his care for New France, sends out these girls to mate with soldiers and peasants here. It is good, and will confirm the true faith upon the soil. What I cannot understand is your presence among them.”
Her face sank upon her breast.
“I did not know what to do.”
“So, being at a loss, you took shipping to the ends of the earth?”
“Other women of good families have come out here.”