of his back were complaining. Why didn 'tyou send out Georges or Charles? was what they were complaining. He did do that a lot of the time, but they were busy elsewhere this morning.
'And,' he said, speaking to his muscles as if they were the horse, and therefore incapable of talking back, 'I am not in my dotage. If I cannot do this work, what good am I?' But it was not that he couldn't do the work. It was that doing the work exacted its price these days, and the price went up with the years.
He went back out into the cold, back to the farmhouse. Once he got close to it, he whistled in surprise. Dr. Leonard O'Doull's Ford was parked by the house. Even though his son-in-law worked at the hospital on Galtier land, he didn't come to visit all that often. Lucien picked up his pace, to see why O'Doull had come today.
'Bonjour, mon beau-pere' O'Doull said, rising to shake his hand. Marie had already given the young doctor a cup of coffee and a sweet roll.
'Bonjour' Lucien said. 'My daughter and my grandson, I trust they are well?'
'Yes,' O'Doull said, and Marie nodded: she must have asked the same question. The American went on, 'I have come, as I was beginning to tell your wife before you got here, to ask a favor of you.'
'Vraiment?' Lucien said in some surprise. O'Doull was an independent fellow, and the favors he asked few and far between. Galtier waved his arms. 'Well, if you came here to do that, you'd better get on with it, don't you think?'
'Yes, certainly.' But O'Doull hesitated again before finally continuing, 'My mother and father have decided they would like to come up to Quebec to see their first grandson. You know our house, and know that it is not of the largest. Is it-would it be- possible that you might put them up here for a few days' visit? If it cannot be done, you must know I will understand, but it would be good if it could.'
Before answering, Galtier glanced toward Marie. The farmhouse was her province. He knew there would be disruption, but she was the one to gauge how much. Only after she gave him a tiny nod did he answer in effusive tones: 'But of course! They would be most welcome. When would they be traveling up to see you?'
'In a couple of weeks, if that's all right,' O'Doull answered. 'They're so looking forward to meeting Nicole and seeing little Lucien and to meeting all of you, for your doings have filled the pages of our letters.'
'I hope we are not so bad as you will have made us out to be,' Galtier said.
While Leonard O'Doull was still figuring out how to take that, Marie asked, 'Is it that your mother and father speak French?'
'My father does, some,' O'Doull replied. 'He is a doctor himself, and studied French in college. My mother has been trying to learn since I decided to live here, but I do not know how much she has picked up.'
'We will get along,' Galtier said in his rusty English. Then he had to translate for his wife. Marie nodded, though she had almost no English of her own.
'I thank you very much,' O'Doull said with a nod of his own that was almost a bow. 'I will wire them and tell them it is arranged. Truly, they do want to meet you. I will also, naturally, let you know when I hear just when they will arrive in Riviere-du-Loup.' With one more nod, he went back to his motorcar and then back to the hospital.
After the door closed behind him, Lucien and Marie looked at each other. They both raised eyebrows and then both started to laugh. Galtier said, 'Well, this will be something out of the ordinary, at the very least.'
'Out of the ordinary, yes,' Marie agreed. 'And the work we will have to do to be ready in time will be out of the ordinary, too.' She drew herself up straight with pride. 'But we will do it. We will not shame ourselves before Leonard's rich American parents.'
Doctors weren't necessarily rich, but Lucien didn't bother contradicting his wife. Contradicting Marie rarely did any good. Besides, she was in essence right. Galtier too wanted to put on the best show he could for his son-in- law's parents.
Over the next couple of weeks, a tornado might have passed through the house. Doing spring cleaning and the laundry that went with spring cleaning while snow lay on the ground wasn't easy, but Marie and her daughters managed, with help from Lucien and the two boys whenever they could be roped into it. Denise, who'd had the room she'd once shared with Nicole to herself since her sister's wedding, was bundled off to sleep with Susanne and Jeanne to give the guests a room of their own.
'Why have we no electricity?' Marie moaned. 'Why have we no piped water?'
'Why does not matter for these things,' Galtier said with a shrug. 'We do not have them, and we cannot have them before the O'Doulls arrive. Save your worries for things we can help.'
'They will think we are backwards,' Marie said.
'They will think we live on a farm.' Galtier looked around. 'As best I can see, they will be right.' She wrinkled her nose at him. Shrugging again, he added, 'I have heard from our son-in-law that it is the same on farms in the United States as it is here.'
That quieted Marie for the time being. She got nervous a dozen more times before Leonard O'Doull, having met his parents at the train station in Riviere-du-Loup, brought them and Nicole and little Lucien down to the farmhouse. By then, the suits Lucien and Charles and Georges wore had been aired long enough that they no longer smelled of mothballs.
Harvey O'Doull looked like a shorter, older, more weathered version of his son. Rose, his wife, resembled nothing so much as a suet pudding, but her eyes, green like Leonard's, were kind. 'I was pleased to meet your lovely daughter at last, and I am pleased to meet all of you,' Harvey said, his accent about two-thirds American, one-third Parisian. 'I am glad to have you in our family, and to be in yours '
'Moi aussi' his wife said. Her accent was considerably worse than his, but she made the effort to speak at least a little French.
Because she did, Lucien answered in his own creaky English: 'And I am glad also to meet you. Please to come inside, where it is more hot.'
Harvey O'Doull's eyes had been flicking back and forth around the farm, as if they were a camera taking snapshots. His face showed a good deal of knowledge; how many farms had he seen in the course of his practice? A lot, probably. When he said, 'This is a good place,' he spoke with authority.
'This is precious!' Rose said in English when they did go inside. It wasn't quite the word Galtier would have used to describe the house where he lived, but it was meant as praise, and he accepted it in the spirit offered.
Leonard O'Doull carried in suitcases. His father opened one and rummaged through it. 'I have here for the baby many toys,' he said in his rather strange French, 'and one also for you, M. Galtier.' With the air of a man performing a conjuring trick, he held up a large bottle of whiskey.
'Since I cannot drink all that by myself-at least not right away-I will share it with anyone who would like some,' Galtier said. 'Denise, run into the kitchen and fetch glasses, would you?'
There was plenty of whiskey to go around. There would be enough to go around several times. 'To Lucien O'Doull!' Harvey O'Doull said loudly. Everyone drank. It was, Lucien Galtier discovered, not only abundant whiskey but excellent whiskey as well.
Lucien O'Doull, without whom the gathering would not have taken place, drank no whiskey. He kept pulling himself up to a stand, letting go, and falling on his bottom. His cries were much more of indignation than of hurt. He knew he was supposed to get up there on his hind legs, but he didn't quite know how.
Dinner featured roast chicken and sausage and mashed potatoes and buttered turnips and Marie's fresh- baked bread. Nothing was wrong with either senior O'Doull's appetite, and they both praised the food in two languages. The first awkward moment came when Rose asked in careful French, 'Oil est le W.C.?'
'II n y a pas de WC.' Galtier answered, and then, in English, 'No toilet.' With resigned regret, he pointed outside. One small advantage of cold weather was that the outhouse was less ripe than it would have been in summer.
Rose O'Doull blinked, but wrapped herself in her thick wool coat and sallied forth. When she came back, she was, to Lucien's surprise, smiling. 'I haven't been on a two-holer since Hector was a pup,' she said in English. Lucien didn't know exactly what that meant, but he had a pretty fair notion.
Rose also insisted on going back and helping the Galtier women with the dishes. Harvey proved to have brought a box of cigars to go with the fine whiskey. After the menfolk were puffing happy clouds, he said, 'I hope. M. Galtier, we do not put you to too much trouble.'
'Not at all,' Lucien said. 'It is our pleasure.'
'All except Denise's,' the incorrigible Georges murmured.
Fortunately, Harvey O'Doull either did not hear or did not understand. He went on with his own train of thought: 'I know how much work a farm is. I was a child on a farm. To have guests is not easy for a man with much
