A Frontier Reckoning
A chance meeting at a wilderness camp forces a man to confront the guard who once brutalized him in a French prison.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
We had been out hunting and three men joined our camp. One was a Frenchman who spoke English very indifferently. He seemed a jolly fellow and gave his name as Patrin. We were camped on the Palouse River. I mentioned to Louie Constantin that one of the strangers, I thought, was his countryman. Louie did not seem pleased. When Patrin arrived and heard Louie was French, he extended his hand, saying, 'Monsieur is a countryman of mine, I believe. My name is Adolph Patrin.' Louie Constantin drew back, his face agitated. He asked, 'Are you the Patrin that once was a stone officer in the dockyard at Brest?' When Patrin confirmed this, Constantin hissed, 'Pleasure? I take you to be a man of courage, if not of honor. I ask you to pledge me your word that you will not leave this camp until we have spoken again on the morrow.' The next morning, Constantin demanded, 'Adolph Patrin, look upon me; do you remember Maurice Duport? I was a young convict under your authority. You were a brute and tyrant. I shall always bear the mark of your brutality.' He stripped off his shirt, showing a blood-red seam on his shoulder where he had been cut down with a sword. They chose pistols for satisfaction. In the second fire, Constantin’s ball struck Patrin’s cheek, carrying off his nose. Constantin then allowed him to live, telling him, 'Go, beast, and bear the mark that I in turn have placed upon you.' Patrin eventually recovered and moved to Vallejo, California, while Constantin found relief from his burden.
“Do you recollect the day you cut me down with your sword? I shall always bear the mark of your brutality.”
This narrative, likely a literary piece printed as fact, reflects the era's obsession with 'frontier justice' and moral retribution. The dark intensity of the story captures a time when the vast, lawless Pacific Northwest was seen as a stage where old-world grievances could finally be settled by force.
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