Tramp at the Door

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An adult name Gabrielle narrates a story about family from a time in her adolescence. Her story starts in 1936, she living on a farm outside of Ste. Rose du Lac, Manitoba with her parents, Albert and Madeleine Fournier, he who is the town's justice of the peace. Like many of their neighbors, he is a native francophone Québec expatriate, having left there forty years ago when he was fourteen never to look or go back. He has never talked about his family back in Québec or otherwise to either Madeleine or Gabrielle, except in passing. Being the Depression, they, as a family relatively well off, often got vagabonds on their doorstep, they sometimes providing food, lodging and work on the farm. One such man that year, about ten years older than Albert, is different, as he, relatively well-dressed in a suit but obviously still down on his fortunes, finally comes to the admission that he is Albert's cousin, Gustave. Madeleine knows the man is lying as his stories of their family only gets elaborated upon whenever prompted by clues from Albert, and as such she is suspicious of the man's motives. Albert, deep in his heart, also knows the man is lying, but still allows the man to tell the stories of their family if only in Albert's want to have some touchstone to his past, fabricated or not. Regardless of Gustave's true identity, he may provide a valuable service to the Fourniers in his stories of family.