Smuggler's Legacy: A Breton Sailor's Adventure

Historic Fiction, Action/Adventure.

1802. The ancient seafaring town of Concarneau clings to the perilous Breton Coast of France and endures Napoleon's taxes and cultural persecution. After a cholera epidemic, Captain Louis Bedard, master mariner, resolves to hire a live-in doctor from faraway Paris, but the only way to entice such a man is to offer a year's advance salary. There's only one way to amass that much coin: Smuggling. The risk is high; life in prison.

Bedard confides in the Mayor, who suggests a plan. He'll provide the boat, Bedard will hire the crew. On the dark of each new moon, under an alias, Bedard slips the wharf - right under the nose of his arch-enemy, the young and devious Coast Guard Lieutenant LaMotte, a despised newcomer. Eventually LaMotte imprisons Bedard, but because of a legal loophole, Bedard cannot be prosecuted until he reveals his true name. He and LaMotte play their waiting game while Bedard's secret partner threatens to expose him and hire a new partner. 

Bedard's only joy is visits from Nicole, his unmarried daughter, who is unaware of her father's secret identity. One day, in addition to a hot meal, she brings good news: she has finally fallen in love. Bedard's happiness curdles to horror as she blissfully describes the man.