The King's Warrant

A soldier's concern for his daughter gives a personal focus to Alfred H. Engelbach's historical novel. After the French capture of Oswego, the wounded Captain Lacroix fears for his young daughter Marguerite. His fellow officer Valricour, remembering a debt to his old comrade, assures him that she will have protection. The story sets this intimate concern against the competing interests of New France and New England during the Seven Years' War.

Family pressure, confinement and disputed identity bring further dangers. Baroness Clotilde de Valricour finds herself held in an Ursuline convent, where the superior insists on treating her as Mademoiselle Lacroix. Clotilde says a trap meant for someone else has caught her instead. Readers interested in historical fiction can follow the connection between authority and private vulnerability, with military conflict sharing the stage with an anxious struggle to be believed. The shifts from a battlefield to a locked room give the historical setting a personal scale.