Déserée's Baby" is a short story by Kate Chopin that is both a story of great love and heartbreak.
Madame Valmondé travels to L'Abri to see Déserée and her newly born son.
While traveling to L'Abri , Madame Valmondé thinks back to the time Déserée was just a toddler that her husband, Monsieur Valmondé had found lying asleep under a stone pillar on the Valdmondé estate. Madame Valmondé could not bear children and she raised Déserée as her own child. Madame Valmondé loved Déserée very much and was grateful that Déserée was such a beautiful, gentle and affectionate child.
Years later when Déserée was 18 years old, Armand Aubigny saw Déserée standing under the same stone pillar where she was found as a child and fell instantly and madly in love. Armand decided that they would be married right away.
Wanting to be honest, Monsieur Valmondé tells Armand that Déserée was found and raised by the Valmondé family, however she was of unknown origin and not born of the Valmondé bloodline .
Later, after marriage and the birth of a son, Armand and Déserée were happy and in love for a short time. However, as the child continued to grow up it was clear that the child was part white and part black. This caused the marriage to disintegrate as Armand no longer loved Déserée or the child and in fact disintegrate them both.
Armand believes that as Déserée is of unknown origin that she is part black and that even though she appears to be white, the fact that his son appears to be part black and of a mixed race descent is too much of an embarrassment to his upper class family name and standing in society. Furthering the embarrassment and disgrace is that he is married to someone who is part black.
Déserée decides to leave with child and live with her mother Madame Valmondé. She secretly hopes that Armand will still love her and ask her to stay, however he is cold and unresponsive to her, telling her to leave and not to return.
After the departure of Déserée , Armand Aubigny burns all of her clothes and belongings that he had bought for her as well the clothes and belongings of the mixed race child. The last thing to be burned were all of the love letters from Déserée, however nestled in the same drawer with all of the love letters was a lone letter from the mother of Armand Aubigny. His mother had died in France when Armand was only 8 years old.
The letter from his mother to mother to his father read as such
"night and day, I thank God for having so arranged our lives that our dear
Armand will never know that his mother, who adores him, belongs to the race
that is cursed with the brand of slavery.