Читать книгу 47 Sorrows - Janet Kellough - Страница 9

Luke had planned to spend a week or so in Wellington before he continued his journey to Montreal, where he needed to register with the college and scout for an inexpensive place to live. After the years of chopping, ploughing, and cutting on his brother’s farm, he found the gentler village pace relaxing, the conversation varied and informed, and the food superb. Sophie truly was a genius in the kitchen. He was still profoundly uneasy about his mother’s health, however. She had the frail and fragile look that he had come to recognize as an indicator of more ill health to come. One of the reasons he had been so successful in treating animals, he realized, was his ability to sense when something wasn’t quite right with them. But he scarcely needed any special talent to know that his mother was ailing.

More of a shock to him was the realization that his father was no longer in his prime. He had always seemed invincible — as strong and unyielding as an oak tree. Now he limped a little as he walked, and when he rose from sitting for a long time he needed to steady himself for a moment before he moved further. These infirmities were a result not only of long hours in the saddle, Luke knew, but from the various injuries that Thaddeus had suffered during the course of tracking down two murderers. Near-drowning, a broken arm, and being whacked on the head with a tree branch had all left their mark. Luke hoped that both his parents had many years left to them, of course, but it was obvious that they had entered the twilight era of their years.

Wellington was a small enough village that news of Luke’s visit spread quickly, and many of his father’s friends dropped by the hotel to say hello. He had a long conversation with Dr. Keough, the local physician, who expressed approval of Luke’s choice of career and his plan for entering it.

“This country needs more good doctors,” he said. “There are a terrible passel of quacks around.” And then he launched into a long description of how the newly formed Prince Edward Medical Society had threatened prosecution against someone named Stewart who was practising medicine without a licence. Luke counted up the number of times he had attended patients himself without benefit of a licence and resolved to keep this information from becoming general knowledge.

In an attempt to divert the doctor from this long, complicated, and essentially uninteresting discourse, Luke asked about the dead body that had been found on Wellington’s shore.

“What are the physical manifestations of drowning?” he asked. He had only ever seen farm animals that had become mired in ponds, and those had been found within a day or so. He had no idea what long immersion would do to body tissue.

“It’s not a sight I’d like to see often,” the doctor replied. “The poor soul truly did look like a monster.” Then, in great detail, he described the bloating and the change in colour.

“Is there a difference in appearance between someone who died from drowning and someone who died and then was immersed in water?” Luke wasn’t sure that this distinction was in any way important, but it kept the doctor from returning to the previous topic of licensing issues.

“Not that I know of,” Keough said. “I’m not sure what difference it would make anyway. The person would be equally dead regardless.”

“Odd, the business with the clothing, though.”

“Oh yes, very odd indeed. And nothing in the pockets to point us toward an explanation. Only a piece of green ribbon, and I have no idea what, if anything, that signifies.”

Nor did Luke, but from there he was able to steer the doctor toward the latest developments in medicine, and a discussion of the current battle for public sentiment between the physicians of the traditional bent and the Thompsonians, who claimed that bleeding, blistering, poison minerals, and starving were poor substitutes for a sickbed regimen based on herbs and vegetables.

Many of Betsy’s friends came to pay their respects to Luke as well. A number of these were from the Wellington Methodist community, their visits a reflection of the esteem in which his father was held. A handful of them were of a different connection, amongst them a Mrs. Sprung, who seemed to be a regular visitor, and with whom his mother spent a great deal of time drinking tea.

Each day after the noontime dinner, Luke found himself sitting on a chair on the verandah with his father, his mother having retired for a rest and the others busy with their various tasks. Sometimes the conversation was wide-ranging; at other times they sat in a comfortable silence, their faces lifted to the ever-hotter breezes blowing in from the lake. Luke enjoyed the silent days. He wasn’t used to talking as much as had been required of him since his arrival in Wellington. For the last few years his world had been one of hasty consultation regarding which field should be cleared next, or what the price of wheat was likely to be.

His father appeared to enjoy the silence as well. They weren’t so very different, Luke reflected. No doubt Thaddeus had grown used to silence, too, on his long rides between congregations. Silence was something that could be sorely missed when it wasn’t there.

On one of these days nearly a week into his visit, Luke watched idly as a very stylish trap harnessed to a handsome horse trotted along the main street. As soon as it came into view his father sat up a little straighter. The buggy stopped in front of them, and Thaddeus stood as a very distinguished-looking man climbed down.

“Lewis! Good day to you, sir!” the man said in a booming voice.

“Mr. McFaul! Good day! I don’t believe you’ve met my son Luke.”

“Yes, yes, I’d heard he was here. Welcome to Wellington, young man.” But unlike all the other acquaintances who had come calling, McFaul seemed little interested in chatting with Luke and got straight to the point of his visit. “I meant to talk to you this morning when you were at the warehouse, Thaddeus, but I got sidetracked with a shipment that came up a little short in the counting.”

“Please, come and sit down,” Thaddeus said. “Would you have tea?”

“Haven’t time,” McFaul replied. Then he turned to Luke. “I hear you’re off to Montreal in a few days.”

Luke had no idea how this man knew his plans. He hadn’t mentioned them to anyone but the immediate family. But it was a small village, and he supposed that everyone’s business was soon common knowledge.

“Yes, I need to get myself situated before I begin college in the fall.”

“Excellent. Perhaps you’d like a little company for part of your journey?” He addressed Thaddeus again: “I have some business for you to attend to in Kingston. It appears that one of my business associates has fallen woefully behind in the payments on his mortgage. His interests were mostly in timber, I’m afraid, and of course he’s come amiss now that the market has collapsed. I need you to take an inventory of his property and register some papers with the local court. I’ll have all the details ready for you in the next day or so.”

Thaddeus nodded, but Luke could see that he was puzzled. These were evidently matters that he attended to on a regular basis as part of his arrangement with McFaul. It hardly needed a special visit in the middle of the afternoon.

“I do have something else I would like you to do while you’re there — and,” he said, turning to Luke, “you could perhaps give your father a hand. The school has been short-handed since Father McQuaig passed on.”

This reference was to the Roman Catholic boarding school, which Luke had been told was situated at Tara Hall, the magnificent brick house that McFaul had built for himself but subsequently bequeathed to the Church.

“I’d arranged for a replacement — a Father Higgins — to come from Ireland. The last I heard from him, he had successfully navigated the Atlantic and had got as far as Kingston. He should have been here days ago, but there’s no sign of him. I’d like you to track him down. If he’s fallen ill or something, you can see that he’s looked after. If he hasn’t, you can tell him to get his carcass moving.”

“If you can get the paperwork ready, I could go tomorrow,” Thaddeus offered.

“Monday or Tuesday would suit better, I think. And that would fall in with this young man’s plans, I believe. Travelling is so much more pleasant with a companion, don’t you think?” He nodded at Luke. “A pleasure to meet you, sir. Safe journeys, and perhaps our paths will cross on your next visit.” And with that he leapt into his shiny buggy and drove off.

Luke found McFaul’s manner very abrupt, and commented on it to his father.

“That’s what I like about him,” Thaddeus replied. “There’s no nonsense. He just concentrates on the task at hand.”

“I understood very little of what he said. There’s no market for timber anymore?”

“None. And I’m afraid it’s going to have repercussions here. Apparently, the bottom has fallen right out of the railway boom in Britain and now there’s not so much demand for Canadian timber. And they’ve lifted the tariffs on it as well, so even if the market recovers, a lot of people believe we’ll have to compete with the Baltic nations — Norway in particular — which, of course, we can’t do, since their shipping costs are so much lower.”

Luke had only the vaguest notion where the Baltic nations were, but gathered from what his father said that they were much closer to Britain than Canada was.

“So this gentleman in Kingston has come amiss because of developments in Britain?”

“Yes. The smart ones got out last year. But the demand has been so great that everyone else has been in the backwoods all winter cutting for all they’re worth; but now that they’ve floated the timber down to the front, there’s nowhere they can sell it.”

This was disturbing news. Canada’s most lucrative exports had always been timber and wheat, and now it appeared that neither could find a market. “I hadn’t heard about the timber. The talk in Huron was all about wheat. I know a lot of the mills built along the border are going to be in trouble. The Americans can ship directly now, so why should they bother bringing it here first?” Luke shook his head. “Did our government even point out to Britain what their free trade policies would do to us?”

“Of course not,” Thaddeus said. “It wouldn’t do any good. When has Britain ever given a second thought to our interests? Sometimes I think we should have supported Mackenzie and his rebellion after all.”

This was a surprising statement to Luke’s ears. His father had never seemed interested in politics, other than those involving the Church. Now he was talking of free trade and tariffs and markets with an authority that spoke of working knowledge. It must be Mr. McFaul’s influence, this interest in the complicated business of business.

And Luke figured that if anyone had been smart, and now stood to gain from others’ miscalculations, it was probably Archibald McFaul.

It was a tearful goodbye. The entire family, as well as a number of the hotel guests, gathered on the front porch as Luke and his father prepared to depart for the wharf, where they would board the packet steamer that offered regular service to Kingston.

Thaddeus stood aside as Betsy fussed over Luke, brushing imaginary dust from his jacket and smoothing his hair — any excuse to touch him, it seemed. Everyone shook Luke’s hand and wished him well, but just before he was able to disengage from the hugs and the handshakes and set off down the village’s main street, Francis stepped forward with a wooden box.

“This is from all of us,” he said. “I’m sure you’ll find a use for it in your studies, but perhaps you might spare a page now and then for a letter, just to let us know how you’re getting on.”

Speechless, Luke opened the box to find a steel pen, a bottle of ink, and a supply of good-quality writing paper. Stammering a thank-you, he stuffed it into his pack and promised to write.

They only just made it to the wharf in time for their departure. The whistle was blowing as they boarded, and they had barely time to settle in the passenger cabin before lines were cast off and the vessel pulled away from the dock.

“I stood in the bow the whole way from Toronto,” Luke remarked. “It seems odd to be on a ship and sitting down.”

“Why on earth would you do that?” Thaddeus asked.

“I saw one of the steamers when it came into port. It was overloaded with emigrants and a lot of them were feverish-looking. I’m not sure how malignant fever spreads, but if it comes through the air, it would make sense to stand where the wind can blow the contagion away.”

“I’ll take my chances,” Thaddeus said. “I don’t think my knee can take standing all the way to Kingston.”

Luke shrugged, but, as if to illustrate his point, a steamer heading west passed them as they pulled out into Lake Ontario. That it carried far too many passengers was evident from the way the vessel sat low in the water, and there seemed to be people festooned over every available surface. It was customary for the passengers of passing ships to wave at each other on the way by, but no hand was raised by anyone on the deck of the other boat. The passengers merely stared sullenly at the water.

“I see what you mean,” Thaddeus said. “So the question is whether it’s more dangerous to sit in the cabin where there might be a lingering contagion, or stand outside and let the wind blow it to you from any passing ship.”

“Oh,” said Luke. “I hadn’t thought of that.”

“Given that the two outcomes are equally likely, I’d rather be infected in comfort.”

This question settled between them, they lapsed into a companionable silence as the steamboat chugged down the lake.

It seemed odd to Luke to be travelling with his father beside him. They had spent so little time together when he was growing up. Thaddeus would often be gone for weeks at a time, on the miles of road he was expected to travel as a minister for the Methodist Church. It had always seemed to Luke that the entire household would be disrupted whenever his father did come home for a few days, or a few hours, or simply long enough to get a dry pair of socks. He would shout orders at them, take them to task for something that hadn’t been done to his satisfaction, and then ride away again. It would take a day or two for them all to settle again into the routine that his mother had established. Then later, when his mother had been so ill, after Luke’s sister Sarah had died, there had been no routine at all, only Thaddeus, trying to keep the household together even when he wasn’t there to make it happen.

The old man had softened later, after Sarah’s murderer had finally been caught. Something had changed in him, and although Luke had been thrilled to ride off west with his brother, there had been a part of him that had wanted to stay, to find out who this father of his was exactly. He hadn’t had the chance. And now he found that this man sitting beside him was a stranger.

Luke hoped he’d have a chance someday to change that.