Читать книгу Wishful Seeing - Janet Kellough - Страница 10

Thaddeus saw Martha and the Small family off in the hay wagon before he headed west in the wake of his triumph. He would work his way through Hamilton and Hope Townships, then carry on along the shore of Lake Ontario to Cobourg for a few days rest before he and James traded routes.

For the first hour or so a flush of exhilaration allowed him to ignore his physical discomfort. He had acquitted himself well, although in all modesty he had to admit that the Baptist minister had proved a poor opponent. Still, Thaddeus knew that his efforts could only help the church, and himself, as well. He would have many baptisms to perform and surely many marriages and confirmations and burials would follow. It was a pleasure to labour on such fertile ground. He just wished that the ground he was attempting to sow wasn’t quite so rough.

After his elation wore off, he realized that he was very tired. First there had been the journey from Cobourg to Cold Springs before his day had even really started, and then the three hours of standing on his feet, preaching. And now another long ride. When he’d first started the itinerant life so many years ago he had ridden for hours every day, and had sometimes been offered nothing more than a pile of straw as a bed at the end of it. Many a morning had begun with nothing more than a bowl of thin porridge. Soft in my old age, he thought, and yet he couldn’t help but look forward to completing his round and returning to his comfortable manse in Cobourg.

He had moments when he felt a little guilty about claiming such a large house when his assistant shared a modest cottage with his parents and four siblings. But as the senior man, Thaddeus was entitled to the benefit, and he intended to make full use of it. After years of making do in tiny houses and furnished rooms in other people’s homes, he found that he appreciated the space. He would make a start on his memoirs. He would pore through the many years of notes and records he had kept and put them in some kind of order. He would take over one upstairs room entirely as his office, so he could leave his papers and notebooks spread out over a table. And on those nights when sleep eluded him, he could rise, light a lamp, and write the story of his life.

He shifted in his saddle again to ease the ache in his knee. He carried a supply of willow tea with him now, which he brewed up on a regular basis. His son Luke had told him that it seemed to work best when used regularly and not just when his bones were rattled from the long rides. Luke had also given him a small bottle of laudanum for the really bad times, but Thaddeus didn’t like to use it unless he absolutely had to. It dulled his wits and made him careless. He needed to stay alert. One mistake with his horse and they would both be out of action. He was fortunate that the good weather had lasted this far into the year, for when the fall rains came, the ride would be muddy and treacherous.

Even so, he much preferred riding alone with no sound but that of the wind and the birds to keep him company. He was relieved to be done with the first difficult week with his assistant. Small felt obliged to supply conversation as they rode, and it had taken only a few hours for Thaddeus to tire of it. Now he could let his thoughts wander without interruption.

He found that they were wandering far too often in the direction of the Howell woman. He wasn’t sure why she unsettled him so. It was the dress, he guessed: a token of a lost time, a happier time. A memory he thought had been lost.

He wondered if he should have a word with the husband about the bruise he had seen on her arm. That could be tricky. The Howells were not members of his church. Mr. Howell was, if not an important man, at least a self-important one. He might not take kindly to an admonition from a Methodist saddlebag preacher, someone who, Thaddeus was sure, Howell regarded as a lower order of being. Besides, sometimes confrontation made things worse. But Thaddeus was sure the bruising had not been inflicted by a cow’s hoof as the woman claimed. Someone had grabbed her wrist and wrenched it, leaving the unmistakable outline of fingers in a rainbow of nasty marks. For the sake of his own conscience, he needed to try to set things right. In fact, it was his duty to do so.

Perhaps he should ask Leland Gordon about it first. Gordon said he rented land from the Howells. Maybe he would know if there had been other bruises. Or better yet, he would ask Old Mrs. Gordon, who might be more sympathetic to his inquiry. That resolved, he felt easier in his mind, if not in his body.

As he reached each meeting on his western circuit, he found that reports of The Great Baptism Debate had already spread, and that his arrival was eagerly anticipated in every instance. All of his meetings attracted new people. His services were full. Everyone wanted to hear the preacher who had acquitted himself so well, who had marshalled his knowledge of scripture and commanded a large crowd. He allowed himself to bask a little in the notoriety. His only other encounter with fame had been as a result of the apprehension of murderers. This time, people wanted to know him because of the heavenly message he delivered, and not because of some earthly derring-do. This kind of admiration was much more welcome and he allowed himself to savour it.

He scheduled extra meetings for the coming month. Small would have to pick up some of them. He hoped the junior minister could consolidate the gains he’d made, and that the people didn’t wander away again when they discovered that they wouldn’t be hearing the preacher who had verbally wrestled a Baptist to the ground.

Second only to the talk of his exploits on the speaking platform was news of the local railways. In the western part of his circuit, the conversation was all about the proposed Port Hope Railway that was intended to snake past the western end of Rice Lake to Lindsay and Peterborough. A company had been formed and a charter applied for, with construction slated to begin sometime in the next two years. Even if it was completed, the Port Hope line would face stiff competition from the Cobourg to Peterborough Railway. They both hoped to draw from the same market, and Cobourg had a head start.

Even so, Port Hope was the far more sensible proposal, as far as Thaddeus could tell. The Cobourg railway seemed to be almost entirely dependent on the integrity of the bridge across the lake, and although the contractor, a man named Zimmerman, claimed to have extensive experience with things like bridge-building and had landed contracts for an enormous number of these small railways as a result, Thaddeus couldn’t rid himself of the notion that the project was ill-fated, and that the railway mania that gripped the country would all come to naught in the end. No one had been terribly successful at building reliable roads, and he failed to see how iron rails would fare any better. Still, the province was buzzing with plans for small local railways, and a major trunk line was even now slated to inch its way from Montreal to Toronto.

As Thaddeus reached the limit of his circuit and headed east again, the conversation subtly changed. Although he was still welcomed wherever he went, he began to realize that his exploits were rather a nine-day wonder, and more of the discussions he overheard were about the difficulties that the Cobourg railway now found itself in. The problem was not with the bridge, however, but with a tract of land at the village of Sully.

“The railway company’s already started building sheds on the land and now it looks like they may not own it after all,” one man in Port Britain said. “Jack Plews is taking them to court.”

“But I thought Plews was behind in the mortgage and that’s why he sold it,” Thaddeus said. That was what the men at the camp meeting had thought.

“People say there was some sharp dealing and that D’Arcy Boulton tipped George Howell off about the plans for the land. Stands to reason, given Boulton is a director of the railway company. Anyhow, Plews intends to get some satisfaction.”

“Could be Plews didn’t really own it either,” said one toothless old man who had hobbled into the meeting on the arm of his neighbour and now sat on the bench closest to the window. “Nor Boulton neither, if it comes to that.”

“What are you talking about, Walter?” his neighbour said.

“My uncle farmed that land on shares maybe fifty, sixty years ago, but he couldn’t never get clear title for it. There was some problem.” The old man stopped and mumbled his gums while he thought about this. “Now, I just can’t quite remember the ins and outs of it, but any road, he moved on. Nice piece of property, though, right there by the lake.”

“Are you sure, Walter? I didn’t know your Uncle Albert ever farmed back at the lake.” The neighbour was obviously skeptical about the story.

“No, no, t’wasn’t Uncle Albert. It was Uncle Lem Palmer. Or maybe it was Uncle Syl. No, it musta been Uncle Lem, ’cause he was married to Aunt Harriet …”

The old man embarked on a long, complicated explanation of his family tree. The others chuckled indulgently, but Thaddeus figured the core point of the story could well be true. Land titles were tricky things in Upper Canada — proving which parcels were grants and which were purchases, which ones had fulfilled the requirements for a patent, and which had been assigned to settlers who failed to clear the requisite number of acres and therefore forfeited the land to the Crown. The Heir and Devisee Commission existed to sort it all out, but often the original records had been lost or destroyed or simply not recorded accurately. Sometimes land passed through two or three generations with no clear title in place, and a grandson might discover that he couldn’t get a mortgage on his property because his grandfather hadn’t really owned it in the first place.

Thaddeus would be surprised if the railway company hadn’t made certain of their ownership before they began to build, but then, he reflected, everything about the Cobourg railway was being done in a hurry and they may not have bothered before they began construction.

In any event, it wasn’t really any of his business and he gently tried to steer the conversation back to the original purpose of the meeting. But he did wonder what would happen to the Sully Railroad Station if Mr. Plews could make his accusations stick. He would probably just be paid off, Thaddeus guessed. The railway company appeared to have no end of funds at their disposal, so what was a little extra to make a problem go away? And that, he decided, was probably what Plews was angling for.

The road that wound its way along the shore of Lake Ontario was kept in reasonable repair, and after the conclusion of the meeting, he made good time, arriving back in Cobourg just before suppertime. He stabled and fed his horse, then walked across the yard to the manse. To his surprise, James Small was standing just inside the back porch, a pie in his hand. Martha leaned against the jamb of the door that led into the kitchen. Small seemed flustered when he saw Thaddeus.

“Mr. Lewis,” he stammered. “I’m surprised to see you so soon.”

“You too,” Thaddeus said. Small must have galloped through his appointments and galloped right home again.

“Mother’s just sent over an apple pie,” Small said, whisking away the cloth that covered the pan and holding it out for Thaddeus to see, as if he had been challenged somehow about what he was carrying and needed to justify his presence.

“Excellent!” Thaddeus said. A pie was always a welcome thing.

“Thank you, Mr. Small,” Martha said and reached for the pan. “And tell your mother I’m very much obliged.”

Small nodded at her, and then at Thaddeus, before he stumbled out the door.

Thaddeus kicked off his boots and followed Martha into the kitchen. “What was that all about?”

She sighed. “That’s twice now he’s made an excuse to come over here. It’s a nuisance really, except that both times he brought something — first a box of kindling, and now a pie.”

“Ah, I see.” Apparently James Small had taken a fancy to Martha. “Is this going to be a problem?” She seemed not just indifferent to, but downright annoyed by, the young man’s attentions. “Should I speak to him?”

“I don’t think so,” Martha said. “I haven’t given him the slightest encouragement. Nor will I.” She giggled a little. “Have you noticed that his Adam’s apple bobs up and down when he talks? I can’t help staring at it, and then I miss what he’s saying to me.”

She was right. It did. Thaddeus had become mesmerized by it once or twice himself. He hoped Small wouldn’t be too insistent and that there would be no hard feelings over Martha’s rejection. It could make their working relationship awkward if Small took offence, or persisted in spite of her discouragement.

“Besides,” Martha went on, “he’s old.”

Thaddeus laughed. “He’s twenty-three!”

Martha looked at him solemnly. “And I’m fifteen. Far too young to have any young man coming to the door, much less an old one of twenty-three.”

“That’s absolutely correct, my dear.” He knew he was being teased, but he did wonder again if he had taken on more than he bargained for.

“Anyway, I hadn’t expected to see you quite so soon,” she said. “I was going to melt some cheese on some bread and call that my supper.”

“That sounds fine, if we can have some of that pie for dessert.”

“I’ll brew some tea for you first.”

Thaddeus walked over to the kitchen table and pulled out a chair, but was suddenly struck with the realization that something was different. It took him a few moments to work out what it was.

“Did you put different curtains in here?” he asked. The window had been draped in a worn and yellowed fabric that blocked most of the light. Now only the bottom pane was covered, and with a far lighter material.

“Yes. Those came from the back bedroom. They washed up better than the ones that were there, so I switched them. It’s lovely in the morning — the sun pours in through that window.”

“Good idea,” he said. It was something that would never have occurred to him to do. “They look nice.”

He sat down and reached for the newspapers that Martha had left on the table. He had seen only one or two papers in the days he had been away, and then he had not been able to do anything more than glance at them. It would have been rude to do otherwise in someone else’s home; he was expected to make polite conversation, to comment on the fineness of the meal, and to lead the family in prayer, not sit with his nose stuck in their reading material. Now he looked forward to a steaming cup of tea and a bite to eat, all consumed while devouring the latest news and the commentary on it. It was a luxury to take the papers, but one that he was reluctant to forego.

The Cobourg Star had only a brief article on the matter of the Plews lawsuit, stating only the barest of the details. Thaddeus wondered what the Sully neighbourhood was making of the whole affair. George Howell was not a particularly popular figure to begin with, apparently, and his seemingly unscrupulous land deal seemed to have uncovered a tangled web of questions, none of which had been answered by the newspaper. It didn’t seem to matter, as far as the town fathers were concerned. Thaddeus discovered in a second article that they were prepared to pour another forty thousand pounds of municipal money into the railway project, and in a third, that they had unveiled plans to build a substantial town hall to reflect the glory that would soon be Cobourg’s. This seemed rash to Thaddeus. Better to wait and see whether the bridge fell down and the lines heaved first.

Bemused, he turned to the next page, which featured the international news. Trouble was brewing on the Crimean Peninsula, and it looked as though France and England were prepared to go to war with Russia in a complicated dispute that somehow involved the rights of Christians in Jerusalem. Although this was something that Thaddeus was all in favour of, his understanding was that the city was controlled by the Ottoman Empire, and he couldn’t quite follow the article well enough to discover how so many other countries had become embroiled in the dispute. The Crimea was nowhere near Jerusalem. Or at least he didn’t think it was. Just another of Britain’s imperial squabbles, he decided, and unlikely to affect Canada. He leafed through the paper looking for reading that was a little less taxing, but he had exhausted the intellectual offerings of The Star. The rest of the paper was filled with social news and advertisements.

He reached for the Toronto Globe. Tucked beneath it was a small volume. Uncle Tom’s Cabin or Life Among the Lowly, he read. It was a popular novel, he knew, a tale that exposed the evils of slavery.

“Is this yours?” he asked.

Martha glanced at the book. “Oh, that’s where it went. Yes, it’s mine now, I suppose. One of the guests left it at the hotel, but we couldn’t ever figure out who it belonged to, so father gave it to me.”

“Have you read it?”

“About five times. Whenever I get tired of the papers and don’t have anything new to read, I go back to my old favourites.”

Thaddeus was surprised. “You read the newspapers?”

“Yes, of course. They’re here anyway. You needn’t bother reading them yourself. Just ask me what you want to know and I’ll tell you all about it.” She set his tea in front of him.

“Can you explain the situation in the Crimea?”

“Nobody can explain the situation in the Crimea. There is no explanation.”

“That was my conclusion as well.”

She laughed and returned to cooking their makeshift meal.

He was impressed by her, but he tried not to let it show as he once again buried his nose in the day’s news.