Читать книгу Wishful Seeing - Janet Kellough - Страница 7

Thaddeus shifted his weight into a more comfortable position as he waited impatiently for his assistant, James Small, to find a way around the knot of construction that blocked the road ahead. Upper Canadian summers could certainly be steamy at times, but August had ushered in an unusually long stretch of very high temperatures, making travel uncomfortable and enclosed spaces unbearable, and there was no sign of any relief to come.

The aggravation and discomfort of heat and travel were made worse by the delays he encountered whenever his route took him near the rail line construction. It was tempting to believe that the surveyor had deliberately laid the route out in such a way as to cross Cobourg Creek as many times as it possibly could, solely for the purpose of annoying travellers, but Thaddeus knew that the route had been designed to skirt along the bottoms of hills and run as levelly as possible for as far as possible before it had to tackle the steep climb to Rice Lake. The local newspaper had been full of breathless articles detailing the route, the method of construction, and the extraordinary benefits the Cobourg to Peterborough Railway would bring to the entire community.

For the umpteenth time that day Thaddeus pulled out his handkerchief and mopped away the sweat on his face. He was beginning to wonder if he had made the right decision when he’d accepted this appointment. He had been of two minds about taking any posting at all when Bishop Smith offered Hope as a reward for having been so obliging about the Yonge Street Circuit.

“The meetings are already well established on Hope,” the Bishop had said in his usual persuasive manner. “There’s strong support in the whole district. It’s not nearly the challenge that Yonge was.”

Thaddeus knew it was a plum, but he was also familiar with the geography of the district. The villages along the shore of Lake Ontario were easily reached, but a rolling landscape climbed steeply from the swampy ground around Cobourg to the oak plains at Rice Lake. There would be an endless progression of steep rises and deep valleys, sudden descents into little dales followed by precipitous climbs up a series of never-ending hills. If he took the posting, he would have to cover it on horseback rather than in the buggy he had grown so used to on Yonge Street.

He protested that he couldn’t stand up to that kind of punishment anymore. He was old and had grown soft after two years of riding in a cart and dining a little too well at his son’s table in Yorkville. Bishop Smith listened to him politely, and then offered the enticement of an assistant, a man named James Small, a young probationer not experienced enough for his own circuit yet, but certainly qualified enough to lead prayer meetings.

“You can limit your appointments, if you like,” Smith said. “Take as many rest days as you need and let your assistant do the bulk of the work.”

And then he threw out the clincher. The circuit came with a comfortable manse, a four-bedroom house with a garden and a good barn for his horse.

In the end, Thaddeus agreed, but only for a year. He had no other prospects in sight anyway, and he wasn’t entirely sure what he would do instead if he turned the appointment down.

Now, as heavy lumber carts clogged the roads and churned up the dust, he was becoming exasperated and wondered if he had made a mistake. He was in a hurry. He and Small had agreed that it would be best to make an inaugural tour of the circuit together, and circumstances played nicely into this plan when a farmer in Haldimand Township offered the use of an enclosed field for a camp meeting. Given the continuing fairness of the weather, it was likely to draw a large crowd. All of the Methodist Episcopal ministers within riding distance had been invited to speak, and as an old hand at camp meetings, Thaddeus was offered four stints on the platform. It was a splendid opportunity for an initial introduction. But only if he could get there.

He shifted in the saddle again and fanned his face with his hat. He wondered how the men on the railway crews could bear such hard physical labour in such high temperatures. They were well paid, he knew. There had been an advertisement in the Cobourg Star offering a dollar a day in wages. Even so, most of the workmen were immigrant German or Irish, and Thaddeus could hear guttural tones clashing with Celtic lilts as the workers called to one another. Few local men were willing to put in the ten or twelve hours a day of back-breaking effort required to build the railway. They could make better coin from supplying the enormous quantity of timber and gravel that was needed, or from selling food to the store that fed the crews. But the one thing they all agreed on was that, once built, the railway would bring them enormous riches, whether it was from working on it, supplying it, or investing in it.

As annoyed as he was by the delay, Thaddeus had to admit that he was fascinated by the construction. While he waited for Small, he watched a work crew scrape away at the roadbed, levelling the soil in preparation for a second crew who would lay down wooden ties to cushion the iron rails. It was not unlike the way a plank road was built, he realized. One of these ran from Cobourg to Gores Landing to connect with the steamers that crossed Rice Lake to Peterborough, but there was constant complaint about the condition it was in. The planks that had been laid across the boggy lowland parts of the road refused to stay put. Every winter the frost heaved and twisted them and every spring the road was found to be nearly unusable. No one seemed able to say for certain that the same thing wouldn’t happen to the rail line, but if the amount of soil that was being moved was anything to go by, it should be able to withstand the worst of winters.

Off to the east, Thaddeus could see a crew of workmen excavating a small hill. They shovelled piles of earth into wagons that lumbered their loads over to the sides of the roadbed to reinforce the abutments. Half the hill had been hauled away, and the men were still digging. Thaddeus wondered if he and Small should try to pick their way through the excavation, but just then a wagon finally got itself turned around and out of the way, and one of the workers waved at Thaddeus to ride through the small gap that opened as a consequence. He was relieved. If they made good time from here, they could still arrive at their destination with a few minutes to spare.

By the time Thaddeus and James Small finally arrived at the farmer’s field, the entrance laneway was jammed with carts, horses, and pedestrians, a circumstance that boded well for the success of the meeting. There were some within the church who maintained that camp meetings were a thing of the past, that the day of the circuit-riding preacher was over, and that people were settling into a pattern of staying put and looking to their own neighbourhoods for their spiritual sustenance, but the presence of so many people so early on the first day seemed to belie these naysayers. In Thaddeus’s experience, camp meetings started slowly and gained momentum as they went on, finally reaching a crescendo on the third day.

And when he mounted the speaking platform later that afternoon, he could see knots of tents and campfires around the entire periphery of the field. Whole families had come and appeared prepared to camp out for the duration.

The response to his message was enthusiastic, a sign that the excitement would continue to build until it reached a frenzy of confession and conversion. At the end of his sermon, Thaddeus turned the meeting over to Elias Knight, who would exhort the crowd to come forward until he judged the time was ripe to lead them into a hymn.

Thaddeus’s duties for that afternoon were over. He would return to speak twice on the second day, and once more on the third, but in the meantime he was free to circulate through the campground and meet with people individually. Besides, he was hungry, and hoped that somewhere he might find a familiar face and a bowl of soup.

There was the usual mob of peddlers and vendors set up amongst the wagons. Some of them cooked food in quantity over open campfires and served it up to those disinclined to cook for themselves. Others sold trinkets and patent medicines, and, as was usual at camp meetings, prayer books and small Bibles. The scene always reminded Thaddeus of the moneychangers in the temple, and he wondered if the church shouldn’t clear these out just like Jesus had; but then he reflected that the crowd had to be fed somehow. There were always a number who needed to be physicked, he supposed, and if a sinner were brought to the Lord during the preaching, who was Thaddeus to say that they shouldn’t follow it up with the purchase of a Bible, just to help make it stick?

He walked slowly through the crowd, trying to make a rough count of the number of people in attendance. He first noticed the woman because of her dress. It was a cotton print with a blue background and a scattering of tiny pink and yellow flowers. Long ago he had been paid for a christening with a bolt of cloth that had much the same kind of pattern. At the time, he knew he should have taken it to a store and traded it for something useful like sugar or tea, but something had stopped him. He carried it home to his wife, Betsy, instead, and was rewarded when her eyes lit up. She had fashioned it into a dress for herself, and looked as pretty as a flower in it. Odd that he should remember such a detail after so many years.

Or maybe it was the slight limp that triggered the memory. Betsy had limped a little whenever a storm was coming, a relic of the dreadful bouts of fever she’d suffered. But except for the dress and the small hitch in her gait, the woman walking through the camp meeting was as unlike Betsy as it was possible to imagine. She was very fair, a knot of golden hair showing under her bonnet, and quite small, or at least she seemed so because she was so slight. She was arm in arm with a gentleman who had impressive mutton-chop whiskers and wore a silk hat. They seemed an odd couple to be at a Methodist camp meeting. Their clothes were just a little too fine-looking, their manner just a little grand. They stopped at one of the peddler’s wagons and spoke to a man who was hawking patent medicines. Whatever they said appeared to find favour, as some sort of transaction took place while Thaddeus looked on.

A knot of men standing in front of one of the campfires to Thaddeus’s right appeared to be deep in conversation, but he noticed one of them glance up at the couple, a sour expression on his face. Thaddeus edged a little closer, hoping someone in the group might mention something about the pair, but at first their talk seemed to be all about the railway.

“They’ve started work on the bridge already,” one man said. “They’ve brought in a pile driver. It’s something to see, I’ll tell you. I wasted the whole day yesterday watching them raise a post.”

The railway was to run all the way across Rice Lake to Peterborough so that timber and other products from the north could be hauled directly to Cobourg harbour. Thaddeus had his doubts about the project. No one had ever before built a trestle bridge that long. And if frost heave was a problem for a plank road, what would the ice do to the wooden poles that supported the bridge? He didn’t want to be caught eavesdropping, however, so he refrained from offering his opinion.

He was about to walk away when he heard one of the men say, “Jack Plews is pretty sour that he lost his land just when it turned out to be so valuable.”

Thaddeus knew that this wasn’t really any of his business, except that he tried to stay alert to potential sources of contention within his congregation. Generally speaking, neighbourhood issues tended to be petty little disputes that nevertheless could boil up into rancour, poisoning entire meetings and destroying the work that the church had accomplished. He needed to be ready at all times to calm the waters and suggest compromise. He took a step closer, hoping to hear more details of this land sale that was exciting comment.

“I thought he was behind on the mortgage?”

“He was. He thought it was a good deal when the Major offered to buy him out.” The speaker gestured toward the man in the silk hat. “And then it turns out that’s where they want to put the train station. If Jack had just held out a few more months, he could’ve got top dollar.”

“The Major is pretty thick with Boulton, isn’t he? He must have heard where the station was going to go and that’s why he bought it.”

The first man shrugged. “I don’t know what anybody can do about it. Jack sold it fair and square, didn’t he?”

“Yeah, he did. But it still doesn’t seem right somehow.”

“I expect when the dust settles, you’ll find that a lot of people have made good coin selling land to the railroad. And none of them will be the ordinary farmers like Jack.”

The men were slowly moving off in the direction of the platform as they talked. Thaddeus could scarcely follow them without it being obvious that he was listening, so he let them go on and walked toward the gate instead.

“Mr. Lewis!” He was hailed by a friendly-looking man who had set up a camp just inside the entrance to the grounds. As Thaddeus walked over to it he caught the aroma of cooking and noticed that steam was wafting up from the iron pot hanging from a makeshift tripod.

The man held out his hand. “Leland Gordon,” he said, “and this is my mother, Patience Gordon. We haven’t met you yet, but I’m the lay preacher at the Sully meeting. We’ll be seeing you there in a few days, I expect.”

The mother, Patience, was ancient, her back so bent that she could scarcely lift her head to greet him, but her face broke into a wreath of smiling wrinkles. “I hoped we would get a chance to hear you speak today,” she said, “to try you out a bit before we heard you at our own place.”

“And how did I do?” Thaddeus asked with a grin.

“Splendidly. I could hear every word. I must say, we have all been happy to have you come to this circuit. The last man we had was a little dry.”

Thaddeus’s predecessor had been Calvin Merritt, who was known to have a weak voice, to perspire heavily, and to stutter in moments of stress.

“We all serve God in our own ways,” he said. “Some of us have been blessed with better lungs, that’s all.”

“We have stew,” Mr. Gordon said. “Would you have a bowl?”

Thaddeus accepted gratefully, and leaned against the Gordons’ wagon while he ate his late dinner.

“This is a grand turnout for the meeting,” Old Mrs. Gordon said. “Mind you, it’s been so hot I expect everyone jumped at the chance to camp out; but still, you must be pleased.”

“I am. It’s a grand occasion to meet you all. And, as you say, it’s perfect weather for an outdoor meeting.”

“Is it the comet, do you think, that’s causing the heat? Some say it’s an omen.”

A strange ball of light had first appeared in the evening sky at the beginning of the month, near the southern part of the Great Bear, its long brilliant tail trailing behind it. Its appearance had caused a great deal of speculation and not a little alarm.

“No, from what I’ve read it’s a perfectly natural occurrence,” Thaddeus said. “Soon it will travel on to another part of the heavens and then we won’t be able to see it so easily. I doubt it’s a harbinger of evil times to come, but no one seems to know if it affects the weather or not. I suppose it’s possible.”

“It would be nice if it gave us a mild winter,” the old woman said. “My rheumatism would thank it.”

Just then, the woman in the familiar dress caught Thaddeus’s eye again. He watched as the couple walked past the Gordons’ camp, in the direction of the entrance gate.

“Who is that?” Thaddeus asked, hoping that the Gordons could supply him with a few more details about the pair. “I heard someone call him ‘the Major.’”

Now that he could see the woman more closely, his impression was confirmed that, although the pattern of her dress was similar to Betsy’s, the material was of a far finer quality, and had been fashioned into a skirt with several flounces — more stylish, he supposed, than the plain dress his wife had made.

“The Major and his wife?” Mrs. Gordon said. “I must say, I’m surprised to see them here. Not their sort of thing at all.”

“What is he major of, exactly?” Thaddeus asked. The man’s coat was well cut and of a good-quality broadcloth, but he was in ordinary street clothes, not a uniform that would denote a commission in any of the British regiments stationed in Canada.

Gordon laughed. “Oh, I don’t know that George Howell is really a major of anything. That’s just what everyone calls him. He was in the British Army years ago, or so he says, and came out here to settle in the thirties. He has a farm south of us, but he doesn’t seem to farm it, hard work being beneath him and all. I rent a couple of his fields for wheat.”

“Now, now, it takes all kinds. There’s no call to be uncharitable,” Old Mrs. Gordon chided.

Thaddeus knew the type. A large number of English settlers had immigrated to the district in the 1820s and ’30s. Cobourg itself, and much of the land around Rice Lake, was full of them. The English farmers who had come from small holdings in the old country made a great success of their Canadian farms, but some of the settlers had been half-pay officers unable to live in England on the pensions they were awarded in the wake of the Peninsular War. These former military officers were unsuited to pioneering, and many of them fled to the haven of government appointments and favours. Those left behind on their bush farms seemed to have survived on little more than boxes from home and loans from their neighbours, all the while sniffing at the “Yankeefied manners” that flavoured Upper Canada.

Leland Gordon was unchastened by his mother’s words. “I’ve nothing against Ellen Howell,” he said. “She’s pleasant enough, and neighbourly, but the Major seems to think we should all be tugging our forelocks when he passes by. It’s a good thing he’s seldom home. I can ignore him on the few occasions when he is around.”

“I feel sorry for her,” Mrs. Gordon said. “The English seem to want to stick to themselves, but with the Major gone so much, she seldom sees anybody.”

Thaddeus was curious. “If the Major doesn’t farm, what does he do? Something in the government?”

Gordon shrugged. “No, some sort of business, he claims, although I’ve never heard what exactly. He seems to travel in some pretty high circles — well, high for around here, at any rate. Mayor Perry is a friend, apparently. D’Arcy Boulton. He prefers to associate with people like that — or with other Englishmen who used to be somebody.”

Thaddeus knew the names. D’Arcy Boulton was a lawyer who had settled in Cobourg and built a large house, a mansion, really, that was called “The Lawn.” You couldn’t spend much time in the area without hearing about D’Arcy Boulton. I wonder what the Howells are doing here? he thought.

A British officer who hobnobbed with the mayor of Cobourg and the Boultons was most likely to be an Anglican, and Thaddeus knew there were not many of those present. Almost every other denomination had been drawn to the campground, whether out of a genuine interest or the promise of a fine entertainment, but the movers and shakers of business and government usually disdained Methodist affairs. Especially Methodist Episcopal ones. It didn’t matter one way or the other why the Howells had come, he supposed, but he had to admit he was curious.

He had just handed his bowl back to Mrs. Gordon when a commotion erupted at the gate. Three wagons arrived at once and were jockeying to gain entrance to the grounds. One of the horses balked and stood stubbornly at the gate, blocking the way of the other two, who were growing restless at the delay. As Thaddeus hurried toward them, one of them reared and whinnied.

Thaddeus grabbed the halter of the first horse. “Come on, girl, come on,” he said softly, and then slowly led her through the gateposts and into the field.

“Thank you,” said the man who was at the reins. “She’s an ornery beast. I couldn’t get her to budge.”

“Sometimes they just need a little coaxing. Where are you from?”

“Bailieboro. We heard about the meeting and decided to come along.” The man’s brow furrowed and he looked a little worried. “We’re not Methodists, though, we’re Presbyterians. I hope you don’t mind that we’re here. Everyone seemed very excited about the meeting and we don’t get much edification where we are.”

Thaddeus beamed at the man. “You don’t have to be a member of our church to come to any of our meetings. We’re very happy to share the Word with anyone who cares to hear.” He was delighted. Bailieboro was a long way away, but news of the meeting had obviously reached beyond the Hope Circuit. Bishop Smith was right. There was a lot of support in this district.

People continued to pour into the farmer’s field for the rest of the day. Thaddeus was particularly pleased to hear that a number of the Wesleyan Methodists from nearby Alderville had chosen to attend, not only many of the Indians who attended the school there, but their teachers as well. Besides the Wesleyans, there were apparently contingents of Baptists and Lutherans, along with the usual groups of backsliders and nothingarians who had come along merely for the outing.

Well, Thaddeus thought, now that they’re here, I’ll give them a preaching they won’t forget.

Over the course of the second day, droves of people came up to the platform and fell to their knees. After a hurried consultation amongst all of the speakers, it was decided that the circumstances called for extra prayer meetings. As a senior preacher, and one of the most popular speakers, Thaddeus was asked to lead these.

He chose a corner of the field well away from the distractions of the main platform. As news of the informal meeting spread through the campground, he was gratified to see a number of people streaming toward him. One young man, who had spread a blanket out and sat on the ground directly in front of Thaddeus, spoke up: “Could you talk to us about Baptism, sir?”

Those sitting around him nodded in agreement. Many of the camp meeting converts were apparently anxious on this account, having never encountered an opportunity to formalize their membership in any church. Thaddeus agreed, but delayed the start of the meeting until it appeared that everyone who was interested had found a place to sit where they could easily hear him. To his surprise, the woman with the flowered dress slipped to a place beside the Gordons. What was her name? Howell. Ellen Howell, that was it. There was no sign of her silk-hatted husband.

Thaddeus stood up a little straighter, and quietly cleared his throat once or twice while he waited for the crowd to settle. He was showing off a little, he knew he was, but he wasn’t entirely sure why he was so anxious to make a good impression.

Just as he was about to begin speaking, he became aware of a stir at the back of the crowd. A late arrival, a small man with grizzled hair and a Bible under his arm, jostled others as he stepped closer to the front.

There were a few mutters of complaint, but Thaddeus ignored them, instead inviting everyone to join him in singing “Come, Let Us to the Lord Our God,” feeding the lines to those who didn’t know the hymn and counting on the Methodists to carry the tune.

As the last notes died away, he began to speak.

“The Gospel of Matthew tells us, Jesus came and spake unto them, saying ‘All power is given to me in heaven and in earth. Go ye therefore and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost’.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Thaddeus could see the man with the Bible attempting to gain the front row, to the annoyance of the people he was pushing out of the way. This sometimes happened when someone was seized by the Holy Spirit and was moved to come forward and confess for all to hear. But generally not so early in the meeting, and this man didn’t have the usual rapturous appearance of the suddenly saved. He just looked determined to get closer.

Thaddeus ignored him and continued. “And the Gospel of John confirms the direction: Jesus said ‘Verily, verily I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the Kingdom of God. Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the Kingdom of God.’”

“Born again of water!” The man’s voice floated over the crowd, and Thaddeus suddenly knew who he was and what he was trying to do. He was a disrupter — someone who had come along to do nothing more than disrupt the Methodist meeting with some other creed’s point of view. And since he had been speaking specifically about the rite of baptism, Thaddeus knew that this man must come from one of the denominations that supported full immersion.

“Shush!” one woman shouted in the man’s direction, but a murmur rippled through the rest of the worshippers. This was entertainment that they had not anticipated, and they were eager to hear how Thaddeus would respond.

He decided to meet the challenge head on, and instead of continuing with the words that Jesus spoke to his apostles, went instead to a verse from Numbers.“But the man that shall be unclean and shall not purify himself, that soul shall be cut off from among the congregation, because he hath defiled the sanctuary of the Lord. The water of separation hath not been sprinkled upon him. He is unclean.”

“You must read your Bible more carefully,” the man shouted. “Pay special attention to the passages concerning John the Baptist.”

“I would be happy to,” Thaddeus said, and continued with the verses concerning the baptism of Christ. “The water is symbolic of the new life that God grants us as we join the church community,” he explained to the rapt faces in front of him. “It is representative of your covenant with God.”

The gathered crowd appeared content with this, but the Baptist (for he must surely be a Baptist) took no part in the singing and praying that followed.

Just as the meeting was ending, the man stepped forward a pace or two and spoke again. He hoisted the Bible he was carrying into the air so all could see, and then he laid it next to his heart. “I love this book above all books,” he said, “and I esteem it above all others. It is the Book of Books. My good friend here,” the man went on, “relies upon the King James version of this Book of Books, as I am convinced that he knows nothing of Greek or Latin.”

Several heads turned toward Thaddeus to ascertain whether or not this was true. He shrugged. There was no disputing the fact that he knew no classical languages.

“I, however,” the man said, “thank the Good Lord that I have the knowledge to read the original Greek and Latin for myself, and I can tell you that this Bible, this Protestant Bible, has been translated wrongly.”

A gasp went up. This was heresy.

“I challenge you to meet with me and I will prove to you that immersion is the direct and only mode of baptism established by Our Lord Jesus Christ.”

At this point Thaddeus responded. “That’s a very interesting proposition,” he said. “I would be delighted to meet with you in debate. But I suggest that our meeting should not take place in some corner somewhere, but rather in full view. With witnesses.”

The crowd murmured their approval of this plan.

“I will be at the hall in Cold Springs this coming Sunday, and I would be more than willing to give you a place on my platform; provided, of course,” here Thaddeus fixed the man with a stern stare, “you can give proof to your claims. Do I understand you correctly? You are saying that you will prove that Our Lord intended baptism to be a rite of full immersion?”

The man hesitated a little in the face of this direct challenge. “I will try to prove it,” he said.

Thaddeus grinned. “Oh yes, sir, you can try all you like. I look forward to it. Next Sunday. At the Cold Springs meeting.”

The crowd gave a collective gasp and then erupted in cheers. This was so much more than they had bargained for, a battle of preachers with themselves the referees. The Baptist minister looked a little crestfallen. He had no doubt hoped that a debate would take place on the spot, but Thaddeus had far too much experience to fall into the trap. If he engaged in argument at this point, it would appear that he had lost control of the meeting. Besides, news of a lively debate would spread through the neighbourhood and perhaps draw far more people.

He ended the meeting with a prayer, as planned. Having failed to stir any trouble, the Baptist minister wandered off at the end of it.

The rest of the crowd pushed forward to speak to Thaddeus, to shake his hand, some of them just to reach out and touch him. Knowing how important this personal contact was, he tried to take the time to speak to each one. And when they had all drunk their fill of him, he looked for Mrs. Gordon and the woman in the flowered dress, but they were nowhere to be seen.