Death in Salem (31 page)

Mrs. Baldwin rose to her feet and put her plate in the dishpan. She took the steaming kettle from over the fire and poured the hot water over the dishes inside. “Well, Mr. Rees, unless you can fly, you can't reach Hulls Cove any faster than four hours. Not even on a galloping horse. And I would guess neither of those cobs in the barn are fast, even if they are broken to the saddle.”

“Peggy can't travel any faster than you,” Lydia murmured, “and they still have to load the ship.”

Rees hesitated and then accepted the pie Lydia handed him. He sat down and began eating hurriedly.

“You'll want to find an inn for the night,” Mrs. Baldwin suggested.

Rees involuntarily shook his head. He needed to be in Salem, where the Boothes were. He always found this point of an investigation difficult, when time was short and he needed to press his sources for final answers and everything took too long. “I'll walk up to the ropewalk,” he said, “and speak to Billy. If he doesn't have the map, maybe someone there will be able to offer me some directions.” He scraped his plate clean and left.

He half-walked, half-trotted in a kind of jumping limp northeast to the ropewalk. His thigh hurt but he couldn't baby himself, not now with so much at stake. In Dugard, his hometown, his speedy and uneven gait would have occasioned comment, but here, in busy Salem, few paid Rees any attention. He reached the ropewalk in less than twenty minutes and poked his head inside. Billy was turning the wheel that took up the hemp cables for all he was worth. Rees stepped inside and sidled up the building wall toward Billy.

“Hey, you,” one of the older men called to Rees. “What are you doing in here?”

“Sorry,” Rees said. “But I need to speak to Billy. It's urgent.”

“You can wait until he takes his dinner?”

Rees hurriedly crossed the floor, cursing the man for wasting these precious minutes. “I told you,” he said impatiently, “this is important. It has to do with Jacob Boothe's murder.” The man's brown eyebrows, as thick and fuzzy as caterpillars, crawled up his forehead. Although younger than Rees, the gentleman's brown hair was retreating backward across his head. In the warm close air of the ropewalk, his bald pate was spangled with perspiration. “I need one minute only with Billy,” Rees promised. “Unless you can offer me a map of the Salem Harbor and surrounding coves.” The man's eyebrows climbed even higher, and he threw a look behind him as though expecting a map to spring up by magic.

“All right. Ask your question of Mr. Baldwin. But one minute only.”

Rees turned and hastened across the floor to Billy. The boy eyed Rees in trepidation. “It's not my mother, is it?”

“No. She told me she gave your father's map to you. Do you still have it?”

“Of course. It's one of the few things I have from him.”

“Where is it? I desperately need to examine a map.”

“In my room. Nailed to one side of the clothespress.” Billy, his eyes widening in sudden excitement, lowered his voice. “Is this to do with Mr. Boothe's murder?”

“Yes, it is,” Rees said, also in a whisper.

“Take it then,” Billy said. “But you must promise you'll tell me the entire tale when it's done.”

Rees nodded his promise. He turned and, shouting a thank-you to Billy's supervisor, he left.

The salty breeze from the water felt cool and refreshing after the few minutes inside and quickly dried the perspiration on Rees's face and back. He paused for a few seconds to look at the far end of the ropewalk, on a wharf that protruded far into the cove. Rees could see the bluish smudges of land on the other side of Collins Cove and wondered if one of those spits of land shielded Hulls Cove. With a ship, the coast to the north would be easily accessed.

Rees turned and, with a rapid limp, hurried back home.

Mrs. Baldwin and Lydia were waiting for him. “What did he say?” Mrs. Baldwin said.

“Does he have the map?” Lydia asked at the same moment.

“In his room,” Rees replied. Mrs. Baldwin cast a wary eye upon the shop in the front, but led the way up the stairs. Billy's room was across the hall from Rees's and overlooked the street out front. She threw open the door.

They found the map, old and stained and ripped in several places, nailed to the clothespress as Billy had promised. Rees peered at it. Now he understood why the journey would take so long by road: a rider must first travel west, then north, to avoid the coves and inlets that gave the coast its ragged appearance. He carefully detached the map, producing two additional tears in the corners, and rolled it up. He was already thinking ahead to the supplies he would need for the journey.

*   *   *

It was after four before Rees got on the road, but Amos was fresh and willing to travel at a smart pace; Rees hoped to reach Hulls Cove before dark. The first leg out of Salem did not go as rapidly as he expected. Traffic, mainly farmers on their way home, choked the road. But once Rees turned north, the number of fellow travelers diminished rapidly and he was able to increase his speed. Amos adopted a steady trot that ate up the miles.

Rees lost some time twice. He had to stop by the side of the road and, in the long rays of sun slanting over his shoulder from the west, study the map. Although Hulls Cove was clearly marked, none of the roads were, and he had to guess what would be the most rapid route.

By about seven the small farms through which he had been traveling gave way to a hamlet of about fifteen cottages. He could smell the sea and when he began descending the ridge he saw the inlet. Shallops and other fishing vessels dotted the harbor. The one wharf held a building Rees suspected was devoted to the processing of cod, although no one was working there now.

Rees stopped an old man and asked him the way to Hulls Cove and, if he knew, to the Hull farm. “Keep going,” the old man said, using his thumb to mark the direction. Rees's heart sank. His back hurt and his hands were stiff and cramped from his clutch upon the reins. “You can see the house from the road. Old white house with a widow's walk.” Rees wondered if this man with the grizzled beard could tell him more, but Rees didn't have the time to question him. The sun would set in a little more than an hour.

The distance to the house proved much longer than Rees expected, and the sun was rapidly dropping to the horizon when he finally spotted the square white box with the widow's walk on the roof. Even from the road, the building looked in poor shape, almost derelict. Rees turned Amos down the dirt lane, the green ground marked by wagon wheels, and smacked the reins down upon the horse's flanks. But Amos was tired. Although he jumped ahead, his gait soon slowed to a walk.

The road bent left, approaching the house. There were no lights and no activity, although Rees spotted a horse in the stable. A rough path led away from the house, down the slope toward the water. Rees jumped out of the buggy and groaned. He was stiff, and besides, his bruised thigh still ached. He hid both horse and buggy behind the stable, where the shadow made them invisible.

From the top of the cliff Rees could see the
India Princess
anchored out in the deeper water. Two dories were approaching the ship; a third had just left the beach below. The first two rode low in the water, laden heavy with cargo, but the third was filled with men. Rees broke into a rough trot upon the path but, as it wound down the steep cliff to the rocky beach below, he had to slow down. The surface was weak, the dirt slid away beneath him, and he half fell. Scrambling to his feet, he ran across the short beach shouting. He wasn't sure the occupants of the final boat could even see him; the beach was dark in the shadow of the cliff. But Rees could clearly see the occupants of the boats, outlined against the sun-streaked water.

Philippe Benoit was identifiable by the gold earrings glittering through his long wavy black hair. Rees ran forward, yelling. “Captain Benoit.” The boat was already too far out in the water for Rees to reach, even if he were an accomplished swimmer. Benoit lifted a small glittering object—Rees thought it was a pistol, but the man next to him put a restraining hand upon his arm. Was that John Hull? Rees focused upon that figure. Lydia's hints came together in his head. He shouted tentatively, “Peggy?” She turned her head, and her long blond braid blew in the wind. Rees stared through the twilight. It was definitely Peggy, dressed in a man's jacket and neck cloth, and presumably breeches, although Rees couldn't see them. She must have been John Hull all along. She was barely recognizable. Now he understood why her room smelled of starch and why Benoit had described a speech impediment. She'd applied a fake beard and mustache, sticking them on with starch, to disguise her gender. She waved an arm. And, although Rees couldn't see her expression, he imagined she was smiling.

 

Chapter Twenty-nine

Rees came to a halt on the pebbled beach. For some reason he did not understand, all he could think about just now was his sister Caroline. Her hair was brown instead of blond, and she was already married with children, so Rees could not picture her joining the crew of a merchant ship. But just like Peggy, Caroline had always been headstrong. Rees wished he'd been kinder to her, and promised himself he would be in the future.

The first two boats reached the
India Princess
and, shortly after, the third. Rees watched the men swarm on board. Peggy was indistinguishable from the rest. Soon both Benoit and Peggy would disappear. Depending on where they chose to sail, they might not return home for three or four years. Or more.

Rees swallowed. He did not relish returning to Salem and informing William that his sister had not only run away, but that she was in the company of the man suspected of murdering her father. And that maybe Peggy herself might have had something to do with her father's death.

Rees turned and retraced his steps back to the cliff. Although there were two clefts side by side in the wall, a quick examination revealed that both were too shallow for long-term storage of goods. A few steps into the damp and Rees could touch the back walls. He didn't fancy climbing the path back to the top either, and anyway, if cargo had to be carried to the beach, it would surely have had to come down via another route. Besides, by now the beach was deep in shadow. Rees followed the curve of the wall north, guessing that any other descent would be located on that side. And sure enough, within a minute or two, he found a set of stone steps, cut into an indentation in the rock, and concealed by the granite swells on either side. He began to climb, using his hands as well as his feet for the sake of speed, until he reached the top.

A pale gray light shot with pink still illuminated the top of the cliff and even that would not last much longer. The
India Princess
was just a black dot against the purple sky. Rees turned and looked behind him. A candle burned in one of the house windows. Rees trotted up to the glass and peered through it. A solitary woman was bent over some sewing at a table. He was just about to bang upon the window when a tall and heavyset man came into the room. He did not speak. Instead he tapped the woman on her shoulder and, when she looked up, made several gestures. She rose instantly to her feet and disappeared from view. So, she was deaf.

Rees cast another look at the ruffian who, catching the movement, stared fixedly at the window. Surely, Rees thought, the man couldn't see him. And yet the black-eyed gaze seemed to lock onto Rees, eye to eye. As the man began to shout, his hand fumbled at his waistband. Rees figured it was time to leave; no telling how many others remained in the house. He sprinted for the barn, and for Amos and the buggy, still hidden out of sight behind the wall. As he jumped into his vehicle and snapped the whip across Amos's withers, the man Rees had seen through the window hurtled through the door. He moved with a rapid but peculiar lurching gait; a wooden peg formed the bottom of his left leg. Two more forms burst from the door, but Rees did not linger to see if these three were the only crew left to guard the house. He whipped Amos into a gallop and they tore down the lane toward the road in a cloud of dust.

Rees set a stiff pace upon the road, but only for a short time. Amos wheezed with effort. Besides, Rees could barely see; the light dust of the road was a slightly lighter strip of gray in a dark world. As soon as he could, he turned off in an unused pasture, the weeds already almost knee high. There he set up camp and by the light of a tiny fire he ate the bread, cheese, and bacon that Lydia had packed for him. Tomorrow he would stop somewhere for a proper meal. And then back to Salem with his unhappy news.

And he would hurry. Although he was not looking forward to seeing William Boothe, Rees was eager to discuss this new development with Lydia.

*   *   *

By daybreak the following morning, he was on the road, but he was not traveling as quickly as he wished. Amos, although well used to pulling the buggy, was old and not accustomed to the pace Rees had set yesterday. So Rees restrained himself from pushing the gelding.

He could do nothing but think. It was clear to him—finally—that it was Peggy who had been operating her own shipping operation under the name John Hull. Not Matthew. And probably, he thought ruefully, Lydia had seen it before he did. He'd been blinded by Peggy's gender, but now, in retrospect, her masquerade made sense. With the merchants she'd met running errands for her father, her ability to purchase excess vessels from the business at a vastly reduced rate, as well as the use of the Boothe wharf, and all the insider knowledge she'd gained, Peggy would enjoy a tremendous advantage over her competitors. But only if she were a man.

Rees wondered how she'd met Philippe Benoit, since it was now obvious that Matthew had not introduced them. Benoit came from the whaling world, not from the merchants and the counting houses. Was it possible one of the Coville brothers had introduced Peggy to Benoit? Unconsciously Rees nodded. That made sense, since the Covilles were whalemen, too.