On the Head of a Pin (24 page)

There were a few glimmers of hope, even Simms had to concede, although they were slow in materializing. There had been several new steamships launched in the previous year, and more regular excursions between the towns around the lake had been instituted, although many travellers complained of poor service, indifferent food, and unrealistic timetables. The harvest had been good, especially the wheat crop, and some farmers had done well, at least the ones who were able to get their crops to market. Those who couldn't gave up and joined the exodus, but there was no one to replace them. Those immigrants still willing to come to Canada were no longer pretentious British with money in their pockets, but starving Irish with little more than the clothes on their backs, hoping to be hired for the back-breaking work of canal-building.

Still, there was at least a stirring, as if the colony had held its breath for a long time and was now cautiously exhaling again. The future might be rosy yet, the omens were there, but in the short-term that was of little benefit to a peddler like Simms. Lewis felt quite sorry for the man and the pressure he was under.

Still, he could not be absolved from suspicion in the matter of the four murders. It remained difficult for Lewis to subscribe to the notion that this man with the friendly, open face and the wagging tongue was anything more than an honest peddler, yet there was something that kept nagging at him about that day in Millcreek. Simms had too quickly seized on the opportunity to blame Bill Johnston for the Clark girl's death. It may just have been a serendipitous opportunity to make a little money, and he supposed that if he were in Simms's place he would do the same — as odious as that was given the circumstances — but Simms had been just a little too quick off the mark, too eager to agree with the pat answer as soon as it was presented. And what had he been doing there in the first place? Why had he been hovering outside the meeting that day? Had he heard about the murder and rushed to the meeting, sure that his relics would be in demand? He had stood outside the graveyard gate at Rachel's funeral, as well, although he hadn't attempted to sell anything that day. He wasn't aware of any connection between Rachel and Simms and yet the man had more or less attended her funeral. Why?

In spite of his suspicions, he found Simms's company entertaining and enjoyable and was not at all sorry that they travelled the same route so often. He reassured himself that by riding along with the peddler he would be able to keep a closer eye on him, alert for signs that might give the man away if he were the culprit. He was careful not to signal distrust in any way, but he couldn't resist the opportunity to ask a few artfully posed questions.

As soon as he finished grumbling about lack of business, Simms filled him in on all the latest news. Seth Jessup had finally purchased the smithy in Demorestville — an arrangement that Minta had mentioned to him at one point. Lewis hoped that she and the baby were happily settled into the house behind the smithy and reflected that, no matter how bad the economic times, people would still need their horses shod.

“He always used to strike me as an evil-tempered man,” Simms remarked, “but there's quite a difference in him now. He's got a family to work for and his wife rules the household, they say.”

“Ah, Minta. She's one of those women who hide a personality of iron behind a facade of soft washed cotton.”

Simms chuckled. “Seth doesn't seem to mind at all. He's even begun attending the Methodist meetings.”

He had never seriously considered putting Seth Jessup on his list of potential suspects. The man had not really been in the right places at the right times. Still, Lewis wondered where he had disappeared to so mysteriously on the night of his son's birth —the night of Rachel's death. He briefly reviewed the information he had gathered. No, Seth couldn't be the killer, at least not of the last two victims. If he was comfortably settled in the Demorestville smithy shoeing horses day in and day out, he would be hard-pressed to find a reason for absenting himself from his work and was unlikely to forego the money he earned from it. He could ask, if he got the chance, whether or not Seth had gone away for a day or two on occasion, but he was fairly certain what the answer would be.

Sometimes he wondered if the murders were indeed unrelated, although the doctor in Millcreek had agreed with his assessment that one hand had slain all. But who was to say that he even knew the man that the hand belonged to? There were any number of desperate men roaming the colony — strangers, madmen, rogues, thieves. Why not murderers as well? But then why did the murderer seem to be following Lewis wherever he went?

“Are you still selling those little pins of the Caddicks'?” he asked Simms one time as they jogged along the road toward Percy.

“Oh, yes, they're still good sellers,” Simms said. “Although the Caddicks haven't time to make many these days. Benjamin's married, you know, and so is his brother Willet.”

Lewis hadn't heard this.

“Oh, yes,” Simms said. “The two brothers married two sisters. Willet always did have to do whatever Benjamin did, although I hear that even in this instance he lost out. Benjamin got the sister that's much the best-looking.”

“And the girl who was murdered in Millcreek? Have you heard any more of that?”

“Not at thing. I think it's pretty clear that it must have been the pirate … or Americans. Do you know a preacher named Spicer? Runty little fellow.”

“Morgan Spicer? Yes, but he's not a preacher, not really. He just wants to be. What about him?”

“He's not one of yours? How odd.”

“What do you mean?”

“Well, I was sure that he must be some sort of assistant or something. Everywhere you go he seems to be somewhere close by.”

Lewis shrugged. “Anyone can preach the Word. It's just unfortunate that he calls himself a Methodist, after all the accusations that we're uneducated and illiterate. Spicer tends only to confirm this opinion.”

“No, I mean that murder seems to happen wherever the both of you are. It's becoming rather a disturbing pattern, don't you think?”

Except that Spicer was nowhere near Sarah when she was murdered, at least as far as Lewis was aware. He had never mentioned the details of his daughter's death to the peddler, only the fact that she was one of many who had died. Come to that, he couldn't ever recall expressing to him the opinion that Rachel's death had been anything but an act of nature.
A pattern?
Two deaths were no pattern, four surely were, but how would Simms know that? Except that Simms always seemed to know everything.

He was uncertain how to respond. Was this mention of Spicer's name in connection with the murders a genuine attempt to help bring a criminal to justice, or was it a ploy to divert attention, in the same way that Simms had shifted focus to Bill Johnston that day at Millcreek?

He decided to laugh off the statement. “What are you suggesting, Isaac? Do you think I'm the killer? Or that Spicer and I have conspired in some way?”

“Of course not,” Simms replied. “I just think Spicer bears watching.”

As do you
, Lewis thought.

The conversation was unsettling, though Simms's words only echoed what he himself had considered, and he worried away at it for several days afterward. And then, when the words he remembered were becoming jumbled and fragmentary in his mind to the point where he had almost decided to try to forget them, he realized what his problem was. It was his approach that was faulty. He had been trying to find the connections that would point to one person, but what if he turned the riddle around, and simply tried to eliminate rather than prove? “Murder seems to happen wherever the both of you are,” Simms had said. What if one of them hadn't been there after all?

Simms's movements would be the most difficult to trace, especially if he was trying to be discreet about his inquiries. It would be far easier to track Spicer. He knew for a fact that Spicer had been in both Demorestville and Prescott when the murders had occurred nearby. He could have been in Millcreek — he had dropped in at Bath often enough to enquire after Lewis's health — but it was uncertain where he had been specifically when the Clark girl was killed. And where was he when Sarah died? He would need to return to Demorestville to find out.

II

B
righton Circuit had been a good choice for Lewis, both in terms of the number of new converts and the number of weddings, baptisms, and — less appealing — funerals he was called to. Fortunately, the settlements on this round had a high proportion of younger people, so marriages and baptisms formed the bulk of the work that brought him extra money. It sounded callous, even to his own ears. After all, his mission was to preach the Word, not to make a profit. Nevertheless, his £100 debt preyed heavily on his mind and the remuneration he received for presiding at special occasions was allowing him to slowly peck away at his monetary millstone. Even when, as was all too often, there was no cash to give him, he received eggs or cheese or joints of beef for his services. These he would carry to the nearest store where, in exchange, he could chivvy a coin or two from the storekeeper. Good sense dictated that he shouldn't allow any of these opportunities to slip away. His return to Demorestville would have to wait.

The heavy rains continued into June, causing the creeks and small rivers to swell and flood and rendering the back roads even more boggy and unpleasant than usual. Lewis was finding it difficult to reach the more remote areas of his circuit, and once there, found few to preach to. The families who normally would have congregated in the nearest village for a meeting found it almost impossible to fight their way through the water and mud to get there. He would have been willing to travel from house to house to worship with them — he had done it before — but even he found many trails impassable.

It seemed to him an excellent opportunity to leave his meetings in the hands of the local preachers. He could use the time not only to carry out his investigations, but to check on his family in Bath as well. As long as he stayed on the better-maintained main thoroughfares, it should only take him a day or two.

Although it had only been a few weeks since he had seen her, it appeared to him that Martha had grown several inches and had lost that babyish look. Both she and her grandmother seemed happy and well, and although Betsy was walking with a slight limp — the result of an aggravation of her fever during the damp spring — her colour was good and there was no sign of the pinched look that marred her face when she was in great pain.

When he announced that he was on his way to Demorestville next, Betsy insisted that she and Martha join him. It would be a change of pace, a holiday, and a chance to meet with old friends.

“That's one of the hardest things about this life,” she said. “You make friends, then you move, and it's years before you get to see them again. I'm quite interested in seeing Minta Jessup's baby, and I'll never get a better chance than this.”

Lewis would have preferred to go alone. Taking his family meant he would have to take them back to Bath when the visit was over whereas if he were on his own, he could transact his business and continue westward, back to his circuit. Besides, he had intended to mull over his suspicions and formulate his approach on the way. On the other hand, Betsy's insights could well be an asset, if she could manage to articulate them over Martha's chatter. He would, however, have to borrow a horse. Three of them together on one horse was fine for a short ride, but Martha was too big and his horse too old to carry them many miles. He wondered if Betsy was well enough to ride that far, but he knew of no one from whom he could borrow a carriage or even a cart for more than a few hours.

“I'll be fine,” she said. “The only thing I'll ask of you is that we stop once in a while. I know you. You'll ride for hours just to say you made good time.”

He prevailed upon Luke to ask for a horse from the livery.

“He's not much to look at, but I think he'll get you there,” Luke said when he trotted out a swayback bay. “Mr. Trager says he's sorry, but this is all he's got at the moment. No charge for him, though.”

The horse looked steady enough, placid even, and if they didn't push too fast it should carry them through.

As a result, good time was the one thing they didn't make. Lewis's horse was every bit as old as the bay, but it was used to long hours on the trail. The poor horse they had borrowed had difficulty maintaining even what Lewis thought was a sedate pace, and in spite of its lethargic appearance it was spooked by the presence of Martha, who squirmed in the saddle constantly and pulled at the reins on occasion. The bay disliked picking its way around the huge puddles in the road and sometimes rode straight through, splashing water and mud on Betsy and the little girl. To add to their discomfort, a cold drizzle sneaked down the back of their collars and soaked their cloaks.

They had to wait for the horse ferry at Green Point. It was on the Prince Edward side picking up a farmer with a wagon and took what seemed to Lewis an interminable time to come back across. Betsy, however, appreciated the chance to dismount and stretch her legs, and she and Martha spent the time looking for wildflowers and frogs along the shore and throwing stones into the water. They were both delighted by the ferry, measuring its progress as it churned toward them, and he chuckled at Martha's delight when she realized that she was going to be given a ride on it. The bay was not nearly so happy, and Lewis had to tug and pull at its reins to get it to board at all.

The horse remained skittish as they rode on. They had just reached the stretch of road that wound along past the marsh to the north of Demorestville when one of the mangy brown dogs that were a feature of most farmyards came racing out to the road to warn them away from the property. As the animal nipped at the bay's legs, Martha squealed and the horse reared, throwing both Martha and Betsy to the ground. One of the horse's hooves connected squarely with the dog's head, and it, too, was thrown into the air, to land in a huddle beside the humans.