“The lieutenant-governor,” Marc said, bristling.
But Elijah had already turned away and was now ambling towards the barn. As he went in, he called back over his shoulder, “Don’t tha’ be long up there. I won’t have ya upsettin’ the missus.”
So much for imperial authority.
“You’re wonderin’ why I’m not draped in widow’s weeds,” Beth Smallman said.
In truth, Marc was silently noting not the absence of mourning attire but the arresting presence of a plain white blouse, brown woollen skirt, and an unadorned apron that might have been stitched together out of discarded flour sacking. Once again her flaming russet hair was behaving as it pleased.
“Well, there’s no one would see them, is there?” she said, once again seated across from him in the tender light of the south window. “Besides, grief goes much deeper than crêpe or black wreaths upon doors.”
“I apologize, ma’am, for the necessity of this interview-”
“Please don’t,” she said. “I’m as eager to learn why Father died in the way he did as you and the governor are.” Her face was grave but not solemn. She struck Marc as a woman who would do her weeping at night-more Scots than Irish. “Livin’ with ‘whys’ that never get answered is as hard as grievin’ itself.”
That she was alluding to her husband’s death as much as to her father-in-law’s was not in doubt. But Marc was not ready to take up that cue. Not yet. “It is the why, the motive, that I need to discover,” he said quietly. “And to do so, I must learn as much as possible about your father-in-law’s thoughts and feelings and actions over the past few months.”
“I understand,” she said. Her voice was breathy and low: she would be an alto in the Congregationalist choir, he thought. “I’ll help in any way I can.”
“My task is made somewhat easier by the fact that until your husband passed away a year ago, your father-in-law lived and worked in Toronto. We need to focus then on those activities he took up here subsequent to his return.”
“He was born here,” she reminded him, “and grew up on a farm near Cobourg. When his father died, he sold the farm and moved to Toronto-it was still York then. He enjoyed the country very much, but his talents lay in business, in the life of the town.”
“And your husband’s?”
Beth paused, smiled shrewdly, and said, “They did not share similar interests.”
Marc decided it was politic to sip at his tea and sample a biscuit before he spoke again. “Jesse was not enamoured of dry goods?”
“While his mother was alive, he pretended to be. When she died seven years ago, Jesse took the money she left him from her own father’s estate, moved back here where they were just opening the township, and bought this farm.” She looked down at her tea but did not drink. “He felt he’d come home.”
The scraping of a boot along floorboards announced the entrance of Aaron. Marc waited patiently while Beth fussed over the boy, tucked a biscuit into his twisted mouth, did up the top button of his mackintosh, and escorted him back outside, whispering instructions into his ear as if she were not repeating them for the hundredth time.
When the tea was replenished and she was seated again, she said, “You’ll want to know how we met.”
“Pardon me for saying so, but you don’t look as though you’ve been a farm girl all your life.”
“You’re very observant for one so … young,” she said. And so coddled and pampered and protected from the true horrors of the world, she implied with her single, taut glance. “But these are genuine calluses.” She showed both her palms while the cup and saucer teetered on her knees. “You learn how when you have to, and quickly.” That she herself was younger than he appeared to be of no relevance.
“You met your husband here, then?”
“My father was the Congregationalist minister in Cobourg. We came up here when I was eight, after my mother died back in Pennsylvania.”
“But your husband was Church of England,” Marc said.
Once again he was raked by that appraising gaze. “A venial sin,” she said. “Congregationalists are a tolerant lot. And democratic to boot.” She watched to see the effect of this last remark.
“Would you say that relations between Jesse and Joshua were strained?”
“Did Father come to the wedding, you mean?”
“Did he approve of the … way his son’s life was going?”
“He came down for the wedding at St. Peter’s in Cobourg.”
“And that was …?”
“Almost four years ago. Jess and I came directly here.”
“Did his father visit?”
Each new question seemed to disconcert her just a bit more, but the only outward sign of discomfort was the length of the pause before she could answer. When she did, Marc could see no indication that she was reluctant, withholding, or evasive.
“Only at Christmas. And once at Easter.”
When the thorny issue of whose church to attend must have complicated matters.
“Perhaps if there had been children …” Her voice trailed off.
“But there weren’t,” Marc prompted, uncertain now of his ground.
Her smile was indulgent but nonetheless pained. “No miscarriages, no stillborns, no infant deaths,” she whispered. “Nothing.”
“But Joshua came immediately when he was needed,” Marc said with feeling, “and he stayed.”
“Yes.”
“And gave up dry goods to become a farmer.”
Her “yes” was just audible.
Marc was grateful for the sudden arrival of Mary Huggan through the kitchen door.
“Oh,” she said to Beth, “I didn’t know anybody was with you.” Mary seemed to have arrived in a state of some turmoil, but when she saw Beth’s face, she looked bewildered and began backing away. “I’m sorry, I’ve come at a bad time.”
“It’s all right, Mary. Ensign Edwards and I have some distressing but necessary things to talk over.”
“Of course,” Mary said, then whirled and fled.
Beth called out, “Come over after you’ve served dinner!” She had drawn a cotton handkerchief from her apron pocket. “I’m ready to go on now.”
“If your father-in-law made an enemy, even one he didn’t know he’d made, I need to find that person-or group.”
“As in political party.”
“Or faction. Erastus Hatch and others have given me a rough sketch of the various parties and factions contending in the county. He also mentioned that-”
“I dragged my Tory father-in-law off to Reform rallies in five different townships when I’d be servin’ my monarch better by mindin’ the house, lookin’ for a husband who could give me babies, and helpin’ to raise enough corn to keep the bailiffs out of the barn.”
“Something of that order,” Marc managed to reply.
“I also read newspapers, and I helped Jess write two of his petitions to the Assembly.”
“I’ve been led to believe that Joshua accompanied you to Reform rallies as a means merely of seeing you properly chaperoned.”
“He was a gentleman.”
“Was he not in danger of being … embarrassed or otherwise discomfited? After all, his Tory leanings, his former business in the capital, the friends he selected here upon his return-these would be well-known.”
“Everything is eventually well-known in Northumberland County.”
“Did he participate in any way when he accompanied you?”
Again the indulgent smile, with just a touch of scorn in it. “I see you haven’t attended the hustings or any of our infamous political picnics.”
“As a soldier I have other pressing duties.”
“So I’ve been told.” This time her smile was warm, accepting. “But if you had, you’d know that opponents of every stripe show up and pipe up at every opportunity. The give and take of public debate is another way of describin’ the shoutin’ matches and general mayhem. Sometimes it takes fisticuffs or a donnybrook to settle on a winner.”
“No place for an unescorted lady, then.” For a brief moment he pictured her dependent upon his strong, soldier’s arm.
“You want to know, I think, but are too polite to ask, if Father became embroiled in the debates? The answer is no. He was a friendly but reserved man.” She paused. “He was that rare thing among men: a listener.”