Light was just breaking across the horizon when they got underway the next day. Martha climbed up onto the seat of the light buckboard rig Thaddeus had picked up from the livery and held her face to the rising sun as they trotted through the outskirts of Cobourg. It promised to be a fine day, warm for the third week of October, and with no sign of rain in the sky. Little conversation passed at first. She and Thaddeus were content in each other’s company, and Martha’s mind was free to wander.
If only it would. She was unable to tear it away from the unsettling exchange with Mrs. Small, a subject that she thought she had exhausted while trying to fall asleep the night before. She dismissed the gossip about Ashby as no more than he deserved. As much as he claimed that drinking at the Globe was a strategy designed to collect information, she rather suspected that he spent a great deal of time in the town’s other drinking establishments, as well. After all, the first evening he had come for dinner he had made a comment about foregoing his cigar and brandy so that they could all discuss the case.
Nor was she surprised, although she was slightly annoyed, at the reference to fluttering girls. Ashby was a good-looking young man who appeared to have a great deal of ready money jangling in his pockets. He could hardly fail to attract female attention. And it wasn’t that she was jealous or anything — she wasn’t sure she even liked him all that much. He was exasperating at times and not nearly serious enough for a lawyer who was defending an accused murderer. It was almost as though he thought it was a game, and that if he didn’t win, well, better luck next time. This wouldn’t be much comfort for Ellen Howell. And she wasn’t at all sure what losing the case would mean to Thaddeus.
She had a very strong suspicion that her grandfather had a greater interest in the proceedings than merely wanting to see justice done, and it appeared that the Cobourg gossips thought so too. She didn’t quite know what to make of this. The notion that her grandfather would behave inappropriately with a married woman was ludicrous. He was the most upright man Martha knew. She had wanted to defend him, to argue that he was, after all, a minister, and was merely offering spiritual solace to a person in dire need of comfort. She would have, if she had been surer of her ground.
He had not confided his reasons for helping Mrs. Howell and Martha had not questioned his motives. She assumed that there was a higher moral or ethical reason for everything her grandfather did. But now Mrs. Small had made her doubt him.
“Do you think Mr. Ashby will win?” she said, suddenly breaking the silence.
“I don’t know,” her grandfather responded.
“What will you do if he doesn’t?”
Thaddeus stared stolidly ahead, obviously uncomfortable with her question. As curious as she was, Martha didn’t dare press him for an answer. From the time she first arrived in Cobourg, he had paid her the compliment of treating her like an equal, and she treasured the fact that they could joke so easily with each other. But he was still her grandfather, and there were some things you just couldn’t ask.
She would have to trust that he would tell her what was going on when he thought she needed to know. And with that decided, she was able at last to sit back and give herself up to watching the passing scenery.
After a time, Thaddeus brightened up and starting pointing out the sights along the way, the houses that welcomed a Methodist minister, the halls and schoolhouses where he had held meetings.
“Another hour will see us there,” he said at one point, and Martha began to look forward to getting down out of the lurching cart. Her legs hurt from bracing them against the buckboard when they jolted over a bump or descended a hill, and her back was starting to ache from sitting in such an upright position for so long. She wondered how Thaddeus managed to endure so much travel. It was no wonder he complained of a pain in his knee at times.
They began to pass heavy wagons hauling gravel and lumber and throwing up dust, and here and there through the trees she could see signs of the railway construction.
“I didn’t realize they were so far along,” Thaddeus remarked at one point. “They’ll be to Sully before you know it.”
And then the work would be hidden again by the thickness of the woods and the hilliness of the land, making it difficult to see anything, and she would fall to studying the farms and little hamlets they passed, wondering to herself what it was like to live there.
Thaddeus was quite hungry by the time they pulled into the laneway that led to Leland Gordon’s tidy white farmhouse just south of Sully. They had long since eaten the makeshift breakfast Martha had packed, and even the jug of water she had tucked by her feet was nearly empty.
As soon as they reached the yard, the porch door of the house was flung open and Mrs. Gordon hobbled out, smiling in welcome.
“Mr. Lewis! What a pleasant surprise!” she said, “and you brought your granddaughter with you! Come in, come in. Have you driven all the way from Cobourg today? You must be starving and dinner’s nearly ready to put on the table. Would you join us?”
Thaddeus shot a wry glance at Martha. He had been right. The Gordons would insist on feeding them. Martha climbed down from the buggy and followed the old woman as she began walking back to the house. Thaddeus led his tired horse over to the water trough and met Leland coming out of the barn.
“Mr. Lewis! This is a pleasant surprise. What brings you out this way?”
Thaddeus quickly explained his mission, then appealed for Gordon’s help. “It would be useful to me, Leland, if you could spare some time to come with us. At least the Howell girl knows who you are.”
“I’m not sure how much help it would be,” he said. “I can’t get near her. Nor can anyone else. One of the English families, friends of the Howells, tried to fetch her, but they couldn’t find her. They said she’d obviously been there, but she wouldn’t answer their calls.”
“She wouldn’t come out, even for them?”
“No.” Gordon was obviously uncomfortable with the topic, and he hesitated before he spoke again. “I’m not saying I know this for a fact, and I’m certainly not sure enough to tell anybody else about it, but I think George Howell is there, too.”
When Thaddeus thought about this, he realized that it made perfect sense — Mrs. Howell’s lack of concern about her daughter, Ashby’s conviction that she was protecting someone with her silence, the Howell girl’s sudden disappearances whenever anyone came near. The only thing that was surprising was that no one but Leland seemed to have figured it out.
“Wouldn’t someone be watching the place, though? After all, Howell is wanted for murder.”
Gordon shrugged. “No one much goes near the place at the best of times, and whenever they do, the dog causes a racket long before they get there. Howell would have plenty of time to get away, especially if he’s got a bolt-hole somewhere.”
Everyone was sure he had left the country anyway, Thaddeus realized. And there were only a handful of constables for the entire district. One of them might check in at the farm once in a while, but none of them would have time to sit there and wait for Howell to show himself.
“I’m only telling you this, Mr. Lewis, because I’ve been wrestling with my conscience,” Gordon said. “Even if I report what I suspect, it won’t bring the dead man back. I’m not sure what’s going to happen to Mrs. Howell, but I can’t do anything about it anyway, and turning her husband in won’t make any difference to her defence — if both were to be found guilty, it would mean two of them would hang instead of just one. I don’t like George Howell, but I don’t want to be responsible for his death, either. And at the same time, I don’t want to put you in unnecessary danger. I have no idea if Howell is armed or not, or what he would do if cornered. You see my dilemma.”
Thaddeus did, indeed, and was beginning to have second thoughts about his decision to bring Martha along.
“I’ve told you this in confidence,” Gordon went on. “I would prefer that it remain between us, but if your judgment is clearer on the matter than mine is, then you must do what you have to do. But more than anything, I would like your opinion.”
God bless the Methodists, Thaddeus thought, forever willing to wrestle with their souls over questions of right and wrong. He smiled at the worried farmer who looked so earnestly for his advice. “My opinion is that the Sully meeting made a wise choice when they accepted you as a lay preacher. I agree that it’s a thorny issue when the law is at odds with your principles, but you already know what the answer is, Leland. You must follow your conscience.”
Gordon nodded and looked relieved. “I don’t agree with an eye for an eye, no matter what the Bible says. So what are you going to do now?”
“I’m not sure,” Thaddeus said. “Maybe I should go away and leave them alone. The lawyer wants to talk to the girl, but he assumed she was alone on the farm, and that her father was long gone. She’s unlikely to tell anybody anything if he’s still there.”
“That’s true enough. At any rate, you shouldn’t do anything until you’ve had some dinner. We’d better go in. Mother will be wondering what we’re talking about out here.”
After Leland fetched a bucket of feed for the horse, Thaddeus followed him into the Gordon kitchen and sat at the table while Martha bustled around, helping to serve up the meal. She couldn’t have done anything to recommend her more to someone like Mrs. Gordon. The old woman clucked and fussed and told Martha to sit, but looked pleased at the help all the same.
Thaddeus said grace, and then Mrs. Gordon turned to him. “Young Martha here tells me that you’re going to the Howell farm. I’ll pack up what’s left of our meal when we’re done. You can take it to Caroline.”
“It was our intention to go when we set off,” Thaddeus said. “I’m not so sure now that we should do that. Leland seems to think that maybe we should leave her be.”
Martha looked disappointed. He would be, too, he supposed, if the promise of a great adventure turned out to be nothing more than a long drive, followed by dinner and another long drive.
“If you’re going by anyway, you should at least stop in and leave the food,” Mrs. Gordon said. “No one seems able to get close to the girl, but you could just leave it in the kitchen for her.”
“I suppose you’re right,” Thaddeus said, and Martha brightened up a little. There was certainly no harm in just stopping by, he reasoned. The girl would probably run off at their first approach, like she’d done before. He could have a look around, and if there was nothing to see, he and Martha could be on their way.
“How is poor Mrs. Howell?” the old woman asked. “The poor thing, stuck in a gaol cell. Couldn’t your young barrister get her out?”
“It’s complicated. Something to do with having to apply to a higher court. The trial will start in a few days, anyway, so she’s already done most of her waiting.”
“What are the chances of his winning the case?” Leland asked.
Thaddeus sighed. “It seems hopeless to me, but he remains optimistic. I have no way to judge whether his investigations will lead to a successful defence or not, but at least he’s digging around. Or rather, I’m digging for him, I suppose.”
“What does he want you to find out?” Mrs. Gordon said.
“Well, for one thing, where Jack Plews was on the day of the murder.”
“Plews? I’m afraid you’re out of luck there,” Leland said. “He’s left the district entirely. Gone off west somewhere, to live with his cousin, or so I heard.”
“That family always was thick as thieves,” Old Mrs. Gordon said. “The Plews and the Palmers and the Dafoes always look after each other.”
Martha suddenly sat up very straight and cocked her head to one side. “Is the man who found the body from that same family? The Dafoes, I mean.”
Thaddeus had made the connection as well, and looked approvingly at Martha.
“Oh yes,” Mrs. Gordon said. “They’re all intertwined. The Dafoes and the Plews and the Palmers. One sneezes and the others catch cold.”
“The family certainly seems to have had more than their share of difficulty holding on to their land, haven’t they?” Thaddeus ventured.
“They certainly have,” Old Mrs. Gordon said. “Donald’s father lost his farm, and so did his uncle. And then Jack, under very peculiar circumstances, if you ask me.”
“Was it the same farm that was lost each time?”
“No, no, different ones, but all in Hamilton and Haldimand Townships. I misremember what the problem was with them. Donald’s father, and his uncle, Lem Palmer, and there may have been another one as well. Like I said, they’re all so mixed up together it’s hard to keep them all straight. Lem’s son married an aunt of Donald’s, and I’m not sure, but I think another one married Jack Plew’s mother. That would make them what? Cousins at the very least. You remember Jack’s mother, don’t you Leland? She had a lovely voice and used to sing at meeting.”
Leland just shrugged and looked apologetically at his guests.
“You don’t happen to know when, exactly, Plews went west?” Thaddeus asked.
Leland shook his head. “No. He stayed with his sister for a time after he sold the farm to Howell, I know, but I couldn’t tell you when he left the district. I just remember hearing that he had, and I can’t even tell you when I heard it. It was probably just something that was said at meeting. I could ask the sister the next time I see her if you think that would be helpful.”
“I think it might,” Thaddeus said, but he had no idea how. “Thank you.”
As soon as they’d finished their meal, Martha offered to help with the dishes, but Old Mrs. Gordon shooed her out the door.
“You folks have a long drive home,” she said. “You don’t want to be held up any longer than you have to.” She turned to Thaddeus, “I hope you realize what a fine girl your granddaughter is, Mr. Lewis. You bring her back here any time.”
“I do realize it,” Thaddeus said with a smile. “That’s why I asked her to keep my house for me. And we’ll come back sometime when we’re not in quite such a hurry.”
They were just pulling out from the Gordons’ lane when Martha caught sight of a lone horseman riding in their direction.
“Oh no. Is that who I think it is?” she asked.
Thaddeus squinted a little and then said, “I do believe that’s James. He must be working his way back to Cobourg.” He cast his mind over the appointment schedule they had set up. “Yes, that would be about right. He should be heading home about now.”
Small must have recognized them, as well, for he kicked his horse into a trot and soon caught up with them. He beamed at Martha.
“I didn’t expect to see you.”
“It’s such a lovely day, we thought we’d drive up this way and visit some old friends,” Thaddeus said. He didn’t make any further explanation and Martha understood that her grandfather was loath to disclose any details about what they were doing. Small looked understandably puzzled. Part of the reason he had been appointed an assistant on this circuit was so that Thaddeus wouldn’t have to travel so much.
“That’s a long way for a visit,” he said.
“Well, yes, but I’ve got my granddaughter to drive me home, you see, if I get tired.”
That seemed to satisfy Small, even though Martha thought the statement made no sense at all.
“You’re planning to return to Cobourg tonight, then?” Small considered for a moment, then to Martha’s profound annoyance said, “I can ride at least part of the way with you.” He smiled at Martha again. “You’d like some company, wouldn’t you?”
Thaddeus looked annoyed as well. The last thing they needed was to land in at the Howell farm with a stranger in tow. But short of telling Small what was going on, Martha couldn’t think of any gracious way of telling him to make himself scarce.
Neither, apparently, could Thaddeus.
And then, to Martha’s dismay, Small climbed down from his horse, tethered it to the wagon, and scrambled up to the seat of the rig. She was obliged to slide over and crowd into her grandfather so that no part of her would touch Small.
Thaddeus noticed her discomfort and shifted to his left as much as he could in order to give her more room, but it still wasn’t far enough away for Martha. Small kept leaning over to her to make some comment about the weather or the road. She was aware of his Adam’s apple bobbing unpleasantly every time he spoke.
After an uncomfortable mile or so, they reached the long, winding lane that led to the Howells’ dilapidated farmhouse. Off in the distance they could hear a dog barking frantically, but as they drove down the lane, this sound seemed to move farther away until it was no longer audible.
“She already knows we’re here,” Thaddeus said quietly to Martha. “Keep your eyes open. I have something to tell you later.”
“Where are we going now?” Small asked, then his eyes narrowed. “This is the Howell place, isn’t it? Does this have something to do with the trial?”
“I’m just making a delivery,” Thaddeus said. “If it will put you behind time, I don’t mind if you ride on ahead.”
“No, no, that’s all right,” Small said. “I’m not in that big a rush,” and he moved another inch closer to Martha.
When they reached the house, she pushed past her grandfather and hopped out of the wagon. Thaddeus handed down Mrs. Gordon’s basket of food and then they walked up to peer in through the kitchen window. Martha could see that there was evidence of recent occupation, but no one was there. Neither was there anyone in the barn.
“What about the privy?” Martha asked.
“I doubt she’s there, but it would still be best if you checked,” Thaddeus said. “I’d hate to startle her in the middle of something.”
Martha giggled and was about to head for the precariously tilted outhouse when Small said, “Can you hear something? It seems to be coming from up over the hill somewhere.”
They could — the occasional rumble of a cart, or the call of a man’s voice, together with the intermittent sound of metal striking rock.
“It must be the railway crew,” Small said. “I didn’t realize they were cutting through so close to the road.”
Thaddeus walked around the end of the barn, gesturing for Martha to come with him. Small made to follow.
“James, it would be most helpful if you stayed with the wagon,” Thaddeus said. “The horse is rather skittish, and I don’t want him to gallop off if he should become frightened by the noise.”
Martha thought this statement was hilarious — the cart horse they had hired was one of the most phlegmatic creatures she had ever seen — but she was relieved that Thaddeus had manufactured a reason to leave Small behind. She hoped that Small would become bored, or realize that he was late for a meeting or something, and ride on ahead without them.
There was little to see behind the barn other than the steeply sloping hill.
“Should we climb it?” Martha asked.
She could see him hesitating, and then he said, “Leland Gordon thinks George Howell is still here on the farm. I have no idea whether he’s dangerous or not. I don’t like the idea of walking into an ambush.”
“Oh.” All of a sudden the adventure got very real for Martha and she briefly wondered if she shouldn’t wait back at the cart after all. It would depend on what Thaddeus did next, she decided. If he climbed the hill, she would go with him. If he turned around and left, she would follow without a murmur.
“Can you see whether there’s a path up the hill?”
She looked carefully, but there were too many trees and bushes to tell. “I can’t see anything.”
He studied it for a moment more. “I’d hate to come this far and give up. Let’s see what we find up there. Keep low when we get near the top.”
“Mind the thorns, though.”
Thaddeus grabbed an old hay rake that was leaning against the barn and used it to push branches out of the way while Martha slid through the opening. Then she grabbed the other end of it and held the thorny bushes back for him. Once they were past these, the way was clearer. They zigged and zagged up the hill until they crested the rise and discovered that the hill descended again quite steeply. A little pond fringed by cattails was nestled at the bottom in a tiny vale. On the other side of this was a smaller hill, wooded on the side closest to them, but completely bare at the top.
“I didn’t realize the track was passing this close,” Thaddeus said. “Howell must have sold off the timber for ties and he’ll collect a roadway allowance, as well, I expect. He certainly has been playing all the angles.”
Three workmen with pickaxes appeared at the summit opposite them. One blond giant of a man swung his axe in a high arc over his head and brought it smashing down into the earth. A second time, a third, a fourth, and then with the fifth blow he lost his balance, his arms flailed wildly, and the point of the axe swung perilously close to his head. Suddenly he just disappeared down into the earth he had been digging. The air was filled with yells and angry barks.
“What just happened?” Martha asked.
“I’m not sure,” Thaddeus said. “Stay here and keep your eyes open.”
He slid down the hill and picked his way through the marshy edge of the pond, then scrambled up the steep climb to where the workman had disappeared. Just as he reached the top, Martha saw a thin girl with blond hair appear seemingly out of nowhere on the far side of the pond. She began to climb after Thaddeus.
Martha didn’t give her grandfather’s admonition to stay put a second thought. She slid down the side of the hill and ran through the bulrushes.
“Hey,” she shouted at the girl. “Wait for me.”
The girl turned but made no attempt to run away. Her dress was filthy and torn, her hair wild, and tears were running down her face.
“I’ve got to get Digger!” she said and began climbing again.
Martha thought she was referring to the workman who had fallen.
“It’s all right,” she shouted. “The others will get the man out. They’ll get a rope and pull him out.”
“Not the man. Digger.”
Martha had no doubt that the girl in front of her was Caroline Howell. Who “Digger” was, she had no idea. But she certainly wasn’t going to wait to find out. She scrambled up the hill in pursuit of the girl.
Thaddeus arrived at the top of the hill to find five workmen peering over the edge of a large hole. It must be a sinkhole, he figured, the inside of a hill eroded by water until just a crust covered the top. The workmen had been in the process of drawing soil and rock to buttress the line embankments — Thaddeus could see that a portion of the adjacent slope had been dug away already. He approached the hole cautiously and looked in.
He saw a mound of scree, the blond labourer backed up against the side of the hole, and an angry brown dog that barked ferociously at the man’s feet.
“Hilfe! Hilfe! Zwerg! Der Teufel!”
The workman kicked at the dog with his heavy leather boot in an attempt to fend it off.
“Hilfe! Hilfe!”
“Does anyone have a rope?” Thaddeus asked.
“Joe’s gone to bring his wagon up,” one of the work crew answered. “He’ll have a rope.”
The others stared at him blankly.
It will be tricky, Thaddeus thought, to get close enough to the edge of the hole without further collapsing its crumbling sides. He turned as the wagon came lumbering up. It was one of the square three-wheeled construction carts, cumbersome and difficult to manoeuvre. The sorry beast that pulled it managed to reach the halfway point before it gave up and halted.
“Stop there,” Thaddeus called.
“I don’t think I can get any closer anyway,” the man called back. It took him several minutes to turn the horse and wagon so that it was pointing back down the hill. Then he climbed up to where Thaddeus and the rest of the crew were standing.
“I’ve got a length of sisal,” he said. “It’s pretty heavy for the job, though.”
“It’s better than nothing.”
The man nodded and returned to the wagon, where he lifted out a heavy coil of rope and tied it to the back of the wagon.
All the while the dog continued to bark and growl as the man yelled a steady stream of German interspersed with the occasional call of “hilfe!”
Thaddeus walked gingerly to the edge. The loose sandy soil shifted under his feet. He took a couple of steps back, then dropped to his knees and crawled over to the hole.
“We’re throwing you a rope,” he shouted at the man. “Tie it around yourself and we’ll pull you up.”
There was no answer but a continued guttural invective.
“Are you hurt?”
“Hilfe, hilfe! Zwerg! Der Teufel!”
“He don’t have much English,” said the worker who had spoken before. “You’ll have to talk to him in his own lingo.”
“Surely he’ll be able to figure out what we’re doing when we throw the rope down,” Thaddeus said. “You don’t have to speak English for that.” He grabbed the coil from the wagoner and tossed it over the side. He was relieved to see that it reached all the way to the bottom. “Grab the rope and we’ll pull you up,” he repeated. “Tug on it when you’re ready.”
There was a renewed volley of frantic barking as the dog confronted this new menace. It lunged at the rope and grabbed it briefly, growling and shaking it from side to side. Then it seemed to realize that it was in no peril from the inanimate object and renewed its standoff with the beleaguered German, planting itself firmly between the man and the rope.
“We need to do something about that damned dog,” the wagoner said. “Hang on a minute.”
He walked back to his wagon, then returned with an old battered-looking rifle. “I’ll take care of the beast.”
He was just aiming down the hole when there was a deafening shriek and a small body slammed into the man sideways. He lost his footing and fell heavily. The rifle discharged harmlessly into the air.
Caroline Howell had arrived at the top of the hill. She ran over to the edge of the hole and dropped to her knees. “Digger!” she called. “Don’t worry, I’ll get you.”
Martha appeared a few moments later. She was panting heavily from the climb, which hadn’t seemed to bother Caroline at all. “She’s after her dog,” Martha said to Thaddeus.
The animal had stopped growling and barking at the sound of its owner’s voice.
“Can you get your dog away from the man in the pit?” Thaddeus asked.
Caroline leaned a little farther over the side. “Digger! Go sit,” she said. “Go on! Over there!” She pointed at the side of the hole farthest from the German workman. The dog obediently went to where she was pointing and sat, its tail wagging furiously.
The German didn’t wait for any help. As soon as the dog was out of the way, he grabbed the rope and pulled himself up hand over hand, showers of loose soil and gravel cascading over him as he climbed. When he reached the top, his workmates finally stirred themselves and grabbed his arms to pull him out. They stood him upright and helped brush him off, then they all wandered down the hill.
Joe the wagoner retrieved his rope and his gun, glared at Caroline, and followed them.
“But what about the dog? Thaddeus asked.
“It can stay there forever as far as I’m concerned.”
Caroline looked at Thaddeus beseechingly. She was very like her mother in colouring, he thought, the same pale hair and high cheekbones, but unlike her mother, there was no sunniness in her face.
“Will you help me?” she asked.
Thaddeus looked over the edge of the pit again. The dog began to yelp and jump up and down, then it leaped up onto the heap of rubble that had fallen and clawed frantically at the side of the hole in an attempt to climb up. All this did was bring down more dirt. After a few minutes it seemed to realize that this was futile. It stopped digging and began running around the pit, looking for another way out. Eventually, it started pawing at the far wall, then dug furiously, dirt flying out behind it.
More scree fell, and now Thaddeus could see a piece of wood — a timber that had been knocked over to lean at an angle.
“Is there a cave or something on the other side of that pile of dirt?” he asked.
Caroline nodded. “We were there when the roof fell down. Digger was on the wrong side.”
“I don’t see how we’re going to get him out from here. Do you think we might be able to dig through from the other end?”
“Maybe.”
“Are there timbers along the walls and the roof? Pieces of wood that hold it up?”
“Yes.”
Thaddeus wasn’t sure he liked the idea of going into a cave that had already collapsed once, but then, he decided, it hadn’t been an inherent fault in the construction that had caused the roof to fall in, but rather the railroad crew’s excavations. In any event, he figured he stood little chance of gaining Caroline Howell’s trust unless he could somehow rescue her dog. Besides, he disliked the idea of just leaving the animal there to expire from thirst. Or to be shot by one of the rail crew who might yet return if it grew too noisy.
“We need to go back to your house and find shovels,” he said. “If there’s just loose sand and gravel we can probably dig through it.”
“I’m not leaving Digger,” Caroline said, a stubborn set to her face. “What if the man with the gun comes back?”
The dog seemed to be preoccupied with his frantic digging and was unlikely to draw any more attention, but Thaddeus could understand the girl’s concern.
“Martha can stay here. If the man comes back she can tell him to go away. Would that be all right?”
Caroline considered this for a moment, then nodded. Martha knelt down a few feet from the hole so she could keep an eye on the dog.
“If you run into trouble of any kind, give a shout,” he said to her. “I’m pretty sure we can hear you from the other side.”
“Don’t worry. They won’t get past me.”
James Small jumped up in alarm when Thaddeus came down the hill with an unfamiliar girl in tow.
“Where’s Martha?” he asked anxiously.
“She’s fine, but there’s no time to explain,” Thaddeus said. “Right now we need to do some digging.”
Caroline found two shovels and another hay rake in the barn, then led the two men over the hill and past the pond. Twenty feet from the crest of the second hill, she pushed through a stand of thick bushes that screened a small hole at the base of a massive black oak. It would be impossible to find, Thaddeus realized, unless you knew exactly where it was. He had to get down on all fours to squeeze through the opening.
He didn’t know what he had been expecting — a cavern, maybe, carved out of rock, or a series of honeycombed recesses. But it was not a large hill, and the substrate was loose and sandy, partly held in place by the roots of the tree, and partly shored up with sawn lumber. It was a small space, more like a burrow than a cave, the only light coming from the small opening at its entrance. Thaddeus could see, though, that the supports had collapsed at one end. It was going to be tricky to dig it out without bringing more of it down.
He turned to Caroline. “Can you find a couple of buckets?”
She nodded, and while she was getting them, Thaddeus and Small began tentatively to poke at the mound of soil in front of them. When Caroline returned, they started filling the buckets with dirt.
“Take them outside and dump them,” Thaddeus said.
She hesitated. “But Papa said not to leave any sign.”
“Sign of what?”
“Any sign that would tell somebody where the door is.”
So Leland Gordon was right. Howell had been here all along. Elegant, bewhiskered, silk-hatted George Howell had become a cornered animal cowering in a sandpit.
“I’m afraid we’ll have to dump it outside,” Thaddeus said to the girl. “There’s nowhere else to put the dirt. The cave is pretty much discovered anyway, now that the railway men have broken through the top.”
She blinked at him for a few moments, then without a word picked up a filled bucket and hauled it through the opening.
“Papa?” Small said, “Does she mean George Howell?”
“I guess so.” Thaddeus wasn’t sure what to do about Small. He could scarcely ask his assistant to hide the fact that a wanted man was lurking nearby. He wasn’t, in fact, sure what he was going to do himself. As Leland Gordon had pointed out, Howell’s apprehension would in no way help his wife. But failing to report Howell’s presence could open them all to charges of aiding and abetting. Get the dog out first, he decided. Worry about the rest of it later.
As it turned out, Thaddeus was glad he had James with him. The young man worked steadily, and before long they had reached the section where the timbers had fallen. One of them swung loose at the bottom, its top still embedded in the hill.
“Soon, now. But we’ll have to be careful. In fact, we might want to shore this up a bit before we go any farther.”
No sooner had Thaddeus spoken when the dog wriggled through the remaining scree to its freedom. When it porpoised through the last inches, its back feet pushed against the bottom of the loose support, knocking it to one side. A pile of soil and gravel and lumber cascaded down on top of James Small.
Thaddeus wielded his shovel frantically to clear the mess of debris away from Small’s head, so that at least he wouldn’t suffocate before they figured out how to extract him. To his surprise, Caroline grabbed the other shovel and she, too, began to dig, although her efforts had little effect. After a few moments, Thaddeus realized that shovelling was futile — the sand and fine gravel quickly spilled back into whatever hole they managed to make.
“Put your shovel down,” he ordered the girl. “We’re going to have to pull.”
“Is everything all right?” Martha could hear them from her perch at the edge of the hole.
“No. Get over here.” And then he said to Caroline, “You take one leg and I’ll take the other and then we need to pull for all we’re worth.”
He wasn’t at all certain that their combined strength would be enough, but to his surprise they shifted the inert body a few inches with the first pull.
“Again!”
This time Small moved a foot or so. Thaddeus leaped forward and used his arms as a scoop to remove the debris around his assistant’s head. To his surprise, a wad of paper was plastered over Small’s face, largely shielding his mouth and nose from the sandy soil. Thaddeus swept it aside. Small began to cough and sputter, inhaling great shuddering gasps of air in between spasms, but the cave was filled with a fine dust that stung the eyes and filled the lungs. Thaddeus knew he needed to get the young man into the fresh air as quickly as possible.
Martha scrambled into the cave and together they scooped more soil away, until finally, with one last heave, they were able to pull Small entirely free. They dragged him over to the fresher air at the opening. Although he had by some miracle been saved from inhaling much sediment, he had a cut on the back of his head that was bleeding profusely. Thaddeus scrambled to retrieve the papers he had thrown to one side and jammed them against the wound.
“Put your hand here,” he said to Martha. “Keep pressing down, as hard as you can. We need to get the bleeding stopped.”
Suddenly Caroline crawled past them to paw through the fallen rubble. She scooped out several other bundles of paper, then she poked around until she uncovered a leather satchel. She pushed the papers inside it, climbed past them again, and disappeared.
Thaddeus pulled Small to a sitting position, then helped him manoeuvre through the small opening. Finally free of the cloying dust, his breathing gradually became easier.
“I thought we’d lost you there for a minute, James,” Thaddeus said.
Small looked around, blinking. “Lost? I’m not lost. I just got tangled in the quilt, that’s all.”
“What do you mean?”
“I slept in. Couldn’t get out of bed. I was too rolled up in the bedclothes.”
“Oh my,” Martha said. “What’s wrong with him?”
Thaddeus knelt down beside him. “Do you know where you are, James?”
“In my house, of course. In Cobourg.”
“Look around you.” Thaddeus spoke in a gentle voice.
Small did as he was told, and then a puzzled expression crossed his face.
“Where am I? This isn’t Cobourg. I have to get home. I need to milk the cow.”
This last statement was not as odd as it sounded. The Howells’ cow had started a mournful low that was audible from where they sat.
“Listen to me, James,” Thaddeus said. “You were buried in a cave-in. You were struck on the head, and that’s why you don’t know where you are.”
“What cave? How did I get here?” Small was still bewildered. “Why does my head hurt?”
“You got a bump, I’m afraid. Martha is trying to stop the bleeding.”
His face dissolved into a sappy grin. “Ah, Martha,” he said. “Is Martha looking after me? That’s wonderful.”
“We need to get him to a doctor,” Thaddeus said. “Perhaps the best thing to do is to take him back to the Gordons.” Then he turned to Small. “Do you think you can walk, James?”
Small nodded, and together Thaddeus and Martha hauled him to his feet. He could walk only a few paces before he had to stop for a moment to rest, but the downward slope helped and they made good progress until they reached the bottom of the hill, where he sank to the ground again.
“We’ll rest for a bit, James,” Thaddeus said, “then we’ll try the climb.”
He seemed to gain a little strength after that, and although the going was slow, Thaddeus and Martha managed to push and pull him up to the top of the hill overlooking the Howells’ barn. After another rest, Small insisted that he could manage the descent without help. Thaddeus followed close behind, one hand clutching his coattails, just in case he fell.
Digger barked at them hysterically the whole time they were climbing down, adding his protests to the pleadings of the uncomfortable cow.
“Not very grateful at being rescued, is he?” Martha remarked.
Caroline came out of the house and called for the dog, which obediently ran back to her.
It was only then that Thaddeus realized that James’s horse was missing. He pointed this out to Martha.
“Major Howell?” she asked. “If he got clear of the cave-in, he may have come back here.”
“It’s the most likely explanation.” Thaddeus had no doubt that Caroline had been genuinely concerned about her dog, but its predicament had made a convenient diversion all the same. And if Howell had taken the horse, he could be a long way away by now. Thaddeus could only hope that his assistant wouldn’t remember that he’d had a horse in the first place.
“Let’s get James over to the cart, then see if we can borrow a blanket or something from the house,” Thaddeus said to Martha when they reached the Howells’ dooryard. “He can lie in the back.”
“I’m fine,” Small protested. “Really.” And in fact, he was able to climb up into the back of the rig by himself, a relief for Thaddeus, who hadn’t been sure how they were going to manage it otherwise.
Martha went to the house and knocked on the door. “Caroline,” she called.
Silence.
“I need to talk to you.”
“Go away.”
“Do you have a blanket we can use? Mr. Small is hurt and he needs to lie down in the wagon.”
There was no answer, but a few moments later the door opened and Caroline threw two old quilts onto the stoop. Martha took them back to the cart and helped Thaddeus arrange a cushion for Small’s head with one of them. She covered him with the other. Then Thaddeus pulled her aside.
“We need to take the girl with us. Maybe it would be better if you talked to her.”
“I’ll try,” Martha said, “but I don’t know if I can get her to come.”
She walked up to the door again, while Thaddeus waited at the cart. “Caroline?”
There was no answer.
“Can you come out and talk to me?”
“No. Papa said don’t talk to anybody.”
“Your Papa’s gone now. He took our horse and rode away.”
“He’ll come back.”
“No, Caroline, he won’t. Too many people know he was here. He’ll ride a long way away and he won’t dare come back. You don’t really want to be here all by yourself, do you?” There was no reply to this. “I’d be scared to be here all alone,” Martha went on. “You never know who might turn up.”
“The man’s dead. He won’t come back.”
“Which man? The man who fell in the hole?”
“No. The other man.”
“Do you mean the man who’s hurt? That’s a friend of my grandfather’s. My grandfather’s been trying to help your mother. She’s in Cobourg. You could go see her. You could ask her what you should do.”
“Papa told me what to do.”
“Yes, but things are different now. Your Papa’s gone and he’s not coming back.”
Suddenly the dog burst through the door. He made a beeline for Martha, barking and snapping. She turned her body away to try to deflect the attack.
“Digger, sit!” Thaddeus commanded, in a voice that was as stern as he could muster.
To his surprise, the dog aborted its attack. It obediently sat, but continued a low growl.
Thaddeus walked over to Martha, ignoring the dog. “Do you feel like you’re getting anywhere?” he asked.
“Not really.” He could see that she was shaking a little. Thaddeus knew he needed to resolve the situation one way or the other in short order. He was worried about Small’s condition, and he was afraid that the dog might yet bite one of them. It was also getting late, and he didn’t like the notion of trying to navigate the hilly road to Cobourg in the dark. It was frustrating to have found the girl and then be stymied by something so insubstantial as a cabin door and a scrappy dog. He didn’t want to leave her behind, but he would if he had to.
“Caroline!” he called suddenly in a harsh voice. “I don’t know what you have in that satchel, but you can’t keep it safe all by yourself. Open the door now!” It was much the same voice he had used with the dog. It had much the same effect. The door opened a crack.
“Do you know who I am?” Thaddeus asked.
“You’re the preacher who talked the most and won,” she said.
It was an unflattering summation of his performance at The Great Debate, but at least she remembered him. “That’s right,” he said. “Your mother sent me to get you. Come on.”
He turned and walked back to the buggy, as if there were no question that Caroline would do exactly as she was told. He motioned Martha to follow. He climbed up and took the reins, but before Martha could claim her seat, Caroline emerged from the cabin, clutching the leather satchel she had rescued.
“Wait,” she said. Then she walked over to them, a scowl on her face. “What about Digger?”
“He can come, too.”
She whistled, and the dog leaped into the back of the cart, with only a growl or two directed at the recumbent James Small.
“Digger, go sit,” Thaddeus said. The dog subsided and Caroline climbed in beside him.
“How do you do that?” Martha asked.
“It’s just a matter of using the right tone of voice,” Thaddeus said as he flicked the reins. “Maybe you should practise on James.”