Solemn Vows Read online

  Willoughby decided it was prudent to put his oar in. “Perhaps you could suggest, sir, that the young lady keep indoors for the duration. After all, it’s only until next Thursday.”

  Sir Francis shifted his glare from the pilaster to Willoughby. “That, sir, is a preposterous suggestion!”

  Willoughby’s head snapped back as if struck. But Marc was pleased to see that he held his ground. “But you wouldn’t willingly put her in danger?”

  “I have absolutely no intention of putting my ward’s safety in jeopardy. But she has expressly conveyed to me her desire to shop for a gown suitable for the gala at Somerset House next Saturday, and on Tuesdays she always takes the carriage to Streetsville to visit a second cousin of hers of whom she is extremely fond, and on Wednesdays she goes riding in the College Park.”

  “But surely, sir, these are extraordinary circumstances,” Willoughby tried again.

  “Miss Hartley, provided she is fully recovered by Monday, will continue with her habitual routine. Is that clear to everyone?” The governor’s voice had the ring of royal prerogative in it. No one spoke. “Moreover, she shall be fully protected and armoured against the slightest interruption or irritation. Willoughby, you will choose two reliable men from the barracks to act as bodyguards. You yourself will accompany Miss Hartley wherever she wishes to go, and I shall hold you personally responsible for her well-being as well as her safety.”

  Willoughby began to tremble, from anger or chagrin, it was hard to tell, and Marc felt obliged to say, “I would be happy to take on those duties, sir. Lieutenant Willoughby will be needed at your side in Woodstock and London.”

  “That is a magnanimous gesture, sir, and I know you would carry out those duties conscientiously, as you demonstrated this afternoon,” Sir Francis said evenly, but his rage—stoked no doubt by guilt and anxiety over Angeline’s mishap on King Street and, probably, by Willoughby’s mistimed temerity—was not far below the surface. “But Lieutenant Willoughby has already done me yeoman’s service this week: the speeches are written. You, on the other hand, have a murderer to catch. Any pressing paperwork here next week can be handled by Major Burns, whom you and Willoughby will assist whenever you can.”

  “But what about your own safety, sir?” Willoughby said desperately.

  “Hilliard will take over the unit. All the basic arrangements have already been made, thanks to you.” Sir Francis looked long and hard at Willoughby, who was in a way like Angeline: a ward and a trust, as well as the prodigal son of a friend. He said, not unkindly, “Colin, I am giving you a very important assignment. You have acquitted yourself with distinction these past few days. I have already written to your father to inform him of your progress and of the potential I see in you. But you are a soldier and an officer: you took an oath to serve and obey your monarch and those who speak in his name—however you may personally feel about the commands given you. What I am telling you by offering you this assignment is that I have enough faith in you to put Miss Hartley’s well- being in your hands.”

  And with that the governor wheeled and strode towards his apartments.

  Willoughby stood stock- still, clenching and unclenching his fists, a wild, unfocused anger in his eyes. Four days to be spent as chaperone and nursemaid to an overindulged, babbling, flighty, whim-driven ingenue would have unsettled the most dedicated officer. For Willoughby—who had become, however temporarily, the day-to- day aide-de-camp of a lieutenant- governor—it was a crushing blow.

  Hilliard made consoling noises, but Willoughby swore at him or the world in general, brushed rudely past Marc, and stormed out.

  Major Burns, impassive in his office doorway, said to Marc, “I think you’d better go after him. He looks capable of anything.”

  Including self- destruction, Marc thought, and headed for the door.

  MARC SPENT THE NEXT TWO HOURS in a fruitless search of every public house and drinking den within a five- block area of Government House. Not only did he not find Colin, he found no one who had seen him. At least his anxiety over Colin was keeping at bay the dark thoughts about this afternoon’s encounter with Beth. It had promised so much, had seemed so serendipitous—fated even—that the disastrous outcome was all the more unbearable. It seemed self-evident now that he must give her up. That decision was simple compared with the impossible one: to cease loving her. So he was not surprised to find himself on Eliza’s flower- bedecked doorstep—red-eyed, haggard, and seeking any sort of solace. His urgent need for comfort made him blissfully blind to the inappropriateness of wringing pity out of another woman who possibly entertained the notion that he was in love with her.

  Eliza took one look and ushered him quickly past a startled butler and her uncle’s office into the sanctum of her private sitting room. He slumped onto the sofa there and let Eliza pull his boots off and undo the buttons of his jacket. Seconds later a brandy snifter appeared in his right hand, and he drank.

  “Did you get hit by a horse?” she said lightly, but there was deep concern in her eyes. She stroked his brow, and he felt both guilt and ease at the spontaneity of the gesture.

  “By two horses and a wagon,” he murmured, and realized then that this was the only part of a devastating day he could talk about, the only part of it that he had a right to reveal to this handsome, generous, unjudging woman with the sloe eyes and free- falling, lustrous hair.

  “Do you want to discuss it?” she said gently. “Or shall we carry on as we usually do?”

  “Let’s carry on,” he said.

  And so they talked about wines and the hazards of shipping and the bad roads that ruptured casks, and about a dozen other idle, tender diversions—always giving a wide berth to the confusions he couldn’t talk about and she knew to be more than accidental.

  Later on when she kissed him, he kissed her back. And felt like a traitor, though who it was he was betraying most, he could not determine.

  IT MUST HAVE BEEN MIDNIGHT when Marc slipped out of Uncle Sebastian’s house like a cat burglar and walked home under a star- filled sky. Once there, he eased open the door of Colin’s room just enough to note that the bed was undisturbed. He tiptoed back to the veranda and sat down on the bottom step to wait.

  He was just dozing off, his chin in his hands, when he heard footsteps. It was Colin, walking deliberately. He was not drunk, Marc was relieved to see as he stood up to greet him. Colin stopped, squinted incredulously at the shadowy figure on the porch, and then came up to Marc until they were face to face—no more than a yard apart.

  In the distorting light of the moon Marc could see a sudden rage take hold of Colin’s features, then his body, and finally his fists. “Traitor!” he hissed and swung wildly at Marc’s head. Marc ducked away easily and watched, with some bewilderment, as his friend wobbled noisily into the hall.

  Well, he was alive and almost sober—that was something, Marc thought; then he wondered what in heaven could possibly happen next to make his own life more miserable.

  TEN

  At daybreak on Monday morning Sir Francis Bond Head’s vice-regal cavalcade trotted out of Toronto onto Dundas Road, with flags flying. For four days the capital would be without its steward, but the countryside west of it would be graced by his presence and treated to the power and authority of his rhetoric. The future of a British colony lay in his hands and in his capacity to persuade. Having a convenient scapegoat—a disaffected Yankee mercenary, for example—was an unexpected boon and too tempting to be resisted. Sir Francis would hammer that plank into every platform on his royal route. And lest the loyal citizens of Toronto, in his absence, forget the message he had delivered to them daily from the seat of Government House, he left these words on the front page of the Gazette:

  I consider that in a British colony, British interests should be paramount, and that in these provinces we should foster them by every means in our power, by infusing into the country Britain’s redundant population, and by giving nothing to aliens but their bare rights.

  MARC SP
ENT THE MORNING WITH MAJOR BURNS, working on backlogged correspondence. About ten o’clock he heard Colin come out of his office (they had not spoken about the incident on Saturday night) and go back towards the living quarters. If Colin was still angry, he was keeping it to himself. But a morning spent on a shopping expedition with Angeline Hartley would soon put any restraint to the test. A few minutes later, the governor’s second-best carriage was heard rattling along the east driveway towards Simcoe Street.

  About eleven, Marc got a note from Cobb to meet him at the Crooked Anchor. He left Major Burns asleep on his desk and walked quickly towards Bay Street. He was eager to hear any news about Rumsey. Sunday had been a long and tedious day for Marc. The governor was a strict observer of the Sabbath and expected others to emulate his public piety. After church, Marc tried to forget his personal troubles for a while by riding up to the mess at the garrison. Throughout the winter months he had eaten his evening meal in the officers’ quarters there at least three times a week—both as a pleasant diversion and as a way of maintaining contact with the regular army. But lately his increasingly onerous duties as aide- de- camp had made these visits less and less common. Last night he had astonished his peers at mess by getting thoroughly drunk and singing bawdy songs he couldn’t remember having memorized. But the camaraderie and the drink had worn off by morning, leaving Marc lower in spirits than ever. What he needed most was action—of any kind. A break in the investigation would be just fine.

  Cobb was nursing an ale and looking as if he, too, had found Sunday interminable.

  “Anything on Rumsey yet?” Marc asked, skipping the preliminaries.

  “You don’t expect him to pop up in front of us and beg for the leg irons, do you?” Cobb muttered.

  Marc waited while Cobb scratched at his wart. His uniform had regained its customary stains. His sweat- soaked helmet and wooden truncheon lay on the table. “His wife hasn’t budged from the cabin except to trot off to Danby’s to empty the slop pots. The older kids’re spendin’ a lot of time at Kimble’s harness shop. The Kimbles seem to’ve taken to the Rumsey brood. My spies are suggestin’ the Kimbles are just what they seem to be: nice honest folk who vote Reform, as they ought to.” Cobb peeked up from his ale to see the effect of this provocation.

  “Perhaps Rumsey is content to let the Kimbles take care of his children,” Marc said. “He doesn’t sound like much of a father. Unfortunately that means he might well forsake them and join his relations in Buffalo.”

  “Or he’s got another reason to hang about.”

  “Another assassination?”

  “Could be. Or could be he’s into some kinda fuss with the people payin’ him.”

  “There are just too damn many ‘could-be’s’ in this case,” Marc snapped.

  “Downed one too many at the mess last night, did ya, Major?” Cobb asked.

  Marc ignored the jibe (while quietly marvelling at Cobb’s seeming omniscience in matters local), and said, “Give me something positive, Constable, something definite. God knows, I need it.”

  “Well, then, I can tell ya fer certain that the little collision on King Street was most definitely an accident.”

  “And how do you know that?” Marc said abruptly, immediately regretting the doubt in his voice—which Cobb did not miss.

  Cobb polished off his ale, then said evenly, “Wilkie found the driver of the cart. Wilkie’s just a country bumpkin like myself, but he does know a horse’s arse when he sees one, and in fact he recognized both of the horses. Turns out they belong to a butcher on John Street. So Wilkie had them taken home, where said butcher was most startled to see them and even more startled not to see his driver—one Alfie Foote by name. Seems that Alfie’d lost his regular job as a joiner and talked the butcher into takin’ him on as a teamster. Which the kind- hearted butcher did. Only Alfie neglected to tell said butcher that he’d never driven a harnessed team before. He only got a block or so towards the market when the horses reckoned they would go fer a nice trot up Newgate Street. Alfie tried yellin’ at ’em, but they figured he was encouragin’ them, so they roared along Newgate, wheeled south onto Yonge, and then decided to head fer home back along King Street—where you was foolish enough to get in their way.”

  “You’re certain of this?”

  “Wilkie’s known Alfie and his folks fer years: dumb, but honest as they come.”

  “Good work, Constable,” Marc said in what he hoped was not a patronizing tone. Then he remembered something. “When did you discover all this?”

  “Late Saturday afternoon. We don’t walk around with a thumb up our noses, Major.”

  “Then why didn’t you inform me immediately?”

  “Now, now, keep yer braces buckled. I left a warm stew and a willin’ woman in my house to come all the way to Mrs. Standish’s place. But you wasn’t home.”

  “But that was Saturday. You had all day yesterday to get in touch.”

  Cobb looked horrified. “Major,” he said solemnly, “yesterday was the Sabbath.”

  WHILE MARC WAS PLEASED WITH THE NEWS that the collision had not been deliberate—which meant that Angeline Hartley’s life was not in any danger—he was annoyed at Cobb for not informing him in time to let Willoughby off the hook and to put the governor’s mind at ease before he left. And while it was possible to get a message to Sir Francis at Brantford or Woodstock, he knew the governor well enough to realize that he would want to hear the facts directly from the source. Nor could Marc leave his duties here to ride west himself. In any event, Colin had been given his orders, and Sir Francis, who saw them no doubt as yet another trial by fire for the wayward Willoughby, would be unlikely to reverse himself. Marc finally decided that he would send a note by courier to the commander at London barracks informing the governor that it seemed almost certain that no one was out to injure his ward but that, to err on the side of safety, he would have Willoughby continue to shepherd Miss Hartley according to her whim. Nor would he tell Colin: at least the poor bugger now had some reason to think himself useful as the girl’s chaperone. If he were to find out that the whole business had been a mistake, he might go off the deep end for good.

  THREE DAYS WENT BY WITH NO WORD from Danby’s Crossing. Marc sent Cobb back to his regular patrol, subject to instant recall should the need arise. Major Burns’s fingers stiffened so much that his pen dropped between them. Marc buried himself in paperwork. Colin fumed and boiled by day and avoided Marc in the evenings by heading out somewhere every night. “The blast of his cologne would’ve brung a donkey to its knees,” Mrs. Standish informed Marc, who was grateful for such news, as it seemed that Colin had found some female company to help him cope with his bitter disappointment (as long as that company wasn’t the daughter of a possessive and vengeful receiver general). The day trip out to Streetsville had been particularly trying as Angeline’s second cousin proved to be an exact copy, and so poor Willoughby had had a giggler at each ear and was paraded about the town like a wooden soldier on display.

  “I feel like a goddamn pimp!” he was heard raving to a defenceless duty- corporal.

  As for Marc, he avoided Eliza’s company for as long as he could, and found more than one reason to pass by the dry- goods store and its adjacent millinery each day. But he didn’t go in, and no one he knew came out.

  On Thursday evening, the governor’s cortège returned, and everything changed.

  HILLIARD WAS BUG- EYED WITH EXCITEMENT as he recounted to the staff of Government House the succession of triumphant speeches delivered by Sir Francis. Colonel MacNab was ecstatic. Receiver General Maxwell predicted a Tory-Constitutionist landslide, with even Mackenzie going down to defeat in the second riding of York. There wasn’t the faintest rumour of a threat against the governor. Security had been tight, the crowds boisterous but non- violent. The governor’s message had sunk in, and its effect had been palpable.

  So when Marc was asked to join Sir Francis in his office after supper that evening he was astonished to find him in high
dudgeon. By the time Marc arrived, he had already worked himself into a crimson rage—with the ailing Major Burns as his sole witness. Marc had expected to be asked immediately for a report on Rumsey and another on Angeline and the accident, but the governor had already chosen his theme.

  “I want that bastard’s name, do you hear?” he shouted at Marc across the room.

  “Do calm yourself, sir,” Burns was saying. “You’ll do yourself some damage.”

  “I do not intend to be upstaged by some anonymous coward calling himself by the ludicrous name of Farmer’s Friend. The people of Brantford and Woodstock and London heard for themselves who is really the farmer’s friend!”

  “I’m sure they did, sir,” Burns soothed, and glanced at Marc imploringly.

  “Damn right they did!” Sir Francis seemed for the moment to have lost sight of Marc. “But everywhere we went, everywhere, those damnable broadsheets preceded us. They were even left on church pews, I was told, on the Sabbath! And supporters of that traitorous Yankee and so- called Reformer, Bidwell, had the nerve to move through the crowd in London handing them out like invitations to tea! Giving them out to the people who had come to hear their governor, not to have their minds polluted with that rot!”

  “But, sir—”

  “And don’t tell me to calm down, Titus!” Sir Francis brayed.

  “Are you referring to the letters written by Farmer’s Friend, sir?” Marc said quietly.

  Sir Francis wheeled and caught sight of Marc near the door. He heaved a huge sigh, and struggled to get his anger under control. When he spoke again his voice was low, but still tight. “It is, Lieutenant. And I’m glad you’re here. I want you to drop everything and follow this Clegg fellow from his house tomorrow morning. Don’t lose him. Let him lead you to the writer of these scurrilous, seditious letters. Find out his name. Then bring him here to me—by force if you must. And don’t tell Cobb. I don’t trust that man.”