The dining room service had been completed, and now Francis and Martha returned to the kitchen and plunked themselves down close to Luke. Everyone had a question for him, and each was asked before Luke had time to provide an answer to the last.
“Wait, wait, wait, one at a time,” Thaddeus ordered, and then promptly jumped in first with his own comment: “Why didn’t you let us know you were coming? It’s a wonder your mother didn’t expire on the spot with the shock of it.”
“I wasn’t sure when I was going to get here,” Luke replied. “I stayed to help Moses until after the spring planting, and of course that always depends on the weather. By the time I realized it was time to go, it was too late to write. The letter would have arrived long after I did. Besides, don’t you like surprises?”
“Tell me about the children,” Betsy demanded. “They must be nearly grown by now.” It was a constant source of grief to her that she had no chance to see her other grandchildren.
“They’re noisy,” Luke said. “And mischievous.”
“And how is farming in the west? Is it as good as they say?” Thaddeus asked.
“Better,” Luke replied, “once you get the land cleared. The chopping is hard, but the wheat practically jumps out of the ground once it’s sown. Wheat and potash, those have been the cash crops.”
“Who are you?” Ten-year-old Martha finally found an opportunity to break into the conversation.
“This is your Uncle Luke,” Thaddeus replied. “We’ve told you about your uncles who went west. Now this one, at least, has come back home. Do you remember him?”
She didn’t. She had been too small when they left. “Hello,” she said. “I’m Martha.”
“I know,” Luke said. “I figured you had to be, but I wouldn’t have recognized you. I remember you being very small, but now you’re all grown up.”
Martha beamed. “You look like Grandpa.”
“He does, doesn’t he?” Betsy said. “He’s a tall, dark stranger.”
Sophie began dishing up the family meal, setting heaping bowls of early potatoes and snap beans in front of them, followed by a platter of fried chicken and a basket of crusty bread. Finally, when all of the food was on the table, she took her place beside Francis and waited expectantly for Thaddeus to say grace.
Luke was caught reaching for the platter of chicken. “I almost forgot,” he said, pulling his hand back. “So many of my meals have been eaten in a hurry and standing up. I’m afraid grace is a nicety that has tended to slip away back in the bush.”
“I believe it’s a necessity, not a nicety,” Thaddeus said. But he said it mildly. The mellowing effect of hard years had made him less inclined to judgment. And the boy had only just returned, after all. He said a few simple words of thanks, and then they all dove into the food.
“You haven’t actually met Sophie, have you, Luke?” Francis asked as he began passing the bowl of potatoes around the table. “Sophie, this is the youngest brat in the original pack. Luke, this is Sophie, who for some reason consented to be my wife. We’re still trying to figure out why.”
Martha was indignant. “Because she loves you, that’s why!” and they all laughed.
There was a hiatus in the conversation as everyone ate, which gave Thaddeus a chance to reflect on how much had changed in the years Luke had been gone. Francis with Sophie, instead of with Luke’s sister, Sarah, who had perished at the hands of a killer. He himself no longer riding the ministerial circuits, but toiling at a hotel and assisting in the business of one of Wellington’s important men. But the change that was the most profound, he realized, was his wife’s physical condition. She was so frail. She had never fully recovered from the dreadful bout of fever she suffered so many years ago, but on her good days she had still been capable of a day’s work that would exhaust a man. That would be the Betsy who Luke remembered, not the Betsy who had been prematurely aged by the apoplexy that had brought them to Temperance House, and which required a constant attendance from Thaddeus that had put paid to his preaching days.
Martha was the first to finish her dinner. She set her knife and spoon neatly across her plate. There was still dessert to come, but with the others still eating, she could now take control of the conversation.
“We found a monster down by the lake,” she announced.
Luke looked surprised that this statement was apparently directed at him. “A monster? What sort of monster? You mean like a fish?”
“No, at first we thought it was a whale, or a dragon, but it turned out to be a man dressed like a woman, only drownded.”
Luke turned to his father for verification of this astounding revelation.
“A dead body is hardly a topic for mealtime conversation,” Thaddeus said.
“But why was it dressed like a woman?” Luke asked, and Martha shot him a grateful glance.
“We don’t know,” Thaddeus said. “But I’m not surprised the children mistook it for a monster. A drowned person is not a pretty thing. It was only after the doctor had a look at it that we realized that the dress was so misleading. Everyone thinks it must be one of the emigrants, and that he fell off a steamer.”
“No one’s come looking for him?”
“No. I suppose with so many of them arriving in such a hurry, it’s not surprising that a few might go missing.”
“I’ve been commissioned to look for one of them myself,” Luke said. “There are settlements of Irish and Scots both, not too far from us. One of them asked me to keep an eye out for his brother, but it’s unlikely I’ll be very successful. There seem to be hordes of them.”
“Poor souls,” Thaddeus said. “I hear that half of them are sick and all of them are starving. I don’t know that they’re going to be able to find a better life here.”
“I came across some of them on the road. They were hoping for farm work, but now that the tariff is lifted on wheat, I don’t know anyone who can afford to hire them.”
“Typical, isn’t it?” Francis said. “Just when Britain has decided to destroy farming in Canada, they round up all their paupers and send them over with the expectation that they can farm.”
The British prime minister, Sir Robert Peel, had changed the Corn Laws, as they were known, although “corn” in England apparently meant any kind of grain, and not just the yellow, husked ears that grew so readily in Canada. The tariffs that had been in place had given Canadian wheat preferential treatment in the British markets. Now this advantage had been wiped away with a stroke of the pen, forcing Canadian farmers to compete directly with the Americans, who produced far larger crops and enjoyed a much longer growing season.
“Everyone is wondering where we’re going to sell our wheat,” Luke said. “There’s a lot of uncertainty about what’s going to happen. Wheat is one of the few things that ever made money.”
“It does seem very odd to me that Britain is rewarding the colony that rebelled while the one that has stayed loyal is being penalized,” Thaddeus said.
“Kind of like the Prodigal Son, isn’t it?” Luke said.
Thaddeus was about to retort, when he realized, for once, that he was being teased by one of his offspring.
“It’s almost as if Britain is aiding and abetting their sabre-rattling,” he grumbled. The United States was embroiled in a territorial war with the newly