“Why, yes, I believe so,” Varney replied, surprised. “One of those little ones with a red leather cover. A prayer book or some such. How did you know that?”
Just like Sarah.
“Do you happen to know if the girl had one of those little pins? You know, the ones with the Lord’s Prayer?” To his own ears the question sounded odd and hoarse, but Varney appeared not to notice.
“Well, now, I don’t know, I’m sure. Do you mean one of those pins that the Caddicks make? It’s so small, you see. If you weren’t looking for it, you’d never notice it.”
That was true. It had been Betsy who found it with Sarah, as she was preparing the body for burial. A shiny little pin stabbed into the bodice. Betsy had raked her hand on it and it had left a long scratch along one finger. She had pulled it out and was about to set it aside when the sunlight had caught it, revealing the writing on the head of it. She had commented on how odd it was; she had never seen anything like it before. They had not known of the Caddicks’ talents then.
“So what is everyone making of the death?” Lewis asked.
“Oh, there will be a Coroner’s inquest — there has to be because it was an unexpected death — but I reckon that it will be put down to an act of God. There’s nothing to indicate that anyone else is involved.”
He exchanged a glance with Betsy. They had heard all this before — no evidence to indicate foul play, no reason to believe anything else — except for the marks around Sarah’s neck — and the pin — and the little red book that neither of them had ever seen before. But try as they might to point this out, no one else was willing to believe the death was the result of anything but some strange kind of “fit,” that general all-purpose diagnosis that really meant “we don’t know.”
“I must go and speak with the family.”
“Yes, I expected you would,” Varney said. “The sister will find a comfort in that.”
They sat at the table for a long time after Varney left, neither of them wanting to discuss the tragedy that reminded them so forcefully of the one they had lived through so recently. Nearly every detail the same, and the promise once again that justice would be blind. Oh, poor Rachel, Lewis thought, gone to meet your Maker with nothing to show him but chestnut hair and a pair of soft grey eyes.
IX
Lewis badly wanted to confirm the details with the local doctor in case Varney had somehow got them wrong, but he knew he really should see Minta first. Her parents lived in a nicely built frame house on the outskirts of Picton, the front dooryard neatly fenced and planted with laylock and virgin’s bower. An older woman answered the door, and when Lewis announced who he was, she showed him to the downstairs room where Minta lay, her new infant by her side. Her eyes were red from crying, but it was obvious that the new little boy was claiming most of her attention. Lewis wasn’t sure if her weeping had been for Rachel, or was just part of that peculiar storm of emotion that often follows childbirth.
“Will you christen him, when the time comes?” she asked.
“I would be delighted,” he said. “But what will your husband think of that?”
“He’ll do as I say.”
Again this firm authority masked by meekness. A woman produced a child and, particularly if it was a male, assumed an aura of power, as if reproduction had given them sovereignty. He had been told that Seth was a brute, and that Minta had been having a thin time of it, but that may just have been a reflection of the difficulties she was having carrying the child, or the unfortunate look that Seth had. He always seemed so burly beside his petite wife, and had a very dark complexion. His habitual glower also didn’t help his appearance any. But Lewis now began to get a glimpse of the true dynamics of this marriage; he had seen evidence of it when Minta had stepped forward in the churchyard, and now she wore a queenly aura that she didn’t bother to hide.
“We’d like you to preach at Rachel’s funeral, as well,” Minta said.
He should have been prepared for the request. He was, after all, a minister first and foremost. And how could he refuse? How could he explain that it was far too soon for him to see another chestnut-haired girl laid to rest? He must pull himself together; he was the preacher and it was his duty to be the comforter, not the one to give in to the emotion of the occasion.
He nodded. “Of course I will. Have you decided a name yet?”
She smiled. “Henry, after my father, and George, after Seth’s. Henry George Jessup. Now, don’t you think that a fine name?”
“It is indeed. The finest of names. When exactly was Henry George born?”
“Saturday night. Seth thought it time to bring me here Saturday morning, and he stayed until the baby was born, in spite of the fact that the midwife kept trying to shoo him out of the room. He was a great comfort to me, you know, and I realize that most husbands aren’t. It’s too much for them, as a rule.”
Lewis felt a twinge of guilt when he thought back and realized that he hadn’t even been home for most of Betsy’s lying-ins, never mind in the same room.
“And he found Rachel when?”
“On Sunday night. At least that’s when he came back and told us something awful had happened.” Her eyes welled up with tears. “Poor Rachel. All the time I was cooing over my child, she was lying alone and dead in her bed.”
“Minta,” he said gently. “Do you know if she repented her sins before she passed on?”
“I don’t know. We didn’t ever talk about it much. But … I think so. Oh, I hope so.” The tears began to spill down her face now. “It’s not as if she would have many of them, would she? She was so young. She didn’t have much time to sin.”
He knew he should have pointed out that it didn’t work quite that way, but he felt reluctant to add to Minta’s burden. The baby began to fuss and he deemed it time to leave.
“Thank you,” she said as he left.
“Thank you for coming,” her mother echoed, but she was tight-lipped when she said it.
Dr. Gordon was a brusque, busy man and was just climbing into his buggy when Lewis caught up with him.
“Whatever you want, make it quick,” he said. “Joe Blezard has chopped off half his foot with an axe and I need to go and see if I can do anything about the half that’s left.”
“I just wondered if I might ask a few questions about Rachel Jessup.”
The doctor’s brow furrowed as he struggled to recall the name. “Oh, yes, the girl in Demorestville. Strange case, but then most of them are.”
Lewis grappled with how to ask the next question gracefully, but there didn’t seem to be any way to do it, so he gave up and asked straight out. Doctors weren’t the sort of people who could be shocked. They saw too much.
“Do you think she was strangled? I heard there were marks on her neck.”
Gordon looked at him sternly. “The blessed grapevine — the gossips know more of the details than I do. Yes, there were strange marks on her neck, and yes, she strangled, but whether from the hand of man or the hand of nature, I have no way to judge. Her skirts were thrown up, but there was no evidence of any interference that way, and they could have become disarranged if she’d had some sort of fit. The only other thing of note was an open book in her lap.”
Varney had had the details right after all. “Did you happen to find a small pin anywhere on her person?”
He had the doctor’s full attention for the first time now. “Yes, there was one in the book. How did you know that?”
“There didn’t happen to be writing on the head of it, was there?