“Did you have any sort of written agreement with Simms? Or was it all just a verbal arrangement?”
“It wasn’t worth enough to be bothered with any sort of contract. I’d just make a note of what I sent with him and he’d make a note of what he’d sold.”
“Do you still have the notes?”
“Yes.” He disappeared under the counter and hauled out a box. “I should have tossed this out ages ago, but my father was always a stickler for record-keeping. He says you never know when you may have to prove something.” He shuffled through the documents. “Yes, it’s all here.” He shoved a sheaf of papers toward Lewis.
He only needed to find one and it didn’t take him long. There, in a fine sloping hand were the words RECEIVED, 31 JULY 1837, 100 PINS. CONSIGNMENT SALES AS AT 9 OCTOBER, 1837–82. PAID 10 OCTOBER 1837.
Just to make sure, he pulled open Rachel’s book and compared the writing. There was no question. It was the same. But why would Simms have written in the book before he placed it in her lifeless lap?
He handed the papers back. “Thank you. That helps a lot.”
Caddick shrugged. “I don’t know how, but you’re welcome.”
Lewis had never set much store by the Caddicks’ so-called “artistic talents.” The pins, he felt, were quite useless articles and perilously close to being icons of a sort — something that was more along the lines of the Catholic way of thinking than the Methodist. He could see no reason for Willett’s landscapes at all: why put something down in paint when you could see it in person? But he had had a change of heart about Benjamin’s little miniature portraits. He wished that he had, at some point, had the sense to have one done of Sarah, for he realized that he was beginning to forget what she looked like.
IV
The next day Betsy announced that she was ready to try their return journey, and Minta looked dismayed. “You can’t go yet. It’s been so good having you here. Martha is wonderful with Henry. Stay another day. Please?” and then she disappeared out to the blacksmith’s shop. When she returned, she had a smug expression on her face, but refused to say anything until Seth came in for his dinner.
She waited until the children had finished eating and then she cleared her throat and looked at Seth.
“What are you looking at me for?” he said. “This is your scheme, you do the talking.”
“Well.” She sat up a little straighter in her chair. “I’ve been thinking.”
“That much is obvious,” Lewis said. “I can tell by the look on your face that you’re hatching something. So tell us what it is.”
It turned out to be the last thing he expected.
“Well, we have the half-house that’s empty, you know. We wanted to rent it anyway, to help out until the shop gets off the ground. Seth and I have been talking about trying to find a tenant.”
Seth was busy all day in the smithy, and it looked to Lewis, at least, that the business was well-launched already, so he knew that Minta was just using this argument to lay the groundwork for what she had in mind.
“I’ve found it a real help to have Martha around,” she went on. “She’s so good with Henry, and I was just thinking that maybe, since the place is empty anyway, you might think about renting it. I know you already have a place in Bath,” she said hurriedly, “but you could rent here just as easily as there, and since you’re travelling all the time anyway, it would be easier for you to come back here. It’s not nearly as far.”
“Well, yes,” Lewis said. “But that would only hold true for a time. I’m just as apt to be on a different circuit in a year’s time.”
“And that’s the problem,” Betsy said, and Lewis knew then that this plot had been carefully constructed by the two women. “Thaddeus, I told you that I’ve reached a time in my life when I want to be settled, and I need some help with Martha. We’re not young anymore, you and I. It won’t be that long before you can’t manage the travelling either, and I can’t think of a better place for us to locate.”
He could see that her mind was quite made up, and long experience had told him that when Betsy made a decision, the decision stayed made. The idea had a lot to recommend it, really, when he thought about it. He wanted to be able to keep a closer watch on Simms, and between that and his regular round, it was evident that he needed the luxury of knowing that he needn’t hurry home to make sure that his family was all right. There was also another aspect to the situation that neither of the women would be aware of. In the long term, he could see that the day of the itinerant clergyman was probably drawing to an end, except perhaps in the newly settled western regions of the province. But that would be a task for younger men, not old hands like him. He suspected he would soon be looking for a place to locate, to become a settled minister who stayed in one place and preached to the same congregation at every service. The Methodist Episcopals in Demorestville had land given to them by Mr. Demorest and hoped to soon be building their own meeting house. He could do worse than ask to be their local preacher when the time came.
“Well,” he said, “what were you thinking of renting the place for?”
Minta named a sum that was less than they were currently paying in Bath, so Lewis knew that her wish to have Betsy and Martha nearby was sincere.
“The place is worth more than that, surely?”
“No, it isn’t,” Minta replied. “It’s so dark on that side, and there’s no yard. But if it’s Mrs. Lewis and Martha next door, I won’t mind sharing the yard, and if it’s too dark over there, they can come and sit in my kitchen.”
Lewis turned to Seth. “And what do you say to all this, sir?”
“It seems like a fine idea to me. It will help us out and you too. What is there here to quarrel with?”
Lewis was aware that his wife was perhaps not the easiest person to share a house with. Will and Nabby had made that clear. But Minta wasn’t Nabby and the two women did seem to get along. Besides, they wouldn’t be in the same house, would they? They could each run their kitchens the way they saw fit and keep each other company in the meantime. And then there was Martha. There was no question that it would be better for her to grow up in the company of someone younger than her grandparents, and to have a ready playmate nearby. He wasn’t sure what Luke would think of it, but the boy was nearly finished school and would be going off on his own soon anyway. If he disliked the notion he could make some plan that suited him better.
“Settled,” he said, and Betsy and Minta beamed.
The question of what Luke would do answered itself in an unexpected way. As soon as everything was agreed, Lewis rode for Bath to arrange for the transport of their belongings. To his surprise, Moses was there when he arrived.
Lewis had heard nothing of Will and Nabby since they had given up the farm in Marysburgh and moved west. They had sent no message, and he had no idea where they were or how they were prospering. He wasn’t sure that he would have written to them even if he had. His last conversation with Will still festered in his mind, and the fact that he was still struggling with the boy’s debt was a constant source of irritation.
It turned out that they had written, not to Lewis, but to Moses.
“It’s a struggle for them,” Moses reported, “but Will says it’s good farmland out there and the price of wheat is starting to rise. He figures I should go there, too. You can still get land real cheap and I could share in with him until I get my own place underway.”
“You shared in once before and it didn’t work,” Lewis said sourly. “What makes you think this will be any different?”
Moses shrugged. “I don’t intend to stay with them for any great length of time. I’ve got a little money saved and if the land is as good as Will