The two men rode on toward Belleville. Surely it would be easier to find the peddler there, with so many more people around who might have seen him. At the very least they could call on the Simms family. He was not sure where in the bustling town the family lived, but when they arrived it did not take long to find someone to provide directions; Belleville was the largest town in the area but most of the inhabitants still knew where everyone else lived. They were pointed toward a narrow two-storey brick house that stood in a row of similar houses. Lewis was surprised; it was a very prosperous-looking neighbourhood, and never himself having aspired to anything as grand as a multi-storied brick dwelling, he was amazed that Simms could afford such a thing. It was no wonder that he grumbled at the lack of business.
He knocked at the front door, and it was opened by a young carrot-haired girl, obviously a domestic judging by the poor quality of her dress and the grease stains on her apron. He asked for one of the Misses Simms. The girl informed him that none of the Misses Simms was receiving company at the moment, and that if he wished to conduct business with the household, he must use the kitchen door at the back of the house.
Lewis was suddenly very conscious of his dusty coat and his muddy boots. Nonetheless, he wasn’t about to be put off by the hired help. He drew himself up to the full height of his lanky frame, and called upon every ounce of the authority he had assumed over the years. “It is a matter of some urgency. I suggest you go and get one of them. Now.”
The girl looked startled, but obediently turned around and went to deliver his message. After a few moments a very tall, very plain woman returned with her.
“Who are you, and what do you want?” she said, sniffing a little at his travel-weary appearance. “And how dare you come to the front door. Tradesmen go to the rear. You should know that.”
This was a deliberate insult, as Lewis’s profession should have been obvious to even a casual observer. He ignored the barb, however, and politely explained that he was looking for Isaac, and asked if he had returned to the house recently.
He never found out what response the woman would have given him — likely none at all, or a tongue-lashing — as another woman appeared suddenly at the door. “Who is it, Tildy?” this woman asked. “It’s not Isaac again, is it?” And Lewis could hear the fear in her voice.
“He has been here, then?” Lewis said.
“Oh, yes,” the second woman replied. “I’ve never seen him in such a state. He was extremely rude to mother, and actually lifted a hand to Esther. I don’t know what’s come over him.”
“Was there an argument?” he asked. “Was he upset?”
“Don’t answer,” Tildy said. “We have no idea who this man is or what he wants.”
“What I want is to help your brother,” Lewis said. “Please? Tell me.”
Tildy glared at the other woman, but she answered anyway. “Yes there was a dreadful argument, but I don’t think I should tell you anything more.” It was obvious that she was torn between wanting to talk about the incident and fear of what her sister would do if she did.
“Please,” he pleaded. “This could be a matter of life and death.”
“Who is it?” A plaintive voice floated out into the hallway from somewhere within the house. “What does he want?”
“It’s just some scoundrel who claims he’s looking for Isaac,” Tildy called back. “It’s all right, Mother, he’s just leaving.” And with that she shut the door and left him standing on the step in a boil of frustration. He had hoped against hope that a clue to Simms’s whereabouts might be found here, and now it appeared that the line of inquiry had been decisively closed. He had no idea where to look next.
Spicer had been silent by his side, but now he spoke up. “Let’s go down the road a little way,” he said. “Just far enough so they can’t see you from inside.”
The curtains at the front window twitched as he said the words. The Simms family was watching, all right, watching to make sure their unwelcome company had well and truly departed. And then the lacy fabric was pulled aside farther and Lewis saw a figure that was certainly not either of the plain women they had talked to. This girl had a beautifully shaped oval face with a slightly aquiline nose and a mass of chestnut hair. Lewis felt a familiar stab of pain at the sight. It could have been Sarah standing there. Then, abruptly, the curtain fell back across the window and the apparition disappeared.
They walked their horses down the street until they judged they were out of sight of the house. Spicer found a lane that he thought would lead to the back of the dwellings, and this he followed, leaving Lewis to wait for him at the corner. In spite of the fact that they were in a desperate hurry to find Simms, he welcomed a few moments of solitude so he could deal with the turmoil of emotion he felt. He had thought that he was past the wrenching shock that had so often assailed him whenever he saw someone who reminded him of Sarah. He’d begun to lose track of her features, to forget the details of her appearance, but the resemblance to Simms’s sister was so pronounced that one brief glimpse had been enough to bring it all storming back. Again he felt the grief of losing his daughter, but at the same time he knew that he was very close to unlocking the secret of Simms’s madness — young women with chestnut hair and grey eyes; young women who looked like his sister, whom he had just now argued with and struck.
Fifteen minutes later, Spicer returned with the girl who had answered the door.
“Tell him what you told me,” he urged.
The girl looked at Lewis. “Is it true Mr. Simms is in trouble and you’re trying to help him?” she asked. Lewis nodded. “And you’re a preacher, aren’t you, sir?” She hesitated for a moment and then she said, “Well, if you’re a preacher, then there can’t be anything wrong with telling you, can there? It would be just about like talking to Jesus himself, wouldn’t it?”
Lewis chose to ignore this piece of doctrinal confusion and waited for the girl to go on.
“I don’t give two hoots about the women in there. Nasty, the whole bunch of them, but Mr. Simms has always been right kind to me, and if he’s in trouble, I’d like to help him. Well, you met Miss Tildy and Miss Bella, the two who came to the door, right? Have you ever seen two such ugly women in your life? Well, there’s another one, the youngest, Miss Esther and you couldn’t imagine a body so different from her sisters. She’s right pretty, she is, but she knows it, too. And just between you and me and the doorpost, she uses it to get what she wants. The others all wait on her hand and foot, especially Mr. Simms.”
“But there was an argument, wasn’t there, between Mr. Simms and Miss Esther? When he was just here?”
“Oh, yes, it was dreadful, shoutin’ and yellin’ like you wouldn’t believe. Esther got another marriage proposal, you see, but of course the old woman forbade it again.”
“Another?”
“Oh, my yes, gets ’em all the time. And the answer is always the same. The old lady won’t let her wed until the older ones do. Says its “unseemly” or some such thing, and “just ain’t done.” The girl pantomimed looking down her nose with disdain. “Well, that ain’t goin’ to happen anytime soon, I can tell you, not with the way them older two look. And then Mr. Simms come bargin’ into the house and starts yellin’ at Esther to go against their mother’s wishes and get married anyway. And like I said, she’s real pretty and uses it, and she just sort of smiled at him and said, ‘Oh, no, Isaac, I couldn’t possibly go against mother,’ and then she did this real funny little smirk at him and said, ‘Besides, dear brother, where would that leave you and me?”
Lewis had the feeling that the girl was rehearsing, practicing her story until she got it dramatic enough to recount for her friends and family. He was suddenly glad that he had never been able to