Unholy Alliance

by Don Gutteridge

  “What about Tremblay?”

  “Well, he brooded in his room all morning, but fifteen minutes ago he came down and asked me for a pair of raquettes.”

  “Snowshoes?”

  “Right. I took him to the back shed and outfitted him with a pair, a huge wool sweater, and a tuque. Seems he did a lot of snowshoeing back home.”

  “And he’s gone off on his own?” Marc said, letting his alarm show.

  “Oh, don’t worry, Marc. I helped him dress for the outdoors. He wasn’t concealing anything contraband on his person, and I doubt he’ll attempt to snowshoe all the way to Montreal.”

  “I suppose blowing off a little steam through physical exertion can’t do him any harm.”

  “Why don’t you slip home for a few hours?” Macaulay suggested. “If you’re worried about being spotted coming into town from this vicinity, you could take my saddle-horse and head out the back way.”

  “The back way?”

  “Yes. You’ll recall the lumber road that you arrived on just to the north of Elmgrove. Well, it soon turns into a narrow Indian trail, not wide enough for a sleigh but suitable for a horse and rider. It comes out of the woods at a swamp – now frozen solid – where Parliament Street now ends. You could ride down to your cottage from that direction.”

  Marc laughed. “I haven’t been seen in town riding a horse since I left the army two years ago. To say I’d be noticed would be an understatement. Thanks anyway, but I’ll take the usual route.”

  “As long as you’ll go and get away from this place for a while,” Macaulay said with evident relief. “I’ll have Struthers bring a small cutter around to the front door in fifteen minutes.”

  Marc thanked Macaulay, and while he went off to find Struthers, Marc had some lunch and thought about what he might do in the city, in addition to spending some time with Beth and Maggie. It would be useful, he decided, to seek out Nestor Peck, Cobb’s most reliable snitch, and have him and his cronies try to trace the movements of Giles Harkness over the past two weeks and, if possible, determine his present whereabouts.

  By the time the horse and cutter drew up at the front door, Marc had packed his grip (with soiled clothes) and pulled on his outdoor things. He stepped out into the cold, clear afternoon, thanked Abel Struthers, and hopped up into the cutter. It felt good to be outdoors and on the move after the claustrophobia of Elmgrove. He snapped the reins and the horse began to trot smartly up Macaulay’s driveway towards the Kingston Road. The driveway wound its way among spruce and cedar, their boughs still glistening and pristine with snow.

  He was in sight of the highway when he heard a strange sound coming from the grove of evergreens on his right. He drew back on the reins. There it was again. It seemed to be a lone blue jay shrieking, as they sometimes did in the early spring: sharp and insistent. With the cutter stopped and the horse standing still, the woods around Marc became eerily silent – until the jay-shriek came again.

  “Au secours! Au secours!”

  Not a bird at all, but someone crying out desperately in French, crying for help. Marc knew he could not get the horse and cutter through the evergreens, so he jumped down and ploughed straight towards the cry, which, after a brief pause, started up again – somewhat fainter than before. The drifts were three- or four-feet deep, and Marc found himself floundering in them up to his thighs. It was easy to see why the locals resorted to snowshoes to travel anywhere off the roads or trails. In less than a minute he had become winded and, despite the piteous and fading cries ahead, he was forced to stop and catch his breath.

  “It’s all right! I’m coming to help!” he shouted in French.

  Several minutes later, panting and sweating, Marc thrashed his way past a bushy cedar-tree and spotted the source of the cry for help. Maurice Tremblay lay on his back in a huge drift. One leg – still snowshoed – was sticking up in the air and being shaken about as if it were trying to get a purchase on the air itself. The other was, apparently, twisted underneath him at an unnatural angle. He’s tipped over and sprained or broken his left ankle, was Marc’s thought as he pushed his way the final few yards to the stricken man.

  “Don’t try to speak,” Marc said firmly. “I’m here to help. I’ve got a sleigh nearby on the driveway. If you can stand it, I’m going to lift you onto my back and carry you there.”

  Tremblay, his face white and contorted, nodded, then grimaced horribly and sighed against the pain tearing up through his injured leg.

  Marc quickly removed the raquette from the sound right foot, then got behind Tremblay and very gently lifted him upright. But as the bent leg and twisted ankle straightened out with the rest of his body, Tremblay screamed in agony, and the shock of his scream almost sent Marc toppling. Realizing that it would be too painful to try and remove the other snowshoe, Marc simply eased himself around Tremblay’s body, squatted down, and heaved him up onto his shoulders, pick-a-back.

  As he staggered forward with his burden, Marc could feel the man’s trembling and his hot, wheezing, pain-driven breath on the back of his neck. The extra weight caused Marc to sink even deeper in the drifts as he made his way back towards the cutter. At times he sank up to his hips, and had to use one mittened hand to paw a path through the snow ahead while balancing Tremblay and steadying him with the other one. Soon Marc’s breathing became heavy and tortured. His chest tightened and burned as he gasped at the icy air. He lost count of the number of times he had to pause and rest, while Tremblay continued to whimper pitifully. Perhaps he should have driven back to the house and gotten a sled or toboggan, and expert assistance, Marc thought. But Tremblay’s suffering had been acute and the cutter had seemed so near.

  Finally, Marc staggered onto the firmer snow of the driveway, almost tipped over, righted himself and, using the last reserves of his strength, eased Tremblay across the cutter’s leather seat. He set the injured leg down tenderly and began unlacing the raquette. Tremblay’s cries had now become a single, heart-wrenching moan.

  Marc took the reins and stood up behind the seat to guide the horse. He was forced to take the cutter out onto the Kingston Road in order to get it turned around, after which he was able, at last, to transport Maurice Tremblay back to the manor-house and whatever comforts it might offer.

  ***

  “It’s not broken,” Macaulay informed Marc, who was sitting in the kitchen being pampered by Hetty and Tillie Janes. “It’s a severe sprain, which is often a damn sight more painful than a clean break.”

  “He’s settled in his room, then?” Marc said, waving off another cup of tea from Tillie.

  “Mrs. Blodgett’s been her usual wonderful self. She poured brandy down his throat, probed for breaks, found none, packed the ankle in ice, and made him put it up on a high stool. When the swelling goes down, she’ll wrap it tightly or apply a splint. Meantime, she’s given him a dose of laudanum.” He smiled and added, “From her private supply.”

  “Well, that’s a relief,” Marc said. “It’s hard to think what else could go wrong, eh?”

  “By the way, Marc, Tremblay wishes to speak with you – now, before the sedative takes effect.”

  “I’ll go right up,” Marc said, putting down his teacup and giving the sisters a grateful smile.

  Upstairs, Marc found Tremblay sitting in a chair with his leg propped up on a pillowed stool. He was looking somewhat dazed, and barely able to open his eyes wide enough to take in his visitor. He gave Marc as broad a smile as he could muster.

  “I’m pleased to hear that your injury was not as serious as we thought it might be,” Marc said. “You’ll be in good hands here, at any rate.”

  “I wanted to thank you personally,” Tremblay said, looking straight at Marc as he spoke. “What you did out there was courageous and very – very generous.”

  “I did what anyone would do in the circumstances,” Marc said, meaning it.

  “After the way I have treated you and your colleagues, and abused our host’s hospitality, I could not have blamed yo
u for driving on and leaving me to my own devices. Who would have known if you had? I wish to apologize with all sincerity, and hope you will convey my apologies to Mr. Macaulay and the others.”

  “I will make certain of it.”

  “I have been in turmoil all week,” Tremblay said, fighting hard against the onset of the sleep his body was demanding. “I have had to admit to myself the logic of many of the arguments put forth on both sides of our discussions, but have been unable to put aside the kind of hate and outrage that has built up in me since the failure of the rebellion. This surprised me, and made me even more difficult to get along with.”

  “I do understand.”

  “I wish you every success in your investigation.”

  “Thank you. Now I’ll leave you to rest.”

  Tremblay had already closed his eyes.

  In the hall, Marc joined Macaulay, and as they descended the stairs, Marc said, “I think we may have done our cause some good in that quarter.”

  “I’m sure you’re right, Marc. Now it’s time for you to do some good for yourself. Go home to Beth and Maggie – this minute!”

  ***

  Cobb estimated that there were fewer than two hours of daylight remaining as he left the village of Port Hope. He had been on the road for almost twelve hours, and had made five or six stops along the way. At three of them he had been given reliable information that confirmed the east-to-west progress of the red-headed impostor in Weller’s stagecoach on the Thursday afternoon of the week past. Exhausted as he was, and disappointed that the spot where the ambush and exchange of identities occurred seemed to be farther east than he had hoped, Cobb was determined to reach Cobourg before he gave up for the day. He debated urging Ben into a brisk canter, but the horse had been wonderful throughout the arduous journey, requiring only brief respites and two feedbags, and not once complaining – as long as he was permitted to set his own steady pace.

  So, Cobb just closed his eyes and dozed as the cutter skidded and bumped along the province’s principal thoroughfare. He awoke with a start when the motion of the sleigh ceased abruptly, and was surprised to find himself parked in front of a commercial building on the main street of Cobourg. He persuaded Ben to go one block farther to the hitching-post beside the verandah of The Cobourg Hotel. In the foyer he was warmly greeted by the proprietor, who introduced himself as Seth Martin. It was clear from his effusive manner that he had interpreted the fine cast of Alfred Harkness’s overcoat, calfskin gloves and tooled leather boots as indications of affluence – despite contrary signs in the gentleman’s rough-hewn, weather-beaten face.

  “Will you be staying the night, Mr. Cobb?” he enthused. “We serve a supper here that’s the talk of the county.”

  “I’m sure it is,” Cobb said generously. “Whether I stay or not depends on the information you may have for me.”

  “You’d like a rundown on the beauty spots of our region?”

  Cobb went straight to the point. He was looking for his missing cousin, a young Englishman, lost somewhere en route from New York to Toronto a week ago. “Your hotel is where the Weller’s passengers from Kingston stop overnight before makin’ a run fer Toronto, ain’t it?”

  Martin winced at the gentleman’s grammar, but did his duty. “It is, Mr. Cobb. That it is.”

  “Think back to a week ago Tuesday. When the sleigh got here in the late afternoon, was there on it a well-dressed young gentleman of slim build with an English accent?”

  Proprietor Martin squeezed his eyes shut to ponder the question. “That was the day the driver come in here with two frozen fingers, so I remember it well. No, yer cousin couldn’t’ve been on it because only one passenger got off an’ stayed over. A merchant chap from Montreal. Very talkative. I put him in the Queen’s Suite upstairs.”

  “An’ the coach leaves fer Toronto the next mornin’?”

  “It does. This gent got on by himself that particular Wednesday, I recall. Nobody from here was headin’ to the city, I guess.”

  “What about the next coach, later on Wednesday afternoon?”

  “Let me see. Four or five passengers, but they all live around these parts. None of ‘em stayed here.”

  Cobb was puzzled. If the impostor had got off at Elmgrove late Thursday – and he was seen doing so – then he should have been among this group of arrivals on Wednesday afternoon and should have stayed overnight in the hotel in preparation for the Thursday morning run to Toronto.

  “So you’re sayin’ nobody got on board here Thursday mornin’?”

  “Not quite. Three of our locals boarded for Toronto, an’ then a few minutes before nine o’clock, a cutter comes racin’ up and a gentleman hops out. The driver of the cutter is big Brutus Glatt from the inn up the road. He hauls the gent’s luggage aboard, an’ the gent then gets in.”

  “What did he look like, this gent?”

  “Well now, it coulda been yer cousin. Slim fella with fancy duds. Youngish. Didn’t hear him talk enough to tell what his accent was.”

  “Did he have a full head of hair? Reddish hair? Or was he bald maybe?”

  “Normally I’d recall somethin’ like that, but he was wearin’ a tall hat an’ was all swaddled up against the cold. I couldn’t say one way or the other. Sorry.”

  So was Cobb. Was this man Graves Chilton? If so, then the exchange of identities must have taken place somewhere between here and Port Hope, where the red-headed impostor had definitely been noted on that same Thursday stage by the innkeeper there (the impostor’s hat having fallen off far enough to expose that garish and memorable mane).

  “You could always check with the driver,” Martin suggested. “He’ll be comin’ this way again on Monday.”

  “I really need to find him before then,” Cobb said.

  “Well, I didn’t ask Brutus – an’ he couldn’t answer if I did – about the gent’s sudden arrival, but if he drove him from the inn where he works, then I’d say the gent spent the night there an’ then dashed the five miles from there to here next mornin’ in time to catch the stage.”

  “That sounds reasonable.”

  “And if he did sleep in the inn, then Mrs. Jiggins, who runs the place, would surely know if the chap mighta been yer cousin.”

  Cobb felt a surge of adrenalin through his fatigue. “You’re right. I better go right there and ask, before it gets too dark or starts to snow.”

  “You won’t take some supper, then?”

  “If I find my cousin,” Cobb said smoothly, “we’ll both come back here an’ have a meal to celebrate.”

  Seth Martin, with an eye on the prize, held the door open for the nattily attired, unlettered gentleman.

  ***

  It was fully dark when Cobb drew his weary horse to a halt before The Pine Knot Inn. Seconds later, the double doors flew open, and a grinning, aggressively plump woman steamed out to greet him.

  THIRTEEN

  Bessie Jiggins insisted that the “gentleman from Toronto” be received in the “drawing-room” of The Pine Knot. Cobb had been ushered into the establishment through the double front-doors, which opened onto a large, low-ceilinged, smoky room that evidently served as the township’s tavern. Here, Cobb noticed as he was guided hastily by, three or four local farmers crouched around a tree-stump table, puffing on clay pipes and dipping tin cups into a communal whiskey-crock. In a far, dim corner a makeshift bar had been set up, a half-log of oak with its flat side up, against which a young woman had propped both elbows and from which she cast a weary, unintrigued glance at the newcomer.

  “That’s Cassandra,” Bessie said as she nudged Cobb into a dark central hallway, “my char and barmaid, and I use the term maid very loosely. A royal name, eh, much wasted on such a plebeian creature. But we get along, and that’s what matters, doesn’t it?”

  “What about my horse?” Cobb protested mildly as he was aimed to the left through a curtained archway whose beaded fringe rattled against his cheek. “I can’t stay but a – ”

  “Br
utus’ll take good care of your beast, no need to worry on that score, Mr. Cobb.”

  “Just Cobb, ma’am, but – ”

  “No ‘buts’ required, Cobb. I make my living out of horses, and Brutus is the best horseman in the county. There are two stables in Cobourg that have been trying to get the contract to supply horses for Weller’s company, but Weller sticks with me and Brutus. I erected this hostelry here just to give the Kingston Road a little elegance.”

  They now stood in a cosier, if smaller, room than the one used as a tavern. Several candelabra illuminated the interior, flattering the calico curtains on the square, glass window and the matching tablecloth. The table itself had been set for two diners, including a pair wine goblets and an uncorked bottle of red wine. Beside the hearth, where a brisk fire burned evenly, sat two padded chairs with armrests.

  “Cass and I were just about to have supper, but I insist that you join me. She won’t mind and you look like you been dragged through the snow behind a runaway.”

  Cobb’s nostrils twitched at the aroma of roasted chicken wafting its way from the cramped galley he’d spotted at the end of the central hall. His stomach rumbled as he replied, “That’s awful kind of you, ma’am.”

  “Bessie.”

  “Bessie. But I must get some important information first, before I’ll know whether or not I c’n take up yer kind offer.”

  “What could be more important than having a hot meal in good company on a night not fit for Christians?” she said as she swept her sweater aside to expose the swollen upper halves of her bosom, their lower counterparts having been trapped in a swathe of scarlet sateen as garish and provocative as a warrior’s sash. Below this wrapping, a voluminous skirt flared out and downward, needing neither hoops nor bustle to keep it afloat. When she smiled, as she did now lustily, she presented a set of beautifully even teeth, and her tiny blue eyes winked merrily in their fleshy sockets. Her rosy, plump face was free of powder and lip-rouge, and her reddish-blond curls had been freed to dazzle in any way they pleased. Bessie Jiggins might have been thirty or fifty, as there were no telltale lines or wrinkles to give the game away.