Abiding Peace (11 page)

“But why?”

“Who knows? She had been to the trader. Several people saw her there this morning. Perhaps he thought to rob her of the stores she had bought, and she wouldn’t give them up.”

“Oh no.”

“She is a stubborn woman.” Samuel rested his large, strong hand on her shoulder, and the warmth of his touch comforted her. “Let us not assume the worst, but what you tell me makes me very uneasy. We will concentrate our search along the road from the trading post to the Ackley farm. Can you tell me what this man looks like? Though any stranger would be suspect under the circumstances.”

“I mostly saw him in the dark, but I did get one good look at him. His beard and hair are sandy colored. He’s tall. As tall as you, perhaps, and a bit thinner. His shoulders are not as broad.”

Samuel gave her a bittersweet smile. “So, my gardening trousers fit him?”

“I believe they did. He might have tied them in closer than you with the bit of rope he wore for a belt.”

“If he still loiters about the village, we shall find him. When did you last see him?”

“Last night. Tabitha saw him, too, though not clearly. She discovered us talking. He must have wakened her when he threw pebbles at the wall to summon me. I was telling him that he must cease and that I would not continue to do his bidding, when Tabitha came to the door and warned him off.”

“She knows then.”

“Aye. I told her all about it last night, and we agreed I should tell you today, but you left in such haste this morning, and then Goodman Ackley was with you at noon….”

“Yes, I see. Christine, I must leave you. There is no time to be lost in searching for this woman. We shall speak more of this later.”

A fresh rush of tears burst into her eyes, and she raised the hem of her apron to wipe them away. “Can you forgive me? I was foolish not to tell you right away, but I truly thought I must keep silence for the children’s sake.”

He touched her cheek gently, and she looked up at him. “You have nothing to fear from me. Keep close with the children, as I said, and wait for word that all is well.” He hesitated a moment, then took her hand in his and pressed it. “Do not torture yourself over this. You did what seemed best.”

“Father?” came a voice from the front of the parsonage.

Christine flinched, and Samuel stepped away from her.

“Father? Where are you?”

“Here, Ben.” The pastor strode around the corner of the house.

Christine followed, dabbing at her damp cheeks with the apron.

“Father, come quick to the Ackleys’.”

“What’s happened?”

Ben stood tall as a man, but his lips trembled. “They found her. Goody Ackley is dead.”

“Ben, you stay here.” Samuel turned around and found Christine close behind him, her eyes red rimmed from weeping. “You heard?”

“Aye. Let me go with you, if Ben will stay with Tabitha and the children. Goody Baldwin will need help to prepare the body.”

Samuel nodded. “Son, do they know what happened to her?”

Ben shook his head. “I heard only that she was found and they were carrying her home in a cart. Mr. Heard told me to run and find you.”

Samuel and Christine walked the mile to Roger Ackley’s farm in silence. People had gathered as the word spread, and a score of men and women milled about the yard. Captain Baldwin’s wife came forward to meet them.

“My husband be out back, with the constable and Brother Ackley. I be waiting for the word to tend the body, poor woman. They told me to send you around there and no other, sir.”

Samuel nodded grimly. “Miss Hardin came to help, if you need assistance when the time comes.”

Goody Baldwin nodded at Christine. “I can use a levelheaded woman in times such as this. I expect Mrs. Dudley will be here soon, too.”

Samuel left the ladies and walked around to the back of the house. James Dudley stood by his oxen, with one hand on the near ox’s shoulder. Behind the team was his cart, and Baldwin, Paine, and Ackley all stared down over the sideboard, into the bed of the cart.

As Samuel approached them, Captain Baldwin looked up. “Ah, Pastor. Good. You’re the man we need. Take a look, sir.”

Samuel joined him beside the cart and looked down at its grisly burden. “It appears to me this work was not done by savages.”

“Aye, sir,” said Baldwin. “My first thought. See the wound on her temple? An Indian would have brained her with a tomahawk and scalped her.”

“This looks more like a blow from a club or some such thing,” Samuel agreed. “And do you see the mark around her neck?”

The men crowded in closer.

“Aye,” said Paine.

“I am not a surgeon,” Samuel said, “but I should think something was tight about her neck that is not there now.”

“You think she were strangled?” the constable asked.

Samuel reached out and gently probed the discoloration beneath Goody Ackley’s chin. “It seems likely.”

Roger Ackley turned away from the sight and put his clenched fists to his eyes as though to rub away the terrible sight. “Ah, my poor, poor wife! I should have gone with her this morning.”

Baldwin laid a brawny hand on his shoulder. “Easy there, Brother Roger. You cannot blame yourself.”

“Can I not? She wished me to go with her to the trading post, but I told her I was too busy. If she wanted me to finish getting the hay in, she could go alone. That is what I told her. And she went.”

Joseph Paine straightened, a faraway look in his eyes. “She was there when I opened this morn. She came in with a big basket, the one she often brings.”

“Aye,” Ackley said. “She totes things home in that, or rather, usually I do the toting.”

“But where is the basket now?” Paine asked.

The men looked at each other.

“Perhaps if we find the basket, we shall know more,” Baldwin suggested. “She was found in the woods, not far off the road. I shall have the men fan out from the place where she lay and see if they find her basket or any of the things she carried in it.”

He left them. Samuel said to Paine, “There is nothing we can do for her but carry her inside and let the women lay her out.”

“Aye. Where do you want her laid, Brother Roger?”

They mustered two more men to help them transfer the body.

Ackley ran ahead of them into the house and threw a clean sheet over the rope bed. “Place her there. I shall have to get someone to build a coffin. I would do it myself, but I am all at a loss, gentlemen.” Ackley sank onto a stool, his shoulders sagging.

“I expect Charles Gardner would be willing to make the coffin,” Samuel said. “Shall I speak to him for you?”

“Aye.”

Christine, Goody Baldwin, Sarah Dudley and her mother-in-law, and the maid, Alice Stevens, entered the house.

“Oh, my poor, poor mistress,” Alice cried when she saw the body stretched out on the bed in the corner. “I asked if she wished me to go with her this morn, but she said, ‘Nay, you must finish your spinning and churn the butter.’”

Christine put an arm around her shoulders. “Mayhap you wish to go home to your mother, dear. We can tend to her.”

“Nay, I must help. It is the last thing I can do for her. She were mean sometimes, but I want to do a kindness for her if I may.”

“Miss Stevens,” Samuel said, “pardon me for asking, but wasn’t your mistress afraid to walk a mile through forest and field alone?”

“She declared that she wasn’t, sir. It be not far to the village. Oh, how I wish I had pressed her to let me go. But I was afeared she would call me lazy.”

Roger Ackley rose and stumbled toward the door. “My wife was a sharp-tongued woman, but she didn’t deserve this horrid end.”

Baldwin cleared his throat. “Reverend, I’ve heard that a physician now lives at Dover Point. Shall I send a man or two to fetch him?”

“Aye, that might be good.” Samuel said to Goody Baldwin, “Perhaps it is best if you ladies do not wash or dress her until we see if the physician can come. He may tell us more of her passing.”

Goody Baldwin nodded. “I’ll sit with her, then. If Alice wants to stay, she may. We can prepare for our duty and bake toward the morrow.”

Alice sniffed. “Thank you, ma’am. I expect all the village will want to view her tomorrow. We must have gingerbread and journey cake.”

Christine insisted on staying with them.

Samuel went home and ate supper, then he took his Bible to the church and studied for a scant hour.

Daniel Otis found him there at twilight. “The leech is come, sir. He’s headed to the Ackleys’ now.”

Samuel hurried along the path beside Daniel. The physician was already in the farmhouse when he got there, and he and Daniel entered and stood in silence by Captain Baldwin and Joseph Paine to one side, while the doctor examined the body. Roger Ackley sat in a corner, declaring that he could not look on as the doctor completed his task.

The physician finished and pulled the blanket up to Goody Ackley’s neck. “I do not think she was carnally defiled.”

The men let out a collective sigh.

“But she was struck in the face. See how bruised her cheek is? And strangled, that is certain. You see how her eyes have ruptured.”

Samuel walked across the room and leaned over the body. He could see the fine red blood vessels in the eyes. The sight repelled him, but who knew when he would need this knowledge again?

Ackley stood and rushed outside.

“I shall go to him,” said Daniel Otis.

“Reverend, you are the one they tell me tends the sick and injured?” the physician asked.

“Aye, sir. It is not my choice, nor my calling, but I do what I can in need.”

“Just so. You may wish to note the white fibers in the crease of her neck.”

Samuel peered where he pointed, bending closer than before. Constable Paine leaned in, too. Samuel did see a few short, fine threads clinging to the discolored skin.

The physician took a pair of tweezers from his bag and plucked one of the fibers. “That may tell you with what she was suffocated.”

Christine waited in the yard with the other women.

The physician was inside not ten minutes when Goodman Ackley rushed out the door and around the corner of the house.

Goodman Otis followed, more slowly. “Where is Brother Roger got to?” he asked.

Christine pointed, and Otis followed the bereaved husband.

A few minutes later, the doctor, Captain Baldwin, Paine, and Samuel emerged. Samuel headed straight toward her, and Christine felt her color rise.

“I shall go home and be with the children,” he said. “Plan you to stay here all night?”

Christine looked toward Goody Baldwin, who nodded. “Aye.”

“Then I shall come for you in the morning.” He hesitated then said, “Walk with me a moment, Miss Hardin. I’ve something to say to you.”

Christine walked a few steps away with him.

“My dear …” Samuel seemed to find inhaling difficult. “Christine, say naught to the others, but I fear the man you described to me, the outlaw who bade you feed him, is the killer.”

Her lips trembled as she drew in a deep breath. “What leads you to this conclusion?”

“Nothing, except I cannot imagine any one of our own people doing this foul deed.”

She also found the idea inconceivable. But still, it was hard to think that the man who had proclaimed his innocence would murder for a few groceries. Was it possible that in refusing to help him, she had condemned Mahalia Ackley to death? “Oh, Samuel, I’m afraid.”

He reached toward her then let his hand fall to his side. “I’ll see that the captain posts at least one man here to watch through the night. Do not try to leave here alone.”

“I won’t, sir.”

He nodded. “I told Paine and Baldwin about the outlaw. It is time to gather the men of the village, warn them, and plan how we shall find this felon.”

“You will be sure he is not harmed, won’t you?”

Samuel looked at her strangely, his forehead wrinkled between his brows. “Christine, you cannot believe him innocent of this.”

“But I can. He at least should have a fair trial. No one has proven him guilty of anything. I myself would testify that he has pilfered and manipulated and intimidated, and, yes, stolen. But I do not say he has killed. Not until I see proof.”

“You seem certain. If you fear him, as you told me you do, how can you think him incapable of this act?”

“I cannot fully answer that.” She tried to picture the man’s haunting face once more, and a shudder ran through her. “I’m not fully persuaded that he is innocent, but neither am I positive of his guilt.”

Samuel closed his eyes for a moment. When he opened them, he nodded. “As you wish. I shall speak for him because you ask me to. It is right for him to be fairly tried, as you say. ‘Vengeance is mine,’ saith the Lord. I shall admonish the men not to mistreat him if they catch him. But I tell you, it stirs my wrath when I think of what he said to you—when I remember he swore to mutilate my dear little children.” His voice cracked, and he looked away.

Christine’s heart wrenched. “Oh, Samuel.” She longed to touch him, but several people still milled about the yard, and there was no surer way to ruin a minister’s reputation than to let him be seen touching—or being touched by—a woman not his wife. “My dear Samuel,” she whispered, “thank you. I shall pray that God will bring this all to rights.”