Mending Horses Read online

  Noah opened his mouth to protest, but Seth continued. “Find whoever you can and tell them to join us.”

  “But I want to go, too,” Noah said.

  Seth grabbed the boy’s shoulder and shook him. “This is important, son.”

  “You can be like William Dawes and Paul Revere,” Levi added.

  Seth threw Levi a grateful glance. “Yes, just like them.”

  Noah puffed out his chest and nodded. “Yes, sir,” the boy said, and was gone.

  Chapter Two

  Constable Chester Ainesworth was having a very bad day. A weasel had gotten into the henhouse during the night and ravaged the flock, leaving only a trio of tough, scrawny hens behind. Of the prized chickens Amelia had fattened and primped for next month’s agricultural fair, not a one was left. Cleaning up the blood, feathers, and torn bodies with their stench of tainted meat had been a joy compared to facing Amelia’s distress over her lost flock.

  After a scorched and dismal breakfast, Chester had discovered a leak in the barn roof that had ruined a good quantity of hay. In the process of mending the damage, he’d spilled a box of nails and hammered his thumb.

  In the afternoon, he’d found the cattle placidly grazing among his pumpkins, having broken down their pasture fence and forsaken the tough August grass for the cornstalks standing sentry over the pumpkins. It seemed that everything he wanted to keep in was bound and determined to get out, and everything he wanted to keep out was equally set on getting in.

  He returned to the house to find a babble of frantic women, excited children, and agitated men blocking his front door, all of them vexed because Chester had been out when they thought he should have been in. He caught snatches of conversation that made him wish he’d stayed out.

  “. . . he killed them in their beds, the whole family,” said Caroline Dunbar in her grating squeal of a voice. “Slit their throats one by one and robbed ’em and then set the house on fire . . .”

  Chester circumnavigated the group, hoping to slip into the kitchen and fortify himself with a glass of rum before facing the horde. Walter Sackett stood on the doorstep talking to Amelia, his hair sweat-plastered to his forehead. The blather of the crowd kept Chester from catching any of his words.

  “. . . ain’t nobody safe in their homes anymore,” said a man on Chester’s left. “He bashed in their brains while they slept, and then made off with a thousand dollars in silver and gold . . .”

  “. . . assaulted the women and girls, then chopped them to pieces with an ax . . .”

  Chester told himself that his neighbors were probably stirred up over some newspaper story about a faraway crime. Nothing sensational ever happened here. Chauncey was so tiny, it merited only three sentences in the gazetteer.

  “. . . a gruesome sight as you’d ever want to see,” someone grumbled in harsh bass tones. “He cut off their heads with a scythe, as easy as mowing hay . . .”

  Or perhaps the tale of the chicken massacre had circulated through town and returned transmogrified into something more ghastly.

  “. . . and when the constable came for him, he shot him dead,” said a voice at Chester’s elbow.

  Then again, perhaps not.

  Daniel stood with his cheek pressed to Ivy’s, overseeing the blacksmith’s ritual of fitting, nailing, and filing. The familiar task was almost a comfort when set against the uncertainty and bewilderment that had been his lot for the past several days.

  The more time and distance he put between himself and Farmington and the Lymans, the more he discovered how ill-prepared he’d been for the journey. The number of simple things he didn’t know seemed unending. Finding a night’s lodging should have been easy enough. At first glance, landladies and tavern-keepers would greet him with fair and smiling faces. But their smiles faded when he opened his mouth and his Irishness showed itself—that Irish turn to his words he’d fought so hard to keep ever since that horrific day six years ago, when fire had taken his parents, his baby brother, and his home. Now he tried to flatten his vowels like a native-born New Englander. Even so, asking for food or lodging, or a barn to stable Ivy for the night, was a challenge. Perhaps it was because he couldn’t remember ever asking for anything where the answer hadn’t been no.

  Finding his way was another problem. A line on a map and a road on the ground were different things entirely. He might blunder about until winter, trying to puzzle out where to go, where to stay, how to speak, and how not to get robbed. Finding the peddler had quickly turned from a whim to a necessity.

  “There, that should do it.” The blacksmith released Ivy’s foot and straightened.

  Daniel blinked out of his fog. “Yes, thank you, sir,” he said. At least he remembered to say yes instead of aye and thank you instead of ta. He stooped to check the smith’s work, then glanced up to ask about the peddler.

  The blacksmith wasn’t looking at Daniel or at Ivy, but at something behind them.

  Releasing Ivy’s hoof, Daniel rose and turned. A little sandy-haired man stood at the edge of the blacksmith’s yard, an ax in his hand. Another next to him held a pitchfork, and another a spade. There were more behind them and coming up the road. Others carried weapons rather than tools: a rusted sword, a twisted bayonet, battered muskets. Daniel wondered if he’d arrived in town on training day. Perhaps the blacksmith was captain of the militia and . . .

  But the men weren’t looking at the blacksmith. Their dark, cold gazes were fixed on Daniel.

  The constable’s parlor was jammed with people, some standing on chairs to get a better view, some trying to shove their way in from the hall. Those out in the yard jostled at the open windows, trying to thrust their heads and shoulders into the room.

  Daniel felt as if he stood outside himself, seeing himself as one of the spectators might: a stranger with nothing to say in his own defense. The contents of his bags lay in an untidy sprawl across the constable’s table. Funny how quickly he’d attached himself to those bits of cloth and leather and metal and paper. It felt as if his guts were laid out there, instead of only his goods.

  “What’s the charge, Chester?” snapped a sharp-nosed, silver-haired man who sat in an upholstered chair behind the table. He held a candlestick, which he periodically rapped on the table to silence the crowd. From the man’s attitude and the deference everyone showed him, Daniel guessed him to be the justice of the peace.

  The constable showed none of the older man’s poise. Dressed in sweat-dampened work clothes, he slouched in a wooden chair next to the justice. He stared balefully at the goods strewn across his table. He rubbed his eyes and seemed disappointed that neither goods nor crowd had disappeared when he put his hands down. “Damned if I know,” he muttered. “So what is it, Jake?” he said, a little louder. “This fella’s stolen something from you?”

  “Not yet.” The blacksmith stepped forward and crossed his burly arms over his chest. “I never gave him the chance.” The crowd mumbled its approval.

  “Then why in blazes did you haul all these people into my parlor?” the constable demanded.

  “He stole these goods from someone, that’s why.” The smith grabbed a shirt and waved it under Daniel’s nose. “Now tell me how a boy like you comes to have goods like this?”

  The justice’s and the constable’s stares felt like an ox yoke across Daniel’s shoulders. “Th-they’re mine,” was all the answer he could blurt out.

  The blacksmith picked up the books: the fat little volume of Shakespeare the peddler had given him and Sir Walter Scott’s Ivanhoe—a parting gift from Lizzie, the Lymans’ dairymaid. Daniel cringed at the sooty marks the blacksmith made on Ivanhoe’s pages as he riffled through them. “I suppose these are his, too?” The blacksmith sniffed. “I doubt the brute can even read.”

  Daniel choked back a retort. Whether dealing with powerful men like George Lyman, his former master, or schoolyard bullies like Joshua Ward and his mates, it had always been safest to be mute and passive. But now it was time to say something, anything, an
d he didn’t know what to say. “They’re m-mine, too,” he stammered.

  The room burst into contemptuous laughter. “Yours?” the blacksmith said, echoed by half a dozen others. “Yours?”

  His mind began to retreat into that safe place inside himself that he’d built when he’d learned that the way to end trouble was to submit and endure. The rapping of the justice’s candlestick pulled him away from the temptation to withdraw and give up.

  He cursed himself for an idiot. His defense was right there in front of him. He’d just been too daft with panic to tell them about the papers Lyman’s son Silas had given him. “I got papers.” He gestured toward the table. “Bills of sale. References. They’re all there in that pocketbook.”

  The blacksmith grabbed the small leather case. He let the papers spill to the floor and trod on them. “Forged, no doubt.”

  Daniel felt as if the blacksmith’s boot heel had ground into his chest. “And how would I be forging ’em, then, if I can’t read?”

  A corner of the constable’s mouth twitched up before the man hid it behind his hand. The blacksmith’s face flushed, and he looked as if he wanted to strike Daniel. “Stolen, then,” the blacksmith said. “How do we know you haven’t killed this fellow and stole his goods and his papers?”

  “Of course I didn’t kill him. He’s me.”

  “And what proof do you have?” the justice of the peace demanded, rapping the candlestick against the table. The constable winced as the metal knocked the polished surface.

  “Is there anyone who can vouch for you, boy?” The constable’s voice was almost gentle. The justice of the peace looked disgruntled that the constable had taken over the hearing—if the hubbub could be called a hearing—but the constable continued, “Anyone at all who knows you?”

  Daniel shook his head. Ivy was the only one who knew him. She could show them all she pleased that nobody else had a right to her, but they’d only see her as stolen goods.

  The constable massaged his forehead, then his temples. He looked almost as miserable as Daniel felt. “So you have no proof you’re who you say you are. And you, Jacob”—he pointed to the blacksmith—“have no proof he isn’t. And I have no grounds for a warrant.”

  Somebody at the back of the room shouted, “But we know he’s a thief!”

  Daniel stared at the papers at the blacksmith’s feet—the papers Silas had worked so hard to gather. If they wouldn’t believe Silas’s papers, surely they’d believe the man himself. “Send word to Silas Lyman in Farmington—Farmington, Massachusetts, that is. He’ll speak for me. I used to work for his father, George Lyman.”

  “And how will he do that with his throat cut?” snarled the blacksmith.

  “C-Cut?” Daniel clutched at his own neck. It couldn’t be true, and yet it made all too much sense. It must have been an unforgivable betrayal for Silas to turn against his father and help Daniel to freedom. It wasn’t hard to imagine the elder Lyman slitting Silas’s throat in revenge. What better vengeance than to place all the blame on the Irish lad who’d just left town?

  “What—what’s become of himself, then?” He barely managed to choke out the question.

  “Himself?”

  “His da. Silas’s da, I mean. George Lyman.”

  The slight man stepped forward, shoving at Daniel’s shoulder. “Don’t pretend you don’t know. You’re the one that killed them all.”

  “All? They’re all of ’em dead?” Lyman had seemed subdued and shaken the last time Daniel had seen him, but mad? Insane enough to kill his whole family and himself?

  “All—killed in their sleep,” called a voice from the crowd.

  The accusations grew louder around him. The justice of the peace and constable shouted for order, and the justice rapped the table, but everything melted into a sea of angry faces, a whirlwind of frenzied voices confirming the death of every last Lyman.

  Daniel’s knees gave way underneath him. His stomach rolled and pushed up into his throat. He cradled his head in his arms. “Oh, God, oh, God. Jesus, Mary, and Joseph.”

  A massive hand grabbed his collar and hauled him upright. “There, you see?” The blacksmith’s voice boomed in his ear. “There’s guilt written all over him.”

  Chapter Three

  “Mr. S.?”

  “Mmm-hmm?” Jonathan Stocking peered through his spectacles at the collection of tousled yellow hair, rumpled clothes, and dirty feet and hands perched next to him on the wagon seat. Hadn’t he cleaned the child the last time they’d stopped to water Phizzy? How could a body get so disordered just riding in a wagon?

  “There’s something queer about this town,” Billy said.

  “Queer?” Jonathan said. “How do you mean?” He was less concerned about the answer than the child’s clothes and hair. Blast that hair, couldn’t it stay combed for five minutes?

  Billy gestured at the house they’d just passed. “There’s no one about. All the houses are shut up tight like it was winter.”

  “Put your shoes and stockings on.” Jonathan pulled out his handkerchief, spat into it, and handed it to Billy. “And wipe that smudge off your chin. There’s prob’ly just some doin’s down to the common. A fair, maybe, or town meeting or training day.”

  After scrubbing away the smudge, Billy wrestled grubby toes into grayish socks. The shoes went on next, accompanied by a pained grimace.

  “Don’t you be making faces like that to my cousin Sophie, now,” Jonathan warned. “We’re depending on her hospitality.”

  “If there’s a fair, can we go see?” Billy’s blue eyes sparkled at the prospect.

  “We won’t be going that way. Where’s your hat?” Jonathan yanked the rumpled blue cap out from under Billy’s rump. “Why do you always have to be sitting on it?” He whacked the cap on his arm a few times to beat the dust out of it, then settled the cap on Billy’s head. He stuffed as much of the unruly blond hair under the hat as he could and tugged the visor straight. “In case you’ve forgot, Eldad pays our wages. If we make Sophie happy, then we make Eldad happy. So if there’s a fair, and if you make your manners nice to Sophie, then maybe you can go.” Billy rewarded the peddler with half a smile. “Anyway, here we are,” Jonathan added, as the familiar white house and flower-filled dooryard came into view. Phizzy let out a cheerful whicker and stopped at the front gate.

  Jonathan climbed stiffly down from the wagon. He brushed the dust from his jacket and trousers, polished his coat buttons with his cuffs, tugged vest and jacket and collar into place. He wasn’t much cleaner than Billy, but then again, Sophie wouldn’t expect tidiness from him. As for Billy, well, she wasn’t expecting Billy at all.

  “How’s that?” He glanced up at Billy, still perched on the wagon seat.

  Billy’s nose wrinkled. “Better, I s’pose.” Billy jumped down and applied a whisk broom to Jonathan’s elbows, lapels, and backside. “There.” Billy gave the peddler a satisfied nod.

  Jonathan fluffed Billy’s cravat into a fat bow. He tugged the blue jacket straight, brushed the road dust from the child’s shoulders, and set them square. “Now, you mind your manners in front of Sophie. Just ’cause she’s my cousin don’t mean she ain’t a lady.” Jonathan licked the tips of his fingers and plastered an unruly curl down under Billy’s cap. “Best foot forward, remember?”

  “Yessir.” Billy’s right foot moved smartly forward.

  They looked down at Billy’s dusty shoes, then at Jonathan’s, which were equally filthy. They shared a shrug and polished the toes of their shoes on the backs of their trouser legs. The result was more smear than shine.

  A curtain stirred at one of the windows. He heard a muffled squeal, and the door flew open. “Jonny! Oh, Jonny, we didn’t think to see you for weeks yet!” A plump, blue-eyed woman dashed down the path and squeezed Jonathan in a lavender-scented hug.

  “Now, Soph, don’t go bruising the goods.” Jonathan kissed his cousin on the cheek.

  “And who’s this?” Sophie eyed Billy.

  “A—
um—a business associate, you might say.”

  “William James Michael Fogarty at your service, ma’am.” Billy bowed. A stray curl escaped the cap and drooped over one blue eye.

  A smile washed over Sophie’s apple-round face. She reached out one finger, captured the wayward curl, and tucked it back in. “Sophronia Elizabeth Bartholomew Taylor.” She bobbed in a little curtsy. “Delighted to make your acquaintance. Although I fancy you’d be more delighted to make the acquaintance of a peach pie and a cup of tea.”

  Billy searched the peddler’s face for a cue. Jonathan nodded. “She’s only asking us to tea, son, not the governor’s ball.”

  “I—uh, yes, please, thank you, ma’am,” Billy blurted.

  Sophie tucked one hand under Billy’s arm and the other under Jonathan’s, but Billy pulled away, face stricken with a spasm of guilt. “Phizzy!” Billy said, glancing at the floppy-eared gray gelding who nodded sleepily at the gate. “I got to see to Phizzy first. It’s me job.” Billy’s cheeks flushed with shame.

  “I’m sure Phizzy will excuse you for a bit,” Sophie said.

  “I’m sorry, ma’am, but you see Phizzy needs me.” Billy broke away to rush back to the horse. Jonathan caught bits of murmured Irish apologies as Billy caressed Phizzy’s nose.

  Jonathan started to apologize for Billy’s breach of manners, but Sophie cut him off with a laugh. “Let the boy be. It looks like he loves that old horse as much as you do.”

  “Where’s Eldad?” Jonathan asked.

  “There was some hubbub down to Chester Ainesworth’s. He went to see what the to-do was all about. He should be back soon.” Sophie nudged her cousin’s elbow. “Go show your boy where to put Phizzy. I’ll have tea ready when you come in.”