Cradle to Grave (28 page)

“Well, Maggie solved that problem for you. She married Mr. Whitney and left for Boston.”

Cooper nodded.

“You knew Jerusha was your child, didn't you?” Rees leaned forward, shaking his finger at Cooper. “And when she returned from Boston you took up with her again. Maggie gave birth to two additional children, Nancy and Judah.”

“The boy can't be mine. Goddamn, he doesn't even look like me.”

“Please, Mr. Cooper,” Lydia said. “Language.”

“But Nancy is?” Rees fixed his fierce eyes upon the constable.

Cooper met his gaze for a moment and then his weary blue eyes dropped. “It's possible,” he admitted.

“Of course she's yours,” Rees said, not bothering to soften the harshness in his voice. “The resemblance between Jerusha, Nancy, and your legal daughter is very strong. What happened that time?”

“I'd come by a few times to check on Olive,” Cooper admitted in a low voice. “Genevieve lived with her parents on the farm then. Another quarrel and she went home. Maggie and I took up where we left off. It was just … pleasure. But Maggie wanted something more.” His voice took on an aggrieved edge. “She thought I could live with her, desert my family, you know, and she would become my wife in all but name.”

“But you didn't want that?”

“I already had a wife,” Cooper said, scowling. “I didn't want another. Anyway, there was Simon, her son by another man. God knows how many men she took into her bed.”

Lydia slapped the coffee mug down upon the table with such force the hot liquid sprayed out of the cup and upon Cooper's arm. He yelled and jumped upright.

Rees looked at him in disgust. “I see. And what happened the night she died? Did she ask you for help? Ask for money for the taxes? Threaten to tell the town Jerusha and Nancy were yours?”

Cooper stared at Rees, and as his words sank in, the constable leaned across the table and pounded his fist upon the wood. “I didn't kill Maggie. I would never do that. I knew her from childhood. I loved her. And I wouldn't orphan my children by her.”

Rees stared at Cooper in scorn. “You loved her but wouldn't marry her. Of course, that didn't stop you from fathering two children with her. Did she threaten to tell everyone your secret?”

“Maybe I'm a coward,” Cooper said. “I couldn't antagonize Genevieve's father. But I tried to keep Maggie safe, as safe as I could. I didn't kill her, Rees. I swear it. I've been searching for her killer as hard as you have.”

“I think you'd better go after your wife now,” Rees said in a soft voice. “Maybe she'll come back to you. I don't know, though. She seemed pretty angry to me, and her father was as well.”

Cooper glared at Rees a moment longer before jumping up and striding out of the door.

“That … that hypocrite,” Lydia snapped.

Rees sighed.

“Do you believe him? About not murdering Maggie?”

“I don't know,” Rees admitted.

“He had two, maybe three reasons, for wishing Maggie out of the way,” Lydia said. “Jerusha and Nancy, and maybe Judah. Of course Mrs. Cooper would be furious if she found out.”

“Maybe, although I think she already suspected,” Rees said. Cooper's secret wasn't all that secret. He stared into space. “I wonder if Cooper's attachment to Maggie wasn't one of the reasons she was constantly under the threat of being warned out and possibly losing her children. Mr. Shaw, Cooper's father-in-law, probably tried to get Maggie out of Dover Springs for the sake of his daughter's marriage.”

“So why didn't he?” Lydia asked. “Maggie was still here.”

“She had her defenders. And I'll bet he never admitted to the town selectmen that his son-in-law had fathered at least two, maybe three, of Maggie's children. His daughter would have been shamed in front of the entire village. And Cooper's income would have been affected. The selectmen probably would have sacked him and would have also pressured him to take some financial responsibility for his children.” He paused. Lydia nodded.

“So not just Mr. Cooper, but also Genevieve and her father had good reason to want Maggie out of the way,” she said.

Rees nodded. “Maggie kept Cooper's name to herself, but she could have broadcast it any time she chose. She was dangerous.”

“I have no sympathy for Mr. Cooper at all,” Lydia said with unusual sharpness. “He should support his children. His problems are entirely of his own making.” She turned her back to Rees and, moving very quickly, changed into her long nightgown. She loosened her hair and plaited it into a long rope down her back. Although her auburn hair looked dark in the dim light, the firelight sent flashes of red and gold through it. She blew out her candle and lay down upon the pallet, curling her arms protectively around her. Not once did she look at Rees; it was almost as though she blamed him for Cooper's behavior.

Rees sat for another moment at the table in the pool of light from the one remaining lighted candle. He wished he could wholeheartedly believe in Cooper's innocence, but he couldn't. The constable's reasons for wanting Maggie out of the way were too many and too plausible. And Rees knew he could share nothing of his own investigation with Cooper until he could be positive the constable was innocent.

“And he might be,” he said aloud. “Cooper might be innocent. If he did not father Judah, and I am inclined to believe he did not, then the same reasons he might have for murdering Maggie might also apply to Judah's father.”

Lydia did not answer and Rees saw no movement.

“Fathering two of Maggie's children doesn't mean he is guilty of murder.”

Still Lydia made no response.

Suddenly recalling Mr. Randall's comment about Mr. Gray, that he'd known Maggie's Aunt Olive well, Rees thought he would visit the old man again the next morning. Rees didn't relish trying to carry on a conversation with him, but maybe Mr. Gray knew something more of Maggie's history and it would shed some light on her murder.

With a sharp determined nod, Rees blew out his own candle and by the light of the banked fire made his way to the pallet. Lydia did not roll to face him, and when he looked over he saw she was already asleep.

Chapter Twenty-four

Rees left immediately after breakfast the next morning to call on Mr. Gray. “Please come home by dinner,” Lydia said. Rees looked at her in surprise. She smiled faintly. “I plan to call upon Miss Pike. Get it over with.”

“Jerusha can watch her brothers and sisters,” Rees said. “It will only be for a few hours.”

“Yes, but we have but one buggy and one horse. If I'm visiting Miss Pike what will you do? Wait outside for me?”

Rees almost offered to drive her and pick her up again, but reconsidered. He didn't want to be held to a set time, especially if he were involved in an especially productive conversation.

“I don't want her to come here again and I suspect she will if I don't prevent her,” Lydia said. She looked around at the battered cabin. “I don't expect to stay very long. Please. We will never be friends, and I know she invited me only because she's lonely.”

“You are almost certainly the only other woman in this town with some pretensions of gentility,” Rees said.

“You're forgetting Maartje Griffin,” Lydia said with a smile. “Perhaps Miss Pike sees me as a peer. But I am not my sister or Nell. I've no doubt Miss Pike will find me greatly disappointing.” She sighed. “I can't imagine what we shall discuss.”

Chuckling, and very relieved Lydia had recovered from last night's ill humor, Rees agreed to return promptly.

He was soon on the main road and heading for Mr. Gray's home. As he passed the log church, Rees noticed that new shiny chains and a large padlock secured the front doors. The local lads wouldn't be creeping into the church to escape adult supervision again.

Maartje opened the door to Rees. She looked even more pregnant than ever and the slightest exertion sent her into a paroxysm of rapid panting. Rees suspected the birth was not far away. “Mr. Rees,” she said.

“I wanted to speak to your uncle,” he said.

“He is with Mr. Randall.” She cast a glance over her shoulder.

“I was just leaving,” Mr. Randall said, coming up behind her. “Please, permit me to drive you home. It will save your husband a trip.” Nodding, Maartje stood back to allow Rees to enter. Then she put on her cloak. The shabby blue garment did not meet over her belly.

“How much longer do you have?” Rees nodded at the round bulge protruding through the gap in the cloak.

“I guess not more than a week, if that,” she replied, breathing between each word. “My cousin is on her way.”

“Let me help you,” Mr. Randall said, taking the basket from her.

Rees watched as Mr. Randall helped Maartje down the steps and over the icy path. She struggled to climb the high step and fell panting and perspiring into the seat. A flap of the cloak hung down from the seat, a small tear in the hem. Gasping for breath, she flipped the cloak inside the buggy. Mr. Randall waved farewell. Rees lifted a hand in acknowledgment and turned back to the house. He had come out without his greatcoat, and although already into March, the air felt cold and wintery. He hurried inside, shutting the door firmly behind him, and found his way through the darkness to the bright kitchen. Mr. Gray looked up with a broad smile, but when he saw it was Rees, his smile disappeared.

“What do you want?” he shouted.

“To ask a few questions,” Rees shouted in return.

“Questions? Questions about what? Not that wretched girl again.”

“Yes, Maggie Whitney. I thought you might know something of her history. Maybe about her mother? Owen Randall said you were friendly with Phineas Tucker.”

“With Phinney, yes. With Owen, too.” He sighed. “A long time ago. Knew Olive some too, from school.” Shaking his shaggy white head, he said emphatically, “Phinney was ill and died twenty or so years back. I was about your age. Had my own family. Besides…” He paused and then asked, “How much do you remember of that time?”

“I was a boy then,” Rees bawled at the top of his lungs. “I remember.”

“Phinney, and of course Olive, and Owen Randall were passionate Patriots. I had to behave more circumspectly. My father was a judge.”

Rees understood what Elias Gray did not say. His father was, at least, a moderate if not a Loyalist sympathizer.

“But you did see Olive and Phinneas?”

“Of course. Phinney, Owen, and I were like brothers. My father visited Olive and Phinney regularly. I daresay he suspected Phinney of some of the anonymous pranks on the local Tories. You remember? Fires set on doorsteps, hanged dummies, that sort of thing.”

Rees nodded. He'd participated in such mischief himself.

Mr. Gray smiled at the memory. “Phinney was always thinking up new ways to irritate the British.”

“But I thought he was dying,” Rees objected.

Mr. Gray nodded. “Yes.” Sudden tears moistened his eyes. “Sorry. So many years and I still miss him. He had such vigor, such life.”

Rees thought of his good friend Nate, who had died before his time last year. Murdered. As boys, they'd been like brothers, and Rees would always regret the estrangement that later came between them. “I understand.”

“Probably Phinney suggested and Owen performed. Owen would have followed Phinney to world's end. Loyal, that's Owen Randall.”

“Hmm. Did you know Olive's sisters?”

“I met them, of course, when I was a boy. But Olive was the youngest. Her sisters married and moved west and I never saw them again.”

“And Olive's brothers?”

“They moved away too and, as far as I know, haven't come back since.”

Another dead end. Rees chewed his lip. “Why didn't Olive remarry?” he asked. “It's uncommon for a widow to remain single. And she had young children to care for. And then her sister's child, as well. Was she ill-favored?”

Mr. Gray chuckled. “Ill-favored? No.” Without Maartje's presence, he seemed softer, more willing to help. “Go upstairs. Bedroom on the left. Take the silhouette from the wall by the door. Second row from the bottom. Um, three, no four in.”

Rees eyed the old man in perplexity. “Why?”

“Go on. Do it.”

So Rees returned to the hall and went up the steps to the second floor. Mr. Gray's former bedroom lay directly across the landing, with windows that overlooked the street outside. Although very tidy, the floor and the bedside table bore a thick coat of dust. Maartje had been unable to climb the stairs for some time.

Another bedroom occupied the corner of the second floor, and when Rees peered through the open door, he saw an entire wall of silhouettes, all of young women. He counted up from the bottom and in from the door; the silhouette resembled Maggie. He lifted it from the nail and turned to go downstairs.

But before he did so, he walked to the last door on the landing. Unlike the other two this door was closed, and Rees could not resist his curiosity. He opened the door and went inside.

Located at the back of the house, the windows in this room overlooked the log church. From this vantage point Rees could see only the small window on the wall over the altar and under the loft above. A small old-fashioned rope mattress bed was positioned underneath the window and covered by a quilt worked in shades of blue and pink. At the foot of the cot was a worn canvas valise, unrolled, and with men's shirts and other linens hanging out. But this room had been decorated for a baby. A crate of toys was pushed into one corner and a rocking horse stood opposite. Whose room had this been? For the first time he wondered about Mr. Gray. Maybe this room explained why his nieces cared for him instead of one of his own children.

Rees quietly withdrew from this monument to an old grief and closed the door behind him. Then he went down the stairs and into the kitchen. Mr. Gray, intent on some inner world, stared blindly through the window. His mouth turned down in an unhappy curve and Rees wondered what thoughts disturbed him so. “Mr. Gray?” Rees said loudly.