On the Head of a Pin (13 page)

Other than a worried curiosity about Sarah and Rachel's deaths that continued to flirt around the edges of his thoughts, his only real annoyance, and it was a minor one, was Morgan Spicer, who had refused to take the rejection of his aspirations seriously. He appeared to be travelling the length and breadth of the colony holding his own prayer meetings and preaching in dooryards and kitchens. Many people assumed that he was a bona fide minister in the Methodist Church, albeit an unorthodox one, and although their paths crossed on occasion, Spicer brushed him off when Lewis remonstrated with him.

“You preach your way, I'll preach mine,” he said. “It's the Word of the Lord that counts and it matters not what the vehicle is.”

Lewis felt that it mattered very much indeed. Who knew what misinterpretations Spicer was spreading, what ignorance he was perpetuating? But then, he tended to stay away from the towns, and the people he preached to were simple folk, not concerned with the details of ecclesiastical theory. They wanted only the simple words of comfort a preacher offered. Still, he knew that sooner or later he would have to ask the conference to do something about him.

He had just preached at a meeting at the far eastern edge of his circuit, and although there were many there who pressed him to stay the night, he had a sudden hankering to see the graves of Paul and Barbara Heck at the Blue Church Burying Ground. These stalwarts of Methodism had arrived with other Loyalists after the American madness and had been given land in Augusta. Here they had helped to build a small community and gather a congregation. They must have hoped that their village would grow, but nearby Prescott had quickly established itself as the preeminent town in the district. It had a reasonable harbour and attracted a great deal of forwarding traffic, for it stood above the rapids, those roils that hampered the flow of traffic along the St. Lawrence River. Prescott had the added prestige of Fort Wellington, built during the troubles of 1812. The fort had fallen into disrepair since the war, but now it was being re-fitted and expanded in light of the growing tensions across the border. The Hecks and their congregation had never even succeeded in raising a building to go with their graveyard; a subscription had been started but had not garnered the necessary funds. It was left to the Anglicans to accomplish that, but the Blue Church and its Burying Ground was revered as a Methodist shrine of sorts, as much as the Methodists were ever given to that sort of thing. It would take him out of his way, but he was really only a few miles distant and was sure there were many families nearby who would welcome him for the night. He could circle to the southeast, pay his tribute to the Hecks' graves, then turn west again to make his way back along the shore to Brockville.

He nearly fell from his horse when he heard his name called. He had been deep in thought and had not heard the approach of the peddler's wagon. It was Isaac Simms.

“I thought it was you,” Simms said when the wagon caught up. “There's a certain set to the shoulders of a preacher man. You've strayed over the border of your circuit, haven't you?”

“Aye, I know,” Lewis replied. “I thought I'd just visit the Blue Church for a few minutes. I've no commitments until tomorrow. Where are you off to?”

“Prescott. There's a shipment of goods due and my stock is low. I'll load up and head west.”

“You're the only man I know who travels more than I do.” Lewis laughed. “Peddlers and preachers know the paths better than anyone.”

Simms asked about Betsy and the rest of his family and Lewis filled him in on the arrangements he had made.

“I'll be down that way in a few weeks,” Simms said. “I'll drop in and say hello.” And sell them as much as he can out of his pack, Lewis thought, but then realized that this was uncharitable. It was the man's living after all.

It was twilight already, an early November nightfall, and had the small boy not been gasping for breath as he ran, they might have missed seeing him altogether. As it was, they heard him coming and reined in until he reached them. He was a lad of about twelve, sobbing and crying as he ran. When he saw the two horsemen he stopped, but had to bend double and catch his breath before he could speak.

Lewis dismounted and went to the boy. “What is it? What's troubling you? Maybe we can help.”

The boy finally found his breath and stood up. “It's my brother. He's only six and he has the fever. I fear he's dying and mother sent me for the priest, but he's not at home.”

Out of the corner of his eye, Lewis realized that Simms had stiffened in his seat.

He turned his attention back to the boy. “The priest? You're Roman, then?”

The boy nodded. “Danny won't last long, that's what Mum said, and if I can't find the priest he'll never get into heaven and then I won't ever see him again.” His voice trailed off in a long wail. Simms snorted.

“Where is your cabin, lad?”

The boy pointed toward a sideroad they had just passed. “Just down there, and you turn left where the next road crosses. It's about a half-mile and then our farm. It's the only one on the road.”

“And where does the priest live?”

“In Prescott.”

“You've run all this way? It's no wonder you're winded.” He thought for a moment. He wasn't sure his ministrations would find any kind of welcome, but he had to try. “Listen, son, I'm not a priest, but I am an ordained minister. I know it's not the same, but do you think I might bring some comfort to your brother?”

The boy was dubious. “What kind of minister?”

“Methodist. But we worship the same God. Just in a different way. I don't know your rituals, but I could try to do what I can for him while you continue looking for the priest. What do you think of that?”

“They said he headed up toward Bellamy's this morning, but that he should be on his way back.”

“That's fine then. You can carry on and I'll go and see to your brother.”

He looked up at Simms, hoping that the peddler might take pity and offer to take the boy, but Simms's face was enough to let him know it was a forlorn hope.

“A priest!” he said. “What a lot of pagan Popish nonsense! What do you think you're doing, Lewis?”

“I think I'm trying to offer some comfort to a dying child,” Lewis said. “It may not be good enough in his parents' eyes, but I won't see a young boy die with nothing.”

“You're only encouraging their papist nonsense. Besides, they probably won't even let you in the door. They're all too set in their heathenish ways to have any truck with a Methodist minister.”

Simms's face was twisted up in an expression of profound disgust. Lewis shouldn't have been surprised. As much as the Protestant Churches of Upper Canada fought amongst themselves, there was one thing they all agreed on — the seriousness of “The Popish Threat.” The population of Lower Canada was overwhelmingly Catholic, and any addition to their numbers in the form of Catholic settlers in the upper colony was viewed with alarm. Everyone knew that Catholics would plot and scheme to turn the Canadian colony into a Roman state, and that they would then all be forced to kneel in subjugation to the Pope, and that their souls would be in mortal danger. This alarm, fuelled by ignorance and the shadowy workings of secret lodges often translated into an active discrimination against Catholics, and most specifically Catholic priests, whether they showed any evidence of plotting or not. He knew he was to get no help from Simms. He wasn't sure himself what he was doing in offering to help, and Simms could well be right — they might turn him away at the door — but he couldn't walk away from a dying child. He thought of Mary, his first daughter, lying in scalded agony, while he and Betsy sat helpless and he knew that had any man of God come calling he'd have been ushered to her side.

“I would like to think that if it were my child and no else was around, a Roman priest might do what he could,” Lewis said slowly. “The greatest of these is charity, saith the Lord, and if ever a situation called for a little charity, this is it.” He eyed Simms. “I don't suppose I could persuade you to help this lad go and find his priest?”

“I'll not subscribe to this in any way, shape, or form, Lewis. This is wrong.”

“If it's wrong, it's on my head, not yours.”

But Simms was having none of it. Shaking his head, he whipped his horse and the wagon rumbled off. This left Lewis with one horse and two people, and the people going in different directions. He would reach the farm much faster if he rode, but that would leave the boy to go on foot, and he had run so far already that he looked about done in. He hooked down his pack and cloak and lifted the boy up into the saddle.

Fortunately he had been idling along, and the horse had not been pushed. “Ride fast, and find the priest,” he said. “I'll go see to your brother.” The boy's eyes were wide. This was a generosity he had never expected. “If you can't find him right away, then you probably won't find him at all. If that's the case, then bring my horse back to the house.”

The boy nodded and spurred the horse into a fast trot. He was obviously unused to riding and clutched the reins with one hand and the saddle with the other. Lewis hoped he wouldn't fall off before he reached his destination. It was not a prosperous farm he arrived at an hour later. The cabin was tiny, still the log shanty that is the settler's first house, with no attempt at the improvements that were such visible signs of industry and thrift elsewhere — luck, too, he supposed, if you were fortunate enough to get a piece of land that had deep soil and a plentiful supply of water. Several acres had been fenced around the cabin, though; a promise that this farmer would stick to it.

There was no one outside, twilight having deepened into night and the chores of the day completed. He knocked on the door. A small girl perhaps five or six years old opened it. She took one look at him, screamed, and slammed the door in his face. A moment later the door opened again, and a tired-looking woman wordlessly questioned his presence.

“My name is Thaddeus Lewis,” he said, doffing his hat. “I met your boy on the road and he told me of your trouble. He hasn't found the priest yet, he's still looking. I came along to see if I might help.”

“Are you a doctor?” she asked. Though her voice was weary, it betrayed the lilting brogue of western Ireland.

“No, ma'am, I'm afraid I'm not. I'm a Methodist minister, and I know this is irregular and if you want to send me away, then you can — but I can't bear the thought of a child dying outside the comfort of the Lord. Besides, your boy has my horse.” Her face showed her surprise. “I can't perform your rites, but at least I can speak to him of God's mercy. All I'm offering is to do my best to ease his passage, if that be the Lord's will.”

The woman hesitated, and Lewis thought she was on the verge of closing the door in his face, as had her daughter, but a burly red-haired man came up behind her.

“Methodist? Well, better than Church of England at any rate. He's going fast, Brigid, I think we should take what we can get.”

The woman opened the door a little wider and Lewis entered the cabin. There were a number of children of various ages sitting wide-eyed at the hand-hewn trestle table, which was the only furniture in the room besides a bed that had been built into the corner. Here lay the boy, and Lewis could see that the father was right: he would not be long in this world. His eyes were sunken and his cheeks flushed, a sheen of sweat covering him — fever, the plague of the colony.

Lewis knelt beside the bed and looked at the parents. “Would it be acceptable to say the Lord's Prayer?” he asked. The man nodded, and he began the familiar words of comfort, the family joining in here and there in snatches. “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want …” The boy's eyes fluttered as if he were reacting to the words.

“What is the boy's name?” he asked. His brother had said it, but he'd forgotten.

“Danny. Daniel Patrick, after me father.”

He took the boy's hand in his own. “The Lord Jesus Christ died for your sins, Danny, and you must trust that a merciful God will welcome you into the Kingdom of Heaven where one day, God be praised, you will again see all those you love. You must believe this, Danny, to know it in your heart of hearts to be true. Your father and mother love you very much, but their love is as nothing compared to God's. He sees each sparrow fall, and extends his Grace to all.”

There was a bowl of water and a cloth beside the bed, and as he crooned the words again and again to the dying child, he dipped the cloth and wiped his face, his arms, his hands, hoping he could bring a degree of physical comfort as well as spiritual. He lost track of time, and his words became a mantra. He scarcely knew what he was saying, but the boy slowly quieted as he spoke, until at the last, he convulsed. When his body stopped shaking, Lewis ceased the words that had been their company through the long night and listened in vain for a heartbeat.

A wail went up in the cabin, a dreadful keening as the woman realized her son was gone. The other children joined in as Lewis rose, stiff from the hours of kneeling. He was about to turn his attention to the comfort of the living when the door opened, and there stood the lad he had met on the road, the priest behind him.

“It's not too late,” he said quickly, and the priest rushed past him to hurriedly perform the ritual that sent Catholics on their way out of earth's troubled moil. Lewis had no idea whether it was too late or not, but he knew that it was important to this family that these rites be completed. He turned and went out the door to see to his tired horse, for once found, the priest had wasted no time in arriving and the horses were panting and sweat-covered. He removed both saddles, and was wiping down the heaving flanks when, to his surprise, the father emerged from the cabin.