Act of Injustice

by Argyle, Ray

  Emmett Hughes pushed his plate away and laughed. “I’m glad to see you have a sense of humour, Mr. Babington.”

  The supper went on with no further disagreement, much to Leonard’s relief. He wondered how a Christian who believed in the Kingdom of God – where the Gospels say there are neither Jews nor Gentiles – could hold such enmity against other human beings. There was a lot of judging and weighing going on here on earth, but how would these same people be judged and weighed when they were called to the final accounting? He didn’t know much about the Jews. There were none in Vandeleur and he’d seen only a few on the street in Toronto. Old men, mostly, with long beards, sometimes pushing carts of workmen’s clothing. They’d stand outside factories and try to sell to workers as they came off shift. People spoke of the Jews gathering up the riches of the world, but that seemed to him an unlikely possibility.

  When Leonard bid the Hughes’s good evening a little after nine o’clock, he had the sense that Rebecca had been embarrassed by the mealtime conversation. Still, he thought later, he could never be comfortable in their house. He did not expect to dine there again.

  On the way home, Leonard thought he saw a familiar face in the shadows of the elm trees that grew on Church Street. With a start, he realized it was Angus McIntosh. “What do you think you’re on to?” Leonard demanded. As he spoke, McIntosh rushed at him and shoved him to the ground. Leonard scrambled to his feet and struck McIntosh in the face. The blow sent McIntosh reeling backward. He turned and ran into the dark. Leonard debated whether he should go to the police station and report the incident, but decided against it. The next morning, when Leonard confronted McIntosh at work, he denied the encounter. Leonard noticed a bruise on his face, but said nothing more. Unaccountably, several strange incidents occurred over the next few days. Leonard’s name was forged to a note supporting American annexation of Canada. A dead rat was found in his drawer at the reporter’s table. He made up his mind to ignore such occurrences.

  The 1887 general election put the Evening Telegram in a great struggle against its Liberal rival, the Globe, for the loyalty of Toronto voters. Leonard was sent to cover several rallies for Conservative candidates, with orders to “always put our man in a good light.” All three Toronto seats returned Conservatives – as did Grey North, which elected James Masson. Leonard wondered how his life might have changed if he had been given the chance to carry the Conservative flag in the Beaver Valley.

  Leonard had put such things as elections out of his mind by the time he remembered that an important anniversary was almost upon him. The last day of October, 1888, would mark five years from the day that Rosannah had died. He felt guilty that he had almost forgotten this. He’d been back to Vandeleur a few times on short visits. But almost everything that had happened there had been pushed to the back of his mind by his new life. It had been ages since he had written anything for Rosannah’s Story. He was relieved when he found he could still bring Rosannah’s face to mind. He wished he had her picture, but no one he knew in Vandeleur had a camera. He thought on this for a while and then took a sheaf of paper from a drawer and began to write:

  Five years and what have I accomplished? Five years after Rosannah’s death and I am no closer to finding out the truth. My work at the Evening Telegram has distracted me from pursuing the matter of who killed Rosannah and why. Yet, my memory of her has in no wise faded. She remains in my mind the delightful, puzzling, exciting and beautiful girl that I knew in Vandeleur. A girl of dark, wavy hair and amber eyes. Even stronger in my mind than the image of her face is my recollection of her scent. Sometimes she smelled of fresh-cut clover, and other times after we’d been together in the woods, of pine boughs and resin.

  Most of all, I remember the tangy odour of her sweat. That was the smell I loved. In the city, ladies try to hide this with soap and perfume. I don’t know why. I would not want a girl who did not carry with her the smell of womanhood. Perhaps this is because I love the essence of the country. The fragrance of wild flowers in the meadow. The mustiness of the barn, a mix of cattle odour, dung and hay. Of newly turned soil, ready for the seed. The breath of a fresh breeze through the trees. All these things are absent in the city.

  I do not think the doctors who attended Rosannah helped her any. Opium and alcohol, the main ingredients of modern women’s medicines, hardly make a healthy mix. Add to that tobacco and you have a dastardly combination. If a person is sad some days and happy another, then it seems logical that one must try to multiply the circumstances that prevail on their days of contentment, and minimize the conditions that induce days of bleakness and pity. I regret I did not have the wisdom and experience, during the time I knew Rosannah, to help her find solutions to the problems that confounded her.

  At the trial, we learned from Bridget Leppard that Rosannah had been interfered with as a child. How innocent she must have been when that depraved man satisfied his lust at her expense! And a priest, of all things. Had her father ever learned of this, I am sure he would have killed him. I never heard James Leppard speak against the Church, although it is well known he has become a staunch Orangeman after having quitted Rome. He had only become a Catholic in order to marry Rosannah’s mother. One wonders what events might have transpired to lead him to break off from the Church.

  While Owen Staples was in Philadelphia, Leonard filled his time by seeking out new pursuits. He bought one of the new bicycles with air-filled tires that made it easier to ride over the city’s rough streets. He spent more time with other boarders at Mrs. Coles’s and tagged along on excursions to nearby beauty spots – one time to Niagara Falls and another to Lake Simcoe. On summer days he cycled out to Victoria Park and swam beneath the Scarborough Bluffs. He kept his visits to Vandeleur to a minimum as he was receiving regular reports on the farm and house from Sam Bowles’s granddaughter. A small but satisfactory sum was deposited in his bank account every fall, representing his share of proceeds from oats and barley crops.

  Owen and Leonard had promised to write each other often. In one letter Owen described the “most valued lesson” he had learned from his instructors. “It’s to know and understand anatomy, that’s the basis of true art. We are forever sketching models, or modelling for each other. They make us paint direct from the model to the canvas. We’re not to sketch an outline or make a drawing of the subject first. Now I have learned to go straight to the picture without those time-wasting and distracting preliminaries.”

  Owen returned to Toronto in possession of a diploma from the Academy of Fine Art and a portfolio of work that gained him much praise in the city’s art circles. A picture Owen called “In Captivity” depicted a tiger prowling in its cage during a snowstorm at the Philadelphia Zoo. “I’d gone out there one winter morning and before I knew it, a blizzard struck,” he told Leonard. “The keepers thought I was crazy when I set up my easel. But I think it’s my best work.” At Leonard’s urging, Owen submitted the painting to the annual exhibition of the Royal Canadian Academy. When it was accepted, “In Captivity” became the first Owen Staples work to be publicly shown in Canada.

  By now, Leonard was the only one of the old gang still at Mrs. Coles’s boardinghouse. He expected Owen would join him there and he was surprised that on his return to Toronto Owen took a room with the Coopers on Henry Street.

  “Isn’t the old place good enough for you?” Leonard asked.

  It took a fair bit of digging and jabbing before he found out the reason for Owen’s move. He had met a girl at a church event. Her name was Lillian Hewitt and she was musically accomplished. When Owen discovered that Lillian’s aunt, Mrs. Cooper, had rooms to let, he arranged to stay there. Lillian visited often to play her aunt’s spinet. Soon, Owen was taking singing lessons from her. Within a few months they were engaged to be married.

  It was so simple for Owen, Leonard thought, but so difficult for him.

  * In 1866, a contingent of an Irish Republican Brotherhood crossed the Niagara River with the intention of seizing Canada
as a base to attack Britain’s control of Ireland. The invaders were beaten back and the U.S. cracked down on the movement.

  Chapter 29

  RETURN TO VANDELEUR

  September 20, 1889

  The Grange was a gracious place, the most famous of all the fine residences in Toronto. Leonard Babington’s first sight of it came one Sunday when he managed to extract Owen Staples from Lillian Hewitt’s embrace long enough to have an afternoon walk together. The Grange stood like a fortress on high ground on McCaul Street, surrounded by terraced gardens. “It’s like a Georgian manor house,” Owen told Leonard. “Made of bricks, but you can hardly see them under all those vines. Belonged to Mayor Boulton until he died, then his wife up and married Goldwin Smith. They still live there.”

  In Leonard’s view, Goldwin Smith, a writer of often contentious opinions, was one of the great intellectual and political minds of the nineteenth century. He’d read about Smith’s work with the Canada First movement and he agreed wholeheartedly with the idea of being for Canada as long as you were for the Imperial connection as well. He’d heard Smith had put money into the Evening Telegram but pulled out over John Ross Robertson’s insistence on backing the Conservative party.

  “A fine house for a great man,” Leonard said.

  “I guess, but how is it that some people come off with so much, while the rest of us have to scratch and scrounge for crumbs?” Owen asked. “Especially folks like your friends the Leppards and the Teets’s up in Grey County.”

  “I’ve often wondered that myself,” Leonard said. “Some do it by hard work, others by conniving and stealing, and some people just get it handed to them.” He winced as he said that, realizing he’d been favoured with the legacy of Vandeleur Hall. Recovering, he added: “Rosannah Leppard wouldn’t have dreamt such a place as The Grange could exist.” Just the saying of her name brought a catch to Leonard’s throat. Rosannah could have been nothing but a scullery maid in the mansion they strood before. Leonard had a troubling dream that night. Rosannah appeared before him, reminding him he hadn’t yet found out who was responsible for her death. He awoke with a start, and it took him a long time to get back to sleep.

  Leonard thought no more of Goldwin Smith or his great house until one day when John Ross Robertson brought up Smith’s name. Leonard was in the publisher’s office taking notes for a speech Robertson would be making to the opening of the Industrial Exhibition. He wanted to talk about Toronto’s reputation for law and order. Leonard’s knowledge of the courts and the proclivity of the denizens of The Ward to flout the law made him just the man, Robertson told Leonard, to help him with his speech.

  “That man’s the greatest thinker of our time,” Robertson said of Goldwin Smith, “but I disagree with his every thought. Would you like to meet him?”

  The occasion was the publication of Smith’s new book, Canada and the Canadian Question. He was holding the celebration in the library that Harriette had built for him at The Grange. With Mr. Robertson guiding the way, Leonard found himself among thirty men who were crowded into the room to hear Smith talk of his latest project. Leonard thought it a jocular crowd, good-natured from the flow of fine liquor and eager to hear the latest quips that might fall from the lips of this notoriously free wheeling observer. After a half hour’s reading from his book, Smith retired to a sideboard cabinet where a waiter was serving whisky and gin. Smith was a handsome man, clean-shaven, and on this occasion he wore an ascot necktie that added a splash of colour to a white shirt, a dark vest, and a brown coat. Leonard edged to the front long enough to introduce himself and pose a question: What is the greatest problem facing Canada?

  “What is wanting in this country is unity,” Smith answered. “Quebec’s a theocracy, like an antediluvian animal preserved in ice. Ontario is a world unto itself. If the North West ever fills up, Old Canada will be dwarfed and the centre of power will shift westward. The disappearance of your Indians, of course, will be of little loss to humanity. I explain all this in my book.”

  Leonard had hastily scanned a few pages back at the office. He was left with the impression that Smith was writing off Canada, suggesting its destiny lay in union with the United States.

  “Do you really believe our future is to be an American state?” Leonard asked. “I know some think it a grand idea but it hardly seems practical to me.”

  Smith swirled the gin in his glass before answering. “The idea of a United Continent of North America is both grand and practical,” he said. “It would secure free trade and intercourse over a vast area, with external safety and internal peace.”

  “But what of our manufactures? The National Policy?”

  “Babington, remember this: the great industry of Ontario is farming, despite the efforts of protectionists to make it a manufacturing country. Let’s concentrate on what we do best – grow food.”

  Leonard had one more question.

  “Growing food, that’s right, we’re good at that. But many of our farmers are in abject poverty. Where I come from, Grey County, some folks, the Irish especially, are hard up. What can be done to help them?” As he asked the question, a vision of Rosannah scrubbing clothes in the Leppard shack filled his mind.

  “Ah, the Irish,” Goldwin Smith answered. “Amiable but thriftless, a saint-worshipping, priest-ridden race.”

  Leonard saw he wouldn’t get much sympathy from this man for the struggles of a few no-account Irish hidden away in the Queen’s Bush. Other men were coming forward to demand the attention of the great thinker. Leonard heard more of Smith’s ideas as he fended off questions from his guests. For all his dismay at Goldwin Smith’s slurs toward the Irish and the Indians, Leonard thought his other insights dazzling. Through the chatter of the guests, he picked up bits and pieces of his remarks: “The sapling of Canadian literature cannot grow beneath the shadow of the parent tree … The merit of Ontario landscape painters will someday be recognized in England … Farm cookery is vile – fried pork, bread ill-baked, heavy pies coarse and strong, that account for the advertisements of pills which everywhere meet the eye.”

  It was bewildering. What Leonard heard impressed him but gave him no new insight into what still remained the unfulfilled mission of his life – solving the mystery of Rosannah Leppard’s death. Nor did it prepare him for the news he received when he got home. A note had arrived from Owen Staples. Angus McIntosh had jumped from the Queen Street bridge into the Don River. He’d left a letter accusing Leonard of hounding him to his death.

  Astonishing news. Trembling, Leonard dropped Owen’s letter to the floor. Blamed again for something not his fault – was this to be his fate? Angry now, he picked up the note and ripped it to shreds.

  Leonard felt his stomach tighten and his head throb when he walked into the editorial department at the Telegram the morning after the suicide. He had shivered in bed during the night and his heart had raced at an alarming rate. He awoke determined not to take the blame for the old reporter’s tragic end. People weren’t always rational when they wrote suicide notes, he told himself. McIntosh had been on the edge for a long time and nothing Leonard had done could have pushed him over.

  “Are we printing the suicide note?” Leonard asked the men around the reporter’s table. He let the question hang in the air.

  Tom White, who was searching through a pile of newspapers for stories missed by the Evening Telegram, finally answered. “Mr. Robinson says to make no mention of it. Nothing about how McIntosh has been dispirited and gloomy. Just a paragraph that the poor sod fell into the river. All a misadventure.”

  Hearing this, Leonard’s heart slowed its pace. He went to Black Jack Robinson’s office where he found him scrawling an editorial on a piece of brown wrapping paper that he’d found lying on his desk.

  “Ah, Babington, let me read you a line of what I’ve written about Goldwin Smith’s book. Listen to this:”

  Professor Goldwin Smith’s book is distinctively a great effort. It will charm all by the power of its style witho
ut, let us hope, enforcing acceptance of its conclusions. For the hopes of Young Canada outrun his beliefs. Its heart craves a destiny nobler than that which he assigns to this Dominion.

  “A backhanded compliment, I’d say,” Leonard answered. “And one I’d agree with. But I want to talk to you about McIntosh. I’ll not let him reach back from the grave and blame me for his death.”

  Black Jack Robinson was used to dealing with the frequent disputes between men at the Evening Telegram. A hotheaded, conceited bunch, he often called them. Always trying to impose their wills on those around them. Leonard had been different, he had to admit.

  “I spoke to Mr. Robertson this morning. You’ll have to see what he thinks. He’s at church meetings today and he’ll be out of town for a week or so, down to New York. Just carry on until he gets back. Who knows what he’s thinking? A man of very strict morals, you know.”

  Black Jack’s remarks left Leonard with a hollow feeling in his chest. He tried to put McIntosh out of his mind and carry on as if nothing had happened. If the Evening Telegram thought he bore a shred of guilt over McIntosh, he’d have it out with the proprietor. He wasn’t going to live again through what happened at the Globe. He avoided his usual beer sessions at the Queen’s Hotel and went straight to Mrs. Coles’s boardng house every night. Owen Staples did his best to help Leonard keep up his spirits. “Everybody knows you did McIntosh no harm,” he told him over and over. A week went by.

  Leonard had just returned from his police rounds when he found a note telling him to go to Mr. Robertson’s office. He saw the proprietor at his desk. He knocked on the glass door and went in.

  “This McIntosh business,” Robertson began. “How do you feel about it?”

  “I feel damn put upon,” Leonard answered. He was growing agitated. “Everybody’s been going around as if nothing had happened. I’d like to get it cleared up. I hardly ever spoke to the man.”