An Old, Cold Grave

by Iona Whishaw

  “So if it is a child from that house, and aside from the locket we’ve nothing else to go on, it would most likely have been Isabel. I was going to ask you, was she terribly slight? The tiny bit I saw of that skeleton did seem like that of a child. I was under the impression Isabel was a bit older, like sixteen or seventeen?”

  Kenny considered and then gave a nod. “She was small. Petite I guess they’d call it. But well developed, like a young woman, for all that. I seem to recall Bob having a go at Robin when they were young, maybe over her.”

  “I think I have enough bits and pieces to give Darling a ring, anyway. I’ll pop back home and write the whole thing up, see if I can make it coherent,” Lane said.

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  LANE LEANED AGAINST THE WALL by the phone. It had become warm enough to leave the front door open, and she could see the sun dappling the yard between her door and the barn in greens and gold. She thought she might have a go at tidying up the yard. Anything to be out in it. Her heart thumped when she heard his voice.

  “Inspector Darling.”

  “Ah, Inspector, it’s Lane Winslow. I have some bits and bobs for you.”

  “Excellent. That’s what this case has been lacking. I am making two columns, bits, and then bobs.”

  Lane told him about Gwen’s revelation that Isabel had worn the locket, or one like it, around the time the cellar was built. “She apparently disapproved of it because the girl was poor and oughtn’t to have had a gold locket.”

  Darling took notes as Lane spoke. While it wasn’t conclusive, knowing that it was positively identified with Isabel Anscomb was progress. He could now set Ames to finding her, or any other members of the family. The discovery of the body had gone into the paper the week before, but no information had come forward, as sometimes happened in these cases. Having a name would certainly help.

  “I think that’s it for now,” Lane said.

  “You’ve done well. You’d meagre enough information to work with. I can’t help feeling this whole thing is coalescing around that Anscomb family. I’ll get Ames onto tracking down that girl in particular. We’ll look silly if she is alive and well somewhere raising apples and putting her children through university.”

  “How’s your young miscreant getting on?” Lane asked.

  “As sulky as ever. She’s threatening to drop out of school. A bit of nonsense, since June is only a few months away, and she’ll be finished anyway. She’s not allowed out of the house unless the boyfriend is with her, and she seems to have gone off him as well. Her court date is coming up in a week. Perhaps all will be revealed then.”

  “I hope everyone understands that she’s very bright. I worry about what people might be missing in thinking she’s just a girl to be married off. Well, it’s not my affair, I suppose.”

  Darling put the phone down, his hand lingering on the receiver, as if to keep her voice in his mind. He imagined her in the hall, slipping that ridiculous earpiece onto its faulty hook, walking back to her kitchen, perhaps, leaning over her map of the Cove and writing in what she had learned.

  “Sir,” Ames said brightly, bristly with obvious news.

  Darling pulled himself together with a touch of guilt, “Yes, Ames, out with it,” he said, unable to quell his annoyance at being discovered by Ames of all people, in a reverie about Miss Winslow. Well, Ames couldn’t read minds.

  “I’ve got something. I’ve traced one of the Chases to a house just out of town. The other one seems to have died. I’ll go see her after, if you like, but that’s not the big news.” Ames paused here.

  “Buried the lede again, Ames. What is the big news?”

  “Manitoba, sir. There is an old record of a fracas involving one Henry Anscomb in about 1903. He was arrested for child endangerment when a Home Child died on his farm. Interestingly they do make a note of an older boy on the farm as well. Apparently he had been questioned, but the investigation settled on the father in the end.”

  “So that oldest boy could be Bob Anscomb. What’s a Home Child, when it’s at home?”

  “I had to ask that too, sir. It seems that children who were living on the streets in England were sent out to Canada to be adopted, or to work. To quote the policeman I talked to, ‘they were supposed to get a better life, huh!’”

  “I have never heard of it. How old was the child?” Darling asked.

  Ames consulted his notes, “Umm, oh, he was listed as being eleven. He died at the farm, and Henry was arrested. ‘Endangerment’ is a vague word. It’s hard to tell if he beat him to death or let him fall in a well.”

  Darling was aghast. “Eleven? How is that old enough to plunk a child on a farm with complete strangers? Anything could happen to him and obviously did. At a guess I’d say the receiving families weren’t even vetted. Okay. This thing is firmly settling on this Anscomb family. Miss Winslow got information that the locket was seen on the Anscomb girl, Isabel. So he was arrested and then what happened?”

  “The family disappeared, sir, and I guess no one followed up. My guess is they came out this way to get away. There’s no record of his having been before a judge.”

  “Not following up on the death of child. It’s a bloody disgrace. Well, let’s not add to the scandal. Have you tracked down Henry Anscomb? He appears in the Cove with a large family and then leaves before the war. Where did he go? Is he still alive, what’s happened to that family?”

  “That’s interesting too, sir. I don’t know what happened to the family, but I tracked down Henry Anscomb. He died of a heart attack in 1930 in Creston. The fellow at the RCMP office remembered it right off the bat because one of the girls that worked at the nursing wing of the hospital tried to say she thought the man’s son had something to do with his death. A report was taken at the time, but nothing came of it, except the original diagnosis that he’d died of a heart attack.”

  Darling rubbed his chin. “That’s a lot of violence sniffing around one family. Anscomb senior, and possibly junior, implicated in the death of a child, this child we’ve found possibly being part of the family, and now we have Anscomb himself dying of a heart attack, only someone thinks he was killed by his son. Excellent work, Ames. Call them back and get them to read you chapter and verse of the report they took in 1930. Better yet, see if you can talk to that girl who made the fuss. And track down,” Darling consulted his paper, “Isabel Anscomb, Joseph Anscomb, and Andrew Anscomb. The boys were young at the time. If they are alive, we will have to expand our search.” Ames, pleased that the word “excellent” was used anywhere in his vicinity, went off on winged feet to do his master’s bidding.

  MABEL AWOKE FEELING completely groggy. She knew this meant she had overslept. Twenty minutes was her rule for her after-lunch nap, or she spent the rest of the afternoon trying to recover. She groaned and swung her legs off the bed and sat. It wasn’t just the sleep, she knew. It was being reminded of the whole business. Thinking about the Anscombs brought back, with staggering force, what had shattered her young life. What she had struggled to forget but still haunted her nights. She pulled on the sock that was dangling on the end of her foot and padded downstairs to the kitchen to peer at the afternoon. There was no sign of Gwen or her mother. They too must be oversleeping. A storm was brewing up behind the mountain, but for the moment the sun still spread across the garden. She would walk up past the top of the orchard onto that rocky knoll that had that lovely view of the lake to clear her head.

  “Come on, then,” she called to the spaniels, who sensed adventure, and she started through the garden, trying to throw off the last vestiges of her sleep. The only sounds in the quiet afternoon were her footsteps. The dogs had run ahead. She reached the end of the orchard and took the path that wound steeply uphill through the forest to the outcrop. Panting, she arrived and sat on the flat bench of rock that had been a favourite of hers all her life. She looked out across the lake to the mountains beyond. The storm clouds were coming from over the mountains behind her, and she could see that t
hey were beginning to cast a shadow on the scene below. As it wasn’t yet summer and the apple trees were still nearly naked, the house was visible now. In the deep quiet she heard the screen door slam and saw the figure of her mother, stretching. How often in her life had she sought comfort in this secluded spot! When she was a girl her glumness had lifted away here, as if carried by the breeze. Now she wished for this same magic. Even the climb up the hill had not eroded in the slightest the anxiety that was causing her to feel completely ill. You soon learn that there is no magic, she thought. A cascade of near-hysterical barking by the spaniels interrupted her gloomy reflections. God, she thought, they’ve cornered a bear. Best to beat a retreat. She moved a few feet into the forest behind her to call them, anxious not to encounter the bear herself.

  “Come on, you bloody stupid dogs!” she shouted. “Get away from there!” She was rewarded with a crashing in the underbrush as the dogs made their way back to her, still barking, a reminder to whatever it was that they meant business.

  But even back by her side, they continued looking into the forest behind her. Mabel felt suddenly uneasy. A bear would be kept at bay for a bit by the dogs as long as they didn’t get too close. She waited, silently now, to make sure that it was not coming closer. She would calmly walk back down the hill, not giving the bear any reason to pursue. The silence was absolute, and her eyes had begun to water from looking so intently into the forest, now darkening because of the coming storm. “Come on, let’s go home,” she said and turned. But at that moment she was certain she saw a pale flash in the woods. Not a bear, she thought, her heart in her mouth, not a bear. Human. She began to descend as quickly as she could, trying to sound calm as she called the dogs.

  September, 1910

  Through the window Mabel could see the early morning sun cascading down the hill. She was irritated in the next minute to see that Gwen was already up. She always wanted to be first, as if it were she who discovered the morning before anyone else. She hurried to dress in her overalls, took the chamber pot from under the bed, and went carefully downstairs to the outhouse. The slight bite of coolness presaging the coming fall lifted her. By the afternoon they would all be hot, baked in the unrelenting sun and sweaty from picking. Gwen was coming from the chickens with a bowl of eggs. She was wearing her work dress and pinafore. “You’re not planning to climb ladders in those clothes?” Mabel asked. Her heart flooded with warmth again at the thought of the day; everyone was going to be at the upper orchard.

  “What if I am? At least I look like a girl,” her sister said disdainfully, stamping her boots on the first step and then swinging into the house, letting the screen door slam. Mabel flipped her braid off her shoulder so it hung down her back. She didn’t care what Gwen said. Bob knew she was a girl. She smiled as she approached the orchard. Both Robin Harris and Kenny Armstrong had their wagons parked along the rutted road, the horses nodding their heads against the restrictions of their tackle and reaching for the long yellowing grass at the edge of the road. Boxes were piled on the ground, smelling of clean, new fir, the labels already affixed. Andrew was at his station, ready to wrap each apple when it was approved and place it in the box. Mabel was surprised to see that he had a helper: young Joe, who stood solemnly and attentively, waiting for apples. She had thought he was not above seven years old, but someone said he was closer to ten. She could see the young men settling ladders against the trees and felt herself blush at the sight of Bob, testing the stability of his ladder, shaking it against the tree to make the branches give up their cargo.

  “Stop that! Are you going to pay for the bruised ones?” John called out to him impatiently.

  Bob saluted good-naturedly and adjusted his shoulder basket. Mabel looked around for Isabel and found her talking to one of the horses in a soft voice. She was so pretty, Mabel thought, glancing at John. She wondered suddenly if that was the reason for Gwen’s dislike of her.

  “Isabel, can you make sure the boys know what they’re doing with those papers, and then maybe go see if Mother and Gwen need help with lunch?” Isabel smiled at her and waved, moving to where her two little brothers were waiting with the papers. How quiet Joe was, Mabel thought. So unlike his older brother, who laughed easily and chattered incessantly. John could be happy with a girl like Isabel. Such a sweet smile. Not striking like Gwen but sweet and amiable. For that matter, so could Robin. Look what had happened at the dance.

  In the end, Isabel stayed and helped the boys, who were young and getting behind, and it was Gwen who came up from the house and said, “Lunch is ready.” They trooped down the hill, swatting flies away from their damp faces, thirsty and ready for some food. Mabel threw herself under a tree at the edge of the lawn with a sandwich and willed Bob, who was jostling with the Armstrong boys by the table, to come and sit by her.

  “You work hard, for a girl,” he teased, flopping down beside her. Their shoulders were touching and she could feel her face flushing. It was like being at the dance all over again. That wonderful dance with him. Touching him. Being close to him. In the three weeks since the summer fete he’d hardly paid her any attention. But she knew the fight had thrown everything off. It had worried her, but now she could see how he felt about her.

  “You’re lovely and pink from the exercise,” he said.

  She turned to him. His smiling face was close to hers. “Well, you’re bright red. You’ll get all grizzled like your dad if you’re not careful.” He looked at her for a moment, his expression suddenly serious. God, she thought. I’ve said the wrong thing. “I’m sorry . . .” she faltered.

  “Oh don’t worry. My da’s all right. He’s had to work hard. Worry probably does it more than anything. Speaking of which, where have those boys got to?” He stood up and called his sister. “Isabel, have you seen Andrew and little Joe?”

  Isabel, leaning on a nearby tree with her arms crossed, had been watching her brother and Mabel. She pushed herself erect and looked back up the path to the orchard. “They probably went to talk to the horses. I’ll go.”

  “I’ll go with,” Bob said, and strode off after her, leaving Mabel with a wink.

  Mabel sat, her heart in her mouth. He meant for her to go with them, she thought. She looked around the garden where people sat in the shade, finishing the last of their lunches, taking cookies off a plate Gladys was handing around. She stood up, brushed off the back of her overalls, and started walking after them. She had just passed the barn when she felt her arm pulled. Bob, winking, pushed her gently against the wall of the side of the barn, out of everyone’s sight. He leaned in, kissing her, exploring her mouth, pressing his body into hers.

  “Got ’em!” It was Isabel, from somewhere near them. Bob pulled away from Mabel and pushed at her, as if wanting to put distance between them, and in that moment Isabel caught sight of them. She stopped for a moment and then turned angrily away, pushing the children back toward the picnickers.

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  SHE TOSSED LONG INTO THE night. At last Mabel blearily turned on her lamp and took up her book, hopeful that the prose would impose order on her careening thoughts. It was absurd that after all these years she should be seized again by the shame of having been lured so easily into the thrall of that horrible family.

  February, 1911

  Bob came into the house from the closed-in back porch where he had left his boots. The kitchen smelled sour—of cabbage soup, wet wool, and unwashed people—and already seemed as dark as night, though outside the thin light of winter evening still clung to the tops of the trees like mist. Isabel was near the stove where she’d obviously been trying to do something with the soup, but she had the baby in one arm and he had been crying, She was trying to jostle him into a better humour. His eyes were beginning to close.

  Bob shook his head. Isabel was forced to cope with the baby, because his mother never got out of bed. She had to be coaxed by Henry or Isabel to feed the infant. Isabel was still only seventeen, but she looked weary and full of shadows, as if she e
xpected no other life than this one. Charlie felt anger well up in him as he put down the armload of kindling. “He’s asleep now. Lay him down in his crib.” Henry had gone to help Lady Armstrong, and Andrew was playing with the girls from down the road. Charlie pushed her gently toward the room where Marla Anscomb lay in a perpetual stupor. “His ma will hear him when he wakes up, go on.”

  “But she can’t . . .”

  “She’s his ma. She’s got to. She ain’t never going to get better if you do everything for her.” He watched her as she came back, tucking her hair behind her ear, looking nervously back into the solitary bedroom, which was dark and cold. He felt a shock of confusion. Mabel was waiting for him, but he had a momentary vision of kissing Isabel. He shook his head slightly, and thought about the woman in the orphanage all those years ago. “You’ll be able to have a better life, your own farm, in the healthy open places of Canada.” Isn’t that what that lady in the black dress had said? Nothing was healthy about their life right now. Watching Isabel, drained of life, the spark gone out of her eyes, he thought what a lie it had all been. In a short time the world would descend into the grey semi-darkness of a winter evening, like some land that hovered between life and death.

  MABEL WAITED WHERE he had told her to wait, at the edge of the path hidden by the tall spruce, and looked furtively into the misty and overwhelming vastness of the forest silence. She shuddered with a combination of excitement and fear. If Mummy or Gwen knew! But she could not look away as Bob came around the house from the kitchen porch in the grey light and then down the path toward her. Fearful, she knew she was on the brink of something wonderful.

  Bob found her and, smiling, put a finger to his lips, led her across the yard to the building where whoever had built this place intended to store tools. There was a ladder and a massive two-man saw lying along the length of the wall, and various buckets and the wash tin had been pushed into the small space. In the darkness inside, Mabel wasn’t sure what she was meant to be looking at, when suddenly light flared up and danced up the wooden walls. Bob held up the kerosene lamp he’d lit and said, “See?”