Sowing Poison
Page 27
“You really want to go across the ice again? You’re getting quite bold, aren’t you?” Francis teased, but he agreed readily enough to go along.
The ice was solidly frozen and the wind bit at them as they crossed the channel, making their eyes water. They followed the trail along until they reached the clearing in the woods. The stench from the root cellar had dissipated, and anything that had been left behind had frozen, the slow putrefaction halted by the cold. The wreckage of the burnt-out cabin had been scattered by the crew of men who had gathered the bones, the crude stone hearth had been thrown down, the iron pot removed.
“What are we looking for this time, Thaddeus? You do have a habit of making the most amazing discoveries. I’m never sure what I’ll see when I’m with you.”
Lewis didn’t answer, because he wasn’t sure himself why he had come, except that he felt that he owed something to the wild creature who had lived here. One of many innocents caught up by the actions of others.
Francis stood by the shore and watched as Lewis picked through the fallen hearth stones. He made no comment when his father-in-law finally selected a flat piece of limestone, but he held the rock steady while Lewis scratched the letters on it with a nail. He helped scoop out a hole in the sandy earth under the cedar trees and together the two men lowered the stone into it, shoring it up with sand and more stones. When they were done, they stood before it in silence, their heads bowed. It was a plain enough remembrance, and would probably last only a winter or two before the stone heaved and the words were lost, but at least the intent was sincere.
The inscription was short. Lewis had been able to think of nothing more fitting than to simply mark it “Boy.”
Copyright © Janet Kellough, 2012
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.
Editor: Allison Hirst
Design: Jesse Hooper
Epub Design: Carmen Giraudy
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Kellough, Janet
Sowing poison [electronic resource]: a Thaddeus Lewis mystery / Janet Kellough.
Type of computer file: Electronic monograph.
Issued also in print format.
ISBN 978-1-4597-0055-0
I. Title.
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Canada Book Fund and Livres Canada Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishing Tax Credit and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.
Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.
J. Kirk Howard, President
www.dundurn.com
Also by Janet Kellough
On the Head of a Pin
978-1554884346
$11.99
Thaddeus Lewis, an itinerant “saddlebag” preacher, still mourns the mysterious death of his daughter Sarah as he rides to his new posting in Prince Edward County. When a girl in Demorestville dies in a similar way, he realizes that the circumstances point to murder. But in the turmoil following the 1837 Mackenzie Rebellion he can get no one to listen. Convinced there is a serial killer loose in Upper Canada, Lewis alone must track the culprit across a colony convulsed by dissension, invasion, and fear. His only clues are a Book of Proverbs and a small painted pin left with the victims. And the list of suspects is growing.
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Lights! Camera! Action! On the English Channel Island of Guernsey, Detective Inspector Ed Moretti and his new partner, Liz Falla, investigate vicious attacks on Epicure Films. The international production company is shooting a movie based on a British bad-boy author’s bestselling novel about an Italian aristocratic family at the end of the Second World War. When vandalism escalates into murder, Moretti must resist the attractions of the author’s glamorous American wife, consolidate his working relationship with Falla, and establish whether the murders on Guernsey go beyond the island.
Available at your favourite bookseller.
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