by Oak, B. B.
“But he may come back.”
“I’ll keep watch,” Tansy said. “You best lie down, Julia. You don’t look so good.”
I took up the looking glass on my dresser to see for myself and near fainted. “Dear God help me,” I said.
“Dear God help us both!” Tansy said as she peered out the window. “A monster even more fearsome than Satan is coming toward the house. He is as black as the night and as tall as a mountain.”
A moment later there was pounding on the door. “Will you go down and let him in, Tansy? I feel too dizzy to manage it.”
“Let him in? Are you plumb crazy?” She did not move a muscle.
Mawuli let himself in, for neither Tansy nor I had thought to bolt the door. He stood in the hall and shouted my name.
“He’s come to get you, Julia!” Tansy said.
“No, he’s come to help me.”
I called back to Mawuli to come upstairs. Tansy gasped at first sight of him, no doubt because of his scars, but Mawuli showed no reaction when he took in my battered face.
“I knew Monsieur had done evil when he returned to the Sun,” he said in an even tone. “I came here to make sure you were still alive. Where is Dr. Walker?”
“He went to Boston with Henry Thoreau.”
“To the shipyards?”
I nodded. “If you know that, Mawuli, you must also know their reason for going there. You know that Pelletier is having a slave ship built.”
His expression remained inscrutable. “Go to bed, Madame. You look like you have had a very hard time of it.”
ADAM
Early Tuesday morning, May 23
It was well past midnight when I rode into Plumford, but I was not surprised to see light through the drawn curtains of Julia’s bedchamber windows. I had expected her to wait up for me. I let myself in and bounded up the stairs, eager to tell her that our mission had been successful and Pelletier would soon be arrested. I found her in bed, propped up by pillows, a cloth over her face. Tansy was sitting beside her, holding her hand.
“What happened?” I said, rushing to Julia’s side.
Julia removed the cloth from her face, and I saw that she had contusions over her left brow and right cheek, an ecchymosis of the left eye, and a split lip. Most horrifying of all were the purple finger marks on her smooth white neck, for they might have resulted in death by strangulation.
“I’m going to be just fine,” she told me softly. “Tansy has been taking good care of me.”
“I’ve been applying a cabbage leaf poultice to her bruises,” Tansy said. “It helps them heal faster. One time Prouty got himself kicked by a mule and—”
“Did Pelletier do this to you?” I asked Julia.
“Who else?” a deep voice inquired. I whirled around and saw Mawuli enter the room. He was carrying a coffee pot, which he set upon the card table. “Shall I bring you a cup, Dr. Walker?”
I brushed past him without bothering to reply and made my way out of the room, blind with rage.
“Don’t go to the Sun, Adam!” Julia called after me as I dashed down the stairs.
I could hear Mawuli’s tread right behind me, and he grabbed my arm when I reached the front gate. “Leave the old man alone,” he said.
“Why do you want to protect Pelletier, Mawuli? He’s still a slaver, damn it! I saw his new ship with my own eyes tonight.”
Mawuli had nothing to say to that. His countenance was impassive as he continued to grip my arm. He was a good foot taller than me, but also a good forty years older, so I reckoned I could take him on.
“Let go my arm or I will fight you,” I said.
He released his hold immediately, and without another word he returned to the house. I continued on to the tavern. Fueled by rage, I was there in what seemed seconds.
I did not know what I intended to do to Pelletier when I entered the Sun. Do him bodily harm, most certainly. Kill him? Possibly. I was too incensed to have formed a lucid plan in my fervid mind. I glanced around the taproom to see if Pelletier might be lurking there, but the only customers at this late hour were Beers and a drinking crony. They were playing a desultory game of dominoes whilst Ruggles wiped down the bar. The three men all looked back at me warily. My countenance must have reflected my fulminating emotions.
“I was getting ready to close up, Adam,” Ruggles said in a cautious tone. “But I’ll be happy to serve you up a drink on the house. You look like you are in need of one.”
“Not at all,” I said as coolly as I could manage. “I have come to check on my patient Haven.”
“Odd time to be doing that,” Ruggles said.
“Such are a doctor’s hours.”
With as much control as I could muster, I proceeded to mount the stairs leading to the inn’s bedchambers. The first room, I knew, was occupied by Haven, and I walked right past it. I tried the door of the next one. It was unlocked, and I peered inside. No one was within, and the narrow bed was neatly made. A leather carpenter’s apron hung on a peg, and I guessed it was Henry’s temporary living quarters. It occurred to me that if Henry had returned to Plumford with me, he might have talked me out of what I intended to do. But what did I intend to do? I still had not admitted to myself that my intention was murder.
The next door I opened revealed an unoccupied sitting room lit by a sputtering oil lamp on the wall. I recognized Pelletier’s cane leaning against a chair and his top hat upon it. There was a small table covered with a white cloth in the middle of the room, and on it was a full carafe of wine, an empty glass, a fork beside a folded napkin, and a thick piece of steak on a plate, the blood and juice around it congealed. Despite my raging emotions, I paid careful attention to all this in order to ascertain if Pelletier was alone behind the closed door across the sitting room, which I assumed led to the bedchamber. I had no wish to harm anyone but him. There were no signs that he had company, so I threw open the door.
Pelletier was indeed alone, laid out on his back in the bed, fully clothed. He did not acknowledge my sudden presence. I would have thought him in deep, peaceful slumber but for the knife buried in his chest. I pulled it out and observed wet, slick blood on the blade. There was no blood on his pale silk waistcoat until a drop or two dripped upon it from the withdrawn knife. With my free hand I felt his forehead. It was cold. I moved his jaw from side to side with difficulty. I picked up his arm by the wrist and noticed definite stiffening in the shoulder joint. There was no question rigor mortis had commenced, and I estimated he had died at least five or six hours ago.
I became aware of footsteps and looked out the doorway to see Beers and Ruggles enter the sitting room. I stood frozen over the body as they rushed toward me.
“Good Lord, Adam, what have you done?” Ruggles said, pausing at the bedchamber threshold.
“Put down your knife,” Beers ordered, standing behind Ruggles.
“It’s not my knife. I found it already plunged into his heart when I came in. But I don’t think it killed him.”
“Of course it did!” Beers said. “A knife in the heart is always fatal. And I will ask you one last time to put down your murder weapon, Walker. You are under arrest.”
“Don’t be an idiot, Beers!” I yelled in frustration, brushing past Ruggles to speak directly to the constable. “Just listen to what I am trying to explain to you. This is not the murder weapon.” I waved the knife in front of his bleary eyes.
Beers backed away from me and blundered against a chair in the sitting room. “Help me, Ruggles!” he said.
I turned to look at Ruggles, still standing at the threshold. He was white as a sheet from the shock of seeing a dead man in one of the Sun’s bedchambers. “Best you drop the knife, Adam,” he said softly.
In the next instant I caught a glimpse of the heavy silver head of Pelletier’s cane come flashing at me. It hit the side of my head before I could duck. I dropped the knife and pressed my hand to my ear, cupping blood. Stunned, I stared at Beers.
He drew back the cane a
gain, his fat face looking frightened yet eager to deliver another blow. This one landed on my crown, and I lost consciousness the next instant.
JULIA
Tuesday, May 23
I was greeted by a sound like a beehive stirred up with a stick when I entered the Meetinghouse for the Hearing this afternoon. The pews were packed, and all heads turned to watch me walk down the aisle. How grateful I was to have Henry’s strong arm for support, for I was weak from shock and lack of sleep. I ignored the hissing whispers and buzzing murmurs my arrival had incited and looked to neither left nor right. My visage was covered with a black mourning veil that Tansy had found for me in an attic trunk. ’Twas not from shame that I hid my face although I am sure that was what people thought. I would have preferred to stare each and every one of these sensation seekers down, but I wanted to keep my facial injuries hidden from view. If Justice Phyfe saw the damage Pelletier had done to me, he would likely conclude that the beating had incited Adam to murder my husband.
Had it? My heart cried no! The man I love is a healer, not a murderer. But neither do I think myself capable of murder, yet I had wanted to plunge my shard of porcelain into Pelletier’s heart whilst he was attacking me.
I’d not been allowed to see Adam before the Hearing. But I’d been required to view my husband’s body. The police officer Henry had brought from Boston to arrest Jacques Pelletier needed me to officially identify him. They brought me into the chamber where he’d been murdered, and as I looked down at the corpse in the bed, I felt no hatred. Only relief.
Henry and I sat in the front pew that had been designated for those whom Justice Phyfe intended to question. The Hearing had been called to establish if there was reason enough to hold Adam on suspicion of murder. If Phyfe concluded that there was, the next step would be a grand jury investigation presided over by the State’s Attorney General. If indicted for murder by the grand jury, Adam would be jailed until his trial. And then, if a trial jury found him guilty, he would be hanged. No! I would not allow myself to think that possible. Adam would be set free, if not this very afternoon, then no more than a year from now, when this ordeal came to an end with a verdict that found him innocent.
Was he? Again, that worm of doubt slithered in my breast. If only I had been able to talk to Adam earlier. I longed with every fiber of my being to see him again.
And in the next moment I did, as he was led down the aisle by Constable Beers to stand in front of the deacons’ table at the front of the Meetinghouse. Beers kept a firm hold of Adam’s arm, as if his prisoner would try to escape. And run where? Everything in this world that Adam cared about—his relatives, his patients, his friends, his farm, and yes, me—were right here in Plumford.
He turned to look at me, and I lifted my veil so that he could see the love in my eyes. He was hatless, and there was a nasty bruise on his temple. He managed a small smile, but I could not manage one in return, for my lips were trembling. Justice Phyfe entered through the minister’s door at the front of the Meetinghouse, and I dropped my veil.
Phyfe went to the deacons’ table and knocked his gavel upon it, an unnecessary gesture of authority since everyone had fallen silent as soon as he’d made his appearance. “Adam Walker, you have been brought in front of me today by Constable Beers, who has charged and arrested you for the murder of Jacques Pelletier, husband of Julia Bell Pelletier.” Phyfe regarded Adam with more disappointment than disapproval. Although they’d had strong differences in the past, Phyfe had always respected Adam’s dedication to his profession. “Do you claim yourself innocent or guilty as charged, Doctor?”
“I am innocent, your honor. Allow me to explain what—”
Phyfe banged his gavel. “In due course.” He seated himself behind the table. “First, I would like to hear from Constable Beers. Why did you arrest Dr. Walker for Mr. Pelletier’s murder, Constable?”
“Because he did it!”
“Did you witness him kill Pelletier?”
“Well, I nearly did.”
Beers went on to state that he had suspected that Dr. Walker was up to no good the moment he entered the tavern. He had blatantly lied about going upstairs to see to a patient, but Beers wasn’t having it. Being a diligent constable, he decided to investigate what Walker was really up to. He found the doctor standing over Pelletier’s body with a bloody knife in his hand. Beers demanded that Walker put down the knife, but instead Walker proceeded to attack him with it. Beers had staunchly held his ground, however, and overpowered Walker, subduing and then arresting him.
“No one can say that I do not do my duty as the constable of this town,” Beers concluded, glaring at Adam.
Mr. Ruggles was then asked to testify, and he more or less verified what Beers had said. “But I do not think Dr. Walker intended to stab Constable Beers,” he added.
“Was he still holding the knife as he went toward the constable?” Phyfe asked Ruggles.
“Well, yes.”
“I made sure to bring the murder weapon with me, sir,” Beers said. He pulled the knife, wrapped in his soiled handkerchief, out of his jacket pocket and laid it on the table.
Phyfe looked down at the knife. It was about ten inches long, with a heavy walnut handle. The blade was streaked with dried blood. “Is this your knife, Dr. Walker?”
“No, it’s the knife I found implanted in the victim’s chest. May I explain now how—”
“In due course,” Phyfe said again. “I would first like to ascertain whose knife this is.”
“Mine,” Ruggles said. “One of a dozen I had specially forged of the best steel for the Sun Tavern. It was brought up to Mr. Pelletier with the steak he requested to be served to him at midnight. Along with a fork, of course.”
“Did you deliver the steak to him?”
“No, sir. My wife did. He wanted it fetched up straight from the kitchen by the cook.”
“Is your wife here?”
“She’s sitting in the back.”
“I would like to question her,” Phyfe said.
Ruggles leaned across the table toward him and spoke in a low voice. “Edda’s English is not so good, sir.”
“No matter. I am sure we will manage to understand each other,” Phyfe said.
Ruggles looked over the heads of the spectators, and when he spotted his wife he motioned her to come forward. I did not turn around to see her reaction, but apparently she did not want to oblige him, for Ruggles motioned again, with a broader gesture and an impatient expression. Finally Justice Phyfe called out. “Mrs. Ruggles, come up here. Now!”
She hurried to the front of the Meetinghouse, fussily readjusting her shawl around her shoulders and her bonnet on her head. Phyfe asked her to take a seat across from him.
“When you brought up Mr. Pelletier’s steak, did you talk with him, Mrs. Ruggles?”
“About what?”
“About anything. Did you converse with him at all?”
She shrugged. “A little. Not so much. He is a stranger to me.”
“Did he by any chance mention that he was expecting a visitor later?”
She shook her head vehemently. “We do not allow prostitutes into the Sun.”
“I should think not!” Phyfe looked most dismayed. “I meant a gentleman visitor.”
“Oh. No.”
“No what?”
“No mention.”
“Did Mr. Pelletier act in any way differently than he normally did?”
“How do I know? I told you he is a stranger to me. I only meet him two days ago.”
Phyfe appeared to have grown bored with her testimony. “Thank you, Mrs. Ruggles. That will be all.”
She practically jumped out of her chair, dropping her reticule in the process. It fell near Henry’s feet, and he picked it up for her. When she took it from him I saw that her hand was shaking. Poor Edda. She had so wanted Pelletier out of the Sun. Instead, he had ended up dead there. She would not look at me. No doubt she thought it was all my fault. No doubt everyone did.
<
br /> “Mrs. Pelletier, I would like to question you now,” Phyfe said.
I reluctantly rose and went to the table. Phyfe did not invite me to take the seat across from him, but I did so anyway, for I was not very steady on my feet. He regarded me as patronizingly as he had when he’d been the Plumford schoolmaster and I was a saucy girl who did not know her proper place.
“Pray remove your veil, Mrs. Pelletier.”
“I am in mourning, sir.” Did I hear titters behind me?
“Of course you are,” Phyfe said condescendingly. “And I offer you my condolences for the passing of your husband, madam. But I want to see your eyes when I question you.”
“If you insist.” I threw the veil over the back of my bonnet.
Phyfe winced at the sight of my face. “Julia,” he said softly, and for an instant compassion tempered his haughty expression. “Who beat you?”
I made no reply.
“Was it Dr. Walker?”
“Of course not.”
“No, I don’t suppose he had cause to,” Phyfe said.
“No man has cause to beat a woman.”
“Some would say your husband had cause, madam.” Phyfe’s pronouncement got a few murmurs of approval from some manly voices in the audience.
I glared at him. “Is this a session to hear facts or to share gossip, sir?”
Phyfe blanched, just as he used to when I talked back to him as a girl. When will you ever learn, Julia? That was what Phyfe would ask me right before he rapped my knuckles with a ferule.
Now he banged the table with his gavel. “I shall ask the questions, madam! And you must truthfully answer them. Now tell me. Was it your husband who beat you?”
“Yes,” I hissed.
“When?”
“Last evening.”
“And did Dr. Walker see you last evening?”
“No,” I said. It was not a lie. Adam had seen me in the early hours of this morning.
Phyfe looked at me long and hard. “You are dismissed, Mrs. Pelletier.”
I pulled the veil back over my face and returned to the pew. I dared not look at Adam. Henry took my icy hand and gave it a good, hard, comforting squeeze. He then stood up and requested to testify.