Free Turncoat by Don Gutteridge Page B

here have read it?”
    Beth Smallman peered up at Marc with a look of puzzlement, pity, and the beginnings of anger. “I’m pleased you are takin’ such an interest in Father, and I would like some questions about that night to have better answers, but my husband’s father was an honest and well-loved gentleman. If somebody deliberately killed him, then you’ll have to come up with something less fanciful than notions about secret notes and mysterious footprints in the snow. You’ve got to hate or fear somebody with a passion before you can kill them. If there was a note, I was the only person here that night capable of readin’ it. Unless you suspect Emma Durfee.”
    Marc got up and made a stiff bow. Beth’s features softened, and in other circumstances he was confident shewould have smiled. “I have inconvenienced you long enough and imposed unconscionably on your hospitality,” he said, wrestling his way into his greatcoat.
    Beth took an elbow and helped him complete the task.
    At the door she said, “You will let me know what you find?”
    â€œI can do no less, ma’am.”
    â€œCall me Beth, please.”
    He touched the peak of his cap and left.
    M ARC WAS GRATEFUL FOR THE SLOW walk back to the mill, one that didn’t include a further encounter with the misanthropic Elijah. He needed a few quiet moments to mull over what he had learned before rehashing it with Erastus Hatch.
    He was convinced that a note had been delivered. Joshua’s decision to leave the house had been made sometime in the half hour or so in which he was checking out the barn. Most likely as he was returning to the house, someone gave it to him—a servant or stableboy on foot or someone who had ridden in from farther afield specifically for the purpose. The need for detailed directions and some elaborate “hook” strongly suggested written instructions, but a personally delivered oral message, though riskier, was not out of the question.
    At some point he realized he was going to have to interrogate Elijah about when he had left for the Child estateand whether he had seen his master beforehand. But deep down he was certain that, until some motive became clear, little beyond informed speculation was possible. Nevertheless, he was still in possession of a salient fact known only to him: Joshua Smallman was an informer for Sir John. No one in the region, not even a friend like Hatch, was aware of this. But had someone discovered or guessed at the truth? Some rabid annexationist or firebrand among the apostles of the rabble-rousing Mackenzie? Even so, the area was thick with Tories and loyalists, any one of whom could be (and likely was) viewed as a spy with a direct link to the powerful Family Compact in Toronto or the government itself. You’d have to arrange for the deaths of a lot of locals to assuage that particular fever, Marc thought. At the moment, the most plausible premise was that Smallman had discovered some critical information, the revelation of which presented a real danger to a particular individual or cause. Such information may have been revealed already (Sir John would not be above withholding “politically sensitive” material from his investigating officer), prompting a revenge killing.
    It was far too early to tell anyone what he knew about Joshua’s relationship with Sir John. That he must, at some time, tell Beth Smallman that particular news filled him with dread: she obviously worshipped the father-in-law who in less than a year had become “Father.” Any suggestion that he might have been leading a secret life and had perhaps used her political activities to gather information on herassociates might prove devastating. Then again, Beth Smallman did not appear to be a woman easily devastated.
    AT THE MILL , T HOMAS G OODALL INFORMED Marc that Constable Hatch had been summoned to Durfee’s inn to settle a dispute between two