Man in the Shadows (6 page)

“Some of us may yet rise to become national statesmen,” Macdonald pronounced without breaking stride. He was determined to carry on a conversation.

“Preparing a speech, are you, dear?” she said softly, her eyes focused on the wool.

“Just think about what happened. That damned fool Monck gave me a higher honour than the others. Cartier and Galt were so insulted they’ll probably refuse theirs, and they’re supposed to be my partners. Cartier keeps saying that I’m forever taking all the credit, and that my behaviour is not gentlemanly.”

She looked up in wonderment. What an intriguing and insecure bundle of nerves she had married. Never satisfied. So rarely able to relax. She cringed as he poured himself another glass of sherry.

“Didn’t you have enough at lunch?” she inquired delicately, trying not to sound too scolding.

“And what of McGee?” he continued, ignoring her question. “There was no room in the cabinet for either McGee or Tupper, and they’re supposed to be my friends.”

“Friends?” she asked. “Do you really have friends in this business?”

“Well, Tupper brought Nova Scotia to the union and McGee helped talk me into the damned idea in the first place—me and half the country.”

She liked D’Arcy McGee, even though he was a Romanist with a controversial past. She was impressed that Dr. Tupper carried his medical case with him, even into the parliamentary chamber. But this day wasn’t about them; it was about her husband. She laid her knitting on her lap and sighed. “John, how do you think they’ll remember today?” She paused for an answer. Oddly, he had none, so she continued. “Mr. Cartier’s right; you’re not always ‘gentlemanly,’ but that’s not the point. Confederation will always be
your
achievement. The others helped you design it. McGee, Tupper, Galt, even Cartier, they’ll soon be forgotten, but you won’t be.”

There was a knock at the door. She carried on regardless. If her husband wanted to talk, he would have to hear her out. “It’s been a hot, gusty day but these are gusty times,” she said, amused by his astonished reaction. “You’re the leader. Make sure this new country of yours—of ours—doesn’t break apart before it has a chance to grow.”

John A. Macdonald just stood there, feeling like an impetuous child who had just been soothed by his mother and, not for the first time, marvelling at the insight of this strong-willed young woman he had married.

“You do speak your mind,” he said.

“As I said to you before, ‘I do.’” With that, she turned her attention to the closed door and pleasantly commanded, “Come in.”

The butler entered awkwardly, rather like an understudy, she thought, playing a British servant but not quite understanding the subtleties of the role. The leaders of the country were such an odd assortment that one could hardly condemn the staff for missing the grade. She smiled at the butler as he cleared his throat and announced, “Gilbert McMicken to see you, sir.”

“I’ll leave you to your serious business,” she whispered in her husband’s ear. “Keep your temper down, and don’t forget the fireworks are tonight, not this afternoon.” She nodded politely to a particularly severe man who marched into the room, and she departed, along with her knitting.

GILBERT
McMicken was one of Macdonald’s more successful political appointments. When he was attorney general, Macdonald had named him a stipendiary magistrate and justice of the peace. McMicken oversaw police activities and appointments. He had proven to be such a capable administrator that Macdonald charged him with heading a clandestine mission spying on Fenian activities in the United States and Canada. Macdonald was impressed at how McMicken exercised power shrewdly and secretively, although the man’s persistence sometimes annoyed him.

McMicken could be a stuffed shirt, in Macdonald’s view—not the sort of man he would want to socialize with—but he was extremely loyal to Macdonald, and there was nothing the prime minister admired more than people who admired him.

John Macdonald had come to British North America when he was five years old with his kindly, but not very successful, father. The
family settled in Kingston amidst a welcoming contingent of relatives. Gilbert McMicken had emigrated on his own when he was nineteen. He settled in the Niagara region, just across the American border. Macdonald had only the trace of the Scottish brogue in his voice. McMicken spoke with a pronounced accent. Macdonald was clean-shaven with a cheerful smile. McMicken’s beard was thick and heavy, his nose looked as if it had been broken a few times and his yellowing teeth were barely visible in a mouth that rarely smiled.

“McMicken, I wonder if God ever made a man as earnest as you look?” Macdonald said, glancing dramatically, and uselessly, at the clock. “May I offer you a wee glass of sherry?”

“Not while I’m on duty,” McMicken answered and watched with interest as Macdonald topped his glass to the brim.

“It’s been a great day,” declared the prime minister.

“That it has.” Small talk was not a part of McMicken’s social armour. And this was no social call.

Macdonald chuckled to himself. He got the message. “All right, man, you’ve taken me away from a rare afternoon rest, so get on with it. What do you have to report?”

Irish extremists had recently staged a series of invasions, the so-called Fenian raids. The first, on New Brunswick’s Campobello Island, had been quickly checked, but in early June 1866 almost a thousand Fenians had crossed the Niagara River and actually captured Fort Erie. At the ensuing Battle of Ridgeway, ten British—or Canadians—were killed and thirty wounded before the Fenians fled back to Buffalo. The same day, there were two other attacks in Quebec.

To add real insult, it took five full days for the American government to denounce the raid. It was well known that William Seward, the influential American secretary of state, wanted to see the Stars and Stripes fly up to the North Pole. Seward had often said that British North America’s absorption by the United States
was as inevitable as the Mississippi flowing south. President Andrew Johnson was not as vocal in his ambitions—he had enough trouble just staying in office—but Macdonald had never forgiven Johnson for taking so long to condemn the Fenian raid.

Macdonald responded to the Fenian threat in two ways, one public and one private. Publicly, he used the threat of an Irish-American invasion as a key argument for Confederation. “We are in a state of semi-war,” he would tell his audiences. “We must gather together, if only for protection.” This was for show and political purpose. Privately, he ordered the real work. He commissioned McMicken to find out how serious the Fenian threat really was. McMicken had all the resources he needed, and he used them well, building a spy ring that impressed even Macdonald, who in his darkest moments felt the Fenians were a society too cold and sinister ever to penetrate. About six months ago, one of McMicken’s men had actually infiltrated a cell in New York. He faced possible torture and certain death if discovered. On the first day of Confederation, McMicken insisted on delivering the first substantive report from his undercover agent. “The news is not good, Mr. Macdonald,” he began. “I mean, Sir John.” Macdonald waved his hand impatiently. This was no social call, indeed.

“The reports we’ve been getting from the United States indicate that the movement is spreading and the Yankee government is turning a blind eye to the treason.”

The prime minister knew this, so why the meeting?

“The Fenians have renewed vigour,” McMicken continued. “The New Jersey officer who led the Ridgeway invasion—”

“Raid,” Macdonald objected.

“Sir, John O’Neill, who led the soldiers across the border into Canada last year—and I remind you, took Fort Erie—has been named president of the Irish Republican Brotherhood. He also has
some fanatical people advising him and urging him on. They have actually started calling themselves the Irish Republican Army.”

“A republic, is it?”

“Yes, and an
army
, and one well connected to a Republican president.”

Macdonald dismissed this. “President Johnson has other problems on his plate.” But the prime minister’s eyes were alert and probing. “You said the movement is spreading. Well, by how much?”

“Twenty-one Fenian regiments have been allowed to parade this spring without being bothered by any authorities.”

Again the prime minister was unimpressed. “Children can parade.”

“These are not children, Prime Minister.” McMicken was not the kind of man to overstate a case, or have his reports dismissed, even by his patron. “They brag in Massachusetts that there are enough men in Boston alone to ensure a successful invasion. In Chicago two thousand men are armed. In all—”

“Enough. I get the point.”

“With respect, sir, you must hear the rest. They claim to have six hundred circles—or cells, as they call them.” He paused to give full effect to his next sentence. “Twenty of them are here in Canada.” Macdonald’s eyes dropped, and with them, much of his spirit. He asked with some trepidation, “How many men do you think they could assemble for an invasion?”

McMicken noted that the prime minister was now saying
invasion
and not
raid.

“Forty, maybe fifty thousand are ready.”

Macdonald did not need to check the arithmetic to know that if that number was accurate, and the attack was well planned, it could—no, it
would
—succeed. He guessed the Fenian strength was much exaggerated, and he was certain there was more bravado than substance to their claims. Still, he thought, what if they
did
attack?
Even with twenty thousand men? Would there be Fenians in Canada to welcome them with open arms? Would the American government, and that damn meddler Seward, rush to the Fenians’ side? Did this weak, defenceless thing called Canada really stand a chance?

He had recently received a dispatch from Great Britain. His fellow Conservative Benjamin Disraeli had declared, “It can never be our policy to defend the Canadian frontier against the United States. What is the use of colonial dead weights which we do not govern?” So British help was out of the question. That was what McGee had been telling him for years. British North America must learn to stand alone.

“Have you heard of any invasion plans?” Macdonald asked calmly. There was no reason to let McMicken know the full extent of his fears.

“Yes, Sir. The plan is to attack at three places simultaneously. Where, we’re not sure.”

“And I suppose you don’t know when.”

“This is the shocking news,” he responded, almost sounding sympathetic. “After a rash of assassinations.”

“You mean murders?” the prime minister asked, in astonishment.

“Yes, sir. We have reason to believe there is a man in Canada right now whose purpose is to start what they call ‘a reign of terror.’”

Macdonald looked dazed.

“If our informant is correct, your life and the lives of your colleagues are most seriously threatened. He is as dangerous as a poisonous snake.”

The prime minister did not say a word. He glanced around the room as if seeking another opinion, searching for someone with more comforting words to offer. He took a long, hard drink from his sherry glass.

McMicken noticed the decanter was empty.

W
ill Trotter had asked Conor to watch the Confederation night fireworks on Major’s Hill Park with him and his mother. Meg smiled demurely and offered, “I might join you.”

Conor had hung up his wet clothes and eaten a questionable piece of chicken for dinner. He agonized over what to wear. Even if his suit dried out, was it too formal? What do you wear to a fireworks display? What would he sit on? He couldn’t ask Thomas. His father was still at the bar, and he would simply bark, “Don’t go.”

Luckily, he had taken his suit jacket off before diving into the water, so it wasn’t wet. The jacket might cover his ragged pants. Looking right, sounding right, acting right—it was such a lot of work.

At the corner of Rideau and Sussex, Mrs. Trotter greeted Conor warmly. “You are my hero,” she said.

“Mother,” said Meg, “Conor saves damsels in distress every day, I’m sure.” Meg had tied her hair back, but ribbons couldn’t control the curls. He wanted to run his hands through the wild tangle, and he found himself staring, again.

Will broke the moment’s spell. “Let’s sit over there,” he said. Conor was relieved to see that Will was carrying a blanket.

They sat to the side of the park, not with Ottawa’s elite and a bit too close to the “scruff section” for Conor’s taste. Mary Ann Trotter didn’t seem to care about issues of class and status, and this spot would give them a nice view of the fireworks. He saw people he knew: loggers enjoying the freedom of summer, some tradespeople, some patrons of Lapierre’s and that Ryan woman. That was her name. He remembered it now: Polly Ryan. He could tell she was watching him, but he avoided her stare.

Conor saw John Macdonald sitting with Lord Monck in a box in the centre of the park. They were both with their wives. If the prime minister and the governor general were in attendance, the suit coat was the right choice, the company was appropriate, and this was the proper place to be. Good.

Conor took the blanket from Will and placed it on the ground for the ladies. In the midst of his gallantry, he noted that there wasn’t enough room for them all. He wondered how hard it would be to remove grass stains from his old pants.

It was a clear, star-filled night. A warm breeze softened the air. With the Parliament Buildings as a backdrop, the sky exploded in thunder and light, and the glow from the fireworks lit up Meg’s face. She gasped with each bolt of colour. Conor was mesmerized. He had given up trying not to look love-struck.

Mary Ann Trotter watched him and smiled. People didn’t often see her smile. When her husband died, she was devastated. She moved her family from Toronto to Ottawa and opened a boarding house on Sparks Street. The capital seemed like a place that would grow and attract “the right sort.” She checked out many sites in Ottawa before settling on Sparks Street, in the Desbarats Block. Mr. Desbarats, the Queen’s printer, was a fair landlord and the building’s stone entranceway and thick wooden door spoke of substance. She named it the Toronto House. It was Meg’s idea. She said it would
bring in clientele from the West. It was also a nod to Mary Ann’s sister in Toronto, who had married a banker and had been so generous to her family.