Solemn Vows (2 page)

While Marc had chosen the action of a military life over the tedium of law, he was happy to sit at a desk and write because he was, by and large, in agreement with the governor’s sentiments and strategy. Even though Marc knew that the grievances raised by the ordinary citizens were valid, mainly as a result of the winter weeks he had spent at Crawford’s Corners and Cobourg where he had carried out his first investigative assignment, he had little sympathy for the Reformers. He believed, as did Sir Francis, that because these grievances were of long standing and had been noisily protested by the “republican” immigrants from the United States, the first priority was to calm the waters, reassert the King’s authority with a firm and fair hand, and then one by one deal with the people’s complaints in an atmosphere free of partisan rant and rhetoric. This message, cunningly couched in the rhetoric of regal prerogative, seemed to be having a positive effect on the electorate. (That the lieutenant- governor was by tradition supposed to be neutral in election campaigns was being conveniently overlooked.)

On the bench directly behind the governor, Langdon Moncreiff—the newly appointed member of the Executive Council—slumbered noisily. Above Danby’s drone and the rush of a sudden breeze through the far maple trees, the councillor’s snores rose as strident and nozzling as any hog’s.
Sir Francis shuffled his papers again; Danby appeared to be running out of inspiration. The crowd below fidgeted in anticipation.

Remembering that he was on the hustings to ensure the governor’s safety, Marc put his shako back on, leaned forward, and scanned the village square. He knew that immediately behind the platform, where the path south began, two junior officers stood watch, their horses tethered nearby. Marc swept his eyes over Danby’s Inn, where the entire entourage, like a royal progress, had arrived at midmorning with flags flying and carriage wheels clattering. Ensign Roderick Hilliard, fresh- faced and keen to please, stood stiffly at the entrance and gripped his Brown Bess tightly. The platform dignitaries—including three merchants, a brace of lawyers, and a rotund banker—were less than twenty yards from the balustrade of the inn’s upper veranda. Hilliard gave Marc the briefest of nods. Beyond the inn, the wide corduroy road that led west to Yonge Street was fringed on the north with several tall maple trees, now sporting a dozen youngsters who had climbed among the branches to “get a gander” at the vice-regal personage or simply to make a happy nuisance of themselves. Opposite the hustings, the general store and a sprawling livery stable merited only a cursory glance. On the east side, the smithy was now fireless and quiet, and in front of the harness shop next to it, the proprietor and his family stood in the sun, smiling as Danby wound up his introduction. Above the harness shop was an apartment with
glass windows and, higher still, a gabled garret. Marc spotted nothing unusual.

Half- throttled by his own snores, Councillor Moncreiff let out a gasp and a purging cough before the snorts started up again. Marc suspected that the other self- invited platform guests were likely dozing as well. It was not yet three o’clock, but everyone here had already put in a full day. For those travelling in the governor’s retinue—Ignatius Maxwell, the receiver general and veteran Executive councillor, his ample wife, and his debutante daughter, along with Langdon Moncreiff and the governor’s physician, Angus Withers, and their escort, Lieutenants Edwards and Willoughby, and a company of eight mounted and fully armed junior officers—the day had begun at nine o’clock outside the garrison at Fort York. After a lurching ride up dusty Yonge Street, past Blue Hill, Deer Park, and Montgomery’s Tavern at Eglinton, they had travelled the quarter-mile east to Danby’s Crossing.

Upon arrival, Sir Francis and the Toronto worthies had been greeted by the local gentry and their ladies (from as far away as Newmarket), several of whom had got into the Madeira sometime earlier. Danby had laid on a stultifying midday meal, with wine, several desserts, and cigars. If Sir Francis had been shocked by the presence of the ladies throughout the meal, by the ingratiating speeches of welcome, or by the port- and- cigar aftermath, he was too well mannered to show it. Marc and his second-in-command,
Colin Willoughby, had led the troop into a back room, where more modest fare awaited them.

Willoughby had given Marc a look that said quite plainly, “Did we really leave England for this?” which made Marc grin. He liked Willoughby. The young man had arrived with the governor in January, suffering terribly from a luckless love affair. Sir Francis had taken Colin under his wing and had asked Marc to assist him. Marc found it easy to sympathize with the pain of unrequited love, as his own attempts to win over Beth Smallman, a widow he’d met in Cobourg, had had little success. None of his letters had been answered. Marc now glanced down at Willoughby, whose scrutiny of the crowd in the square was as keen as Marc’s had been upon the peripheral buildings. When Marc caught his eye, Willoughby nodded reassuringly and turned his eyes back to the crowd.

“Ladies and gentlemen,” boomed Danby at last, “I present to you this afternoon, Lieutenant- Governor Sir Francis Bond Head!”

A gust of wind swept across the platform, and one of the sheets of notes fluttered out of the governor’s hand just as he was about to stand. He reached down to retrieve it before it reached the floor, as did Marc. There was an embarrassing collision of heads, followed by a loud cracking sound somewhere beyond them, a muted thud close behind them, then silence. Marc turned to see Councillor Moncreiff sit bolt upright and flick open both eyes—eyes that saw nothing.
The old gentleman was already dead, his blood and lungs beginning to ooze through the gap in his waistcoat.

Marc froze. Then everyone seemed to move at once. Angus Withers threw his bulk over a crouching Sir Francis, the other dignitaries flailed for cover, Willoughby vaulted onto the platform, and Langdon Moncreiff’s body slumped to the floor. The confusion of noises struck Marc a second later: women screaming, men shouting, the governor hissing to his protector to get the hell off him.

“He’s dead,” Marc said to Dr. Withers and Sir Francis as they untangled.

Beside him, Willoughby went pale and the whites of his eyes ballooned. Marc steadied him, then leapt up onto the bench and peered across the crowded square. The throng had not yet panicked; they were either too shocked or too curious to move. The members of Marc’s contingent appeared to have recalled the training he had given them before the governor’s patriotic rallies had begun a week ago. Several of them were already mounted and scanning the crowd and buildings for the source of the gunshot or some glimpse of a fleeing assassin.

They had not long to wait. A man’s cry, sharp enough to carry over the excited mutterings of the crowd, soared out of a treed area on the northwest corner of the square. This was followed by the sounds of branches snapping and a body hitting the ground. Marc looked over in time to see a rough-clad farmer stagger to his feet, gaze around him with
brilliant, stunned eyes, and then scurry towards the general store. In his right hand he carried a large hunting gun.

“There he is!” Marc yelled to two of the ensigns who had just ridden up to the hustings. “Apprehend him!”

The crowd now turned to face the latest commotion, and they, too, began screaming for someone, anyone, to block the assassin’s flight.

“Stop that man!”

“He’s getting away!”

But no one stopped him as the assassin dashed past the general store and down the side of the livery stables towards the trail that led into the back townships of York County. He had tied his horse just behind the stables and now he swung into the saddle and, gun in hand, raced away into the bush.

“Detail! Form up and pursue!” Marc called out to his men. “Willoughby, bring up our horses and we’ll follow.”

Willoughby was trembling. Marc gave him a furious shake, anxious that the governor not see what looked like cowardice in the face of danger. Willoughby was no coward: Marc would have staked his life on it. “We’ve got to go, Colin,” he whispered fiercely. “Now!”

Fortunately, Sir Francis, Dr. Withers, Ignatius Maxwell, and others on the platform were still crouched around Moncreiff’s body, and Marc was able to pull Willoughby away from the hustings. At last the frightened man began to take gasping breaths.

“I’m all right now,” he said to Marc as Ensign Hilliard trotted up beside them with the horses in tow.

“Then let’s be off,” Marc said as he hit the saddle. “We can’t let him get away!”

W
HEN
S
IR
F
RANCIS HAD GIVEN
M
ARC
the task of forming a guard for his political forays into the hinterland, he had spared no expense. Marc had chosen eight young and eager subalterns from his regiment at Fort York (Colin Willoughby was put forward by Sir Francis) and armed them with Brown Bess muskets in addition to the traditional sabre and pistol. The horses now galloping along the trail of the assassin, no more than a hundred yards ahead of Marc, were the best that York County could provide. The pounding of their hooves around the next bend could be heard clearly.

“They’ll get him soon at this pace!” Hilliard shouted excitedly over to Willoughby.

“If he hasn’t swung off the trail into the forest!” Willoughby yelled to Marc.

“I hope they know enough to keep an eye out for that,” Marc said more to himself than to Hilliard or to Willoughby, who seemed to be dropping back. But there was no chance of slowing down to wait for him.

A few seconds later, Willoughby came abreast at a rapid gallop. “Some of the townsfolk are following us!” he shouted.

Eager to be in on the kill? Marc wondered. Or hoping to obstruct justice in some way?

“There they are!” Hilliard shouted.

The rumps of the governor’s prize horseflesh came into view as Marc dashed around yet another S curve. He dug both heels in, and his mount—a chestnut mare—responded with a burst of speed that brought Marc alongside Ensign Parker and the others.

“Where is he?” Marc cried.

“Still ahead, sir. We can hear the bugger even when we can’t see him!”

“We need to be sure he doesn’t deke into the woods. If he’s a local, he’ll know every deer- trail in the township.”

“We thought of that, sir, but the trees are too thick on either side for a horse to get through. He’d have to go on foot, and then we’d spot his horse.”

“Good thinking, Ensign.”

“I think he’s panicked, sir. I think he’s beating his mount flat out, and it won’t be long before it dies under him.”

“I hope so. We can’t push our own animals much farther at this pace.”

As Hilliard and Willoughby joined the main group, Marc took the lead, raising his hand to signal the others to remain nine or ten strides in his wake so that he could listen to the hoofbeats of the assassin’s horse up ahead. The cadence of its gallop was distinctly audible, and it was beginning to flag. A minute or two more and they would have him. Marc’s heart
was racing in a cadence of its own, driven by anger, excitement, and the sheer thrill of the chase. This was what he had abandoned law and the Inns of Court for! Here he was thundering into danger (the man ahead had, after all, just murdered in cold blood and doubtless would not hesitate to do so again), careless of his safety, hazarding all for his monarch.

Coming around a sharp turn in the trail, Marc at last caught a glimpse of the felon: a mane of grey hair flying in the wind, the glint of the sun on the gun barrel, the pinto beginning to fail under him.

“Halt! In the name of the King!” Marc cried, but it was too late. Felon and mount had swerved into the tangled bush.

Marc swore and reined his horse in as brutally as he dare. If he were to follow the assassin into this narrow passage in the woods, those coming up behind might charge on past him, unaware. It was only seconds, however, before Willoughby and the guards arrived.

“He’s a local, all right,” Marc said, catching his breath and stroking the chestnut’s neck. “He’s gone in there. There must be a track of sorts or else he’s trying his luck on foot.”

Marc eased the horse between two stout pine trunks and entered the humid gloom. As he had suspected, they were on a deer- trail that wound tortuously through the dense woods. There was no need to wave the troop into single file.

“We’re right behind you, sir!”

Farther back, he could hear the commotion of the camp followers from town as they, too, stumbled into the woods. One of these fellows, with a stentorian bellow, kept calling out “Stop! Stop!” as if mere repetition would shame the fugitive into giving up the chase.

In the dim light, Marc could easily make out the felon’s passage, for the trail itself had been unused since heavy rains a few days earlier, and the pinto’s hoofprints were registered clearly in the boggy ground, every stricken step of the way.

“That horse can’t last more than a minute or two longer in this morass,” Marc called back to Willoughby. “You’d better get your pistol ready. We may need it soon.”

The trail arced steeply upwards, and with a sidling lurch, Marc found himself out of the forest entirely and partly blinded by the sun. Ahead lay an extensive clearing—the back field of a farm, most likely—lush with timothy. He could not see the fugitive. Then, as his eyes adjusted, he spotted a rocky, spruce- topped ridge on the eastern edge of the field. At the base of it, not more than fifteen yards away, the pinto pony lay on its side, wheezing, dying. Behind it and rising slowly was the fugitive, with his grizzled chest-length beard and wild shock of grey hair and mud-splotched overalls. He was barefoot. All this Marc saw in a single moment, along with the musket that was pointed straight at his heart. He had been given no time to evade or to retaliate, or even to cry out: the trigger was already being squeezed. What he did feel, in the moment before his certain death,
was a twinge of animal terror, then an eerie calm. If he had to die here, at least his courage would have been tested, and found worthy.

The shot did not come. Instead, the felon turned, scrambled up a path of sorts towards the top of the ridge—and vanished. Perhaps the troop coming up out of the woods behind Marc had decided him against pulling the trigger.