Don Gutteridge - Minor Corruption

He also gave some thought to the men he couldsee sitting on the edge of the bench in the adjoining room. IfBroom’s account were even generally accurate, none of these menwould fit the description he gave of the rapist: the wild shock ofwhitish hair, the impression of a short, wiry man of some years.Clift was skinny and near six feet. The miller was fifty and fat.Mullins was stocky with slicked-down red hair. And Thurgood, whomhe’d already met, had black curls and a young man’s physique.Perhaps Broom himself did it. But then, why report it? No, Broom’saccount was credible and, if it came to pass, he would make acredible witness in the box.

With these thoughts, Cobb took a deep breathand called for Burton Thurgood.

If Thurgood were embarrassed by the emptythreats he had made the previous week, he had chosen not to showit. Instead, as was his wont, he chose belligerence.

“I thought you people’d caved in to thebigwigs!” he snarled as Cobb waved him to a chair. “So whaddya want now ?”

“I want you to sit back in that chair andlisten while I tell you a story about what really happened to yourlittle girl.”

That got his attention, and with a grunt heshut up and allowed Cobb to sketch in the details of the apparentrape of his daughter in the barn a mere hundred yards from wherethey sat.

“I told you that old bastard raped her!” heshouted, rising halfway out of his seat. “But you wouldn’t listento me!”

Cobb had deliberately avoided mentioning JoeMullins’s sighting of Seamus Baldwin, but he realized of coursethat Thurgood was fixated on the old man. Certainly thecircumstantial evidence surrounding the abortion payment was notgoing to play out in Uncle Seamus’s favour.

“We don’t know who did that awful thing toyer daughter, sir. That’s why I’m here.”

“Well, I do! And I’m goin’ up to Spadina totake care of him myself, seein’ as how you’re doin’bugger-all.”

“I’d advise against that, sir. Yer good wifedon’t need you in jail., does she?”

“What do you expect me to do? I washer father!”

“Let me get to the truth.”

Thurgood’s rage seemed to have spent itself.He sat down, leaned back, and simply scowled at Cobb.

“That’s better. Now I want you to walk methrough everythin’ that happened from the time Betsy arrived thatday.”

Grudgingly, Thurgood confirmed the previousaccounts, showing a reaction only when Cobb interrupted to informhim of Sol Clift’s report of Betsy going to the barn to feed thehorses the treats she had brought them.

“I told her to go straight back! If onlyshe’d listened to me!”

Thurgood said that he and Whittle had indeedleft early to go up to the damaged weir. Like the miller, he hadseen or heard nothing unusual. Cobb noted once again that no-onehad heard screams or cries for help – not even Jake Broom at thescene. Perhaps the rapist had gagged her or held his hand over hermouth.

Cobb thanked Seth Whittle and released hiscaptive audience. Just as he did, Jake Broom came into theoffice.

“You c’n tell ‘em everythin’ now,” Cobb said,and walked out to leave these men an afternoon of ceaseless chatterand speculation about the terrible events of August the third. Heonly hoped that when Thurgood heard of Uncle Seamus’s presence inthe ravine, he would not do anything drastic. At any rate, it wasclear now that he himself must drive up to Spadina and beard theold gent. With the growing evidence against him, Cobb concludedthat, in his current unstable state, the fellow would merelyconfess and get the anguish and guilt over with. As the Chief hadimplied, the police desperately needed an unequivocal result.

First, however, he would survey the terrainto get a clear picture of it in his mind and to make sure that thereferences to it by the mill-hands were accurate.

He turned north outside the mill-office.Beyond the mill building itself, where the huge millstones werealready pounding and clashing, he spied the barn just to the rightand, indeed, about a hundred paces away. A well-worn path connectedit to the mill. Just above the barn lay a cluster of cedar treesthat acted as a screen between the barn and the millpond fathernorth. Cobb walked through the barn. A dozen stalls were occupiedby four horses, three cows, four calves and a black-and-white pony.Near the rear of the barn, whose doors were wide open, to let abreeze through, Cobb came across the vacant stall where the rapemust have occurred. If Broom had walked on by – again thereappeared to have been no cries to alert him – and then had turnedjust here in the doorway, he would have spotted the outrage, almostdead on, from about thirty-five feet (a little farther than Broomhad stated, but it was a small discrepancy). Still, it was closeenough for him to have determined the colour and pattern of Betsy’sdress, get a glimpse of legs and buttocks moving up and down, andnote a whitish spray of hair, especially if – as now – the sun hadstreaked in through cracks in the siding and added to the wash oflight from the open doorway.

Next Cobb walked up to the millpond alongsidethe race running swiftly down to the millwheel. At the milldam, orweir as Whittle called it, he noticed where several newer-lookinglogs had been inserted at the top of the sluice after thewindstorm. From here he looked back and could not see anything butthe barn roof behind the clump of cedars. North beyond the weir andthe millpond, Trout Creek vanished into thick bush.

Satisfied, he walked slowly back towards themill-office and his buggy. Suddenly he sped up. While he was notlooking forward to interrogating and perhaps arresting SeamusBaldwin, he remembered that he ought to get to Spadina before anenraged and avenging father did.

Cobb tethered his horse to a low tree on the eastside of Spadina. As he was about to walk around to the rearentrance, he spotted Herb Morrisey, the gardener, digging in one ofthe kitchen gardens. He hailed him, and Morrisey put his spade downand ambled over.

“Good day, sir. I’m Constable Cobb. I need toask you a few questions. It’s about what happened to young BetsyThurgood.” Slyly, Cobb did not add that his business dealt with anew and more serious charge.

Morrisey was a big man, ruddy-cheeked, withan open, welcoming face. He frowned at Cobb’s latter remark. “Damnshame that. Elsie Trigger shoulda been run outta this town yearsago.”

“We’ll catch her, don’t worry. But we’re nowtryin’ to find out who the father of her babe was. I been asked totalk to the servants here.” Cobb was pleased at being able to tellsome of the truth without revealing all of it and spookingMorrisey. Marc Edwards would have approved.

“Don’t see how I could help you there,”Morrisey said, looking puzzled rather than concerned.

“Did you ever see anythin’ improper goin’ onaround here between Betsy and a man or lad?”

“You’re referrin’ to things romantic, Ireckon?” Morrisey gave him a wry, man-to-man smile.

“I am. I remember the Baldwins had a lot ofpicnics up here last summer, and I been told Betsy helped serve atmost of ‘em. There’d be plenty of opportunity fer her to getattracted to a young fella or one of the older guests.”

“That’s so. Dr. Baldwin is very generous topeople in the neighbourhood. Lots of folks, rich and poor, werehere in July and August. Kept all of us busy.”

“And?”

“And I didn’t see Betsy doin’ anythin’ sheshouldn’t have. Matter of fact, she was the shy one. It was herfriend Edie who was rambunctious – always drawin’ a rebuke fromPartridge.”

“I heard, though, that Betsy was seen sittin’on Mr. Seamus’s lap, playin’ a dummy.”

Morrisey’s gaze narrowed, but nothing likesuspicion had set in – yet. “Ah that. Uncle Seamus, as we all callhim, was fond of his pranks and sideshows. He’s a goodventriloquist and does his act with a live dummy. It’s quite funny.But he does it with Edie. Betsy’s shy, and did it only once ortwice, to please Uncle. She wasn’t a flirt, Mr. Cobb.”