LITMIR.BIZ

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away. He hoped he was doing the right thing. He headed back to the wharf, with the distinct impression that he had somehow narrowly avoided some serious trouble. Perhaps his imagination had run away with him. He hoped so.

      The encounter did, however, remind him of the promise he had given. He would see if there was anyone at the wharves who kept a list of the emigrants who had arrived. With some difficulty, and a great deal of misdirection from the labourers who worked the docks, he was eventually directed to the emigration office.

      There was a counter inside, behind which a clerk was scratching away at a sheaf of papers.

      “I’m wondering if you could help me,” Luke said. “I’m looking for someone.”

      “You and the whole rest of the world,” the clerk said without looking up. “What’s the name?”

      “Gallagher.”

      The clerk sighed, and grabbed a pile of papers to his right, again without looking up. Quickly he scanned his lists.

      “No Gallaghers today,” he said.

      “He was expected some time ago.”

      “He’s probably been held back. You’d have to check at the other ports.”

      “Held back? Why?”

      The clerk looked at him as though he was being deliberately obtuse.

      “Because of the fever,” he said. “Sick emigrants are held in quarantine. Where have you been that you haven’t heard? The whole province is in an uproar about it.”

      Of course. The scene he had just witnessed at Toronto’s harbour must be happening at other ports as well. “I’m sorry,” Luke said. “I’ve just arrived from Huron. Do you keep lists of those who were kept back?”

      “No. I have lists of those who have arrived here. I have no lists for those who didn’t.” The clerk finally raised his head to look at Luke. “The records are in a shambles anyway. There are hundreds of emigrants on every ship. Some of them die on the way over, some of them die in quarantine, the rest of them are piled on steamers and brought up the lake. We do our best to keep track of them all, but chances are nobody will find anybody until the season ends and the dust settles. Sorry.” And with that he went back to his paperwork.

      Luke wandered back outside, stunned by the notion of hundreds of people aboard each ship. Even in the backcountry, they had heard that there would be a lot of emigration this year, but hundreds multiplied by what? How many ships crossed the Atlantic in a season? Another hundred? The sheer number of people on the move was staggering, and what on earth were they all supposed to do when they finally got here?

      At the wharf outside the emigration office, the steamer that had just deposited its load of passengers was being swabbed down, buckets of water thrown haphazardly over the decks, followed by a cursory mopping. Luke hoped that this was not the vessel he would be boarding shortly. This boat had just dumped a number of very sick people on shore, and he doubted that the random sloshing of water around the decks would do anything to disinfect the craft. He resolved to spend his coming journey outside, on the deck of the ship, and to avoid entering the cabin or going below decks. He wasn’t entirely sure where malignant fever came from, but surely fresh air would do much to blow it away.

      When it came time to board, he realized with relief that it was a different vessel entirely — one of the packet ships that offered regular passenger service around the lake. He should have realized this, he supposed. If there was fear of the malignant fever spreading, the packet steamers would lose a great deal of business if their passengers were made to sit in the same seats as infected newcomers. The overloaded ship he had seen must have been hired especially to handle the emigrant traffic.

      Even so, once he boarded, he discovered that the passenger cabin was airless and fusty-smelling, so he held to his original resolve and found a place at the bow of the boat, where he could lean against the railing and watch the passing sights. He almost changed his mind once the steamer had left the shelter of Toronto’s harbour and entered Lake Ontario, where the swell caused a steady thump beneath him. But then he became engrossed in watching the passing shore, marvelling at the number of settlements that lined the lake.

      As they pulled in to the pier at Port Darlington Harbour, Luke could see that there were wooden sheds here as well, but not so many as at Toronto, which, after all, was a major town with nearly twenty thousand residents. That would be the preferred destination for anyone looking for work, and a natural way station for those who hoped to travel west into the farther reaches of the province.

      He needed to stretch his legs and walk on solid ground for a few minutes. The constant pitch of the ship against the waves had made his legs stiff and sore. He wasn’t used to being on the water. Perhaps he could also find something to eat while he was ashore. He found the purser and asked when the steamer would be leaving again. The man assured him that they would stay in port for at least a half-hour, and that he had plenty of time to find a bite at one of the shops near the wharf.

      He walked down the gangplank and picked his way past the huge piles of cordwood stacked on and near the docks, waiting to be loaded onto the steamers in order to feed their insatiable boilers. He wandered down the road that led away from the water, hoping he would find someone selling pies or some other portable fare. He didn’t want to stray too far in case the steamer left earlier than the porter had indicated — although he had been told that the captain would blow the whistle several times before departure.

      Off in the distance he could see a gaggle of people trudging toward the harbour. As they drew nearer, the group resolved itself into twenty or so ragged, exhausted-looking creatures who moaned and grumbled as they walked. When they reached the wharf, two women and a frail old man collapsed beside a shabby pile of trunks, boxes, and carpet bags. Some of the luggage looked as though it would surely disintegrate in the light rain that had begun to fall.

      Luke walked over to them. “Are you waiting to board a steamer?” he asked a man who was fingering a gaping hole in one of his boots.

      “That’s what they told us.” The man had a thick accent that made Luke strain to understand what he was saying. “They put us off further along because they left our trunks here by mistake. We’ve had to walk back ten miles or more to get ’em.”

      “Why couldn’t you have come back on a steamer?” Luke asked. “There are plenty of them going back down the lake.”

      The man shrugged. “They’re willin’ to take us one way, but not the other. And none of us have any money to pay for it anyway. They’re grumbling enough as it is, because they’re having to take us twice.”

      “Where is it that you you’re headed?”

      “Anywhere there’s work. They say Toronto might be good. Or the area beyond.” He looked up, his brow furrowed with worry. “There are farms to the west, aren’t there? A man might get work there.”

      Luke thought of the bush farms he had left, where few could afford help, even when there was a crop to sell; and now that there was no market for wheat, even the successful farmers were too worried about the future to spend good money on a hired hand. It was true that the Canada Company offered land on easy terms, but even if these poor people could manage to get their hands on a lot of their own, he knew they could never manage the hardscrabble tasks of cutting and chopping. These poor souls were so rickety they looked likely to expire just from the thought of it.

      “What’s your name?” he asked, but it was apparently a touchy topic, for the Irishman grew wary.

      “Who wants to know?”

      “I’m looking for someone. My neighbour asked me to try to find him. Just anxious, that’s all, because he’s late. The name is Gallagher.”

      “Gallagher?” The man shook his head. “I wouldn’t want to be a Gallagher, I don’t think.”

      Luke was taken aback. “Why not?”

      “There was some trouble with Gallaghers, as I recall.” The

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