Sisters in the Wilderness - Charlotte Gray [74]
John still had not secured a permanent position in Belleville, and by July, the separation had become too much for both of them. John returned home for a brief reunion, and to help his overworked wife with the harvest. But he was back in Belleville by September, desperately lobbying Baron de Rottenburg for a new position. Susanna knew that if she had to spend a third winter alone in the woods, she would go mad: “Another long separation from you would almost break my heart.” She clung to her belief that “God would provide for us, as He had hitherto done,” if she demonstrated enough faith.
Perhaps it was her faith that did the trick; perhaps it was John’s persistence. In October 1839, John wrote a euphoric letter home to tell her he had been appointed sheriff of Victoria District. “Come down as soon as I let you know that I have a house for you,” he wrote to Susanna. “I really long to kiss you all again.”
Conflicting emotions swept over Susanna as she held John’s letter in her hand. Her prayers had been answered, but she was not overjoyed. She always hated change: she had wept as she left Southwold, and she was miserable when they had left their first Canadian home, in Hamilton Township. John was always confident that every move would improve their situation, and this time, he assured her that she would thrive in the society of Belleville. But would she? She looked down at her shabby skirts and passed a chapped hand over her untidy, greying hair. During her years in the bush, she had rarely looked in a mirror. The backwoods had transformed her from a vivacious young lady into a capable, but haggard, matron. She had railed against her isolation in the bush, but now she told herself that she preferred solitude: “I did not like to be dragged from it to mingle in gay scenes, in a busy town, and with gaily-dressed people. I was no longer fit for the world.” John knew his Susie well enough to realize that she was anxious that she and her family would be regarded as ignorant yokels by the sophisticates of Belleville. He quickly sent her another parcel of fabric, so she could sew new clothes for herself and her children.
Susanna swallowed her doubts and began to organize the move. There was a lot to do, but as usual she systematically and efficiently accomplished the task. She sold their stock, implements and household furniture, disposed of the livestock and made the necessary arrangements to lease the farm and leave the backwoods. Then she and the children sat back and waited for the onset of winter. There had to be a good base of packed snow on the corduroy roads before the two sleighs that John had hired in Belleville could make their way north to collect her. They waited and waited, and no flakes fell. On Christmas Day, her eldest son Dunbar looked out the window at the bright sunshine glittering on the ice of Lake Katchawanooka and groaned, “Winter never means to come this year! It will never snow again.”
It was six more days before a savage winter gale swept across the landscape. The following morning, Dunbar looked out at trees, lake and distant woods covered in a thick white mantle. The same afternoon, the Belleville sleighs arrived (the storm had hit the lakefront a few days earlier). Blowing on their frozen hands, Susanna and Jenny quickly loaded their belongings. In the midst of all the confusion, Sam Strickland arrived and announced that he would transport his sister and her children to Belleville in his well-sprung lumber sleigh, which meant they would have a much more comfortable journey. Susanna always relaxed around her large, noisy, capable brother. Soon they were both laughing as they watched Katie try to squeeze the old cat Peppermint into a basket. Sister and brother were convulsed when Jenny appeared, balancing on her head no fewer than four hats—a drawn silk bonnet, a calico cap, a beribboned straw sunhat and a grey beaver-fur hat. “For God’s sake take all that tomfoolery from