Great Historical Novels (46 page)

He nodded.

Rhia explained, as best she could, what a photogenic drawing was and what had brought them to Rose Hill. Even to her ears it sounded like blarney. Eliza picked imaginary flecks from her apron and then destroyed a piece of bread with her fingers. When it was reduced to a pile of crumbs, she clasped her hands together.

Rhia waited until Eliza looked ready before she spoke again. ‘Do you know why Juliette might have thought one of the men was a murderer, Mrs Green?’

Eliza looked a little dazed. It was a lot to take in. ‘I know only one man who’s been murdered, and that was my husband,’ she said finally.

Rhia and Michael let this settle on a respectful silence.

‘And what happened to him?’ Michael asked quietly.

She told them how she had been widowed, violently, and had become so impoverished that hunger drove her to steal food. As if that were not enough, she’d been caught, tried and sent away from her child.

Michael was shaking his head. ‘Can you think of any reason why Juliette might think one of the men in the portrait killed her father?’

‘Only if she’d recognised him. But she was only wee.’

‘But she must have a strong suspicion, to want you to see it,’ Michael pressed.

‘Oh, I’d know John Hannam all right. I went looking for him myself. But men like that are cunning, there’s no end to what they’ll do. He’s trampled on my heart and left his filthy mark.’

Michael was nodding, but looking through the doors and out across the fields of sheep. ‘Mrs Green,’ he said finally, ‘what would you say if I told you there’s a clipper leaving Sydney for London in two weeks and you could have a ticket home?’

‘I’d say you have no idea what a maidservant earns, Mr Kelly.’

‘What I’m saying, Mrs Green, is that I’ve a job as ship’s carpenter on that clipper so I’ve no need to pay my own way. I’ve reason to believe you’ll be needed as a witness and I’m willing to pay your passage to London. You see, I was thinking I’d be needing to buy this young lady’s fare, but she tells me she has money of her own.’

Eliza more or less hurtled across the floor and threw her arms around Michael. She was laughing and then she was weeping and then she seemed to be doing both at once.

Michael winked at Rhia. ‘I’d say she’s agreed.’

‘Yes,’ said Rhia, ‘I’d say so.’

20 October 1841

We walked all day, from Rose Hill to George Street, and tonight I will sleep in a real bed. It is narrow and hard and this room is plain, but it smells of sunshine and feels like a palace. This is the home of a draper and his wife. They’re friends of Michael Kelly and they’re kind people.

Michael is quieter than I remember, but being a prisoner makes you quiet. His Aboriginal friend, though, is the lord of silence. He doesn’t even make a sound when he treads on the dry underbrush of the eucalypt forest. I don’t expect he knew what to make of me any more than I did of him. He heard me asking Michael about the names of flowers and plants, and would occasionally point to something and tell me what it was called, though I’m not sure if it was in his language or not. The laughing bird is a kookaburra, the huge white parakeet with a yellow crest is a cockatoo and the lizard the size of a crocodile is a goanna. Michael says there are crocodiles too, but they’re further north. I hope he’s right about that.

I feel like an interloper in the world of the free, just as I once did in the world of the convicted. I don’t think I quite believe it yet, and I don’t seem to be the person I once was. I cannot even remember who or what I was. Perhaps this is just what you intended. I don’t think it was entirely necessary that I sail halfway around the earth on a stinking ship to be changed, but I take your point. I am not exactly heroic when even the sound of a passing cart makes me edgy. I have lost my armour against the world. I will find it again, though I expect it will take a little time.

Tonight we dined on mutton and potatoes, and we talked about wool. I can afford to invest in a small amount of merino, just as Ryan said I should. I put it to Michael immediately, so at least I am still impulsive! He looked surprised and then doubtful and then, thankfully, thoughtful. He said he’d been thinking of sending some wool to Dublin himself but he hadn’t expected to find a business partner. I could tell he was thinking that he hadn’t expected to find one who was a woman, either. I hadn’t expected it myself, but it suddenly seems perfectly sensible. This is what I have come here to do. It must have been Antonia who put the money in my purse. I will repay her when our ship comes in. And now I will go to bed. In a bed. 

Straw

Who would have thought he’d feel such pride in showing someone from home around Sydney? Michael was pleased as punch when Rhia exclaimed over the elegantly carved stone edifices of Government House, and the fine turret of St Philip’s church. Gone was the bitterness of the early years when he’d seen how labouring men were expendable. The pain and fury of it had led to his pamphlet, and countless angry essays about the false gods of commerce that the colonists had hewn from the sandstone cliffs. He’d paid his dues to the real cost of nationhood, to the butchery and the heartbreak of the forgotten.

He pointed out loan and investment companies, the library, the offices of the Australian Gas Light Company and the Australian Sugar Company, the literary and scientific societies, the School of Arts and the new museum. Rhia was shaking her head by the time they were back on George Street.

‘I’d no idea that an architect could earn a living in Australia,’ she said.

Michael laughed. ‘The principle architect was transported for forgery. The change in his circumstances turned out well for him. He’d never have designed so many important public buildings if he’d stayed in Bristol.’

Rhia had her eye on the shop windows as they passed saddlers, tea dealers and druggists and, closer to the quay, ship
chandlers and sail makers. She stopped at a milliner to look at the bonnets behind the panelled window. She turned with a raised eyebrow and a look that Michael recognised. She was, after all, a woman.

There had always been something about Rhia Mahoney, Michael reflected as she disappeared through the milliner’s doorway. She had the old woman’s eyes, the grandmother – as dark as pitch and somehow a little unnatural, as if they could see beyond the visible. Michael took out his tobacco tin and watched the street. A cart and dray swung past, piled high with bales of merino. There had been a lot of talk of wool, and Rhia was right, it was time to start shipping. The loss of liberty did strange things to you. It made you hungry for life.

She emerged from the milliner with her ragged head hidden beneath a new straw hat – not a bonnet, a hat, with a flat crown and a broad rim. ‘It looks well on you,’ he said, and meant it. It shaded her face and gave her the look of a pioneer. They were almost outside Dan’s. ‘I’ll not stop,’ he said, ‘I’ve some business this evening.’ She’d not asked about his business, though he could tell she was curious. She put her hand into her reticule and pulled out a crumpled calling card and handed it to him. ‘The Chinese character on the back stands for silver,’ she said, ‘but I don’t know where the coordinates are. Do you?’

Michael looked at the card. ‘That’s just off shore,’ he said, ‘a bit north but not far at all. Where did this come from?’

‘I found it on the floor at China Wharf the day Ryan died. That lovely copperplate isn’t his handwriting, though.’ She raised that eyebrow again to make her point. ‘Good night then,’ she said. But she wanted to say something more. She looked at him almost shyly, and then down at her hands. ‘How is Thomas?’

‘In good health, still sensible, and hard-working too, from what I can gather. But you’d want to know about the condition of his heart, being a woman, and I can’t tell you about that.’

‘I’m only asking as a friend.’

‘Aye, I know that. I might even have known it before the two of you did, without wanting to sound too clever. You’re not made from moulds that fit together, are you. There’s much to be said for a friendship that has outlasted romance. I sometimes wonder if …’ He couldn’t say it. Seven years was a long time to be away. People changed. Rhia was looking right into him with her sloe-black eyes, as if she could see it.

‘They must have been lonely years,’ she said.

‘I made a life for myself, and that’s just what you’ll do when you get home. Maybe it’s this place. You can’t just give up because you’ve found yourself at the farthest reaches of the earth. The people here – colonists, settlers, prisoners – all want the same thing: freedom.’ Rhia was watching him intently, and Michael laughed. ‘I’d best get off my soapbox and get on with my business.’

‘Well,’ she said, ‘when next we meet I hope to have the price for a clipper full of merino to Dublin. Godspeed, Mr Kelly.’

‘Aye, Godspeed.’ He watched her walk into the drapery before he set off. She moved slowly and carefully, like an old lady. He didn’t think she was ready to ship wool just yet. He took another look at the calling card and put it in his pocked thoughtfully.

Maggie’s girls hadn’t seen any of the Smiths for months now, and one of Calvin’s night patrols had reported some unusual goings-on in one of the small inlets off the cove. As if that wasn’t enough, Jarrah had finally tracked down the rigger who knew something about Josiah Blake’s death. He’d got as far
north as the Hunter River, a good seventy miles, which was impressive for a sailor on horseback.

Calvin was sitting on the verandah with his boots on the rails, smoking. It was the posture he liked to take as the gas lanterns were lit at Circular Quay. He was still hugely entertained by the notion of gaslight. It was also the best time of the day to watch the shop girls on their way to the quay and, after all, women were as much a glowing mystery as gas. Of course, gas was a natural phenomenon, and women were another thing altogether with that unknown quality which could soften your heart or harden your cock. Calvin had never married. No woman could or should put up with being of less importance than a policeman’s work. The map of Calvin’s heart was his work. He was in love with his strip of sand and docks and maritime industry, and devoted to keeping it running as smooth as oil.

Calvin leaned forward instinctively when a timber creaked, his hand reaching towards the boot where he kept his pistol. He had the natural uneasiness of one who kept the law in a lawless land, but he wasn’t usually so twitchy.

‘It’s only me, Cal.’

‘Michael. Ready for the show?’

‘You think they’ll be shipping soon?’

‘Any time now. I’ve got boys keeping watch on the beach. There’s a clipper anchored outside of the harbour’s reach; just beyond the sights of my telescope. But I know a fisherman who likes to throw his net out in the deep water, and he tells me she’s called
Sea Witch.
I’ve got men on the beach tonight so you and I can have a chat with the sailor who went droving.’

‘Well, I can tell you exactly where I think you’ll find your clipper,’ said Michael and handed Calvin the calling card.

‘The Jerusalem Coffee House?’

‘Turn the card over, man.’

‘Ah,’ said the policeman. ‘What’s the squiggle?’

‘Chinese character for silver.’

‘Ah.’

They walked to the barracks, smoking and talking about who should, and should not, be on the cricket team. There was a big match soon between the constabulary and the military.

The boy was younger than Michael had imagined, which accounted for his lack of judgement in sailing back into Sydney Cove when Calvin had warned him against it. He was sitting in the corner of his cell with his head bent sulkily. He barely looked up when the two men entered.

‘Evening, son,’ said Calvin cheerfully. ‘I’ve brought an associate along to see if we can’t, between us, get you out of here.’ The sailor looked up quickly, his expression fleetingly hopeful before he narrowed his eyes suspiciously.

‘Why’d ye care?’

‘I don’t care especially, but I need some information. If I say I’ll let you go once I’ve heard what I want to, then that’s what I’ll do because I’m a man of my word. But if you walk free today, I don’t want to see you again. Ever. I mean it this time.’

The prisoner looked at his hands. ‘Well I still don’t know nothin’.’

‘That’s not what I heard. I heard you told someone that the Quaker who fell off the
Mathilda
was up to no good.’

‘No, that’s not what I said.’ He bit his lip and stopped himself before he gave any more away.

‘Then you did say
something
?’

Silence. Calvin turned to Michael. ‘You know, I told this boy that if he came back to my patch he’d be in a rope cravat when he left again. Am I a man of my word, Michael?’

‘Aye, you are, Calvin.’ Michael looked at the youth. He could see that he was scared out of his wits, and not just of the gallows. ‘If you tell us what you know, we’ll have the master of this coining operation so swiftly he’ll not have time to come after you for ratting.’ He watched the boy’s eyes widen with surprise.

‘How’d you know about the coining?’

‘By the end of this week there won’t be a coiner left in the Rocks, and the only crew on the
Sea Witch
will be soldiers. Now, you can either talk or not, it’s your life, son.’

This seemed to decide him. He took a deep, resigned breath. ‘I seen the Quaker gent in the Calcutta bazaar, but I thought he was the other one, the one that was hiring crew to go up to Lintin Island. I needed the work, see. So I told him I was as good a rigger as any. He looked at me peculiar, like he didn’t know what I was on about, so I said I knew that he, being a Quaker, shouldn’t exactly be filling clippers full of black gold and I hoped he didn’t mind my coming to him. The problem was, see, that no one seemed to know anything much about that charter, since most of the crew were Indian and the craft,
Mathilda
, was supposedly signed off to the dry dock.’

Michael frowned. This didn’t entirely make sense to him. ‘So the
Mathilda
was making an undocumented run to Lintin Island.’