Richard put his tool box away and joined the circle around the fire; of wood for sawing there might be none, but of wood for burning there was plenty.
How to do it? How to tell them? Ought he to tell Lizzie in private? Yes, of course he had to tell her first, and in private, no matter how he dreaded the tears and protestations. She would assume he had asked not to take her with him.
He ate his food in silence, glad that no one had noticed him deposit the tool box in their belongings room. Of long experience they saved a little of the pease-and-rice for a cold breakfast, even though every one of them could have devoured the lot and still felt hungry.
How would they survive without him? Well enough, he thought; after eight months here, each of them has forged some kind of life for himself independent of the group. Only food and shelter keep them intact. The Government Stores men—and that is most—have excellent relationships with other convicts in Stores and with Lieutenant Furzer, and the others all sharpen together. If I worry about any of them, it is Joey Long, such a simple and easily led soul. I pray the rest watch out for him. As for Lizzie—she would survive the sinking of the Royal George. Mine has never been a push sort of leadership; they will hardly know I am gone, and maybe some of them will be glad to strike out on their own.
“Walk with me, Lizzie,” he said when the meal was over.
She looked surprised, but accompanied him without a murmur, aware that something bothered him tonight, yet sure it was nothing she had done.
Dusk was thickening but the official curfew stayed at eight o’clock all year round, still well after dark. Richard led his wife to a quiet place by the water and found a seat for them on a rock. Crickets were making a racket in the grass and the huge huntsman spiders were on the prowl, but there was little else to disturb them.
“Major Ross summoned me today,” he said steadily, looking out across the cove to where the myriad lights of the western shore flickered and flamed. “He informed me that tomorrow I am to board Golden Grove. I am being sent to Norfolk Island.”
His voice told her that she was not to accompany him, but she had to ask. “Am I to go with you?”
“No. I did ask that ye might, but I was refused. Apparently the Governor has already picked the women.”
A tear splashed on the rock, still warm from the last sunlight; her mouth began to tremble, though she fought valiantly to maintain her calm. He would not like a scene, this man of the shadows. Not wanting to stand out from the rest, yet speared on his own abilities and excellences. Nothing will draw him out of his armor, nothing can weaken him, nothing will deflect him from what he sees as his purpose. And I too am a nothing in his eyes, for all that he does genuinely care about my well-being. If he ever had a light inside of him he has snuffed it out. I know nothing about him because he never speaks of himself; when he is angry it only shows as a different sort of silence, after which he proceeds to get his own way by some other means. I am sure that inside his mind he was able to intrude his name into Major Ross’s mind. Silly thought! How can one mind influence another without the necessity for speech and glances and nearness? Yet he can do it. Who else in this place has managed to get on the right side of Major Ross? Without smarming or greasing—well, Major Ross cannot be so cozened, as all know who have tried. He wants to go. Richard wants to go. I am sure he did ask for me, but I am quite as sure that he knew the answer would be no. Were he evil, I would say he had sold his soul to the Devil, but there is no evil in him. Has he sold his soul to God? Does God buy souls?
“It is all right, Richard,” she said in a voice which did not betray her grief. “We go where we are sent because we are not free to choose. We are not paid for our labors and we cannot insist on having what we want. I will continue to live here and look after our family. If I behave soberly and decently they cannot force me back into the women’s camp. I am a married woman separated from her husband at the Governor’s whim. And I have a good arrangement with Lieutenant Furzer about vegetables, so he will not want me back in the women’s camp. Yes, it will be all right.” She got up quickly. “Now let us go back and tell the others.”
It was Joey Long who cried.
Shortly after dawn Joey’s woebegone face became wreathed in delighted smiles; Sergeant Thomas Smyth appeared to inform him that he would be going to Norfolk Island on Golden Grove, so get his things together and be at the eastern jetty for embarkation at four that afternoon—and no farewelling crowd, either.
His own few things were packed more quickly than Richard’s, for they mostly fitted into his box. What Richard had to do was to sort out which books he would take with him and which he would leave in Port Jackson for Will, Bill, Neddy, Tommy Crowder and Aaron Davis. The collection had grown amazingly, mostly thanks to Stephen Donovan’s efforts in gathering those books the marine officers and enlisted men had left behind in Sirius. Finally he selected the ones he thought would be of most practical use plus those Cousin James-of-the-clergy had given him. What he needed was Encyclopaedia Britannica, but that would have to wait until he wrote home to beg for it, as would Jethro Tull’s book about farming, published fifty-five years ago but still every cultivating man’s bible. One day he must write home! Only not yet. Not yet.
Golden Grove’s longboat was waiting at the hastily constructed little jetty, companion to a second on the western shore of Sydney Cove; there were 19 other convicts to go on board, some of whom Richard knew well from Alexander. Willy Dring and Joe Robinson from Hull! John Allen and his beloved violin—there would be good music at Norfolk Island. Bill Blackall, a rather moody individual from the starboard side. Len Dyer, a Cockney who had lived forward, truculent and given to violent outbursts. Will Francis, who went back to Ceres as well as Alexander, a constant nuisance to those in authority. Jim Richardson, also from Ceres as well as Alexander, another moody individual; he and Dyer had been up a deck among the Londoners on Ceres. The rest were strangers come on other ships from other hulks.
There is, thought Richard as he got himself, Joey Long and MacGregor settled in the bow, a solution to this human equation which time will give to me. When I see which women the Governor has personally chosen, the answer will grow clearer.
As Golden Grove was a storeship she owned no slaver-style accommodation; the men were led to the after hatch and found themselves in a lower deck devoid of anything save hammocks. A two-decker, this ship’s remaining cargo, for Norfolk Island, was stored further below. He left Joey Long and MacGregor to guard their belongings and went up on deck.
“We meet again,” said Stephen Donovan.
Wordless, Richard gaped.
“How nice to see ye without an answer,” Donovan purred, taking his companion by one arm and drawing him forward. “Johnny, this is Richard Morgan. Richard, this is my friend Johnny Livingstone.”
One glance was enough to make the attraction understandable; Johnny Livingstone was slight, graceful, owned a mop of golden curls and large, soulful greenish eyes fringed with very long, black lashes. Extremely pretty and probably a very nice fellow doomed, if he had followed the sea as a profession from childhood, to be the plaything of a succession of naval officers. He had the look of a ship’s boy, of whom there had been three on Alexander, all the property of Trimmings the steward, who would have been neither gentle nor compassionate.
“I cannot shake your hand, Mr. Livingstone,” said Richard with a smile, “but I am very glad to meet you.” He moved to the rail to put distance between himself and the free pair because other convicts were back on deck again, gazing curiously. “I thought ye were with Sirius.”
“And off to the Cape of Good Hope around Cape Horn,” Donovan said, nodding. “The trouble is that we are not needed as badly aboard Sirius as we are at Norfolk Island. His Excellency is very short of free men to act as supervisors of convicts because Major Ross has let it be known very loudly that the Marine Corps is not about to extend guard duty to supervisory duties. So the Crown has deputed me to act as supervisor of convicts at Norfolk
Island.” He dropped his voice, wriggling his brows expressively. “I suspect Captain Hunter decided he would like a nice long cruise alone with Johnny, and personally nominated me to the Governor. But, alas, Johnny elected to go to Norfolk Island too. Captain Hunter has retired cursing, but no doubt will live to seek a return bout.”
“What will you do at Norfolk Island, Mr. Livingstone?” asked Richard, resigning himself to being identified by his fellow convicts as friendly with two free men who were a little—free.
Mr. Livingstone made no attempt to answer for himself; he was, as Richard discovered, extremely shy and self-conscious.
“Johnny has a great talent for the woodworking lathe, one of which—it is probably the only one, knowing London—is aboard for use at Norfolk Island. The wood at Port Jackson cannot be worked on a lathe, whereas the pine can be. That His Excellency was eager to accommodate Johnny in the matter of his desire to leave Sirius lies in the new Government House’s balusters—he will turn them at the source of the timber. Also many other useful wooden objects His Excellency lacks.”
“Surely a job better done at Port Jackson?”
“There is not room for the raw timber aboard ships plying back and forth between the two settlements—every ship will be loaded to the gunwales with sawn timber to get the bachelor marines and convicts into better houses.”
“Of course. I should have thought of that.”
“And here,” Donovan announced blithely, “are the ladies.”
There were eleven women in the longboat. Richard knew most of them by sight thanks to Lizzie, though none by acquaintance. Mary Gamble, who had told Captain Sever to kiss her cunt and had cut a swathe through those men who prided their masculinity by demeaning it in any way her barbed tongue could; her back would scarcely have time to heal before she was lashed again. Ann Dutton, who loved rum and marines, and would go after the latter to obtain the former. Rachel Early, a slattern who would pick a fight with an iron post. Elizabeth Cole, who had married a fellow convict shortly after reaching Port Jackson and been so shockingly beaten by him that Major Ross had stepped in and put her in the women’s camp as a laundress. If the other seven were like these, then His Excellency was ridding himself of nuisances, though obviously Elizabeth Cole was being sent 1,100 miles from her husband as an act of pure compassion.
“What a jolly voyage this is going to be,” Richard sighed, watching the women being herded to the forward hatch.
Golden Grove sailed at dawn on the 2nd of October, 1788, in company with Sirius until the two ships shook free of the Heads; then Golden Grove tacked to find a wind to bear her northeast while Sirius took advantage of the south-flowing coastal current and headed away to find her eastings for Cape Horn, 4,000 miles to the east.
By the time that the ship drew close to Lord Howe Island five days later, Richard had solved his equation. As he suspected, the Governor was ridding himself of nuisances. Not necessarily because they were disciplinary problems like Mary Gamble and Will Francis. No, the majority were less fortunate than that: they had been adjudged mildly mad. Only four of the men could pass muster as what the ship’s manifest purported them to be—young, strong, unattached and sea crazy. They were to man the fishing coble at Norfolk Island. For himself, he was not sure quite why he had been chosen—a sawyer he was not, yet that was what he was listed as. Did Major Ross somehow sense that Morgan was tired of Port Jackson? And if he had, what was so different about that? Everybody was tired of Port Jackson, even the Governor. At the core of him he had a feeling that Major Ross was banking him like money—tucking him away for future use. Well, maybe. . . .
Men like poor, timid John Allen and Sam Hussey were distinctly peculiar, twitched or muttered or stayed too long in one position. The real villains were outstanding ones—Will Francis, Josh Peck, Len Dyer and Sam Pickett. Some were married and had been allowed to bring their wives, in every case because one or the other or both were odd—John Anderson and Liz Bruce; the fanatical Catholics John Bryant and Ann Coombes; John Price and Rachel Early; James Davis and Martha Burkitt.
Sergeant Thomas Smyth, Corporal John Gowen and four privates of marines made up the guard detachment, though guard on Golden Grove was so relaxed a business that Private Sammy King was able to commence a touching and passionate affair with Mary Rolt, one of the peculiarities (she conducted whole conversations with herself). A temporary aberration, it seemed, for after she and the Private became lovers her imaginary dialogues stopped completely. A sea voyage, Richard mused, could indeed be highly beneficial.
For him it had commenced badly; Len Dyer and Tom Jones lay in wait for him below to teach him how they felt about convicts who not only hobnobbed with free men but with Miss Molly free men into the bargain.
“Oh, grow up!” he said wearily, not backing down. “I can take both of ye with one hand tied behind me.”
“How about six of us?” asked Dyer, beckoning.
Suddenly there was MacGregor, snapping and snarling; Dyer aimed a foot at him, caught him on the hind leg just as Golden Grove heeled hard over. The rest of it happened very quickly as Joey Long hurled himself into the fray and three of the six attackers lost interest in anything but their rising gorges. Richard put a shod toe into Dyer’s backside right behind his testicles, Joey climbed on Jones’s back and started biting and scratching, and MacGregor, uninjured, sank his teeth into Josh Peck’s heel tendon. Francis, Pickett and Richardson were busy vomiting, which came in very handy; Richard finished the fight by rubbing Dyer’s face in spattered deck and putting all his weight into kicking Jones and Peck in the groin.
“I fight dirty,” he said, panting, “so do not lie in wait for me again. Otherwise ye’ll never sire children.”
It was politic, however, he decided after making sure that Joey and MacGregor were all right, to shift themselves and their stuff up on deck. If it rained they would shelter under a boat.
“I hope,” he said to Stephen Donovan later, “that ye can handle yourself, Mr. Donovan. Tom Jones and Len Dyer do not care for Miss Mollies. Ye’ll be supervising them, not to mention Peck, Pickett and Francis. Though the last man is their leader, he let Dyer do the job. Therefore he is dangerous.”
“I thank ye for the warning, Richard.” Donovan studied him thoughtfully. “No black eyes or bruises that I can see.”
“I kicked them in the balls. Seasickness,” Richard grinned, “was a great help. My luck held, you see. Just as they rushed me Golden Grove found a wind and some of the stomachs revolted.”
“ ’Tis true, Richard, ye do have luck. It seems odd to say that of a man unlucky enough to have gone down for something he did not do, yet ye do have luck.”
“Morgan’s run,” said Richard, nodding. “Luck runs.”
“Ye have had your runs of bad luck too.”
“In Bristol, aye. As a convict I have had very good luck.”
Lord Howe Island marked a kind of halfway point, and save for the day they spent in its vicinity the weather was glorious. That meant the ship’s company never saw this magical island of turtles, palm trees and soaring peaks, 500 miles east of the coast of New South Wales. They ploughed onward, another 600 miles to go.
This was Richard’s first venture into the mightiest of all seas, the Pacific, which he had thought to find no different from the King’s herring pond, or that unnamed monster of an ocean south of whatever lay between New Holland and Van Diemen’s Land. But the Pacific was different; it must, he decided, leaning for hour after hour over the rail looking into illimitable distances, be unfathomably deep. Seen close up as the tremendous yet tranquil swell cradled Golden Grove, its waves were a luminous ultramarine shot with pure purple. Of fish they caught none, though of denizens there were plenty—huge turtles skimmed along, porpoises leaped. Massive sharks cruised by scornfully ignoring the baited lines, their dorsal fins three feet clear of the water, their length terrifying. A sea of giant sharks rather than whales. Until the day when they were surrounded by leviathans, voyaging south to summer wh
ile Golden Grove, inexplicable marine creature, surged northeast. Strange. He had never really felt lonely on the way to New South Wales, but now he was perpetually conscious of his loneliness. The sense of belonging a year ago probably lay in the fact that there were always ten sets of sail in sight. Here no ship ventured except Golden Grove.
At some time during the eleventh night he became aware that he was not lifting and falling gently; Golden Grove had backed her sails and was standing. We are here.
The deck was absolutely quiet because the sailors had nothing to do and the helmsman, out in the open on the quarterdeck, had only to keep the tiller steady. The night was still, the sky cloudless save for that haunting wilderness of numberless stars, no moon to dim them as they wheeled in some incalculable cycle across the heavens. Anything so thinly and ethereally brilliant, he felt, ought to be audible: what privileged ear could hear the music of the spheres? His ear heard naught but the creaks and washes of a ship standing in an easy sea, and the shadow-sounds of night birds flitting like ghosts. Land is there, invisible. Yet another shape to my fate. I am going to a tiny isle in the midst of utter nowhere, so remote that even men have not dwelled in it until we English came. Counting us, there will be about sixty Englishmen and Englishwomen.
One thing is certain. This place can never be home. I come alone through a lonely sea, and I will leave alone through a lonely sea. Nothing so far away can have substance, for I have reached that point on the globe where I begin to swallow my own tail.
PART SIX
From
October of 1788
until
May of 1791
The women were ordered to ftay below, but at dawn all the men had their belongings on deck and waited for morning to reveal Norfolk Island. Light came in the midst of a stunning sunrise, high billows and wisps of rainless cloud turning slowly from purple-shot plum through fiery scarlet to the glory of pure gold.