So she was not going to give me to the soldiers or the constables. Perhaps. Maybe the Beans didn’t know I was a rebel. But how else would I have got a shoulder wound? Why else would I have croppy hair?
Mrs Bean stood and placed the baby over her shoulder, then used her free hand to stroke my cheek. No one had ever touched me like that before.
I began to cry. I cried because she was kind to me. I cried because this was the most wonderful room I had ever been inside, and yet I had to leave before they found out my secret and called the constables. I had to find Mr Cunningham, help the rebel army rescue him if he were a prisoner —
Mrs Bean reached into her sleeve, pulled out a handkerchief and handed it to me. It was white linen, bordered with lace. I stared at it. It was too fine to use.
She smiled, as if she knew what I was thinking. ‘Blow your nose. I must put Milbah in her cradle, then I will bring you up some broth, with eggs and bread sopped in it. You need to build up your strength.’
I nodded. I’d escape as soon as she had gone. Out the window if it weren’t too high, or down the hall . . .
Mrs Bean stopped at the doorway. ‘I haven’t even asked your name.’
My name wouldn’t help her find me again, or help the troopers either. ‘I’m Frog.’
‘Surely you have another name?’ She shrugged. ‘No matter. We’ll talk when you are stronger. I checked your wound earlier. It will heal, now the fever’s broken. I’ll get the broth.’
I tensed, ready to slip from the bed as soon as she had left. Instead she stayed there and met my eyes. ‘We know your secret,’ she added. ‘There is no need to be afraid. We will protect you here.’
‘You know that I’m a rebel?’
‘Oh, yes. We guessed that. But I meant your other secret.’
I tried to keep the fear from my face.
‘Yes,’ she said quietly. ‘We know you are a girl.’
She closed the door behind her.
CHAPTER 11
A New Life?
I couldn’t trust her. I couldn’t trust anyone. Even the rebel army had not stood arm in arm once Mr Cunningham had fallen. But I couldn’t escape in just a nightshirt. I had to find clothes, and find out where I was too.
I felt my shoulder carefully. It felt painful, but the bandage around it was clean and tight, with no sign of blood, so I didn’t disturb it. I tried to sit up, but the room swayed about me. I had the feeling my legs wouldn’t take me even to the window, much less outside. Besides, Mrs Bean had mentioned food. I’d travel faster with something in my belly.
Footsteps sounded beyond the door. A man’s steps, firm and loud. Maybe Mr Bean had called the troopers or a constable after all. I looked around for a weapon, but there was only the chair. I could smash it and use one of the legs.
But if these people hadn’t called the constables, then smashing their chair might make them send me away . . .
The door opened. A man entered, carrying a wooden tray with a big china bowl, two round bread buns and a silver spoon. And there on a flowered china plate was a big slice of apple tart, just like the one I’d eaten the day I met Mr Cunningham. I stared at it, then at the man holding the tray.
‘Good morning,’ he said quietly. ‘I’m Barney Bean. I hope you’re feeling better?’
I nodded cautiously. ‘Thank you,’ I said. That seemed a safe thing to say. I managed to lean back on the pillows.
I’d never eaten with a spoon. I ate the tart with my fingers, wishing I could eat apple tart forever, sopped the bread in the broth, then gulped it fast from the bowl, in case Mr Bean changed his mind and made me answer questions before I was allowed to eat.
But he said nothing, just sat on the chair and watched me. He was a short man, sturdy, with a brown skin from working out of doors, but his clothes were good. His face was kind, and his hair neither long like a gentleman’s or close-cut like a croppy’s.
Maybe these people weren’t keeping me here to give me to the magistrate to be hanged or flogged. Maybe . . . maybe the rebels had already won, and that’s why they were helping me. Or maybe . . .
At last I put the bowl down and wiped my mouth on my sleeve. ‘Are you a rebel too, sir?’
Mr Bean looked surprised. ‘I don’t know what to say to that.’
I frowned. ‘How can you not know if you’re a rebel?’
‘Because . . . life isn’t always simple. Nor are choices. No, Miss, er, Frog, I was not part of the rebellion, but neither am I a friend to the Rum Corps. I’m like many of the farmers hereabouts. If the rebellion had succeeded, I’d have been glad as long as the governor and his staff were spared, and the other good people in our colony.’
It was as if a cloud had settled on the room. ‘So we didn’t win,’ I said dully.
‘No,’ he said gently. ‘I’m sorry. A friend of ours, Mrs Macarthur, sent me a note yesterday. It seems that the messages to the other convict groups were never sent. The messengers were spies.’ He hesitated. ‘One of the Irish leaders told his employer and the authorities all about the rebellion as soon as he heard they’d lit a fire at Castle Hill.’
I knew as soon as he said it that it would have been Mr Holt. So there’d never been any hope, I thought wearily. We’d spent that night and half the day waiting for men who didn’t even know the call had come. New South Wales might be the Republic of New Ireland today, if it hadn’t been for three spies and a traitor.
‘And Mr Cunningham?’ I asked desperately. ‘Is he a prisoner?’
As soon as I asked the question, I knew the answer. Had always known it, even if I would not let myself believe it. I watched Mr Bean try to find the words to tell me.
‘Mr Cunningham is dead, I’m afraid,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. By all accounts he was a good man, an honourable one, who could have had a comfortable life but gave it for his cause.’
‘Where have they buried him?’ I whispered.
Mr Bean hesitated again, as if he didn’t want to hurt me with the truth. But I needed the truth and Mr Bean knew it.
At last he said, ‘They haven’t buried him at all. His body is still strung up outside the building where they give out the rations as a lesson to those who’d take a stand against the Rum Corps.’ He shook his head. ‘Each of our governors has tried to stop the Corps. I don’t think anyone can limit their power and corruption now, except perhaps new troops from England.’
I had known Mr Cunningham was dead. There was no reason to start to sob again.
Mr Bean let me cry. Finally he said, ‘Nine rebels have been hanged. Thirty have been sent to the Coal River chain gang. Others have been given two hundred lashes, or five hundred, or sent to Norfolk Island, and others put in irons. It’s said that many others died, a hundred and fifty perhaps, left uncounted by the soldiers. But a few have been let free and others,’ he met my eyes, ‘escaped. I don’t think anyone will hunt for them too hard. The Corps and the governor both want this matter kept as quiet as possible in case it sparks another uprising. And it is illegal to use soldiers against civilians. The Corps won’t want officials back in England knowing about that.’
‘We were an army,’ I said defiantly.
‘Perhaps you were,’ said Mr Bean gently. ‘But that army is no more.’
I thought for a moment, and then looked at Barney Bean. ‘Would you have joined us? If the other groups had heard the news and risen too?’
He shrugged. I remembered that once he’d been as ignorant and orphaned as I was. ‘I don’t know. I’m glad I didn’t have to choose. I’m a farmer, a family man, not a rebel.’
‘You’d have let others fight for freedom for you?’
‘Yes,’ he said simply. ‘There are some, like your Mr Cunningham, who take big roles on the stage of life. I take a small one. I do good where I can.’
I opened my mouth to tell him that all men should have joined the cause of justice. I closed it again. Mr Bean had risked his life, or at least his freedom, for me. If anyone had seen him with a wounded rebel, he’d h
ave been arrested as a rebel too. I had no right to call this man a coward.
‘Would you like more broth, or maybe some apple tart?’
I nodded. I wasn’t hungry, but I needed to eat as much as I could before I had to leave. And I probably wouldn’t ever get a chance to eat apple tart again once I left here.
‘Elsie will bring it up to you — Mrs Bean, my wife.’ He smiled at the word ‘wife’. ‘Elsie says it will be a couple of weeks before you should travel, in case your wound breaks open again and gets inflamed. Who should we send word to that you are safe?’
‘No one,’ I said. I couldn’t go back to Ma Grimsby’s now, even if she’d have me. Too many had seen me in the rebel army. Ma or Long Henry would find me soon enough if I went back to Parramatta. It would have to be Sydney Town again. I’d grown a bit, so maybe Floggin’ Dan wouldn’t know me. I’d change my name too . . .
. . . and that felt right, for it had been Frog who’d joined the rebel army, had dreamed of standing side by side in New Ireland with a hero. That girl was gone.
‘Don’t worry,’ said Mr Bean quickly. ‘I can have a word with your master.’
I realised he thought I must be a convict who’d run off to fight. ‘No,’ I said. ‘I’m free born.’
Liberty or death, I thought. What did liberty mean, if being free meant you only had the choice to steal or starve?
Something wet dripped onto my nightshirt. I realised I was crying again. And suddenly I told him everything, about Ma Grimsby and how I never knew my real ma and so much more . . . I thought he’d turn away from me with every new thing I said, but he listened to it all.
‘I’m sorry,’ he said at last.
I scrubbed at my eyes with that fine handkerchief, then blew my nose on my sleeve so as not to dirty the pretty wiper too much. ‘It’s not your fault.’
‘A wise man told me once that every child belongs to all of us. My wife and Mrs Moore are trying to establish a safe home for the orphans of Sydney Town. But there are so many.’
And what will they do with orphans in this safe home? I thought. Put them to work picking oakum, or sell them as servants? But he had been kind and so had his wife, so I said nothing.
Mr Bean looked around his fine room and out his window, then back at me. ‘It is so easy to forget what others still have to bear,’ he said quietly. ‘But at least we can offer a home to you.’
I thought I must have misunderstood — back then I didn’t know all the words I know today. ‘You’ll let me stay here?’
‘If that’s what you’d like.’
‘Where am I then?’ I demanded.
He laughed. ‘I’m sorry. You’re at Jeanne’s Farm, on the river.’
‘Your farm?’
He paused before he answered. ‘It’s my name on the title. But it’s home to many people.’
I stared at him. I was used to folk knowing exactly what was theirs. ‘You’re a flash cove? Rich? You got convicts here?’
He smiled. ‘I’m rich enough, though not the way you’re probably thinking.’
‘You’ve got a rich man’s house.’
‘Yes.’ He held up his hands, rough and muscular. ‘But I built it with my own hands, though I had some help. No man is chained here, or imprisoned or flogged. If there’s a good harvest, every man gets a harvest bonus, convicts too.’
‘And I can be a servant here? I don’t know servanting things,’ I admitted, ‘like cookin’ or washin’ stuff.’ I knew I was too small to do farmwork, even when my shoulder healed.
‘Elsie will teach you. We’ve talked about this already. You’d live here as our daughter, if that is what you’d like, just as we lived like the son and daughter of the couple who took us in.’
It was too big to understand. I wasn’t even sure what daughters were supposed to do, except rich ones who rode in carriages and wore ribbons in their hair.
‘What about grub?’ I insisted. ‘How much would I get fed?’
His lips twitched. ‘Whatever you’d like. There’s no shortage of food on a farm. And plenty to do too — you’ll help, of course, and have lessons. But not like a servant: like family.’
I had no way of seeing what that meant then and didn’t know how to ask about it. ‘Why me? There’s plenty of orphans.’
‘Because you tried to fight for all of us.’ He stood up. ‘You don’t have to decide now. I’ll get you some more broth.’
I looked at him, calculating. ‘I’d rather have more apple tart.’ If he was willing to give me more tart, maybe he was serious. Maybe this was . . . was so good I wasn’t even sure what it was . . .
Mr Bean grinned. ‘If Bill and the others haven’t polished off the rest, I’ll bring it up to you. If they have, it’ll have to be bread and jam.’
I’d never eaten jam, though I’d seen pots in the marketplace. I wondered if it tasted as good as apple tart. ‘You . . . you aren’t afraid I’ll gammon you?’ The spoon had been real silver. ‘Steal everything I can carry off into the night?’
‘Are you going to?’
‘No,’ I said, pretty sure I wouldn’t.
‘Well then.’
‘But you don’t know me!’
Once more he seemed to choose his words. He thought things out, this Mr Bean. ‘I see a girl who had one thing only, her life, and was prepared to give it for her fellow men. I think if that girl is given a loving home and friends and knowledge, then she will take all of that and do good for others too.’
I said nothing. I didn’t have the words. But I saw he was right. I didn’t want to steal his spoons. I wanted everything he said to come true.
‘I’ll get your apple tart,’ he said. Something in my face made him add, ‘If there’s no tart left, I’ll ask Elsie if she’ll make you another.’
CHAPTER 12
A Different Kind of Rebel Now
Each year on 5 March I wear a green dress. No one guesses, perhaps, why I wear it. But I do not forget.
My name is Mary-Anne Bean, elder daughter of Barney and Elsie Bean. I make the best apple tart in the colony. Even Papa says so, though not when Maman can hear.
I don’t think there’s anyone alive these days who remembers an urchin called Frog. Ma Grimsby died of the flux three years after I came to Jeanne’s Farm; nor did she recognise me, in fine blue skirts and yellow ribbons, when she glimpsed me once on market day, my hair curled and clean under my bonnet.
I’d learned to be a girl by then, to wear skirts and how to read and write, and speak as a young lady should. I’d learned how to love too — not the adoration I gave Mr Cunningham, but a softer, deeper love of good people, like Maman and Papa, and Milbah and my little brothers. Brothers are a nuisance sometimes, but they are good to have. It is good having a family, and home, and land to love.
I have so much to love now. Sometimes I think my heart can fit no more love in, then Jess has puppies, or Blossom a new calf, or baby Richard toddles in with a rosebud to match my skirts and I find my heart has stretched again.
The colony is a better place now, for some. Not a good place, not yet, for orphans still starve and scuttle about the streets, and men are still flogged, and some are worked as animals. Too many will never know a home like mine, nor ever see the families they left behind. But there is hope and justice, more often, of a kind.
Neither the croppies nor the convicts have rebelled again, but nor have any of the New South Wales Corps been brought to justice. The next governor, Mr Bligh, tried to control the Corps, and the next rebellion in our colony was by the redcoats against him. They imprisoned Governor Bligh and kept their power, growing richer and even more corrupt.
But when the next governor, Mr Macquarie, arrived, he brought new troops and sent most of the others home. Many of the officers who had made themselves rich stayed, and he did not take their fortunes away — for they were feeding the colony with their sheep and crops as well.
Few people even remember the Castle Hill rebellion now. It could have changed this land forever, if sp
ies had not betrayed their friends. But the spies told their lies, and a rebellion that never really happened is soon forgotten. Irish rebels are kept away from Sydney Town now, sent to Van Diemen’s Land — or given land grants, if they are of good family, to turn them into farmers. Convicts and ex-convicts can be men of standing under Governor Macquarie: surveyors, architects or builders, even magistrates. Governor Macquarie says he is building a nation, here in the south, with fine buildings and cobbled roads. Perhaps he will.
I wonder sometimes what would have changed if we had become the Republic of New Ireland. Would we really have a parliament, with men like my papa voting for the laws?
I could not imagine a different world back then, because I had never known one, in real life or in books or conversations with people of ideas, and most of my fellow rebels knew little more than I did.
But these days I know that when France guillotined their king and their aristocrats, the men who seized power made themselves emperors and new aristocrats. It was the same world for the poor, but with different faces ruling over them.
Maybe the Republic of New Ireland would have been like that. Or perhaps the leaders of our rebellion loved humanity enough to truly give freedom to all, not just seize it for themselves. Maman and Papa have taught me that work done with love for others grows more love, just like sowing wheat seeds brings you more wheat.
I have learned so much in the last few years. I have learned this too, since I sat with rebels by their fire: if a man has lied before, a man in power, like Major Johnston was, then he will lie again. Never trust a leader who has lied.
I have not forgotten Mr Cunningham. His body lies in the convict cemetery at Windsor, which used to be Green Hills, though there is no stone to mark his grave. His soul, I think, travelled back to Ireland when he died, before he went to Heaven. If souls can see, it’s Ireland that he watches. I am sad Mr Cunningham never learned to love the land we have here.
He was the first to teach me that even a guttersnipe could have a dream and maybe reach it. He led us all far beyond what any one of us could see before. And that was why we failed, that day, because without our ‘king’ we were a rabble, not an army.
The Secret of the Youngest Rebel Page 5
