by Janet Lee
Perhaps you could write to your mother in the coming weeks, he says, in case there were any words you should like to say to her now.
I think of how he says coming weeks.
I have a shadow over me until they grant me a reprieve. I think perhaps he sees the shadow cross my face because then he very gently says, Tell me more of your position in Merriwa.
Well, after I said goodbye to my mother, I tell him, I walked up the drive to the main house and went around the back and knocked upon the kitchen door and the cook said, Hello, Louisa, and so I went in.
And I said, Hello, Mrs Maisie, for that was that particular cook’s name and she did not like to be called Cookie, although some cooks do. I am come to see the boss’s wife and get a reference, I said. And Mrs Maisie said the reference had been left for me to collect from the kitchen as the boss’s wife had said she would have no time to see me that morning, because she was in the library.
Mrs Maisie wiped her hands on her apron, and picked up a letter from the hutch in the kitchen and gave it to me, and I placed it in my bundle, but I did not read it, for it was not a letter to me, but rather a letter about me.
Then Mrs Maisie said, So you are away from us, are you, Louisa?
And I said I was, that I was to be working as a domestic for a solicitor in Merriwa, and that the boss’s wife had arranged it all for me.
Mrs Maisie said, Well, did she now. That was kind. And I did not like the way she said this, sir, for there are ways some people say things as though they do not really mean them, although you may not know why this is so when they do. But later I thought that Mrs Maisie had guessed that Harry’s mother was trying to separate us, for I came to learn that the cooks are often the most knowing people of all the household. Of course, I knew none of that then, for I was only a girl, and so I simply said that I would like to say goodbye to Harry as I did not know when I might see him again. And Mrs Maisie told me Harry had been up before the dawn and ridden out to the shepherd’s hut that was up the top paddock. He had gone with his father to check the work of the men, and wasn’t my own father there?
I said, He is, Mrs Maisie, and I bit my lip, for I was thinking how I would not get to say goodbye to my father, and how I had just parted from my mother and now I would not get to say goodbye to Harry either. I became quite sad at the thought of this going away.
Then she said that I should sit at the kitchen table and take a piece of fruit cake and a drink of milk before my long journey. She said she did not think as the boss’s wife would mind, as she would never know, for she was in the library, reading a book, and there was no denying the way Mrs Maisie said this last comment – quite unkindly, as though reading a book was a sin.
And so my last meal at the property was a piece of cake in the great house. When the time came to leave, Mrs Maisie wrapped a jar of jam and some biscuits up for me, which she said I should have to remind me of my own home and she gave me another piece of cake to take upon the dray, and one for Mr Waldock besides.
14.
Mr Waldock would go to Merriwa at least once a month to get goods for the farm and so he was familiar with the place and the road to get there, and I was very glad of it as it seemed a long way to travel.
We did not speak for much of the journey, as Mr Waldock was not a man of many words, but he gladly took the fruit cake I offered and said it were a treat, having company upon the dray, and nice company at that, and then to have fruit cake to boot. There are some men who say nice company and they say it in a certain way, but Mr Waldock was not one of those men. I came to know as such even better in the years ahead, for he would visit me often. The journey took several hours and I remember thinking that with each roll of the dray’s wheels I was getting further from my mother and father, and so I was glad of Mr Waldock, for he was a link to them.
Merriwa is such a pretty town, with the gentle hills around it, and a nice, wide main street, although I was nervous to be in such a big place on my own. I might laugh at that today, sir, now that I find my own way all over Sydney, but then I was only a girl.
As we came in along the main street, Mr Waldock said, Now you be careful, young Louisa, and mind yourself here. I will try to visit you whenever I come in, at least for a time. And I thought these kind words, and very nice of him that he wanted to see me do well.
Then Mr Waldock stopped the dray outside a large house of two storeys, with a wrought-iron balustrade and small windows in the roof. There was a garden which was full of rose bushes, and each of them covered in blooms. So there was pink and yellow and red roses all along the front of the fence. The house was not the same sort as the boss’s house back at the property and it looked very grand to me.
Of course, there are many houses of this type in Sydney, sir, and they are all lined up along Elizabeth Street and George Street and there are so many that you would barely notice one above the others. They are all owned by doctors and solicitors, being as they are the ones who make all the money in the world. But in a small town, a large house such as this makes quite an impression.
Mr Waldock came to the side of the dray and helped me down, and lifted down my bundles. He said he would call at the house around the same time on Thursday next, and that he would take a letter for my mother and that I should be sure to write. And I said I would look out for him, but that I would be grateful if he would call to the back of the house as I would leave the letter there with the cook, in case I was unable to see him because of my duties. He said he would and then he climbed back up on the dray and went further up the road to the store for his errands. I stood on the path and watched him put the brake on the dray and get his knotted string out of his pocket and walk into the store.
Well, I stood for a moment and looked at the house, and I think I did give myself a pinch for courage, for it was a grand affair, as I said. And then the pinch worked and I went through the gate and to the back of the house, to the kitchen. I took off my coat, and was glad of this, for it was a warm day, and I shook off the dust from my dress as best I could. Then I wiped my mother’s boots on the mat and knocked upon the door.
A lady, who I took to be the cook on account of it being a kitchen and her wearing an apron, came to the flyscreen and looked at me up and down.
I said, Good morning, ma’am, my name is Louisa, Louisa Hall, and she said she was Mrs Roberts, the cook, and I could be calling her Cook and there should be no ma’aming about it, and I was to call my employers the Master and the Missus.
Well there, it’s about time and you’re here, she said, which I took as a way of welcome, for most cooks like to rule their kitchen and they often speak in this manner to give you the footing you need to start with. She said the Missus was wanting to see me.
The other girl’s been gone and I’m run off me feet with all the work, she said, and I’m a cook and I shouldn’t have to be clearing out slops and washing the underthings. She said Mrs Rainer came weekly and did the heavy laundry, but there were always some things which wouldn’t wait for the week, and she wouldn’t have Mrs Rainer do the Missus’s intimates.
I learnt from that first day that Cook liked to talk but had no need that I should give her too many answers, and that if I nodded occasionally she would interpret that as an agreeance with whatever she was saying. I think it must be a way with cooks – they spend so long with puddings and flour and eggs, and other things which don’t answer back, that they like to have their voice heard and talk constantly so that even if the bread could talk it wouldn’t get a word in.
When I was living at the solicitor’s I would hear Cook out in the morning, feeding the fowls, for even though that was the gardener’s job she always liked to do this herself, and get the eggs, and she would be saying something to the hens. Now there, my little ducks, there’s some nice nibbles for you, lay me some eggs for the ’morrow, I need to make me a cake. And the hens would cluck around her, and she would talk away and it was as tho
ugh they would answer her.
On that first afternoon, I left my things in the kitchen and carefully retrieved my reference, and followed Cook into the hallway of the house. She motioned for me to wait while she went into the parlour and spoke to the Missus. Through the doorway, I could see the Missus sitting in a beautiful chair. Burgundy, I later learnt the colour was called. The parlour had the doors open onto the verandah, and the lace curtains were blowing gently as there was a slight breeze that afternoon. A table stood beside the chair and there was a large silver teapot, a milk jug and a sugar bowl and I came to know them well enough, sir, for it was one of my jobs to polish them.
She was sipping tea, the Missus, all dressed in black, her hair bundled loose on her head, which gave her a soft look. She was reading from a book, and looked calm and peaceful and there was the light and the lace curtains behind her, and I remember thinking that this was what Heaven was like: calm and gentle.
She looked like an angel, although one dressed in black, mind.
I am thinking of this picture in my head and Canon Rich asks me if I am thinking of Heaven.
No, sir, I say. I was not thinking of Heaven.
I was thinking of the Missus and how you can be wrong about a person, for she looked so happy and peaceful, but it was the sadness which made her like that. Or the laudanum, but I did not know about that then.
Cook beckoned for me to go into the room and the Missus looked up from her book, although I did not think as she was really reading it. She moved her arm and waved for me to come in and go around in front of her chair, which I did.
She smiled at me and said, My dear, how pretty you are, such beautiful dark hair.
And I said, Thank you, Missus.
You must be tired from your journey, she said. Get Mrs Roberts to take you into the kitchen and fetch you a glass of milk and something to eat. Then she will take you up to your room, for you will want to unpack your things. Mrs Roberts will see to everything for you and we will talk tomorrow, my dear. She waved her hand again as she said this and looked back down at her book and I remember thinking at the time that it was odd, to be so slow in everything. But that was her way.
So for the second time that day, I sat in a kitchen and had milk and a slice of cake, and the cake was good too. It was only after I had eaten that I realised the Missus had not asked to see my reference and so I asked if I should go back in to see her, but Cook said that I should not be bothering the Missus with such trifles, and I should just give my letter to her, so I did.
Then later, Cook took me up the stairs and showed me to my room.
The room was in under the roof and had one of the small windows that you could see from the front of the house. There was a tiny washstand with a basin and a jug upon it, and there was a bed. I asked Cook who I was to share with and she said, Bless you, child, this is your room. I have a room off the kitchen as it is kinder for my knees not to have to climb these stairs.
I smile at the recollection.
The room was a nice room, Mrs Collins?
It was beautiful, sir, I say.
He smiles back at me.
I can tell he doesn’t understand. I try to explain it to him.
I had never had anything but I had to share. I never had one of my own, you see.
Ahh. He nods. Your own room.
Yes, sir, that was it.
Did you not have a large family, sir? I ask.
Not very large, no, he says.
So he would not understand my excitement.
The window was glass, which I thought was very modern, and you will laugh at me to think so, but most of our homes until then had a shutter-type window that you had to prop open if you wanted to see out. Of course, there were windows with glass up at the main houses and the church, but to have such a thing in a room which would be mine felt very grand. There was a pretty little curtain across the top of the window and it was tied back by a piece of cord that went to the side and hooked over a nail, so that I might draw the curtain at night, for that is the thing with glass windows, sir – you can see right through them, unless they are covered over.
There was a little table beside the bed and on it sat three pink roses in a glass bottle. I walked over and touched one of the petals.
The Missus asked me to put them roses there herself, Cook said. She wanted you to feel welcome. She said the Missus was too soft by half and I should not be taking advantage of her softness, for Cook herself would not put up with it. And I nodded and said that I would remember that.
The bed had a horsehair mattress and stitched sacking and on the top of the bed was a thin quilt made from material patterned with pink roses. Later, when I left, I was allowed to keep the quilt. But that was not until after I was married to Charles.
Cook told me the other room in the attic was kept locked and only the Master had the key and that was enough said about that. She said I should not be afraid of the Master for he were a gentleman and very kind with the Missus. She said that there was no other man in the house, as Bert, the gardener, slept out the back. The Missus tended the roses herself and Bert did the yard work, and tended to the privy and did the boot blackening and looked after the carriage and horses, although they were kept out of town and only fetched when needed.
You were happy there, Canon Rich says.
Oh yes, sir, I was, I say. They were very good to me. And it came so that I did not want to leave them.
From Whom:
The Sheriff.
Notifying that Louisa Collins will be executed on the 8th January next.
Read to prisoner.
Darlinghurst Gaol Correspondence Register11
15.
The Female Governor comes to my cell today and brings the Prison Governor with her.
I was reading the Bible, for it passes the time, and Alice and I were sitting in quiet conversation. She and I talk of the discussions I have with the chaplain. Often, after I have visited with him, I am in the mind to talk of my youth and Alice seems happy to hear this and I think the Female Governor permits our talking, on account of my being a condemned woman.
The Female Governor has walked into my cell many times since I was found guilty, but the Prison Governor has never been to see me here.
They have come to read me the death letter. The letter which outlines the date when the government hopes to hang me.
I still think I shall be reprieved.
My sentence shall be commuted to life in prison, for they will not execute a woman – they never have done so in this gaol. But now I have the date when the government intends to hang me if it can.
It shall be 8 January 1889.
16.
When I go to see the chaplain late this afternoon, Alice is with me. She seems to have been assigned to be with me during my waking hours, although at times there are other warders – Bryce and Anderson are regulars. Warder Bryce often comes at night and I am greeted by her harsh face when I wake. She is always asleep when I wake, and although she is no company at all, she does not snore like Flora.
I try not to disturb Bryce in the mornings, as I savour the few moments of time when I am able to keep my own company. I have not always liked the early morning, as sometimes I would wake with a thumping head from the night before. But I like them more now that I do not know for certain how many more early mornings there may be.
Canon Rich asks me about the death letter.
How do you feel this afternoon, Mrs Collins, he asks, after the letter that was read to you today?
I lower my head and wonder how he knows of this, but I suppose the Prison Governor has told him. It makes me wonder what else they have talked about.
I do not know, sir, I say.
It is a difficult time for you, Louisa, he says. To know your fate.
He has called me Louisa. I am normally Mrs Collins, but I suppose everything
is different now.
Some see it as a gift, he says, to know when your time shall come and to be able to prepare yourself.
I lift my head and look at him.
I do not understand, sir.
To know the time that you will have left and to be able to prepare can be a gift, Louisa. I have seen it many times, in the sick, in the condemned.
I think of how he says condemned.
There can be a peace in acceptance, he says.
But I do not believe it will ever come to pass, sir. I have an appeal to go before the courts and they may overturn my conviction.
They may, he says softly. Although, they may not.
I tell him again that there have been three times when the jury could not agree that I was guilty and that I am hopeful the new judges might consider the opinion of these men against the twelve who did find me guilty.
And even if they do not overturn the conviction, I say, the government has never hung a woman at this gaol. I think they shall commute my sentence and I shall be reprieved.
Would you be happy with that? he asks.
I do not want to die. Then I think of spending all my time in this place.
I am not happy to be in this circumstance at all, sir. But I do not want to die.
Others are working to support you, he says. There are letters being written to members of parliament. I have heard there is a petition by the women of Sydney to have your execution commuted to life in prison.
I wonder if any of the women who are writing are the ones who come to visit the female prisoners; the do-gooders. I hope so, for the government will surely listen to good women such as them.
Would you like to write to anyone? he asks. Would you like to write to a member of parliament, or to the Governor perhaps? I could provide you with paper and pen so that you might write to your sister Elizabeth, or to your mother? Or to your children?
I say I do not know anyone in parliament to write to, but that I would like to write to my mother, and I would like to write to the children, as I have not seen the littlest ones, Edwin or Charles, the whole time I have been in gaol.
