by Peter McAra
‘How goes it with Ann?’ she whispered in the dark.
‘She’s asleep, thank God,’ Susannah whispered back. ‘I put my finger in her eye by mistake in the dark. She made to bellow, I know. I heard her draw breath. But I near throttled her till she stilled. Now she’s dead to the world.’
The singing and dancing continued hour after hour. Eliza began to wonder in her fear whether the men might be performing some ritual to celebrate the capture of the two women, or a preliminary to eating them. She dare not share her thoughts with Susannah. All night she lay awake. The water ran low — Eliza willed herself not to drink from the last container. Susannah should have it to keep her milk flowing.
As soon as dawn broke, Eliza looked out onto the beach, desperate for water. The men were slowly rousing themselves. With hardly a word, they gathered their spears and sticks. One man looked in the direction of the cave. Then he walked towards it, murmuring to the others. Eliza felt her heart skip. She turned to look at Susannah, who watched her wide-eyed. Eliza put her finger to her lips. Then she looked about the cave for a weapon. There was none. She drew slowly back from her peephole, thinking that the rising sun could catch some movement of her white face which the man’s keen eyes might detect.
Then, without warning, the group moved purposefully towards the cave. They walked closer. Soon they were so close she could see only their bare black legs. Then one stepped right to the cave entrance. He stopped, his ankles but inches from her face. Her heart pounded fit to burst. Then he shouted to the others. His voice carried excitement. One of them called back in a voice obviously intended to calm the other’s excitement. After perhaps a minute, the first man moved on up the cliff, followed by his companions. Eliza dared to hope they had left the beach. She held her breath, listened. The occasional clatter of wooden weapons on the rocks was all that she could hear. Eventually the sound died away. The beach fell silent. Eliza climbed out of the cave.
She walked to the waterfall on unsteady legs. Twelve hours of dehydration while she sat immobile with fear had taxed her body. Again she strained her ears for sounds of the departing men, but heard nothing. As she walked down the path to the beach, she felt light-headed. She staggered the last few steps to the waterfall and drank from the pool until she was satisfied. As she headed back to the cave with water and food for Susannah, she saw the beach through new eyes.
It was no longer a haven. She passed the pile of ashes left by the visitors’ fire, not wanting to walk directly to it, nor leave her footprints superimposed on the churned sand surrounding it. Then her eye caught the glint of a polished object lying beside the ashes. Diffidently, she walked to the fire and saw a boat-shaped stone as long a man’s hand. It was made from black granite, polished smooth, and incised with wavy lines and patterns of dots. What was it for? It bore no marks of usage such as a tool might. What did the markings mean? Was it a sacred object they would later return to collect? And when might that be? She took it with her to show Susannah.
By the greatest of blessings, the trio had been hidden in the cave when the savages arrived at the beach. Then, by unexpected good fortune, the storm had obliterated their footprints. What if the men had come upon the three of them sleeping naked on the sand in the afternoon sun, a habit they had acquired of late? Whatever the collection of miracles that had saved them from this visitation, the place no longer offered them the nurture they had sought after the shipwreck. Now it had turned on them, showing its true colours after bidding them welcome.
As she had trained herself to do when she read of the unresolved problems of science or philosophy, Eliza took, for a moment, a diametrically opposite perspective. In fact, the two women had trespassed on the native people’s land, not the other way about. How would the good folk of Poole, in her native Dorset, react if they saw naked black men walking along the beach, their wrecked canoe in the distance?
‘You must climb the cliffs and look about. See what lies open to us,’ Susannah said as they talked. ‘Who knows, Botany Bay may be but a stroll away.’
‘Indeed it might. And if it were, we’d be clapped in irons in a trice, and spend our next one-and-twenty years as prisoners. Or hanged.’ Eliza must play Devil’s advocate.
‘That might be better than being roasted by savages,’ Susannah said. Although Eliza dreaded the native people, Susannah seemed petrified by the mere thought of them. ‘And there might be other things you find — a safe place to hide, easier foraging,’ she added.
‘How could that be?’ Eliza said. ‘Here, the sea feeds us. If we leave, we turn our backs on our larder.’
‘We can never know till we look,’ Susannah urged.
‘Till I look. You must stay here with Ann.’
Next morning, Eliza ate and drank till she was more than comfortably full, then set off to scale the cliff, following the route taken by the men. Climbing the rockfall was laborious rather than difficult. Soon, she heaved herself round a big rock and saw that she was at the top of the cliff. She stood on high ground and looked about her. A tree-covered plain, cut by small steep-sided gorges, stretched as far as she could see. At a distance, the forest took on a distinctly purple colour, till it met the horizon in a line of low, flat-topped hills. All was primeval. There was no field, no house, no scar on the wrinkled purple carpet that stretched as far as she could see. A crow circled above her, curious at the interloper. The sun beat down on her head. The air was uncannily quiet.
She sat on a rock. She must think. She listened acutely, but no sound broke the silence. The aromatic smell from the leaves of the forest was stronger here than at their beach home. The nearby trees were like those growing among the rocks at the top of the beach — gnarled limbs with papery bark lifting here and there to show white skin beneath — hard, sparse leaves, but no hint of fruit. She stared to the western horizon for minutes at a time until her eyes watered. Perhaps there might be a steeple, the gable of a roof, which would show up under methodical scrutiny. But nothing emerged from the tableau before her. It was a benign desert.
‘We must leave, dearie,’ Susannah said. Although it would cost her pain and anxiety to make the journey through the forest, she was prepared for this. With her wrist not yet properly healed, and an infant yet to be weaned, she was bound to suffer more than Eliza, who had become strong and resilient during their life as cave-dwellers. ‘If we stay, we must be eaten the next time the savages come. It was Providence they didn’t discover us. We could be on the beach, talking, fishing, cooking on our fire, trailing our footprints everywhere. Sooner or later, it must happen.’
‘But there is nothing; nothing at the top of the cliff, just forest,’ Eliza said. ‘It goes on forever.’
‘You mean you saw nothing,’ Susannah persisted. ‘It’s simply a lonely part of the coast. I’ve heard tell there are farms in Botany Bay. Taverns, shops, docks, churches, stables.’
‘We know that.’ Eliza was forced to agree. In her lessons with Mr Harcourt, she had learned about the towns of Sydney and Liverpool and Windsor, and the farming of sheep and cattle. Yet she had no idea where these places were, nor where the two of them stood in relation to the towns. Above all, she was reluctant to walk into the arms of her gaolers. For all the world knew, the two of them were dead, along with the rest of the ship’s company. Now they faced the twin horrors of being eaten by savages or discovered and imprisoned by white men. What to do?
CHAPTER 23
‘Thurber has sent me a message, Harry.’ Viscount John pushed aside his brandy glass. ‘It is an invitation to another ball. A ball I have reason to believe is to celebrate your betrothal to Miss Agatha.’
‘But sir, I am not betrothed to her.’
‘Not yet. That is evidently the purpose of this invitation. To speed the betrothal.’ He looked into his son’s face, saw it pale.
‘Well then, my son.’ Harry watched his father’s expression harden. ‘You must go to the ball. This is an order, not an invitation on a square of pink paper with a lace border. And propose
marriage to Miss Agatha. At the first opportunity. Do you understand? If you do not, I shall be dragged away to debtors’ prison, and you will have to survive like a scavenging rat.’ He waited. Harry hesitated. The silence began to set like wet mortar.
‘How many times must I tell you your duty, Harry?’ Viscount John sighed extravagantly. ‘It is of the most vital importance that you marry Agatha. If you do not, then your estate will be lost. Your estate, and the estate that should have been home to untold numbers of your descendants. What will those descendants think of you, boy? Imagine a soirée a hundred years from now.’ He leaned back in his chair, steepled his hands.
‘A handsome young man, your great-grandson, let us imagine he is also called Harry, courts a beautiful young woman, heir apparent to a title and a rich estate. He drops to his knees and proposes. She turns away with a wave of her bejewelled hand.
‘“I am sorry, Harry, but marriage between us can never be,” she says. “You are but a landless pauper. Thanks, I understand, to your great-grandfather, another Harry De Havilland. I’m told that he refused to support his sick and ageing father, Viscount John De Havilland. The result was a tragedy which will haunt numberless generations to come. Young Harry lost the estate which had been the family’s pride and privilege for eight hundred years. And so I cannot marry you, peasant.”’
With a long sigh, Sir John slid a hand towards the decanter.
‘But sir, I — ’
‘Say no more, Harry. Your duty is clear. The ball is to be on the thirteenth of the month.’
The evening had begun to chill as Harry rode up to Thurber Hall and dismounted. He handed his horse to the groom waiting at the bottom of the grand staircase. As he climbed the stairs, music washed over him — the sound of fiddles playing a lively dance. A young couple, seemingly much in love, stood at the entrance to the hall, the man smiling and holding the young woman’s hand while she smoothed her crinoline with the other. He recognised them as Lord and Lady Barton-Smythe, neighbours of the De Havillands, recently wed in what everyone had seen as a love match.
A stab of pain shot through Harry’s heart. He looked away. No such love match lay in store for him. If he married Agatha, his fate would be too horrible to imagine. He pictured a future of ugly arguments, lonely nights in his chambers, years of celibacy, or worse, occasional clandestine visits to a mistress. At balls, soirées, and visits to London he would suffer, year on year, the humiliation of having a cantankerous, selfish woman on his arm. Then there would be the snide behind-the-hand comments between his male friends whenever they met as couples at social events.
He pushed such thoughts aside. He had come to the ball to perform a duty. Now he must execute that duty. A blaze of light shone through the open doors. A butler welcomed him and led him indoors. As they entered the ballroom, the fiddlers stopped. The dancers slowed, smiled and bowed to their partners. Some men walked from the dance floor arm in arm with their ladies while others melted into the crowd. Some eyed acquaintances with whom they could become inconspicuous while they waited for the next dance.
‘You are late, Mr Harry.’ He turned at the sound of a voice which reminded him of fingernails scraping glass. Agatha Thurber; sallow, thin, wearing a high-necked, full-skirted blue silk gown, minced towards him in dancing shoes that must make her every step excruciating. She could be one of the ugly sisters who had gone to the ball, leaving Cinderella at home to scrub the kitchen.
‘I was forced to become a wallflower for the last dance,’ she said. ‘At my very own ball. Shame on you, sir.’
‘My humblest apologies, Miss Thurber.’ Harry bowed. ‘Could you not have danced with another man meantime?’
‘No, sir. I could not. Tongues would have wagged. And anyway, no one asked me.’
‘My horse…went lame a mile or so away from your manor. With the best intentions in the world I couldn’t have — ’
‘Goodness me, Mr Harry. Whenever we make arrangements to meet, some disaster overtakes you. What is it about you? How do you attract misfortunes so regularly?’
Harry bit his tongue. He would forbear to mention the life-threatening disaster that now loomed too close, too inescapable, a mere yard away.
‘Not at all, Miss Agatha. It will be my pleasure to accompany you in the very next dance.’
‘It’s to be a cotillion. I trust you dance the cotillion well.’
‘Er, well enough, Miss, I hope.’
The fiddles began to play a lively introduction to the fashionable dance lately taken up by English society from its French origins. Couples gathered on the dance floor. The piercing voice of the caller, a lady of uncertain age but very certain presence, ordered the couples into line. Agatha took Harry’s hand, tugged him into her place, as the formal hostess of the evening, at the head of the line.
‘When we dance, sir, pray do not make me trip over your boots,’ she whispered loudly to him as they waited, poised, expectant. Then the music began in earnest.
‘Allez!’ the caller barked. Then, swaying to the music, the couples began the complicated sequence of skipping, bowing, twirling, then the arm-extending introduction to the next partner. Harry struggled to keep his movements in time with the music, watching nearby couples with all his concentration. In time, he gained confidence. He told himself he might actually enjoy the complex ebbing and flowing of the dancers opposite as the line moved towards its climax. Then the stately bow by Agatha when she and her partner had returned to the head of the line would signal the end of the dance.
With one exchange of partners to come before the finale, the music sped up, became louder. All eyes turned to Agatha and Harry. Then, as they bowed and faced each other to take up the last movement, he extended his left arm. Her eyes shot him a fiery glance. She reached for his right arm, missed it, and fell with a thud. Her petticoats flew out from her skirt, revealing a pair of bony stockinged legs. As one, the crowd burst into laughter. Mortified, Harry bent to help her up.
‘Idiot!’ Her eyes flamed as she took his arm. He flinched, fought to keep his jaw rigid. Pain shot through his heart. ‘You were supposed to hold out your right arm, sir,’ she whispered through clenched teeth in a voice heard across the suddenly silent room. ‘Do you not know your left from your right?’
‘My deepest apologies, Miss Agatha. I — ’
‘Kindly escort me to the ladies’ retiring room. Quickly!’ She choked back a sob of rage. ‘I am…undone!’
As he walked her in the direction she pointed, he saw that she limped. Her unseemly crash to the floor might have bruised her bottom. With a flounce of her skirt, she disappeared into the ladies’ sanctuary, firing a look of utter venom at him as she closed the door.
Harry took himself to the bar, avoiding the barely contained laughter of the assembled guests. The steward handed him a brandy, communicating his sympathy with a wordless smile. Soon, its healing magic began to work. Without a word, the steward presented him with another. An hour and several brandies later, Harry stood alone on the veranda in the cool of the darkness, another brandy in hand. Now, thanks to the brandies he had been forced to take as medicine, the night had become almost pleasant. He counted himself lucky to have escaped Miss Agatha’s ire. As he looked into the garden, he felt a touch on his wrist. He turned in surprise.
‘Take me to the bower, sir.’ The voice was laced with bile. ‘Now.’ Agatha, now wearing another voluminous skirt of pale gold, took his wrist. Her grip was so strong it hurt him, despite his healing brandies. He drained his glass, left it on a table, and let her steer him towards a vine-covered structure near the far end of the long veranda.
‘Do you not think the guests might raise their eyebrows a little if they learn that the belle of the ball has disappeared into the dark with a…boring neighbour?’ he asked. She did not answer. ‘You will understand that some may think me one of those men with a dubious reputation for their demeanour towards attractive young women.’
‘Reputation or no, sir. I require you to take me to the bo
wer, and there to fall on one knee. Do I make myself clear?’
‘Indeed, Miss. And I must say that I am of the opinion that tonight is not the most, er, romantically appropriate occasion. Given your distress, entirely my own fault, at your present indisposition. And also — ’
‘Fiddlesticks. You have a promise to honour, sir. Now honour it.’ They reached the bower. She sat on a chaise longue, leaned back, and extended an arm in his direction. ‘Now, sir,’ she said.
Harry sat frozen. In a moment he must perform an act that would cripple him for the rest of his life; cripple his mind, his soul. Condemn him to spend a lifetime in melancholy, separated from the woman he must always love, chained to a harridan who would hate him even more than he hated her. He would rather die from a kindly bullet.
Then a strange feeling jiggled low in his stomach. A nausea that had tickled at his insides ever since he had set foot on Thurber’s estate suddenly swept through his body. He leapt to the railing that enclosed the bower, leaned over it and puked, long and hard. When he looked up, it was to see Miss Agatha twenty yards away, skirts held above the ground, limping towards the ballroom. Even in the low light, he saw that she positively glowed with anger. He took his cue. Five minutes later, he mounted his horse and galloped through Thurber Hall’s ostentatious gates.
As Harry rode by Thurber Hall next morning, he took stock of his situation. As month followed month, Ernest Thurber’s excitement for the De Havilland’s land waxed stronger. The work on the new gardens would soon be finished, and Thurber would settle his account with Harry’s father. The day that happened, Thurber would be the new owner of Morton-Somersby. And Sir John De Havilland, lately Viscount of Morton-Somersby, would become a landless pauper. All the money paid by Thurber would be taken by the bankers who sat like vultures, waiting, waiting. Harry had learned from his father’s man of business that the viscount would have not one penny to his name after the bankers had taken their dues.
