Ghost Gum Valley

by Johanna Nicholls

  Marmaduke dismissed her words with a flourish. ‘First night nerves, nothing more. I’d be worried if you didn’t have them. You are already adored in this town – you can’t put a foot wrong.’

  ‘As an opera singer, yes. But Shakespeare!’ She turned as if to flee.

  Marmaduke held her face between his hands and spoke soothingly as if to a child. ‘Don’t let that word terrify you. Shakespeare was an actor himself. He understood actors, body and soul. If you had been born in his Elizabethan era he would have written the role of Portia especially for you – if women had been allowed to play female roles then.’

  Conscious that actors had begun to filter to the rear of the stage and were chatting in small groups, Marmaduke placed his arm around Josepha’s shoulders and drew her down-stage, determined to restore her confidence without being overheard.

  ‘This play isn’t pure tragedy although it has some electric, tragic moments thanks to Edmund Kean’s revolutionary interpretation. Earlier, Shylock was played as a grotesque Hebrew in a clown’s red wig. Kean refused the wig and made audiences see inside Shylock the man and his years of suffering humiliation at the hands of the Venetian nobles.’

  Josepha hung on his every word, so he pressed on. ‘Portia is Shakespeare’s first and most triumphant heroine – a courageous woman who disguises herself as a male judge to save a man’s life. Portia is everything you are, Josepha, brave, sunny of nature, beautiful, wise, witty, a real woman. Remember how Bassanio describes her?’ Marmaduke quoted the speech in the tones of a lover’s admiration. ‘“She is fair and fairer than that word. Of wondrous virtues. Sometimes from her eyes I did receive fair speechless messages. Her name is Portia.”’

  He saw the hunger in Josepha’s dark eyes, now a vulnerable child seeking the reassurance of praise. She reached out and grasped the lapels of his coat.

  ‘You really think I can do it, Marmaduke?’

  ‘Josepha St John, you won’t merely play, Portia, you’ll be Portia!’

  She gave a nervous laugh. ‘I want to believe you.’

  ‘Have I ever lied to you, my sweet lady?’

  She was suddenly serious. ‘No. You were even honest about your fiancée.’

  ‘The wedding is a mere formality for both parties. But much as I desire you, you’ve always known I’m a man who’s incapable of love.’

  ‘Yet,’ she said slyly, glancing up at the box he had taken for the season. ‘You will come tonight, won’t you? I know it’s your wedding day but I need you tonight.’

  He kissed her hand, freeing it gently from his lapel. ‘I have every intention of witnessing your triumph. But do not look for me, I may be forced to arrive late. That’s why I ask you to do me the honour of wearing this ring on stage tonight. I designed the Venetian setting to suit the plot, the ring trickery Portia initiates.’

  Josepha gasped as she placed the ruby ring on her wedding finger.

  ‘You darling! It’s perfect for Portia’s ring! It’s so large – and beautiful.’ She extended her hand to admire the effect. ‘Look how it catches the light, it looks so real.’

  Marmaduke hid a smile. ‘This ring is not simply for Portia – it’s a token of my huge admiration for your gifts. Don’t grow careless and discard it amongst the theatre props. It is a genuine Indian ruby.’

  She laughed in delight. ‘I should have guessed.’

  Alerted by the stage manager’s impatient call to the cast, Marmaduke said softly, ‘I must bid you adieu, my Portia.’

  ‘My offer is serious, my love. We can travel the world together. You as my manager to guide my career and whatever private roles you desire me to play.’

  There was no mistaking the innuendo in her words. Marmaduke was saved from the need to respond by the stage manager’s strident call of panic.

  ‘Christ! Will someone go and drag Shylock out of the dunny? How the hell can we stage The Merchant without the Jew?’

  Marmaduke bowed a hasty farewell to Josepha as the irate stage manager called out to a figure lurking in the shadows of the back stalls. ‘Hey, you! No auditions today. If you want to try out, join the queue in Barnett Levey’s office!’

  The shadow disappeared. As Marmaduke hurried down the aisle he looked back at Josepha, now the central figure in a tableau of actors all charged with nervous energy like thoroughbred horses before a race. Josepha stood centre stage, every inch the actress, the star. He saw she had already stepped into the role of Portia and, for the moment, forgotten him.

  As Thomas drove him back to the Princess Alexandrina to change, Marmaduke vividly recalled the London performance of this play, when he had been spellbound by Edmund Kean’s Shylock. The poet and critic Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s description of Kean’s genius was no exaggeration. Kean had indeed revealed Shakespeare through flashes of lightning.

  Marmaduke had been tactful not to remind Josepha of the Portia he’d seen play opposite Kean in London. Young Fanny Kemble was a London favourite who had saved her theatre manager father from bankruptcy. Josepha was a woman long past youth. He reassured himself that Sydney Town was hungry for culture and Barnett Levey was giving it to them – no matter how ragged the birth pangs.

  I’d put money on Josepha’s triumph tonight. But Barnett’s sailing close to the wind financially. I only hope to God his heroic dream doesn’t end in his own bankruptcy.

  The town clock’s second chime drew a sigh of resignation from Marmaduke. His own performance as a counterfeit husband lay one hour in the future – a role he must play to the hilt if he were to convince Garnett Gamble he had fulfilled his half of the bargain.

  Mingaletta will soon be mine, Mother.

  Marmaduke closed his eyes, seeing the wild brumbies racing through Ghost Gum Valley. He could smell the rain on the eucalypts, the golden blossoms of the wattle trees dancing in the wind. How strange that his senses were excited by two such diverse sensations – the Australian bush and greasepaint.

  Dark grey clouds were massing to conceal the cloudless blue of morning. Marmaduke knew the signs. The air was growing thick with tropical tension. There would be an electrical thunderstorm before the night was out.

  Chapter 20

  Marmaduke checked his pocket watch for the third time in ten minutes. He dismounted and freed his horse to graze, knowing he was a half hour early and relieved to be the first to arrive. The bush was alive with birds. A mob of sulphur-crested cockatoos swooped in a chaotic pattern to squabble for residency on the branches of a Forest Red Gum. The range of their screeched falsetto notes reminded Marmaduke of a choir of schoolboys excited at their release from school at the beginning of the Christmas holidays.

  He had envied other boys who experienced the camaraderie of school life, who went on bivouacs in the bush and formed lifelong friendships. In contrast he had been incarcerated with a progression of tutors of various nationalities and degrees of competency. They ranged from elderly remittance men to former clerics of different religious persuasions. One tutor daily slashed his ruler across Marmaduke’s knuckles to correct his Latin grammar until the night he awoke to find Marmaduke had planted a snake inside his periwig.

  Marmaduke’s final tutor, Klaus von Starbold, was a teacher like no other. The Hessian had fostered his love of Shakespeare, Goethe, Voltaire and Moliere, had entertained him with tales of his adventures as a soldier and hinted at a procession of amours with the advice that, ‘Women are the very devil, young man. But only a saint or a fool abstains from the greatest pleasure known to man – taking a woman to bed.’

  This admired tutor had fired up Marmaduke’s own sense of adventure – until he betrayed him and died at his hands.

  Marmaduke returned the gold watch to his waistcoat pocket. The hour of the wedding was fast approaching. He checked the location he had chosen: a grassy open space backed by a rocky cliff with a cave large enough to give shelter in the event of rain.

  A rough walking track skirted the foreshores in the direction of Farm Cove, site of the first farm established after t
he arrival of Governor Arthur Phillips’ First Fleet. Marmaduke found it difficult to believe that rag-tag fleet of convict ships had sailed into this harbour only twenty years before his birth.

  Every Currency Lad knew the story. The soil on the these foreshores was so poor and the majority of the convicts so ignorant of farming methods that when English vegetable seeds were planted in seasons diametrically opposed to the Southern Hemisphere, not surprisingly the crops failed. The First and Second Fleeters lived on the edge of starvation. Convicts and even soldiers were publicly hanged for stealing food. To his credit Governor Phillip had placed himself and his officers on half rations. Food was so short that when his officers and rare female guests such as Elizabeth Macarthur, wife of the free settler John Macarthur, were invited to dine at Government House, the invitation was understood to include bringing their own bread rolls.

  What an amazing reversal. Today Emancipists like Garnet and Sam Terry are the wealthiest men in the Colony and I dine on gourmet food cooked by our own French chef.

  Marmaduke re-checked his pocket watch and surveyed the idyllic scene he had chosen to avoid the risk of a second humiliation at the altar. Now that the Colony’s crops flourished on the rich farming land west of Sydney Town, this foreshore had returned to its original untamed state – an Antipodean Garden of Eden.

  Marmaduke felt his European dress was inappropriate for this setting – the stiff winged collar, tailcoat, boldly striped waistcoat, his long hair tied back like a Regency fop’s. His choice of trousers in place of the older fashion of breeches reminded him of the tale told in London about the heroic Duke of Wellington, until a few years earlier Britain’s Prime Minister, who was once refused admittance at Almack’s by the club’s formidable aristocratic hostess because he dared to wear trousers instead of breeches.

  As the minutes passed Marmaduke grew increasingly edgy. He felt he could count on the Quaker minister’s arrival but would Isabel change her mind?

  Marmaduke heard the sound of the first carriage and went to greet it, relieved by Edwin’s wave of reassurance as he shepherded James Backhouse towards him. The minister was again dressed in the plainest possible Quaker grey. The eyes under the shaggy black eyebrows were friendly and mildly amused. Marmaduke escorted them to the cave to sort out the Quaker commitment procedure, including the marriage certificate to be signed and dated.

  James Backhouse looked around the scene in admiration. ‘Thou hast chosen a fine place for a meeting house, Brother Gamble. I trust it will find favour in the eyes of thy bride.’

  When the hour of three passed without the arrival of the landau and other wedding carriages, Marmaduke began to suspect history was repeating itself. Had Isabel reneged on the deal despite their contract? He strode off down the track anxious to catch sight of the approaching bridal carriage he had ordered to be hung with garlands of flowers.

  Instead, he was confronted by a man emerging from the bush. Barefoot, clothed only in ragged slop trousers with a neckerchief tied around his neck, the sunburnt face looked tough at first glance but as he drew nearer Marmaduke looked into the lad’s eyes and felt the impact of his youth, hunger and fear.

  The bolter brandished a hatchet but seemed to have little strength left to attack. Marmaduke saw the reason – one of his leg irons trailed a chain that he must have hacked free from his other bloodstained ankle.

  The Irish lad’s voice rasped out in desperation. ‘Hand over your watch and money. If ye think I’ll stop short of killing ye, you’re a dead man.’

  Marmaduke answered quietly but remained on the alert for any movement of the hatchet. The lad looked crazed enough to kill.

  ‘No need to fear me, mate. I ain’t armed. And that bloke over there’s a Quaker. He’s as gentle as Jesus. So how about you put that thing down and have a grog with me? It’s my wedding day and I could do with a drink. How about you?’

  The bolter swayed on his feet on the verge of passing out. ‘Why should I be trusting a ruddy English ponce?’

  ‘I’m Currency, mate. What’s more I’m your ticket of escape from the Colony.’

  Marmaduke pointed to the top masts of a sailing ship anchored beyond the curve of the next headland. ‘That’s the Kythera. I’ve got a cargo of rum on board her, no questions asked. The ship’s master, Michaelis, is a Greek mate of mine. I guarantee you’ll sail on her on tomorrow’s tide. I’ll see you’re clothed, fed, with enough cash in your pocket to see you right when the Kythera drops you off in Auckland as a free man.’

  The Irish lad grunted in disbelief. ‘What do ye take me for, an eejit?’

  ‘I reckon you’re a bloke ready to change your name, stay out of trouble and begin a new life in New Zealand.’ Marmaduke held out his hand, ‘Name’s Marmaduke.’

  The lad clung dazedly to his weapon so Marmaduke carefully reached inside his pocket and withdrew a silver flask.

  ‘You look like you could use a nip of brandy.’

  The bolter gulped the contents down in one spluttering draught then, still gripping tightly to the hatchet, reeled forwards and collapsed into Marmaduke’s arms.

  Lights out, mate. Best thing for both of us.

  Drawing the lad’s arm across his shoulder Marmaduke dragged him to the edge of the clearing, watched at a distance by Edwin and James Backhouse. He removed his own coat and rolled the boy over to place his arms in the sleeves, freeing his hold on the hatchet.

  Propped up against a tree the bolter stirred. ‘Where’s me hatchet?’

  Marmaduke saw the approach of Thomas driving the flowerbedecked landau and knew he had to act fast.

  ‘Listen mate, you can have all the grog you can drink. But first I have to get married. Just sit quietly in the shade while the Quaker does his job. Then I’ll drive you to Cockle Bay and see you safe on board the Kythera. Right?’

  The bolter looked bemused. ‘Will I be getting another grog?’

  ‘You can bet your life on it, mate.’

  Edwin crossed to greet the wedding carriage then rejoined Marmaduke.

  ‘What possessed you to give that bolter your tailcoat? Now you’ll have to be married in your shirtsleeves!’

  ‘It beats getting married with a hatchet in my skull, mate.’

  It was a wedding like no other. It began with utter silence. No music.

  Maeve held Isabel’s long train as the bride approached on Thomas’s arm, taking small measured steps that suggested she was playing The Wedding March in her head.

  Marmaduke was surprised to feel his throat constrict. Jesus. Is this the same girl?

  Madame Hortense’s apprentices must have worked themselves ragged for days. The ivory satin gown and the veil floating in the breeze transformed Isabel from a tomboy into a delicate creature, half dryad. The gown moulded her tiny waist and enhanced the delicate curve of a bosom Marmaduke had thought non-existent. Her crown of orange blossoms and the veil framing her face gave her an ethereal quality, like a vision out of A Midsummer Night’s Dream. Her luminous green eyes were the colour of an Irish field. He noted her long delicate hands were trembling as they held the bouquet of white roses.

  Marmaduke was suddenly anxious. Had he ordered the wrong roses? He knew the Plantagenets had broken into two warring factions, their emblems the White Rose of York and the Red Rose of Lancaster.

  Shit! Which side is Isabel on? Red or white? Oh hell, what does it matter? This whole marriage thing will be over in a year.

  When she reached his side Marmaduke whispered without any trace of sarcasm, ‘Thanks for coming, Isabel.’

  His bride’s resigned expression reminded Marmaduke of a painting of Mary Queen of Scots minutes before she laid her pretty neck on the chopping block.

  James Backhouse broke the silence by quoting the words of the first Quaker, George Fox. ‘The right of joining of marriage is the work of the Lord only and not the priests or magistrates, for it is God’s ordinance, not man’s and therefore Friends cannot consent they should join them together – for we marry none, it is the
Lord’s work and we are but witnesses.’

  He explained how a Quaker meeting would be conducted in a spirit of worship based on silence in which anyone present who was moved to speak could feel free to do so.

  The only sound to break the silence was the delicate snoring from the Irish bolter under the tree.

  A few minutes later Edwin was moved to speak. ‘I am witness this day to the decision of two very special people who have joined together after difficult journeys in life. May they always find in each other their true friend.’

  Marmaduke found himself casting sidelong glances at Isabel now that she had lifted the front layer of the veil to reveal her face and Maeve had taken custody of the bridal bouquet. Marmaduke knew the ropes. James Backhouse had given him a copy of the words to read but Marmaduke had learnt them by heart. He took hold of Isabel’s hand and chose to be the first to make the marriage declaration.

  ‘Friends, in the presence of God and this assembly, I take this my friend, Isabel Alizon de Rolland, to be my life partner, trusting with divine assistance to be loving and faithful as long as we both on earth shall live.’

  Those simple, beautiful words had seemed so easy on paper. Words that Isabel deserved to hear from a man who truly loved her.

  I’m the last man in the world fit to say them. What would James Backhouse think if he knew that I’ll be spending my wedding night in Josepha St John’s bed?

  It was now Isabel’s turn to make the same declaration. Her profile with its little tip-tilted nose looked as delicate as a piece of porcelain. Marmaduke noticed for the first time the way her eyelashes curled as her eyes fixed intently on James Backhouse’s face. The soft chin of her heart-shaped face trembled on reaching the words ‘as long as we both on earth shall live’.