The Highwayman

by F. M. Parker

  He scrutinized the harbor as the Moreton sailors began to lower sails. More than a score of sailing ships and steamships lay at anchor. An even greater number of vessels were tied up to the piers extending out from the quay into the bay. Flags of several nations flapped at mastheads. Most were English and American ships. Whaling and seal hunting ships of several nations sought the port for supplies during their long sojourns in the southern oceans. A mighty British man-o-war with cannons bristling from many gun ports dominated the assemblage of ships. A prison ship, an ancient man-o-war with three decks above water line and now a rotting hulk without masts, hung at anchor separated more than a quarter mile distance from all other vessels. Small crafts bobbed about as they were rowed between the ships and the shore.

  Beyond the ships, the buildings of Sydney, most of them made of stone and convict built, crowded each other along the shore and spread onto the range of low hills farther inland. Several new buildings were under construction. Thousands of chimneys spewed coal smoke and fed a thick gray pall hanging over the town. The English flags on the tall government buildings were visible flapping to a slow wind.

  “That big four story building there by itself on top of the hill is the Prisoners’ Barracks,” Knatchbull said and pointed. “It hasn’t changed a bit since I was here some five years ago. But the town’s sure bigger.”

  “Where are the women prisoners kept?” McCoy asked.

  “You can’t see the Female Factory from here.” Knatchbull replied. “But it’s off over there among those buildings on the right side of the town.” He grinned knowingly at McCoy. “You’ll not get close enough to have any fun with them gals.”

  “I’d sure like to get my hands on one of the young ones that’s just got here,” McCoy said wistfully.

  A murmur of “Amens” rose from several of the men. Patrick found himself nodding silent agreement to the desire.

  Four seamen swarmed up the ratlines and lowered the sloop’s last sail. Another sailor, carrying a heavy wooden maul, went forward to the anchor windlass. He stood with the maul over his shoulder and watched the captain standing near the helmsman.

  The captain waited as the ship glided on and slowing. Then he called, “Let go the anchor.”

  The sailor struck the trip. The anchor fell and its chain came rattling out through the hawsehole to plunge like a giant snake into the green water of the bay.

  The captain shouted to the signalman near the flag bag. “Run up a signal telling Government House that we’ve prisoners aboard.”

  The man swiftly attached a series of flags to a line and hoisted all aloft to flutter in the wind.

  “We’ll soon be on land,” McCoy said. “I’ll be glad to set foot on land again.”

  “I think we all got a problem,” Patrick said. “The prison hulk is putting out a big launch and I see Marines in it.”

  “My, God, that can’t be so,” McCoy said. “They can’t lock us up there.”

  Knatchbull groaned. “Nobody escapes from a prison hulk,” he lamented. “Nobody.”

  “Goddamn our luck,” cursed another man.

  Patrick watched with the other stricken and demoralized convicts as the oarsmen in the launch propelled the launch across the stretch of water separating the two ships. The coxswain guided his boat up under the narrow gangway that had been lowered and hung along the hull of the ship. The launch made fast to the gangway.

  The Marines aboard the Moreton unlocked the convicts’ from the chain cable and marched them to the gangway. The corporal of Marines passed the convicts’ transfer documents down to the Marine corporal from the hulk. That man signed the papers and sent it back up to the Marine on the deck.

  “Down you go one at a time,” said the corporal on the Moreton. “You now belong to the hulk.”

  The convicts in their leg-irons clumsily descended the gangway and found seats in the launch. At a word from the hulk corporal, the coxswain cut loose from the gangway and the oarsmen dipped their blades and the boat pulled away from the Moreton.

  Deeply disheartened, Patrick studied the prison hulk. Government ships that became unseaworthy were often used as prisons. He had been confined in one in England for a few days just before being shipped out to Australia. He had spent two years on one in Melbourne harbor. They were hell ships, with the prisoner death toll heavy. Knatchbull was correct, nobody escaped from a hulk.

  CHAPTER 24

  The three-deck prison ship wallowed in the waves that were covered with garbage and human waste of the hundreds of prisoners confined within and upon her. The smell of the slop was rank, awaiting the next tide that would cleanse the harbor by washing the filth out of the harbor and into the open sea. Dark streamers of seaweed hung from the hulk’s unpainted wooden hull that was black with rot, and from the iron links of the massive, rusty chain that held the ship at permanent anchorage. To Patrick, the ancient hulk appeared ready to sink in the first strong storm.

  The gun ports no longer revealed gleaming black cannon barrels to run out, but were barred with strong iron latticework. Space for prisoners had been added in every possible manner by the construction of crude deckhouses, platforms, and lean-tos protruding out at all angles from the original hull. Lines of bedding and washed clothing were strung out to the air between the stumps of the three masts cut off some six feet above the main deck.

  The launch carrying Patrick and the other ten prisoners came up through the floating muck on the starboard side of the ship and was made fast to the gangway permanently secured to the hull. The oarsmen shipped their blades. At a command from the Marine corporal, Patrick and the other convicts struggled up the gangway to the main deck. There other Marines met the convicts without a word and liberally using the butts of their rifles prodded them aft along the deck.

  A strong wooden barricade running athwartship and five feet high and tipped every few inches with sharp prongs of iron divided the deck near the ship’s mid-length. Only a single opening existed in the barrier, one so narrow that but a single man could squeeze through at a time. On the stern half of the deck, a watch of ten Marines stood with loaded rifles and fixed bayonets. Just in front of the Marines, three large bore cannons were aimed forward.

  Patrick knew the cannon would be loaded with grapeshot and that with a single blast it could sweep the deck clean of any number of mutinous convicts. The Government officials had a sound reason for the stout walls, the cannon, and the heavily armed Marines on the ship, as they did in all the Australian prisons. The three thousand or so Marines station on the continent prison must keep control of some fifty thousand convicts, and that number was constantly growing with the frequent arrival of another shipload of deportees from England. Many convicts were hardened thieves and murderers. Those who had not been hardened before being sent to the godforsaken land, soon became so under the savage discipline of the Marines. Should the convicts break free, help for the Marines to put down the uprising from distant England lying half way around the world could take months to arrive. In the meantime, there would be wide spread pillage and the wholesale slaughter of civilian officials, and most assuredly of the hated Marines.

  “Gooddam my soul, see the cannon,” Knatchbull muttered. “I’ve never seen that before on other hulks.”

  The corporal of the guards stepped quickly forward and struck Knatchbull in the ribs with his rifle butt. “Shut your trap. Now all of you line up.”

  The convicts were each handed a thin blanket. Then with a Marine carrying a lantern ahead and two other Marines with rifles following, the convicts were herded below deck.

  A horrible stench struck Patrick the instant he dropped below the main deck and he half gagged and his breath came hard. The bilge in the ship’s bottom was a fermenting, sloshing broth of seawater, urine, puke, dung and dead rats and its noxious effluvia filled the confined space below deck.

  A long, narrow passageway running fore and aft separated the lower decks into two sections of equal size. Each of these sections had been divided into
a series of cells each with a capacity to hold several prisoners. The bulkheads had been reinforced with thick timbers to make them shot proof, and escape proof. Every hatchway was strengthened with thick iron bars, and fastened shut with bolts and padlocks. As at topside, only one man at a time could squeeze through the constricted entryway into one of the cells.

  The guards halted the prisoners and unlocked one of the iron reinforced hatchways. “This is yours,” said the corporal. “Here you’ll stay until your trial begins.”

  Patrick held back to be last in line. Sometimes when new prisoners entered such a cell, they were set upon by those already there and beaten and robbed of whatever scant possessions they might have. However there was no attack this time, which told just how tough the Marines guards were enforcing the government rules.

  Patrick could barely make out a dense throng of men, most lying on their blankets, a few sitting or standing. Then the hatchway closed behind him and the Stygian darkness of the grave fell upon the cell. Below decks, no candle or lantern was allowed by the prisoners for fear of fire. One careless flame in the wooden ship would send every man to his death. He heard a man coughed raggedly and spit. Another groaned. There was always some level of sickness among the convicts. Death was a common visitor.

  The dim outlines of two barred portholes gradually became visible. Then in the gloom the scores of men standing or lying about took shape as individuals.

  “Patrick Scanlan, is that truly you?” a voice called out.

  Patrick peered hard into the frail light to identify the man that had called his name. The man was approaching slowly. He was some ten years older than Patrick, an inch or so below average height, quite thin, and limped heavily because of a crippled foot. He was blond headed and wore a long full beard.

  “Peter Swallow. Well I’ll be damned.” Patrick knew Swallow from the voyage to Australia and on the prison hulk at Melbourne. He was one of the educated convicts, which were few in number. He had turned his skill with the pen to forgery and that had gotten him a prison sentence of fourteen years and a journey to Australia. During the long nights on the hulk, Swallow had helped Patrick to increase his knowledge of mathematics. Patrick liked the little, crippled fellow.

  “The same. I thought Van Diemen’s Land would never give you up except as a corpse.”

  “My mates and I decided to come to Sydney.”

  “Ah, that explains it. I hope you’re not the one.”

  “No. Our mate, Taylor, here is. He’s a brave fellow.”

  “You may have a long wait for trial. Nearly every man here in this cell has committed a new crime, or is a witness to one.”

  “How bad is the hulk?”

  “Oh bad. Very bad. Rations are short and the guards are extra strict. All irons are inspected twice a day for tampering, nick-marks, ovaling, and loose rivets. At any time, you can expect to be mustered and counted, and given a full body search, up your holes, everywhere. To be caught with a weapon means a hundred lashes and a day in the bilge pit naked and up to you waist in the slop. Down there you can’t sleep for you’d drown. The worst thing for the likes of you fellows who had a plan is that you’ll never get a work detail on shore while you wait for the trial.”

  Knatchbull spoke, “No work details? That’s what the corporal meant when he said we’d not get a chance to escape.”

  “You’ll not escape from the hulk, that’s for certain,” Swallow confirmed.

  “Goddamn me,” Knatchbull exclaimed. “Popjoy is dead and our mate Taylor will get his neck stretched and all for nothing.”

  “And we all get sent back to Van Diemen’s Land,” McCoy said. “Except for Taylor.”

  Taylor cursed weakly and started to sob.

  Swallow caught Patrick by the arm and pointed. “Over there’s a bit of room where we can sit down and talk some.”

  “Right.”

  Patrick and Swallow made their way through the press of prisoners and dropped down on the deck. Swallow winced and straightened his crippled leg.

  “The thing hurts most all the time,” he said.

  “That doctor would do better as a butcher,” Patrick said. He remembered when the injury to Swallow’s foot occurred. The ship transporting them from England was hit by a strong storm and cargo had broken loose and was rolling about in one of the holds. While helping lash the cargo down, a barrel of salt pork had crushed Swallow’s lower leg and foot. The ships doctor, drunk and caring nothing for convicts, did not properly treat the severe injury and left the leg twisted and the foot deformed.

  “Damn, I’m glad to see you,” Swallow said and caught Patrick by the arm. “We can have a good talk before I go ashore.” He released his hold on Patrick.

  “What do you mean ashore? You said no one gets shore details.“

  “The officials discovered that I have an education. Well an educated man has value even here. I’m what they call skilled labor. Free labor of course. An influential man, one that owns a fish company, had me transferred here to Sydney to keep his books. I’ve been here for nearly as long as you’ve been on Van Diemen’s Land. Usually I stay on shore all night so that I’m available for a full day’s work. The owner has given me a bunk to sleep on in a back room. I’m just temporarily here on the hulk because the owner died and the family members are holding a wake to mourn his death. The funeral was today and tomorrow I go back ashore.”

  “You’re a lucky man,” Patrick said.

  “Yeah, better than most. No lockup, decent food, and the work isn’t difficult. And I’m so crippled that the guards don’t make me wear irons.”

  “Then I’d say you got it doubly easy. Heard anything recently from your wife and kid?”

  “Nothing in the past six months,” Swallow said sadly. “My little girl would be nine now. She was the prettiest little thing you ever saw. Didn’t take after me. Took after my wife who was awfully pretty.”

  Swallow fell silent with his thoughts turned inward. Patrick knew the man was remembering his wife and child in some favorite scene.

  Swallow spoke in a low voice. “But what about you, Patrick? You want to escape or you wouldn’t be party to a Sydney caper. Have you a plan?”

  Patrick spoke in a low voice. Every prison ship had its snitches wanting to curry favor from the Marines. “No. Depends on what happens while I’m here.”

  “And I know what you’re thinking. You’re wondering if I know something that’ll help you.”

  “Tell me about this fishing company you work for.”

  “Patrick, I want to tell you right off that I can’t and won’t take part in any escape attempt.”

  “All right.” Patrick realized Swallow was one of those convicts who had found a position where he was reasonably comfortable and planned to spend his remaining prison years being an obedient servant to a business man.

  “A fishing company means boats.” Patrick prompted.

  “Like I told you, I’m not going to be part of any escape try.”

  “I heard that. But about the boats?” Patrick had run the chance of being killed in the game of a Sydney Trip and wasn’t now going to be easily put off.

  Swallow spoke reluctantly. “They have eight.”

  A flame of hope came alive in Patrick. Boats meant the sea could be used as a way to escape. “All sail boats?”

  “Yes.”

  “What sizes?”

  “Several sizes. Now I’ve said enough. If I’d be caught helping you, I’d be whipped to death. If I didn’t die under the cat, another seven years would be added to my sentence and I’d be sent back to the hulk. Here I would surely die.” Favoring his crippled leg, Swallow climbed to his feet.

  He looked down at Patrick. “I’ll spend my ten years here and go home a free man.”

  Patrick reached up and caught Swallow by the arm and pulled him forcefully down into a stooped position near him. He whispered roughly. “Will your wife wait another ten years? I bet you’ve asked yourself that question many times.”

  Swal
low seemed to grow smaller. Patrick didn’t like what he was doing to his friend. However Swallow offered a chance to escape. If Patrick must be cruel, then he would be cruel. “You said she was a pretty woman so how many men do you think are trying to get into her bed right this minute? And she’s still young and will want some man to love her. She would want that love NOW and not ten years in the future. And she’ll be thinking, I’m getting older every day and soon no man will want me.”

  A moan escaped Swallow and he sank down on the deck beside Patrick. He caught his head between his ands and squeezed it.

  Patrick continued on. “How does your wife even know if you’ll survive to come home?”

  Swallow’s chin sank to rest on his chest. “You’re a heartless man, Patrick. You shouldn’t be saying those things about her.”

  “I’m sorry to say them and I mean no disrespect toward her. But she’s a woman and will act like a woman.”

  Swallow lifted his head and stared out across the crowded cell. “I’ve been thinking those very thoughts ever since I left London.”

  “Then why stay here? Let’s both go to London.”

  Swallow remained silent for a time. “Maybe. Maybe that is the best thing for me to do. To try to get home.” He rubbed his crippled leg. “With this leg I can’t run. So going by sea would be the best way to escape. Still I’d need a strong man to give me an arm when the going got rough. Would you do that if I helped you escape?”

  “I’d help you for as far as I could go and never leave you behind. You have my oath on that.”

  “I take your word for I believe it’s good. With us going by sea neither the Marines or the bounty hunters and their dogs can chase us.”

  “Exactly right. Now is there some way to get a stash of food and other supplies needed for a sea trip?”

  “The company keeps some food and water in a storeroom for stocking the boats when they go out for more than a day of fishing.”