Nanberry

by Jackie French

  Bennelong surged to his feet. He struck Nanberry a great swipe across the cheek. Nanberry fell back onto the floor. He bit his lip to stop himself crying out.

  ‘How dare you —’ began Father White.

  Mr Tench held him back.

  Nanberry struggled to his feet again. He wiped the blood from his mouth. ‘I am sorry,’ he said to Bennelong. ‘I know a warrior is never frightened. But the white ghosts do not know how to behave sometimes.’

  For the first time Bennelong looked at him. ‘You are a little white ghost now.’

  Nanberry put up his chin. ‘I am Nanberry White, son of a great man among these people.’

  ‘You’re nothing. An ant, a beetle.’

  Nanberry trembled. He didn’t know if it was anger, shame or pain. ‘What I ask?’ he said to Father White.

  ‘Ask him how he got those scars,’ said Mr Tench.

  Nanberry translated.

  This time Bennelong laughed. He pointed proudly to the scars on his chest and upper arms.

  ‘Those are from when he was made a man,’ said Nanberry.

  ‘And the deep ones on his arm and leg?’ Father White sounded interested. ‘They look like spear marks.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Nanberry.

  ‘Violent lot,’ said Mr Tench. ‘What about the scar on his hand?’

  Once more Nanberry translated.

  Bennelong laughed again. He seemed happy to talk now, though he faced the men, not Nanberry, as though the boy was a far-off bird, singing to itself.

  ‘He got that scar carrying off a woman from another clan.’

  ‘She didn’t want to go?’ Mr Tench sounded amused.

  Bennelong responded with a long explanation. Nanberry tried to find the words to translate. ‘She was angry. She yelled and yelled. She bit his hand. There was lots of blood.’

  ‘What did he do then?’ Mr Tench was enjoying the story.

  ‘He knocked her down. He beat her till she … I do not know … asleep?’

  ‘Unconscious,’ said Father White grimly.

  ‘Unconscious. She had all blood, lots of blood.’

  ‘Quite the lover,’ said Mr Tench, grinning.

  Nanberry didn’t understand.

  Every day, after that, Nanberry was taken to Bennelong to translate and teach him English words.

  He hated it. Sometimes Father White came with him and it was not so bad. Other times Father White had to be at the hospital, and Mr Tench took him instead.

  Bennelong spoke to him now. But it wasn’t to him; it was to the men. He used Nanberry like a … a boat carrying the sentences to and fro, a way to understand the speech of the white men without learning more than a few words himself. Nor did the white men try to understand much of the natives’ languages.

  Even when Bennelong said that two other Cadigal had survived the smallpox — Colbee, Caruey — he didn’t look at Nanberry to see if the news hurt him. Even when the Governor took Bennelong and Nanberry to a hut on the great headland called Woolara, to look for sails in case the big ships came back, it was as though only Nanberry’s mouth was there. I am parrot mouth, he thought.

  He stood on the headland overlooking the sea with the man who lived at the lookout post and the Governor. Bennelong threw a great spear, it landed exactly on the rock he threw it at despite the wind that whipped about them.

  He shivered. He didn’t like Woolara. It was a place of battle and many dead. He sat on the rocks and stared out to sea, ignoring Bennelong’s and the Governor’s laughter behind him.

  Suddenly he realised that all was quiet. He climbed up the hill. Down on the harbour the boat with the Governor and Bennelong vanished behind the ridge.

  ‘Stop!’ he yelled. He began to scramble down the beach.

  The lookout keeper ran after him. He grabbed his shoulder.

  ‘You’re to stay here a few days, lad. Talk to the natives if they come this way.’

  Nanberry shook his head. ‘No! There are ghosts here. I want Father White. I want to go home!’

  The Surgeon’s hut was home, he realised. The Surgeon was the one who protected him now.

  How could they have left him here? Did Father White know?

  ‘You’ll go home in a few days, lad,’ said the man. He led the way into the hut.

  Nanberry followed him. The shadows were swallowing the day. Soon the ghosts would be out, whispering around the hut, under the howl of the wind.

  It was hard at the lookout hut. But no natives came. There was only a blanket on the floor for him; he had grown used to the comfort of a bed. There were no good stews or roasted duck, just salt meat boiled with dried peas, stinking and sour. There was no Maria to tell him to wash his face. Worst of all, there was no Father White to smile at him and tell him he was a good lad.

  Nightmares left him quiet and shaken: dreams where every person screamed at him, white blisters on their skin; and other dreams where he walked alone, always alone, along a beach that had no end. There was a hut but he could never find it. Never, never, never. Always he walked alone …

  The lookout man, Mr Southwell, was kind enough. He wanted to know what he called native ways. Nanberry showed him how to dig a grave and pour on earth, and how to rub sticks to make a fire.

  But his hands weren’t strong enough and the hot north wind ate every spark he made before it had time to burrow into the dry leaves he’d gathered. At last he gave up and sat on the rocks. Mr Southwell sat with him, the man staring out at the sea for the ship that didn’t come; the boy staring into the harbour, waiting for the man who called himself his father.

  No supply ship came. But at last a fishing boat skimmed across the water, with six convict rowers.

  And at the prow sat Father White.

  Nanberry ran down to the cove below the headland. Even before the boat was pulled up onto the sand he splashed into the water and swam out, grasping the edges of the boat and hoisting himself up. ‘Father White!’ he cried. ‘Father White.’

  ‘Missed me, have you?’ asked Father White. He reached over the rail and ruffled Nanberry’s hair. Maria kept it short so it curled around his head.

  Nanberry held onto the boat till the rowers hauled it up onto the sand. Father White stepped out. He looked at Nanberry for a second, then held out his arms.

  ‘I’m sorry they left you here, boy,’ he said as he held Nanberry close. ‘I thought you would have liked to be out in the wild again for a few days. Be away from the township and the smells.’

  ‘No,’ said Nanberry. ‘Stay with you. Always stay with you.’

  Father White held him close again.

  Chapter 24

  NANBERRY

  SYDNEY COVE, 18 FEBRUARY 1790

  Nanberry sat at the table, his elbows pressed politely close to his body, his freshly ironed shirt crisp and warm against his skin. There were scrambled eggs and toast and honey for breakfast.

  He had helped make the toast, holding the slices of bread up to the fire on a metal three-pronged toasting fork. He had found the honey too, climbing up a tree and filling a bucket with the dripping comb. Father White had patted his head, and said he was a fine lad, then smiled and suggested that perhaps next time he climbed a tree he shouldn’t take all his clothes off, especially when there might be ladies about.

  But how could your knees grip a tree trunk properly in trousers?

  There was a lot to learn, even when you had been English through nearly a whole circle of the stars.

  For a while he had wondered if his skin would turn white too, now that he wore clothes and lived in a ghost house. But his skin was as dark as before.

  He did not let himself think about the Cadigal. They were dead these days: dead to him, even if two others still lived. You did not think about the dead, in case their ghosts came to haunt you. And that was true, for whenever he thought about his family and his friends, he felt like the convicts must have when they were lashed for not working or for being rude to important people. But his pain was inside him, not on his b
ack.

  It would be easier to bear pain on my back, he thought.

  He did not talk to Bennelong, or Bennelong to him any more. Bennelong had enough English words now to talk directly to the Governor, who he called beanga, or father. Sometimes Nanberry saw the two of them walk around the town, the Governor in his fine coat and Bennelong in one almost as fine, the iron ring still around his leg, his convict keeper trailing them with the other end of the rope in his hand.

  ‘Well, are we all ready?’ Father White smiled. Nanberry forced himself out of his dream. It was good to see Father White smile. He was still worried about the big ships that didn’t come, about the convicts and marines who grew thin and tired because they would eat only what came from the stores.

  There was little food left there now. But there was lots of food in the Surgeon’s garden, and plenty of fish in the sea.

  Nanberry had grown almost as tall as a spear. Maria had put longer legs on his trousers and made a coat of Father White’s fit him. She had pulled apart ragged stockings to knit him new ones. Maria could knit cloth that was as warm as o’possum skin.

  Nanberry watched Father White dab his lips with his napkin and stand up from the breakfast table.

  ‘I’m ready, sir.’ Maria stood at the table with her hat on, and her coat, even though the day was warm. Nanberry tried not to bounce with excitement.

  Today was a great day. A … What was the word? … a grand day. Today Father White and he and Maria were to move into a new house, a big house made of bricks, with a slate roof, not this hut where water dribbled in when it rained.

  Something squeaked from the window ledge. Nanberry grinned. Father White and his people and his bungu — no, his o’possum — were to move.

  It was still strange living with an o’possum. Almost as strange as sleeping on a bed off the floor and having times for meals instead of eating when there was food or when you were hungry. There was food in the morning and during the day, and just before the sun set too. If you ate at the right time you could eat as much as you wanted, except for wheat bread and salt meat.

  Nanberry didn’t mind. Salt meat stank. It wasn’t proper food. Bread was good, especially with honey, but cornbread made good toast, and corncobs were even better.

  Father White put his head out the door and made some sort of signal. Men came — men in bare feet and dirty rags, not like Nanberry’s clean pressed shirt and trousers. Nanberry looked at his clothes proudly. Father White had even shown him how to make his boots shine.

  The ragged men began to lift all that could be moved. Already the sacks and boxes from the storeroom had been taken. Now beds, tables and Maria’s big pot were grabbed and hauled away.

  Father White put on his hat and coat. He led the way up the track between the huts, Maria walking behind holding a bundle of her own things. Nanberry and Father White carried nothing, like true warriors. The summer sun beat down on them, making him sweat in his clothes.

  Something screamed behind them. Nanberry turned. It was the o’possum, shrieking at the convict who carried his basket. The angry animal jumped out of the basket and clambered up a tree. It chittered angrily down at them again.

  Nanberry laughed. So did Father White. Even Maria gave a smile. ‘Maybe the o’possum will stay here,’ she said hopefully.

  Father White smiled. ‘The new house is only just up the hill. I suspect he’ll find us.’

  ‘Just as long as he doesn’t find the sack of apples again,’ muttered Maria as they reached the house.

  It was so big! Nanberry ran from room to room as the men put beds and tables down. Maria was bustling about and telling them what to do. A Cadigal man would have bashed her on the head with his axe for speaking to him like that, but here Maria was important because Father White was important, just as Nanberry was important too.

  The house had a big kitchen and a storeroom — and a study too. Upstairs — stairs were stacks of wood you could run up and down — were rooms for him and Maria and Father White. There were shutters at the windows to keep out the wind and a smooth wooden floor that bounced a little when he jumped up and down on it.

  His room was as big as the old hut’s kitchen! It had a window that looked down to the harbour, so he could see if a big ship sailed in.

  ‘Put the bed there,’ he said to the convicts as they lugged it into the room. He knelt on the pallet and looked out the window again. He could see the harbour from his bed, and someone with dark skin splashing in the waves. It was Booroong.

  ‘Father White, may I go and swim, please?’

  ‘Drat the boy … can’t you do something useful?’ Maria bustled in with an armful of sheets.

  ‘Let him have a day of play,’ came Father White’s voice from the hall.

  Something small and dark ran up the stairs, then dashed under the bed. A small furry face — an angry face — peered out. The o’possum gave a short sharp scream.

  ‘Your friend has found us already,’ Father White said to Maria.

  Maria snorted.

  Nanberry laughed again and ran downstairs.

  Booroong was only a girl. But it would be good, just for a while, to speak to someone without having to work out the words. Besides, he knew lots more English words than her and could show them off.

  Nanberry ran down to the waves, yelling as he leapt over the rocks and into the water, diving down into the blueness, then swimming up towards the sunlight, his wet clothes dragging at his body. Booroong laughed as he poked his head out of the water and waved at her.

  It is almost like it was before, a small voice whispered, when you swam while your people feasted and life was good.

  Nanberry shut the voice away. He lived in a grand house. He had Father White, who was proud of him. He was not like Bennelong, with a chain around his leg.

  It was good — yes, it was good — to be English.

  Chapter 25

  SURGEON WHITE

  COCKLE BAY, APRIL 1790

  The fishing boat bobbed and the waves splashed its sides. Nanberry peered down at the nets, excited by the splash of fish. The Surgeon smiled. The lad’s laughter was one of the great comforts of his life.

  All at once the boy looked up, his gaze entranced. ‘Father White! The big ship is sailing!’

  The Surgeon looked over towards the rocky headland, his heart leaping with hope that it might be a ship from England. But it was only the tiny Supply. The Supply was the only ship the colony had left, now that the Sirius had been wrecked on Norfolk Island. It had been taking another load of convicts and supplies to the small outpost there — and the troublesome Major Ross, to try to stop him urging his marines to open rebellion.

  The Supply was heading for Batavia, in a desperate attempt to buy food to keep the colony alive through winter. There had been little from this year’s wheat harvest, although the corn crop had been good. The weekly ration was only two pounds of flour now, two pounds of salt meat or ten pounds of fresh fish, and a cup of rice-and-weevils or dried-peas-and-weevils. It was enough to keep a man alive. But only just.

  The colony had huddled on this barren shore for nearly two and a half years now and still not a sail had been seen from England. Why hadn’t a ship come?

  Sometimes it seemed as though home must have vanished off the earth. At other times he wondered if this land had wandered further south in the great ocean, so no one would ever find them again.

  Foolish thoughts, for a scientist. But no one could help the dreams that came at night.

  The Surgeon stared at the hovels that lined Sydney Cove, the small farming plots, the vast green wilderness of trees behind them. There were still hardly a dozen brick houses in the colony and even those would probably crumble in ten years. The rest were mud and wattle, roofed with bark. Could they even last a third winter?

  He shook his head. There was no clothing to be had in the stores now. No medicines, except the remedies, so new to him, that Arabanoo had told him about, like the oil from the eucalyptus leaves that helped the it
ch and congestion of the lungs. No more dried peas, no wine.

  His fishing brought in enough to feed his household, no more. Even the fish had mostly vanished from the harbour. Only Bennelong still ate all the bread that he wanted in the colony now. The Governor was afraid that if the native knew how little food and gunpowder the colony had he might tell his old friends were he to escape.

  If the Indians attacked now they couldn’t defend themselves. Starvation or murder, thought the Surgeon, which will happen first?

  He looked at his adopted son again, peering down to see whether a fish swam near their nets. He had been right. The lad was a comfort to him. At least he could see that the boy — and Maria — didn’t starve.

  ‘I’ll take you out shooting tonight,’ he said suddenly.

  The lad grinned up at him like he had offered the crown jewels. ‘I can fire a big musket?’

  ‘Yes, lad.’

  ‘We will shoot a kangaroo,’ said Nanberry joyfully. ‘I will show you where they graze. We will be warriors!’

  ‘Yes, lad.’ The more meat the better, thought the Surgeon.

  The Surgeon watched the Supply change course, avoiding the rocks. Poor leaky little ship, with the treacherous reefs and storms between here and Batavia. If only they could all sail away on her, but she could carry fifty men at best. Could she even get to Batavia? Could she make it back here? Even if she did, she would be away for at least five months. How many would survive till then?

  The tiny ship was nearly past the headland now. And then it was gone …

  An empty harbour. Empty stores and empty hopes.

  It was time to haul in the nets, to do a final round at the hospital, checking on the convicts who had unnecessary scurvy, the fools injured in fights because they hadn’t learnt that so far from civilisation every life was precious.

  We are a small speck in a vast land, across an even vaster ocean, he thought. Oh Lord, who sees a sparrow fall, watch over us and protect us. Send us a ship, some food, some stores. Don’t let us die here forgotten.