The Hanging of Mary Ann

by Angela Badger

  “That single word saved my life I am sure. ‘I am not an Englishman,’ I said. “I am a Frenchman, baptized in the faith, and in the name of the Holy Mother I swear this shall be the end of the matter. Have you thought what will happen if an officer of King George disappears? The country hereabouts will be turned upside down and even if they have no evidence, plenty could be found about your other activities…” I gestured to the ragged men who watched every movement I made.

  I took another step forward and leant over the captain whose eyes rolled with fear. “No more will be spoken of this. Will it?” I repeated and he just shook his head. He was so scared he couldn’t even speak.

  “So that night when the governor arrived at the post he found his captain and everything as it should be.” Grand-père sat back and closed his eyes for a moment.

  “How could that change your life, Grand-père? You haven’t explained that.”

  “As I’ve said before, the pay of a private in the New South Wales Corps was fourteen pounds a year but grants were often made for services rendered. You could be rewarded by money or land. The very next day the good Major made it clear that my lips must be sealed and I’d not go unrewarded. Well, I was wise enough to have understood that. He was as good as his word. A grant of land came my way, my first piece of property, those acres out beyond Liverpool, we still have them in the family. And now so much besides sir. The Guise lands stretch for thousands of acres, Up to the mountains and down to the lake. The holdings around Sydney are well known, too.”

  “And it all happened because of that night at the inn and your going round to the kitchen because of the stink of the bugs!”

  “Well, that was the beginning: a piece of land, cattle, some good years when you sell at a good price, bad years when drought stifles you… good… bad. “The old man’s head nodded upon his chest.

  “Your grandfather’s very tired.”

  “I’ll ask them to find Job to help him to his room.”

  “Let me do that, Miss Mary Ann.”

  “We have our servant with us Sir.”

  “Perhaps for one moment I can be your servant?”

  Mary Ann busied herself winding up her wool and putting her work away in her tapestry bag. She did not look up. So much that was new had happened in the last twenty-four hours, not least the uneasy sensation of treading upon completely unknown territory when she caught Frank’s glance.

  CHAPTER 4

  Mary Ann stepped from the carriage and looked up and down the street.

  Catching her breath she gazed at the sandstone facades, all uniformly handsome and imposing. The city at last! An elegant street in an elegant city just as imagined. What a relief to be finally free of that lurching coach. To be able to stand upright once more! Taking a deep breath she hurried up the path to her sister’s front door.

  Everything became better and better. In those few moments she moved from everyday life into a dream, and when dreams become the new reality then anyone’s life is transformed.

  Greeted by the scent of pot-pourri and beeswax, hugged and kissed and hugged yet again, Mary Ann immediately felt at home. Her height, her hair, her complexion, in fact everything about her person became the subject of amazement and admiration for the elder sister. And soon it was her own turn to wonder and exclaim as Hannah finally led the way up the hall. The delicate plasterwork in the cornices, the archway above their heads and the soft carpet under their feet! The floorboards and planks of Bywong were a whole world away.

  Briefly Mary Ann felt like a wild creature which had strayed out of the forest into one of the paddocks, one of the brumbies from the mountain slopes rubbing shoulders with the thoroughbreds. Silly, she shook herself, a home is just a home, after all. Certainly her grandfather did not appear to be overawed.

  Grand-père, supported by Job, hobbled behind them.

  “Dear Grand-père, I’ll take you to your room at once. The girl can bring you some tea and…”

  “Tea! Haven’t you anything stronger than that?”

  “Dear Grand-père, I forget your country ways,” Hannah inclined her head and pursed her lips. “Oh, the doormat’s back there,” she pointedly frowned at his boots. “Well it doesn’t really matter, not raining today…yes, of course you can have anything you want. I’ll speak to them in the kitchen. Let us settle you down and make you comfortable after that great journey. First things first.”

  First things first. She lived by popular maxim. A stitch in time saves nine, do unto others etc. Life was easiest when lived according to convention in Hannah’s view. Her shrewd grey eyes saw what they wanted, nothing else existed in her world. The first of the Guise girls to marry, she had long forgotten the easy life of Bywong and happily embraced the formality of city living. Standards must be maintained, obligations met and time needed to be spent ensuring daily routines were correctly observed. Neat ringlets framed a face which was beginning to owe just a little more to artifice than nature. Time marched on and Hannah intended to remain at the forefront. Brisk, kindly, without a trace of any disturbing fancy in her head, Hannah welcomed her visitors…but she did not expect her life to suffer too many disruptions.

  “We can’t have the place turned upside down,” she’d shared her opinions with her husband earlier that day. “I hope he’s not going to expect everyone to wait hand and foot on him. And Mary Ann will need to change her ways too. None of that racing off doing her own thing all the time, life is different here. She’ll have to mind her manners. There’s so much I’ll need to show her.” Hannah allowed herself a heartfelt sigh. “But I hope I know my duty, I’ve always known my duty.” And her husband nodded, dutifully.

  “It’s most gratifying to have my family under our roof, but I hope they haven’t brought their country ways with them. We don’t want any nonsense. No nonsense, I say.” He had nodded again.

  Settling Grand-père took up to the best part of an hour. Hannah made it clear to her young sister that looking after all his needs remained firmly within Mary Ann’s domain. “He’s such a demanding old man, isn’t he? Seems to think he is the centre of the universe.”

  By the time his face and hands were sponged, a pillow propping up his back, another under his knee and a glass of wine in his hand Mary Ann had learnt the layout of the bedrooms and the kitchen and the washhouse.

  “Let me show you the parlour.” Taking her arm, Hannah led her sister down the hall. The rich colours of a Kidderminster carpet glowed on the polished wooden floor whilst on each side pictures covered the walls and a French clock ticked the hours away upon a mahogany card table.

  “Oh, so elegant,” exclaimed Mary Ann as she rested her hand on the Turkey-style sofa which had no ends or pillows. “I’ve never seen a sofa like this… and how beautifully those crystals reflect the sunshine.” On a small table between two red morocco armchairs a large candlestick with lustre drops caught the last rays of the afternoon sun.

  “Newly arrived in the Colony my dear, the latest in fact.”

  The dining room proved no less stylish but as Hannah ran her finger along the back of one of the eight rosewood chairs she frowned. “These servants, no better than Gundaroo, I’ll be bound, you’d think they could at least manage the dusting. Oh, mind that vase!” She frowned as Mary Ann brushed against the sideboard. “Wedgwood, of course, not that ordinary blue stuff, black jasper it’s called.”

  Wedgewood, Hepplewhite, soirées, tête a têtes as quickly as the words tripped from Hannah’s lips Mary Ann squirreled them away, an exclusive vocabulary of delicacy and pleasure.

  Harvesting, haymaking, footrot and the myriad ills of livestock and crop had always dominated the conversation at home, now the arrival of the latest ship, the date of the next ball at Government House or the beginning of the Races were on everyone’s lips.

  Over the next weeks, as Grand-père underwent his operation and began the slow business of recovery, Mary Ann’s head echoed with words she had never heard before. Chinoiserie, deshabillée, boudoir, pot pourri
and of course the necessity for the careful observance of etiquette. Sometimes she seemed to be learning another language. But she found little time to ponder that, Grand-père’s needs filled up most of the day. Sitting reading to him or listening to his chatter took up a lot of time and when she wasn’t expected to be at his side then Hannah whisked her off on shopping expeditions and visits to friends.

  Mary Ann found the latter quite daunting. They were very fine ladies indeed. Hannah took her out paying visits nearly every day, the strict etiquette demanded that calls were made and returned with almost military precision, especially in the afternoon when Grand-père snoozed. On the days when they did not go out ladies came calling round to become acquainted with this newly arrived relative of dear Hannah’s from the country. Smiling and nodding they plied her with endless discreet questions as they sat perched upon the rosewood chairs sipping tea.

  As soon as polite enquiries about events in the country flagged, because of course everyone knew nothing of importance ever happened away from the city…they fell back on their usual exchanges.

  “Sixpence! Can you imagine, sixpence to be rowed just across the Harbour. And then the lazy fellow shipped the oars before we got to land. The gentlemen in our party had to take turns. Exhausted they were! That fellow declared he had the cramp and could go no further. I ask you, sixpence!”

  The disgraceful lack of respect, the idleness and the sheer frustration of dealing with the lower orders came continually to the fore in their conversations.

  The evenings proved no different. When guests arrived for dinner - whilst the Sauternes, the claret and the brandy lightened the conversation - the deplorable fecklessness of the working class remained the overriding topic.

  The upper echelons of Sydney obviously had very hard burdens to shoulder. Only when talk turned to gold discoveries, and the new wealth that would follow on a good investment, did the mood lighten. When the port circulated and the ladies retired to the drawing room each sex could talk about matters that really interested them. Money and sport for the men. Marriage and fashion for the ladies.

  As she listened Mary Ann was surprised to find she increasingly yearned for the old parlour, with the flames licking up the sides of the stones in the fireplace, the familiar smell of tallow candles.

  “…and don’t you agree?” one of the ladies turned to Mary Ann for an answer but Mary Ann had never heard the question. Her thoughts had been back at Bywong and she stuttered out some hastily composed reply. With slightly raised eyebrows the ladies exchanged glances - these country folk!

  It’s the newness of it all, she kept telling herself as Hannah’s housemaid fussed and tidied and dusted and polished every surface even though it already gleamed like glass. As she dutifully followed her sister into the parlour and waited for the ringing of the front doorbell to herald yet another caller she told herself not to be such a dullard. This was how ladies spent their days, after all. The only change in their routine occurred when they themselves went out visiting and invariably another orderly, prosperous establishment presented itself.

  “And did you prefer Maritana to Satanella?” the ladies were sitting on the verandah at the rear of the house belonging to Hannah’s bosom friend Mrs McAllister. Mrs McAllister gleaned the gossip and ground it down to the tiniest particle, only then did it waft around the city’s tea tables.

  “I felt the story of Maritana was a little…well, you know, a trifle risqué and I certainly preferred the singing in Satanella.”

  “Ah, wait till you’ve seen Farouita,” chimed in another lady.

  “I can assure you, Mr.McAllister would never suggest such a performance to me. No respectable person would be seen in the audience.”

  The other lady was momentarily chastened, but only momentarily. “I certainly saw the Governor’s lady in a box and her friend Mrs.Wentworth was there, too.”

  “We all know the company Mrs Wentworth keeps. Enough said.”

  “While I think of it,” Hannah was adept at changing the subject if it became controversial.” That new dressmaker, the one who made up that lovely yellow taffeta of yours, where does she live?”

  “Ah, Madame Duval. I’ll find her address later, my dear.” Mrs McAllister turned to her guest, “do you find the city very tiring, that is, after your life at…where is it…yes, of course…Gun… Gundarry...no, I remember… Gundaroo?” Before Mary Ann could reply another question followed.

  “It must be wearisome, so far away from town. Do you have any society in that part of the world…does anyone actually live there?”

  “There are several very large properties in the area…”

  “But I don’t suppose anyone actually lives there more than a few months of the year, do they? The men would go down for a hunt now and then and see how matters are progressing but beyond that…what is there for them to do?”

  “Many certainly prefer city life. Strangely, our mother seemed to favour the country. I can’t tell you the relief for me when dear Edward agreed to us moving up here. We’ve a very good overseer on the property. We only go back when I need to visit my family.”

  “I have a cousin near Goulburn. That isn’t far from Gundaroo I believe?” Mrs McAllister gave Mary Ann a pitying glance. “She’s frantic, absolutely frantic to get back to the city. Not a soul lives down there, she tells me. There’s nobody living down there at all.”

  Nobody? Uneasily Mary Ann shifted in her chair but she did not want to speak out in such sophisticated company.

  Nobody? What about the schoolteacher and the blacksmith and the new store in Gundaroo where you could buy anything from cough linctus to a blade for the harrow. What about the hunting parties of the Canberri and the smoke rising from the fires of the Ngunawal? Then there were all the newcomers to the district, for people were always on the lookout for land. And round about seethed that underbelly of life, the runaways and the ne’er-do-wells, those who’d lost all they possessed and existed in the bush since they had nowhere else to go.

  But of course they were all nobodies! Annoyance surged through Mary Ann as she listened to the desultory exchange.

  “Everyone works very hard in Gundaroo,” she blurted out.

  “Works?” muttered Mrs McAllister, rolling the word distastefully round her tongue. “Oh, really. How interesting. Surely there are picnics and the occasional races and perhaps a ball?”

  Mary Ann shook her head. “Sometimes Ashton’s Circus comes, then just sometimes we have a ball. The Count de Rossi is going to give a ball one day. His father is building a ballroom.”

  “Count de Rossi…doesn’t the family live at Rossiville?” a lady asked.

  “The very same,” Mrs McAllister was quick to show off her knowledge.

  “You know it’s said the old man gave up his title, but his son has reclaimed it,” another lady chimed in and others followed.

  “Why would he do that?”

  “Who knows with people of that ilk.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, it’s common knowledge. The family come from Corsica.”

  “Like Bonaparte?”

  Mrs McAllister nodded. “But not of the same persuasion. The old count had been a spy in the pay of good King George.”

  A hush had fallen round the table. “Of course he was well rewarded, that’s where their fortune came from. Perhaps that’s when he gave up his title. But his son has certainly taken it back, always over there attending to their property. You say he is giving a ball?”

  Mary Ann nodded. “Yes, it will be a great occasion. We’ve never had a really grand ball before.”

  “There! It’s as I said. Just one ball! So remote. You poor girl.” Her hostess added the last remark with a doleful shake of the head. “Ah! Out here, my love, we are taking advantage of the clement weather.”

  Mrs McAllister raised her hand majestically as they heard a footstep inside the house.

  The little man who tentatively put his head round the door and just as cautiously advanc
ed across the verandah reminded Mary Ann of the doomed male spider in the clutches of the murderous female golden orb.

  Lateish in the summer these spiders weave multi-layered webs stretching between bushes and plants and trees. Not a flat web such as spiders usually spin, but a great trap which stretches in three levels and snares a multitude of flies.

  The fat, striped female spider waits complacently in the centre for her next victim, and further out the single, tiny male clings to a strand and awaits the remnants of her meals. Wing of wasp and leg of beetle are his lot while his mate gorges on fat bodies. Not wanting to be her next repast he keeps to the furthest edges of the web.

  Mary Ann had always marvelled that birds did not swoop down and gobble up the fat spider waiting in the middle but Grand-père had explained the spreading gossamer confounded them. Not one web but several confronted them, so they kept away.

  Mrs McAllister extracted yet another piece of Turkish Delight from its box and discreetly brushed the icing sugar moustache from her upper lip. Her mate hovered just out of reach.

  Two more weeks of this? Mary Ann picked at her cake and wished herself many miles away. How much she had looked forward to the visit and now her thoughts were entirely of Bywong, the space and silence of the farm. Away from this place where heavy sandstone and brick and cobbles crushed and covered the earth.

  As the ladies clucked and commiserated the hours away Mary Ann thought longingly of just such a mellow afternoon back at Bywong. The air would be filled with busy calls from the chickens as they wallowed and fluffed the afternoon away in their dust baths. From the fowl run would come those deep contented exchanges the birds made as the soft sand slipped through their feathers and between their claws. Living so close to Nature she’d observed that hens had different calls for different times of the day. In the morning an urgency marked their exchanges, sometimes the triumphant cackle for a newly laid egg, but, in the afternoon contentment softened their songs, bringing forth deep caws of pleasure, sounds redolent of full gizzards and fat worms and all the things that made a chicken’s life a delight.