Far From Botany Bay

by Rosa Jordan

  About a week after boarding the Gorgon, the captives were given cast-off clothing collected from passengers and mariners. The sailor who brought the garments told them that Edwards had been opposed to this charity, but Captain Parker had decided that they were to be allowed on deck as soon as the ship sailed. He would not have the wives of officers on board further insulted by the sight of nude prisoners.

  The day after they received clothing to cover their nakedness, the hatch opened, but no one immediately descended. Instead, a discussion commenced on deck, in voices loud enough for those below to hear most of what was being said. The loudest voice was that of Edwards, which the prisoners knew well and had come to dread. He was saying, in a petulant tone, “I have no choice but to abide by your decision, Captain Parker, but I strongly protest these criminals being allowed out of irons.”

  “It would seem that you make no distinction between men charged and those proven guilty,” Parker observed.

  And Edwards’s unimaginative response, “I don’t know what you mean, Captain.”

  “As the Bounty sailors have not been tried, one cannot say with certainty that all are mutineers,” Parker explained patiently.

  “As for the others, surely you would not keep a woman in irons!” exclaimed the high-pitched voice of a woman whom Mary guessed to be Mrs. Parker.

  “I certainly would,” Edwards asserted. “And have done these six months past. There is absolutely nothing of the gentle sex in Mary Bryant. They say she showed not a sign of grief when her husband died, and put her infant son over the side with neither tear nor prayer.”

  “You are quite mistaken!” protested Tench. “The child Mrs. Bryant has with her now was born on our voyage out. I observed them daily, and I assure you, no high-born lady could have been more tender. The Bryants were model prisoners on that voyage, and in the colony as well, except for Bryant’s delving into the black market. I wager it was for the children’s sake that they made their bid for freedom.”

  “But how did they get to Timor? And with all alive?” wondered Captain Parker.

  “What an intriguing woman,” mused his wife.

  “Pray do not misplace your admiration, Mrs. Parker,” scolded Edwards. “The woman is in no way remarkable.”

  That brought a snort of derisive laughter from Dr. White. “Except that with a babe in each arm, she sailed a boat all the way to Kupang. And am I not correct in saying that their vessel did not founder on a reef?”

  “They are less than the vermin that feeds upon them,” Edwards muttered.

  “A great many humans do not rise above the level of vermin,” came Dr. White’s dour comment. “Nevertheless, it is a remarkable thing they have done.”

  “Indeed it is,” Tench said eagerly. “With your permission, Captain Parker, Dr. White and I will proceed to interview them.”

  “If you wish,” Captain Parker said easily. “But I daresay you won’t stay long. Given the kangaroos and other wildlife we are transporting, the stench in the hold is overpowering. You would do better to wait until we sail, and the prisoners can be brought on deck.”

  At this point Edwards launched into a protestation against the notion that the prisoners should be allowed to take exercise, but Mary had ceased to listen, for even listening took energy she did not have. She lay sweltering in the heat and the mindless rage that now so often consumed her; she was hardly cognisant of her surroundings until James’s voice broke through.

  “Mary! Get up. Captain Tench and Dr. White are here.”

  “Dr. White?” Mary struggled to her feet and tried to collect her thoughts. “You ought not to be here, Sir. ‘Tis not a fit place for the living.”

  “You and the rest of this lot seem alive enough,” he said, in his usual cranky way. Then he squinted past her to Charlotte, who lay naked and unmoving in her hammock. “Good God! Tench said she was thin, but the child is a perfect skeleton!”

  “After being starved for six full months, what would you expect?” Mary spat.

  Tench cleared his throat and said, speaking to Mary but in a voice meant for all to hear, “Mrs. Parker would have you and your child put in a separate cell, Mrs. Bryant, to prevent molesting by the men. But the ship has only the two, and the other is taken up by prisoners from the Bounty. She did ask me to enquire as to whether you are being abused. If so, her husband, the captain, will see that the man is properly punished.”

  For a moment Mary stared blankly, her thoughts coming slower than in the past. Then with that sudden vehemence which, since their recapture, sometimes came exploding out of her without premeditation, she cried, “Abuse? What does she know of abuse? Who among these men—” she flung out her arm to include the four men who shared her cell, “—could imagine doing to a woman what that vile Edwards has done to us all? If Captain Parker would mete out punishment, let him not start with these men, my brothers all, but by hanging—”

  “Mary, Mary!” James grasped her arm and tried to pull her from the bars which she was gripping with unnatural force. “Be quiet!”

  “—Captain Edwards!” Mary shouted. “Hang him, I say! Hang him! Hang him!”

  “Stop it!” White snapped, adding his authority to James’s pleadings. And to Tench, “Captain Parker fairly warned us—the stench down here is unbearable. Let us continue the interview later, when we are out of the harbour and the prisoners can be brought on deck.”

  The two visitors exchanged a meaningful glance and quickly left the hold.

  “Oh, Miss Mary!” Pip whispered in a frightened voice. “Ye ought not to’ve said such a thing. I’m sure they was meaning us well.”

  For a moment longer Mary stood gripping the bars as if her hands were welded there. Only when she turned around and saw how the men were staring at her did she realise what she had done; how, just as she let her rage take possession of her back in Kupang, and had offended Governor Wanjon to the point that he gave no consideration to her supplications, so might she have done again with the officers from Botany Bay.

  “Reckon we ain’t got all that many friends,” Luke said. He turned his back on her, muttering, “Seems like we might be showing respect to them that is.”

  From further along in the hold, Ellison called out, “That your little Captain Mary down there trying to stir up a mutiny?” Amidst raucous laughter, he added, “Don’t count us in on this one. We done had ours, and it ain’t done any of us a bit of good!”

  “Them Bounty boys got a point,” Scrapper said laconically. “Don’t know ‘bout a woman, but a man could get a flogging for saying how one of His Majesty’s officers oughta be hanged.”

  Mary looked from one to another, last at James, whose worried eyes said all those things and more. “Oh James,” she moaned. “Have I lost my mind?”

  “Not your mind, Mary,” he said gently, putting his arm around her and urging her back to her hammock. “There was nothing illogical in what you said. It’s more a matter of self-control, upon which you once prided yourself, and which served you well as a means of getting things done. Flying into a rage was necessary in Batavia, as the fever going about might have killed us all, and there was no other way to bring attention to our situation. But in our present circumstances . . .” His voice trailed off, as if he could not bring himself to criticise her as the others had.

  “I don’t know what comes over me that I behave thus,” she said.

  He looked at her thoughtfully for a moment, then replied, “It has been clear to me for some time that when a body is as wasted as ours are, the mind is likewise weakened. I suppose the same applies to self-control. But I believe, truly I do, that as we recover our physical strength, those other parts of our personality will regain their vigour as well.”

  “Those are comforting words,” Mary said, and closed her eyes and went to sleep.

  *

  Dr. White did not take his ow
n advice about waiting till the prisoners were brought on deck to see them. The next day he returned to the hold, this time alone. Again, James had to rouse Mary from her hammock, for it was to her the doctor wished to speak. “I came to see Charlotte,” he said abruptly. “Bring her to the bars.”

  Mary hesitated. “She cries when I try to lift her. It pains her.”

  “I did not ask what she wanted,” White snapped. “Do as you’re bid, woman.”

  Charlotte did cry when Mary picked her up, and continued to do so as her mother held her near the bars for Dr. White’s inspection.

  He looked at the suppurating sores on the child’s bone-thin thighs, but all he said was, “You have been aboard for more than a week. Has she put on no flesh at all?”

  “She will not eat,” Mary admitted. “I believe it is scurvy, for her teeth have loosened and fallen out but for one.”

  “Hold her close and open her mouth so I can examine it,” the doctor instructed, and muttered to himself, “As if I could see a damned thing down here in the dark.”

  Mary, cajoling the child to open, got the mouth opened wide enough for the doctor to run a finger around inside. “As might be expected,” he snapped. “Full of cankers. Once scurvy reaches this stage it’s damn near fatal. What she needs are citrus fruits.”

  “Are they to be had?” Mary asked anxiously.

  “I will have some sent down,” White said, “But the acidic nature of such foods makes eating them agony once the mouth is so raw.”

  True to his word, Dr. White saw to it that a lime each day was sent down for Charlotte. But as he had predicted, the child screamed in agony when the juice was squeezed into her mouth, and she gagged, and absorbed but a few drops of what was given to her.

  They set sail soon thereafter. To the prisoners’ relief, they were allowed to spend the morning hours on deck where the temperatures, although still stifling hot, were not as high as in the hold.

  One day, as Mary sat with Charlotte, trying to keep her cool with a wet rag and the fanning of her palms, Captain Tench wandered by. “Mrs. Bryant,” he said pleasantly. “The heat is quite unbearable, is it not?”

  “Bearable,” she said shortly. “And awful.”

  “It must have been hot in that open boat, too, when you were sailing the Coral Sea,” he continued, no doubt hoping to lure her into a conversation about the adventures of their escape. When Mary did not respond, he continued, “Of course, one had to mind the reefs there. How was it that you steered clear of them?”

  “’Twas easy enough,” Mary said impatiently. “When I felt coral teeth rising up to bite a hole in the boat, we turned aside.”

  Tench stared down at her uneasily for a moment, then said in a dubious voice, “I see. Well, uh, good day to you, Ma’am.”

  Dr. White, who had observed the exchange, said, “I see your interviews are not going very well, Mr. Tench.”

  Tench grimaced. “Oh, the others are inclined to talk. And except for young Scrapper, not inclined to boast. But her—.” He motioned toward Mary.

  “The criminal mind is not given to reason,” pronounced Edwards, who, although uninvited, had wandered over to join the conversation.

  “I confess I find her strange,” Tench admitted.

  “She has suffered a great deal,” White said shortly. “I suspect that she now stands just this side of madness.”

  Edwards’s small lips curved into a mirthless smile. “Perhaps it will ease her hanging.”

  The heat was horrible on deck, and even worse for the prisoners during the hours they were confined to the hold. Mary stripped off the dress Mrs. Parker had acquired for her, and went back to wearing what remained of the sarong, a mere strip of fabric knotted about the waist. Yet there was nothing sensuous in that nudity, for neither her bare breasts nor her legs retained enough flesh to give them womanly curves.

  Charlotte’s agony was so great when touched that her mother’s arms were no longer a comfort. When Mary realised this, she offered the only thing available that might provide a little solace. She told stories, and called on the others to do the same during all the hours the child was awake. For Mary, nothing existed except her daughter, whom she might have seen—could she have borne the knowledge—was dying.

  In fact, children were dying all over the ship. Within a month of their sailing, Clark wrote in his journal that seven of the mariners’ children had died, most of these being around Charlotte’s age or younger. Only a miracle might have ensured that Charlotte, disease-ridden and starved beyond recovery, would survive. On this voyage there would be no miracles.

  In the late afternoon of May 5, the air was rent with screams. A sailor came tumbling down the ladder to find Mary at the bars, holding Charlotte in her arms. Around her crowded the four men, terrified by their own helplessness.

  “The bosun says shut the bleedin’ bitch up if I have to pitch her oversides,” the tar barked.

  “Please fetch Dr. White!” James begged, as he tried to comply by covering Mary’s mouth with his hand.

  “Come, fellow, you can see she’s plumb off her head. You want her quiet, bring the doctor,” Luke urged the sailor. “He’s the only one can settle her down.”

  “What if he won’t come?” the sailor asked dubiously.

  “He’ll come, Sir, I know he will,” Pip put in. “He’s fair fond of the little one.”

  “Make haste, Sir!” Scrapper panted, as he tried to assist the others in getting Mary into her hammock. “This ain’t—!”

  Just then Mary got one of her arms free and bashed Scrapper across the face, bloodying his nose. The sailor shook his head and disappeared.

  It was not long before the hatchway opened and Dr. White descended, along with the turnkey.

  “It’s Charlotte,” James said, and mouthed the word, “Dead.”

  “Mary!” White commanded. “Bring Charlotte to me.”

  “No!” Mary shrieked, clutching the limp body to her breast. “She is going with me. To see England.”

  White wiped perspiration from his brow, and muttered, “Perhaps she sees it now.”

  “To walk the fields of Cornwall, and pick wildflowers along the lane!” Mary insisted.

  The doctor shook his head slowly from side to side. “You are bound for prison, Mary. That is no place for a child.”

  “In all the world,” she said dully, “no place for my child.”

  White motioned for the turnkey to open the door. When the door was open, he said, “Come, then. Bring her up into the sunshine.”

  Mary followed the doctor obediently, whispering to the little body as if it were alive.

  “Doctor?” the turnkey called after him.

  Dr. White looked back. The turnkey motioned toward Mary’s companions, asking if they were to be allowed to accompany her. White nodded. The turnkey held the cell door open, and the men filed silently out.

  Up on deck, only a few of the ship’s company gathered for the funeral service. It might have been the heat, because the sun was just touching the horizon, and as yet there was no relief from the day’s sweltering temperatures. Or maybe they stayed away because it was only a convict’s child. Or because in recent days they had seen too many children die already.

  Captain Parker came to the railing with a Bible in his hand. Mary gave him a suspicious look. He cleared his throat and began to read, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.”

  Mary interrupted loudly. “She is cold, Dr. White. Feel her hands. Is she not cold?”

  White took the dead child from her. “We are very near the place where Charlotte came to life, Mary. God wants to take her back and you must let her go. Do you wish to kiss her once more?”

  Obediently, Mary kissed the lifeless cheek.

  Captain Parker continued reading. “He maketh me to lie down in green pas
tures. He leadeth me beside still waters.”

  Dr. White held the little body over the railing and let go. Mary watched it fall. Then, without warning, she flung herself at the doctor like a wild animal. Screaming incoherently, she tore at him with teeth and nails. White was so taken by surprise that he sustained several bites and bloody scratches before Tench and Gardner, who stood closest, leapt forward and pinioned her.

  Almost immediately, Mary ceased to flail and went limp. Although her eyes remained wide open, she was obviously not seeing anything around her, nor did she respond to their entreaties. For a moment the onlookers were silent, aghast. Then Mrs. Parker said quietly, “Perhaps we were praying for the wrong soul.”

  From that day in early May until the ship sailed up the Thames in mid-June, Mary spoke not a word. Her mates tended her like the invalid she was, cajoling her to eat and to take sips of water, for without urging she would do neither. She left her hammock only when they pulled her from it and moved her up on deck with considerable effort, two pulling her from above, and two below boosting her from behind.

  While on deck, James never left her side. If it was hot, they took turns fanning her, and if it was rainy, they huddled with her and held a bit of canvas over her head. She paid them no mind, other than to occasionally jerk against their grip. The wooden comb Bados had made stayed tucked into the waistband of the half-sarong she still wore, but her hair remained uncombed and her body unwashed.

  She was in those days something of a curiosity, with passengers and crew wandering by from time to time to observe and comment on her condition. As she appeared oblivious to their presence, they thought nothing of making remarks in her presence. Whereas at the start of the voyage she was called “the girl from Botany Bay,” they later began to refer to her as “the mad woman.”

  Dr. White checked on her daily, sometimes giving James a curt command as to a detail of her care. One morning, as Mrs. Parker was accompanying White on a stroll around the deck, she stopped in front of Mary, and asked, “Does she ever speak?”