Fled

by Meg Keneally

  But while Lockhart’s guard dog was gone – and she had heard many say Lockhart was as overjoyed by this as his officers were – the governor wore a perpetual frown, perhaps put there by the necessity to feed people with crops that wouldn’t grow and livestock that kept dying.

  He didn’t appear to have found comfort in the prayers that Sunday, judging by the look on his face. He stared at the ground as he walked slowly away from the service, wearing a closed, pinched expression that did not invite conversation.

  Jenny didn’t wait for an invitation. ‘Sir,’ she said as she approached. She couldn’t decide whether a bow or a curtsy would be more likely to succeed with this man; she ended up producing a most unsatisfactory hybrid, which she hoped he didn’t take for mockery.

  If he did, he gave her no encouragement. Simply raised his head and looked at her.

  ‘Your Excellency, it’s Jenny Gwyn. Wife to Dan, who brings in all the fish.’

  ‘Yes, Mrs Gwyn. I know who you are.’

  ‘Sir, my husband is doing his best with what tools he has.’

  ‘Yes, as we all must under these circumstances, in this place.’

  ‘Yes, sir. But the fish – close to shore, sir, you must’ve noticed, the catch is not what it was.’

  ‘No. It’s to be hoped it will recover now the winds have turned.’

  ‘But we don’t need to wait for that sir, if you’ll pardon me. There are still plenty of fish to be had – just a bit further out. If Dan was able to use the cutter . . . well, the stores would increase. I’m sure of it.’

  ‘You’re sure of it.’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Once your husband is in my cutter, what is to prevent him sailing out through the heads?’

  ‘He would not be so foolish, sir. He knows the sea, and he knows that taking a vessel such as that into the open ocean would be death.’

  ‘Hm.’

  ‘Sir, if I could make a proposal.’

  ‘Are you in a position to make a proposal?’

  ‘If you want more fish, sir, yes.’

  Jenny sent up a silent prayer of thanks that the repugnant Rowe was no longer there. That was exactly the kind of statement that would have earned her immediate dismissal or worse.

  ‘How would this be, sir?’ she continued. ‘You let Dan take your cutter out. Night’s the best time. Send someone with him. Mr Corbett, perhaps. With his musket. If Dan tries to sail into nowhere, Mr Corbett can use that musket. If Dan comes back with a boat full of fish, you will know we mean as we say and can be trusted with the boat. You’ll have fish for supper a lot more often.’

  The governor stared at her.

  Social barriers had been breaking down. There were still only 1500 of them, and some had drifted beyond the reach of the law while others had been born into imprisonment. It was not unusual to hear soldiers and convicts conversing like friends. There were limits, though. Perhaps a convict berating the governor. A female one, who had no business talking about fish or anything else.

  Lockhart turned and looked behind him, and for a moment she was sure the rest of his body would follow, that she had offended him and that she and Dan would be condemned to the dwindling returns of the shallows.

  The governor didn’t walk away, though. He saw the man he was looking for, and beckoned him over. Within half a minute, Mr Corbett had answered his summons.

  ‘Corbett, you know this woman.’

  ‘Yes, of course, Your Excellency. Dan Gwyn’s wife. I occasionally assist, as you know, in hauling nets with the Gwyns.’

  ‘What is your assessment of her character, and that of her husband?’

  Corbett turned to her, his face shadowed from the eyes of the governor, and gave her a lopsided smile. It would have been more comfortable on the face of a young boy about to put a burr under a horse’s saddle.

  She tightened her jaw and widened her eyes, not wanting to risk a head shake but hoping her expression was warning enough not to joke.

  Then Corbett turned to fully face the governor. ‘I haven’t a complaint in regard to either of them, Your Excellency,’ he said. ‘They have been temperate and of good behaviour since our arrival here, and before. They were both of them on the Charlotte, where Gwyn distinguished himself in helping with the management of the other prisoners. I believe they may be trusted as much as any convict here.’

  ‘Do you feel, Captain, that there might be some merit in exploring Mrs Gwyn’s claims of better catches further out?’

  ‘Yes. Certainly, with the new fleet on its way, there can be no harm in investigating.’

  This was the final, irrefutable argument, as Jenny knew it would be.

  ‘Very well. You will take the cutter out with Gwyn. He will take you to where he believes fish are to be found, and if he comes back with sufficient numbers, I will consider letting him have use of the cutter.’ The governor turned to Jenny, then. ‘Of course if your husband comes back with nothing, one might be tempted to ask oneself what his motives were in asking for the vessel.’

  ‘There will be fish, sir,’ Jenny said. ‘As to how many, I couldn’t say. But more than we are hauling these days. My husband is willing to bet his reputation on it.’

  When Dan found out he had bet his reputation on it, he drew back his hand to strike Jenny.

  ‘Now before you go doing that,’ she said, her calm manner stilling him momentarily, ‘I’d like you to think how it would look to Mr Corbett. You know he doesn’t hold with that sort of thing, and – well, Corbett’s goodwill is useful to both of us. So I wouldn’t, if I were you.’

  Dan closed his fist in midair as though snatching at an insect, lowered his hands to his sides and swore. ‘Why did you pretend you were speaking for me? Why did you speak at all? I’ve never been to this place where you say the fish are to be found! Wouldn’t know where to find it, especially not in the dark. If I come back with an empty boat, Lockhart will see it as proof of a planned escape, and you and I will be watched. They might even move us into the barracks so they can do a better job of watching. You may very well have ruined everything.’

  ‘If I wanted to ruin things, I would leave them as they are, bringing in fewer and fewer fish until there were none, and everyone – including us – starved, and they moved us out of our hut because a fisherman who can’t bring in fish isn’t worth it.’

  She let him sulk for a while, then led him to the gap in the trees and pointed to where Mawberry had brought her on the water.

  ‘I don’t think they go out every night – at least, not to this place. They have their own fires, of course, but I don’t like your chances of getting the governor to allow you to light one in the cutter.’

  Dan stared out, his eyes unfocused and jumping from one side of the bay to the other. ‘He was probably reluctant to give us the boat because of you.’

  ‘Me!’

  ‘You talk to people you have no business talking to. Asking about everything from pitch to soap to flax.’

  ‘All useful things.’

  ‘Especially when it comes to repairing boats or making sails. For God’s sake, stop it. We do not want them to start counting fish.’

  ‘You will not be watched. They will not believe it can be done in the governor’s cutter, with my big belly. And for now, the only thing I’m keen to escape is a move to the women’s huts.’

  But perhaps after a few good hauls, and months of returning the boat each morning in good condition, Dan might be allowed to take it outside the heads. Jenny could join him. They might see what the coast was like outside the sheltering arms of the harbour. The last time she’d been past the coast’s southern reaches, she had been below decks. It would be useful to be out in a boat with no decks at all. As for the northern coast – very few English people, as far as she knew, had seen that.

  For now, though, she told Dan everything she could about where Mawberry had found the fish, and showed him a hook she had made out of the shells Mawberry used.

  ‘Well, you’d better come w
ith us,’ he said.

  Jenny smiled. If she hadn’t been invited, she would have insisted, but far better to have her presence asked for.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I suppose so. Don’t want you and Mr Corbett rowing round in circles out there until dawn.’

  The dreams came to her almost every night, with varying degrees of intensity. Sometimes in fragments, sometimes in seemingly endless, circular stories that followed their own logic.

  Occasionally Jenny was in a canoe like Mawberry’s, rowing out through the heads, trying to turn north before a wall of water silently formed in front of her. Or she was back in Cornwall, walking to the door of her house, opening it, seeing her mother and Dolly at their work by the hearth, embracing them and weeping – only to find they did not notice her presence, did not feel her kisses, continued talking as before.

  Dawn would bring the laughter of birds, and sometimes of Charlotte if Dan was in a playful mood and decided to tickle her. Jenny would haul herself up through the water of her dreams to the surface, then set about the daily task of not dying and ensuring that neither of her children – the one without and the one within – did either.

  So escape was not immediately possible. But the idea continued to flit around the edges of her vision, an impossibility that refused to be forgotten as all impossible things should be.

  John Carney came with them in the end. He was known to Mr Corbett and had earned the gratitude of the marines by not giving them any reason to exert themselves on his behalf. And the cutter had six oars.

  Neither Carney nor Mr Corbett showed any surprise when Jenny arrived with Dan, although Corbett fussed over her a little. ‘Help her on, man, and be careful with it,’ he said to Dan. ‘Make sure she doesn’t bump herself.’

  Dan did as he was told, helping Jenny haul herself in. She scrambled to the front, to what she viewed as her place, and no one stopped her.

  ‘So,’ said Dan, ‘where are you taking us this evening?’

  ‘Back to Cornwall, I thought,’ she said, and everyone in the boat laughed, though the words did not have the ring of a joke.

  As night fell, she guided them to the spot that Mawberry had shown her. No canoes were out that night, but there was enough of the moon to light the way.

  She sat with her newly crafted hook dangling from a thread she had extracted from her skirt, while the men hauled the net. By midnight there were close to twenty fish in the bottom of the boat.

  ‘Will this do, do you think?’ said Dan. ‘Will these fish make our case?’

  ‘I imagine they will,’ said Corbett. ‘As we are out here, though, we might as well give the ocean enough of a chance to prove itself. A few more hours, at least.’

  The fish threatened to flop off the piece of canvas and onto the dirt. Dan could have presented them in a barrel, but he wanted to show off. So he held the end of the canvas drawn tight until he could release the catch before the governor’s feet.

  When Lockhart nodded his approval, Jenny and some of the women took the fish away for gutting and scaling. Dan’s theatrical moment was all very well, but leave them there too long and he’d be standing in front of a stinking pile of unusable rot.

  The boat was, in all but name, Dan’s from then on. He trained a crew – John Carney and Vincent Langham, the former navigator of a merchant vessel – to fish with him, and trained up a few of the lads so he could call on them at need.

  News of the better catch spread quickly, and brought with it the renewed attention of Elenor.

  She and Joseph had married in a ceremony as sparse as Jenny and Dan’s. Perhaps they’d been hoping for a hut of their own, or at least permission to clear land and build one. They were surely disappointed, though, for both remained in the main settlement.

  The pair of them enjoyed gossiping; both adored being the first to pass on news of a skirmish with the natives or an attempted escape. If anybody else dared to bring information into the clannish convict society, they were ridiculed, sneered at, told they were lying. Because Elenor and Joseph wanted to be the sole purveyors of truth, the only ones who could be relied on to say what was what.

  One of the truths they had been purveying recently was the story of an affair between Jenny and Mr Corbett.

  Jenny had snorted when Bea had told her. They were sitting cross-legged on the ground, each with a fish on a piece of bark in front of them. Jenny had taught her friend to gut and scale fish, but Bea still couldn’t match Jenny’s speed and accuracy – Jenny had had her hands inside fish bellies since early childhood. But it was good to have the help, and the company.

  It was also good, Jenny had to admit, to have someone who could enlighten her on the state of things in the settlement. One of the few disadvantages of the Gwyns’ living arrangements was isolation, and in the hole left by Jenny and Dan, darker things might grow. They were growing, by the sounds of it.

  ‘Can you imagine anyone less likely to bed a married woman than Corbett?’ she said to Bea. ‘I wonder if he even knows how.’

  ‘There have been women, from time to time,’ said Bea. ‘Not often, and not for long. He’s discreet, and he takes care of them.’

  Oddly Jenny felt jealous, and tried to crush the impulse to find out who these women were.

  ‘Well, my bird,’ she said, ‘I can tell you for certain that that particular rumour is false.’

  ‘Of course it is,’ said Bea. ‘Most know it, too. But it doesn’t stop them talking about it, does it? They have to entertain themselves somehow.’

  ‘This’ll be Elenor’s doing, I expect.’

  ‘Her and Suse, yes. They say, particularly Joseph, that you’re being given a bigger share of the catch. That you’re being given extra rations, too. That you and Dan threatened to withhold the fish if you don’t get what you want.’

  ‘Do you believe the governor would allow us to do that?’

  ‘I don’t, no. But Joseph, you see, he’s clever. He never makes something up out of thin air. He chooses a fact and rolls it around in the mud until it is roughly the same shape but much bigger and uglier. So no, I don’t believe it. But there are those that do, those that say you’re holding the settlement to ransom, you and Dan. They say action must be taken.’

  Jenny was suddenly very, very angry. Had those who said such things actually tried to learn how to fish, or offered to help with the scaling and gutting and pressing?

  ‘Will you tell them, then, that any fish that ends up in their guts was put there by us?’

  ‘They know that already. It’s what makes them angry.’

  ‘Angry that we’re feeding them?’

  ‘Angry that they have to rely on you.’

  ‘But Dan . . . You saw how it was on the Charlotte. The lads love him.’

  ‘They did. Some of them still do. But not everyone came here on the Charlotte.’

  ‘What can we do, Bea?’ said Jenny. ‘I’m not giving away our share of the catch, that much is certain, although you can have as much as you want.’

  ‘I wouldn’t be giving anything away either,’ Bea said. ‘You earned it. If you start giving fish away, even one, they’ll think you have far more than you need. The next day there’ll be ten people waiting down at the shore, or twenty. When you can’t magically produce fish from under your skirts, they are not likely to be forgiving.’

  ‘So we just go on as we are, then. Catching as much as we can, and keeping as much as we can.’

  ‘Yes, I think so. At least I can’t see any other way. But be careful. A great many people would like to see you and Dan brought down to the same level as the rest of us. They’re sitting at Joseph’s knee like a child hearing a story.’

  It didn’t take long for the first request to arrive. The next day, as Jenny wasn’t occupied with fishing, she was put to work with the other women. Because she was large and ungainly, she wasn’t able to do anything except collect shells for burning. Today, she was collecting them with the group of women that included Elenor.

  Almost immediately
, she saw what Elenor was doing. The woman inserted herself between Jenny and the rest of the group, walking slightly away until the distance widened to the point where a hissed demand would be heard only by Jenny.

  ‘This is your doing, all of it,’ Elenor whispered. She flung her arm around Jenny’s shoulder in a gesture of seeming amiability, but her nails dug into the flesh of Jenny’s upper arm.

  Hunger was driving many people to anger, to violence or despair. Now, it had clearly ended the period of relative peace between Jenny and Elenor.

  ‘It isn’t, though, Elenor,’ Jenny said. ‘You were there, you took part, and I don’t recall you refusing an equal share.’

  ‘You were the one who bashed her. You were the one who made her bleed, who made her screech and scream and get attention. We would probably be back in Plymouth by now, after maybe a few years in prison. Now we are here, we will always be here.’

  ‘Do you know, Elenor, how boring you are?’ said Jenny.

  The nails dug in harder. ‘Tell me, then, how boring am I?’

  ‘Ask any lag – here or in Newgate or in Plymouth – whether they deserve what they’re getting. Ask any of them whether they committed the crime. Most of them will tell you they didn’t, and those who own to it will tell you about their starving mother or grandmother or children or aunts. The real cowards, though, will tell you how someone else made them do it.’

  Elenor’s nails punctured Jenny’s skin, leaving half-moon indents. Jenny inhaled sharply but refused to cry out.

  ‘You might remember, I am owed a favour. You will give me one fish a day,’ Elenor said. ‘I will come to your hut to collect, every morning. No little ones, either. The biggest you have. Actually, you know what? Now I think of it, you’ll lay all of your fish out for me, and I’ll pick the one I like best. Every morning, starting tomorrow.’