I await, Sir …’
Louis looked up. ‘There it is, Sara! My daughter is the property of her maternal grandfather ‒ too delicate a plant to be entrusted to this harsh manner of living, or to my irresponsible care!’
She had not known Louis as angry as this before. She said, ‘And what will you reply to him?’
‘Reply!’ With great emphasis he thrust the letter back into his pocket. ‘I’ll reply in person ‒ and I’ll show him exactly whose property Elizabeth is.’
Sara put a hand on his arm. ‘Louis, what do you mean?’
‘I’m taking a passage to England in order to fetch Elizabeth. And then I’ll bring her back to the country that in future will be her home.’
‘Here …! Are you mad?’
‘Mad, Sara? If you had a daughter as well as three sons, wouldn’t you keep her here with you?’
‘That’s different. If I had a daughter she would have been born here. She would be of the generation that belongs here, just as my sons are. She would know nothing of England, or the niceties of manners all little girls imbibe from the time they can walk. And in the end I would have to send her back to England, so that the accepted pattern of gentility could be imposed upon her.’
‘Elizabeth shall bring it here with her!’ he said emphatically. ‘She shall have one of those females who run uncomfortable seminaries for young ladies to accompany her. And nothing ‒ nothing at all, Sara ‒ will be neglected in the direction of music, painting, and sewing! If she is not precisely her mother’s daughter, she will be grateful to me for taking her away from that cold barracks her grandparents inhabit.’
Sara shook her head doubtfully. ‘Shouldn’t you think again, Louis? You’re angry now …but later you will see it differently. She is such a child still, yet …’
‘But she is my child!’ he burst out. ‘She will live in my house, and lead the life I have chosen for her!’
Angrily he rose, and stood frowning down at her.
‘I am quite determined about this, Sara. The Dolphin is in Port Jackson ‒ it was she who brought in the mails. I am going now to write to her captain to hold me a passage for the homeward trip. She goes directly back to the Cape, I believe. With favourable weather, in six months I shall be in England.’
Louis sailed with the Dolphin three weeks later. He went leaving Madame Balvet in charge at Banon, and his business affairs in Andrew’s hands, begging Andrew to find time occasionally to ride out to the Nepean, to report progress at the farm.
The harbour was white-capped the day he left, its green shores beautiful and aloof, as they had been the first time he saw them. He kissed Sara’s hand, shook Andrew’s firmly, and then made his way down the wooden steps of the jetty to the waiting boat. The wind whipped Sara’s skirts about her ankles, and fluttered the handkerchief she waved. As he drew into the shadow of the Dolphin, he could distinguish Sara’s red gown in the midst of the small crowd on the jetty.
Chapter Two
On a Sunday evening in March, 1804, Sara stood with Julia and Ellen Ryder on the veranda of their house. She bent and kissed Julia Ryder’s cheek warmly in farewell.
‘Take care of yourself,’ she said in a low tone. ‘Perhaps now that Ellen is back here to take charge, James could spare you to come to Glenbarr for a visit?’
‘We’ll see … we’ll see,’ Julia answered cautiously. ‘I’ve scarcely had time to get used to the thought of Ellen being back yet, and I very much doubt that the Bath seminary has trained her in the management of a colonial household. But … we’ll see, my dear. Your Sebastian holds my heart-strings so firmly, I find it difficult to stay away.’
Ellen, beside her, let out a little squeak of protest. ‘Oh, Mama, really …!’
Andrew, standing on a lower step, turned back towards Julia. ‘I wish you could consider quite a long visit to Glenbarr. Sara will need some company while I’m away.’
‘Away …?’ she echoed. She looked questioningly at him. ‘I didn’t know you planned a trip ‒ is it to the East again?’
‘Andrew,’ Sara said quietly, ‘is thinking about going to England. It isn’t definite yet, but perhaps when the Hawk comes in again …’
James Ryder, who had been waiting with the carriage door open, suddenly spoke. ‘What’s this about England?’ He started to mount the steps again.
Andrew nodded. ‘I’ve had a notion to go for some time. The news about the way Macarthur’s wool samples were received has set me thinking. He knows what he’s doing, that man. He saw the future of this country was in wool long before any of us.’
Ryder smiled faintly. ‘I wouldn’t say you’d been precisely slow in following him, Andrew. Your own merino flocks are almost as large as his …’
‘Ah, yes,’ Andrew broke in quickly, ‘but look how he’s got ahead of me now. He knows the market for wool in England, and has made himself the most talked-of man in the wool trade there at the moment. Why, he got himself out of a court martial almost entirely on the strength of what he could do for the future of the trade in Yorkshire! I’ve got to get there as well, and convince these men that there are others producing wool, besides Macarthur.’
‘Oh, there’s more in it than that,’ Sara said, laughing a little. ‘Andrew had heard the reports that Macarthur wrung a grant of five thousand acres from the Colonial Office for his sheep runs, and Andrew is after the same prize.’
‘Well, why not?’ he retorted. ‘This climate is made to produce wool, and England needs every pound of it she can get. They’ve got the factories and the workers, they’ve got the market for their cloth ‒ the merino wool from Spain comes in at the rate of five million pounds a year, and still Yorkshire wants more. I tell you there’s a chance to make real money here! I have the ships to export the wool, I have the capital ‒ or between Louis de Bourget and myself we could raise it. What I need is a substantial grant of land for pasture, and the contract with the leading wool-brokers. Macarthur believes that the time is coming when our wool will outsell the Spanish merino on the London market, and I think he’s right.’
‘If he’s right …’ Ryder began reflectively. ‘If he’s right you’ll stand to make a tidy pile of money, and money that goes on increasing as fast as your merinos breed.’
‘If he’s right,’ Andrew repeated, with a sideways look at his wife, ‘I’ll build that other wing on to Glenbarr, and Sara shall stuff it full of silk curtains and white marble.’
Sara caught his arm and began to urge him down the steps towards the carriage. ‘If that day comes,’ she said laughingly, ‘I’ll have a design of rams’ heads in marble for all the chimney pieces in the new wing.’ Then she tugged more urgently at his arm. ‘But come ‒ we keep Julia and Ellen in the cold.’
She hurried down the steps, James coming to assist her into the carriage. The two men shook hands, and Andrew climbed in beside her. James stepped back, giving the signal to Edwards, on the box above. There were calls of farewell from the two women on the veranda as the carriage moved forward. Sara waved; the pace quickened, and soon all she could see was the darker shape of the house against the night sky, and the lights that streamed from the hall and the drawing-room windows. Then the drive twisted sharply, and the trees cut off even the lights.
They were in darkness in the carriage, Andrew’s face opposite her no more than a whitish blur. She felt sleepy and rather disinclined for talk. Two days previously Ellen Ryder had arrived in Port Jackson, in the Lady Augusta, after an absence of four years. The news had reached Sara and Andrew at Priest’s, and they had driven over to the Ryders’ farm that afternoon. Sara had not cared for the changes she saw in Ellen; the girl was fully a woman now, with all the self-conscious manners of one lately accustomed to the fashions of the Bath seminary, and the Twickenham house of her elegant aunt, Julia’s sister. There was worldly knowledge in the way she greeted Sara, her former nurse, and a one-time convict; if she had dared, she would have snubbed her. But even two days back in the colony had taught Ellen that Andrew Macla
y was not the man to forgive a snub to his formidable wife. So she dimpled and smiled, and consented to play the piano accurately and woodenly, to show off the polish of her English education.
The increased jolting of the carriage told Sara that the drive had now joined the road leading to Castle Hill and Priest’s.
‘What do you think of Ellen?’ she said to Andrew.
He stirred, as though he had been deep in thought, and was reluctant to give any consideration to the girl.
‘Ellen …? Oh ‒ pert and pretty. I expect she’ll improve with marriage and age.’
That was all she could get out of him. She lapsed back into silence, prepared to doze through the journey to Priest’s.
She was roused, stiff and a little cold ‒ there was a trace of autumn already in the air ‒ by Edwards’ shout from the box. The carriage jerked to a stop, sending her sliding sideways in the seat. It was pitch dark on either side; as far as she could see, they were not near a house of any sort. There was no light anywhere, and, seemingly, no reason for stopping.
Andrew thrust his head out of the window. ‘What is it, Edwards? Why are we stopping?’
Edwards’ hoarse old voice betrayed unusual animation.
‘That light ahead, sir! I been watching it, I have. That be no ordinary light. That be fire!’
‘Fire! Where?’
Andrew was out of the carriage in a second, and had scrambled up beside Edwards to get a better view. Sara, craning out of the window, could hear them clearly.
‘We’re not more than half a mile or so from Castle Hill, sir. That light be either the village, or the Government Farm, where they keep the convicts.’
‘The convicts …?’ Andrew’s voice betrayed his own uncertainty. ‘Well … it’s no more than an ordinary fire. We’d better go and see if there’s anything we can do to help.’
But Edwards cautioned him with a wary hand. ‘Be easy, now, sir! It’ll be better to wait a bit and see. There be much talk of trouble among the convicts, and maybe this …’
‘Nonsense!’ Andrew said. ‘I’m tired of hearing rumours of rebellion. All the talk never comes to anything. And this is nothing more than a barn that some careless fool has set alight. Come, man, we’ll go on.’
‘Well, sir … just as you say. But I’d be a lot easier if you kept your pistol handy, now.’
Edwards continued grumbling and muttering under his breath, as Andrew climbed down. In his jumbled stream of words, Sara distinguished ‘rebels,’ and ‘mad Irishmen,’ a number of times.
Andrew opened the door to get in beside her again. Worried, she leaned forward and laid a hand on his arm.
‘Don’t you think we’d be wiser to turn back towards Parramatta, Andrew? If there’s trouble …’
She was checked by Edwards’ shout.
‘Hold it, sir! There be someone coming! Someone with a lamp!’
Andrew stepped down on the road again. Leaning far out, Sara could see the wavering yellow light of a lantern far ahead of the carriage. Then the sound of footsteps reached them, the rhythm of someone coming at a half-run and occasionally stumbling. The night was very still and dark ‒ dark, except for the reddish glow of the fire in the distant sky, and the lantern bobbing along close to the road. Andrew turned back quickly and groped in the place under the seat where he always kept his pistol when travelling. He took it out, cocked it, and waited. The three of them hardly seemed to draw a breath as they waited.
It was a woman’s voice that reached them out of the darkness.
‘For mercy’s sake, wait for me!’
She burst into the circle of light cast by the carriage lanterns, breathless, half-sobbing. She wore a white nightgown, with a cloak flung carelessly over it. Her hair was black and long, tumbling in disorder about her shoulders. Her handsome, plump face was flushed from her running.
Sara gave a gasp. ‘Nell Finnigan! Andrew ‒ it’s Nell Finnigan, from Castle Hill!’
Nell stumbled, and grasped at one of the spokes of the front wheel for support. Andrew took her arm and held it firmly. She leaned against the wheel, her head thrown back as she drew in huge gasping breaths. Andrew bent down, and gently forced the lantern from her clenched fingers.
Edwards had scrambled from the box; he stood peering fixedly into her face.
When she had enough breath to speak, it was to Andrew she turned.
‘There’s a rising!’ she cried, clutching him. ‘The convicts have broken out of the Government Farm, and burnt it! It’s the signal for the rising they’ve been planning these past months. We must all get to Parramatta as quick as we can. We’ll be safe there. They’ll …’
Andrew shook her a little to halt her panic. ‘Tell me quietly, now. Tell me what you know.’
Nell took another great gulp of air, and then restarted her story.
‘Well … The first I knew of it was the bell ringing up at the farm ‒ the bell they call them in from the fields with. I was getting ready for bed, with my place shut and locked this hour past. Finnigan is in Parramatta, and I can tell you I was scared out of my wits. I looked out of the window and saw the fire ‒ I knew about the talk of rising, so I hoped the bell meant a fire, and not that trouble was starting. Then the boys came pouring into the village, searching every house for food and ammunition. They’ve scarcely half a dozen muskets between them, though there seemed to be plenty of pikes ‒ you know ‒ the sort they make themselves.’
‘Yes … yes,’ Andrew said impatiently. ‘But what happened when they got to Castle Hill?’ He gripped her arm too tightly, and she pulled away with a show of indignation.
‘Here, mind what you’re doing!’ She spoke roughly, but then her tone changed in an instant, as she recalled that she was depending on Andrew to get her safely to Parramatta. ‘If you’d been there at the time, you wouldn’t be too clear on it either.’
She made an effort to be calm.
‘Well … it was like this,’ she continued. ‘They came from the direction of the Government Farm ‒ at the other end of the village. Most of them made for Carson’s, the smithy. They were after the horses, of course. And probably they’d have more chance of a pistol or musket there. They kept away from the guardhouse ‒ though there were only three soldiers on duty, and they couldn’t have done much. I could see plainly enough that they were going into each cottage in the row, so I didn’t wait for them to reach mine! I took a lantern, and away with me over the wall of my back garden! Some of those boys aren’t exactly friends of Finnigan, you understand. I wasn’t in much of a mood to see the things in my house pulled about ‒ and I knew if I had anything to say, I’d be done for.’
She was clearly terrified, and Andrew gave a moment’s thought to her neat little cottage, well stocked with rum.
‘How long ago did this happen?’ he asked.
She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. I’ve been shivering in a potato field since I got away ‒ no idea how long. Watching, you know, to try to see how many there were, and if they were using the roads. But it was too dark to see a thing ‒ I could hear them, though. This is the start of the trouble, all right ‒ and, believe me, there were more men in Castle Hill than came out of the Government Farm. They’d collected others. They’ll try a march on Parramatta, I’ll be bound. I doubt that the road between here and Parramatta is safe. The news will spread like fire, and all the boys who’ve been sharpening their blasted pikes all these months will have them up from under the floorboards.’
‘Has anyone sent word to Parramatta?’
‘How should I know!’ she echoed. ‘I tell you, Mr. Maclay, you should have been there, and you wouldn’t be taking it all so calmly. Maybe one of the soldiers went to Parramatta ‒ I don’t know. But, judging from the numbers of the boys, I don’t doubt that Castle Hill has given them all they want for the present. Likely, they’ll be spreading out to pick up more men, and whatever arms they have.’
Andrew gave her an absent-minded pat on the shoulder, turning to Edwards.
‘We’ll have to go back to Parramatta ‒ perhaps the news hasn’t reached them there yet. Though, the trouble is, that the sound of the carriage on the road will give the convicts warning before we ever get near there. Yet if we leave the carriage and take to the fields, we’ll not get to Parramatta before morning, and that’ll be no use at all ‒ we daren’t delay as long as that. There may be gangs out on the road by now. But that’s a risk we’ll have to take.’
As he spoke, Andrew was bustling Nell into the carriage beside Sara. She flung herself back on the seat, shivering, her cloak wrapped tightly about her. Andrew held the lantern high, until she settled herself; she seemed subdued, a softer, gentler Nell Finnigan than either had ever seen before. But her black eyes were still bold ‒ her toughened, unsentimental nature faced their danger realistically; she might have fled from it, but she did not wilt at the thought of it.
Andrew drew a rug across her knees, but his last look, as he withdrew to close the door, was for Sara. The lantern light was soft on her face and hair; she gave him a faint smile ‒ a small, private gesture of her confidence and trust. Then he stepped back and closed the door. The two women were in darkness again. They heard him climb up on the box beside Edwards.
The carriage rolled forward slowly ‒ then with increasing speed. Soon Sara and Nell were rocking and swaying to its uneven rhythm. They were shut in the world of darkness, their faces indistinguishable to each other. Sara looked towards her companion, wondering. Was she afraid, when she no longer had the lonely road to watch, and the sounds in the fields to listen for? Sara was well aware that here in the carriage there was no distraction from fear, and no limit to the imagination. Nell Finnigan was brave, she allowed. But could even Nell sit here long, and still not be afraid? Parramatta lay ahead, but on either side were the silent fields, the labourers’ cottages, the convicts’ huts that might easily have been the scenes of conferences that were carried forward by careful planners. Within a few hours the whole countryside would be aflame with news of the rebellion; muskets, pikes, axes ‒ anything that would serve as a weapon ‒ would be brought out, houses would be plundered, and horses stolen from the stables of employers. The cry of ‘Liberty!’ would stir up the rebels again, as the night gave way to a revealing morning, when perhaps their hearts had grown faint, and their stomachs empty. These were desperate men, with only the flogging-post and the gallows ahead if they failed. Most of them had brought the spirit of rebellion from Ireland, had fostered it, and nourished its growth among their companions; tonight was the product of their efforts.
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