The Wreck

by Meg Keneally

  Whenever Sarah was on deck, with or without Maisie, James would hover off to the side, waiting for an opportunity to be of service, prove himself in a field less crowded than that in which he had spent his youth. He had been delighted when Sarah, feigning homesickness, had asked him to go into Cape Town and fetch the most recent English newspaper. She wanted to know if those in power were still looking for her – and, if they were, how far they were gazing.

  James was not the only man from the ship disappearing into the crowd; she had spied Watkins’s spotless blue jacket among the rough clothes of the longshoremen. He walked with a purposeful stride, anxious to get to wherever he was going.

  She heard a grunt and saw that Coombes was standing a few feet from her along the rail, his eyes narrowed as he watched the departing captain.

  CHAPTER 13

  The first mate had, on occasion, said hello to Sarah on the deck. If Maisie was with her, or if she was within proximity of another passenger, he would pass without acknowledgement; when she was alone, though, he would nod to her and exchange pleasantries. He seemed to be longing for their old banter, diminished by what Sarah thought of as her kidnapping. ‘Too good for me, I suppose, now you’re a passenger,’ he had said once, smiling to let her know the intention behind the words.

  Despite her anger at her forced departure from England, she had not forgotten sobbing against his shoulder as her brother died. ‘Never too good for you,’ she’d said, and smiled just as Reverend and Mrs Simkin passed by, heads together and muttering.

  Now, though, Coombes seemed to be in an irritable mood. He spat on the deck, an action that would have seen any other sailor deprived of rations. Then he noticed her approaching him and nodded politely. ‘Beg your pardon.’

  ‘Are you upset, Mr Coombes?’ Sarah asked, as Maisie wrinkled her nose at the gesture – she deplored rudeness – and walked off a short distance to gaze at the dock.

  ‘By them that get money where they shouldn’t, yes. And by them that spend it where they shouldn’t, too.’

  ‘Is that what the captain is doing?’

  ‘You asked, in London, why I was aboard so early,’ he said quietly. ‘Our man’s not averse to making a profit in ways not to my liking. He picks off whatever parts of a ship he thinks he can sell – it’s why he’s often on board a couple of weeks before anyone else. Not many ships will take him anymore, but I suppose the owner of this one was desperate or hadn’t heard the rumours.’

  Sarah looked down at the timbers of the deck, wondering if they were as solid as they seemed. ‘Is the ship safe?’ she asked.

  ‘I had thought so. He’s been crafty. But sometimes it’s what you don’t see that you have to worry about. He went ashore yesterday, too, carrying a sack. And I know what was inside, for it was in his cabin when I brought him some ale, and he’d left it open. I saw enough to recognise a gudgeon.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  ‘It keeps the rudder on the back of the ship. The pintles were surely in there as well.’

  ‘So . . . the ship has no rudder?’ she asked, resisting the urge to bolt for the dock rather than stay on a maimed ship that might be blown anywhere.

  Coombes shook his head and chuckled joylessly. ‘I keep forgetting you’re not born to this – of course it has a rudder. We’ve managed to steer this far, haven’t we. But what’s keeping the rudder on the stern? Probably not what the shipwright put there. Rusty, maybe. Flimsy. There’s a wound on the back of this vessel, and part of it has disappeared into a shipyard here.’ The deck creaked, and Coombes looked around belatedly for anyone close enough to hear them. He suddenly seemed agitated, as though worrying he had spent his words unwisely. ‘Beg pardon, I have duties,’ he said, and scuttled off.

  Sarah stayed at the rail until she saw James striding back, newspapers under his arm, walking with the confidence of a man who had completed an important mission. She felt a surge of irritation, as he would expect an inordinate amount of praise.

  ‘Your knight has completed his quest, I see,’ said Maisie, who had rejoined her when Coombes left.

  ‘And I will need to swoon when I hear about the dragons he battled,’ said Sarah.

  She would have gone straight to her cabin if Watkins’s jacket had not caught her eye again. He was carrying a long, unwieldy canvas-wrapped bundle back to the Serpent.

  In the life she should have had, she would not have been on board this ship. She would have been in Manchester with her parents. She might have attended Sam’s wedding by now, or even greeted a niece or nephew. And she would have had no idea what a package shaped like that could possibly contain.

  In the life she had been given, though, she had seen more than enough swaddled rifles to recognise them, even from a distance.

  *

  James seemed gratified by his reception when he returned with every edition of The Times of London he had been able to find, some stretching back almost to her departure. He bowed, made to present them to her, then seemed to change his mind and tucked them back under his arm. ‘I went to stores and coffee houses and every tavern I could, begging anyone who had an old paper to give it to me. It’s so alive here. Isn’t it wonderful?’ He gently took her arm with his free hand, as though they were about to walk into a ball. ‘Of course I had a devil of a time getting them for you – some of the alleyways behind the docks, well, I could have been pulled in and never heard from again.’ His shoulders straightened, his chin lifted; maybe he was waiting for her praise. ‘I would ask if there is any particular area of interest in these papers,’ he said, when it became clear she would not faint over his bravery. ‘I know you won’t tell me, though.’

  She was unable to resist sliding a hand into her pocket and closing her fingers around the little leaden sailor. ‘Why does it matter? When we arrive in Sydney, I’ll be into someone’s household, and you’ll be off to make food from some unruly scrap of land.’

  ‘You can always come with me,’ he said softly. ‘If you’re going to fetch and carry, you might as well be in your own household.’

  It was not the first time he had suggested this, nor the first time she needed to find a way to politely deflect the question.

  Had she been what she claimed to be, she would have considered it. They got along well enough, had some lively conversations, and he was handsome. He did not disturb her thoughts the way Henry still did, walking into her dreams to jeer at her or reproach her for doubting him – but that was of no consequence, she told herself. People were rarely able to marry those who invaded their minds unbidden, whose presence or absence could change the complexion of an entire day. Such unions were for the fairy stories her ma had told her.

  If she could know for certain that she was no longer a fugitive, she might consider marrying a man like James. ‘We shall have to see if you are as you appear,’ she said to him. ‘Perhaps you’re really an escaping footpad who bails up carriages and leaves the passengers without their jewellery.’

  James usually laughed at such deflections; this afternoon, though, he frowned. ‘I am not the worst of all possibilities, you know. Your refusal to discuss the matter with any degree of seriousness is beginning to insult me.’

  She bit the inside of her lower lip to keep from saying that his refusal to accept her answer was the true insult. It was vital that she not appear unladylike. ‘I mean nothing by it,’ she said demurely. ‘I am new to this, that is all.’

  ‘As you will be to Sydney. You have no experience of danger, Sarah. No experience of want. There are opportunities in the colony, yes, but also peril and deprivation. I am offering myself as a shield against them, but will not do so for much longer.’ He released her arm, bowed stiffly, handed her the newspapers and stalked off.

  She was astonished he could not read it in her face: the violence she’d witnessed, the loading of rifles and hiding of arms, the fall onto the cobbles. The roar of the crowd at the sight of a man waving a white hat or of a rope tightening around a man’s throat.

&nb
sp; But it wasn’t fair of her to blame James for his ignorance – all he knew of her was what she had chosen to tell him.

  In any case, it was convenient that he had taken himself off. Now she could bring the newspapers to her tiny cabin, spread them out on the floor, and hunt through them for any mention of the names Sarah McCaffrey, Henry Landers and Albert Tourville.

  *

  She had almost reached her cabin door when she heard a man’s voice: ‘You will find nothing in those to help you, and plenty to harm you.’

  She had been so intent on the bundle of papers that she had not seen Captain Watkins approaching. He inclined his head to her, and she bobbed in greeting just as the ship gave a lurch and sent her stumbling against the bulkhead.

  ‘I trust your own excursion today did not involve anything harmful.’ Embarrassed by her stumble, she spoke more harshly than she had intended. She expected him to be mildly irritated, maybe to walk off.

  Instead, he narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips. ‘Captains do go ashore. And their reasons are their own.’

  She felt the trickling heat of an emerging bruise on her shin. ‘Well, I’m grateful for your warning about the perils of these newspapers. But I think I will survive time alone with them.’ With that, she opened her door and ducked into her cabin.

  When she reached the third page of one of the papers, she regretted those last words to Watkins. She was not at all sure she would survive this.

  The final member of the Horse & Coach conspirators to remain at large is believed to be the sister of conspirator Samuel McCaffrey, who was hanged at the Newgate.

  Like her brother, if apprehended Miss Sarah McCaffrey will stand trial for high treason. She will then almost certainly hang for her part in the evil plot that saw her brother so justly executed.

  It seems the McCaffrey family is steeped in villainy. Our correspondent in Manchester writes that the parents of these ruffians brought about their own deaths by resisting lawful direction from yeomen at the infamous public meeting in St Peter’s Field last year.

  While some have reported seeing a woman with a resemblance to Miss McCaffrey in Scotland, there are others who believe she has left these shores, although it is not known where she might have come by the resources to pay for her passage.

  The government has a reasonable idea of Miss McCaffrey’s appearance, as a description was furnished by one or more spies who had infiltrated the conspirators. His or their identities have been protected.

  Familiar bands of fear encircled her chest. She had been hoping to learn that the search for her had been abandoned, or to find nothing in the papers and allow herself to assume that public interest had faded.

  Closing her eyes, she tried to remember Sam’s laugh, even his snore, but he was becoming indistinct like their parents. Surely this must be her deficiency, because a truly loving sister and daughter would carry such things with her to the end of her life.

  She was desperate to wail, to shout – that, though, would bring the solicitous Maisie running, together with James who would sense an opportunity to prove himself a capable protector. She asked Coombes to tell James she was unwell and required uninterrupted solitude. He grunted, mumbling about his other tasks, but stalked off to carry out her request.

  *

  Sarah almost welcomed the worst of the sea’s anger. As the weather roughened and the Serpent pitched, water gushed down ladders and wet her stockings when she stepped out of her small bunk. The fear the ocean brought, the knowledge that she was prevented from sinking by nothing more than wooden planks and bolts, was the only force that could push thoughts of Sam, Henry and her parents away for a moment or two.

  In the midst of a storm, she could howl and no one would come running; no one would ask what on earth that awful noise was, and what creature could possibly be making it.

  Once she had screamed her grief and anger into the maelstrom, her head grew clearer for a time. England had transplanted part of itself to New South Wales, and the shadows of those who had killed her brother could surely be found in the colony, so she might yet be able to cause them some pain. If Watkins was bringing those rifles to fellow sympathisers, they must have a plan. And perhaps they would welcome some assistance.

  CHAPTER 14

  Something had exuded from that newspaper, curled around her, suffocated her without letting her die. The flare of fear when she thought of the constant threat of capture. The choking stress at having to maintain a fiction all her life. The faint hope of finding some vengeance, some redress in Sydney, followed by the renewed realisation that no one would care if she succeeded or failed, lived or died.

  It was days before she emerged into full sunlight.

  She could not stand the sound of male voices now. The educated ones all reminded her of Briardown’s pompous speeches and Tourville’s oily solicitousness. The sailors’ shouts sounded like those of the Runners, the thuds of their feet on the deck like the hooves of a Hussar’s horse.

  She would walk on the deck at dawn, when the place belonged to her, the crew and an occasional soldier. At this hour the convicts would still be in their irons, attached to the ship.The water sloshed against the hull in the morning dark, the furthest reaches of the ship appearing as the sky lightened. She felt, at those times, as though some of the world was hers again.

  Watkins was known for keeping late hours, so she was surprised to see him on deck at such a time. His face was speckled with overnight growth, his eyes perhaps a little less bright than usual, but judging by the commands he barked at his crew, he was no less capable of sailing the ship.

  He was a man of movement and noise, so she started when she realised he was standing next to her by the rail. At her intake of breath, he shook his head. ‘How is it possible for me to frighten a woman who has endured and risked so much? Are you truly so changed already?’ It might have been a rebuke, but his voice was heavy with resignation.

  ‘I am not changed at all, captain. I still believe as you do – fortunately for you. I saw that you carried a parcel back from Cape Town, and I suspect it was not rum.’

  ‘Why would it not be? You have seen how I imbibe.’

  ‘A captain does not go ashore merely to collect rum, not when he has an entire crew at his disposal.’

  ‘Well, Miss Marin, I am not in the habit of justifying my actions to passengers, and nor do I intend to start now.’ Watkins began to walk away.

  ‘I am not asking you to justify anything,’ she said. ‘I am asking you for a promise.’

  He stopped and looked back at her.

  ‘I saw my pa’s innards, you know.’ She was surprised at the steadiness of her voice. ‘They were bulging out of him, shiny. As though they couldn’t wait to be free. My ma – her chest was no thicker than a book. And my brother, now. Strangled while people gossiped and bought trinkets from the peddlers.’

  ‘All of this I know.’

  ‘The hand that killed my brother – one of its fingers is in Sydney. I wish to lop it off, and you will give me the means to do that.’

  Watkins scoffed. ‘How on earth–?’

  ‘You could spare some of your cargo from Cape Town.’

  *

  They were less than a week out from New South Wales. If the winds were favourable, Watkins had told her, maybe a few days. She was almost as distant from the graves of her family as it was possible to be, and the strangeness of the colony – the tall tales she’d heard of bloodthirsty convicts and hopping monstrosities – seemed more ominous than intriguing. Particularly now, when she knew what lay beneath a board in the captain’s quarters.

  He had led her there that morning, after their conversation on the deck. On the way to his cabin she had noticed a couple of the older women whispering to each other, and she had felt like stopping and bowing.

  Watkins had locked his door behind them before levering up the board, then pulling out and unwrapping the bundle of half a dozen rifles. ‘You’ll take these ashore with you.’

  ‘And the
y should go to . . . ?’

  ‘To a tavern near the docks – I will point it out when we arrive. Now don’t flinch, it is empty during the day. Well, mostly. But if you knock at the right time, a man will answer, and you will recognise him.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘How did you recognise this ship? How did I know you for what you were?’

  When she nodded, Watkins bowed, took her hand and moved it towards his mouth, but he stopped short of letting his lips touch her skin.

  Afterwards she had returned to the deck, and she had not sought shelter when it started to rain. When the wind drew her hair over her mouth. When the light faded. She did not know whether the moisture on her face came from the sky or the sea, and she shivered as the shawl she had crossed over her chest and tied at the small of her back began to soak up water.

  Maisie would have chided her for that, had she not already closed her cabin door against the rain and wind plucking the sea into little hillocks. She had given the shawl to Sarah shortly after they had met. ‘You are not an inside woman,’ Maisie had said. ‘You will need something as you wander the deck, getting under the sailors’ feet.’

  How would Maisie react if she knew the truth? Sarah pictured a frown creasing her heart-shaped face. Maisie would care more about the existence of the lie than its substance.

  James would be a different matter. It was one thing to be the brave rescuer of a dark-haired girl whom fate had cheated, another to conceal a revolutionary. He might rage, he might strike her, he might even have her arrested when they landed, an opening gambit in winning the good graces of those in power.

  The weather was inclement enough to rouse the sailors from their evening torpor. They began scurrying around the deck, attending to the sails. Watkins strode out of his cabin and slammed the door flat against its frame, issuing orders that were taken by the wind before they reached her ears. She watched as he stopped a sailor, a hand on the man’s shoulder, and gestured over at her.