Convict Heart

by Lena Dowling

  Somerset hurried to the gate in the high fence. He struggled with the latch. Even at several feet’s distance Harry could see what the man needed to do to unlock it.

  He strode over to the gate, reached easily over the man’s shorter stature and unclipped the lock.

  ‘Much obliged, sir,’ Somerset said.

  With the gate closed again, Harry returned through the kitchen. The dirty dishes were gone from the table, piled in the sink, and replaced with a tea tray laid out ready to receive the tea from the pot, now sitting on a rack to draw behind the stove. But with Nellie herself not in evidence, he mounted the stairs to the upper storey. Most of the rooms were shut, and therefore he presumed occupied. Others, where the door was ajar, gave up stirrings or voices from within, confirming it. Only one room was wide open and visibly vacant. The room itself was spare with bare floorboards and hessian-covered walls. Hessian was a rather grand description for the coarse sacking, but drapes had been made that matched the coverlet. The same material, a floral print, had been used to make curtains to surround the washstand. Other than that, there was a rail suspended from the ceiling on ropes for hanging clothes and two basic kitchen-style chairs, one of which was stacked with fresh towels, topped with a bar of soap. The room was clean and the bed was made up with unwrinkled pillowcases and an equally crisp turnover of sheeting.

  Idly he picked up the soap and held it to his nose and was rewarded with the unexpected smell of rose petals, Nellie’s scent.

  He placed it back where he had found it.

  What Rowley had told him was idle gossip and of no consequence. He must keep his focus on matters at hand. And that meant securing the best return on his investment he possibly could.

  Chapter 6

  Downstairs, Nellie waited anxiously while Harry’s heavy footsteps echoed through the floorboards overhead.

  With one eye on the door that led out to stairs to the second floor, she mussed up a vase of wildflowers then put it back to rights.

  Several times.

  The tea was made and laid out on a tray. If he didn’t come down soon it would go cold, even with the cosy on the pot. And Harry Chester didn’t seem like the type of man who would tolerate cold tea.

  What would he think of the rooms? Everything was clean, but she had not had the money to replace the wall coverings or to whitewash any but the worst parts. With paint being so expensive, where the wood was unmarked or could be sanded clean, she’d had to leave it that way.

  When he finally reappeared, his face gave nothing away. He strode over to the table and sat down where she had laid out the ledger. Tossing the cosy aside, he poured himself a cup of tea.

  Jammy pattered in through the open door, signalling Pikelet’s arrival back from the cove. She took up a vigil near a plate of shortbread Nellie had brought out with the tea. Every time Harry brought the biscuit to his mouth the dog jumped to his hind legs and pranced in a circle, but Harry didn’t seem to notice, concentrating on her figures, turning pages and then sometimes turning back a few before going on again.

  He looked up, his black brows pinched together. ‘Has every item of outgoing and incoming monies been recorded here?’

  ‘Of course.’

  She ran a tight ship. Everything that came in from the paying guests and everything that went out in expenses was written down.

  ‘Then that’s a shame,’ he said, leaning back in his chair, taking another piece of shortbread and snapping it in half. Jammy whined but Harry took no notice, eating one half and resting the other on his saucer.

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘It means you’re not doing particularly well.’

  ‘But I’m making money.’

  ‘A little, but only because you have paid no more than a peppercorn rental to the Crown and have taken only room and board for yourself and this Mr Pike, here,’ he said, stabbing at a line on the open book.

  Nellie laughed. ‘Mr Pike, he’d like that.’

  ‘Pike’s not his surname?’

  ‘Pike’s only a nickname Danny gave him. Danny used to say his head was so ugly the only place it belonged was on the end of a pike. The name stuck, but I call him Pikelet because it’s nicer.’

  ‘What is his real name?’

  ‘He doesn’t know. All he remembers is that he woke up on a ship all cut up and missin’ an eye and that the ship was sailing to the colonies. When it docked, Danny was the only person who’d give him a job on account of his looks.’

  ‘He knows nothing more than that?’

  ‘He’s from Cornwall way because that’s in his accent, and he must have had some schoolin’ because he can read and write, but that’s all. We ask everyone who comes in who sounds like they’re from down the south of England, but so far, no one has remembered him.’

  ‘Well, you and this Mr Pike-Let haven’t taken a penny in wages.’

  ‘Isn’t it a good thing that I’ve been puttin’ all me profits back in?’

  ‘To the extent that you’ve made improvements to the property, yes. But as it stands, you’re in no position to enter into a commercial arrangement.’

  She stared at him. Offer her the lease? Keep her on as a skivvy maybe. But to keep running the place?

  ‘And if I had?’

  ‘I would have given you the right of first refusal,’ he said, throwing his words out like little scraps of hope in the air, only for her to have to watch them being snatched away on the wind again. ‘But as it stands that’s not an option.’

  ‘But we’ve not been open that long. I could build it up. I’m sure I could,’ she said, desperate, grasping for a chance before all the scraps floated from reach.

  Harry flicked through the pages in the guesthouse reservation book once more. ‘If it was the type of business that survived off repeat custom, I might agree, but from what I’ve seen of the guests’ addresses in your ledger, most are ships’ passengers. They stay until they have their own lodgings arranged, and with only a few exceptions, have never returned.’

  ‘So where does that leave me?’

  ***

  Harry cursed himself for having entered into any discussion at all on the matter. He should have simply delivered the news, short and sharp, and with the business done, left the premises.

  It was disappointing the business made so little money, especially when Nellie had put some work into the place, but facts were facts.

  He stood up to avoid looking her in the eye, or anywhere lower for that matter, lest it affect his commercial judgement. ‘The new tenant, as soon as I find one, may very well wish to employ you,’ he said in an attempt at conciliation. ‘I’ll point out that you are a good hostess, the place is clean and well kept, and of course you have Mr Somerset, to provide a reference.’

  Nellie frowned at him. ‘You could make the new tenant take me on. Make it a condition.’

  It would have been within his power, but apart from the deposit he had raised from his own funds, he had taken the rest of the purchase price for the properties out on loan. Borrowings cost interest. Interest he now had to raise each month.

  ‘I can hardly fetter the lease agreement without suffering the disadvantage of adjusting the price for the privilege. I would be doing myself out of income.’

  ‘Then let me take on the lease. You said yourself you were thinking of it to start with.’

  ‘As I’ve already explained, that’s just not possible.’

  He, better than anyone, understood the wrench of forced out of a home to which one was deeply attached and invested. But everything hinged on his being able to achieve a good rent for the guesthouse. ‘Sometimes change can be a good thing,’ he said, almost as much to convince himself as the woman standing in front of him.

  Nellie stood wide-eyed, blinking furiously, drawing attention to her sumptuous brown eyes.

  But he wouldn’t be swayed. And aside from that, the chronic shortage of labour in New South Wales was well documented in the literature he had read prior to leaving London. The
topic had also come up in conversation several times since had arrived, most recently at the Mallard’s soiree last night.

  ‘I’m given to understand positions are numerous here. You should obtain alternative employment quite easily.’

  ‘You’d think, wouldn’t you,’ Nellie said, her shoulders subsiding in the first sign of defeat since they met. The near capitulation came as a surprise, and he took no pleasure in being the one responsible for dashing such a spirit.

  The little terrier he had been trying to ignore tottered closer and sat resting on his feet. ‘You have no friends or family?’

  ‘None in a position to take me in. That’s why I had to make a go of this place. It was either that or the Factory.’

  ‘A factory,’ Harry said, placing his palms down on the table ready to lever himself up, satisfied that a solution had been found.

  ‘You’ve not been long in the Colony long then?’

  ‘Barely a fortnight, why?’

  ‘That’s what they call the women’s prison. The Parramatta Women’s Factory.’

  ‘I’d been led to believe you had been granted a ticket of leave?’

  ‘I still have to find lodgings and employment. Those that can’t end up locked up.’

  The pesky dog hopped up, placing his front paws on his thigh, fixated on last of the shortbread left on his saucer. Absently he gave it a pat.

  The dog whimpered for the morsel. Harry gently brushed him off his leg and stood up, meaning to leave.

  Partway between uplifting the last of the shortbread and walking to the door, Harry stalled.

  Nellie had kept the place in good order, and while the floral touches weren’t to his taste, she had improved it some. He could have arrived to find it derelict and vandalised. So to that extent, at least, he was in her debt.

  Reluctantly, he turned. ‘I will make representations on your behalf to the new tenant once one is found. In the meantime, I should like to keep the business trading. As long as you maintain the premises to the current standard, I shall not put you out on the road.’

  Then he tossed the remaining shortbread to the damnable little dog and took his leave.

  ***

  Once Nellie heard the tricky gate latch and the clunk of the gate behind him, she sat down, her elbows on the table, her head in hands.

  Colleen had ended up in the Factory and Agnes had been there before Rowley pulled strings to get her assigned to the guesthouse. Technically she had been written down as Pike’s servant since he was a free settler, not a convict, and the only way they could get help.

  In the Factory she would be cooped up and at the mercy of the turnkeys, who knowing what she’d been before would be looking for any opportunity to take advantage.

  But she’d shave her own head and present herself at the Factory before she’d ever ruin things for Colleen, even though the thought of it made her come over sick with dread.

  Four little paws landed in her lap, forcing her to sit back upright, which left her wide open to Jammy’s sloppy licks to both cheeks.

  ‘You’re tellin’ me to look on the bright side. Is that what it is?’

  Jammy let out two short, sharp barks.

  It was something, at least, she could stay on for now.

  But for how long?

  There had to be some way to prove she could make more money before Harry found another tenant.

  Chapter 7

  Harry made his way on foot to the Wallaby Club, where he had agreed to meet Tristan, the raucous Australian birdlife squawking a discordant cacophony in his ears. After the previous day’s experience, he put no trust in the carriages for hire, and in any case he needed the walk, if only to reflect on what he had just agreed to. Keeping the guesthouse building occupied made sound business sense, yet he couldn’t escape the feeling he had just done something imprudent.

  ‘Look out. The delivery door is around the back. ’ A redcoat, an officer, based on the braiding and the pewter buttons fastening his uniform, jostled him as he ducked ahead through the doorway.

  The waiter at the front desk, an older greying man who had admitted Harry on previous visits with Tristan, looked up, a frown giving way to recognition. ‘Mr Chester is here as a guest.’

  ‘Of whom?’

  ‘Tristan Mallard.’

  The redcoat turned, subjecting Harry to an up and down appraisal. ‘Even guests need to be propertied.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  The soldier raised an eyebrow.

  ‘Bates’ Saddlery, Smith’s Drapery, Callister’s Bakery, and Tullamore Guesthouse among others,’ Harry said, vaguely annoyed at being required to account for himself.

  The officer’s eyes sharpened for moment, as if one of the properties that Harry had mentioned was of particular interest, then snorted. ‘But not a tailor among them, obviously.’ And to the waiter, he said, ‘At least find him a jacket—I don’t suppose there’s anything to be done about the trousers or the shoes. Remind Mallard the dress code doesn’t only apply to him, but to any waifs and strays he drags in as well.

  ‘Who was that?’

  ‘Captain Anthony Tompkins.’

  ‘Only a captain?’

  The waiter hid a chuckle behind his hand.

  ‘Keep your voice down.’

  ‘Sensitive about it, is he?’

  ‘Very, but don’t let his rank deceive you.’

  ‘He wields power?’

  The waiter hushed his voice to a whisper. ‘He’s the officer in charge of protecting the Commissariat Store, although given it’s the military that does most of the pilfering it’s a case of the fox guarding the chickens.’

  ‘The stores?’

  Wheat, corn, barley, tools and nails. It hardly sounded a sufficiently lofty platform from which to exert high influence.

  ‘His protection extends to the rum,’ the waiter said.

  With that additional piece of information, the waiter’s deference made more sense.

  ‘Tompkins might as well be in charge of guarding the bank. Selling spirits is a licence to mint coin. Just ask the partners in this place,’ the waiter said, opening a cupboard behind him and pulling a coat from a hook. Now try not to relax or you’ll split the seams.’ The clerk held it out for Harry while he removed his own coat and shrugged his way into it. The coat, once on, allowed no freedom of movement whatsoever.

  Harry glanced across the room to Tompkins now engaged in a game of billiards. ‘No danger of that.’

  He found Tristan sitting in a leather chair beside one of the bay windows where the upholstered window seat was strewn with books and papers.

  When he took up a similar chair opposite, Tristan motioned for a waiter to replenish his glass and to bring the same for him.

  ‘How did things go with Nellie?’ Tristan said, folding up his newspaper.

  ‘I thought there might be trouble. It helped she had a lawyer friend of hers there, although he advocated very strongly on her behalf.’

  Tristan tossed the paper onto the window seat. ‘Rowley was there?’

  ‘You know him?’

  ‘You can count the number of men with legal training in the town off on one hand and we’ve all become quite close. It was at Rowley’s house where I last spoke to Nellie.’

  ‘There’s something between Nellie and Somerset?’

  ‘Something, yes, but I very much doubt it’s anything of a romantic nature.’ Tristan chuckled. ‘His wife would never tolerate it for one. Somerset is so henpecked it’s a wonder he’s not permanently pockmarked, and then, of course, there is the question of the man’s orientation.’

  ‘I wonder how he achieved the influence he has?’ Harry said, musing out loud.

  ‘That, my friend, is one of the great mysteries of the colony. If you work it out, I’d be pleased to know. He may only be a clerk, but he is tipped as the next Governor’s Secretary; it would certainly seem he has the Governor’s ear. Will you follow Somerset’s suggestion, do you think?’

  ‘After James H
unter’s rather persuasive comments, I might have actually considered offering Nellie the lease,’ Harry said. ‘The place is well maintained. Better than that, it’s been refurbished to some degree. But I took a look at the books and the figures count her out.’

  ‘You’ll put in a new tenant in then?’

  ‘Eventually.’

  Tristan frowned. ‘Eventually?’

  ‘I’ve allowed Miss Malone to remain until a new lease is signed up. It will be easier to rent out tenanted than empty. Properties deteriorate rapidly once they are unoccupied,’ Harry said, then clammed up. He had already said far too much. It sounded as if he was trying to justify himself.

  ‘I see.’

  ‘You see what exactly?’ Harry said, annoyed as much with himself as with Tristan’s disbelieving tone.

  ‘I’m not saying a distraction isn’t a good idea, quite the opposite after what you’ve been through. It’s just that someone other than Nellie Malone should be your target.’

  ‘Remind me precisely when logic was dropped as a requirement for advancement to the bar?’

  ‘You have a point?’

  ‘Isn’t that a gigantic conceptual leap you’re making? I’m letting Nellie stay on, ergo I’m looking for some attachment, or a least a recreational opportunity?’

  ‘If it’s logic you want, then I have four solid planks for you: Nellie is slim, blonde, attractive and Irish,’ Tristan said, counting them off on his fingers. ‘And that specific collection of attributes has been your particular weakness ever since you kissed Louisa Sheridan behind the summer house at her birthday party when we were six. You forget how long I’ve known you.’

  ‘If Nellie Malone is my perfect match, then why warn me off?’

  ‘Aside from the fact that Emily would never speak to you, and possibly me, ever again, practically half the men of Sydney are in love with her. And some of her admirers have perched themselves on rungs pretty high up on the society ladder.’

  ‘Such as?’ Harry asked. When Somerset said plenty of men would have happily carried Nellie off, he hadn’t figured the upper classes into the mix.