The Naturalist's Daughter

by Téa Cooper

  ‘Who are they?’

  ‘Have a look at the rest of the papers and then I’ll explain.’

  She put the newspaper face down on the table and pulled the last remaining papers from the envelope.

  On the top was a drawing, a cartoon. A man, running down a street—London she’d guess from the houses and the street lamps. His long black legs and coat-tails flying and an angry group of men chasing him. Tucked under one arm was something that looked remarkably like a mermaid—flowing black curly hair, almost as untamed as her own, trailing to the ground and a fish-like tail curving around his upper leg, and dangling from the fingers of his right hand—her heart almost ceased beating—was a platypus. ‘What is this?’

  ‘A satirical print, a lampoon, a very popular way of making social comment. The magazine Punch is the master these days. Read what is written underneath.’

  Tamsin unrolled the remainder of the sheet of paper, hardly able to believe her eyes. ‘Nullius in Verba. The motto of the Royal Society.’

  ‘I think we can safely assume that Rose took the sketchbook to England.’

  ‘Following up on Winton’s request to present his findings. I wonder why he didn’t go himself.’

  Shaw shrugged. ‘One of the many things we’ll never know.’

  ‘Who is the man?’

  ‘No idea. A few theories, but if this is anything to go by Rose didn’t succeed with the Royal Society.’

  ‘So she brought the sketchbook back to Australia, and Winton’s research was never acknowledged.’

  ‘That and the fact Banks died in June 1820, only a matter of days after the lampoon was published.’

  ‘And Rose and Finneas Methenwyck came to Australia.’

  ‘In December 1820, aboard the Neptune. Rose Winton may have left Australia but Mrs Finneas Methenwyck returned with her husband. That’s why I missed it in the shipping records. They left almost immediately after the fire.’

  ‘How on earth did you find all this out?’

  The corners of his mouth turned up, making the dimples she’d missed so much appear. ‘One of the few advantages of working for my father. That devious and rather nasty job I had provided me with a lot of contacts. Combine it with calling in some long overdue favours, my grandfather’s passion for the history of Oxford and the surrounding area plus Lovedale’s help and a bit of a vivid imagination and I think I’ve filled in the blanks.’ He drained his glass and put it down on the table. ‘A series of telegrams have been going backwards and forwards to a company of solicitors in Bodmin. They’ve done some serious digging. A lot relies on local hearsay, nothing written down, so no proof.

  ‘So many questions and we’ll never really know all the answers.’

  ‘Is there anything left of Wyck Hall?’

  ‘Not a lot. No one ever lived there again. Only a couple of old chimneys. A walled garden with a gravestone, which reminds me … a little bit of information that I stumbled across in my research. Your name.’

  ‘Tamsin or Alleyn?’

  ‘Tamsin. I remember you saying you believed it belonged to a Cornish witch.’

  The man had a memory like an elephant. She’d always thought her strange name had been some deliberate ploy on her parents’ part to label her as different.

  ‘It’s Cornish, the female form of Tomas.’

  ‘Tomas! Granfer Tomas Trevan. Jenifer’s granfer.’

  ‘Whose tombstone still stands in the walled garden at Wyck Hall. I’d hazard a guess that’s why. You’ll never really know.’

  There were lots of things she’d never really know but there were plenty she did, and she’d embrace them with open arms.

  ‘And now to the not so pleasant side of the story. Apparently Methenwyck had a penchant for young girls. In his youth he attended the meetings at Medmenham Abbey, popularly known as the Hellfire Club. Have you heard of it?’

  ‘Who hasn’t? Though I was never very sure how much was truth and how much fiction. A club for high society rakes established in the eighteenth century—the meeting place of men of quality, politicians and the like. I think something to do with Brooks’s. How on earth did you find all this out?’

  ‘Luck more than judgement. When Father checked the land title and mentioned the Methenwyck name it rang a bell with me. I’d been unpacking Grandfather’s books. Amongst them I found a ledger, a Cellar Book, which recorded the accounts and attendance of some of the meetings held at Medmenham Abbey. Methenwyck’s name was listed. And then in the most amazing quirk of fate it was Mrs Rushworth who sealed it. She stumbled on an account of Wyck Hall burning down in an old newspaper Grandfather had tucked into the ledger when she came and tried to bribe me with the library here.’

  So that was how the boxes came to have his name stencilled on them, and they were still here.

  ‘That’s what led me to Cornwall. Around the same time as the club was disbanded Methenwyck inherited Wyck Hall from an uncle and he left London. About the only thing he took with him was his penchant for the club’s mock ceremonies and pagan rites. He created his own club and used to hold rituals in one of the ancient barrows on Bodmin Moor—combined them with hunting parties to celebrate various dates on the old calendar. Nobody thought too much about it, the aristocracy doing what they did, until a spate of young girls started mysteriously disappearing. Caroline Methenwyck …’

  ‘Caroline … Caroline Methenwyck. CM. The handkerchief with the faded initials, the embroidery picked and pulled.’

  ‘Lady Caroline Methenwyck. She and Methenwyck never produced any children. They took her brother’s son, Julian Barrington, as their ward.’

  ‘Barrington. The man Jenifer was assigned to when she first arrived in Australia.’

  ‘His son, yes.’

  Before her eyes she could see the pieces coming together, the links in the chain snapping shut inextricably joining the past and the future.

  ‘Born in Australia.’

  ‘Jenifer’s child. I think it is fair to assume that.’

  ‘Rose’s brother. And he inherited Wyck Hall?’

  ‘No, remember the report of the fire? He died at the same time as Lord Methenwyck. Back to the rumours then. Locals say Finneas was responsible for the fire and that’s why he fled the country—married Rose and came to Australia. It’s another of those things we’ll never know.’

  ‘So many questions, their answers buried in the past. Did Finneas inherit the title?’

  ‘I wondered that. I checked in Debrett’s and the Methenwycks weren’t titled. That was just another hoax in a long line, an affectation Methenwyck perpetrated. I suspect it sprang from his other title: Lord High Master of the Wyck Barrow. And Julian, Jenifer’s son, thought to follow in his footsteps and cement his inheritance.’

  ‘What happened to Caroline?’

  ‘She lived in the family’s London home and died not long after the fire.’

  Tamsin flicked through the papers until she reached the last one. Smaller, old—not a copy.

  ‘And what’s this?’ She looked up at him and then looked down, too impatient to wait. ‘It’s a pardon.’

  ‘Not just a pardon but an Absolute Pardon. It means Jenifer Trevan’s sentence was completely remitted.’

  A smile crossed her lips. ‘So she was free to return to Cornwall.’

  ‘It would seem so.’

  ‘Granfer’s girl. How dreadful being sent away from everything and everyone you knew and loved for a crime you didn’t commit.’

  ‘And that’s the last bit of the puzzle. There’s no proof but local rumour has it that one of Lady Methenwyck’s favourite scullery maids caught Lord Methenwyck’s eye and she knew she would be the next girl to disappear. So rather than see her die on his sacrificial altar Lady Methenwyck set the girl up. Planted the Methenwyck rose, a bloody great carved emerald, on her and she was accused of stealing it.’

  ‘But in those days she would have hanged.’

  ‘Mad King George saved her. To celebrate his return to sanity in May 178
9 her sentence, and that of all other condemned women, was respited. Instead they were transported “to parts beyond the sea”.’

  ‘On the Lady Juliana. That’s how she ended up in Australia.’ Rose delved into her pocket and gazed down at the daguerreotype in her hand, running her thumb over the surface. ‘Do you think they were happy?’

  ‘I think Rose learnt to accept all life threw at her and to forgive and that’s the most important thing. Maybe she’d decided that there were things more important than ambition.’

  Perhaps that was the apology she was waiting for.

  ‘Now, can I tell you the real reason I’m here?’

  ‘You didn’t come to tell me this?’

  Something shifted; only someone who truly cared would have gone to all this trouble.

  ‘I came to give you this.’ He put a small square box on the table and opened it. A rose-gold ring, the pinkish colour highlighting a carved emerald, sat nestled on a stained cushion of threadbare satin.

  She swallowed, her hands shaking and picked up the box. ‘Is this the ring that Jenifer was accused of stealing?’

  ‘Lovedale assures me it is. He asked me to give it to you. Kelly had it in his safe deposit box, perhaps the very reason he was so determined to find the person who should inherit. It’s where your story began.’

  ‘Come with me. I’ll show you where my story began.’ Tamsin stood and held out her hand. He grasped it tight, gave a squeeze and stepped up beside her.

  ‘Where are we going?’

  ‘My turn. Wait and see.’

  The long dry grass brushed at her skirt and little puffs of dust rose around her feet. It was as though she was walking on air. When they reached the stepping stones across the brook she dropped Shaw’s hand and lifted her skirt above her calves. ‘This way. It’s not too tricky, just be careful because the stones can be slippery.’ Or so she’d discovered in the past days. She’d come every afternoon to see Gayadin and help her clear the area around the headstones and the path leading to her tumbledown cottage.

  As she suspected the old woman was waiting, sitting with her back resting against Rose’s headstone plaiting the long strands of grass.

  ‘I’ve brought someone to meet you. Gayadin this is Shaw, Shaw Everdene. Shaw this is Gayadin. She knew my grandmother and my great-grandmother. Her grandmother, Yukri, was a friend of Jenifer’s.’

  ‘We all friends.’ Gayadin dropped her eyes to her plaiting but a gentle smile played on her face.

  There was no need to show Shaw the headstones. He spotted them in an instant and walked slowly around, reading the inscriptions and running the palm of his hand over the engraving. Finally he let out a long, long sigh. ‘And to think that very evening we sat and watched the platypus we were so close to the truth.’

  ‘As I said, this is where my story began and this is where it will end.’

  ‘You lucky you got so many stories. Make sure they don’t get lost.’

  ‘That won’t happen, Gayadin. I promise you that.’

  She wiped away the solitary tear trickling down her cheek. Shaw’s hand clasped her fingers, held them tight and warm.

  ‘Can you imagine how Rose must have felt, shunned by the Royal Society, then discovering her mother’s sentence was nothing but malicious deceptions, a string of deliberately fabricated falsehoods masquerading as the truth.’

  He pulled her into his arms and held her tight. ‘There’ll be no more falsehoods, no more lies, that’s my promise to you.’

  Epilogue

  Wollombi, New South Wales 1912

  ‘What have you got there?’

  Tamsin shaded her eyes to better appreciate her daughter’s gap toothed smile as she sat on her father’s shoulders, arms stretched wide.

  ‘An invitation.’

  Shaw hoisted the girl over his head then settled her on the ground, patting her coal-black curls as she tottered into her mother’s embrace. She swung her up onto the sandstone bench next to her. ‘Sit quietly and maybe they’ll come.’

  She slapped her chubby forefinger over her lips. ‘Ssh! Mallangong time.’

  ‘Is there room for me?’

  ‘Always. Make room for Pa, Rose.’

  The little girl shuffled closer, eyes riveted on the water in front of her.

  Tamsin handed the invitation to Shaw. He scanned the words and his eyebrows disappeared into the thick thatch of hair dangling over his eyes. ‘Are you going?’

  ‘Of course. I feel a little bit of a fraud though. Charles Winton was no relation of mine.’

  ‘But Rose was, and Charles was the father of her heart.’

  ‘True. I suppose that makes him the great-great-grandfather of my heart.’

  ‘You can hardly refuse an invitation like this.’

  ‘Read it to me.’

  ‘You must know it word for word. You’ve been sitting out here looking at it for the last hour.’

  ‘I do, but I’d like to hear it again.’

  The Royal Society of New South Wales requests the attendance of Mrs Tamsin Everdene at the Admission Day Ceremony on the fourth day of July, 1912 to accept on behalf of Charles Winton a Posthumous Honorary Fellowship for his substantial contribution to furthering of the natural knowledge of Ornithorhynchus anatinus.

  Historical note

  In 1835 The Penny Magazine of the Society for the Diffusion of Useful Knowledge ran a front page article about the platypus. It stated:

  Among the strange and interesting productions of that little explored country, Australia, not one is so anomalous, so wonderful, such a stumbling block to the naturalist, as the Ornithorhynchus platypus or as it is termed by the colonialists the water mole. Its first discovery created the utmost surprise; nor has the feeling much abated.

  One hundred and eighty years later this still holds true. From the Dreamtime stories to the comparison of human and platypus genomes, the platypus continues to fascinate.

  Should you wish to discover more I thoroughly recommend Ann Moyal’s book Platypus: The Extraordinary Animal that Baffled the World.

  The great platypus debate began in 1799 when Governor John Hunter watched an Aborigine spear a ‘Small Amphibious Animal of the Mole Kind’ and sent the skin, preserved in a keg of spirits, to The Literary and Philosophical Society of Newcastle-upon-Tyne.

  However, it was one line in an old journal that sparked my story. It suggested Sir Joseph Banks had already received a strange pelt from an ‘unknown source’ in the Antipodes before Hunter’s discovery. I have no idea whether this is true. And if it was, why would Sir Joseph have kept quiet?

  And so, my story began. Although you may recognise some of the characters and settings, this is a work of fiction. Charles Winton did not exist, nor did any of the other major players in The Naturalist’s Daughter, except in my imagination.

  Acknowledgements

  I’d like to begin by acknowledging the Traditional Owners of the lands on which this story takes place and pay my respects to Elders both past and present.

  Thanks to so many people. Firstly my new publisher, Jo Mackay, and all the fabulous team at Harlequin. Jo and Annabel, your belief and support in this book has been both flattering and heartwarming. I must also thank Alex Craig for her expert eye and insightful editing. I’m still not quite sure how you managed to get your head around that timeline! It has been a pleasure and a privilege to work with every one of you.

  As always my love and thanks to my team of long-suffering writing friends without whom my books would never see the light of day. I owe you all more than I can ever repay. And, most especially, Charles—the most patient and long-suffering plot wrangler in the business!

  THE HORSE THIEF

  by Tea Cooper

  Can she save her family’s horse stud and reputation?

  When India Kilhampton is caught up in the heart–stopping excitement of the first Melbourne Cup her mind is made up. She will breed a horse to win the coveted trophy and reunite her fractured family. Determined to make her dream
a reality she advertises for a horse breeder.

  Jim Mawgan arrives at Helligen Stud in the Hunter Valley to take up the position. Jim however, has a mission: he must fulfil his father’s dying wish to right past wrongs and prove his ownership of the prized stallion Jefferson.

  Jim and India discover they share a common goal but as the secrets of the past unravel old enmities surface. Although betrayed, will India save Jim before he is branded a horse thief and sentenced to death?

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  ISBN: 9781489242433

  TITLE: THE NATURALIST’S DAUGHTER

  First Australian Publication 2018

  Copyright © 2018 Tea Cooper

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