His Convict Wife

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His Convict Wife Page 7

by Lena Dowling


  Mr Biggs threw back his head and laughed like a kindly bear.

  ‘Based on what I saw at The Factory your technique leaves a lot to be desired — yes. I’ll do any breaking we need, but mostly if you sort through the pile you’ll find something that fits without having to knock too much off it.’

  She fossicked through the rocks, picking one up that looked like it would be good fit to fill the next gap.

  ‘Here, this one I reckon.’

  She handed him the stone then turned back and scanned the pile until she found another good one. She pointed. ‘See that one with the curve on its side. It’ll fit nice and snug next to that bulge on the other.’ Colleen bent, straining to lift it.’

  ‘Here, let me.’

  Mr Biggs gently nudged her out of the way and picked the rock up as if it was weightless, placing it beside the other one.

  It was a perfect mate for the one she had chosen before it.

  ‘Excellent work, Colleen. You have the right eye for it.’

  With a rush of pleasure at Mr Biggs’ praise for her efforts she clapped her hands together and then immediately wished she hadn’t, hissing back in a pained breath. ‘Easy with that hand of yours now.’

  Mr Biggs turned to her, his forehead furrowed with concern, but she flapped him off with the glove like a seal’s flipper.

  She wasn’t about to complain about a couple of blisters. At least she was outside, and working with Mr Biggs she would have someone to talk to, which had to be better than being sat in the hut by herself all day.

  ‘Don’t be worryin’ about that now.’

  ‘But I do worry Colleen. You’re my wife. It’s my responsibility to worry for your welfare.’

  Mr Biggs had stopped smiling. He looked away; his voice all clipped and serious again like the night before when he had shown her to the scullery.

  ‘You make it sound like a chore.’

  ‘Not a chore, but as I said last night, it’s an arrangement that suits both of us. It’s good to have help, and with your assistance I think we have every chance of finishing this today.’

  Colleen searched for the next stone. If only he’d stop banging on about their marriage being an arrangement.

  ‘Why did you even take me for a wife then if it’s to be an arrangement, why not just take me out on a Ticket of Leave?’ she snapped.

  ‘That was the express purpose with which I visited The Factory that first day, but they wouldn’t let me take you on that basis. It was either marry you, or leave you there. I assume your preference wouldn’t have been for me to exercise that option.’ Mr Biggs said in a tone that was now as tetchy as hers, whacking another rock into place so hard it broke apart.

  Thinking he might be regretting it she changed tack. She handed him a stone with a flat side to fill one of the gaps.

  ‘Thank you for rescuin’ me, by the way. I don’t reckon I’ve said that yet.’

  ‘Yes well, no need to thank me,’ he said without turning around again, motioning backwards with his hand for another stone. ‘For reasons that are beyond me, her ladyship was determined that I should have feminine company. I think she hoped if I took a maid it might turn into something more.’

  ‘Ah,’ Colleen said placing another stone in his open hand.

  ‘What do you mean by that?’

  ‘I think I might know what her bein’ so keen to fix you up with a wife was all about.’

  ‘And what would that be?’ Mr Biggs said. About to slot the stone into position he pulled it back out of the gap, turning around to look at her.

  ‘Lady Hunter is fearsome lonely and looking for company.’

  Mr Biggs looked blank. ‘Her ladyship is lonely so she finds me someone to wed. I’m afraid I don’t quite see the connection?’

  ‘She’s looking for someone to be her friend, and an overseer’s wife would be not so lowly she couldn’t spend time in her company. I reckon you might have been played.’

  This time he was the one to say ‘ah’, making an upwards jerk of his head.

  ‘I’m quite sure you’re right, it sounds exactly like something Lady Hunter would do,’ he said, swivelling back around towards the partly built wall.

  ‘But we’re gettin’ on alright aren’t we?’ she said, worried now what effect finding out her ladyship had been out to hoodwink him might have on his attitude towards her.

  He dropped the rock into place, turned back and tensed up his face like he was thinking hard.

  ‘Yes, Colleen. Yes we are.’

  Samuel watched Colleen as she stomped around the rock pile, turning over every stone, mentally cataloguing its dimensions and basic shape, piling up similarly shape stones. She had a knack for it and he was pleased to have her help.

  She also made for better than adequate company with her charmingly idiomatic way of speaking, which she often preceded with an impish dance of her eyes and an impertinent little twist of her mouth.

  He could see now, with her shrouded back in her convict garb, that his fears about being at such close quarters with Colleen had been groundless.

  In fact it felt good to have her working alongside him.

  He had enjoyed nothing like this sort of easy companionship with his first wife. From time to time he had accompanied Amelia on constitutional strolls in the park, where they had engaged in sombre conversation. Not that there had ever been any discord, but where Amelia had been solemn and pious like a pristine blanket of snow, Colleen’s easy manner reminded him much more of the first warm huff of a summer zephyr.

  Chapter 7

  ‘So this is where you’ve been hiding. Get up, lazybones,’ a female voice shouted. A claw of fingers gripped her by the shoulder, shaking her awake.

  At first, with her head foggy with sleep, Colleen had thought she was back in The Factory, but then she remembered that today would be her second whole day of freedom. She opened her eyes and pushed the hand off, rubbing the sleep out of her eyes.

  ‘What?’

  ‘It’s a washday and I need you helping. I’ll not be stoking the copper all morning while you play up to the sandman.’

  Colleen hauled herself up onto her elbows.

  ‘Alright, alright keep your cap on. Who are you, anyway?’ she asked the young woman standing over her — a Ticket of Leaver judging from her clothes, which were much the same as her own prison slops.

  ‘Liza.’

  ‘I’m Mrs Biggs,’ she said, a little thrill bursting up inside her as she gave her new name.

  Imagine that — her, Colleen Malone, married. And not just married, but wed to someone who treated her with respect and was willing to have her at his side as a helper, and someone she could have a laugh with as well.

  But there was no sense in letting on she was pleased and give the girl an excuse to accuse her of being big-headed. She tried to keep up a poker face.

  Not that it helped. Liza somehow sensed she was proud to call herself Samuel Biggs’ wife jumping at the chance to throw it back in her face. ‘I know who you are. No need to come over all high n’ mighty about it. Just coz you’re Mrs Biggs doesn’t mean you can shirk your share.’

  ‘Alright, don’t be workin’ yerself up into a lather. I’ll be there in a minute.’

  Colleen flopped back down on the bed like she meant to lie in a while longer. She didn’t know what had got up the girl’s nose but whatever it was, she wasn’t going to let Miss Uppity get the better of her.

  ‘Well, see that you are. I’m not going to be waiting around all mornin” Liza said, turning and stomping off out of the hut.

  Once the little madam was gone Colleen struggled out of bed, washed using the battered jug and bowl and sliver of soap that had been left for her, dressed, and fought her wild tousle to fix it up under her mob-cap.

  She looked around for Mr Biggs but he was already up and gone. She left the cabin; circling the yard, idling around behind the cabin and the cookhouse, taking her own sweet time.

  Living with a bunch of harpies for the last
seven years she’d had no choice but to stand up for herself, but mostly she’d had to learn sharpish how to look out for Nell, who came in for more than her fair share of trouble on account of being so popular with the punters.

  She found the washhouse, little more than a shed, open at the front, made of planks and shingles behind the house. On one side it was mainly filled with wood, on the other stood a mangle. Liza had a fire crackling under a bubbling pot of boiling washing outside.

  ‘There.’ Liza pointed to the swirling cauldron of linen soup, ‘Since you were late up, you can haul them out.’

  She handed Colleen a long handled tool for pulling the sheets out and over the side into another metal tub. Even with the implement it wasn’t possible to get far enough back to avoid the splashes of boiling water. The water washed over Colleen’s bare hands and wrists, burning her skin, leaving red welts in its wake, only adding to the pain from her palm which was still fearsome sore.

  Liza leaned back on the woodpile and pretended to inspect her dirty nails.

  ‘So things are not so rosy between you and his nibs then?’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Colleen said, making out she was concentrating on snagging another sheet, wishing the girl would leave off and mind her own feckin’ business. She wasn’t about to discuss Mr Biggs with this one, that was for sure.

  ‘What were you doing sleeping in the scullery?’

  The girl hit a nerve.

  For a while, the day before, when they were breaking stones together, she thought Mr Biggs might have been warming up to her, but then he had gone quiet and later that evening after dinner he made some excuse about having to work in the barn, leaving her alone all evening. It was after dark when the door of the hut creaked open, and he was gone again before dawn broke.

  ‘None of your beeswax.’

  Liza sniffed. ‘Alright, alright, I was only curious. Just seems odd that a man and his wife are sleeping in separate beds this soon after their wedding, that’s all I’m saying.’

  Even though Mr Biggs had made a meal of insisting they keep separate rooms, with them dossing down within a few feet of each other Colleen had held onto some faint hope that he might have come to her, but so far he had been as good as his word; staying in his own bed.

  ‘We might be wed, but we barely know each other. Mr Biggs was just acting considerate that’s all.’

  Liza smirked as she spoke, slowly and deliberately, as if she was conniving something at roughly the same rate she mouthed the words. ‘I can’t think why he’d bother with one of your lot. I bet he doesn’t know does he? About what you did before?’

  ‘And what would that be?’ Colleen said in a tone that should have been warning enough for the nosy maid to think better of keeping up with her questions, but Liza kept on, swaggering towards her. ‘The convicts talk amongst themselves, but even if they didn’t it would only take one look at your shiny mug to work it out. I reckon you’d be older than me, but your face is as smooth as a baby’s bum. Only two ways a woman keeps herself all peaches n’ cream, and you’re no lady, so I’m picking your working hours have mostly been after the sun’s gone down.’

  Colleen said nothing, hooking another sheet and slapping it down into the tub beside the copper, not the least bit sorry about the fact that a few scalding splashes escaped the sides going Liza’s way, making her jump back again.

  ‘Does Mr Biggs know about you then or doesn’t he?’

  ‘He knows. So there’ll be no satisfaction to you in spillin’ the beans. You can get that idea right out of your warped little mind.’

  Colleen gave the tub a vicious tug, dragging it into the shed and over beside the mangle, then pulled one of the sheets up and into the rollers, swearing as the hot cloth seared her hands. She cranked the handle, her stomach churning along with it, her legs feeling like but for the fact she was holding onto the mangle, they might go out from underneath her.

  Jesus. What else did Liza know? Surely she couldn’t know about James.

  She put all her energy into winding even harder at the handle of the mangle. She didn’t dare look up in case Liza made something of her expression.

  ‘They say that before he met her ladyship, Mr Hunter was a regular at O’Shane’s.’

  There it was.

  Liza had obviously been building up to something, she had just hoped like mad it wasn’t going to be that.

  Colleen let go of the mangle and turned to eyeball her.

  ‘What’s your game?’

  ‘No game. It’s just what I heard, that’s all,’ Liza said slyly.

  ‘Why don’t you come closer and say that, you filthy minded little scrubber.’

  Colleen took a deep slow breath remembering what Nell had said about holding her tongue and keeping out of trouble, but that had been meant for the baby’s sake. If she didn’t do something this evil wench’s poisonous talk was going to ruin her baby’s future.

  ‘Aye, I thought so,’ Liza said clocking her expression. ‘You would have known him before, then?’

  Colleen took a step towards Liza, ready to pounce.

  Quick as lightening she lunged forward and slipped her hand up under the smaller girl’s mob-cap, grabbing a fistful of hair.

  Liza yelped but Colleen made no move to ease off with the tugging.

  ‘While you’re busy puttin’ two and two together and makin’ five, why don’t you tell her ladyship that her husband is partial to the bawdy house.’ Colleen gave the handful of hair another half-turn. ‘Speak of the devil. Lady Hunter’s comin’ this way.’ She pointed in her ladyship’s direction. ‘Look, she just left the backdoor. Why don’t you tell her all about your clever theories and then see how much longer you keep your Ticket of Leave.’

  ‘What’s all this about a Ticket of Leave?’ Lady Hunter demanded.

  ‘Liza’s got something she wanted to tell you, haven’t you Liza. Go on.’

  Colleen shoved Liza forwards out of the shed and into the bright morning light.

  Liza squinted into the sun.

  ‘Nothing m’lady.’

  Lady Hunter frowned, searching Colleen’s face and then Liza’s for a clue as to what was going on.

  ‘Well, it didn’t look like nothing to me, but if that’s all, you can get back to your work.’

  Her ladyship’s attention flicked up over Colleen’s shoulder.

  ‘Lady Hunter.’

  ‘Good day, Mr Biggs.’

  Colleen gave a start.

  How long had he been standing there?

  Colleen turned to face her new husband all the blood draining from her legs.

  But Mr Biggs stood calmly, a sack of something, flour she decided from the trail of white powder leaking from one end, over his shoulder as if it were only the slightest burden.

  Still looking unperturbed he absently waved at a handful of flies buzzing around his face.

  Colleen fanned out the breath she had been holding. If he had heard he’d have had a face of thunder, not been standing there all relaxed.

  ‘I see you’ve endeared yourself to the maids already, Mrs Biggs,’ he said to her lightly, but terrifying her all over again with what it might prompt Liza might come out with in return, but before Colleen could change the subject Mr Biggs turned to Thea. ‘No problem here, I hope, your ladyship?’

  ‘None at all, Mr Biggs. I think you might have just stumbled into what is known out here in the bush as secret women’s business.’

  Colleen only just covered her mouth in time to prevent a gasp getting out.

  If only Lady Hunter knew. Her comment hadn’t so much as cut too close to the bone as drilled in and scooped out the marrow.

  But thankfully oblivious, Mr Biggs laughed at Lady Hunter’s joke.

  ‘In that case I’ll ask no more about it.’

  ‘Very good Mr Biggs. Cook will be keen to get that flour, so she can carry on with the baking.’

  It was only then, as her heart stopped beating at a gallop, that Colleen took in the fact that Mr Bigg
s was naked from the trousers up, with his shirt tucked into the side of his waistband like a forgotten rag. He smiled an encouraging smile in her direction, then turned to leave, and like his stomach, the muscles in his back flexed with the effort of keeping the sack balanced evenly across his shoulder. Even though it was warming up to a hot day, goosebumps ran out over her skin. She had been expecting to have a screwy stomach of a morning, but no one had said how queer being pregnant could make a person feel all over.

  Her eyes continued to follow Mr Biggs as he walked away.

  If only he would sling her over his shoulder like that sack of flour, as Thea had said, then half of her worries would be over.

  She couldn’t understand it.

  Colleen might have been used to playing second fiddle to Nellie but despite that she had her own loyal band of regulars, and those who lined up for Nell but ended up having to take her instead never left complaining. What in the hell was so wrong with her that Mr Biggs didn’t want to make her a proper wife?

  ‘I’m sure you can manage the rest of the washing on your own. I have something I want to discuss with Mrs Biggs,’ Lady Hunter said taking her by the arm, wrenching Colleen’s eyes away from Mr Biggs as her ladyship turned her around to set off back towards the big house.

  Without risking another look at Liza, Colleen followed, shaking like a junket.

  Sweet Jesus.

  If Mr Biggs had arrived a few moments earlier, or if she hadn’t gotten so riled up and matched Liza’s, go at blackmail with a bluff of her own, goodness only knew what the minx would have done.

  Now there were two people who might put their foot in it.

  She could only pray James had the good sense to watch what he said and that Liza was too fond of her own freedom to stir up trouble.

  ‘Has Liza been giving you a hard time? Is that what was going on out at the washhouse before?’ Thea said, motioning for her to sit, as soon as they were alone.

  Colleen looked down clasping her hands together, saying nothing. Liza might have been a mouthy scrubber not worth the time of day, but Colleen had never been a dobber.

  ‘Don’t worry about Liza. I overheard Cook telling Nanny that her nose is out of joint because she fancied Mr Biggs for herself.’

 

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