The Hanging of Mary Ann

by Angela Badger

  The brass face glowed in the light of day and the soft beams of candlelight gave a gleam to the delicately carved hands as its steady note ticked and tocked their lives away.

  Though sturdy and solid the clock had to be kept delicately balanced. Tiny slivers of wood wedged under the base corrected any fault in the uneven floor. Only a sudden movement could put the pendulum out of kilter and stop the hands.

  “How long have we lived in Bywong? Nearly forty years…well, I’ve seen a few things in my time and I can tell you there’s more that goes on around here than meets the eye.”

  “Oh, you’re just imagining things, Grand-père!”

  “That clock stopped at two in the morning! You wound it up three days ago, I saw you do it, William. What else could cause the hands to stop?”

  “Well, I suppose there could be some truth to it,” his son conceded.

  “The earth shifts. We all know that. In this place the earth shifts.”

  “Some say, some say.” Even at nearly sixty he did not like contradicting his father, outlandish as some of the old man’s notions might be.

  “Some say!” mercilessly Grand-père mimicked him. “There’s more to this land than meets the eye, just as I’ve always said. I’ve lived in this house for too many years now and I’ve seen things I can hardly credit. Why is the water going down in the lake? Why are there dead fish floating on the surface? It’s a devious place.”

  “What do you mean? Devious?” Mary Ann asked.

  “Underhand perhaps, would be better to say, underground. Where is the water going to? Who knows what happens when the earth shifts, it’s common knowledge we get these movements here. Nothing like this happened in Sydney, or Parramatta or Liverpool, come to that. Why else is our lake draining away?”

  “Why? Papa, have a care. Don’t tempt the gods with all this despondency. We are in drought once more. No rain’s fallen on the ranges for months. The level could be expected to drop.”

  “Drop! Haven’t you seen how far out from the shore we can walk? The mud’s baked solid. Mark my words, with the earth shifting there’s a mighty crack out there in the middle beneath the waters. Deep, deep down in the earth anything might be happening. Remember the old legends of the gods and the forge in the centre of the earth? Well, we do know such people never existed but these things happen all the same. What can it be but a crack letting the waters drain away?”

  “Next thing you’ll be telling me we are living on top of a volcano,” laughed William.

  “Not such a joke after all my son. Didn’t Frank de Rossi’s father show me those white stones he found? Not real stones but what he called pumice, such as are found on the slopes of the volcanoes in Italy. A wise man, Captain de Rossi. He said that ages and ages ago a river flowed through here and he believed something like one of our shakings of the earth, something like a volcano or a calamity, closed off the valley and that’s why we have this lake. Tell me how it is no river flows in or out of Lake George. Contrary to nature itself.”

  William sighed with resignation. He knew better than to cut him off in full flood before he had finished whatever he wanted to say.

  Nowadays, with just Job for help, William was hard put to keep up with work in the paddocks as well as the tasks around the yard. Now that young Elizabeth was married and over at Woodbury and Charles so often away overseeing other family properties William was worn out from the never ending routine of the property. Only Mary Ann, of all the family, remained to see to the chickens, make the butter and the cheese and ride out with the rations to the shepherds in their lonely huts. Let alone look after the home.

  “Dunno what we’d do without you,” William said one evening, as he sat back and pushed away his empty plate. “Meal and a half that was. Your mother certainly taught you how to cook.” Praise did not come readily from her father’s lips. Her heart swelled with pride as she looked around the kitchen which had become her domain. The crockery gleamed on the dresser shelves, the embers glowed in the fireplace and dried bunches of basil, thyme and rosemary hung from the rafters, softening the air with the scent of summertime.

  “Daresay you’d rather be up in town with your sister. Going to all those balls and spending time at the races, but it’ll happen one day my girl, it’ll happen.”

  “Not for me, Papa, I’m happy. Never think otherwise.”

  “When this confounded drought ends there’ll be money in the bank again, there’ll be enough of that alright. First off we’ll have one of those gigs, those really smart turnouts from America, think they call them buggies. You’ll be the talk of the countryside in your buggy. You will.” He laughed.

  Mary Ann smiled. “Never you worry, Papa, I’m happy. Just wish we could have some rain. The paddocks are crying out for a real downpour.”

  The relentless sun had desiccated every blade of grass. Four weeks before Christmas her father sent the last of the Bywong sheep to be boiled down. Only a shilling a beast they fetched; now the pastures lay empty. Due to his foresight the flocks up in the mountains survived, scrawny and scraggy and so dusty as to be almost undistinguishable from the rocks, but they certainly survived. Every time Mary Ann rode up with rations for the shepherds she marvelled that the flocks still increased, in spite of the dry conditions and the dingoes.

  There was no doubt the Guises knew how to manage when the hard times came. But others did not fare so well and within the first year of the drought several neighbouring families had packed up and moved back to the city.

  “Mary Ann should go up to Hannah’s, you know.” Sister Elizabeth, visiting for a few days, gave her opinion freely. “What is there here for a young girl? Mary Ann must go to the city, Hannah will look after her. She can go back with Charles, he’ll be coming down soon. He can take her next time he goes up north.”

  “It’s all very well for you to say that but I don’t see how we could manage without her these days.”

  “Manage! It’s no place for a young girl, there’s not another single lady hereabouts, not another one anywhere. The Mitchells have gone, the Barrys have gone. Even the Coulthards have left. Only the men remain.”

  “There’s the women down by the river!”

  “Women! That’s a kindly term for them. Sluts, more likely. Our Mary Ann needs proper company. She’s burned brown and her hair’s in rats-tails half the time. There’s not a spare bit of flesh on her, out all hours with Job, and if she’s not in the paddocks she’s in the dairy. And if that’s not enough – there’s the kitchen. Spick and span, I admit, but the girl’s never free of chores.”

  “And how would we manage without Mary Ann in the kitchen? If it weren’t for Mary Ann we’d be in a sorry state.”

  “If you didn’t have her to run around after you then you could manage like all the others do. Men on their own can cope, just like the shepherds. There’s always meat and then there’s damper. What more do you want. No, I tell you, this is no life for a young girl.”

  “No, Papa. No! I can’t go. I won’t go!” Mary Ann had her own views on the matter when it was raised. “Bywong’s too important. Much more important than all that folderol in the city. You need the help. Who’ll tend the dairy? Who’ll take out the rations? There’s too much to do, and with Grand-père not his usual self too.”

  “He’ll be alright after Christmas, he just needs time. Even if he can’t get about much, this long rest probably’s all for the best, he needed to slow down, the older folks get, the longer it takes them to recover. This rest is doing him the world of good.” All the problems in William’s world had silver linings and if he could not find one he kept his own counsel. Certainly no good would come trying to persuade Mary Ann against her will and secretly he did not want her to leave.

  Time was needed, just time.

  The whole countryside needed time. Time to revive from the suffocating heat which poured down from the sky day after day, time to pay off the debts relentlessly piling up.

  “Even the blackfellers are leaving,” William m
uttered. “That camp down near the river’s deserted and some say they’re all heading for the Monaro.”

  Only very rarely now did Grand-père get Job to saddle up for him, and venture across the paddocks but even if he spent increasing hours sitting on the verandah, his very presence kept their spirits up.

  He’d seen hard times, he’d lived through good and bad. With his memory undimmed he made light of every fresh setback.

  “Look, Grand-père, some plovers’ eggs! I found them over past the dam, such a treat!” Carefully Mary Ann unwrapped the speckled eggs. Surely they would tempt her grandfather’s failing appetite?

  A faint smile touched his lips. “Plovers’ eggs? Well, that’s a delicacy now.”

  He picked one up and looked at it. “Food fit for a queen.”

  “Well, no queens round here and…”

  “Perhaps not. But blood counts, Mary Ann. Do you know why you were called Mary Ann?”

  Sensing a story in the air she gathered her skirts about her and sat on the stool at his feet. “Tell me.”

  “Because of the queen, Queen Marie Antoinette. Marie Antoinette, Mary Ann… do you see now? Marie Antoinette belonged to the House of Lorraine, so did the de Guises. Something to be proud of. A kinswoman – think of that. Noble blood flows in your veins, Mary Ann.”

  “Isn’t much help now, is it?”

  “That’s rather an impertinent remark to make. Remember where we came from, remember I came to this Colony as a common soldier.”

  Immediately sorry she’d offended the old man, she pulled the stool closer and took his hand. Over the last months he no longer mentioned his early life. The times when she had listened spellbound had disappeared and now she realised how those reminiscences had been lost amongst a welter of hauling buckets of water to the orchard, searching for lost animals, carrying the hay into the stables, cleaning up the dairy and fetching and carrying in the house.

  “Did you ever think you’d one day be sitting in your home, at the other end of the world?”

  He sighed. “As one door closes, another opens.”

  “Tell me, Grand-père.”

  “It’s so long ago.”

  “You’ve never forgotten, have you?”

  How could he forget that screaming mob that had surged out of Paris and struggled through the rain and mud for the fifteen miles that divided the capital from Versailles? The air had been filled with curses and demands that the king return to the country’s rightful capital and not waste his time amongst the pleasures of the countryside. How could he forget the shrieks of the crowd and the frantic panic of the courtiers as they tried to escape from the palace before the mob arrived? There was no hope of securing Versailles against them for no door or gate could be locked or bolted as none had been secured since the days of the great Sun King. Louis XIV. Rusty and open the mob poured through the portals as the nobles took flight as best they could, dressed as servants, grooms, lady’s maids… anyone of humble appearance. Disguised as the poorest of the poor they made their escape. The words poured out as Mary Ann listened.

  “But not a de Guise, we would not desert our queen. A de Guise never turns his back on the enemy.”

  “But you did escape. How did you get away?”

  “The King and Queen knew they would have to follow the crowd’s bidding and return to the capital. Her Majesty told me I was not to come with them, she knew only too well the fate that awaited all who were faithful to the monarchy. But I would never leave them unguarded.” For a moment he shut his eyes as he saw the scene once more. The white- faced woman with her children, her husband standing, silent and defeated staring down into the courtyard where the blood of their bodyguard crimsoned the cobbles.

  “ ‘Go,’ she said. I did go, but only to my room to fetch my sword and pistol. A tiny room too, do you know, Mary Ann, that to live at Versailles conferred such an honour, many of us would make do with a cupboard!” He laughed.“ A cupboard! Well, mine may have been a little larger than that, but it was smaller than our smallest room at Bywong! I can tell you. I knew I must follow the king and the queen but my servant thought otherwise.”

  “Your servant? How could a servant alter things?”

  “Jerome had been with my father, then he came to serve me. I’ve often marvelled when I’ve thought of him. It would have been so easy for him to have joined the crowd and washed his hands of his master, but he didn’t.”

  “Did he stand up for you?”

  “Stand up for me! They’d have put a pike through him in no time at all. No, he argued with me, told me that Queen Marie Antoinette and King Louis had no chance at all. He begged me not to return to them, it would be my death warrant if I followed them to Paris. The guillotine awaited, we would all die.”

  “So you listened to him. That was…”

  “Of course I listened but I’d never have deserted my masters and my kin.”

  “Were you caught?”

  “Patience, child. I told Jerome to hold his tongue and help me prepare, help me put everything needed in my saddlebag, call the groom and have my horse saddled. I needed to be off and follow them on their journey, not a second must be lost. A shriek came from the courtyard below where a guard had always stood at the entrance and a scream of triumph followed, then the thunder of footsteps as a horde of people came hurtling up the stairs. I was kneeling by my chest, rummaging for my pistols when suddenly everything went black.”

  “Black? How do you mean, Grand-père?”

  “Jerome must have hit me on the head, picked up a chair, I daresay. He’d knocked me out. Not clean out, but the shock sent me spinning across the room and next thing I was staring up at him. He stood over me with a knife in his hand.”

  “Oh, Grand-père! He was going to kill you!”

  “Certainly looked like that. I could just see a crowd of faces at the door. Fresh bright red blood spattered their shirts. Funny how things cross your mind when there is panic all round. That’s Pierre’s blood. Or perhaps it’s the blood of one of the Swiss Guards, I remember thinking as they stood there, their eyes so keen and excited, waiting for my blood. But Jerome knew what he was doing. He threw himself on me with the knife in his hand. Don’t know where it went, suppose it slid down the side of me. Then he got up and faced those rogues.”

  “What did he say?”

  “ ‘Leave him to me, citizens,’ he said, ‘leave him to me. Too long I’ve been waiting for this moment.’ And they cheered him and went off without another glance.”

  “You mean they thought he’d killed you himself?”

  “Exactly so. Groggy I might have been but finally I managed to struggle up. The footsteps were thundering away and in the distance came terrible screams. Others had not been as fortunate as I. I cursed him though, still nothing could wipe that satisfied grin off his face. By the time I was compos mentis the king and queen had been bundled away in their carriage and where their guard had stood there was just a pool of blood. Old Jerome didn’t say much, gave me my saddlebag and said I’d best make good use of the time and get to Calais…”

  “Pity our Mary Ann hasn’t more company her own age nowadays,” Elizabeth observed yet again to her father on another of her quite frequent visits from Woodbury. ”When it was the two of us that wasn’t so bad but nowadays all she has is men! And old men too! Grand-père forever filling her head with those ancient tales, Job grousing away out in the yard spouting parables at the poor girl. “T’isn’t natural for a young girl.”

  Momentarily William felt a twinge of amusement. Where did he fit in agewise?

  “Think how she enjoyed herself when she was up at Barrack Street, think of the different things she could do.”

  “I seem to remember she was very thankful to be home again, though.”

  “Oh Papa, of course anyone likes being home again but I’d say the city is the place for her at her age.”

  “Well, you speak to her then.” The running of the property posed enough responsibility for William. Having to con
cern himself over the womenfolk was a burden he did not want to shoulder. “Perhaps she should go up to Hannah after all. Just as you said way back, this is no place for a girl, no life at all. We could manage, Grand-père and me, no doubt about that. Just get in a woman to clean up once in a while. There’s always women down in the village needing a shilling or two these times.”

  “Reliable decent women? I doubt it. Every wife and mother worth her salt is hard put to it keeping their own homes and family together.”

  “Well, there’s the Irish family. Down near the river.”

  “Certainly not reliable or decent! They’re not setting foot inside this house and that’s an end of it. Neither Mama nor Grand-mère would have had them coming within a mile of Bywong.”

  “Never fear, we could find someone.”

  “And I’ll speak to her again.”

  But speaking to Mary Ann brought no more success than the last time it had been suggested she might go up to the city.

  Never, never would she leave her home! Mary Ann was not naïve. Whenever Papa and Charles met she’d noticed they immediately fell into deep conversation. Overseeing the distant properties, making decisions about their lands around the lake, their property up in Sydney and leased holdings elsewhere around New South Wales, all required care and attention. Always so much to talk about, so many decisions to make.

  Who would be left to care for the Guise property? Two sons already lay in the family at St Johns, only Charles remained. And his life was spent riding out to the other holdings, up to Parramatta, over to Macquarie Fields, then off to the mountains. Maybe she could not pass on the Guise name but she could make sure the property was never neglected. Amongst all the other properties, Bywong was their home and through good times and bad it was going to be looked after.

  This is where I belong, Mary Ann muttered to herself, I’ll not go up to the city, never again. No, this is where I’m staying. “One day the rain will come. The drought can’t get any worse. It can’t get any worse!”

  “Don’t tempt the dark gods, my girl. Don’t say such things,” her father warned.