It was late in the morning when Ellen woke me. ‘Ye’ve a new sister,’ were her first words as she unhooked the shutters to let in the shadowy December daylight.
‘I know,’ I said, ‘and Mama is ill.’
‘Nay, she be tired, be all. Quick now. Put on ye new shift and petticoats. Martha has set I to all manner of tasks. Ye must have ye hair left for today. I has nay time for owt.’
With no one about to chide me, I took from the pantry a piece of loaf and a morsel of cheese, wandered out into the garden and slipped between the ribs of my tree. I had no mind at all for the chanting of spells or the mixing of potions, and sat numbly under its bare canopy, its leaves a rotting carpet beneath my feet. Presently, I heard the sound of a carriage halting, followed by a knocking at our front door. I made my way inside, where Martha was admitting Lady Spencer, elegantly shawled and bonneted. I smoothed down my rumpled pinafore and dropped a curtsey. She kissed my forehead.
‘I hear you have a new sister, Fanny. Does she resemble you?’
‘No, Ma’am,’ I said, ‘or, at least, I hope not, for she’s exceedingly ugly. Yellow and wrinkled as a walnut.’
‘A fine way to speak of your own sister, you naughty minx,’ said Martha crossly.
Lady Spencer placed an arm about my shoulders. ‘I’m sure she is but speaking the truth, Martha. At least two of my own were quite horrid in appearance when first they were born. Crinkled and crushed as prunes. But, you know, Fanny, they’ve grown into very handsome boys.’
‘And I have not seen Mama since my sister arrived.’
‘Now that is why I am here, Fanny dear. Mama needs her rest and I should like very much to take you back with me to Cobb House, just for tonight and tomorrow, so that she won’t fret and worry about you. Lucy is very desirous of your company. She wants to hear all about your new sister.’
‘But Mama and the baby—’
‘Martha and the other servants will look after them.’
‘But—’
Lady Spencer drew me close to her. ‘It is only for a little while.’
‘But when will I see Mama again?’
‘Why, the day after tomorrow. And you’ll find her quite restored to herself by then.’ She turned to Martha. ‘I think perhaps Fanny might tiptoe in to kiss her dear mama goodbye.’
Stealing into Mama’s room where she lay sleeping, I placed a kiss on her brow and gazed at my sister, her face still saffron yellow against the white of the sheet. I put out a tentative finger and stroked her sunken cheek. At once, twisting her face towards my finger, she opened her toothless mouth. Had I woken her? Would she begin to mewl and howl and waken Mama? Recalling Blanche, I hastily laid my knuckle against her gums. She nuzzled it weakly, then settled back to sleep.
‘Goodbye, Mama,’ I whispered, but there was no response.
On my return from the Spencers, I found Mama propped against her pillows, looking rosy and well, my sister beside her in a basket. ‘Fanny, my darling,’ she cried.
‘I’ve come only to deliver Fanny back to you,’ said Lady Spencer, ‘and to bring you a mutton broth. Ah, here is the cause of all the fuss.’ She gazed into the basket. ‘Why, she’s like a tiny doll. Her features are so delicate I’m sure she’ll be another beauty.’
‘You’ve been very kind,’ said Mama.
‘Pouf,’ said Lady Spencer, ‘it was a trifle only.’
‘And now,’ said Mama, when Lady Spencer had left us, ‘you may hold your sister, Fanny.’
I thought of the shrunken tortoise head. ‘Perhaps I should wait until she is bigger.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Mama. ‘Come.’
The bundle Martha laid in my unwilling arms was so swaddled in shawls I could barely make out its face. I peeped quickly between the folds and saw with relief that it seemed paler.
‘So, whom does she resemble?’
I hesitated. ‘At first, I thought she looked like a Chinaman and very … wrinkled.’
Mama’s smile reassured me.
‘But now,’ I went on, ‘she seems only a little squashed …’
‘I meant to ask whether she resembled Papa or me. Or you.’
‘Not me,’ I said hastily. ‘At least, I—’
‘I think she has a likeness to Papa, but we’ll have to see. Now, as to her name … Nothing Frenchie, I think. A pretty English name. What do you say?’
The warmth of my sister’s body began to seep into me; a tiny pulse beat in her temple. I stroked the fine down that covered her head. ‘She’s very small.’
‘She will grow.’
‘We might call her Harriet.’
‘What other names do you favour?’
‘Louisa is pretty.’
‘Very pretty,’ said Mama, ‘and it suits her well. Shall we call her Louisa Ann, after Lady Spencer who has been so kind?’
‘I like those names very much,’ I said.
‘Then it’s settled. I shall write and tell Papa.’
‘Please to tell Papa,’ I said, ‘that Louisa is a very comfortable baby, and that I promise to take care of her as he charged me to do with you, dearest Mama.’
For several days, all was well, so I was surprised on returning from school to find Dr Judd conferring with Martha in the kitchen.
‘What has happened?’ I asked, in panic.
‘There is nothing at all to worry about,’ said the doctor. ‘Mama has developed a slight fever and I have come to see her only as a precaution.’
I ran upstairs to where Mama lay against her pillows. She beckoned me to her and I kissed her cheek.
‘Are you ill, Mama?’
‘Just a little tired.’ Her voice was faint and I strained to hear her words. ‘Now, Fanny, my own sweet girl, I have a very foolish whim. I shan’t be easy in my mind until Baby Louisa is baptised, so Parson Hodges has agreed to perform the ceremony here this evening.’
I stared at her, then at my sister who lay pallid and almost motionless beside her.
Mama opened her half-closed eyelids and smiled at me. Her hand lifted, as if to pat my cheek, but fell back against the counterpane. ‘Go downstairs now to Ellen, Fanny dear.’
I do not know what impulse woke me so early at dawn next day. No sound came from anywhere in the house, but I rose and, as if by instinct, went straight to Mama’s room and opened the shutters. In the soft, pale light, I saw she lay as ashen as my sister. I bent towards her, expecting to be enveloped in her sweet, familiar scent, but recoiled from the repulsive smell of the fish market that seemed suddenly to engulf me. Panicked, I saw that beads of feverish sweat had formed on her forehead and, in an effort to cool her, I turned back her covers.
The lower part of her nightgown was stained purplish-red. As I watched, crimson trickles oozed down her lower legs and across her feet, seeping into the bedding beneath her. For a moment I stood aghast, then, stumbling into the corridor, I began to scream.
‘Martha! Ellen! Come at once. Mama is lying in a bed of blood.’
Of the funeral I remember almost nothing. I recall that from somewhere were conjured for me a black mourning frock, petticoats and bonnet; that I stood, numb, by William’s grave, staring at the bottomless space beside it as it received the coffin in which lay Mama with Baby Louisa in her arms. I know that it rained, for I remember thinking that I should never again, in all my life, see the sun shine. And, through it all, I was engulfed by the constant sad toll of the funeral bell.
I recall only snatches of the time following but, even now, I can bring to mind that bitter afternoon when I climbed the small incline in St Michael’s churchyard and, surrounded by tombstones, sat on William’s grave beside the grassless rectangle where Mama and Louisa lay. I gazed up at the weathercock on the church tower, and I recollect still how the grey sky above it was reflected in the water of Lyme Bay below.
It was Ellen who told me I was to live with ‘they grand family at they Cobb’.
‘Them be off to Australia and them is to take ye wi’ they. They master have agreed.’
I stared at her, uncomprehending.
‘Ye is to stay here till they Christmas Eve. Then ye is to go to they Spencers and all ye on to Charmouth and after, I knows nay where. But, come they April or May, ye and they leaves for Australia.’
I felt the wetness of tears on my cheeks.
‘Ye must nay cry now. They Spencers be very good folk. And it be sure ye will come back some day.’
My tree stood skeleton-stark in the garden. Agnes had left us for another situation, Joseph was about the business of the house, and Martha and Ellen were packing my trunks. Very soon, Lady Spencer would come in the carriage to fetch me. I crept into the garden and stood, frozen with misery and cold, gazing at it in farewell. Then, seized by a sudden frenzy, I rushed to my mulberry tree, tore from it twigs and branches, and, with bloodied fingers, ripped and twisted at Mama’s holly bush. Weeping, I fled out of the gate into Church Street. My boots rang out on the frosty cobbles, hammers on a blacksmith’s anvil; white trails of my breath pursued me as I ran. And in St Michael’s churchyard, swept by bleak winter winds, I heaped the drab grey tombstone and the scarred earth beside it with my magic twigs and red and green holly boughs, a Christmas offering to Mama and William and Baby Louisa for whom now all seasons were as one.
II
AOTEAROA
Consider the significance of the beginning — every beginning — how the seed sprouts forth to become the adult plant. Who is it who nurtures the kauri seed to flourish into the giant of the forest? Tane-Mahuta, guardian of the trees? His brother, vengeful Tawhiri, god of the winds and storms, who blows the seed to its home and waters it with his rainstorms? Or their brother, Rongo, who, for the sake of his mother, Papatuanuku, nourishes it as it grows, then gives it to his youngest brother, Tu, who fashions from it the canoes in which he sends the tribes to war one against another? How can we know who determines the beginning … or the end? How far off may the seed fall yet still grow to fulfil its destiny? Now, I am only a phantom swirling in the sea fog but, then, I was of the seed of the mighty chief, Te Rau-paraha.
THE HIGH SEAS, 1835
The cracks in our cabin walls became portals through which our ship released a nocturnal army. At the onset of darkness, drawn by the sour reek of vomit, waving their feelers, clacking their varnished wings, hundreds of cockroaches crawled out to plague us. In vain did we stuff every aperture with paper, stop any gaps with strips of cloth, even wedge buttons sideways into the larger openings. Still they squeezed out from the tiniest crevices. And if we crushed them, a horrible stench rose from the carcasses and thousands of tiny eggs were released to hatch into yet more tormentors.
The Buffalo rose up on giant swells and slammed down their breaking sides, struggling against the sea’s attempts to swamp and claim us. When I opened my eyes, I saw Lucy in the opposite bunk, Mary Ann and Gussie in their berths above. Perhaps I was dreaming? But when I closed my eyes, then opened them again, the Spencer girls were still there with me.
I could not collect my thoughts. Disoriented by the endless pitching of the sea, I fancied I had died and gone to Hell.
‘Mama,’ I heard someone call.
‘Hush, Fanny,’ said a soothing voice.
‘Mama!’ I cried, raising my head.
A damp cloth wiped the tears from my face. I caught the pleasant drift of lavender but, aching for the sweet familiar smell of my own mama, I burst out into gasping sobs. ‘Please, Ma’am, I want to go home. To Lyme.’
For three weeks now we had been at sea, and still Gussie and I were struggling against sea-sickness.
‘Fanny,’ said Lucy, sitting on my berth, ‘Mama wishes to see you.’
I staggered behind her to Lady Spencer’s cabin.
‘Now, my dear,’ she said, ‘I have something to say to you. Sir Richard and I have grown very fond of you and, as you’ve become part of our family, we should like you to call us Uncle and Aunt.’
‘If she’s one of the family, why shouldn’t she call you Mama and Papa?’
‘Because, Lucy, she has a papa of her own. What do you think of that idea, Fanny?’
‘I … It’s very kind, Ma’am.’
She patted my hand. ‘It’s very kind … Aunt.’
Tears started in my eyes and I fought to keep them back.
‘My papa … Perhaps he thinks I am dead, too.’
‘My dear child, he thinks no such thing. Sir Richard has written to him. As soon as his ship docks at Portsmouth, your papa will seek a ship bound for Western Australia and join us at Albany.’
‘Are you certain … Aunt?’
‘As I sit here. Your papa will come to you.’
‘And take me back to Lyme?’
‘We will decide all that when he comes.’
Like Noah’s Ark, our ship floated alone on a vast empty ocean stretching endlessly to the horizon. Having found our sea-legs, Lucy and I roamed unchecked about the ship, taking care to avoid the hatches at the stern, from which rose the stench and shrieks of the transport women manacled in the hold.
‘Let’s go to the mid-decks,’ said Lucy.
‘But we’re forbidden to—’
‘Pouf. Who’s to know where we are?’
As we slipped down the stairway, a pungent land odour wafted from below and a vision of Ellen rose unexpectedly before me.
‘Why, it smells … exactly like the stables at the George Inn.’
As we descended further, we heard clucking and odd scraping noises.
‘Hens!’ I cried. ‘And look …’
There, in pens and crates, were two sheepdogs, a quantity of fowls, a number of goats and ewes, and a ram that glowered wickedly from a separate cage.
‘Those are our animals,’ said Lucy. ‘And that’s Papa’s stallion, Thunder. But how thin and wretched he is. We must find Hugh at once.’
Hugh, Lucy’s eldest brother, was taken aback by our indignation.
‘Why are the animals confined so?’ demanded Lucy. ‘It’s most terribly cruel.’
‘How could we allow them to stray about the ship?’ said Hugh. ‘They’d be overboard in a moment. And there’s nothing cruel about it at all. The sheep and goats and fowls are quite content in their quarters, the cows are led about the decks on halters twice a week and the dogs are walked by the crew every morning.’
‘And Thunder?’
‘Yes, it is hard for him. He’s taken three or four times a week to walk in a halter, but he’s in such terror of his surroundings we can scarcely persuade him to move at all. We have hopes of exercising him in Rio.’
RIO DE JANEIRO, 1835
Rio holds no charms for me. I remember the strangeness of the looming, oddly shaped mountains and the dark green forests as we approached, the gradual discerning of the people clustering at the quayside. We left the Buffalo and were lodged for five days with the Resident, Mr Tully, in an imposing house with white columns, but the ship remained with us. As we lay in our beds, or walked about the large garden, suddenly the ground would seem to heave beneath us like a great wave.
‘Only five days on land,’ said Lucy. ‘I would rather stay here forever than have to return to that smelly ship.’
‘Nonsense,’ said Uncle. ‘Shipboard life is capital. Now, my good girls, this is our second day here and you are quite rested, so I propose to take you the three of you on an excursion into Rio town. It will be a chance to test my command of the Portuguese language.’
‘I didn’t know you spoke the native language, Papa.’
‘Yes, indeed, Augusta. I have put ashore here many times when I was captaining my ship. And I first came to Rio as a midshipman.’
Lucy laughed. ‘I can’t imagine my dear papa as a middy.’
Uncle Spencer ruffled her hair. ‘Come along now. Fetch your bonnets and we shall be off.’
So, while Aunt rested in the shade, gossiping with Mrs Tully, and the younger boys played among the brightly coloured flowers, we four set off together. The flamboyance of the vegetation, the heat and the prolif
eration of dark-skinned people chattering in a language I could not understand made our surroundings feel like a mirage. Strangely garbed men passed in mule-trains, women balanced baskets of unknown fruits on their heads, ragged children grubbed in the dust.
A woman in a tattered purple gown darted towards us, her skin and hair soot-black. ‘Fortuna, fortuna,’ she cried, clutching at Gussie’s hand.
Uncle snapped something at her, and she spat on the ground and flounced off. ‘She’s harmless enough,’ he said. ‘A rogue, certainly, but I doubt she’s a thief.’
‘What did she want, Papa?’
‘Money, of course, Liza-Lou. For telling your fortunes. It’s a speciality of the natives in this part of the world. They claim to have the second sight.’
Lucy seized her father’s arm. ‘Oh, Papa, please, please. I long to have my fortune told.’
‘It’s nothing but stuff and nonsense. You will be rich, you will marry a handsome man, have a fine horse and carriage … All that babble, that’s what they will tell you. And for that, you must part with a silver coin.’
‘But, Papa, dearest Papa, I wish so much to hear my fortune.’
I knew that, of all his children, it was Lucy who could coax Uncle from the angry rages which sometimes overtook him, often for no more reason than a fly’s alighting on his arm. These were provoked, so Gussie had told me, by the livid flattened scar on his forehead which, from time to time, pressed upon the humours of his temperament. It was always Lucy whom Aunt sent with cooling cloths and brandy to bring him to himself again. Wheedling and teasing, she could calm him in minutes.
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