The Gentleman's Garden

by Catherine Jinks

  ‘I have told her what she will endure, if she fails to satisfy,’ he declared. ‘You heard me address her. She knows that she can expect no quarter from me. Now you have only to stand firm, and not allow her to take advantage, as you have done with others in the past. Be strict, and you will have nothing to fear.’

  But Captain Brande was wrong. Jane Steel spent just two days in the Brandes’ service, and by the end of the first day it was already glaringly obvious that she possessed not one redeeming feature. She was sulky. She was slow. She allowed the pudding to boil dry, and made no apology for doing so. She tracked muddy footprints through the house, burned a hole in a dishcloth, had to be reminded three times to empty the chamberpots, and employed foul language against Daniel Callaghan. Dorothea herself happened to overhear this incident. It occurred after dinner on the first day, as Dorothea was approaching the kitchen, and it involved the use of the words ‘whoreson croppy bastard’.

  Dorothea was entering the room just as this imprecation was uttered. She therefore had no opportunity to withdraw before she was seen. Flushing, she realised that she had stumbled upon a dispute, for Jane was wielding a rolling pin in a very threatening manner, while Daniel stood, hands on hips, against a wall.

  He seemed more wary than enraged, until his gaze met Dorothea’s. Then he coloured, and frowned.

  Jane turned her back on her mistress in the most discourteous way imaginable.

  ‘I hope nothing is wrong,’ Dorothea remarked, her voice sounding thin even to her own ears. Jane did not reply. She began to move pots about, noisily. Daniel said: ‘Pay’t no mind, Ma’am.’ He spoke formally, almost stiffly, as he would have spoken to Captain Brande. It seemed to Dorothea that he did not want her there—that neither of them wanted her there (though perhaps for different reasons).

  ‘I do not like to hear such language in my kitchen,’ she remarked. ‘Jane? Look at me when I am speaking to you, please.’

  Jane turned. The expression on her face would have curdled milk.

  ‘I realise that you are not familiar with the ways of this house, Jane,’ Dorothea continued, attempting to assume a tranquil demeanour. ‘Mistakes can be forgiven, in the circumstances. But profanity cannot. Do you hear? I will not have this house defiled by such language. Daniel has never once offended me, in this regard, and I do not intend that you should. Is that clear?’

  Jane glowered.

  ‘Jane? Kindly answer me, when I speak to you.’

  ‘I ’eard,’ said Jane.

  ‘Good. Now, why have you fallen out? What reason could there be for such a display?’ Seeing Jane lower her eyes and scowl, Dorothea turned to Daniel. But he was no more helpful than the housemaid.

  ‘Pay’t no mind, Ma’am,’ he repeated, grimly.

  ‘Will you not tell me? Perhaps I can be of assistance.’

  ‘Not in this,’ he said. ‘Sure, and ’tis not a fit thing for yeer notice.’

  Helplessly, Dorothea looked from face to face. They were shuttered and forbidding. Had she and Daniel been alone, she might have made more peremptory demands. As it was, she could only say: ‘Please recall that Jane is new, Daniel. She requires our help and guidance.’

  ‘Aye,’ he drawled flatly, avoiding Dorothea’s eye.

  ‘And Jane—you must listen to Daniel. I place all my trust in him where this house is concerned. He knows what must be done. He gives good counsel.’ Observing the sneer that was forming on her housemaid’s face, Dorothea added, in a sudden burst of temper: ‘If you speak to him like that again, my girl, I shall have you punished. Do you understand?’

  Jane muttered something in reply.

  ‘What? What did you say?’

  ‘I said, I never tuk no orders from no damn croppy, afore. No, and won’t neither.’

  Jane’s tone was insupportable. Dorothea felt her face grow hot.

  ‘You will do exactly what I tell you to do, whether you like it or not!’ she snapped. ‘And I am telling you that you must pay heed to everything Daniel says!’ Then, realising that she might very well become embroiled in a vulgar argument if she stayed any longer, she left the room, her heart pounding furiously.

  Of course she went straight to her husband, and expressed the gravest doubts about their new housemaid. Charles responded promptly. He gave both servants a good dressing down, at the top of his voice. But he later expressed to Dorothea his opinion that crude language, where it was not directed at a master or mistress, could be tolerated providing that there were no other grounds for taking offence. ‘It is an unpromising start,’ he said, ‘but I have truly put the fear of God into her, now. Give her a few more days, and see if you are still dissatisfied.’

  Dorothea had no choice but to obey. She insisted on one thing, however: that Daniel, not Jane, sleep in the little room next to their own that night. She would feel safer, she told Charles, if Jane was to occupy the kitchen. Naturally, her husband scoffed at this. He assured her that an Irishman was ten times more dangerous than any underfed, bow-legged female. Nevertheless, he acquiesced (albeit grumpily), and Dorothea’s misgivings were laid to rest—at least in this particular.

  Daniel did not object to his change of quarters. He did not demand an explanation; perhaps he needed none. He simply gathered up his linen and followed Dorothea into the house, where he unrolled Martha’s old hammock and tethered it to hooks that adorned the wall of his assigned room. Dorothea watched him for a while without speaking. Finally she asked, in a low voice: ‘What happened after dinner? Will you tell me, now?’

  He stopped, and sighed, before glancing at her.

  ‘ ’Twas of no consequence,’ he said. ‘Such a silly thing, Ma’am. I’d not have ye trouble yeerself.’

  ‘But will she serve, Daniel? What do you think? She seems so …’ Dorothea floundered, searching for a suitable description.

  Daniel turned back to the knot he was tying, and tugged at it, hard.

  ‘That I cannot tell ye,’ he replied, without expression.

  ‘I doubt that she will stay here. If it were up to me …’ Dorothea paused, catching herself on the verge of a disloyal remark, and saw Daniel’s hands hesitate before recommencing their busy work. He kept his eyes fixed on them.

  ‘I hope that you will not be too inconvenienced,’ she said at last, hopelessly. Whereupon he sighed again.

  ‘Please, Ma’am, will ye not trouble yeerself? Sure, and I’d not have ye frettin’ over this—I would not, indeed.’

  Then Charles called to her, and she had to leave the room. Her intention was to spend the next day supervising Jane very closely, so as to gain a better understanding of her true character and abilities. But this opportunity was denied to her. For news had reached the colony of the death of Princess Charlotte, and by morning plans for an official memorial service were well underway.

  Though the royal death had occurred six months previously, the distress of the colonists was immediate and heartfelt. People wept in the streets. Shops were closed, and flags flown at half mast. A slow and solemn procession of mourners marched from Government House to the church of St Philip, where a sermon was delivered by the Reverend Mr Cowper. Every gentleman in Sydney—every civil and military officer—was expected to join this procession, dressed in the deepest mourning. Captain Brande, of course, was among them.

  As for Dorothea, her presence was also required. She attended the service clad in the sombre garments that she had first donned after the loss of her second baby. She sat beside Mrs Bent (whose wardrobe was well furnished with mourning clothes), and together they lamented the death of such a young and lovely princess, so soon after her wedding day. Wielding a black-trimmed handkerchief, Mrs Bent confessed to having shed many tears. She pointed out that Mrs Antill was wearing only black ribbons. And she launched into an account of her struggles with Mr Campbell, who had finally agreed to pay twenty-eight pounds for her green doors and sixty pounds for her exterior blinds. The total bill had come to two hundred and thirty-five pounds, though she was wondering if
she should stand firm and enforce a government purchase of her morticed doorlocks.

  ‘I told Mr Campbell,’ she declared, ‘that he had displayed, in the course of our correspondence, a pettishness which would hardly be excusable in one of my own sex. So I had the last scratch, you see.’

  Happily, Mrs Bent’s monologue (of which Dorothea could not entirely approve) was cut short by Mr Cowper’s sermon. It was an impressive and dignified oration. It moved many of the congregation to tears. Dorothea saw Mrs Macquarie dabbing at her eyes, and heard the Governor sniff. He sniffed twice, though his posture remained ramrod straight. Dorothea herself did not cry, but she was horribly depressed. The gloom attendant upon Princess Charlotte’s passing had cast even darker shadows over her own existence, for it seemed almost like an omen. It frightened her. If Princess Charlotte’s marriage could end in tragedy, what of her own? Would there never be an end to these blows of fate? She was filled with misgivings. And she prayed, not for the princess, but for an improvement in her own prospects.

  The service was rather long. When it was over, Charles had to report to the barracks, so Dorothea left the church in Mrs Molle’s company. Together they went to Mrs Molle’s house, where they partook of a nourishing meal. Over cutlets and cake, they discussed the sermon, and Mrs Molle’s offspring, and Dorothea’s new maid—concerning whom Mrs Molle nursed the very gravest doubts. (The vulgar language, she thought, was particularly ominous.) After promising not to allow the girl any liberties, Dorothea returned home, where she found Daniel in the garden.

  He was bleeding from an ugly wound under one eye.

  ‘Daniel!’ she exclaimed. ‘What have you done to yourself?’ He had been weeding with one hand; the other was employed in pressing a folded rag against his left cheekbone. When Dorothea insisted on examining the damage concealed by this rag, she discovered swelling, and bruising, and a great deal of dried blood. ‘You need a corn plaster and muslin gauze,’ she declared. ‘What happened? Did you fall?’

  ‘Aye,’ he mumbled, not looking at her. But she knew him rather well by now.

  ‘Did you fall, or was it something else?’ she inquired sharply. ‘Daniel?’

  ‘Please,’ he said, with almost an edge of desperation in his voice, ‘I’d not have ye trouble yeerself.’

  ‘It was Jane, was it not?’

  ‘Ma’am—’

  ‘What did she do? Did she hit you? Where is she?’

  ‘Wait.’ He put out his hand as she turned. ‘Wait. Do not go near her.’

  ‘But—’

  ‘She should not be in this house, Ma’am. What she says—’tis not fit for yeer ears.’

  ‘Why? What did she say? What did she do?’

  ‘I’m thinkin’ she’s a little mad.’

  They stared at each other. But before Dorothea could comment, she heard a noise from the kitchen.

  It was the crash of crockery breaking.

  ‘No,’ said Daniel, as Dorothea began to move. ‘Let me go.’

  ‘I must see, Daniel—I am the mistress of this house.’

  ‘Let me go first. Please.’

  When they reached the kitchen, Daniel insisted on entering it ahead of his mistress. As a result, Jane immediately began to shout at him. She cried that he could go to hell—he was a lousy rascal—him and his cackle tub be damned, and he might go and fuck dogs like the rest of his race.

  Then the housemaid saw Dorothea, and her surprise rendered her speechless.

  Dorothea did not know what to say. She had never in her life before heard such language employed. She blushed, and swallowed, and averted her gaze from Daniel. There was a tense moment as she and the housemaid regarded each other. Finally, she said: ‘I believe that I have already spoken to you on the subject of your language, Jane.’

  Jane turned red. Abruptly she swung around, and began to ply her broom with some violence. Dorothea heard clinking sounds.

  ‘Did you break something?’ she inquired.

  No response.

  ‘Answer me, please! Did you break something?’

  ‘What do you think?’ Jane said rudely.

  ‘Do not speak to me like that. If you speak to me like that, I shall have you dismissed.’ Still no reply, as Jane banged her broom about. ‘Jane? Answer me. What have you done now? Jane. You insolent girl, how dare you defy me!’

  ‘Kiss my cunt.’

  Dorothea blinked. In genuine ignorance, she gasped: ‘What did you say?’

  ‘I said kiss my cunt, you whore! You slut, you baggage, I’ll chive yer buff for you, and damn yer bloody eyes!You’re no better’n me, you sneaksman’s bunter!’

  Screaming insults of this sort, wild-eyed and open-mouthed, Jane came at Dorothea with her broomstick raised. She simply exploded, like a gun; as Dorothea shrank back, Daniel leaped forward. He grabbed the broom. He wrenched it from the housemaid’s grasp. He tossed it aside, and yelled a warning, and there followed a dreadful set-to, wherein Jane attacked him with her nails and teeth, and Daniel overcame her with all the strength at his disposal, slowly pinning her to the floor.

  Even so she writhed, and bucked, and screeched, and used such appalling language that Dorothea had to cover her ears.

  ‘Get the constable!’ Daniel gasped.

  ‘What? Oh no!’ Go to a watchhouse? Unattended? It was out of the question. ‘You must go.’

  ‘Ma’am—’

  ‘Wait!’ Dorothea remembered the key. The key to the little room—Daniel’s room. ‘Bring her. Bring her inside.’

  ‘Eh?’

  ‘Bring her inside!’

  Somehow it was accomplished. Daniel dragged Jane into the house, while she kicked and spat and screamed at the top of her lungs. Then Dorothea locked her into the small room where the soap and preserves were kept, and stepped back to listen as preserving jars crashed to the floor.

  ‘Go to the watchhouse,’ she quavered. ‘Fetch a constable.’

  ‘Come with me,’ he urged. ‘Don’t stay here.’

  ‘No. I shall stay. You go—quickly!’

  ‘Ma’am, ’tis not safe—’

  ‘Hurry!’

  So Daniel went, and returned in fifteen minutes with a pair of constables. Dorothea, who had been watching a solid wooden door shake under the force of Jane’s heel, was greatly relieved. She withdrew to the drawing room while the constables performed their duty. She heard them address the housemaid in loud voices, to no avail, before they unlocked the door that imprisoned her. There followed a mighty crash (as Jane threw a wooden box at their heads), and a series of cries, thumps and curses. Finally, the din subsided. Someone was panting, and someone else—Jane—was groaning.

  A constable appeared at the drawing-room door, breathing heavily, to inform Dorothea that the matter had been ‘taken care of’. Jane, he said, would be dispatched to the watchhouse.

  ‘We ’ad to give ’er a bit of a thump—to quiet ’er, like,’ he announced cheerfully, his raddled face gleaming with perspiration. ‘But she won’t feel it fer long. Will you be layin’ charges, Mum?’

  ‘I—I—’ Dorothea could hardly speak. ‘My husband will tell you,’ she said at last, faintly. ‘I shall send my husband.’

  ‘Orright. Thank’ee, Mum.’

  He touched his forelock, and vanished. Dorothea waited. There was a shuffling, and a grunting, and the sound of heavy boots. Jane groaned, and was told to ‘shut it’. A door slammed. A board creaked. Laughing voices were raised outside.

  Dorothea did not even realise that she was chewing her thumb until Daniel approached her, all bloody and dishevelled. There were scratches on his face and forearms.

  ‘They’ve gone, Ma’am,’ he said.

  She nodded.

  ‘Can—can I get ye a cup o’ tea?’

  ‘No.’ With a start she noticed what she was doing, and pulled her thumb from her mouth. ‘No, I … you must fetch Captain Brande. Wait. I shall write a note.’ But she found that she could not move.

  ‘Ma’am?’

  ‘Wait.’
Her throat tightened. She put her hands over her eyes.

  ‘She’s gone,’ he said gently. ‘She’s gone, now. She’ll not trouble ye further.’

  ‘Oh, Daniel,’ she whimpered. ‘Oh, Daniel. Thank heavens you were here.’

  ‘Aye. God be thanked.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ she moaned. But when he stepped forward she rose, abruptly, with one hand raised. ‘No,’ she mumbled, and cleared her throat. ‘No, I—I am quite all right. Really. I must not—I must fetch you a corn plaster.’

  ‘Ma’am—’

  ‘You cannot leave the house in that condition. Wait. Please.’

  She found the plaster, and some vinegar, and a looking glass. Then, while Daniel attended to his wounds, she wrote a letter to her husband.

  Dear Charles, she wrote, I have some very disturbing news. There followed three paragraphs, in a shaky hand. She concluded with the words: I am so grateful that Daniel was here.

  And she did not sign her name.

  CHAPTER THIRTY

  ‘NO,’ SAID CHARLES.

  Dorothea had anticipated this reply. Nevertheless, she strove to explain herself.

  ‘Daniel deserves his ticket-of-leave,’ she insisted. ‘He came to my defence when Jane attacked me, and now he has agreed to testify against her on my behalf. If it were not for Daniel, I would be obliged to stand up in court, and repeat what she said to me.’

  ‘Nonsense. A lady in your position? You could not bring yourself to utter such filth.’