“Concentrate upon passing your stone, sir. We will not let Hill and his New South Wales Corps take over.”
“Oh, here it comes again! Go, Morgan, and stay wide awake.”
Mind whirling, Richard stood outside on the landing trying to visualize Norfolk Island without Major Ross. It was boiling already, thanks to marine private Henry Wright. Wright had been caught in the act of raping Elizabeth Gregory, a ten-year-old Queensborough girl. To make matters worse, this was Wright’s second offense; he had been sentenced to death in Port Jackson two years earlier for raping a nine-year-old girl, but His Excellency had reprieved him on the condition that he spend the rest of his life at Norfolk Island. Thereby transferring his problem to Major Ross. Wright’s wife and toddling daughter had come with him, but in the aftermath of Elizabeth Gregory the wife had petitioned to take her daughter back to Port Jackson on the next ship. Ross had agreed. He had sentenced Wright to run the gauntlet three times: first at Sydney Town, then at Queensborough, and then at Phillipsburgh. The Sydney Town gauntlet had happened the very day Major Ross fell ill; stripped to breeches, Wright had been made to run between two lines of people from all walks, thirsting for his blood and armed with hoes, hatchets, cudgels, whips.
The child rape had destroyed the reputation of the marines, even among many of the law-abiding convicts, though the whole of the old Norfolk Island community was equally angered by Governor Phillip’s developing tendency to rid himself of his troublemakers at Norfolk Island’s expense.
Ross was absolutely right, Richard thought. If he dies, there will be war.
But, being Major Ross, he did not die. His life hung in the balance for a week during which Richard, Stephen and their cohorts prowled regularly, then the pain began to diminish. Whether he had passed the stone or whether it had retreated back into the kidney Surgeon Callam had no idea, for the pain did not lift in an instant; it dwindled away gradually. Two weeks after the onslaught he was able to go downstairs, and a week after that he was the same brisk, snarling, caustic Major Ross everybody knew and either loved or feared or loathed.
The balance tipped more in favor of the New South Wales Corps when Mary Ann arrived midway through August of 1791, the first ship since Supply in April, and the first transport in a year. She brought 11 more soldiers with 3 wives and 9 children belonging to the New South Wales Corps, and 133 felons—131 men, a woman and a child. By the time she had unloaded her human cargo, the population of Norfolk Island had risen to 875. Mary Ann was supposed to have nine months’ supplies aboard for the contingent she brought, but, as usual, whoever determined how much the newcomers would eat had grossly erred. Five months’ supplies, more like.
The fresh influx consisted of 32 intractables who had long plagued Governor Phillip and 99 sick, half-starved wretches off another ship which had arrived in Port Jackson, Matilda. Matilda and Mary Ann were the first two of ten ships sailed from England around the end of March, which meant that vessels were making the journey faster with fewer and shorter ports of call along the way. Matilda had made the run in four months and five days without stopping at all, Mary Ann almost as swiftly. The brevity of the passage was what saved the convicts they carried, for the same slave contractors had victualled 1791’s transports: Messrs. Camden, Calvert & King. Only the Royal Navy storeship, Gorgon, would be delayed by a long port of call; she was to stay in Cape Town and buy as many animals as possible. As Gorgon carried most of the mail and parcels, the old inhabitants of Norfolk Island settled in with a sigh to wait several more months for news. Oh, the frustration of never knowing what was happening in the rest of the world! Added to which, Mary Ann’s captain, Mark Monroe, was so ignorant of world events that he could contribute nothing.
He did, however, set up a stall on the straight beach.
“Stephen,” said Richard, “I am going to call in a brother’s promise. Will ye lend me gold? I can pay ye for it in notes of hand with interest.”
“I will gladly lend ye the gold, Richard, but I will wait for repayment until ye can give me gold,” said Stephen craftily. “How much d’ye require?”
“Twenty pounds.”
“A trifle!”
“Ye’re sure?”
“Like you, brother, I have plenty of credit with Government. Two or three hundred pounds by now, I expect—I never can bother asking Freeman to tot it up. My wants are simple and not usually to be assuaged by gold or notes of hand. Whereas you have a wife and family to provide for, not to mention a new and much bigger house of two storeys.” Closing all the shutters, he reached into the skeletal maw of a shark he had caught on Alexander and fiddled until a catch sprang, revealing a small door in the wall. The purse he removed was a fat one.
“Twenty pounds,” he said, dropping them into Richard’s palm. “As ye see, I am not skint because of the loan.”
“What if someone fancies a pair of shark jaws?”
“Luckily I deem them last on a thief’s list.” He shut the door and adjusted his trophy. “Let us go, or some other hoarder of gold will beat us to the best bargains.”
Richard bought several lengths of sprigged muslin, well aware that Kitty had told him a small lie; servant maids wore wool, and ten yards of muslin were worth three guineas. The jury had felt sorry for the weeping, devastated girls. As well the jury might. He also bought cheap cotton calico which would make everyday dresses for dealing with pigs and poultry, sewing thread, needles, scissors, some yard rules and trowels for himself, and an iron stove with a fire grate and ashpan in its base surmounted by an oven with a flat top and a hole for a chimney. Captain Monroe had sections of thin steel chimney pipe of the kind installed on ships; they cost more than the stove. What pounds were left he spent on thick napped cotton cloth he knew would make excellent diapers, and dark red woolen serge to make winter coats for Kitty and the baby.
“Ye’ve just spent almost as much as ye did on twelve good acres,” said Stephen, testing the rope binding the goods to the sled. “Monroe is a robber.”
“Land requires labor, and that I give free,” said Richard. “I would have my wife and children as comfortable as Norfolk Island life permits. This is no climate for woolen or canvas slops, and the clothing already made up falls apart on first washing. We are swindled by London over and over again. Kitty sews even better than she cooks, so she can make things to last.” He eased his shoulders into the sled harness and buckled it across his chest. The sled moved off effortlessly, though its contents weighed over 300 pounds. “Ye’re welcome to come up the vale for supper this evening, Stephen.”
“Thankee, but nay. Tobias and I are celebrating the departure of the fucken Mt. Pitt bird by eating two splendid snappers I caught on the reef this morning.”
“Christ, ye’ll be killed doing that!”
“Not I! I can smell the big wave coming a mile away.”
Which he probably could, reflected Richard; Stephen’s gift for wind, weather, current and waves was uncanny, and no one knew more about Norfolk Island’s conditions than he.
Wanting to drop the stove off at the site of the new house first, Richard commenced to toil up the steep slope of Mount George on the Queensborough road. This one-mile slog was nothing new; he had dragged the sled laden with calcarenite stone up the hill time and time again. Wheels would have made the pull even harder, for the sled moved in smooth tracks its runners had worn when the road was muddy. Not a frequent occurrence this year, a dry one. Only an occasional night of heavy rain was bringing the wheat and Indian corn on superbly.
