When building his house he had thought of this eventuality; around the back and against the western slope he had randomly chosen one stone pier and constructed it with a hollow center. No one knew, and no one would know. Retaining twenty of the coins, he put the other eighty into his hiding place, then padded silently inside and into bed. Kitty murmured, purred; MacTavish’s tail thumped against the blanket. Richard patted the dog and folded Kitty’s back into his front, stroked her flank and closed his eyes.

The hat box was still on the chair when Richard went to work in the morning; it sat reproaching Kitty as she moved about the room, dusting, washing, tidying books, preparing the ingredients for a cold lunch; too hot to eat the main meal in the heat of the day, and perhaps if she took Joey and walked into Sydney Town she could find Stephen, persuade him to join them for a hot supper.

Oh, how thoughtful Richard was! The remains of the box were stacked in the kindling heap to one side of the front door, chopped to precisely the right size to start the stove fire—too hot to light it now, she would wait until mid afternoon, then bake bread. This typical kindness from him gave her pause; already outside, she turned back to look into the room and at the hat box. Sighing, she went back to pick it up and started the walk to the Queensborough road. Joey was chopping pines; Richard was determined that he would clear enough of Morgan’s Run to plant several acres of wheat and Indian corn next June, and though Joey could not saw, he could fell timber competently. MacGregor warned him of her advent—no danger of dropping a tree in the wrong place with MacGregor on duty!

“Joey, do you mind walking me to Sydney Town?”

Puffing, the simple soul looked at her with adoration and mutely shook his head. He snatched his shirt off a nearby branch and donned it eagerly, then the pair of them set off toward Mount George, MacGregor and MacTavish frisking around them.

“My own errand is to Government House,” she said, “and while I do that, Joey, find Mr. Donovan and ask him to come to supper this evening. I will meet you here. Do not dawdle!”

Government House was in the throes of huge alterations and additions. Men were crawling all over it, Nat Lucas was barking instructions and the others were very quick to obey. It was a stupid convict took his time over work for the Commandant himself, and surprisingly few convicts were stupid. These renovations were of a temporary nature; Commander King had still not made up his mind whether Government House should remain on its present knoll or move to the other knoll where Richard said the original gardens had been. Never having been to Government House, Kitty did not know whether as a convict she ought to find a back door, or whether all traffic went to the front door, facing the sea.

“Who are ye looking for, Kit-kat?” Nat Lucas asked.

“Mrs. Richard Morgan.”

“In the kitchen house. Around there,” he said, pointing and giving her a wink.

She walked along the side of the main house to the separate building which housed the kitchen.

“Mrs. Morgan?”

The stiff, dark-clad figure hovering over the stove turned, the black eyes widened; a young convict girl peeling potatoes at the work table laid down her knife and stared with mouth adenoidally agape. Staggering a little, which seemed peculiar to Kitty, Lizzie walked to the table and gave the girl a thump. “Take that outside and do it!” she snapped. Then, to Kitty, “What d’ye want, madam?”

“I have brought you a hat.”

“A hat?”

“Yes. Would you not like to see? It is very splendid.”

Kitty looked absolutely blooming, belly protruding a little, fair skin shaded by a wide sun hat made of a local strappy grass (the convict transports had contained far more milliners than farmers), fair hair straggling in fetching wisps from beneath its brim, fair lashes and brows giving her face a slightly bald look that somehow managed not to be a disfigurement. Plain she was, but plain she definitely was not. Gossip had told Lizzie that Kitty Clark was beautifully shaped these days, was far from the thin scrawn she had been when Mrs. Richard Morgan had marched up the garden path. Well, now she could see for herself, which was no comfort. Nor was that bulging belly. Waves of sorrow and disappointment swept over her—where was that bottle of medicine?

“Sit down,” Lizzie said curtly, then gulped furtively from a medicine bottle, its contents catching her breath.

Kitty held out the hat box, smiling gravely. “Please take it.”

Taking it, Lizzie sat on a chair, untied the tapes, lifted the lid. “Ohhhh!” she sighed, exactly as Kitty had. “Ohhhh!” Out it came to be examined, held, gazed at raptly. Then, so unexpectedly that Kitty jumped, Lizzie Lock burst into noisy tears.

Calming her took some time; in an odd way she reminded Kitty of Betty Riley, the tough older servant girl who had led all four of them to disaster. “It is all right, Lizzie, it is all right,” she crooned as she stroked and patted.

There was a small spouted kettle on the hob and an old china teapot on the table. Tea. That was what Lizzie needed, tea. A search unearthed a jar of tea and a jar containing a huge rock of sugar together with a sugar hammer; Kitty made the tea, let it steep, chopped off some sugar, then poured the steaming liquid into a china cup and saucer—how well equipped Government House was! China cups and saucers in the kitchen! Kitty had not seen a cup and saucer since she had been arrested, now here were two cups and two saucers—matching!—in a mere kitchen. What sort of treasures did Government House itself contain? How many servants were there to wait on Mr. and Mrs. King? Was there tea on demand without fear of its running out, were there china bowls and plates and soup tureens? Pictures on the walls? Chamber pots?

“I have just been given my notice,” Lizzie managed to say through hiccoughs and tears. “Mr. King has just told me.”

“Here, drink your tea. Come, ’twill make you feel much more the thing, truly,” coaxed Kitty, stroking the black hair.

Lizzie mopped her eyes with her apron and stared at her nemesis ruefully. “Ye’re really a nice little girl,” she said, the tea beginning to warm the other contents of her stomach.

“I hope I am,” said Kitty, sipping daintily. Why did tea taste so wonderful sipped from a china cup? “Do you like your hat?”

“As ye said, it is a very splendid hat. Major Ross would have whistled and told me I looked like a queen in it, but Mrs. King will only try to be complimentary. She is a very pleasant person with excellent manners, so I cannot say she is to blame for my going. Commander King is responsible. And that Chapman fellow, the crafty booby! An eye to the main chance, that one! Already scheming how to make money out of the place. Brings out the worst in Mrs. King too—which the Commander is starting to realize, let me tell you! I predict that Willy Chapman will shortly be packed off to Queensborough or Phillipsburgh. But Commander King don’t like me, Kitty, and that is a fact I cannot get around. Too vulgar for the likes of Mrs. King, is how he put it. Vulgar! Me? He don’t know what vulgar is! Said he don’t want his children to hear me—sometimes I forget myself and out pops a fuck or two. But never a cunt, Kitty, never a cunt, I swear! It ain’t my fault—blame gaol. Never used to swear and curse.”

“I understand completely,” said Kitty fervently.

“Anyway, he cannot just throw me out, he will have to do the decent thing by me,” growled Lizzie, thrusting out her chin. “I am a free woman, not a convict. And d’ye know who he is going to put in my place?” she demanded, outraged.

“No, who?”

“Mary Rolt. Mary Rolt! Says cunt as well as fuck, I do assure you! Huh! ’Tis all because Mary Rolt fucks Sam King the marine, and he is settling here, and all that. King. Same name, y’see. Makes anyone better in the Commandant’s eyes. Huh!” She sipped a little more tea and stared at the hat. “I wish I had a mirror.”