The Convict's Daughter Read online

  It was to his advantage that there were still too few women and far too many men in the colony. Although, he would just need to play his cards carefully and keep a close hand. He wanted a fellow with money as well as decent connections. He wouldn’t throw his daughter away for nothing. It had to be a match that would advance the standing of his family. He didn’t care if the fellow was tubby or poorly groomed or long-in-the-tooth. In fact, a part of him relished the idea of his daughter having to suffer such a match after the trouble she had caused.

  He liked old Alexander Moore, the unfortunate older brother of the handsome auctioneer, W.G. Moore. Old Alexander was a recent widower. He would want a wife to keep him and his five young children sooner rather than later. Gill suspected he could handle Moore. Better still, with half of his teeth knocked out from a horse-riding accident that had also left him with an awkward right leg, he was also confident that Mary Ann would not have to compete with many other colonial girls for the widower’s attention.

  There was also Lewis Samuel, the man who took the hotel rent from him each quarter. Gill found the mercantile brother of the better-known magistrate Saul Samuel hard to stomach with his exaggerated sense of importance, but he was the nephew of the powerful auctioneer and emancipist Samuel Lyons and also had a number of different business interests in the southern interior. Never married, Gill thought, and would no doubt make a generous settlement. And who knows, with Mary Ann as his wife the brothers might even decide to give Gill the hotel, or at least waive the outstanding rental for the last quarter.

  He didn’t know why, but Martin Gill was quite certain he didn’t want another Irishman in the family. ‘Plenty of other sorts with money for the taking,’ he reasoned, looking about his own dining room and observing that with winter over, the hotel was still emptier than he liked. He was keeping all of this to himself, hoping that Margaret hadn’t picked up on it yet. No use bothering her with money concerns nor with his plans for Mary Ann until they were firmed up.

  It didn’t take long for Mary Ann to learn of Kinchela’s failed appeal. It was a blow but hardly a surprising one, and after their interview at the prison gate, Mary Ann decided to focus on their future rather than dwell upon the frustrations of the present. For the time it also suited her to oblige her parents. She did feel guilty for the trouble she had caused her family and was also aware that her mother appeared to be under some sort of strain, but she associated this with the new baby, Martin, who was now a little over six months old. Most of that winter Mary Ann had been content to stay on the upper floor of the hotel in the family’s private quarters, tending to her brothers and sisters and when possible, retreating to her bedroom where she could muse upon all that was to come.

  By early September, however, spring began to spread across the harbour and surrounding hills, teasing those who had been awaiting its arrival, with light green buds as well as sea breezes full of sun-warmed eucalyptus. From her bedroom window, Mary Ann had taken to following the gradual flowering of a rather pretty line of fruit trees that were sprinkled through a swathe of gums that curved around Circular Quay. And as those early blooms began to unfurl into light bright sprays of whites and pinks, they came to feel, to the young woman patiently awaiting her lover’s release, like the promise of a fresh beginning.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  A More Exalted Position

  The Colonial Secretary, Earl Grey, had broken his promise. Things had got so tight at home that the current climate compelled him to give first consideration to the immediate interests of his country. Despite a solemn commitment he had made to the Legislative Council of New South Wales, he had little choice but to send out a fresh boatload of convicts. No one in the colony could believe it. Almost ten years had passed since there had been such reviled vessels in their harbour. The colony had been purged of this shame. How, they fumed, could Earl Grey dare to insult the respectable people of this land by once more imposing upon them the great ignominy of men in chains?

  For the better part of a decade the colony had been able to hold its head high, the papers huffed. Indeed, in recent years, all sorts had arrived, specifically because they had received reassurance from Earl Grey that there would be no more convicts. Men had made plans, nurtured visions, invested family fortunes and even dreamed of a new Britannia in the southern seas. Free from the old taint, business confidence had risen and the colony had prospered to the extent that many were convinced that New South Wales now occupied an exalted position among the dominions. Their efforts had brought them to the brink of self-governance. Even universal suffrage, the toyshop owner told anyone who would listen, although the men he accosted on the topic cautioned him that the latter might be too much, for now anyway. Even so, a good number of men now knew what it was like to be treated like an Englishman, many, for the first time in their lives. This had been their moment. The wind had been in their sails. Surely Grey would not rob them of their future?

  The news of Grey’s broken promise stirred fear and loathing throughout New South Wales. Colonists were fiery with the insult, particularly shop men and paper men like Parkes and his associates who were now busy manoeuvring around town. They were also peeved that Lowe had shown little thanks for the work they had undertaken on his behalf. Worse than that, Sydney’s Weathercock had also taken to avoiding them, and on several occasions had even flagrantly contradicted them in public. When, for example, Parkes had gone to the hustings after the votes were finished on polling day and declared Lowe’s victory ‘the birth day of democracy in Australia’—the new member for Sydney had visibly recoiled. Lowe wanted no such thing and he quickly disabused Parkes and his friends of this point as well as any assumption on their part that he might owe them any favours.

  It was also apparent to the toyshop owner and his friends that far from wielding greater influence, their election success had earned them the dubious dishonour of being snubbed by a number of important men who had decided that Parkes and his associates had got ahead of themselves. Rather than feel deterred by such a slight, this ‘committee of unknown men’ decided it was time to go it alone and in such a way that would show others just how much influence they could wield. So now Parkes and his associates were out and about, hustling the middle and lower orders as they organised meetings in each city ward—determined to send a most unequivocal message to the Colonial Secretary, the governor and all their friends about the price they would pay if they tried to sail any such boats into their harbour.

  In October, a less controversial vessel docked at Circular Quay—carrying among its passengers a man who harboured his own colonial ambitions. It took the barrel-chested John Kinchela Junior less than a week to realise that Sydney was in quite a different mood than when he had left it for Hawkwood at the end of autumn. At first the doctor’s eldest son couldn’t put his finger on what it was about Sydney that felt different. He wondered if it was perhaps the drought. But it wasn’t just that. There was something else. The papers were a lot riper than he remembered them—that was certainly clear to him after skimming a couple in the Club while enjoying a very pleasant beef and pheasant pie.

  It wasn’t until he finally went out to Parramatta Gaol to see his brother that John Kinchela got a clear whiff of what it was. He had been utterly appalled the first time he saw his own brother shuffling into the room in that uniform. And also deeply incensed—a felon in the family, he fumed. But as James talked him through the damaging events of the past few months, it occurred to John that this entire episode could never have happened even a few years ago. An emancipist pointing his pistols at a free settler’s son and being acquitted of attempted murder? He snorted incredulously. Even more outrageous was the fact that this hotelier had actually been successful in his prosecution of a gentleman when the courts knew full well who had the better social standing. And all for a convict’s daughter, he sniffed in disgust.

  He would have to turn things around and to do that he would need to leave Hawkwood on the market and hope for a sale while he stay
ed closer to home, at least for a time. So John took to calling upon many of his old associates, including a number of family friends. Roger Therry was first. After all, he had been ‘the true hero of the Mudie affair,’ John flattered the little man as they sat down together to a glass of sherry and caught up on news. But Therry was being far too philosophical for John’s liking. ‘Moods changed, John, simple as that,’ he told his old friend’s favourite son with an apologetic expression. ‘It’s like that everywhere around the colony these days. You would be a fool to try and push things the other way, hold back the tide, so to speak, especially,’ he added, much to John’s horror, ‘when it might be for the better in the long run,’ Therry finished, turning the fine etched glass between his thumb and middle finger. John had no idea what he meant but couldn’t believe that his one-time champion was ready to roll over like a dog. He left the meeting with a most uncomfortable feeling.

  John had a long lunch with Davidson up at the Club, where he had acquired yet another perspective on the whole matter. He was at a loss as to why his brother had played his hand so badly, and over such a creature. That was clearly the most shocking point of all to him, but even Davidson didn’t seem to want to pick it up. Instead, he cautioned his friend about the way certain words were being used these days. After all, the girl was hardly a criminal for having convict parents and both her parents had got their ticket-of-leave more than twenty years past. ‘Emancipist be damned,’ John exploded. ‘In the books of John Kinchela Junior,’ he reminded Davidson then and there in no uncertain terms, ‘a felon is a felon through and through and for the rest of his life, come what may. Unless, of course,’ he softened a little, ‘the crime is something honourable in the name of the King or Queen, for example, or for the greater cause of justice.’ As far as John could see, James’ actions had hardly been honourable, let alone for the greater good. The longer he spent with Davidson the more he began to suspect that his old friend also had some role in the absurd adventure.

  Nonetheless, John needed to do what he could for his younger brother and the family name and to do that he would need a different sort of position, closer to home, that could also wield influence. He picked one up at the end of his second week after meeting directly with the governor, Sir Charles FitzRoy, although he decided not to bring up the issue of James at the time. He would, soon enough, but it wouldn’t do to start on it right away. FitzRoy had been most affable, and made it clear that sporting squires with knowledge of the land—like John—were exactly what the colony needed. Particularly, he added, a little cryptically, ‘in the current climate’. John nodded. Something was clearly brewing right under his nose and he would need to be on the right side of it when the storm finally broke.

  The best appointment the governor could offer the doctor’s son was Superintendent of Schools. John thought it a good role—one that would get him out and about but still allow him to visit town regularly. Perhaps even set him up for a country seat in a year or two, FitzRoy added generously, if that was what he wanted. He would be very pleased to see one of his own on the council. But if that was going to happen, John mused to himself after he had left the governor, he would need to clean up his brother’s mess quick smart and also set a few other affairs in order. Anne Bourne’s eldest son bent himself to the tasks before him with characteristic energy and by the end of September the new Superintendent of Schools was dividing his time between rural tours to Blackman’s Swamp near Orange, where he was setting up a new National School, his mother’s home in Liverpool and Parramatta Gaol, where he had already organised a writing desk and chair for his brother as well as a weekly delivery of local newspapers.

  During one visit John also brought his brother news from London. ‘The Battle of Ballingarry is all over the papers,’ John noted, explaining how certain parliamentarians had been describing it as ‘the most monstrous sedition that has ever taken place in misery-ridden Ireland.’ ‘Then they don’t know their history, too well,’ James snorted before reminding his brother of the things they had seen as boys when the Rockites had taken the south to the brink of insurrection just before the family left Ireland for the sugar colony. He also reminded John of what their father had told them about the blood that had run through the family millstream during the United Irishmen’s Uprising of ’98, and how—years after that—no God-fearing Protestant would ever ride alone after dusk.

  ‘Twenty fires at least,’ John continued, for both men shared an interest in the country of their childhood, even though neither held any particular desire to return there, ‘all through the countryside stretching from Kilkenny to Limerick,’ John trailed off. For a moment the two brothers imagined the bonfires blazing through the close wet countryside of their childhoods. ‘I heard,’ John started again after a while, ‘that when the police came after them, the rebels chased the troops about a mile or so into an old farmhouse belonging to a widow. Mind,’ he paused, ‘you won’t be surprised to learn that the police didn’t help themselves much, either—they took the widow’s children hostage and then barricaded themselves inside her house.’ Both boys were familiar with the sort of butter-coloured stone farmhouse where the uprising had taken place, the sort that lay nestled within the rolling hills like a yellow button pressed into a green velvet cushion. A manor house, no doubt, much like their own home in Kilkenny.

  ‘Around forty dead all up they say,’ John added before opening another paper and pointing to a column. ‘Blood spilt on both sides, and it looks as though they have given the ringleaders a platform for what will no doubt be the most written about sedition trial in Ireland for years.’ Yes, James thought, sharing with John an instinct for how it would all play out, and aware that the men his brother was speaking of, lads like Willie O’Brien and Thomas Meagher, were close to their own age. Men both the Kinchela boys might have gone to college with if they hadn’t been in that wretched sugar colony. ‘No doubt they will all hang now,’ James mused out loud. ‘Aye,’ John followed, ‘or if not that, they’ll find themselves in Van Diemen’s Land, I would wager, which might be the worse option of the two.’

  Martin Gill had also heard the story about the skirmish in the widow’s cabbage patch. Once those boys—the Young Irelanders—had parted with Daniel O’Connell and his Repeal Association, Gill had no time for the lot of them, quite frankly. Despite O’Connell’s recent death, the Great Emancipator remained Gill’s hero as well as the only hope that there would ever be peace let alone prosperity in Ireland as far as he was concerned. He hated the thought of Dublin being held in the hands of a bunch of hot heads who had gone off to Paris and come back with a whole lot of foolish ideas as well as a national flag that was bound to cause as much trouble as the French tricolor. This was a mad, bad year as far as Gill was concerned. Not one where a businessman could afford to take his eyes off his investments for even one minute.

  After several weeks of looking about, Gill made up his mind. He would have his daughter wed by the middle of the new year. Earlier, if possible. He wanted the hotel looking good before he began inviting certain gentlemen to join their family for the luncheon Margaret insisted that the family enjoy after mass each Sunday. This would give them time to get the repairs right, and hopefully by then the crowds would be supping on their turtle soup and knocking back their fine pale Indian ales again.

  A month or so before Christmas, Martin Gill gave his wife a good wad of notes with which to purchase his daughter two new dresses, in the latest fashion of course. They had the dressmaker call to the house for the fittings rather than have the girl travel around town while the mood was set against her. Mary Ann was heartened by the dresses and assumed they were a gesture of forgiveness from her father. When she learnt of the gift she had rushed to her father and kissed him warmly on both cheeks only to recoil a little from his coolness.

  But Margaret had her suspicions. She had a feeling that there was something else about all this and it had something to do with money. One Friday evening she came down to the early dinner seating an
d found the dining room almost empty other than for an unkempt sea captain drinking cheap bitter, and three men, from the haberdashery trade by the look of their cases, who were drinking at the bar. She checked the books and noticed that there had only been a few families among their residential guests over the past weeks, and that none of the usual sorts from Wellington Valley or Moreton Bay had stopped in for months.

  Tricky. The situation was tricky, and Margaret spent several days thinking through how to raise the matter with her husband. First, however, she went and spoke with her father about it. Old McCormick’s reply quite stunned her. ‘Best start thinking about putting a bit away for yourself,’ he said quietly as he went about packing the garden rakes into the makeshift shed at the side of his vegetable patch. He wasn’t surprised at all. In fact, ever since the trouble had started with Mary Ann and news had been spreading about the cost of the local drought and wool prices and the like, he had got to thinking along the same lines. If the hotel went under and Martin Gill went up in another bout of hot and bluster, those children would need something. Four little ones, all under ten and the youngest one not yet a year. You couldn’t afford to wait and see. Not with that one ruling the roost.