Remember Me (2 page)

‘The lady we robbed was in court,’ Mary said sadly. ‘She pointed me out.’

Bridie sighed in sympathy. ‘Well, let’s hope they get it over quick. There ain’t nothin’ worse than waiting to get a body down.’

Much later that night, Mary lay on the filthy straw-strewn floor among her fellow prisoners, who all appeared to be sleeping soundly, and found her thoughts slip back to her home and family at Fowey in Cornwall. She knew now that she had been born more fortunate than many of the women she’d met since leaving there.

Her father, William Broad, was a mariner, and although there had been hard times when he had no work, somehow he’d always managed to make sure his family never went hungry or lacked a fire. Mary could remember being cuddled up in bed with her sister Dolly, hearing the sea crashing against the harbour walls, yet feeling safe and secure, for however long her father was away at sea, he always left enough money to tide them over until he returned again.

Just thinking of Fowey with its tiny cottages and cobbled streets made a lump come up in her throat. The bustling harbour and town were never dull, for she knew everyone, and the Broads were a well-respected family. Grace, Mary’s mother, set great store by respectability; she kept the tiny cottage spotlessly clean, and tried to instil in her daughters her high standards in cooking,
housekeeping and sewing. Dolly, Mary’s older sister, was the dutiful, obedient one, happy to follow her mother’s example, and her dreams were only of finding a husband and having children and a home of her own.

Mary did not share Dolly’s dreams. It was often said by friends and neighbours that she should have been a boy. She was clumsy with a needle and household tasks bored her. She was happiest when her father took her out sailing and fishing, for she felt at one with the sea and could handle a boat almost as well as he. She preferred male company too, for men and boys talked of exciting things, of lands overseas, of war, smuggling, and their work in the tin mines. She had no time for giggling, simpering girls who cared for nothing but gossip and the price of hair ribbon.

It was a thirst for adventure which made her want to leave Fowey, and she fully believed she could make her mark upon the world if she was just somewhere else. At the time Mary left, Dolly had said somewhat unkindly that it was just because she’d never had a sweetheart, and she was afraid no one would ever want her.

That wasn’t true. Mary had no real desire for marriage. In fact she felt pity rather than envy for the girls she’d grown up with who were already saddled with two or three children. She knew that their lives grew tougher with each new mouth to feed, that they lived in fear of losing their husbands through drowning at sea or in an accident in the mines. But then life was hard for everyone in Cornwall, unless you were gentry. Work was either fishing, mining or going into service.

Dolly was in service with the Treffrys of Fowey as an under-housemaid, but Mary had stubbornly refused to follow her example. She didn’t want to spend her days emptying slop pails and laying fires, at the beck and call of a hard-faced housekeeper. She’d seen no future in that. But the alternative was gutting and salting fish, and although she’d done that since childhood, and enjoyed the freedom to chatter as she worked, and the camaraderie of her workmates, no one ever got rich gutting fish. You smelt disgusting, and it was freezing in the winter. Mary would look at the bowed backs and gnarled fingers of the women who’d spent their whole life doing it, and knew it meant early death.

She had heard about Plymouth from the sailors. They said there were fine shops and big houses there, and opportunities for anyone with determination. She thought she might get work in one of the shops, for even if she couldn’t read and write, she could add up quicker than her father.

Her parents had mixed feelings about her leaving. On the one hand they wanted to keep her at home in Fowey, but times were hard and they were struggling to support her. Perhaps, too, they hoped that a couple of years away from them in a respectable trade would settle her down, that she’d find a sweetheart and eventually marry.

Mary couldn’t wait to get away, yet now as she lay on the hard cold floor of the prison cell and recalled the day when she left her home, she was filled with remorse.

It was very early in the morning, a beautiful July day without a cloud in the azure sky, and the sun was already
warm. Her father had sailed off for France just a few days earlier, and Mary had insisted that only Dolly should come down to the harbour to see her off. She didn’t want any further lectures from her mother about behaving like a lady on the boat, or being wary of strangers.

Her mother had never been given to displays of emotion, so it was a little unnerving as Mary went to kiss her cheek at the door to find herself suddenly being hugged tightly.

‘Be a good girl,’ her mother said, her voice cracking. ‘Say your prayers and don’t get into any mischief.’

Mary remembered how she hurried away with Dolly, giggling with excitement. It was only as she got to the end of the narrow street and glanced back that she saw her mother was still standing in the doorway, watching them. She looked so old, small and oddly vulnerable, for she hadn’t yet braided her hair up for the day. It was as grey as her dress, making her almost disappear into the stone of the cottage. Even without being able to see her face clearly, Mary knew she was crying. Yet Grace still managed to wave a cheerful goodbye.

‘I don’t know why you think Plymouth will be better than here,’ Dolly said waspishly as they got down to the harbour and saw the boat waiting. ‘I bet you could go right round the world and never find anywhere so pretty.’

‘Don’t be like that,’ Mary retorted, thinking Dolly was jealous. Her sister was far prettier than her, her eyes as blue as the sky above, her complexion clear and pink, and she had a dear little upturned nose. But Mary had a feeling that Dolly often wished she was more daring, and perhaps
resented that her life was already mapped out for her.

‘I can’t help it,’ Dolly replied in a small voice. ‘I’m going to miss you so much. Don’t stay away too long.’

Mary remembered how she’d hugged her sister then, and said something about how she would make her fortune and send for Dolly to join her. If she had known that was going to be the last time she’d see her, she would have told her how much she loved her. Yet that sunny morning she couldn’t get on the boat fast enough. It didn’t even cross her mind that she might fail in Plymouth.

What Mary hadn’t anticipated was that hundreds of girls came off the boats in Plymouth every week looking for work, and it was the literate, the prettiest and the ones with good references who got the best positions. All she landed was a job in a seamen’s ale house, washing the pots and scrubbing the floors. Her bed consisted of a few sacks in the cellar.

It was around Michaelmas when the landlord threw her out. He said she’d stolen some money, but that wasn’t true. All she’d done was refuse to let him have his way with her. Without a reference she couldn’t get another job, and she was too proud to go home to Fowey to hear ‘I told you so’.

The moment she met Thomas Coogan down by the harbour, she knew that she was on the way to hell in a handcart. Surely no decent young woman would allow a complete stranger to buy her a dinner, let him hold her hand, and not run a mile when he suggested she stayed with him until she found another job? But there was
something about his lean, bony face, the sparkle in his blue eyes, and the stories he told her of voyages to France and Spain that captivated her.

Thomas wasn’t bound by any of the rules Mary had been brought up with. He cared nothing for the King, Church, or indeed any authority. He had a gentlemanly manner and was fastidious about his appearance, and he was more fun to be with than anyone she’d ever met before.

Maybe it was partly because he seemed to desire her so much, to hold her and kiss her. No man had ever wanted her that way before, they saw her just as a friend. Thomas said she was beautiful, that her grey eyes were like a brewing storm and her lips made to be kissed.

That first day with him was utterly magical. It rained hard and he took her into a tavern by the harbour and dried her cloak in front of the fire. He introduced her to rum too. She didn’t like the taste, or the way it burned her throat, but she did like the way he leaned forward and licked her lips lightly with the point of his tongue. ‘It tastes like nectar on you,’ he whispered. ‘Drink up, my lovely, it will warm you all over.’

He made her feel so wanton, her whole body seemed to glow, and it wasn’t just the rum. It was his wit, the feel of his hand in hers, the suggestion that she was on the brink of something dangerous yet wonderful too.

With hindsight she ought to have suspected there was something amiss when he never attempted to bed her. He kissed her passionately and told her he loved her, but it never went any further than that. At the time Mary had
foolishly believed his caution was out of love and respect for her, but it was only later she discovered the truth.

Thomas Coogan cared for no one but himself. He was a pick-pocket, and when he’d spotted her crying down by the harbour, he knew her well-scrubbed, innocent country girl appearance would make her an ideal accomplice. All it took was a few sympathetic words to win her trust.

It never crossed Mary’s mind in the first few weeks after meeting him that as they stood arm in arm looking in shop windows or strolled around the market, he was often engaged in helping himself to someone’s pocket-book, fob-watch or other valuable with his spare hand. She was too enamoured with his charm, excited by his interesting friends and acquaintances, and bowled over by his generosity to her to study him closely.

By the time she did become aware of it, she was so entrenched in his easy, fun way of life that he could have told her he was a grave robber and she wouldn’t have turned a hair. When he disappeared just after Christmas, leaving her in the dwelling-house he’d taken her to, she was inconsolable.

The chances were that he’d been caught by the constables, and that was what made her fall in with Mary Haydon and Catherine Fryer. She didn’t want to lose face with these two cut-purses, whom Thomas had held in such high esteem. They appeared so worldly, so very daring, and she needed money to pay the rent on Thomas’s room for when he came back.

At first she was just a lookout while the other two
snipped off purses in the crowded streets and markets. Sometimes she caused a diversion by pretending to faint or claiming that she’d had her own purse snatched. But the day came when Catherine said it was time she took on some of the danger herself, and when they saw the small, neatly dressed woman walking home through the main street with her arms full of parcels, it appeared to be the perfect initiation.

Maybe if Mary hadn’t been so anxious to prove her courage, she would merely have tripped the woman up and sped off with just one of her parcels. But instead she grabbed the woman’s pretty silk hat with one hand, and scooped up everything she dropped in alarm, throwing the parcels to the other Mary and Catherine before running for it. Unluckily for them, people gave chase, cornered them in an alley and called for the constables.

Most of the details of Mary’s arrest and imprisonment in Plymouth were hazy to her now, for the journey to Exeter later on eclipsed everything else. It took four days in an open-topped cart where she was shackled to three other women, two of whom were her supposed friends but berated her most of the way for getting them caught too. It was January, and the icy wind swept across the bleak moors, almost cutting them in half with its ferocity. If they wanted to relieve themselves, all the women had to get down together, with the guard leering at them. Every step was torture, for the shackles dug into their tender skin and they weren’t yet practised at moving together. At nights they were thrown into a stable at an inn, with bread and water the only nourishment they received.
Mary thought she would die of the cold, in fact she hoped fervently that she would, if only to shut out the scorn and ridicule of her companions and the knowledge that her crime, highway robbery, was a hanging offence.

On her first night at Exeter Castle it was Bridie who had comforted her and assured her she would become accustomed to the rats, lice, dirt, stale bread and using a slop pail in front of everyone. Mary supposed that she had now, in as much as she accepted that was all part and parcel of prison life and she deserved punishment for what she’d done. But she couldn’t accept that she was to die in a few days’ time, and would never be free to walk country lanes, to watch the sea breaking on the shore, and see the sun set again.

She wept then, for failing her parents and bringing shame to the family, and for not listening to her conscience when she knew that stealing was wrong.

It was a well-known fact that as many as half of those sentenced to death would get some sort of reprieve. In the next three days Mary’s fellow prisoners talked of nothing else, everyone hoping they would be among the lucky ones.

But Mary was no fool. She knew you needed friends on the outside, a concerned and kindly master or mistress, a member of the clergy, or even a friend with money to plead for you. As the hours and days ticked slowly by, it became clear which of her companions were that fortunate. They were the ones who got food, drink, money and even clean clothes sent in.

Mary looked enviously at the young girl and the woman she knew now to be her aunt, as they ate hot meat pies brought in by one of the gaolers. They had been charged with theft from a lodging-house, but had been protesting their innocence ever since their arrest. Now, judging by the pies and the blankets they’d been given, maybe they had been telling the truth, for someone on the outside was obviously working for their release.

Yet some of the prisoners, even those without any hope of reprieve, had become quite jovial in the last couple of days. Maybe it was because in their eyes a quick death was preferable to the misery of a long prison sentence, or a lingering death through gaol fever. There was also a certain amount of status in being hanged, for huge crowds gathered to watch. If they could go to their death with dignity and courage and get the admiration of the watching rabble, they might become heroic figures, maybe even a legend.