Toward the Sea of Freedom (28 page)

Michael gestured deprecatingly at Cecil, who was just then toiling to prepare the hard soil for new seeds from England.

Lizzie pulled herself together. If she were to show weakness now, if she were to reveal the feelings that welled up anew at the sight of Michael, she would never again be able to approach him unselfconsciously.

“A short man, but a free one,” she mocked. “You, on the other hand, Michael Drury: a year in Van Diemen’s Land and still in chains? Yet all you did was steal a few sacks of grain. Or was that a lie?”

Michael shrugged. “Perhaps something of an understatement, like yours about the bread.” He winked at her. “Maybe I sold a little whiskey too. How about you?” He smiled.

Lizzie smiled back, pained. “To be in chains here, you must have done more than that.”

She struggled to remain calm and, above all, to keep her expression under control. The overseer did not need to know that the two of them were old acquaintances. Slowly she went from one man to the next, pouring them water while she continued to banter with Michael.

“Three escape attempts,” Michael admitted. “The first on the very first day. I thought it was a good idea to sneak back on the
Asia
, since I already knew its darkest corner. Direct passage back to Ireland.” He laughed.

Actually, not such a bad idea.
“What went wrong?”

“I should have waited for them to clean and unload that tub,” Michael said resignedly. “So, they caught me straight away. And then . . .”

Lizzie had finished pouring water. Everyone had drunk, and the overseer was watching her, likely wondering why she was still hanging around the prisoners. She had to return to the house.

“Michael, I have to go,” she whispered. “But tomorrow is Sunday. I’m free in the afternoon. Where can I find you?”

Michael arched his eyebrows. “You mean, where can you find
us
? We stick together, as you can see. Outside a cell, you’ll only find a chain of us. But Sunday afternoons we are allowed a little fresh air. Somewhere between the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth devotional.”

The other men laughed.

“Simply walk down the new road. Our barracks are on the river. The old ones from the bridge construction workers. They’re accordingly bug ridden.”

The overseer raised his whip meaningfully and looked at Lizzie. “Break’s over, men.”

Lizzie waved and raised her pitcher toward the overseer. “I’ll come,” she whispered to Michael.

The next morning, she was to see yet another old acquaintance.

As on every Sunday, she followed the Smitherses to church, although this time she was on the arm of the beaming Cecil. Mr. Smithers looked sheepish. His wife had probably not left him in the dark about why she cared so much about Cecil and Lizzie’s marriage. Lizzie walked with an unhappy face. She could not even muster a smile at the reverend’s congratulations. The cook patted her shoulder comfortingly.

Suddenly, Sergeant Meyers and his wife demanded all her attention. The soldier greeted the Smitherses from the church entrance. His wife stood, tall and elegant, next to him. She wore a simple brown dress adorned with a lace collar and lace gloves over her delicate hands. A lovely little hat with a cream-colored band sat atop her hair, which she had tied at the nape of her neck into a supple bun. She had black hair, eyes like dark diamonds, and a delicate complexion.

Lizzie stared in astonishment at Velvet, the watch thief from London. Velvet politely offered Mr. Smithers her hand, saying a few obliging words. Only with a wink did she reveal to Lizzie that she, too, recognized her old cellmate. Then she followed her husband, whom she towered over by half a head, into the church.

Lizzie could not concentrate on the service. So that was why Velvet had consented to be married. Sergeant Meyers held an elevated post; no doubt he was well paid and could count on a good pension and several acres of land when his military career was over. Lizzie had not known that even such well-off men sought their wives among the convicts, but Velvet was a beauty. Sergeant Meyers was ugly; in England, he might have found a more virtuous wife, but certainly not one nearly as attractive.

After the service, Velvet and her husband took a ride with the Smitherses. The women had not seen the progress of the road construction in a long time, and Mrs. Smithers wanted to know what her husband did during the week. Velvet climbed gracefully into the chaise, waving surreptitiously to Lizzie. Lizzie merely intimated a wave. Neither of them would gain anything from publicizing their acquaintance.

Lizzie needed to escape Cecil’s company if she was going to see Michael that day. Unfortunately, the little gardener stuck to her like a barnacle, laying out his tragic life story to her while leading her on a long walk.

Born the youngest of fifteen children on a farm in Wales, he had fled poverty and hunger and gone to Cardiff. He made a few trips as a sailor but was not very good at it, then made another attempt at farming. Finally, he stole a sheep and was promptly apprehended. That brought him to the colonies.

“And next time, you’ll tell me your story,” he said. Then, to Lizzie’s great surprise, he said, “Now I’m going to meet with a couple fellows.” Cecil furtively withdrew a pint of whiskey from his pocket. “The master gave this to me to celebrate the engagement.”

Lizzie shook with rage. Could he not share the booze with her? Good Lord, she could use a couple swigs after the last few days. And worse yet, it had already begun: Mr. Smithers was giving Cecil whiskey, which he accepted gratefully. The two were getting to be well acquainted. What was a wife between friends?

Lizzie walked down the new road, which was not all that new. Convicts had built the red bridge over the river almost twenty years earlier. Now they mostly did expansion and repair work. On the Elizabeth River, near the bridge, lay the barracks.

The men in Michael’s gang were enjoying themselves by the river. Two of them had built a makeshift rod with which they tried to fish, but it looked like they were new at it. A few of the others tried to explain what they were doing wrong, but they went ignored.

Michael gave Lizzie a warm smile as she walked down to them and sat next to him on the riverbank. The river was lovely and peaceful. Plants that Lizzie would have called water lilies floated on it. Probably, though, they were something completely different—nothing in Van Diemen’s Land was quite what Lizzie expected.

“You’re late. Did your leprechaun keep you so long?” he teased.

“My betrothed took me on a walk,” Lizzie said with dignity.

The chain gang laughed, and the men yelled bawdy jokes at her. Each of them offered to marry her, promising greater pleasure than she could enjoy in Cecil’s arms.

Lizzie frowned and cut them short. “Boys, as it is, you couldn’t have me alone anyway. Now, out with it, Michael Drury. What did you do that they still have you in chains?” She glanced at his wrists, which were red and raw where the chains rubbed. “Heavens, you’re hurt again. You’re lucky it doesn’t get hot here; otherwise you’d have flies bringing you another fever.”

Michael shrugged. “I’m smarter now, you see. But it takes time to learn. It was stupid to run away unprepared. But I had hoped there would be bigger cities here where a fellow could disappear.”

“Even prepared, it’s just as hopeless,” said one of the convicts. He was not shackled, and he also seemed to know how to fish, having apparently caught three that now lay next to him on the beach. “The cities are glorified villages, and the whole thing’s an island, in case you lot haven’t noticed. You can’t get out.”

“I wouldn’t say that,” one of the other men declared. Lizzie recognized the sailor who had come over on the
Asia
in the berth next to Michael’s. “We have a plan, anyway. As soon as they let us out of these chains, we’re off.”

Michael nodded and threw a rock into the water.

“You still want to escape?” Lizzie asked, stunned. “If you’re caught again, you’ll spend your whole sentence in chains. Accept it, Michael. Without a ship, captain, and crew, you won’t reach Ireland.”

“Ireland, no,” said Michael, sticking a blade of grass in his mouth. “But . . .”

“Now, don’t reveal the plan,” warned the sailor. “The moll is after a pardon. You hear it, don’t you? She’ll betray us.”

“You’re doing a good enough job of that yourselves,” Lizzie said angrily. “Who’s behind this brilliant plan, anyway? The twelve of you?”

Unsurprisingly, two other Irish were there, and Lizzie thought there might be something to the talk of their incorrigibility. Dylan was a squarely built, red-haired young man who one could tell was Irish at first glance. His upper body was muscular. Will looked just as strong, and he was taller. He was a giant of a man with blond locks, a sloping forehead, and the small, vicious eyes of a pit bull.

“The three of us, and Connor here as navigator,” Michael said proudly. “Connor’s sailed at sea. He’d find it blind.”

“What is
it
? What would he find blind?” Lizzie stared at him.

Dylan lamented about betraying the “secret.” Lizzie shook her head about the supposed secret, shared with twelve others—and probably half the other residents of the barracks. Not that it was a problem. No one would betray the men. Fleeing Van Diemen’s Land was so hopeless that those in charge did not bother to advertise rewards for betraying others’ escape plans.

“New Zealand,” announced the former sailor. “It’s right nearby; the trip’d be easy as you please.”

“That’s why half the convicts’ve already gone there,” the fisherman mocked them.

“When you know what you’re doing . . .” the sailor retorted.

“What is New Zealand anyway?” Lizzie asked. “Another colony?”

An hour later, her head was swimming with contradictory information. Will and Dylan depicted New Zealand as a promised land; Michael had heard it was supposed to resemble Ireland; and Connor, whom they most believed, told fantastic stories of whale and seal hunting. The West Coast was mentioned again and again. Once more, Lizzie longed for Jeremiah. His reports had mostly been reliable.

Lizzie tried to learn some things on her own. There was a globe in the Smitherses’ study, and she looked around Australia for islands, but besides Van Diemen’s Land, she only found New Guinea and few smaller islands on the other side of the country. Sailing there seemed like madness to Lizzie. You would have to sail along the entire Australian coast.

But then she discovered two islands on the other side of the Tasman Sea: a long one and a smaller one shaped similarly to Van Diemen’s Land. New Zealand. So it did exist, and its western coast lay toward Van Diemen’s Land. But getting there meant crossing an ocean. Lizzie tried to estimate the distance, and she became dizzy.

“What are you doing there, kitten?” Lizzie winced when she heard Mr. Smithers’s voice. “Dusting the globe? Yet you don’t even have your bonnet on.”

Lizzie sighed. “I’m off this evening, sir,” she whispered. “But if you want, I, I can go put it on for you. Just don’t tell . . .”

“Don’t tell what? That you were a little curious how the earth looks? Of course not, sweet, why would I? With your wedding imminent, you are surely dreaming of returning to England with Cecil. But look how far you have to sail, kitten. England is fifteen thousand miles away.”

He kissed the nape of her neck.

“And New Zealand?” Lizzie asked hoarsely.

Mr. Smithers laughed. “You can’t quite swim there either. But it’s only two thousand four hundred miles. There’s even a ship from Hobart. But I’m warning you, kitten, the sea is stormy. And what would you and Cecil do there? Hunt whales? Seals? Cecil wouldn’t hurt a fly. And there are no jobs for house kittens like you either. Unless they’re as bawdy as you.” He embraced her and let his hands wander over her breasts. “You’d find plenty of customers on the West Coast.”

“Have you been there before, sir?” Lizzie asked, fighting back her disgust.

“No, but it might be that we’ll move there when the work here is done,” Mr. Smithers said, seeming rather disinterested. “They’re building a new city on the East Coast. There’ll be work for me there. David Parsley is looking into it soon.” David Parsley was Mr. Smithers’s assistant, a young engineer whom he regarded highly. “If you’re a good little kitty, we’ll take you and Cecil with us.”