English passengers (33 page)

Then Kinvig joined in. ‘‘After the spring tide, neap.’’

I think we all felt a little better for that. ‘‘But it was a middling good price, was it not?’’ I said, just to put us back a little.

‘‘Ah, that it was,’’ answered Brew, grinning again.

‘‘Seven times good,’’ agreed Kinvig besides.

‘‘Can you spare us a penny or two?’’ This last, I should tell, was none of us, being a big sprawled fellow slouched against a wall just ahead. There was no mistaking his accent, which was purest low-life Dublin, and drunk too. I suppose I should’ve just given him a farthing and had done with it, but I felt in no mood for beggars.

‘‘No, we’ve not,’’ I told him, throwing him a sneery sort of look as we passed.

It was that look must’ve got him started. ‘‘Manxies, are you?’’ he called out. ‘‘I know that Manxy prattle. So what Manxy town are you from, then?’’

It was Kinvig played the fool. ‘‘Peel City,’’ he answered, all proud.

‘‘Peel?’’ he shouted, all in triumph. ‘‘I’ve been there. All snots it was, and rotten poor ones at that, with hardly a penny to steal from each
other. The smell it had too, all stinking of last year’s fish.’’ A wicked look came into his eyes. ‘‘Or was that just the Manxy women?’’

Kinvig narrowed his eyes at this. There always was fight in Kinvig, being so small. ‘‘I’ll give him refreshments for that. Go on, Captain, let me settle him.’’

The last thing a fellow wants, if he’s stretching the law tight to bust, is fighting trouble. ‘‘Leave him be,’’ I told him. ‘‘There’s no point in dirtying your knuckles on some yernee yeirk.’’ This last was Manx for an Irishman on the beg, and none too polite, while I took care to speak it clear enough to be well heard, just to answer that chatter about the fish smell. ‘‘Besides, we’d best get back to the ship.’’

I wished I’d kept quiet. ‘‘Manxies on a ship, is it?’’ called out the Dubliner now, delighting at this new fact he’d caught. ‘‘And where are you sailing off to then? Off round to some quiet stretch of Port Phillip Bay in the middle of the night, I’ll wager.’’

Trust an Irishman to see straight through to what you least want him to. I was glad we were at the edge of town and there were no bodies about. None of us said a word, but it never helped, as the beggar gave a cry of delight, knowing our silence had been pure yes. ‘‘Off you go and sell your dirty, watered contraband rum, see if I care,’’ he shouted out, loud as he could. As if the likes of us would go watering. ‘‘And mind you don’t catch some bullet through your little cheating skulls from some bushranger or convict or wild man, as they’re along the shore in swarms, and will eat up little poxy Manxies for their breakfast.’’

Bushrangers? I didn’t know what they were but they sounded nothing good. For that matter neither did convicts and wild men.

‘‘It’s just lies to worry us,’’ growled Brew when we were out of earshot.

The trouble was that those sorts of words will stick in a man’s thoughts. By the time we finally set forth in the dark, just a couple of evenings later, we were all thinking trouble, and little Kinvig even had himself a little fighting practice on the main deck, standing like a boxer and throwing little punches at the darkness. Our new friend Harry Fields had scratched us a little map of where we were to go and it wasn’t far, being a beach just a few miles from the town. The signal they’d give was to be a light. Swung side to side meant all was well, while if it rose and
dropped, then there was trouble and sail off fast as we could. This lamp waving had caught my blood a little, I’ll own, being just the kind of thing that was done in the golden days of Man Island, and as we sailed out from the river into Port Phillip Bay by the faint light of the rising moon, I couldn’t help but wonder how my great-grandfather, Big Juan Kewley, must’ve often journeyed through the night just like this. Why, I liked to think he might be looking down even then, proud as punch of his great-grandson, the hard case who’d thought to follow his road.

The breeze kept light but steady, and it was just a couple of hours before I saw the faint glow of a single lamp from the shore, waving crossways just like it should. I had the boys drop the anchor and lower a boat and we were set. Brew I left behind to mind the ship, telling him to dig out the Englishmen’s rifles, just in case, while Kinvig joined me going ashore, along with two more to pull the oars. It was hardly a bright night, the moon being only two days grown, with bits of cloud to muzzle her more, but still there was light enough to see the foam of the waves as they broke and the faint shadows of those waiting. Two there were, including the one holding the lamp. That hardly seemed enough to go playing murderer. As I clambered out of the boat, one stepped forward into the lamplight, showing himself to be Harry Fields. ‘‘Captain Kewley. You’ve made good time.’’

‘‘I dare say.’’ I handed him a cask of brandy that I’d got ready. Pulling free the cork, he had himself a sniff then took a swig.

‘‘That seems tasty enough.’’ The tobacco pleased him less—he complained it had got a touch damp—but he said he’d take it still. ‘‘And the rest’s all on the ship?’’

‘‘It is.’’

‘‘Where d’you have it hidden?’’

There’s questions and questions, and this was prying when he didn’t yet have the right. I took the brandy and tobacco from him and dropped them back in the boat. ‘‘Where’s this gold of yours?’’

‘‘Just back here.’’ With that he started walking back across the beach. His helper shone the lamp on the sand by their feet so it was pure night they were walking into.

This I wasn’t so sure of ‘‘I’d rather you brought it here.’’

His voice turned suspecting. ‘‘D’you want the gold or not?’’

There was a question. There seemed nothing for it, so I called out in Manx to Kinvig, still sat in the boat, to keep a close watch, and then tramped after them, sand sucking at my feet. Their lamp swung upwards once or twice, catching a long row of trees that I could hear hissing in the breeze, and beneath these I glimpsed a kind of shelter. In front of this I could see there was standing a rough sort of body with a bag slung over his shoulder, heavy so he was all lopsided. That seemed right enough, for sure, so on I went. It was only when I was there that I saw the other fellow, stepping out from the trees. That I wouldn’t have minded, but the moonlight caught the line of a pistol barrel, pointed nicely at my chest. There was worse. The man seemed to have hardly any head. Then I realized this was just a trick of the dark, from his face being so covered up with black beard, almost up to his eyes.

‘‘If it isn’t Captain Kewley,’’ said landing waiter Bowles of the Melbourne customs, ‘‘who’s only carrying ballast and stores.’’

Here was a rotten piece of fortune. I almost would have preferred bushrangers and wild men to this sleetch of a customs, all so smug at his own cleverness, like only your Englishman can be. He must have suspected us the moment he’d stepped aboard, sending his little sneak Fields after him to catch us out, which he’d done nice as nip. All these months and miles we’d travelled, and now to finish like this. Why, we’d have been better off getting caught by Captain Clarke, back in the English Channel, rather than fuss our way clear across half the world to no purpose.

Or was it to no purpose, though? What first made me wonder was Bowles himself Having sprung so cleverly from the trees, he didn’t pull out a pair of cuffs, or call out of the words I was expecting, such as arrest or confiscation. No, he just stood there, watching. ‘‘There’s nobody lands contraband under my nose and gets away with it, I’ll have you know,’’ he growled at last. That didn’t quite sound like customs talk. I’ll own there’s nothing like the fear of losing every penny to make a man eager for a chance, but it did make sense. Now I looked, Bowles wasn’t even wearing his uniform, but was just in an old jacket. Hadn’t Kinvig followed Harry Fields all day and found him company to all manner of dirts and gallows mucks? For all that, this would have to be played careful. It was for him to lead the dance.

‘‘Ah, you have us now, Mr. Bowles,’’ I said sadly.

‘‘I should confiscate your ship and cargo, so I should, as Her Majesty’s property.’’

For all his stern voice the word I heard strongest was ‘‘should,’’ and sweet it sounded. ‘‘The right you are,’’ I agreed. ‘‘Though it does seem a shame, when I’m sure Her Majesty has enough brandy and tobacco to last her nicely.’’

He should’ve bit me hard for that, but instead he softened a scran. ‘‘This is your first visit to Port Phillip?’’

‘‘That it is.’’

‘‘Hmmm.’’ Down went the barrel of his pistol to point at the sand, as he pretended to have a little wonder with himself. ‘‘I should lock you up this instant, so I should. But the fact is I don’t like to be too hard on fellows for one mistake. You don’t seem beyond reformation.’’

I followed his lead. ‘‘You couldn’t be more right, Mr. Bowles. Why, we’d none of us have dreamed of doing such things if our families had not all been starving nearly to their deaths.’’ Was it money he was after? I hoped not, as we had hardly a penny left.

‘‘But even if I could treat you with generosity, there’s still the problem of what should be done with your cargo. I must do my duty.’’

So that was what he wanted. This would be easier. ‘‘Ah, the hard it is.’’

‘‘It’s too late to declare it now, as the documents have all been written and signed.’’ He frowned. ‘‘And yet I would like to help you out if I can.’’

‘‘The ones back home would be so grateful to you. Why, they’d be smiling and weeping right down to the littlest poor babby.’’

Now he was shaking his head and bothering that cheating Englishman’s head of his with playing thinker. ‘‘I suppose there is a certain party I know who might just be kind enough to dispose of your cargo quietly, just to keep you out of gaol. Though it would be doing you a great favour, and would be more than a little dangerous for me.’’

Prices. He was talking prices. All at once we were stepping out of the ooze and onto firm land. Before long he’d blurted a number, this being-just by purest chance—the very amount that was weighing down our friend with the sack. This number was hardly good compared to the
glittering sum that Fields had tempted us with, but still it was hardly so terrible either, being a little more than I’d have expected in Maldon, and far and above the bagful of nothing at all that I’d been looking at two moments before. Brandy and tobacco must be fetching handsome sums in this part of the world.

‘‘I must warn you, though, that this certain party will accept no bargaining,’’ Bowles growled.

I was in no mood to play greedy. ‘‘Whatever you say, Mr. Bowles.’’

With that we were done. As the five of us began walking back towards the boat, the lamp playing on the sand ahead of our feet, my thoughts were looking onwards, having a quick wonder at this weight of gold we’d now be getting—shrunken though it was—and trying to guess how far it would reach. It would keep the ship afloat and the crew fed for a decent while, no doubting, and give us a mighty bit of spare besides. Of course, a ship is hardly much use without cargo. That took me onto thinking what manner of goods—even legal goods—might be worth carrying from this Victoria, or Tasmania, back to where we’d come from. Grain, perhaps? There’d be debts to pay, for sure, but if I added in the last part of the charter fee we were owed by the Englishmen, then it didn’t look so ugly.

I got no further with my wondering. Without any warning all at once there were fellows jumping out of the dark, and something long—an oar—swung in to my right, catching Bowles on his head, so his pistol dropped clean out of his hand. In the same instant Fields was knocked down to my left. The next thing I knew the lamp had been hurled to the ground, casting all into nearly full darkness, and I heard footsteps dashing away.

‘‘You all right, Captain?’’ There was no missing the whine of Kinvig’s voice, which sounded pleased with itself as a voice can be.

He wasn’t smirking for long, mind. ‘‘You stupid dirt of a one. What did you have to go and do that for?’’

That had him all amazed, like the dog that’s been kicked for bringing back the stick. ‘‘They were customs, weren’t they?’’ he whined. ‘‘The one with the beard, and holding a pistol, too.’’

The little fool that he was. I looked round through the gloom. ‘‘Where’re the other two of them gone?’’

Vartin Clague, who was Kinvig’s helper in this fine cleverness, gave a kind of shrug. ‘‘They ran off.’’

What luck we were having. ‘‘Ah,’’ I told him, as if it was a fine proper joke. ‘‘So they ran off did they? The one with the lamp and also the one with the bag full to the brim with gold.’’

That was news to Kinvig. ‘‘Gold?’’

‘‘That’s right. The gold that our friend Bowles was going to give us till you had the clever notion of batting him on the head.’’ Picking up the lamp, I had a quick glance about the beach but there was no sign of either. They’d be well gone by now.

‘‘I was trying to save us.’’ Kinvig sounded hurt, like the child that’s blamed for what baby broke. ‘‘Didn’t you say we should keep an eye out?’’

I had a peer at Bowles and Fields. Both were breathing—which was something, at least—though they were out cold. Even if they came to, I doubted they’d feel like trading now. Still I felt we should tell them it wasn’t us had their jink. ‘‘Fetch some water.’’

Kinvig filled the boat’s bucket with seawater and dropped it over them. Not that it did any good. Now they were just the same as before but wet.

‘‘We could wait, I suppose,’’ said Clague.

The more I looked at them, the more I saw trouble. What if Bowles turned nasty—as well he might—and tried to arrest us? We’d have to knock him down all over again.

‘‘Perhaps we should just go.’’ Kinvig was looking scared. ‘‘Weigh anchor and get away from this place.’’

Even that wasn’t so easy. ‘‘What about Mr. Robins, all ready with his cutter and his soldiers and his cannon at the Heads? Won’t he find it strange if we come sailing up without our Englishmen aboard? Strange enough to hold us and search us and perhaps ask his chief what to do.’’

The little gorm had never thought of that, of course. The more I looked at this, the less I liked what I saw. Whatever we did was taking chances, but we couldn’t stay here, that was sure. If we could get back to Melbourne and collect the Englishmen, that would be something. Even that would take time, though. ‘‘Get some cord,’’ I told them.