The Soldier's Curse (36 page)

She had also, through Monsarrat, asked the major if she could prepare Slattery's final meal, whenever that was to occur, and the major had agreed with a brief nod.

Despite the fact that he was bonded – still – Monsarrat had always seen his workroom as his own personal kingdom. Things were where they were for a reason. He would have taken it very unkindly had anybody tried to rearrange them. Until this day, nobody had.

But now one of the convict clerks from the agricultural station at Rolland's Plains was here. He had been waiting when Monsarrat arrived at the workroom early one morning. The door to the study was closed, the major out on some business or other. The fellow, a thin young man with a receding chin which seemed to be on the same longitude as his Adam's apple, stood to attention when he saw Monsarrat.

‘Good morning, Mr Monsarrat,' he said.

‘Good morning, Ellis,' said Monsarrat, remembering just in time that this was the man's name. He probably could have identified Ellis's handwriting out of a thousand documents, but had rarely met him face to face.

He pointedly moved around the man, and unlocked the door.

Following him, Ellis seemed a little uncomfortable. ‘I take it the major didn't inform you I would be here, then,' he said.

Monsarrat very deliberately got a sheet of paper and laid it on the blotter, taking great pains to ensure it was completely straight. He then slowly retrieved one of his pens and dipped it
in the inkwell, before forming words of exquisite neatness. He intended to give Ellis the impression that he was extremely busy, but in truth he had no transcribing awaiting him, so he wrote the opening greeting of a letter to the Colonial Secretary – he would no doubt have to do one at some point soon, so he might as well get a start.

After he'd written a few words, he said, without looking up, ‘No, Ellis, he did not.'

‘Oh. You're to train me, you see.'

‘Train you?'

‘Yes,' said Ellis, shifting from foot to foot. Monsarrat was dimly aware that he held a somewhat legendary status amongst the other clerks in the settlement, scattered as they were. His close relationship with the major, his reputation for intellectual rigour and his copperplate script saw to it.

Monsarrat was not finding toying with Ellis as satisfying as he had hoped. There was only one seat in his workroom, so he couldn't offer another. Instead he stood, and leaned against his desk, so that they were on a more equal footing. ‘Train you for what exactly, Ellis? You seem to me to be a perfectly competent clerk as it is.'

Ellis, a small-time counterfeiter from Essex who had been caught out after curfew while in Sydney, smiled at the compliment. ‘Yes, I flatter myself that I am. But there's a difference between clerking somewhere like Rolland's Plains and here in the centre of it all, in the commandant's office.'

Monsarrat was slightly amused by Ellis's description of Port Macquarie as ‘the centre of it all'. He had trouble imagining somewhere less central. Nevertheless, he smiled at the boy. ‘Indeed there is.'

‘So I was told you are to be leaving soon, and the major wished me to have sufficient time with you to get to know his preferences, how to organise matters, that sort of thing.'

Further evidence, thought Monsarrat, that the major expected his recommendation for a ticket of leave for Monsarrat to be granted. And also evidence that it was now becoming common knowledge.
He'd better let Mrs Mulrooney know before she found out elsewhere – he would be deprived of tea for a long time otherwise.

‘Very well then, Ellis. We will have to find you a chair somewhere, seat you at my elbow. Now, let me start by showing you how to do the returns …'

If there was any relief at all in seeing the gallows built, it was that they appeared to be doing it properly. The structure slowly rising on the parade ground seemed to consist of a proper platform, with a lever-operated trapdoor, such as Monsarrat had seen in Sydney. As Slattery was aware, there were horror stories around hangings gone wrong. Monsarrat had been spared the spectacle the private had seen, of somebody whose neck didn't break immediately, condemning them to a slow death by choking. He was also eternally grateful never to have seen the more grisly type of hanging – where the rope had not tightened properly, and the drop had torn the head from the body.

He was confident that the major would at least try to make it quick. For starters, Slattery was still well liked amongst his peers. Every one of them understood why what was happening needed to happen. But they didn't have to like it. Many of the men seemed to have a relationship with two separate Slatterys, railing against the one who was capable of killing the major's wife, while missing the banter of the other, the twinkling rogue.

Monsarrat knew he would not be able to escape viewing the hanging. This kind of punishment would never be carried out in secret – part of its value, in addition to ridding the world of the guilty party, was to demonstrate to others the necessity of good behaviour if they wanted to avoid a similar fate, so everyone was required to attend.

Mrs Mulrooney was delighted for Monsarrat when he mentioned his ticket of leave. Despite the fact that he told her not to get her hopes up – it was a recommendation at this point, nothing more
– she had clasped his hand and done a little dance, twirling him around with as much abandon as the confines of the cramped kitchen would allow.

Then she said, ‘Well, if you're going now, Monsarrat, I am definitely leaving. There really will be nothing for me here.'

Monsarrat had, in fact, started to wonder how much he could expect to make as a free man, whether he might be able to resume his employment with Mr Cruden or someone similar, and whether this would give him sufficient funds to employ a housekeeper. He had no doubt, though, that if Mrs Mulrooney became his servant, she would be the most intractable and disobedient one ever to bear that name.

But all of this was a consideration for another time, on the other side of the wall which divided a world with Slattery in it from one without. Still, as the days passed with no executioner, Monsarrat and Mrs Mulrooney were almost able to pretend their young friend would be with them for some time, and that they would simply have to go to a few more lengths to visit him than they previously had.

But that, of course, was a fantasy. After a few weeks of working with Monsarrat, Ellis had come into the workroom early one morning with his cravat slightly askew (Monsarrat would have to talk to him about the importance of precision in one's personal appearance as well as in one's handwriting), with the news that the
Mermaid
was even now attempting a crossing of Port Macquarie's treacherous bar.

The
Mermaid
disgorged a fellow who was referred to as Jack Ketch. Monsarrat never found out his real name – his given one was common amongst executioners, a nod to a notorious hangman of decades past.

Ketch, or whoever he was, inspected the gallows – the sound of the construction of which could not have escaped Slattery's hearing – and found them to be adequate. He suggested the addition of a small wooden barrier at the front for the sake of the dignity of the prisoner and the sensibilities of the onlookers, protecting them from the sight of the lower half of Slattery's body. He spent about an hour closeted with the major, discussing how the business was to proceed, and showing him some nooses he had brought with him from Sydney. The tying of a noose was a delicate art, he said, as it needed to tighten just the right amount to ensure a merciful end. Despite his profession – or perhaps because of it – Ketch did not relish witnessing the outcome of a botched hanging.

He also sought information on Slattery's weight, and did his best to ensure the length of rope selected would break the connection between his brain and his body with the greatest possible efficiency.

That day, Monsarrat knew, the major visited Slattery for the first time, to inform him that the hanging would take place in the morning of the day after next. He told him he could request any visitor, any meal, and any amount of time with Father Hanley until he was taken from the cells to be hanged.

So that night Slattery, having put in a request for a quantity of rum from the stores – which Monsarrat had fetched via Spring – hosted a game of Three Card Brag with Meehan and some other old gambling mates of his, all of them uproariously drunk before an hour had passed.

The next morning, when Monsarrat looked in on him, Slattery said, ‘If it was this morning instead of tomorrow morning, I'd not complain – hanging is preferable to the head I have at the moment.'

He then pressed some coins into Monsarrat's hand. ‘Rum or not, I still did well at cards, although I expect some of them would have let me win even had I not been capable of doing it on my own. Would you do me a great service and give these to Mother Mulrooney after … Well, after.'

Monsarrat promised he would. And that night he saw Slattery again. For the soldier's last meal Mrs Mulrooney had requested some fresh pork – ‘so much better than that salt beef stuff from the cask' – and roasted it together with some vegetables she herself had grown. Monsarrat contributed the meagre return from his own small garden, and with the major's approval requested a bottle of the better wine to be had here, which Spring again provided, grumbling that the stores of wine and spirits would soon be dry.

Monsarrat helped Mrs Mulrooney carry the food down to the gaol, together with proper china plates – ‘I doubt he's eaten off anything except tin these past years,' she said. Once there, they spread a blanket over the river pebbles which made up the floor, and watched Slattery eat – Mrs Mulrooney had brought a setting for three, but neither she nor Monsarrat had much of a stomach. And unlike Slattery, they had at least a chance of a similar meal at some point in the future.

‘I never asked you,' said Monsarrat as he watched Slattery eat, ‘about that message on the plaster.'

Slattery smiled. ‘Our day will come,' he said. ‘My father used to mutter it sometimes, after his lordship had been by with a request for more money. His day never came. Nor will mine, now. Maybe your boy, Mother Mulrooney, will see his day come.'

‘I like to think he has no need of a day, so to speak,' said Mrs Mulrooney. ‘Everything to do with Ireland is a story to him, things I used to tell him when he was little. He hasn't been infected by the old hatreds, the ones that put you here, young man. And I hope he never will be.'

‘They can kill you whether you're infected or not,' said Slattery. ‘Dory, now … no hatred for anyone, that boy, not really. His day will never come, despite my promise to him just before the flogging – turned out to be the last promise anyone ever made to him.'

The dinner done, Mrs Mulrooney began to pack up the things. She was taking her time about it though. Slattery bent down and gently helped her, before putting his arm around her. ‘Will you be there, tomorrow?' he asked. He didn't need to ask the same question of Monsarrat – he knew Monsarrat would be amongst those required to attend.

Mrs Mulrooney looked, suddenly, terribly anguished and tired. ‘Do you want me to be, Fergal?'

‘If you've a choice, now, I'd as soon you didn't. I want you to remember me with all my considerable charm. It's hard to be charming when you're in the process of dying, or so I've been told.'

Mrs Mulrooney nodded. ‘I think that's best.'

And then the awareness settled on both of them – that this would be their final moment together.

‘I would never have done it, you know, had I thought you would suffer for it, even for a moment,' said Slattery. ‘You're as good a woman as I've ever met, for all your crankiness, and I could never have borne it here without you and your tea.'

‘You take care, Fergal,' said Mrs Mulrooney, before catching herself. An exhortation to take care implied a man had a future. ‘You concentrate on what Father Hanley tells you. Make sure you say all the prayers he asks for, go tomorrow in a state of grace, and then you and I might have a chance of seeing each other again.'

She started to cry then, and he folded her into a hug which nearly obscured her from Monsarrat's view. He patted her head, somewhat awkwardly. ‘Don't you go putting tears and viler substances on my shirt. I need to look my best for tomorrow,' he said, his twinkle a little dimmed, matching her tears with his own.

She looked up at him. ‘I love you, young eejit,' she said. She stood on her toes to kiss him on the cheek and then abruptly turned and left the room, leaving the dinner things behind her.

Monsarrat, who had been watching from the corner, cleared them up.

‘You will be there of course, Monsarrat.'

‘Yes, though I don't relish the prospect.'

‘Even less do I,' said Slattery with that odd half-smile.

Monsarrat stood, setting the plates and other things aside on the wooden bench. ‘Fergal, I am going to miss you. I wish with all my heart you had never done this, whatever your grievance. Life will be colder without you; there's no question. I need somebody occasionally to shake me out of my constraints. Without you, I remain in them forever.'

‘Ah, you won't, Monsarrat. You've a bit more imagination than you give yourself credit for, even for a fooking Englishman.'

Monsarrat, because he knew it was expected of him, gave a courtly mock bow.

‘You know,' said Slattery, ‘I was allowed a visit from Bangar last week. He says they'll sing for me. To send me off, make a path for me to follow, when I no longer have eyes to see it or feet to tread it. It will help, I think, knowing that. I wonder, though, whether I could also ask you a great favour.'

‘Of course, assuming it's not taking your place.'

Slattery smiled. ‘I'd like something to fix on in the crowd tomorrow … something I can watch until – well, I'm going to ask if they will dispense with the hood, but I don't know whether they will. So I want somebody to watch, someone I know, until either the hood descends over my eyes or I drop.'

Slattery's voice began to crack at this point, but he recovered himself. ‘I asked many a more handsome man than you, but they
were all busy,' he said. ‘Would you position yourself as close to the front of the crowd as you can? I'd be grateful to see you there.'

Monsarrat bowed again, and this time there was no levity in it. ‘I'd be honoured,' he said.

The next day was cold and crisp, but with a beautiful blue sky, the kind this place seemed to churn out regardless of the season. Monsarrat was nearly at his workroom before he remembered that he would not be required there today. He had a different duty to perform.

He turned and headed for the parade ground. But on the way, he looked into the kitchen. It was empty. It was clear that breakfast had been prepared there, and recently too. The kettle was still warm from having been boiled, and hopefully it had behaved itself in the process or it would be the worse for it.

Monsarrat hoped Mrs Mulrooney had taken herself off for a walk, so as not to hear the shouts from the crowd that would accompany Fergal's execution. She was not the maudlin type, not the kind to go and dash herself on the black rocks, but nonetheless Monsarrat was uneasy. He would go and search her out as soon as possible after the business was done with, let her know that she didn't need to close her eyes anymore.

Slowly, then, he turned towards the parade ground. There was a considerable crush of people, far more than had been required to attend Dory's flogging – floggings had happened before and would again, after all, but this was the penal settlement's first hanging and deserved a decent showing.

Monsarrat had heard tales of notorious hangings at Tyburn near London, which had been a place of execution until shortly before his birth. The executions had been the focal point for a large amount of public merriment, with apprentices given the day off to go and look at the spectacle, and anyone who had something to sell fronting up to do business with anyone willing to buy.

The mood here, though, was not that of a carnival. Grim-faced Buffs lined the parade ground with shouldered muskets. Each man
seemed perfectly and identically turned out, as if to demonstrate their rectitude and therefore unsuitability for the gallows. No one was chatting; there was no buzz of anticipation. Slattery had been well liked, even by those who had regularly lost money to him. And a great many of the convicts who had been there during the flogging of Dory, who had seen his intervention when Diamond seemed bent on flaying the young man to death, felt that there were others who deserved to be up there on the gallows in his place.

The major stood near the base of the gallows steps; Monsarrat too, shifting periodically to make sure he would be in Slattery's sightline. On the platform was the hangman, like a burned tree in his executioner's black.

The mass of people parted to form an avenue leading from the direction of the gaol. And now down it came Fergal Slattery, his hands tied, dressed in a white shirt and plain canvas trousers, with Father Hanley walking beside him. Monsarrat assumed that Slattery had used Hanley's services that morning to get himself into a state as close to grace as possible.

A few arms, both in red sleeves and slop canvas, reached out and a volley of hands patted Slattery's shoulders as he passed. He turned his head from side to side, smiling and winking, as though about to take the stage to perform a play.

When he reached the base of the steps, he nodded to Monsarrat and gave him a grateful smile. Then he turned to Father Hanley, who sliced the air with the edge of his hand in the shape of a cross, and intoned an absolution in a surprisingly deep and sonorous voice. ‘
Ego te absolvo ab omnibus peccatis tuis in nomine Patris, et Filii, et Spiritus Sancti
,' he said.

Monsarrat was amongst the few Protestants there who could have translated, if asked: ‘I absolve you of all your sins in the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.'

Slattery said his final amen, and mounted the steps of the gallows. At the top, he turned to face the crowd. ‘I ask God, the major, and all here present to forgive me for my crime in taking the life of Mrs Shelborne. I have come to realise she was innocent of any wrong against me – not, though, her family. But as long as
a nation of innocents labour under a yoke unfairly imposed on them, more of those without blame on both sides will find their graves too early. May God have mercy on my soul, such as it is.'

The assembled convicts had never, when in a group, been as silent as they were now; however, the occasional mouth tweaked slightly upwards at Slattery's last remark.

He walked over to the hangman, and nodded. The major had granted his request to dispense with the hood.

The hangman positioned Slattery under the arm of the gallows, tested the noose for the umpteenth time to ensure it would slide close around the man's neck at the appropriate moment, and placed it over his head. He then stepped back, and looked at the major, awaiting direction.

Slattery's eyes, meanwhile, were fixed on Monsarrat, who returned his gaze. He felt a huge weight of responsibility, realising that this was the last human connection Slattery would ever experience.

For a few seconds, the major did nothing, and Monsarrat with his eyes on Slattery entertained the impossible hope that there might be a last-minute reprieve. But then the major nodded to the hangman, who pulled the wooden lever on the platform. The door underneath Slattery's feet sprang open, and he dropped far enough so that only his upper body was visible behind the barrier.

Monsarrat kept his eyes fixed on the young soldier all the while, steeling himself for a seemingly endless series of twitches, jerks and convulsions. But the hangman had done his job well – Slattery did bounce slightly and convulse, and his mouth spread further than it ever had, into a gaping, rugged hole from which a gurgle emerged.