A Crooked Rib (6 page)

‘Which she refuses to do?’

‘It seems so. And this has caused her to offend a great many people, not only here in Auckland but in Wellington where she was much criticised, particularly by the detestable Mrs Godley, for failing to leave her cards.’

‘She has always scorned such niceties.’

‘I feel exactly as she does but, in a place like New Zealand, and if she wishes her husband’s advancement and popularity, she must cut her coat according to her cloth. And the Governor has difficulties enough. He’s been something of a success in managing affairs with some of the natives, but he has grave troubles brewing with the settlers. From the outset, he’s been much concerned with the situation of the Maoris and the land sales. My own husband, and I tell you this in the strictest confidence, Miss Thompson, considers that the New Zealand Company has acted most improperly, even illegally.’

‘In what way?’

‘In their sales of land to which there was no title.’

‘You mean they didn’t own it?’

‘Not an acre. But this didn’t prevent them from selling to unwary buyers in England who arrived to find that either their land didn’t exist or that they had no legal claim to it. There are many people, particularly in Wellington, who’ve spent all their capital on what they believed to be large holdings, and then used up the last of their savings on passages for themselves and their families, only to land in New Zealand and find themselves ruined.’

‘Can nothing be done for them?’

‘Very little. Some have even been forced to work as labourers, housing their families in tents, while the Company directors have made fine profits for themselves.’

‘I have heard nothing of this before, but it seems quite shocking.’

‘It is entirely immoral. And, as I said, illegal. But I must ask you again to mention nothing of what I have said to either your host or hostess.’

‘I assure you I will utter not a word of it.’ I hesitated. Then I said, ‘There’s another … matter on which I would greatly value your opinion. But it’s a very delicate one.’

‘If I can advise or assist you, I shall.’

‘Miss Cockcraft, when she spoke to me at the Mission, hinted at some … scandal connected with Lucy. It was to do with the Governor’s former private secretary. She seemed to think I was aware of it, but the ignorance I professed to her was entirely genuine.’

Lady Martin sighed. ‘From all I understand, it was a very trivial matter, or would have been had the Governor not overreacted so.’

‘But surely …?’

‘No, no. Nothing of
that
nature was ever imputed. The Governor’s private secretary was a Mr Cooper, who had been on his staff in Adelaide. Mr Cooper was young, dashing and — more pertinently, I believe — lively in temperament. On several occasions when the Governor was absent, he and Mrs Grey rode together, but always in public places such as the Domain or the shoreline. Perhaps they were thoughtless but I’m sure they did no more than enjoy each other’s company in the most innocent of ways. As I said, I think she is lonely and neglected, and Mr Cooper stimulated her interests.

‘At any rate, for a time, she became most animated, organised a ball at Government House and paid for the restoration of a native’s canoe to settle a dispute over its ownership. The people here began to warm to her. Then, or so my husband had it from a colleague, her husband returned early from the Waikato and found his wife with Mr Cooper in the middle of the day, sitting on the veranda, chatting together, unchaperoned.’

I laughed. ‘Good Heavens! Government House is so poorly constructed that every conversation in any room can be heard from any other place. I should scarcely have thought they would choose the
veranda
if they wished to have a tryst.’

‘I’m sure you’re right. Mrs FitzRoy complained often about the lack of comfort and privacy in that house. But the Governor, who was no doubt tired and strained from travelling, exploded in rage, threatened to horsewhip Cooper and dismissed him on the spot.’

‘But on what grounds?’

‘Supposed misconduct and insubordination. It was an overreaction
of the grossest kind. Poor Cooper came to my husband, protesting his innocence and desirous of his intervention with the Governor.’

‘And …?’

‘My husband tried to soothe matters but, even he — and his rank as Chief Justice is almost equal to that of the Governor — was met with hostility and indifference. So Mr Cooper was forced to leave and, as you may only too well imagine, tongues here began wagging, especially as Mrs Grey appeared wan and unhappy.’

‘The Governor is a very strange man,’ I said. ‘It’s as if he desires a wife, yet he is not prepared in any way to set himself to be kind and gentle towards her, or to allow her those little pleasures that might soften her feelings towards him.’

‘He’s a hard man. There’s no doubt he has a formidable intellect, but his lady has a great interest in learning and could be much more of a helpmeet to him if he would only permit it. She reads most extensively.’

‘I know she longs to travel with her husband. I have heard her pleading with him on several occasions to take her with him.’

‘He refuses?’

‘Yes. And so she becomes ever more estranged from him. She has sought to learn the Maori language so that she might help him with his collection of native legends but that, too, he refuses to countenance.’

Lady Martin shook her head. ‘It’s no wonder she’s miserable. And with no children to occupy her …’

‘And little chance of—’ I stopped.

‘Perhaps you might interest her in good works with the education of the native children in the Mission school?’

‘Most certainly I will but …’ I pondered for some moments. ‘There’s something else I should like to confide in you. I dare not write to her sisters or to my dear aunt, since it would trouble them greatly and they’re too far removed from here to be of any use to her in the matter.’

‘I give you my word again that I shan’t reveal the content of this conversation to anyone, not even to my husband.’

‘I’ve been disturbed … worried … by a certain … recklessness
Lucy has developed in her character. It’s as if … as if she desires to … goad her husband by the wildness of her views. She can’t seem to curb herself when it would be more prudent to do so.’

‘I thought you would
never
arrive, Fanny,’ cried Lucy, as Ellen dropped me at the door of Cobb House.

‘She’s been peering from the window every five minutes since breakfast time,’ said Gussie. ‘Papa says on Judgement Day she’ll be urging haste on the Archangel Michael.’

‘Well, you’re here now,’ said Lucy. ‘So let’s go off together and find something to do. Come along, Gussie.’

On my visits to Cobb House, I had begun covertly to observe the Spencer girls and their papa. He was affectionate to all three of them, but Lucy he particularly favoured. How, being so pert, did she manage to please him so greatly? Gussie, and sometimes Mary Ann, he patted kindly on the head, but Lucy he seized in extravagant bear hugs, flipping her ringlets with his large hands and teasing her when she tossed her head at him. What would my own papa do if I were to conduct myself so? I did not think it prudent to attempt to find out, and spent my time keeping out his way.

‘Today,’ said Lucy, ‘we are going to the boat-builders to show you the lifeboat Papa is designing. It’s to be unsinkable.’

Though I had passed them often, I had never before entered the boat-builders’ premises. As I followed Lucy and Gussie, I stared at the great spars of wood, the caulking vats, and the men clattering hammers, clinking chains, shouting and calling as they hauled and heaved. The sweet smell of wood mixed with choking fumes of tar from the outside yard.

‘Over here,’ called Lucy, leading us out of a doorway to an area fronting the sea.

Thigh-deep in the water, Captain Spencer and several other men
bent over an upturned boat with large cylinders of copper strapped to its either side.

‘Papa!’ called Lucy.

He looked up in annoyance. ‘What the
deuce
are you girls doing here?’

Lucy seemed unmoved by his scowl. ‘We wish to see the new lifeboat.’

‘You have no business in the boatyard unaccompanied.’

‘I am not unaccompanied. Gussie and Fanny are with me.’

The Captain’s face turned red. The other men stood silent, watching as he strode out of the water towards us. I trembled, and saw that Gussie, too, was apprehensive. She pulled at Lucy’s arm. ‘We’re sorry, Papa,’ she said. ‘We will go home directly.’

‘We will
not
go home,’ said Lucy. ‘I promised Fanny she might see your invention.’

His breeches dripping, Captain Spencer marched over the shingle and glowered at Lucy. ‘You are wilful, Miss!’ he bellowed.

‘Indeed, I am not. I wished only—’

‘Be quiet!’ he roared. ‘And you are defiant, Miss. Do you hear me?’

Lucy remained uncowed. ‘I do,’ she said. ‘And why can we not complete our simple errand? Because my cruel papa doesn’t think we should walk the little distance to the boatshed unescorted. Pah!’

I waited for her papa to strike her. They locked eyes, he red-faced and furious, she composed and cool. Suddenly, Captain Spencer threw back his head and let out a great roar of laughter. ‘You minx, Liza-Lou,’ he said. ‘You have the true Spencer spirit.’

She smiled up at him. ‘So now may we show Fanny the cleverness of my dear papa?’

How had she done it? How had she turned his anger to amusement and admiration? I thought of my papa’s fury when he had caught me with the spyglass, and wished with all my heart that he might be like Captain Spencer — or that he would leave us and go back to his ship, and that Mama and I could return to our old life together. I longed to speak of this to Lucy but I dared not. What kind of unnatural child does not love her own papa?

Sheathed in the spring leaves of my tree, I muttered and mixed my spells and potions, seeking a charm strong enough to weaken Papa and send him back to the High Seas. But he remained untouched, even by the power of crushed sheep droppings from the churchyard scrambled together with spittle and blood. As hale as ever, he strode about taking up so much of Mama’s time that it was Ellen who now heard me reading from my primer.

‘Be I has nay they knowing of they letters like ye does, Miss Fanny, but I has aye an ear for they pretty phrase,’ she said one evening as she listened amiably to my laborious deciphering of
Cobwebs to Catch Flies
.

I put down my book. ‘Ellen?’

‘Aye?’

‘Ellen, you remember the witch? By the canal …’

‘Oh, aye. She with they besom?’

I nodded.

‘What have put ye in mind of she?’

I hesitated. ‘I want … I … there’s a … a boy at my school who … who is cruel to me. He doesn’t like me …’

‘Ye should tell they dame. Be her must see to he, not ye.’

‘But I can’t tell her. He … he’ll find out. Ellen, do you know that witch?’

Ellen was offended. ‘I has niver had truck in aye me life wi’ any witch and niver shall!’

‘Then, do you know a spell … or magic … to … to send him … that boy … away?’

She thought for a moment. ‘Be old spell me grandam have used to frighten off they gypsies. Ye might try that one, mebbee.’

‘But does it work?’

‘Me grandam had niver in all of she life they tinkers near they door.’

‘Will you tell it to me?’

Ellen looked around. ‘Nay here. Be Martha may hear and then be trouble. Tomorrow, mebbee, in they woodshed.’

‘But Joseph …’

‘Be Joseph’s afternoon off.’

The woodshed was dark and full of scuttling spiders. I hung back from the door.

‘Quick, now,’ said Ellen. ‘Inside, afore Martha see us.’

The small side window was so cobwebbed it emitted only a filtered shaft of dim light. Ellen stood me before it in the centre of the space not occupied by logs. I thought I heard a rat scuffle.

‘Perhaps we shouldn’t …’

She shook her head and took from her pocket a small cloth bag. ‘Stand ye very still now and nay speak a word.’

From the bag she drew a fistful of dried bay leaves, which she crumpled and sprinkled around me in a circle. Their pungent odour was a relief from the dank sour smell of the shed. Then she took from her pocket another bag, this one full of ashes, and carefully scattered them on top of the bay leaves. ‘Listen careful now. Speak nay a word out loud, but in ye head ye says three times they name of they boy be cruel to ye.’

For a moment I was confused. I had forgotten my lie of yesterday. She mistook my confusion for fear. ‘Be nowt to be affrighted of. Ye be safe in they circle. Now, close ye eyes while I chants they spell.’

Passing slowly around the outside of the circle of bay and ashes, she began to recite in a singsong voice:

Papa, I said silently to myself, Papa, Papa.

Ellen turned and paced solemnly in the other direction around the circle.

‘No!’ I cried. ‘No, Ellen, not to die. I do not wish Pa— that boy to
die. Just … to go away from Lyme.’

Ellen was cross. ‘Be bad luck to break they spell. Hush ye, now. Be not finished.’

‘But not to die, Ellen. Please!’

‘A spell be a spell. They words be they words. Be nay for ye or I to change. Think powerful in they head, then, for they going away of they boy, not they dying.’

I watched Papa, fearing to see him develop a tremor, a pallor, some indication of his imminent death, but he continued to be his usual self. Guilt stole my appetite, weighing on me so heavily I could no longer take pleasure in any of my former pastimes. Once, Mama would have quickly noted such a change in me, but she, herself, was unwell. She had a strange whiteness in her complexion, and on several occasions I heard her calling for Martha to bring her a basin, into which she would then be violently sick.

And then it came to me. I understood what was wrong with Mama. I had interrupted Ellen as she recited her spell, and it had fallen not upon Papa but Mama …

I crept about the house, praying to God to forgive me, promising even to sacrifice Marie if it would restore Mama to health. But Mama kept now to her bed, her door closed against me. I crawled inside my tree, frantically stirred flower petals, sugar lumps, honey and any other sweet and fragrant ingredients into a healing paste, then stole inside to smear it on the floorboards and about the door by Mama’s room, taking care that none of the servants or Papa should catch me.

Mama did not recover.

‘Mistress be no stronger today,’ said Martha to Joseph, ‘so Master be dining at the Rooms again tonight. Be weeks now since she be out of her bed.’

Eating my bread and milk at the kitchen table, I listened dejectedly.

‘Where be ye doll?’ asked Ellen, as she put me to bed.

I had left Marie as a sacrifice, laid out in her best French frock on a slab of wood inside my tree. I thought of rats gnawing at her
beautiful face and her delicate arms … how cold she must be, how lonely without me … Unable to sleep, I quit my bed, determined to pray by Mama’s door. But what if Papa should find me there? And had I not promised Mama I would never again take up a vigil outside her room? I shut the door and knelt at my own door jamb, opposite hers. ‘I am sorry, God,’ I wept. ‘Please, I beg You, restore Mama. Let me be ill, not her. I will … I will even throw Marie off Church Cliffs if You will give Mama back to me again.’

Tears flowed down my cheeks; I shivered in the night chill. And then … I must have fallen asleep, for I woke at the sound of heavy footsteps. Scrambling to my feet in panic, I tried to gain the safety of my bed before Papa should see me. But my legs were numb, and I stumbled and fell again to the floor, sobbing from a mixture of misery and fear as he loomed over me. The strange thick smell of the Maltings engulfed me, whisking me back to the canal by the mill and the sight of Ellen’s witch. I trembled and shuddered.

‘Why, what’s all this?’ said a voice. ‘What has happened, child?’

I felt myself lifted up.

‘It wasn’t Mama’s door,’ I cried. ‘I promised only her door, not my own.’

‘Ssh, ssh,’ said Papa, ‘or you’ll wake poor Mama and that would never do. Come now, we’ll go downstairs to the fire and warm you a little.’

I quivered against him. ‘And then you will whip me?’

Momentarily, my papa looked shamefaced, then he said, ‘Of course I shan’t whip you if you’ve done no wrong.’

‘But I have done wrong. Very wrong. It’s all my doing that Mama is dying and—’

‘Your mama is not dying. Not a bit of it.’

‘Then why is she all the time in bed?’

‘Why, she is merely … a little indisposed …’

Desperate with misery, I laid my head against his jacket and wept. ‘And now I have sacrificed Marie and the rats are eating her.’

‘Sacrificed Marie?’

‘My doll, my beautiful French doll.’

‘And why would the rats be eating her?’

‘I promised God that if He would restore Mama, I would sacrifice
Marie. She’s alone in the garden … and she has never been away from me before.’

‘Dear me,’ said my papa, ‘what a very sorry and complicated state of affairs. Now, where is this unfortunate Marie?’

I cried harder. ‘Under the mulberry tree.’

‘Wait there,’ said Papa, placing me in a chair by the fire. He strode to the door and disappeared into the garden, returning in minutes carrying Marie, damp but unharmed.

He handed her to me.

I shook my head. ‘I promised God …’

‘I don’t think God has any need of Marie and, if He had wanted her as a sacrifice, He would surely have sent the rats to seize her by now. I’m quite sure He wishes you to take her and look after her kindly.’

‘And Mama?’

‘Tomorrow, you may go in and see your mama. But you must promise to be good and quiet and not disturb her. She has need of rest just now.’

I sat slowly absorbing warmth from the fire. ‘Papa?’

‘What is it?’

‘It’s Ellen who hears my primer now, and she doesn’t know her letters so … my dame is vexed with my reading.’

‘That will never do. Sleep now, and tomorrow we will see what we can manage.’