Dark Torment (2 page)

“Nothing you need concern yourself about,” he answered
as he helped her down. Sarah suspected that, like most men, he disapproved of
women bothering their heads with what was men’s business, and that her
authority and involvement in Lowella’s operation irked him.

“You’d better tell me,” Sarah said quietly, her
eyes shifting to the bullock dray pulled up close to the wharf just behind him.
It was loaded with perhaps half-a-dozen dirty, scrawny, manacled men, the
convicts whose acquisition had been the primary purpose of this unusual
mid-week trip into Melbourne. Although convicts were generally assigned by the
government to serve out their sentences at hard labor for Australia’s
landowners, Edward Markham had arranged clandestinely, for a fee, to acquire
six brawny men direct from the ship’s captain, with whom he had dealt
before. Percival had come along to stand guard over the men, although there was
really no need: there was nowhere for them to go, and if they ran they would be
hunted down like dogs. At the moment, Percival stood with his back to the
convicts, ignoring them, as if they were the most God-fearing citizens in the
world. And with good reason, Sarah thought, looking over the convicts again.
After the long voyage from England, made under conditions that Sarah shuddered
even to contemplate, not one of them had a thought in his head about anything
save the misery of his own body. Weak from months spent chained in a stiflingly
hot hold packed with men, half-starved, most suffering from scurvy, newly
arrived convicts were rarely a threat to anyone. It would take a week or more
of rest and good food before even the hardiest of them was fit to do the
back-breaking work of well digging, for which they had been acquired.

Percival still had not replied to Sarah’s question. Annoyed,
she looked back to find him eying her with blatant admiration, and she knew he
meant for her to notice it and feel flattered. If it weren’t growing so
tiresome, Percival’s pursuit of her would have been almost funny, Sarah
thought, frowning at his cow-eyed look that she guessed was supposed to
represent the very ultimate in bedazzlement. He behaved as if smitten by a
raving beauty, which she knew perfectly well she wasn’t. She didn’t
even come close. Tall for a woman, in her sleeveless white linen shirtwaist and
plain round skirt she was all sharp lines and angles where she knew men
preferred a softer, rounder shape. The color of her hair was good—a rich,
tawny gold—but it was thick as a horse’s tail and almost as
straight. Years ago, after countless nights spent tortured by the rag curlers
Lydia had insisted she try, Sarah had given up attempting to achieve a
fashionable coiffure. Nowadays she contented herself with bundling the wayward
mass into a huge, shapeless knot at the nape of her neck. It took nearly two
dozen hairpins to secure it, and even then tendrils were always escaping, not
to curl charmingly around her face as Liza’s did, but to straggle limply
down her neck and back, and make her itch. Her face, with its high cheekbones
and forehead and pointed chin, was totally lacking in the soft prettiness that
characterized her stepmother and sister. Her skin, while fine and smooth, had a
distressing tendency to tan, probably because she was always forgetting her hat
under the hot Australian sun. Only her eyes had any real claim to beauty. They
were as gold as guineas, a gleaming topaz set aslant beneath thick lashes that
were dark at the base and as tawny as her hair at the tips. Even Liza and
Lydia—the latter grudgingly— agreed that Sarah’s eyes were
quite out of the ordinary. The only trouble was that, combined with her
prominent cheekbones, pointed chin, and too-thin body, they gave her the look
of a scrawny cat. And men, Sarah had found, tended to prefer fluffy kittens.

“Mr. Percival,” she prompted with an edge to her voice
as he continued his perusal. His eyes jerked up to her face, and he had the
grace to flush slightly. Sarah returned his look with a level one, and his
flush deepened. “You were going to tell me why my father went aboard a
convict ship?”

“There was a problem with the convicts.” The words
were said reluctantly.

“What kind of problem?” Sarah made no effort to hide
her irritation. Percival’s attempts to keep her in what he considered her
proper, female place were maddening. She supposed that if she married him, he
would expect her to confine her activities to the running of the house, and to
leave to him everything that had to do with the sheep station. Which, she
guessed, was why he wanted to marry her in the first place. As Edward
Markham’s only child, she could reasonably be expected to inherit Lowella
in preference to her stepmother and stepsister. Which, Sarah thought with a wry
inward smile, only showed how little he really knew her father. Edward was
always inclined to take the easy way out of messy situations, and the future
disposition of Lowella was potentially a very messy situation indeed. Her
father was fond of her, she thought, but no more than that. Certainly he was
not so besotted with her as to leave her the station in preference to Lydia,
who periodically questioned him with transparent guilelessness about his will.
Sarah suspected that she also questioned her father’s lawyer, with some
success—Lydia was a very attractive woman. And if Lydia were to find out
that she had been denied ownership of a vast, profitable sheep station . . . !
Sarah couldn’t blame her father; she wouldn’t want to be around on
that day, either.

“We contracted for six, and paid for them too, in cash, not
kind. When we got here, they had six waiting for us, all right. But the
bos’n, who’s a chum of mine, tipped me off that we were being
cheated, in spirit if not in fact. He said one of the men was a rogue, a real
troublemaker, and they couldn’t get anyone else to take him so they were
trying to palm him off on us. But I passed the word along to your da, and he
flatly refused to take him. As Mr. Markham said, and I agree, we don’t
need no troublemakers on Lowella. Not with the way things have been going
lately.”

Sarah nodded agreement. With the convicts whose labor was
Australia’s lifeblood far outnumbering the landowners who worked them,
the situation on the cattle and sheep stations on New South Wales was extremely
volatile. Lowella had always been peaceful—their convicts were well
treated—but their neighbors had not always been so fortunate. There was
no sense in bringing in a rogue convict to stir up trouble on Lowella.

“Didn’t Pa just tell them we don’t want that
kind at Lowella?”

Percival grimaced. “Sure he did. But the mate said a
deal’s a deal. And your da said, the hell—begging your pardon, Miss
Sarah—it is. The mate backed down and agreed to take the convict back,
but he didn’t have the authority to give your da back his money. And you
know how Mr. Markham has been lately about money.”

“I do indeed,” Sarah said with wry amusement. Edward,
whose lineage included a canny Scots grandmother, could be formidable in the
pursuit of money he felt was owed him. She had no doubt that whoever was in
charge of the ship would return it to him double-quick. “So Pa went
aboard the ship to get his money back. Do you think he’ll be long?”

Percival pursed his lips, cocking his head as he considered.
“He’s been gone quite a while already.”

“Sarah, where’s Pa? If I don’t get out of this
heat soon, I’ll just die!” Liza’s plaintive cry brought
Sarah’s attention back to her. The younger girl was perspiring, her
cheeks now more red than rose. She had taken off her hat and was feebly waving
it in front of her face. As Sarah looked at her, Liza dropped the hat into her
lap, as if fanning herself had suddenly become too much work. Sarah frowned.
For all her dark hair and olive skin, Liza did tend to feel the heat. Much more
than Sarah herself did. Despite Sarah’s fair coloring and deceptive
slenderness, she was blessed, or cursed, depending on one’s point of
view, with the constitution of an ox. While Liza, who appeared to be the
sturdier of the two, was far more prone to illness and upsets.

“You won’t die, Liza,” Sarah said firmly.
Catering to Liza’s love of the melodramatic was always a mistake. Usually
it led to a scene complete with tears.

“No wonder you’re an old maid, Sarah! You don’t
have the least sensibility!” Liza burst out. Sarah could not control a
sudden, quick flush of embarrassment as she realized that Percival, who stood
no more than a pace from her side, must have heard, although he gave no sign.
It was one thing to acknowledge privately that at twenty-two she was well past
the common age for marriage; it was another to have Liza announce it to the
world. Not that Sarah particularly minded being a spinster. Better an old maid
than an unhappy wife, she had decided long ago, when Percival had first made
her an offer. The laws of the day made a wife her husband’s chattel,
completely subject to him in all things; Sarah shuddered at the thought of
being so much in any man’s control. At least she was content as she was.
She knew that she would be desperately unhappy as Percival’s wife.

“Sarah, my head aches!” Liza’s moan brought
Sarah out of her musings. She eyed her sister severely, not yet having forgiven
her for that humiliating remark in front of Percival. But Liza’s white
face and the perspiration dotting her forehead convinced Sarah that the younger
girl really was in some distress. Sarah moved quickly around the trap to touch
Liza’s hand. As she had suspected, her skin felt cold and clammy.

“I feel dreadful, Sarah!”

“I know you do, love.” Sarah’s sympathy was
genuine. Liza could not be allowed to remain any longer in the sun, and there
was no shade in sight. Something had to be done, and from long experience Sarah
knew that she was the one who would have to do it. She sighed.
“I’ll go fetch Pa, Liza, and then we can be on our way.
You’ll feel better once we get away from the wharf.”

“Please hurry, Sarah!”

“Miss Sarah, you can’t!”

Liza and Percival spoke at the same time, Liza in an anguished
undertone and Percival with disapproval. Percival continued, “You
can’t have thought—you can’t go aboard a convict ship!
It’s not proper for a lady!”

Sarah took a deep breath, and turned away from Liza to meet
Percival’s eyes with a calm that was beginning to fray. What an awful,
awful day this had been from the start! She didn’t know how much more
aggravation she could take without losing her temper, which was something she
rarely did. Living with Lydia and Liza, one rapidly learned control.

“I am well aware of that, Mr. Percival. But I see no
alternative—unless you’re suggesting that we simply wait here until
Liza faints with the heat. She will, you know. I’ve seen her do
it.”

“But, Miss Sarah . . .”

“I’m going to go fetch my father, Mr. Percival.
There’s nothing more to be said.”

Despite the finality of her words, he refused to give up.
“If you’ll permit me, I’ll fetch Mr. Markham.”

“And leave me here to watch over the convicts?” Sarah
shook her head. “I’ll go. I won’t be long. Liza, did you
hear? I’ll be back directly. And for goodness’ sake, put on your
hat!”

Liza moaned again and closed her eyes. She made no move to obey
about the hat. Sarah shut her own eyes for a moment in a silent appeal to
heaven—why did Liza have to choose this day to be difficult?—then
set off briskly for the
Septimus.
The men on the quay eyed her, some
curiously, others with emotions she preferred not to recognize. But she passed
among them without difficulty, aided, no doubt, she thought with amusement, by
her plain appearance. Or maybe they left her alone simply because they were
just too tired and dispirited to pursue her. Despite the fact that they were
convicts, and backbreaking work under near-intolerable conditions was part of
the punishment for their crimes, she could not help pitying them as they were
forced to labor without pause under the menacing eyes of overseers armed with
whips and rifles, while the sun blazed down mercilessly on their uncovered
heads. Then Sarah silently chided herself, wondering what her father would say
if he knew of her embryonic emancipist feelings. In Melbourne, as in the rest
of Australia, there were basically two classes of residents: the emancipists,
who felt that convicts, former convicts, and the offspring of convicts were as
good as any other member of Australian society and should be treated as such;
and the exclusionists, who considered past and present convicts and their
descendants a lower form of life, not to be spoken of in the same breath as
decent folk. The emancipists, for obvious reasons, tended to be convicts,
former convicts, or the children of convicts, and consequently had difficulty
getting the authorities to listen to their pleas for equal treatment. Like most
landowners, Edward was staunchly exclusionist, and Sarah had been brought up to
consider convicts very much beneath her.

The
Septimus
was tied up close to where Percival waited
with the dray. Like many of the convict ships plying the ocean between England
and Australia, she looked as if one good-sized wave would capsize her. Her
timbers had weathered to a uniformly dull gray, and if she had ever seen a coat
of paint there was no longer any evidence of it. Her middle sagged like that of
a swaybacked horse, and her bare masts and halfheartedly furled sails had a
shabby look. Making her way up the rickety gangplank, Sarah’s attention
was briefly caught by the scene before her. Half a dozen tall ships were
anchored farther out in the bay, their bare, black masts stretching into the
cloudless azure sky. Another ship, her sails useless because there was no wind,
was being towed across the water to the dock by a small flotilla of rowboats.
The bay itself was beautiful, with the sun glinting like diamonds off water
that ranged from palest sea green to emerald to sapphire to near purple.

Sarah was still absorbing the view when she became aware that,
while she was alone on the gangplank, there was much activity on the
Septimus’s
deck. Squinting against the glare, and trying to ignore the headache that
was beginning to throb at her temples, Sarah tried to make out what was
happening. A shifting, muttering crowd of men was gathered near the center of
the ship, their attention focused on something that was taking place in their
midst. Their bared, sweat-streaked, muscular backs prevented her from seeing
exactly what that something was. Sarah toyed with the idea of returning to the
dock and waiting in the safety of the little group from Lowella for her father
to join them, but then the thought of Liza’s probable reaction to her
retreat spurred her on. Much as she disliked the idea of getting too near that
masculine mob, she preferred it to dealing with Liza in hysterics. Swallowing
her reservations, Sarah resumed her walk up the swaying ramp. As she drew
closer, she became aware of a sharp cracking noise repeated at regular
intervals. It slashed with unexpected violence through the other sounds of the
dock—the gentle lapping of the sea, the fluttering of sails, the voices
of the men before and behind her. Sarah frowned as she set foot on the lightly
rocking deck of the
Septimus,
trying to fathom what that sound could
be—and what could be happening at the center of the mob to cause the men
to focus so much sullen yet fascinated attention toward one spot. Then came a
faint whistling sound, inaudible from farther away, followed by another harsh
crack. Then—she was almost sure—she heard a man’s guttural
moan. Sarah’s eyes widened with slowly dawning horror.