Wild Island (2 page)

‘
Our
history?' she said. ‘I was always taught, Harriet, that history is the record of great
men's
achievements. My uncle's discovery of the Northwest Passage is the true history of
my
life . . .'

Sophy loved her Aunt Jane dearly, but she comes from a devout Low-Church family and has severe ideas. She therefore intends to obscure Jane Franklin's part in those events in Van Diemen's Land that changed so many lives and led to Franklin's last fatal Arctic expedition. When Sir John vanished into the ice with the
Erebus
and
Terror
not much more than a year after the Franklins' return to London, Jane and Sophy were determined to save him. If physical rescue should prove impossible, then his fame at least must be preserved. For years they pleaded and flattered to raise money for search parties; they evaded the Admiralty's attempts to declare him dead, and fought the appalling claims of cannibalism. During the course of all this, Sophy came to believe that sometimes the end does justify the means. The destruction of her aunt's pages is nothing, now.

Any beginning must be somewhat arbitrary; we have agreed to start with the Franklins' arrival in Van Diemen's Land in January 1837. Someone else must tell it, since I did not arrive in the island until a year later—but those who were there have not forgotten.

1

BOOTH SHOULD HAVE BEEN IN HOBART TO ATTEND A HANGING
that day. As Commandant of Port Arthur, the main penal station of Van Diemen's Land, he was required to witness certain judicial deaths; but on that January day in 1837, he was still in bed at seven in the morning. Most unusual for him, but it was not self-indulgence: rather, a soldier's habit of catching up on sleep when the opportunity arises. The weather had trapped him down at his station, on an isolated promontory eighty miles south-east of the town. Only two weeks until midsummer, and yet the wind had blown foully for three days: a strong sou'westerly with showers of rain, spitefully cold.

The day before, when the gales seemed to be dropping, he'd walked the five miles up the peninsula to the outstation at the coal mines, to see whether the
Vansittart
, the Government cutter, had managed to get down the estuary to pick him up. Even as he strode along he knew it would not be there. The wind was rising again, and on his way back he was caught in rain like the coming of the Flood. He reached his cottage again at half-past nine that evening, drenched and shivering, and immediately stripped and went to bed, giving Power orders not to call him until eight in the morning.

But the first muster bell brought him wide-awake at half-past five, and he lay listening to a shutter banging, the rushing wind, and
thinking of his beloved semaphore stations. They would have to be kept closed again today. They were on hilltops, bore the brunt of the weather. Wind fretted and tangled the ropes, banged pulley-blocks against the masts, caused havoc if you let it. But if the duty men had frapped the arms down securely there should not be too much damage. If they'd taken care to keep the arm-lines separate from the haul-lines as he was always reminding them . . . The semaphores had brought him this appointment as Commandant, and not a day passed but he thanked God for it. Well, God and the former Lieutenant Governor, Colonel George Arthur. Two of a kind, really.

The job was a wonderful little plum: wholly unexpected at the time. Booth had arrived in Van Diemen's Land early in '33 with the Regiment, had waited on Governor Arthur and been frostily received. A cool word and out. Slightly alarming, since Booth's posting here—his life for the next six, eight, even twelve years—depended on Arthur. Did this mean His Excellency had heard of Booth's old court martial? The goat in the wardroom, the turtle in the bath? Stupid pranks which had seemed so amusingly necessary at that miserable time in the Indies more than a decade ago. It was all in the records; the Governor was sure to know.

He could not have heard of Booth's other sin? No, that was not in the records.

Booth had been left apparently forgotten in the barracks while his friends received placements, until at last there came an invitation to dine at Government House. His hopes rose, collapsed again as soon as he entered the reception room. He'd been warned that the Arthurs were strictly Evangelical, but this was so stark, comfortless, puritanical. What followed was more of the same. Conversation, stilted. One glass of bad Cape wine, a lengthy Grace and a dinner best forgotten. A meagre, dry occasion like the Governor himself. Although, Heavens Above, quiet little Eliza Arthur under her plain black gown was big with her thirteenth child. Arthur was fifty-one and she would be forty, surely. There must be juice in him somewhere.

The Arthurs' eldest son, Frederick, sat next to Booth. A pleasant lad, but too quiet. Seventeen: all knobbly wrists, Adam's apple, boots and blushing. He was really the second son, but his older brother, George, had died of consumption a few years before. Booth set himself to amuse young Fred. Uphill work. But just when the evening seemed interminable, a tumble of young children and half-grown daughters came in with the pudding.

Eliza Arthur grew motherly and the Governor unbent so far as to smile when a beautiful little girl recited her memory-work for the week, a psalm.
Deal bountifully with thy servant . . .
in a pure, piping little voice, then a breathy hesitation
. . . I am a stranger in the earth . . .
The little girl came across to Fred to be hoisted onto his lap. She told Booth, ‘I am Fanny but I am called Mary. I am seven.' Booth's heart contorted and bled from the old wound because his own daughter would have been nine if he had not left her, his wife and son seven years ago in the West Indies, where they had died in penury probably.

But beautiful little Mary was continuing: George, Fred, Bella, Kate, Georgina, Eliza, Charlie, Edward, Sigi, John, Leonard. Her brothers and sisters. (Sigi?) Words had deserted Booth because the names of his own lost ones were filling his mind. Caralin, Rosa, Charlie. The irony being that he never had any trouble talking to children, nor indeed to anyone for that matter. Now Mary had given up waiting for him to say something sensible and was unfolding a drawing, a line of little stick men across the page.

‘Soldiers,' he said, grasping. ‘Making a signal, I think. A semaphore with flags? What are they saying, I wonder?'

‘Why, so they are,' said Arthur, sternly mild. ‘I believe they are saying Mary has done well and may have her jam pudding.'

Later, when the women and children were gone, Arthur said, ‘Semaphores have been much in my mind.'

He wanted a network of signal towers to serve the south-east of Van Diemen's Land. To cover the distance between Hobart—here, the main harbour and centre of Government—and Port Arthur, his new penal settlement. Port Arthur had been a small timber-cutting
camp, but would now become the main penal station of the island, replacing the old prisons at Sarah Island on the Wild West Coast, and Maria Island in the east. These had proved impractical because they were too far from Hobart Town, and communication could only be by sea, with its delays and dangers. But Port Arthur was only eighty miles away, and with semaphores . . . How many stations did Booth think would be needed over that distance? Could it be done—with convict labour and assistance from the Survey Department, of course? Booth was certain it could.

Within a few days, Captain Charles O'Hara Booth, latterly of blotted copybook and uncertain prospects, was Commandant of Port Arthur. Now, four years later, seven semaphores were in place, each with six moveable arms on its mast, allowing the signalling of numbers up to 999,999 with the addition of a jack staff and pennants. Each number represented a word or phrase in the codebook of Booth's devising. They were only using two hundred and twenty-seven numbers so far, but that would increase. At present a short signal and response could be returned in seven minutes. Booth thought they could get it down to four minutes if they built two more stations next year.

I mean this year
, he amended his thoughts. Already January again, so soon. Nearly four years ‘at the ends of the earth' as his sister Char said in her letters—but it was paradise to him. Everywhere in the landscape there was beauty barely explored, a new Eden. All he needed was a new Eve. Could he marry Lizzie this year? Should he? At Christmas there had been a rumour of the Regiment's recall; he discovered he was desperate to remain on the island. He had fallen by grace into a place he loved, and work he believed valuable, but how could he stay? Sell out of the Army? The sale of his commission would not keep him long, and some of it must be returned to Char, who had lent him money. And what civil position could he find here? Especially one that paid what he was earning now, and provided a free cottage. His salary was two hundred and seventy-three pounds fifteen shillings per annum, with a magistrate's allowance of ten
shillings a day on top, but he always spent it all, and in fact, owed his agent twenty pounds at this moment.

The prison was something of a showpiece and visitors multiplied each year: Quaker observers from the Society of Friends, surveyors, auditors, engineers, missionaries and merely curious distinguished guests. Being naturally gregarious he enjoyed their varied company, but was often obliged to lodge and feed them at the Commandant's cottage, and found himself always supplying more in food and wine than his rations allowed. Could he afford to marry Lizzie?

Boyes, the Colonial Auditor, had told him every Governor of a British colony was in a similar position, having to supplement his salary from private income—with the exception of Governor Arthur. Boyes had looked at Booth and they had smiled. Arthur came to Van Diemen's Land with nothing—and left owning thousands of acres granted to him or bought cheaply, together with shares and investments yielding an annual income of five thousand pounds. Or so Robert Murray of the
Colonial Times
estimated, and Boyes believed he was not far wrong.

Booth's mind returned to his future. Surely the Regiment would not be recalled now, just when Arthur had left, and with the new Governor due in a month? And at this distance from Home, postings were often longer than usual. Governor Arthur had been twelve years in the island, recalled after twice the normal period. Booth had been one of the few chosen to accompany the Governor and his family as they boarded their ship for Home two months ago. Arthur unexpectedly weeping floods of tears, Mrs Arthur and the little Venuses, not.

Now the Governor was to be Sir John Franklin, the polar hero, Arctic Lion. Slow-witted, people said, and generally added, ‘and Navy, of course', since that was the chief surprise. Army officers had been in power here since the day of settlement, which would change now, presumably. Franklin might want to appoint a new Commandant with a naval background. One of his own retinue, a younger man . . .

Booth had scarcely thought of his age until recently. He was almost the same age as the century: thirty-seven in August, although he looked younger because he was thin and agile and his hair was still thick and black, just beginning to recede in two arcs from a widow's peak. He was blessed, too, with an excellent constitution he'd come to take for granted. And then on Christmas Day—two weeks ago—he'd woken feeling seedy as hell for the first time in fourteen years. A return of yellow fever, caught when he was stationed in Saint Vincent. He must avoid a full bout. Couldn't afford to be ill.

Booth flung back the covers and sat on the side of the bed. As he did so, impatient footsteps approached along the hall. There was a rap on the door and it flew open to admit the protesting voice of his convict-assigned servant Power, and then his brindle terrier Fran, hurling herself in ecstasy onto the bed and then off again because she knew it was wrong. And the Irish accent of Casey, the station's young medico, peremptory as always: ‘Get up, Charles! We have found you a body.'

A Dublin intonation like Lizzie's.

‘Birch or Jones, I hope?'

‘Birch,' said Casey. ‘The flesh much nibbled by fishes to be sure, and all the whole of him swollen in an unlovely manner. Mutilated altogether. You will not like the look of him. But an arm remains
intacta
and it has Birch's tattoo at the wrist. A heart and two sets of initials. Now sit where you are and stop your talk.'

Casey produced a flexible tube about two feet long from his pocket and fastened one end in his right ear. A cold little white china cup at the other end was applied to Booth's lean ribs. The new snake ear trumpet, a Christmas gift from the old country.

Booth was thin by nature, but also because he spent his days tramping up and down his ‘little kingdom' as he called it in letters home. Two peninsulas, each over twenty miles square, hanging one below the other by two narrow necks. The lower one, Tasman, was really the penal station, and the upper one, Forestier, was kept unpopulated as a barrier, except for a whaling station, and Captain