the side, dangling from ropes. Several jumped or fell into the water and were recovered by the solders. The badly injured were lowered by slings. Surprisingly, the exodus was carried off without incident. In two hours, all 203 were safely stationed on the raft in positions assigned by Scaggs.
The crew came next, Captain Scaggs the last man to leave the steeply slanting deck. He dropped a box containing two pistols, the ship’s log, a chronometer, compass and a sextant into the arms of First Officer Ramsey. Scaggs had taken a position fix before dropping over the side and had told no one, not even Ramsey, that the storm had blown the Gladiator far off the normal shipping routes. They were drifting in a dead area of the Tasman Sea, three hundred miles from the nearest Australian shore, and what was worse, the current was carrying them even farther into nothingness where no ships sailed. He consulted his charts and determined their only hope was to take advantage of the adverse current and winds and sail east toward New Zealand.
Soon after settling in, everyone in their place on the crowded deck, the raft’s passengers found to their dismay that there was only enough space for forty bodies to tie down at any one time. It was obvious to the seamen from the ship that their lives were in great jeopardy; the planked deck of the raft was only four inches above the water. If confronted with a rough sea, the raft and its unfortunate passengers would be immersed.
Scaggs hung the compass on the mast forward of the tiller. “Set sail, Mr. Ramsey. Steer a heading of one- fifteen degrees east-southeast.”
“Aye, Captain. We’ll not try for Australia, then?”
“Our best hope is the west coast of New Zealand.”
“How far do you make it?”
“Six hundred miles,” Scaggs answered as if a sandy beach lay just over the horizon.
Ramsey frowned and stared around the crowded raft. His eyes fell on a group of convicts who were in hushed conversation. Finally, he spoke in a tone heavy with gloom. “I don’t believe any of us God-fearin’ men will see deliverance while we’re surrounded by this lot of scum.”
The sea remained calm for the next five days. The raft’s passengers settled into a routine of disciplined rationing. The cruel sun beat down relentlessly, turning the raft into a fiery hell. There was a desperate longing to drop into the water and cool their bodies, but already the sharks were gathering in anticipation of an easy meal. The seamen threw buckets of saltwater on the canvas awning, but it only served to heighten the humidity beneath.
Already the mood on the raft had begun to swing from melancholy to treachery. Men who had endured two months of confinement in the dark hold of the Gladiator now became troubled without the security of the ship’s hull and with being encompassed by nothingness. The convicts began to regard the sailors and the soldiers with ferocious looks and mutterings that did not go unnoticed by Scaggs. He ordered Lieutenant Sheppard to have his men keep their muskets loaded and primed at all times.
Jess Dorsett studied the tall woman with the golden hair. She was sitting alone beside the forward mast. There was an aura of tough passivity about her, a manner of overlooking the hardships without expectations. She appeared not to notice the other female convicts, seldom conversing, choosing to remain aloof and quiet. She was, Dorsett decided, a woman of values.
He snaked toward her through the bodies packed on board the raft until he was stopped by the hard gaze of a soldier who motioned him back with a musket. Dorsett was a patient man and waited until the guards changed shifts. The replacement promptly began leering at the women, who quickly taunted him. Dorsett took advantage of the diversion to move until he was at the imaginary boundary line dividing the men from the women. The blond woman did not notice, her blue eyes were fixed on something only she could see in the distance.
“Looking for England?” he asked, smiling.
She turned and stared at him as if making up her mind whether to grace him with an answer. “A small village in Cornwall.”
“Where you were arrested?”
“No, that was in Falmouth.”
“For attempting to murder Queen Victoria?”
Her eyes sparkled and she laughed. “Stealing a blanket, actually.”
“You must have been cold.”
She became serious. “It was for my father. He was dying from the lung disease.”
“I’m sorry.”
“You’re the highwayman.”
“I was until my horse broke her leg and the Queen’s men ran me down.”
“And your name is Jess Dorsett.” He was pleased that she knew who he was and wondered if she had inquired of him. “And you are ...?”
“Betsy Fletcher,” she answered without hesitation.
“Betsy,” Dorsett said with a flourish, “consider me your protector.”
“I need no fancy highwayman,” she said smartly. “I can fend for myself.”
He motioned around the horde jammed on the raft. “You may well need a pair of strong hands before we see hard ground again.”
“Why should I put my faith in a man who never got his hands dirty?”
He stared into her eyes. “I may have robbed a few coaches in my time, but next to the good Captain Scaggs, I’m most likely the only man you can trust not to take advantage of a woman.”
Betsy Fletcher turned and pointed at some evil-looking clouds scudding in their direction before a freshening breeze. “Tell me, Mr. Dorsett, how are you going to protect me from that?”
“We’re in for it now, Captain,” said Ramsey. “We’d better take down the sails.”
Scaggs nodded grimly. “Cut short lengths of rope from the keg of spare cordage and pass them around. Tell the poor devils to fasten themselves to the raft to resist the turbulence.”
The sea began to heap up uncomfortably, and the raft lurched and rolled as the waves began to sweep over the huddled mass of bodies, each passenger clutching their individual length of rope for dear life, the smart ones having tied themselves to the planks. The storm was not half as strong as the typhoon that did in the Gladiator, but it soon became impossible to tell where the raft began and the sea left off. The waves rose ever higher as the whitecaps blew off their crests. Some tried to stand to get their heads above water, but the raft was pitching and rolling savagely. They fell back on the planking almost immediately.
Dorsett used both his and Betsy’s ropes to fasten her to the mast. Then he wrapped himself in the shroud lines and used his body to shield her from the force of the waves. As if to add insult to injury, rainsqualls pelted them with the force of stones cast by devils. The disorderly seas struck from every direction.
The only sound that came above the fury of the storm was Scaggs’ vehement cursing as he shouted orders to his crew to add more lines to secure the mound of provisions. The seamen struggled to lash down the crates and kegs, but a mountainous wave reared up at that moment and crashed down onto the raft and pushed it deep under the water. For the better part of a minute there was no one on that pathetic craft who didn’t believe they were about to die.
Scaggs held his breath and closed his eyes and swore without opening his mouth. The weight of the water felt as though it was crushing the life out of him. For what seemed an eternity the raft sluggishly rose through a swirling mass of foam into the wind again. Those who hadn’t been swept into the sea inhaled deeply and coughed out the saltwater.
The captain looked around the raft and was appalled. The entire mass of provisions had been carried away and had disappeared as if they had never been loaded aboard. What was even more horrendous was that the bulk of the crates and kegs had carved an avenue through the pack of convicts, maiming and thrusting them from the raft with the force of an avalanche. Their pathetic cries for help went unanswered. The savage sea made any attempt at rescue impossible, and the lucky ones could only mourn the bitter death of their recent companions.
The raft and its suffering passengers endured the storm through the night, pounded by the wash that constantly rolled over them. By the following morning the sea had begun to ease off, and the wind dwindled to a light southerly breeze. But they still kept an eye out for the occasional renegade wave that lurked out of sight before sweeping in and catching the half-drowned survivors off guard.
