“You have a short time to prepare for the journey. I have purchased passage for you on a steamship leaving for Victoria, in the colony of British Columbia. No doubt you will end up a governess or even a servant, but there is also a possibility of marriage.”
He launched into a short lecture on how I needed to be industrious and work hard to make a better future for myself, but I stopped listening. There it was. I sat rooted in my chair, unable to move, as if someone had placed a heavy weight upon my lap. I was to be sent to a lawless land full of unruly men. Out of the frying pan, into the fire. I was flooded with cascading emotions—intense shock at the suddenness of it all, a nebulous fear of the unknown, and, worst of all, a profound feeling of homesickness at the thought of leaving my dearest Hari forever.
PART TWO
The Voyage
Chapter Eleven
I caught my first glimpse of the Tynemouth anchored offshore. Its freshly painted exterior appeared as a constant dark mass on a watery horizon where ocean and sky were indistinct. I had been dreading this day for so long that I felt numb now that I was here, leaving my old life behind. Wiggles was the only person excited by the adventure before me, and I wondered if it was fate that made her give me that pamphlet that day. I hadn’t had the heart to explain the circumstances of my departure to her, but promised her I would write. I patted my carpetbag, feeling the jewellery box buried deep inside where the emerald necklace was stowed. I needed it now, as never before.
I tried to imagine what life on the northwest coast of North America would be like. I reasoned it must resemble the paintings I had seen of Lower Canada in a gallery in London of voyageurs, their snowshoes strapped to their backs, driving teams of sled dogs over rolling, snow-covered hills. I had read library books about explorers freezing to death in frigid winters and drowning as they tried to navigate uncharted rivers, and heard tales about swarms of blackflies in summer that can turn an exposed face to a swollen pulp. The New World didn’t sound like a place for me. It was a land of gold-crazed adventurers from every corner of the earth, I remembered with a shudder.
At least I would have my sister by my side for a little longer. I turned to study Harriet. She looked miserable, wet and shivering.
“Almost there,” I said. “We’ll be out of this drizzle soon and settled in our cabin.”
She gave me a stoic smile, but her face was deathly pale. “Is that supposed to comfort me?”
It was my fault she was here, and I wore the guilt like a hair shirt.
My earlier fear of being parted from her hadn’t lasted long. When she’d returned from the doctor, Charles had summoned her to his study. He had taken her actions as a betrayal, she’d told me later in her room. Because she had kept him in the dark, he had been forced to bend to George’s demands for justice and was now forever in his debt. Charles wanted her out of his sight. Publicly, he explained that Harriet was suffering from exhaustion and would be taking an extended holiday to escort her sister to her new life in the colonies. Privately, she was a banished wife, sent away to do penance for her sins by her once-adoring husband. He would send word when the whole sorry mess was long forgotten by polite society and she could return.
I had been shocked by his reaction and had said as much to Harriet. “What about trying for a baby? You certainly can’t do that halfway around the world.”
“I think he may have given up on having children with me,” she’d told me softly.
I didn’t have the nerve to tell her what I had overheard Charles say to Lord Ainsley, but the conversation played at my heart. Despite Charles’s plan, it was I who was responsible for her tragic fall from grace, and I had to try to make it up to her. If only I could find an acceptable husband willing to support us both, if need be. When the time was right—when we knew our next step—I would tell her about Charles.
Huddled next to Hari in the chill mist, I felt love and affection for her, and much concern. I put one arm around her. In spite of the calendar, the weather was more like winter than spring. Cold, stinging spray, kicked up by the boat’s plunging bow, threatened to soak our travel clothes as the tender shoved its way through the dense Atlantic waters towards the Tynemouth, our home for the next three and a half months—106 days, to be exact. The closer we got, the better I could see the vessel. With all its patches and repairs, even I could tell that she was past her prime.
It was still raining when we boarded the main deck, where a lively crowd of people from every station and class were preparing to embark. Sailors hoisted large trunks with a makeshift crane, and peacoated officers shouted instructions from the deck above. When a small barrel broke loose and burst open, molasses oozed across the deck and the tangy smell of sweetness mixed with the smoky aroma from the aft coal burners. Black soot swirled in the air before depositing a thick film over the lower-deck portholes. It was dirty and chaotic. I looked around for the purser, who would direct the first- and second-class passengers to their cabins.
Some gentlemen adventurers appeared to be setting out for the gold rush in the colony; they were outfitted with rucksacks and various outdoor equipment. Second and third sons with no inheritance, most likely, with their passage funded by families
