Wilkins did; and he was on good terms with the Aborigines, although they sometimes took a sheep and although a related tribe along the coast harboured a group of escaped convicts; but he never entertained and he allowed nothing but water or at the most weak green tea to be drunk in his house. He had many virtues, Paulton repeated, but his enemies might call him a little rigid and unsociable.
'Is the gentleman married?' asked Martin.
'Oh no,' said Paulton, amused.
'I dare say there are a great many waders on the shore of your lagoon,' said Stephen, after a moment's silence.
I am sure there are,' said Paulton, standing up. 'I often see clouds of birds rise when I go down there to play my fiddle, and they may well have been wading. But now, with my best thanks for a delightful afternoon, I must bid you good day. Oh, and just one last word,' he added in a low voice, 'is it usual to give vails in the Navy?'
'No, no, not at all,' they both replied; and this being nearly the time for Stephen to take Sarah and Emily to be shown to Mrs Macquarie, Martin alone walked back with their guest.
The little girls were quite stiff in their new frocks, and they looked very grave: plainer, poor dears, and even blacker than usual, thought Stephen. 'We are going to see a most amiable lady, at Government House. She is both good and kind,' he said with a somewhat exaggerated cheerfulness.
The four of them made their way up the hill in something near silence, Stephen holding Sarah's hand and Jemmy Ducks Emily's. As ill-luck would have it they passed two iron-gangs. 'Why are those men chained?' asked Sarah as the first clanked slowly by. 'Because they have behaved ill,' said Stephen. In the second a man had fallen and a soldier was beating him. Because of the frigate's peculiar status and her unusual ship's company the little girls had never seen a flogging aboard the Surprise nor yet a starting with bosun's cane or rope's end. They shrank away, and their grasp tightened, but they said nothing. Stephen hoped that the carriages (which made them stare), the horses, the people passing by, particularly the redcoats, and the buildings would distract their minds; and he pointed out the kangaroo on the lawn. They said 'Yes', but neither smiled nor followed it with their gaze.
Mrs Macquarie received them at once. 'How glad I am to see you, my dears,' she said, kissing each as each made her curtsy. 'What pretty frocks!'
A servant brought in fruit-juice and little cakes, and Stephen saw with relief that they were growing less tense. They ate and drank; and when Mrs Macquarie had talked to Dr Maturin about their hope of a ship from Madras quite soon and about the Governor's journey she turned to them and told them about the orphanage. There were many little girls of their age in one part of it, and they played games, running about in a park with trees. They looked quite pleased, accepted more fruit-juice, more cakes, both saying 'Thank you, ma'am', and Sarah asked 'Have they pretty dresses?'
'Not prettier than yours,' said Mrs Macquarie. 'Come with me and I will show you.'
She walked them round to the stables, where her carriage was waiting, and they seemed reasonably happy until Stephen, standing by the step, said 'Jemmy Ducks or I will come to see you tomorrow. Be good girls, now, till then. God bless.'
'Ain't we coming back to the barky?' asked Emily, and the wild look returned.
'Not today, mates: you got to see the orphanage,' said Jemmy Ducks; and as the carriage moved off both little girls stood up, looking at him with faces of alarm, distress and woe until it turned the corner.
The walk down was as silent as the walk up, with only Jemmy's involuntary exclamation 'And in such a country as this, God love us.' At a corner Stephen paused, took his bearings, and said 'Jemmy Ducks, here is a shilling. Go along that way for a couple of hundred yards and you will find a tavern, a decent house where you may have a drink.'
He went on alone, pacing slowly, mechanically noting the differences between the sea-birds over the water on his left hand and repeating the eminently sound reasons for his action. At the third repetition two figures crossed the road, laughing, and there were Davidge and West standing before him, dressed in their good shore-going clothes. 'Why, Doctor,' said West, 'I believe we have broke in upon your thoughts.'
'Not at all,' said Stephen. 'Tell me, is the Captain back yet?'
'No, not yet,' they said together, and Davidge went on 'But Adams came aboard just as we were leaving, and he asked after you.'
And indeed Stephen had not been sitting in the cabin five minutes before there was Adams at the door. 'Well, sir,' he said, 'I have carried out your commission. I came away from Mr Painter not ten minutes ago, and on my way down I saw poor Jemmy Ducks, his face running with tears. I hope nothing dreadful has happened, Doctor?'
'We took the girls to the orphanage.'
'What, in a country like this? Well,' - recollecting himself -'I am sure you know best, sir. Excuse me, if you please. So as I was saying, I saw Mr Painter, as you told me, and he was most obliging; he found me nearly all the present assignments, records and particulars directly. But I am afraid you will not be best pleased with some of what I have to report.' He brought out the lists, each pinned to a sheaf of papers, and laid them on the table. 'Now as for Slade's friends,' he said, 'all is tolerably well. Mrs Smailes was assigned to a man who had served his time, an emancipist as they say here, and who had settled on reasonable good land near the Hawkesbury river; and he married her. Three of the others are on ticket of leave, and work in fishing boats. Only one, Harry Fell, absconded and joined the whalers. Here are the directions of the others.' He handed Stephen a neat clerkly sheet, names and addresses underlined with red ink, and turned to the next. 'As for Bonden's list, I fear the news is not so good. Two never arrived, having died on the voyage; one died here of natural causes; one absconded and either died of want in the bush or was speared by the Aborigines; and two were sent to Norfolk Island.'
'Where is that?'
'Far out in the ocean, a thousand miles, I believe. A penal station that was meant to terrify the convicts here into submission. They were so ill-used that they are not in their right minds any more. For the rest, some are still assigned servants and some are ticket-of-leave men. Here are their particulars. But as for Colman, sir, I am sorry to say he has had a very bad time of it. He would keep trying to escape. Last time it was with three other Irishmen: one of them had heard that if you walked north far enough you came to a river, neither very wide nor very deep, and the-other side there was China, where the people were kind and where you could find an Indiaman to take you home. They were taken by Aborigines, almost dead from hunger and thirst, and brought back for a reward. One of them died from his flogging. Colman survived his - two hundred lashes at twice - and he was to have been sent to a penal colony only Dr Redfern intervened - said it would be his death - and he is to be assigned
