A Tattooed Heart (10 page)

After a short silence Sarah asked, ‘What were you saying, Harrie?'

‘Mr Bloodworth will still be at home, though, won't he? And the servants. It won't be like when you went into Bella Shand's house. Whoops.' She shot a nervous look at Aria.

Friday said to Sarah, ‘I've explained to Aria about your, um, talents. Was that all right?'

Sarah shrugged. ‘Can't see why not. And, no, it won't be the same as going into Bella's, but I've cracked plenty of occupied cribs
in my time. It could be a rush job but that's all right, I've got the best kit of screws you can buy.'

Aria looked irritated. ‘What are you saying? I cannot understand you.'

With uncharacteristic patience, Friday translated. ‘She said she's stolen from lots of houses while people have been at home, but even if she has to do it in a hurry she has all the right tools.'

‘And you are definitely an expert at this?' Aria asked Sarah.

‘I
do
know what I'm doing, if that's what you mean.'

‘Because I must have this letter. It is a matter of honour.'

Sarah stared at her, frowning. ‘What do you mean
you
need it?
We
bloody well need it.'

It occurred to Friday that perhaps, by now, she should have explained to Harrie and Sarah why Aria wanted the letter as much as they did.

Sarah said, ‘You have told her about us, haven't you? You've told everyone else.'

Friday reddened. ‘I
haven't
told everyone else. And no, I haven't told her. Not yet.'

There was a very awkward silence.

Aria broke it. ‘What have you not told me, Friday?'

Panicked now because she'd been trying, desperately and unsuccessfully, to think of a way to broach the subject with Aria without presenting herself in a rather unpleasant light, Friday blurted to Sarah, ‘Bloody hell, I'm going to
have
to tell her now, aren't I? So I will, and I'm telling her everything.'

Harrie and Sarah looked horrified.

‘And don't you dare tell me I can't,' Friday went on. ‘She's my lover. I live with her. I don't want any secrets. I'm fed up with secrets.'

She was fed up with bloody well being sober, too. She'd been on the dry for a whole
week
and could easily
kill
for a drink right now.

‘Do you think we're not?' Sarah demanded. ‘I haven't told Adam everything.'

Harrie said, ‘And I haven't told James anything!'

‘Enough!'
Aria clapped her hands together so sharply the noise was like a pistol shot. Jolted into silence, Friday, Harrie and Sarah stared at her. ‘What is this great secret?'

‘We murdered a man,' Friday burst out.

Flinching, Harrie said, ‘Oh God, where the hell's Adam?'

‘Gone out, thank Christ.' Sarah's face was ashen. ‘I'll never forgive you for this, Friday.'

Aria brushed at a tiny piece of fluff on her bodice. ‘You did this here? In Sydney?'

Friday nodded.

‘Why?'

‘He hurt our friend Rachel very badly and also made her pregnant, with Charlotte, Harrie's little girl. Rachel died having her. We wanted to . . . well, we wanted to pay him back.'

Aria met Friday's apprehensive gaze, her own face expressionless. Finally she said, ‘What is wrong with that? It was the appropriate response to redress such a violation.'

‘Was it?' Friday felt as though she might dissolve with relief. She shot Harrie and Sarah a ‘see?' look.

‘Of course,' Aria said. ‘I do not see a dilemma.'

‘Well, there bloody well is one,' Sarah snapped. ‘Someone saw us, a woman called Bella Shand. She's been blackmailing us.'

‘Yes, I know who she is,' Aria said, her voice like a hoar frost.

Friday raised her eyebrows at Aria for permission, and received a curt nod.

‘You know how we thought Bella, Furniss and Gellar were all in on the business of smuggling those tattooed heads into Sydney together?' she said. ‘Well, they were, and one of the heads —'

‘Upoko tuhi,' Aria interrupted.

Friday corrected herself. ‘Sorry, one of the upoko tuhi they stole, that Furniss personally stole, belonged to Aria's Uncle Whiro.'

‘He owned it?' Sarah asked.

Feeling really quite uncomfortable, Friday said, ‘Er, no, it
was
his head.'

Silence fell.

Eventually Harrie said, ‘Oh dear, I am sorry, Aria.'

‘What happened?' Sarah asked.

‘It was my mother's fault,' Aria said bluntly. ‘We believe Furniss was in Aotearoa on a buying expedition but my mother would not sell. One does not sell one's ancestors.'

‘But he must have seen it to have wanted it. Did she show it to him?'

Aria gave a mirthless smile. ‘Yes. My uncle's upoko tuhi is particularly fine, and my mother is proud and arrogant. She could not resist when he asked to see specimens.'

‘Pardon me,' Sarah said, ‘but wasn't that a bit silly?'

‘Of course it was; she is a stupid woman. It gave Furniss the impetus and opportunity to orchestrate the theft. My family is bereft. And deeply shamed and insulted.'

Friday took Aria's hand. ‘That's partly why Aria's mother and father were in Sydney, that first time we met. They were looking for her uncle's upoko tuhi, and for Furniss. But, well, Furniss has been dead for ages —'

‘And so, we discovered, has Gellar,' Aria interrupted. ‘And we found no trace of Uncle Whiro, or proof to implicate the Shand woman in any smuggling venture.'

Sarah said, ‘But you wouldn't. She
never
leaves a trail, that one. So that's why you want to see this letter?'

‘Yes. If I have concrete evidence she is behind the theft of my uncle's upoko tuhi, I can claim utu, as you did for the life of your friend, Rachel.'

‘You'll kill Bella?' Sarah looked blatantly hopeful.

Aria shrugged. ‘Who knows? My family has a duty to restore balance in some way. If that balance is not restored, we will lose face and therefore power and control.'

‘Does utu mean revenge?' Harrie asked.

‘Not always, but in this case, yes.'

‘But you've run away from your family,' Sarah said.

‘So? I am still who I am, and continue to suffer the insult visited upon me via my family by the Shand woman.'

‘Oh, good.' Sarah cracked her knuckles energetically. ‘Sorry, Aria, no disrespect meant. It was a shitty thing for Furniss to do, and I think we can work well together. Welcome to our crew.'

Friday hadn't seen Sarah this animated for ages. She grinned.

Aria said, ‘And you require the letter because . . . ?'

‘Same reason, really. If it proves Bella's behind bringing those upoko tuhi into the colony, we can use it to stop her blackmailing us.'

‘How long has this blackmail gone on?' Aria asked.

‘Bloody ages,' Friday said. ‘Nearly two years.'

Aria looked astonished. ‘And you have just given her the money?'

‘Well, there's been a bit more to it than that,' Sarah said.

‘She has not met with an unfortunate accident?' Aria asked. ‘Perhaps fallen while out walking and fatally bashed her head? She has not inadvertently eaten a deathly poisonous substance? She has not been found with her throat slit after thieves have ransacked her house?'

Harrie, Sarah and Friday stared at her in amazement. Such a brutally matter-of-fact litany of death from a very beautiful and elegant girl.

Unable to decide whether she was shocked, embarrassed or about to swoon from admiration, Friday said, ‘We did think about that now and then, but we've never been able to get near her. Not really. She's always got people with her, or those bloody dogs.
You don't know her, Aria. She's the nastiest, smartest and most cunning person I've ever met. And, well, we don't really want to make a habit of murdering people, do we?' she added, glancing at Sarah and Harrie.

Harrie shook her head. A moment later, so did Sarah.

‘And if you do not pay the money, the Shand woman will tell about the man you killed?'

‘Yes, the police. Or the governor,' Friday replied.

‘And then?'

‘We'll hang.'

‘So her life is worth more than yours?'

Friday had never looked at it like that before. ‘No,' she said after a second. ‘It isn't.'

Newcastle, New South Wales

Jonah Leary sat in the bar of the Ship Inn, steadily drinking his way through his fifth whisky. From the window he watched a lone gull flapping its arse off in the overcast sky and getting nowhere, buffeted by an onshore wind whipping through the harbour entrance. He knew how it felt. He was feeling aggrieved and exceedingly disagreeable, but these days when did he feel anything else? He hated Newcastle — it was a Godforsaken, half-deserted shithole populated by small-minded fools interested in nothing but grubbing for coal, and he'd been here too long. It was time to make his next move. He finished his whisky, jammed his hat on his head, turned up his collar and left the pub.

Outside, the wind was as vicious as the struggles of the beleaguered gull had suggested. He strode across the sparse grass onto Watt Street, his boots slipping in sand. Half the bloody town was built on it and not a day went by without the wheels of some vehicle or other getting mired and extra bullocks being summoned to drag it out. He swore and spat as a particularly hearty gust blew a handful of the stuff into his mouth and eyes. Iris said it was only like this in winter, that the best weather came with spring. Maybe it did, and he might see it then, depending on how things worked out, but for now he had business back in Sydney.

He turned into King Street, presenting his back to the wind, and shoved his hands in his jacket pockets. He would have to be careful, though. He'd breached the conditions of his ticket of leave by travelling beyond Sydney without permission or a passport, and he'd missed the January muster. But then, people missed the muster all the time and it didn't seem to matter. If the Superintendent of Convicts was alerted, however — or knew already — and he was picked up, he'd be thrown straight back into Hyde Park Barracks, and that would ruin everything. Mind you, over the past seven months he'd been to Norfolk Island, to Van Diemen's Land, and now here looking for his brother, Bennett, and never once had he been stopped and questioned.

He'd departed Sydney just after that stupid girl Harrie Clarke had married her equally insipid doctor and they'd adopted the baby from the orphanage, which had been about six weeks after Malcolm, Jonah's other brother, had appeared out of the blue. Malcolm had always been a bit of a fool, never quite quick or nasty enough to play an integral role in the family's Liverpool business, so everyone had been relieved when he'd gone to sea instead. But then he'd fetched up in tattooist Leo Dundas's chair in Sydney and bloody well died of a heart attack, gasping out to Dundas that Jonah must be found and given the tattoo on his back. Jonah had heard, gone to see Dundas, collected the tattoo — by then floating in formaldehyde — and got the surprise of his life when Dundas told him Malcolm had mentioned that Bennett, Jonah's younger brother, was also a convict somewhere in New South Wales.

No one in the Leary family had seen Bennett for ages as he'd left Liverpool a decade earlier under a black cloud, which was saying something for a Leary, but now Jonah was desperate to find him. He, Jonah and Malcolm each had tattoos on their backs commissioned by their father, which, viewed together, depicted the hiding place of a large amount of gold, something Leary Senior had not divulged until on his deathbed, and well after Bennett had
gone. Now only Bennett remained alive, and when Jonah found him he'd learn the secret location of the gold.

Harrie Clarke had been present when Malcolm died and, sure he'd said more than Dundas had passed on, Leary had at first tried to terrorise her into telling him what else she knew. But she'd been quite cracked, well on her way to being barmy, and he'd got nowhere, even after he'd threatened the baby in the orphanage. There was Dundas himself, of course, but he was saving him as a last resort. By all accounts he was a very tough cove, and Leary didn't want to cross him directly until he had to. Unfortunately, at the rate things were going, it was looking more and more like he would have to, though he did have one or two more things yet to try. Not that anything he'd done so far had borne results.

He'd wasted a lot of time, and money, in Van Diemen's Land. First he'd gone to the convict barracks at Port Arthur — the most obvious place, he'd thought — with no luck. Then he'd tried the penal colliery about twenty miles from the port, not that far as the crow flies but it had still taken him two days each way because of the atrocious road, and again with no result. Then he'd gone up to Darlington Probation Station only to find, after forking out an extortionate sum for the boat ride over to Maria Island, hardly any convicts there at all and the place in the throes of closing down — and no Bennett. Finally, he'd spent bloody days perched on top of a coach, in the pissing rain, all the way to the Brickendon and Woolmers farm estates. There had been plenty of convicts there, but none had been his brother.

After that he'd had to find work to afford the passage from Hobart Town up to Norfolk Island, and bloody expensive it had been, too. Having failed to find Bennett in Van Diemen's Land, he'd convinced himself that he must have done something heinous — well, that wouldn't be surprising, would it? — after he'd arrived in the colony, and been sent to Norfolk Island with the worst of the recidivist convicts. By the time he'd got to Norfolk he'd been sure he
was finally going to find him, but he hadn't. The disappointment had been like a kick in the balls. So he'd spent a couple of days drinking himself senseless in a particularly foul little pub on the island waiting for the next ship, then off he'd gone again, this time to Newcastle.

But Bennett wasn't here, either. True, it was no longer a penal settlement, but he'd thought that as his brother had disappeared from Liverpool in 1822 it was possible he may have been transported that same year and sent to Newcastle, and perhaps assigned, just before the bulk of the military had packed up and moved out. He might even be semi-free now, with a ticket of leave. It'd be very unlikely, though, that he would ever have been granted a pardon of any sort. Not Bennett.

He'd been here for two months now. Five weeks of that had been spent riding up the Hunter Valley on horseback, a less-than-pleasant expedition thanks to bushrangers. Twice he'd been held up at gunpoint, ordered to remove his hat and boots and turn out his pockets, and robbed of his loose change. It had been irritating but he'd borne it stoically enough, especially knowing that his watch, paper money and pocket pistol had been safely jammed under the cantle of his saddle. Bloody amateurs. If he hadn't been so concerned about keeping his head down, he'd have shot the lot of them. But the last thing he wanted was the police after him, or some do-good bloody member of the public thinking
he
was a bushranger and trying to arrest him.

He'd asked at every homestead and little settlement at which he'd stopped, but no one had even heard of Bennett Leary. He'd spent four days at Morpeth, a riverbank town bigger and a damn sight busier than Newcastle, darting out of the pub every time a paddlesteamer or some other boat heading downriver tied up at a wharf, pestering travellers until someone complained and the watch told him to sod off.

After that he'd crossed the river and tried Maitland, then gone farther up to Branxton, Singleton and as far as Muswellbrook. The
land itself was fair — beautiful, in fact — and probably even more arable than England because of the climate, and he could see that this was the place to settle if a man had a mind to make his living from livestock or the soil. He did encounter plenty of emancipists and convicts on assignment, just not the one he was looking for.

After a little over a month he'd had to admit that he wasn't going to find Bennett, not by himself, and had turned back, sold the horse at Morpeth and returned to Newcastle on the paddlesteamer the
Sophia Jane
, saving his arse from a couple of days in the saddle.

He wasn't giving up, though. Bennett had to be somewhere. The tarot card woman he'd consulted before he'd left, Serafina Fortune, had said he was alive and in the colony and he'd believed her, even if he hadn't liked her. There was too much money at stake to quit, money that belonged to him, Bennett and Malcolm. Malcolm was dead and Bennett didn't deserve it, and once he'd got what he wanted from him, he'd be dead, too.

If he could just find the bastard.

And soon, he thought with a tickle of anticipation, he would. He'd always suspected that the Clarke girl really did know where Bennett was, addle-headed and pathetic though she was. She'd nearly died of fear when he'd confronted her about it in the George Street markets. Surely that was proof enough? All he had to do, he'd decided, was apply the right amount of pressure to her Achilles heel — and he knew exactly what that was — and she would tell him.

Turning into Newcomen Street, he plodded up the hill a short distance, then let himself through a low hand gate in a picket fence. Iris had a row of lavender growing on each side of the short pebble path leading to her cottage door — probably the only thing that would take root in the sand. She said there was perfectly good soil if you dug down a foot, but he wasn't that interested in finding out. The sand blew up from the beaches along the harbour and from the great dunes on the ocean side of the town, behind the gaol and the hospital, and he'd had a bloody gutful of it.

He opened the door and went in.

Iris was at the hearth, poking at something in a pot. She glanced at him over her shoulder. ‘You're early. Your dinner's not quite ready. D'you want tea or a tot of whisky while you're waiting?'

‘Whisky. I'll get it.'

Leary poured himself a tumbler (his sixth of the day) from the bottle on the sideboard, sat down at the table and watched Iris as she stirred. She was five or six years younger than him — she said — which made her about thirty-three now, and wasn't bad looking, despite her age. She'd kept her figure, too, and her hair was still a nice, bright gold colour. He'd known her when she'd lived at Parramatta several years earlier, when she'd worked as a whore from her house and he'd been assigned to a market gardener just outside the town.

He'd visited her regularly on Sunday and Wednesday nights, in winter taking her a bag of carrots, potatoes and leeks, and in summer tomatoes, beetroot and squash, for her services in lieu of coin. At the time he'd been saving what little money he had to pay the fee for a ticket of leave, should his behaviour be deemed satisfactory enough to earn one. He'd only got away with giving her vegetables because she'd fancied him. When he'd been granted the ticket he found a real job and started paying her properly, although he had managed to talk her into accepting a reduced rate, given he was a guaranteed customer twice a week. They'd had what he thought was a very comfortable arrangement, with her even cooking him supper on the nights he visited, but then she'd spoilt everything by suggesting he might like to share her bed on a permanent basis.

He'd told her that if he ever settled down with a woman it certainly wouldn't be with a whore, and she'd promptly told him to fuck off. So he had. There were plenty more fish in the sea, especially if you had a quid or so in your pocket. A few months later he heard she'd moved up the coast.

He hadn't thought about her again until he'd arrived in Newcastle in June, taken a room in the Miners' Arms Inn and asked the publican about available women in the town. When the man mentioned an Iris Kellogg as a possibility, Leary had laughed — surely there couldn't be two whores in the colony named Iris Kellogg. She'd been proud of her surname, which she'd insisted was ancient and meant ‘killer of hogs', but he'd teased her about it mercilessly, which she hadn't found funny at all.

So off he'd gone to knock on her door, hoping he could weasel his way back into her bed. To his surprise he found she'd given up whoring, and was now supporting herself by mending the uniforms of soldiers stationed in the town — first the 39th Regiment then the King's Own Royal Regiment when they took over in July — and making undergarments for their wives and slops for prisoners in the local gaol. But she let him in anyway, after he'd grovelled and told her how much he'd missed her since Parramatta. She'd made enough money on her back, she'd told him, to buy herself a cottage and do what she fancied now, which was sewing. What she hadn't told him was that she was also looking for a husband, but he'd seen it in her eyes when she'd opened the door to him. It wasn't going to be him, though. He had other plans, for her as well as himself.

Iris ladled hot savoury stew into two bowls, set them on the table and sliced a loaf of fresh bread. She was a good cook. He'd give her that.

‘What have you been up to this morning?' she asked as she sat down.

‘This and that.'

‘Still no word?'

Reaching for a slice of bread, he shook his head.

Iris looked at him, her pale blue eyes full of compassion. ‘Try not to worry about it, Jonah. You'll find him. I know you will.'

‘You're right, I will.'

All he'd told her was that he'd had word his brother was in
New South Wales, and that it was vital he make contact with him concerning a family matter as important as life and death. She didn't need to know that the death would be Bennett's.

‘What will you do next?' she asked.

‘Go back down to Sydney again.'

‘When?'

‘In a week or so.'

He thought he might travel down on one of the ocean-going paddlesteamers. The fee wasn't too excessive — twelve shillings and sixpence for steerage or twenty shillings for a private cabin (which he certainly wouldn't be wasting his money on) — and the journey was either overnight, or less than a day during daylight, saving endless hours on horseback or in a crowded and probably springless coach.

‘But you will come back?' Iris asked.