The Soldier's Curse (24 page)

‘I don't believe there is any such thing as a random connection, Mr Monsarrat. There's a pattern everywhere, you just need to keep your eyes open enough to spot it. Your own eyes have been cast downward too much of late, who knows what's passed you by. Now, the price of the continuation of your tea supply is to let me know what you were getting at that morning.'

So Monsarrat told her about the article, about the connection between green pigment and illness. ‘But it was Diamond, and he used the arsenic that he sent the private to requisition from the stores, pretending it was for rats,' he said. ‘It's an interesting wrinkle but I don't think it can really be anything more than that.'

Mrs Mulrooney sat down heavily. ‘And yet with green wallpaper being put up just in the next room, and some of the plastering crew sickening from it,' she said, ‘do you not find that just a little too wrinkly altogether?'

‘I don't, as a matter of fact. She can't have been exposed directly, because she was never in the parlour while the paper was being put up, and while some children have died from licking it, I can't imagine Mrs Shelborne doing so! And how would Diamond somehow synthesise the pigment into something he could give to her without himself being affected by the stuff – For that matter, how would he give it? You or Dr Gonville were always with her.'

‘Some interesting questions you raise, Mr Monsarrat,' she said. ‘And I've not a hope of answering them. But there may be answers. Just have a care you don't miss them when they show themselves, or mistake them for some more, as you put it, wrinkles.'

Monsarrat hated leaving Mrs Mulrooney that morning. She had no one to cook for or fuss over, and it was telling on her, for all that she tried to hide it. Her pinafore bore a grease stain – the first which had been allowed to mar it since Monsarrat had known her.
And she was rearranging the teacups on the shelves, over and over, as though trying to parade them like soldiers.

But he would be of no use to her if he was on bread and water for neglecting his duties. So in the absence of any word to the contrary from Lieutenant Carleton, he made for the hospital.

Gonville was not there, and neither was Edward Donald. Nor, unusually, were any of the beds occupied. He found the doctor in the dispensary, being assisted by Donald in mixing a draught.

Gonville looked up. ‘Good morning, Monsarrat. I'm taking a precaution here – I'm not a betting man but I'd suggest Major Shelborne may be in need of a little soothing on his return. And I hope that return is sooner rather than later. There is no fitting place for the lady to rest in the hospital, so she remains in her bed, washed by Mrs Mulrooney and her tears. Thank God it's winter. But if the major is gone for much longer, he will unfortunately have to return to a gravestone.'

‘Shall I go back to the major's office, then, and wait until you have need of me?'

‘Before you do, I have a message for you to deliver to Lieutenant Carleton for me,' said Gonville. He moved away from the bench he was working on towards a small table, on which papers and ink rested. He scratched out a hasty note, not bothering to blot it, leaving it to the fibres of the paper to soak up the excess ink. He folded it and handed it to Monsarrat.

When Monsarrat reached the parade ground, the soldiers were going through their third parade that week. While the major had intended regular parades to prevent boredom, the looks on the faces of many of the soldiers indicated that their frequency was making them counterproductive.

He handed the note to Lieutenant Carleton, who read it before putting it in his pocket. ‘Dr Gonville suggests that I post a sentry on the other side of Shoal Arm Creek, to alert us to the major's approach. So we may ride out and deliver the sad news to the man. A terrible circumstance in which to hear of an even more terrible circumstance, but I can see the doctor's logic – better this than that he race up to the bedroom to check on his wife and find none there.'

Or the shell of one, thought Monsarrat.

Carleton called over a private – Cooper, Monsarrat saw, he who had requisitioned the arsenic.

‘You, Mr Monsarrat, may return to your workroom and complete such work as the major left for you. Remain there until called for – do not go to dinner. We do not know when he may be returning; however, I would like his office to be staffed until nightfall, in readiness.'

Monsarrat had, of course, long finished all the work that the major had left for him. He wished some functionary would come and load him up with a week's worth of reports to transcribe. The process was soothing and distracting, and he desperately needed to be soothed and distracted.

For want of anything else to do, he started work on a letter to Sophia – a process which was well and truly distracting, and anything but soothing.

He tried to comfort himself with the knowledge that Catullus, all those centuries ago, had felt as he did. The Roman seemed to believe no feeling was valid until it was expressed in verse, and had written:
Sad Catullus, stop playing the fool, and let what you know leads you to ruin, end.

If he was honest, Monsarrat suspected Catullus felt more keenly than he himself did. But he still clung to the connection between them.

The letter to Sophia had been through several dozen drafts, and had never been sent. It was a follow-up to the note he had sent her on the eve of leaving Sydney, more than two years ago. He did not know, now, whether the Prancing Stag still stood, and whether she was still its proprietress. Worse, he did not know
whether she still had to fabricate a husband, or whether an actual one had taken the place of the illusion. He couldn't help but fear the latter.

Monsarrat's ticket of leave was by far the most precious document he had ever held in his hand. Previously, it had been his call to the bar, although the ticket of leave had a significant advantage over its predecessor, being genuine.

But of course, the document came with its own drawback – in the one word which sat innocently on it, Windsor.

Before he left Parramatta, he visited Sophia one last time, letting her know why he could no longer come to her, asking her whether she would be willing to wait until such a time as he had managed to set the situation to rights. To his amazement, she did not seem at all concerned.

‘You're a resourceful man, Hugh, as resourceful as any I ever met. What does it matter if we can't be together openly for the present? It's not a long ride to Windsor; you can, I am sure, find appropriate times to come to me when you won't be missed, and have the sense to get off the road if you hear hoof beats. At least you're no longer subject to a curfew – you can stay the night here, and be back at the breakfast table as though nothing has happened.'

Monsarrat's first reaction was to immediately dismiss the suggestion. The freedom his ticket of leave conferred on him had been his lodestar for so long, spurring him on to be a conscientious clerk.

But there was that within him, too, which latched onto risk, a Monsarrat who thought an actual reward was worth the prospect – the probability – of punishment. This shadow Monsarrat had not been in evidence since Exeter, when it had convinced him he could pass himself off as a lawyer indefinitely. Whenever the rational part of him asserted itself and forced him to examine the likely repercussions, the shadow Monsarrat squinted, so that the picture blurred around the edges and therefore became less realistic, less likely.

After a long slumber, shadow Monsarrat suddenly arose in fine voice. What was the good of freedom, he asked, if you
weren't actually free? Should one not be able to live where one wanted, work as one chose, and bed and marry regardless of location? Surely his diligent service entitled him to that, regardless of one word on a piece of paper. Already, the prospect of losing the freedom he had just gained was seeming a little fuzzy.

But shadow Monsarrat was not entirely without caution. And under his auspices Monsarrat made a big show of putting down roots in Windsor, and only in Windsor. He applied for and won a position teaching the sons of a local landowner and magistrate, a reasonable man called Cruden.

‘Just drill what you can into them, Mr Monsarrat,' he said. ‘If they come out the other end learning to appreciate art and literature, and able to parrot a few phrases in Latin, I will be well pleased.'

Monsarrat intended to do a whole lot better than that. That was, however, before he met his students. The only school Monsarrat had known was the quiet of Mr Collins's grammar school, while his university was the old man's study. It had never occurred to him that not all classrooms were places of silent application.

Mr Cruden's boys, while not bad, would certainly have been birched by Mr Collins.

He taught the boys Latin grammar, algebra, proper handwriting and the history of the ancient world, but the young Crudens were nearly wild children, raised indulgently by their father because, like their new teacher, they had lost their mother, and much adored by a convict housekeeper who – it became apparent – was Mr Cruden's mistress. The boys were good-natured, hard-riding, cursing and jovial young men of thirteen and fourteen and their father hoped one day that they would hold a commission in the army. Monsarrat could imagine them thundering around some colony subduing the natives.

Their father was grateful that Monsarrat seemed at least to be making some inroads into their education. He was careful to teach material that would interest them – so the history of the ancient world focused on great battles and great generals, while he had them practise their handwriting by making up stories which cast
themselves in the role of knight or redcoat. It was not possible, sadly, to make algebra and grammar similarly appealing; however, he made a bargain with the boys that if he had their full attention for three-quarters of the lesson, they could take the last quarter off, and race outside to wrestle with each other or gallop around on the horses.

Cruden's gratitude, and his domestic arrangements, encouraged shadow Monsarrat all the more. This man, the shadow whispered, is unlikely to care what you do in your own time, nor is he likely to report you even if he should become aware of the situation.

With Mr Cruden's leave, Monsarrat set up a scribing business at a local inn during the evenings, as he had at the Caledonia Inn. With the money from this, and his pay from Cruden, he was able to afford a horse – a nag, to be honest, but one capable of easily making the journey between Windsor and Parramatta.

One of the many things he enjoyed about being free was that he was not required to account for every movement. So if the tutor was absent from his cottage when not on duty, no one called him on it.

Thus he visited Sophia once a week – far less than he had when a convict, but he assured her he would write to the Colonial Secretary and beg to be assigned to Parramatta. He might even ask the man for a job as a free clerk at the court – surely the Colonial Secretary would see a benefit in having a clerk there who already knew how the place operated, and who could serve as a model of emancipated respectability to those still bonded.

But he received no reply from the Colonial Secretary. And as his weekly visits came close to fifty-two in number, Sophia's discontent was becoming more apparent.

‘Why must you only come to me on Saturdays?' she said. ‘Surely you are at liberty to come on Sundays as well?'

‘You well know that I'm not at liberty to come at all. But a Sunday, that would necessitate my absence from church. It would be noticed. There would be talk.'

‘What of it?' she said. ‘I, of course, must be seen at church on Sunday morning. I have a full pardon and I own a business in
this community, which makes my appearance essential. But you've been going faithfully to the church in Windsor every Sunday for nearly a year. Is it not out of the question that you might find yourself with a sore throat, or a cough, which would prevent your attendance? You could then travel up while I am attending church, and I can meet you back at the Stag. After all, the only reputation which will matter is our reputation together here.'

Monsarrat, however, pointed out to her that Bulmer was likely well aware of the condition on his ticket of leave – in fact, he suspected the man of engineering it. The possibility of encountering the Reverend on a Sunday, when he was abroad after service, daunted him even against the urgings of shadow Monsarrat.

‘And how will you meet him, my love, when you're cloistered with me at the inn?' Sophia laughed. ‘I assure you, Reverend Bulmer is not in the habit of coming here.'

So Monsarrat allowed himself to be persuaded, and made several Sunday visits to his unofficial fiancée, to augment the Saturday ones they had been enjoying for a year.

This success emboldened shadow Monsarrat, so that he left his departure on a Sunday later and later, having to force his poor horse to feats of speed it had never been called upon for in the past in order to return to Windsor at a respectable hour, to prepare his lessons for the rowdy Cruden brood the next day.

Cruden, though, was not oblivious to the wanderings of his children's educator, having called at Monsarrat's cottage a few times on a Sunday on the way back from church. Monsarrat's absence there, too, had been noted. Cruden wished that all of the staff associated with him be above reproach – at least in the eyes of his neighbours – and so had visited the man's cottage in order to drag him to church, even if he was spraying catarrh onto the whole congregation, an eventuality the magistrate considered unlikely, as none was in evidence during his children's lessons. But his hammering on the door, of course, produced no reply.

As a magistrate, Cruden travelled, and was in the habit of dining in the inns between Windsor and Parramatta. Both the colony and the guesthouse business were small ponds, and he
soon heard the rumours of Monsarrat's visits to Sophia – a great many of her guests had noticed the tall man making his way up the stairs to her bedchamber, and remembered him from his time scribing at the Caledonia Inn.

Some of them, too, after Monsarrat had first received his ticket of leave, had heard Sophia rail against the unfairness of his restriction to Windsor. This they gleefully reported to Mr Cruden, always happy to exchange the currency of information for possible leniency later, should it be needed.

One Monday, Cruden came to the room set aside for classes and asked Monsarrat to come outside into the hallway. He did not lose much time in getting to the point.

‘I have heard of your awkward situation, Monsarrat,' said Cruden. ‘You're not the first convict on whom Bulmer has had a geographical restriction placed in order to prevent moral turpitude. Don't look so surprised, man – of course it was Bulmer. He's an impossibly inflexible man. He has an eye on a spot on the bench, you know, and I understand he brought some influence to bear to make sure you didn't keep your position there. Clerks as good as you, I understand, are not lightly disposed of.'

‘With the greatest respect, sir, what precisely do you mean by my awkward situation?' asked Monsarrat, careful to lather his words with the appropriate tone of subservience.

‘Now, Monsarrat, despite your nefarious background and convict past, I have never treated you other than as a man of intellect. I would appreciate the same consideration in return.'

Monsarrat bowed his head. ‘Of course, sir.'

‘I will only say it to you, Monsarrat, and will deny it if you repeat it, but it seems improper to impose a legal sanction for a supposed moral failure, if it be just that, a moral failure, but not a murder, or a robbery. I am no friend of the Reverend Bulmer either, as you might have inferred. His brand of morality is wholly unsuited to life here, and serves only to cause a great deal of anger and worry amongst his parishioners.'

Cruden was silent for a moment, staring at the former convict thoughtfully.

‘I understand what you are sometimes doing with your long rides. The letter-writing, yes, that is quite licit and appropriate, but … the visits to other places … Let us just say, I shall not take any action unless forced to, but I must warn you, if you are brought before me for a technical breach, I will be required to apply the appropriate ordinance, and will thus lose a very good tutor to my wild children. So be careful. I don't expect a man to be inhuman, but I expect him to be wise. And as for frailty, be frail as infrequently as you can manage.'

Monsarrat felt he was already doing this – his frailty needed expression at least twice a week. And though he was newly awake to the dangers after Cruden's warning, shadow Monsarrat chose to interpret it as a permission as well as an admonition.

In the failing light of a winter Sunday, Monsarrat left the Prancing Stag and set out for Windsor. Shadow Monsarrat was unfurling and quickly occupying all available space, having not held this much sway since Exeter.

His recent dusk departures came at the expense of speed – the roads were rutted enough, in places, to lame a horse. He lacked the funds for another, and would never be able to make the journey to Parramatta by foot in time. Nevertheless, Monsarrat made considerable haste, weaving his way across the gouged surface at a trot, rather than the canter he would have employed in full daylight. He always felt safer when he reached the Windsor police district.

On hearing the wheels of a carriage behind him, quarrelling with the rough road surface, he rode into the fringes of the eucalyptus forest and watched the vehicle go by containing a well-dressed male and female and a driver. When it had clattered past, he emerged onto the road again, but the sound he had thought was the departing carriage was a second one bearing down on him. There was a curse from the driver of the second carriage, Monsarrat spurred his horse out of the way, came to a standstill on the verge of the road, and saw, staring at him in the last of the light, the Reverend Bulmer and his wife.

Monsarrat felt an impulse to gallop off then, but he resisted it, from gallantry but more accurately from a sudden desire to defy
this minor consecrated bully who nonetheless had the authority to destroy him.

Bulmer's nasty smile crept over his face. ‘Out of your district, I see, Mr Monsarrat,' he squealed. ‘And are you coming to your concubine, or going from? Do you think you are free to be? Out of your district, I mean?'