Remember Me - Lesley Pearse [141]
Despite his usual calm and controlled manner, he felt very excited. He couldn’t write under his own name of course, there was bound to be some kind of law against a serving officer divulging information. But no one would guess it was him if he wrote the Bryants’ escape story in a florid and sensational manner. Newspapers the length and breadth of England would devour such a story. Men would love the daring of it, women would weep for Mary losing her husband and children. Surely no one with a heart would want to see her hanged after going through so much pain already?
Tench’s smile spread from one ear to the other. It could work. He had to make it work.
Mary sat in a sheltered nook at the stern of the ship, looking out at the fast-approaching coast of England with a mixture of pleasure and trepidation. It was a beautiful June day, warm, sunny and with just enough wind to send the ship scudding along at a good speed. Perfect sailing weather, and she could recall so many other days just like it, out in a boat with her father.
She had thought about her parents and Dolly so much over the years. Had they found out what happened to her? If they hadn’t, maybe they thought she had forsaken them for high life in London. Or even supposed she had died! Whatever they knew, or believed, it was going to distress them terribly if they discovered that she was awaiting trial in London’s Newgate prison.
She hadn’t understood at nineteen what it was to be a mother. Mothers were people who nagged, wanted you to be ladylike, to cook and sew as well as they did, and to marry a respectable man so they could be smug and pat themselves on the back for bringing their daughters up well. They didn’t want their daughters to have fun or adventure, because they didn’t have any themselves.
Mary knew better now. All any woman wanted for her child was for it to be safe and happy. All that nagging was only an attempt to prevent harm. A way of showing love.
She wished there was a way of letting her mother know she understood that now. She also wished she could reassure her that death by hanging didn’t frighten her. It was what she wanted, to rid herself of the terrible burden of guilt for her children’s deaths.
Everyone on this ship had been so kind to her, but it would have been better if someone had called her a murderess, for that was what she knew she was. At the time she planned the escape she thought it was preferable to risk her children drowning at sea, a clean and quick death, than to watch them die slowly of hunger or disease in the colony. She still stood by that. Yet despite all her efforts they had in the end suffered a far worse fate than could ever have befallen them back in New South Wales. And she was to blame for putting them in that position.
A shadow falling on her made her look up. It was Tench.
‘So thoughtful,’ he said with a smile. ‘Will you share them with me?’
Mary couldn’t tell him she was thinking about her children, so she played safe. ‘I was thinking about my mother.’
‘Would you like me to write to her for you?’ he asked, squatting down in front of her.
Mary shook her head. ‘She can’t read, she’d have to take it to someone else.’
‘Maybe I could call on her at some time then,’ he suggested.
‘I can’t put that burden on you,’ she said, imagining how her mother would view a gentleman like Tench. She would be embarrassed to have him call at her humble home, so she’d be curt with him, as if she didn’t care about Mary. Then she’d weep for days after he’d gone.
‘I just hope I get tried and hanged quickly and no one will know about it. That’s the kindest thing for everyone concerned.’
‘Not for me it isn’t,’ he said, looking horrified. ‘I believe there will be public sympathy for you and I hope you’ll be set free.’
Mary gave a tight little laugh. ‘That’s foolish. You know perfectly well I’ll be hanged or sent back. I just