The Secret Fate of Mary Watson Read online

  ‘How did you meet Watson in the first place?’ Riley asks.

  ‘Charley introduced us.’ I tilt my head over my shoulder to where le raconteur is in a deep and heavily gesticulated conversation with some harried-looking man who probably owes him money. Charley untangles himself long enough to frown at me, then look forcefully at the piano. I point to the clock on the wall in return.

  Riley brings my attention back. ‘What’s that scheming so-and-so up to this time?’

  ‘Who knows?’

  He peers at me intently, the skin around his mouth tightening. ‘You know, Mary, there are some things beyond even your cleverness.’

  ‘Charley’s not beyond me,’ I say. ‘I may not be able to glean the particulars of any given contrivance, but I know the way his mind works.’ It helps to have had the example of a scheming father all my life. ‘He’s just a petty shyster,’ I add, scratching the top of one foot with the other through my boot. ‘Blasted mosquitos.’

  ‘I’m not talking about Boule. Time will take care of him. He can’t dodge the guillotine forever.’

  His voice and eyes have boiled down to their essence. ‘I have some money. Why don’t you take it? Go home to your family.’

  ‘Thank you, Riley, but home is backwards,’ I tell him.

  ‘What’s wrong with that? Death’s in the future.’

  ‘Don’t say that to a Cornish girl!’

  ‘You still have time to back out,’ he says.

  ‘From what? Another walk?’

  He sniffs audibly. ‘I’m not as old or as foolish as you think. I watch and I listen. I’m like you in that way.’

  I give him a smile and head for the door, through the breathless heat of too many bodies. On the verandah, I take a deep lungful of what passes for cool night air in the tropics. Riley’s a cagey old coot, but far too morbid. I pull the threads of his words from the velvet dark around me. Death? Not for me. Not now; not soon. And when it happens, it won’t be Bob Watson or his island that will get the credit. Look at Cooktown. If ever a bone’s had a target to point at! And I’ve managed to survive here.

  9

  When your predecessors have all lost their heads

  on the chopping block,

  it’s wise to heed the warning

  of a scratchy throat.

  From the secret diary of Mary Watson

  Something’s changed in the bar when I come back from my break. No immediate sight or sound alerts me, rather it’s my sixth sense twanging. I look up and realise what my intuition already knows. He’s sitting alone in the corner, a fresh beer untouched on the table, his arms folded across his chest. Dressed in black.

  Captain Roberts holds my eye. Fondles the pet of his beard.

  I try to swallow, walk slowly to the piano. It’s no good. I still feel his attention: through the material of my dress, between my shoulderblades, digging deeper, through skin and muscle, reaching the spine, making it vibrate like some ghastly xylophone. My fingers are full of stuffing. I lift the lid and sit, start playing automatically. I hear the music from a long way off. What does he want? What have I done?

  After a few moments I realise I can’t go on until I know. I take a deep breath, wipe my palms on my skirt, close the lid, turn, and meet his stare. His head kinks almost imperceptibly towards the door. He stands and stalks into the night. It’s clear that I’m ordered to follow. Two men I’ve never seen before peel off the far wall and follow him out. Bodyguards?

  I quickly scan the room. Charley’s nowhere to be seen. Hiding in his office, probably, his usual obnoxious bravado headed down the nearest rabbit burrow. Heccy Landers is behind the bar, polishing a glass with a rag. He frowns as I walk past. I plaster on a smile so brittle it’s a wonder my face doesn’t crack. The worry deepens on his face.

  ‘Ma-Ma-Mary?’

  I put a hand up to still his question. Place one foot in front of the other until I’m through the door.

  Outside, the air is warm and fragrant, the texture of talc. Voices bubble out from inside Charley’s, breaking into faint fragments the further I move away from the safety of illumination, the security of a crowd.

  Roberts steps into the alley adjacent to the salon. His two human guard dogs follow obediently, scanning the street as they move. They’re watching me, too. I hurry to catch up, my heart a few gallops in front of me. The narrow corridor leads to the back of the Federal Hotel, where a door has been left open. A faint mulled-pear light shines from inside. Roberts’s thugs take up position either side of the door, but not before peering over my head and down the alley. Roberts is walking up the stairs, not bothering to check if I’m following. It’s an effort to lift my legs. At the top, he takes a lantern from its peg on the wall and steps into a small, dimly lit room. I follow him in.

  Roberts positions the lantern on a pale wooden writing table near four tatty smoking chairs. Dead cockroaches lie on their backs on the hearth of a disused fireplace. The air smells of dust, neglect and the wild, wet-paper stink of mouse droppings. A piece of flypaper dangles from one corner of the ceiling with a dozen desiccated victims stuck to it.

  He chooses a chair facing the door; the dry leather breathes out noisily as he sinks into it. He lifts his big feet onto an upended crate. My eye fixes on his left boot. It will need to be resoled soon; there’s a worn patch the size of a shilling at the ball. I remain standing, but he doesn’t speak, doesn’t gesture for me to sit.

  ‘I wish you’d just get it over with,’ I say finally.

  He doesn’t respond. Just steeples his forefingers, taps his lips. I glance back towards the door. He doesn’t seem to mind if it stays open. I take that as a hopeful sign. But if he doesn’t blame me for the morning’s disconnect, then I don’t know what purpose his silent stare would serve. He might be waiting for me to explain.

  I meet his eye. ‘Permission to speak freely?’

  One dark brow rises minutely as he thinks about this. ‘Permission granted.’ There’s a flicker of amusement deep in those black eyes. He’s mocking me. ‘Have a seat, Mary Oxnam.’

  I sit. Carefully. In the chair furthest from him, back to the door. My mouth opens and all the nervous energy tumbles out. ‘The man who is supposed to receive my messages — Dirty White Neckerchief. He wasn’t at the dock this morning.’

  ‘You mean Collins.’ It isn’t a question.

  ‘Nobody told me his name.’

  ‘Do you always do that?’

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Caricature people with nicknames?’

  ‘Sometimes. At the poker game back in Brisbane, I did it to all of you. Charley Boule was Dandy. The older man who drank too much was Sideburns … and so on. The man who passed messages to Wilson was Cobweb because of a piece of web stuck to his head. I guess shoddy grooming turned out to be the least of his worries, didn’t it?’

  I didn’t mean to add that last sentence. Not quite. I lean back in my seat. The stiff old leather squeaks.

  ‘What name did you have for me?’ he asks.

  ‘Blackbeard.’

  ‘Not original. But apt, I suppose.’

  ‘Are you a pirate, Captain Roberts?’

  ‘On occasion, when it’s necessary.’ This said without pause, and casually, as though I asked him if he was a member of the polo club. He threads those large fingers together on his lap. ‘I know Collins wasn’t there this morning. He’s had an accident. He won’t be your contact any more.’

  ‘What sort of accident?’ I can’t not ask.

  ‘A low branch knocked him off his horse, I believe. Act of God.’ He pauses, watching me. Before I can think how to respond, he asks, ‘What was the message you had for him?’

  ‘China man not found replace. I think a question mark may have been intended after the last word. The grille didn’t align perfectly.’

  I’m not sure whether to believe him about Collins, but I don’t have time to think about it now. If ever there was an occasion to keep my wits about me …

  ‘I see.’ He
stares into the fireplace.

  Dare I say anything? As usual, my mouth decides before my brain has thought it over.

  ‘I don’t mean to interfere, but surely this reluctant Chinaman is not the only signaller you could get for Liz … I mean, the island?’

  Too late to pull back the word. Nowhere in the notes was Lizard Island specifically mentioned. And the Chinaman’s role was only hinted at obliquely.

  ‘There are many islands around here. What makes you suspect it is the Lizard?’

  The voice is silky, non-threatening, but something about the stillness of his head is more alarming than if he’d yelled the words in my face. He’s testing me. If I say the wrong thing now …

  ‘Charley Boule introduced me to Bob Watson. Charley thinks that if Bob and I get married and I go to live on Lizard Island, I might signal boats for him. His own smuggling operations no doubt require some such communication. I made it plain I’m not interested, of course,’ I add hastily. ‘But Bob and Charley put Lizard Island and its signalling hill in my head. And, of course, Percy works on the Lizard with Bob. So when an island and a signaller appeared in your notes, I put two and two together …’

  I’m trying to make it sound as though anyone would draw the same conclusion with the information at hand. But his eyes have hardened.

  ‘It never occurred to you, I suppose, that it’s not part of your job to consult your abacus?’

  Roberts is attempting to stare me down. And succeeding.

  ‘Back in Brisbane, I thought you’d make a good poker player,’ he says. ‘But you’re too impetuous. You haven’t quite got your timing right. Perhaps it’s your age.’

  I don’t answer, just attempt to look chastened. I can’t work out if I’m off the hook or on it.

  ‘I’m not surprised Boule’s approached you,’ he continues. ‘He’s incapable of relinquishing short-term profit for long-term gain.’

  Having just had my fingers burned, I don’t dare fire him up with another question, but I find his comment puzzling. What long-term gain might Charley be missing?

  Roberts pauses again, as if weighing the risk of explaining himself. Or of letting me wander around Cooktown with too much impetuosity at the tip of my tongue. His next words do nothing to clarify my position.

  ‘As for the Chinaman, he’s not hiding from us. There’s a lynch mob of his own kind after him. He robbed and killed a Chow shopkeeper. He knows what will happen if they catch him. He’ll be pinned by his ears to a tree for a few days, until they’ve agreed on a suitable punishment.’

  ‘That’s barbaric.’

  Something snags in the back of my mind. A wanted poster I’ve seen plastered in a few shop windows. I didn’t take much notice of the Chinaman’s face, as it was in profile, but his raised hands left an impression. Veined and knotted, ugly fingers with long nails like chicken’s feet. So that’s why he had been so difficult to locate.

  ‘It’s nothing compared to what’s meted out to thieves and murderers in China,’ Roberts says. ‘They behead them in the town square. Then the crowds dip their money in the blood as it gushes out of the neck. It’s supposed to be lucky.’

  ‘Depends on whether it’s your head that’s been disconnected, I’d think.’

  My nerve is returning; I wouldn’t have thought two minutes ago that I’d do anything but stare dumbly at him. But curiosity hasn’t quite killed this cat … so far, at least. I risk another one of my nine lives.

  ‘Why would you want a man who’s on the run to work for you on the Lizard?’

  ‘What better reason for him to co-operate? He’s delivered from vengeful compatriots and put in a safe haven in the middle of the ocean. It’s not just that he can’t escape. He can’t even want to.’

  ‘I see.’ His last remark reminds me of my own situation. ‘What am I to do now, Captain? Who do I pass the messages on to?’

  He grabs his beard under his chin and tugs on it like a bell rope. ‘That part of your job has come to an end. You can go back to the same surveillance work that occupied you when you first came to Cooktown.’

  ‘So I’m being demoted?’

  He scratches his cheek above the beard. ‘Did you think you would rise through the ranks in measured increments and then end up with a nice fat pension? This is not the Civil Service.’

  I feel my shoulders sink. He’s right, of course. There’s nothing civil about this business. And not many of his employees, I would imagine, need to worry about saving for their old age.

  ‘I was hoping my loyalty might count for something,’ I say.

  ‘It does. There’s a direct correlation between your loyalty and the state of your health.’

  The sense of foreboding that started this morning with the absence of Dirty White Neckerchief, and reached a breaking point when Roberts appeared in French Charley’s, is back. I know enough to see a lessening of my duties as a very bad sign indeed. Roberts and Percy will soon have their base on Lizard Island. The small-time intelligence I can supply from Cooktown will be of only peripheral interest to them. At best, I’ll be ignored, left to languish, playing piano in a brothel. At worst, I’ll outlive my usefulness altogether.

  What are my options? Would they let me go now? Could I walk away? Even so, I’d only have enough money to get back to Brisbane, where I might live frugally for six months. Then, back to where I started. No prospects. No future.

  I take a shuddery breath. I have to talk myself back into the game. I’ve risked so much, come so far. I’m still as good a player as any of them. My motto in Brisbane when talking to Percy comes back to me: may as well be hung for a sheep as a lamb. I hold my sweaty hands together in front of me.

  ‘Captain Roberts, what if I could position myself on Lizard Island? I could be your signaller.’

  He’s relaxed, not taking me seriously. ‘And how exactly would you propose to do that? Get out the lampblack? Disguise yourself as one of the Kanaka crew on Watson’s lugger? At least the Chinaman, if he ever materialises, will pass as a servant.’

  ‘I told you that Charley Boule introduced me to Bob Watson. Bob’s fond of me. More than fond. If I married him, we would live on Lizard Island. But not to signal for Charley; to signal for you. What could attract less suspicion than a dutiful wife, helpmeet to her husband in his sea-slug-fishing business?’

  ‘You would go so far for mere money?’

  ‘I’m not un-fond of Bob,’ I say, a trifle defensively. ‘And there’s nothing mere about money to me. It means a new life. A new start. If I continue to prove my loyalty, that is. I assume it would be a well-paid position?’

  ‘Oh, indeed. It’s risky work. For which I naturally pay a generous stipend.’

  ‘All the more reason, I would think, not to entrust such an important task to a nervous Chinaman who’s stupid enough to murder a countryman in a much-too-public way.’

  Roberts puts one finger to his temple. His black stare dares me to falter.

  ‘What would you do when your job on the Lizard was finished?’ he asks. ‘Would you stay with Watson?’

  ‘Would that matter to you?’

  ‘Probably not. But if you mean to go and start this new life of yours, it would be an extra complication. You’d have an irate husband trying to track you down.’

  I project as calm a demeanour as I can manage. ‘You’ll allow I don’t let much get past me? Bob Watson has a chequered history with women. He would just chalk up the loss of another to experience, I think. One more disappointment to feel bitter about. How many sensible marriages are built on romance, anyway?’

  I can feel the pulse beating at my temples. It’s as though someone far older and more cynical is putting the words in my mouth. How could I possibly know how Bob would react if I left our hypothetical marriage? I hardly know the man. And what of me? Could I really accomplish such a charade? Could I live with Bob? Go to bed with him? That strange, two-sided face sweaty and intense above me … Am I really setting the bar too high? Or am I perversely setting it too low? Ma
ybe I’ve convinced myself that real contentment with a man is not the province of a homely girl like me, and I must orchestrate the future on my own terms. There’s enough truth in this to make me feel squeamish.

  I realise that Roberts has been talking and, for the first time since I met him, I haven’t been hanging on every word. I must sustain a firm argument with this man, whether or not I’m convinced, myself. He’ll see even the smallest hesitation, and discount me because of it.

  ‘Marriage? I’ve never been locked up in that particular institution, so I’m no expert,’ he says. ‘But it seems to me it’s a fairly irrevocable step for a young girl like you.’

  My quick wit dog-paddles frantically, trying to keep an inch ahead of him. ‘On the contrary. Because I have few years behind me, I have many more before me. I may make any number of new starts in my lifetime.’

  Silence descends, for perhaps five painful minutes. I don’t allow myself to fidget. I resist the urge to jump in with further justifications. I do have time, however, to ungag my internal voice of caution and listen to its slightly hysterical opinion that my sane mind’s been sent on a slow boat to China.

  ‘It might work,’ he allows finally. ‘You certainly seem cold and logical enough.’

  I don’t mind logical. But cold? Hardly a compliment. And he should talk!

  ‘It would certainly be a further test of that ingenuity you love to exercise,’ he adds.

  I open my mouth to thank him, then close it again. There’s never a chink in his armour, no place on that hard face or body for any softness to land. Besides, he hasn’t really committed himself one way or the other.

  He stands smoothly, with none of the awkwardness most people experience trying to lift themselves from a lounge chair, and walks over to a small window that looks out on the night.

  I remember something then. And wonder if I’m not signing Charley Boule’s death warrant with my next words.