CHAPTER 7

The Bannin Mission is a particularly unholy-looking place—a smattering of bush timber huts fastened to the earth with tumbledown chains. A church, if it can be aggrandized with such a name, sags on spindly, rotten stumps, the ground surrounding it as harsh as old, cured hide. Native plants have been clumsily uprooted to make way for what might one day resemble an English vegetable garden. There’s a rudimentary school building that looks remarkably like the jailhouse in town, and on the veranda, a pair of white trousers and a shirt bloat in the wind. Eliza looks closer, squints; if she did not know better she might believe them ghosts.

“Dear Eliza.” Father Ernest McVeigh trots out, arms wide as if moving on wayward cattle. His beard is salted with dust and his robe trails in the dirt. He grasps her forearms, fixes her in the eye.

“I am so sorry to hear about your father, Eliza. Terrible, terrible business, especially with what happened to your mother and, well…” His voice fades before he continues. “Charles was here just before the fleets sailed out. We had quite the discussion about the crew. He was helping, of course, to fund the cottages I’m building. The men all want to keep their crews close, but still. Ach, it’s a cruel thing that Balarri has found himself jailed.”

She tells him hurriedly of the man’s escape and Parker’s intention to track him down. His eyebrows leap upward. “You’d better come in.”

Eliza knows many in Bannin consider the priest worthy of nothing but ridicule. They scoff at the very thought of an old Scot herding the Aborigines into church, attempting to teach them the Psalms, to dress their confusing nakedness in European clothing. He is “a fantasist,” the pearlers holler from their groaning lounge chairs. A loon who keeps company with heathens. But she’d always found nothing but kindness in the man. Those he sought to teach humored him too, mostly, although he was here, ostensibly, to save them from themselves. But here was a man who wanted not to take, wanted nothing of their land, their waterholes, or their women. Instead, he intended to give to them: shelter, supplies, food, faith. Whether they wanted it or not.

He leads her into the fly-bitten church, dim as cold mist out of the blinding sun. She is struck by how neat it appears inside. Driftwood pews run through its center. A simple lectern holds a calfskin Bible caked in mold. In a dark corner, a set of cricket stumps leans against the wall, an oxblood ball gathering dust at their feet.

“Come. Let us have a wee seat.” They settle at the front of the room and a watery light slants in through the window bars. Eliza finds something soothing in the man’s hushed tones. The priest is the only soul to have shown any real concern about her father. The rest of the town—her brother too, so stubbornly trading in Cossack—have been continuing as normal, while her life has been hurled against a wall and shattered.

“And how is your brother coping?” McVeigh asks.

“He’s gone on to Cossack to see to business affairs.”

McVeigh pauses, steeples his fingers. “It’s not unnatural, I suppose, to remove oneself from a tragic situation,” he muses. “And we do know how he struggles.”

She tries to blink away the memories of Thomas dragged near lifeless from the dens on Sheba Lane. The times she has woken to find him flat-back on the veranda, vomit caked into the folds of his neck, circling mosquitoes droning with delight.

She tugs her attention back to the room. There is little time to waste so she launches directly into her plea.

“I believe there’s more to my father’s disappearance than we are being told.” She says it, then bites her mouth shut. Will he ridicule her like Parker did? The priest’s slack face tightens but he says nothing, so she continues. “I don’t believe he is dead. I don’t know why, or rather I can’t quite explain why yet, but if I can find out what happened, if I can find him, Parker might call off his search for Balarri too.”

McVeigh pauses, his face blank. She is aware of how she must appear to this man, how desperate she appears to most of Bannin Bay.

“I know you’ll think me foolish, but things don’t make sense. You don’t just disappear from a ship, do you?” She is leaning so close, drawn so much to human contact, she can feel the warmth of his body beside her. “Thomas says there were no pearls missing. No signs of any struggle. No blood.” McVeigh shifts. “Plus, I found something. In his diary.” Reaching into her pocket, she pulls out the ledger paper, unfolds it, and hands it to him.

“What’s this?” he asks. “An address?” As he reads there is a noise from the back of the room. Eliza turns to see a child, about twelve years of age, quietly arranging books on a shelf.

“Ah, yes. This is Quill,” says McVeigh, pointing a finger at the child who freezes as if caught raiding a larder. “Forgive the nickname, but he’s sharp as anything, this lad.” McVeigh rises and crosses the room, still pointing. Quill has a thin chest, wide brown eyes, and a small crucifix pendant on a piece of string around his neck. “Quill is one of the most diligent young chaps I have met in the bay. He was a beggar and a deckhand, would you believe, scratching out a living on the ships before I apprenticed him into the mission here. Now he helps with the repairs, digs the garden, even has a hand in some of the teaching.” McVeigh nods proudly. “His mother was from the camp, that much we know, but I’m afraid we’ve no idea of the father, such are the circumstances round here. European, certainly, though.” Quill looks to the floor. “He’s a marvelous reader,” McVeigh enthuses, “I don’t know any other deckhands who can read, do you, Eliza? What a revelation. He’s adept with lugger pidgin, of course, and can follow some of the other local dialects to a degree too, given his time on the boats.” The apprentice glances up at her. “He’s, er, alphabetizing the Latin books, isn’t that right, Quill?” McVeigh finally crosses his arms. With a dip of the head, Quill places down the books and goes to leave. With the motion, something falls from the child’s waistband, hitting the floor with a dusty thud. Eliza rises and crosses the boards to pick it up. It’s a book, faded and dog-eared. She turns it over to read the spine. Saltwater Cowboys: Adventures on the High Seas. Quill has paused at the threshold and watches her curiously. She flashes a quick smile and hands the book quietly back, then returns to the missionary, who looks up from the paper.

“This address, I’m not sure I like the look of it, you know.”

“You’re familiar with it, then? Do you know what the crescent symbol signifies?”

“No, no, but we can assume it’s not something particularly savory. Sheba Lane is not a safe place for a young lady like you. You should not be going to this address alone; I sincerely hope that’s not what you’re intending.”

“Well, I was hoping I wouldn’t have to go alone.”

McVeigh begins to shake his head before she’s even finished.

“Please, I need help with this.” Her voice is strained. “I have to find out what happened. I know someone out there knows something.” She pauses. Sighs in frustration. “I need a man to help me gain access to certain places.” The words are necessary, but they make her itchy with indignation.

“Eliza, this is not really in my purview. It wouldn’t look good.”

“Well, then I suppose I shall have to go on my own.” She straightens her skirts, steps away from him.

McVeigh groans. “All right, all right, I know it.”

She turns to see his eyebrows knitted in concern. “I know the house it refers to,” he concedes reluctantly. “It’s rather infamous if you know the ins and outs of the town.”

Her eyes widen.

“You’ve heard of the tongs?” He looks up at her. Takes her silence as encouragement to continue. “They’re groups. Made up of men. Bad men. Rotten sorts, really. They do bad business. Snides and such. Gambling. Soliciting.” He shakes his head. “These fellows, they call themselves the Brotherhood of the Waning Moon.” He waves the paper. “Hence the symbol.” He traces it roughly with a finger. “It’s a calling card of sorts. A sickle-shaped wound they’ll leave on a body. They’re not good people to get involved with. I really shouldn’t be telling you this.”

She had heard tales of these secret societies, how they enforced their decrees, leaving bulging eyeballs and shattered windpipes behind them. Her head starts to swim.

“I’ve no idea why your father would have this address in his diary.”

The thought of it makes her queasy. Her father, involved in trading snide pearls? Or worse, having a hand in the brothels? He has always been such a soft sort of man, but maybe a part of his heart had hardened over from simply being in Bannin Bay.

“How do I get there?”

“Eliza.”

Whatever he might have done, she must find him. “You know I’m going to find out eventually, so you might as well tell me.”

The priest sighs.

“I will tell you if you promise you will find someone suitable to escort you, Eliza. Someone who knows this town. A gentleman. Not some miscreant you find on the street. Someone to keep you safe.”

“Of course.” She hopes her expression appears convincing.

“In Chinatown, turn right at the Star, cross to the next road, and look for the place with all the fish. That’ll get you near enough.”

“The fish.” She nods.

“You can’t miss it, but, Eliza, promise me, you must find someone to go with you!”

She is already out of the door.