Chapter 29

Judging by the state of Eveleigh’s desk – papers still stacked neatly from the night before, a fresh blotter with no ink spots on it – he had not been there for long. Monsarrat was relieved – he was sure he would have been able to explain any lateness, but he would prefer not to have to.

He rapped gently on Eveleigh’s open door to make the man aware he was in, then took himself to his own desk and started transcribing a copy of Grace’s statement. He left out Peggy and Bronagh – hiding in the store, they couldn’t have seen anything, and he had no leisure to interview them now. Nor did he want to see them join Grace in her confinement, to see their sentences lengthened and their hair cropped.

The further he got into his transcription, the slower he went, his own reluctance to see the matter concluded dragging on his fingers. He was distracted by an impulse to bring Eveleigh into his confidence. But with a person as highly placed as Rebecca Nelson, and Eveleigh’s current frustration, he did not think it was the time.

So when he presented a document to Eveleigh, it was a list of land grants made in the last days of Governor Brisbane’s administration, for perusal by his replacement. Eveleigh glanced at it, set it aside.

‘And the statement of prisoner O’Leary?’

‘It will be with you by this afternoon, sir.’

‘Good. After that perhaps you may like to pass some time in the cellar, setting those documents to rights.’

‘I’d like that very much indeed, sir. As we know, the worst of the heat never penetrates there, and I must confess I am soothed by the process of imposing order on the mess in which those files currently live.’

‘Very well, you may soothe yourself then.’

‘However, sir …’

Eveleigh, having returned his gaze to the list of land grants, looked up again, putting his pen down very deliberately.

‘Yes, Monsarrat. There would be a “however”.’

‘My housekeeper was ill this morning, and I would as soon look in on her. I promise to confine myself to the cellar until long after nightfall to make up for it. Would you have any objection?’

‘I suppose not. Those files in the cellar are not going to slide any further into disarray for the want of your company. But I do warn you, Mr Monsarrat, if word reaches me that you are continuing to look into the Church murder, you will be confined to this office in perpetuity. And I am glad to hear that you like it in the cellar, I’m beginning to toy with the idea of locking you in there.’

*  *  *

Surely, thought Monsarrat, there was no harm in strolling past the Female Factory. It was on his way from Government House. If there was no guard at the gate, he might be able to duck in to check that Mrs Nelson was there and Hannah Mulrooney wasn’t.

The guard was there, however. He was deep in conversation with Stephen Lethbridge, while wiping some of the contents of one of Lethbridge’s pies off his face with the back of his hand. Lethbridge could afford the time to exchange pleasantries – there were no knots of men outside the Factory today looking for wives or servants.

Monsarrat decided that as he was here, there could be no harm in skirting the Factory to have a look at the other side of the yard gate. He had not examined the gate closely before. He had not had the leisure, nor could he afford the turnkeys or overseers wondering what a man wearing a silk cravat rather than a rough neckerchief was doing staring at the gate in the Third Class yard. On this side of the river, though, he was observed by a few white cockatoos, their sulfur combs stowed for now, and by those bats that happened to be awake among the hundreds which hung from the eucalypt branches above him.

Coming from the other side, he wondered for a moment if it was the same gate. The timbers he had seen in the Third Class yard were as smooth as could be expected for such a utilitarian structure. But clearly those who had built the Factory had felt the side of the gate mostly seen only by the tradesmen who occasionally passed through it did not deserve the same treatment. The wood was rough and splintered, as were the timbers of the frame that wedged the gate into the Factory wall.

‘I’ve never seen such thoughtful contemplation of a gate, Mr Monsarrat.’

Lethbridge had clearly tired of his conversation with the guard – who, after all, was unlikely to be able to exchange views on Tacitus versus Seneca, or the merits of Herodotus. He still had his hot box around his neck, was still moving from foot to foot, making deep indentations in the river mud. If only I had thought to come here just after the murder, thought Monsarrat, I might have seen a footprint. Perhaps a small, feminine one.

‘Mr Lethbridge. Had I the leisure, I would certainly relieve you of one of your pies.’

‘Yet you’re staring at the gate as though you have all the time in the world, Mr Monsarrat. One can’t help but wonder why.’

‘We have an agreement, you and I, about keeping our own secrets, do we not?’

‘Quite right. Forgive my curiosity – if you are not offended by my asking, I shall not be offended by the lack of an answer.’

Monsarrat smiled, inclined his head to show he was perfectly happy with the agreement.

Lethbridge removed his hot box from around his neck and set it on a nearby rock.

‘Keep half an eye on that for me, would you, Mr Monsarrat? The magpies love my wares nearly as much as the men.’

He picked up a stick and began to make indentations at small intervals. He seemed to be thoroughly enjoying himself, poking with his stick at the mud that was exposed when the hungry ocean drew the river waters to it. Monsarrat couldn’t see the attraction himself. In the heat, the mud smelled nearly as bad as the bats.

‘People walk by here and never notice it, you know. No one observes, now, Mr Monsarrat. Not as the philosophers did in Greece and Rome. But you can see the little kink here. The dogleg, where the river jinks to the side a bit before taking the path of least resistance and continue on towards Sydney.’

‘Yes, I suppose … Rather subtle, though, isn’t it?’

‘Not to anything in the river. You can see, here …’ – he waved the stick towards a crescent-shaped amalgamation of leaves and twigs on the riverbank – ‘Things in the river tend to get snagged here. And then the river abandons them.’

His stick continued jabbing into the mud, withdrawing, plunging again. ‘And sometimes it’s not leaves and twigs, Mr Monsarrat. I know. I observe, and I keep my counsel. Sometimes things fall in the river – coins decide to leave pockets and go for a swim, to be found by one with the wit to look. Sometimes people throw things in the river. Thinking that the waters will do their part, carry the offending object out through the heads and to sea, where it won’t be seen again until the waters boil and the Lord parts the skies to deliver the final judgement. And it wouldn’t surprise me if some of them were hoping to avoid judgement in this life.’

Soon his prodding, which seemed to be happening almost by will of the stick rather than the man who held it, slowed. He withdrew the stick from the latest of the dozens of holes it had made and frowned at it as though it had said something puzzling to him. Placed it carefully back in the same hole, and twisted it a few times. Withdrew it again, and inserted it at an angle, using it to remove as much mud as he could without getting his shirt dirty. Then he seemed to give up on the idea of a clean shirt. He knelt, pushed on the exposed end of the stick so that it opened a rift in the mud, and carefully inserted his hand, palpating whatever the stick had found for him.

When his hand drew back from the rift, it was holding an awl.

‘Is this what you were looking for, Mr Monsarrat?’

Monsarrat was hesitant to touch the thing. It was possible that this implement had been forced into the eye of another human, as little as Church was worthy of the term.

‘I’m not sure, to be honest,’ he said. ‘But do you mind if I take it?’

‘Certainly not. I’ve no use for such a thing.’

Monsarrat turned the awl over in his hand as Lethbridge resumed poking at the mud, presumably looking for coins. He found none, retrieved his hot box and said a courteous goodbye to Monsarrat, who looked up and smiled distractedly before returning his attention to the metal spike.

There was no way of being certain this was the implement that had killed Robert Church. Any blood or other material would have been taken care of by the river. Or the thing might have only ever been used for the purpose for which it was made.

It was sturdy enough. And it was long enough too, at least six inches. A few rust spots on the shaft. If it was the agent of Church’s death, it would have been here for a fortnight, so they were to be expected. A useful implement, still – not one ready to be cast away into the river. And who would have been in a position to throw such a thing away from the confines of the Factory? Certainly if they had pitched it into the river from the other side of the wall, they would need a reasonable throwing arm.

He turned, stalked back to the gate, stared at it for a little longer. He reached out a hand, ran it gently around the gate’s frame, and found himself having to extract a splinter from his palm.

All was quiet on the other side of the wall, apart from the white noise of the cicadas. He braced both hands against the gate, and pushed. He tried not to use too much force. He didn’t know if the gate was locked or jammed, and did not want to announce his presence by pushing it so hard it slammed flat against the wall.

The gate, as it happened, was closed, and firmly. But it wasn’t locked. Bloated by years of exposure to the humidity of the riverbank, it barely shifted against its frame with the first push. The second had a little more success. The third did the job, without the explosive entry into the courtyard Monsarrat was dreading.

The yard, as he had thought, was empty. He didn’t step into it though. Instead, keeping the gate open only a fraction, he examined the inside of the frame. This was rougher than the face of the gate. Rough enough to snag something.

He carefully ran his hand around the frame, watching its path until his eye came to a fine line of colour near one of the hinges. He cursed, for the first time, the fact that he kept his nails so closely trimmed. But after some effort, and a few more splinters, he was able to extract a single strand of red.

*  *  *

Monsarrat was disturbed by what he had found at the Factory, and equally by what he had not found – any sign of Rebecca Nelson. Her trap and driver were not waiting outside, and the guard, when Monsarrat asked him after his visit to the gate, claimed to have seen no sign of her.

It would add only another five minutes, ten at most, to go home quickly to alleviate the anxiety which had crouched in the corner of his mind since he’d left this morning.

He was happy to see the house closed up. The curtains drawn, no noise, no sign of activity from within. No smoke from the chimney – hardly surprising: if Mrs Mulrooney had shut herself away during a Parramatta summer with closed windows and drawn curtains, the last thing she would want was a fire.

There was, however, a slip of paper protruding from underneath the front door.

Dear Mr Monsarrat,

I do apologise that your tea service is not with you yet. Mrs Nelson very kindly agreed to convey it when she collected your housekeeper this morning. However, Grogan has returned with it still in the trap. I assure you it remains in pristine condition, and I look forward to delivering it to you at your earliest convenience. If you happen to be passing the warehouse, please do let me know when you anticipate your housekeeper will be home to receive it.

Yours sincerely,

James Henson

Monsarrat skimmed the note almost blithely, was even attempting to settle on an appropriate time to visit Henson at the shop, when the crux of the message struck him.

Rebecca Nelson had collected Mrs Mulrooney. This morning, when the doors were shut and the windows closed and the curtains drawn against that very eventuality.

So, assuming he and his housekeeper were right in believing that Rebecca Nelson was responsible for inserting a sharp object into the brain of the superintendent, Hannah Mulrooney was very possibly now in considerable danger.