One of Us Buried by Johanna Craven (year 2 reading books TXT) 📕

blanket wrapped around her shoulders to keep out the icy wind. I was glad to see her. It had been many weeks since I’d sat at the river and drunk with the factory lasses. There was too much coldness between Lottie and me. Too much hatred in me at Owen. Too much sadness and anger over Maggie.

In the flickering lamplight, I could see Hannah’s smile was strained. “All right, Nell? How they treating you?”

Wind tunnelled across the paddocks and I tugged my shawl around me tighter. “Can’t complain.” I looked at her expectantly. I knew this more than a visit to see how I was faring. “Has something happened?”

Hannah knotted her gnarled fingers. “Patrick Owen came to the factory today. With his marriage certificate.”

I closed my eyes. “Lottie.”

Hannah nodded.

“No. She can’t have. She can’t.” What in hell was she doing? Surely she couldn’t think this was the only way.

“Were there others who were willing?” I asked.

“One or two,” said Hannah. “Far less than normally put themselves forward. But Owen didn’t even look at the others. He wanted Lottie. It were obvious from the start.”

I wondered sickly whether the two of them had discussed this earlier. Had he spoken to her of his plans to marry one night while we were drinking at the river? Had she known he was about to strut into the factory with his marriage permit in his hand?

“They’re saying he got himself land in Sydney Town,” said Hannah. “He’s planning on taking her down there.”

I began to march down the side path and out into the street. “I’ve got to speak to her.”

I went to the hut of old Bert, the ex-convict Lottie was lodging with. Did he know, I wondered, that his concubine had betrothed herself that afternoon?

The hut was tucked away at the end of Back Lane, in a darkness so thick I could barely see the edge of the street. I walked towards the faint light shafting beneath the door. Unlike Blackwell’s mudbrick home, Bert’s hut was made almost entirely of wood, and it leaned dramatically to one side. A thin line of smoke curled up from the chimney. When I knocked on the door, it was Lottie herself who answered.

She sighed resignedly. “Had a feeling you’d show up tonight.”

Peering over her shoulder, I could see no sign of Bert, just a small firelit hovel with a crooked table and a single, narrow sleeping pallet.

“You can’t marry Owen,” I said bluntly.

“No word of congratulations, Nell?” Her words were thick with sarcasm.

“Why are you doing this?” I asked.

She folded her arms across her chest. “You know why I’m doing this. Because I got more than three years of my sentence left and I don’t want to spend them weaving cloth and sleeping beside an old man.”

I softened my voice. “Is lodging with Bert truly so bad you’d risk your life by marrying Owen?” I wanted our old friendship, our old closeness. But Lottie had her guard up.

She laughed coldly. “Lodging with him? Is that what you imagine this is? Just lodging with the man?”

The bitterness in her words chilled me.

“And do you imagine things with Owen will be any better?” I asked.

Lottie held my gaze for a moment, her eyes narrowing. “The thing is done,” she said finally. “The papers have been signed. We’re to be married on Thursday. Leaving for Sydney on Friday. It’s too late for any of this.”

*

I heard the soldiers marching again that night. Crunch and thud from the direction of the barracks. This time I was wide awake; thoughts of Lottie and Owen keeping me from sleep.

I slipped out of bed and peeked through the curtain. My window looked out over the front of the farm, but I could see little in the darkness. I pulled on my dress and boots and slipped out of the house.

One of Leaver’s farmhands was leaning against the stone fence at the front of the property, blowing a line of silver pipe smoke up into the dark. I stood beside him and watched in silence as a parade of redcoats strode out into the wilderness.

“Is there trouble?” I squinted into the night, trying to pick out Blackwell’s figure.

The farmhand took his pipe out from between his teeth. “Just a drill, I’d say.”

“A drill?”

“The Rum Corps likes to be prepared.”

“Prepared for what?” I asked. “Another rebel uprising?”

He nodded.

I frowned. This had to be a new development. When I’d been staying with Blackwell, I’d never known him to leave in the middle of the night. I was a light sleeper. I was sure I would have heard.

“The governor fears another rebellion?” I asked. I thought of the Irishman in the chain gang, his blood disappearing into the mud. “Has something happened?”

The farmhand shrugged. “He’s been fearing another rebellion since Castle Hill.”

I pulled my shawl tighter around me. I realised I was fearing another rebellion too. “Were you here in Parramatta?” I asked. “During the uprising?”

He nodded.

“What was it like?”

He took a long draw on his pipe. “Phil Cunningham raised an army of croppies at Castle Hill. Went from farm to farm recruiting men, taking weapons. There were a mad panic here when we heard it were happening.” He chuckled. “Reverend Marsden jumped in a boat and fled the place like a scared cat.”

I felt a small smile in the corner of my lips.

“Croppies had no chance though,” the farmhand said. “The redcoats marched out to meet them and the battle only lasted a few minutes. Could hear gunshots for days, mind you, what with the lobsters sent out to find all the rebels who got away.”

I felt a sudden tightness in my throat. Owen’s story about what had happened at his family’s cottage echoed at the back of my mind.

I