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

realised then that Lottie had been with child long before she had left Parramatta. Long before she and Owen had married.

I swallowed. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

I knew the answer of course. She and I had barely spoken in the months before she had left. And even if I had known, what would I have had to offer her but another diatribe of abuse towards Owen? What good would any of it done?

She unbuttoned her bodice with one hand and wrangled the baby onto her breast.

“Is he Owen’s?” I asked.

She nodded, not looking at me.

“Did he force you?”

Lottie let out her breath. “What do you want, Nell? To prove you were right and I was wrong? To show me how well you’ve done for yourself? Is that why you’ve come?”

“Of course not,” I said. “I was worried about you. I worried for you every day. I just want to help you.”

She shook her head. “You ought to have stayed in Parramatta with your lobster. How d’you even get here? You have him swing things for you? Persuade him to get you a little more freedom?”

I clenched my teeth. Said nothing.

“You left him,” Lottie said after a moment. “I didn’t think you would.”

I lowered my eyes. “There was nothing to leave.” Heat flushed the back of my neck. I knew myself lying. But I couldn’t let Lottie know how far things had gone between Blackwell and me.

I stood up. “I’ll leave you then. If that’s what you want.”

Lottie rubbed her eyes with her free hand. “Where will you go?”

“I don’t know,” I admitted, heading for the door.

She sighed. “Come back, Nell. It’s not safe to go wandering about out there with no place to go. You’re better off here. Safety in numbers and all that.” She spoke without looking at me. “I’ll deal with you in the morning.”

As the salty smell of broth seeped across the kitchen, the women made their way towards the fire. A young girl at the cooking pot brought a stack of bowls from the shelf, and ladled a thin puddle of soup into each. One by one, the women filed their way towards the table in the centre of the room and took the soup bowls back to their own corners. A well-practised routine. I wondered how long some of them had been here.

“Make yourself useful,” Lottie told me, wiping the baby’s mouth with the hem of her dress. “Fetch us some supper.”

I took two bowls from the table and carried them carefully back to Lottie. We huddled together in the corner, angled towards the wall so we might block out the world around us. Lottie bent over her bowl to scoop a spoonful into her mouth, the baby fidgeting in the crook of her arm.

I ate in silence, unsure what to say. Whatever was to come out of my mouth, I felt certain she wouldn’t be interested in hearing it. She attempted another mouthful of broth, swatting the spoon out of the baby’s grasp.

“Let me take him,” I said, as I swallowed my last mouthful. She dumped the child in my lap and picked up her bowl to drink from it.

I peered down at the baby. Tiny pink fingers were darting in and out of his mouth. He felt small and fragile in my arms.

Patrick Owen’s child. And Lottie’s.

“What’s his name?” I asked.

She gulped down a mouthful. “Willie. After my da.”

He wriggled in my arms and began to whine.

“How long have you been here?” I asked, rubbing his back.

She didn’t look at me. “Half a year maybe.”

I said nothing. Half a year. I wondered if Patrick Owen had ever laid eyes on his son.

“I know what you’re thinking. But he did what I wanted. He got me out of the factory.” She lifted her bowl to her lips to drain it, then sat it on the floor beside her, pulling Willie from my arms.

“It’s good to see you,” I said finally. Both an understatement and a lie. I was inexpressibly glad I had found her alive. But my heart ached to see where she had ended up.

“It’s good to see you too,” Lottie said, giving me a ghost of a smile.

I leant wearily back against the wall. There was so much more I wanted to ask, but I had learned a precious skill in my time around Blackwell. There was nothing so good as silence to encourage an answer.

“Things were good,” she said. “At first. He was kind to me. Decent.”

“Why did Owen come to Sydney?” I asked. “Why not stay upriver? He had it good in Parramatta.”

“He served his time there,” said Lottie. “Can you blame him for wanting a fresh start?”

“I suppose not.” I hugged my knees, watching a women steer a bare-footed child away from the fire. “And the rebels?” I asked. “Is he involved with them here in Sydney?”

Lottie eyed me. “I suppose so. Dan Brady came down here not long after we did. And there was croppies at the farmhouse all the time. Talking among themselves. But I never heard what they were saying.”

“Are they planning another rebellion?”

She sighed. “How would I know that? Look where I am.” And she turned her eyes away, making it clear the conversation was over.

That night I slept curled up beside Lottie on the floor of the kitchen. The flagstones beneath my head were cold, despite the thick, wet heat pressing down on us. I kept my knees pulled to my chest to avoid kicking the women around me.

Before I had closed my eyes, Lottie had lifted the corner of Willie’s blanket to reveal a pistol tucked into the basket.

“Here,” she said. “In case anyone troubles you. Door don’t lock so good. We have visitors in the night sometimes.”

I stared