Claim the Kingdom Read online

  About Claim the Kingdom

  A vast land lies open to those fearless enough and ruthless enough to claim it…

  The year is 1793. Cash and Jack Tremain have arrived in Sydney Cove from Cornwall, summoned by their father to help him build an empire.

  Daring and headstrong, a leader of men and lover of women, Cash is determined to make his fortune. But his efforts bring him into conflict with the colony’s most powerful and corrupt men and soon he finds himself surrounded by enemies.

  Deeply troubled and prone to sudden fits of violence, Jack moves out to Parramatta to farm his father’s land. But Jack is a haunted man and his dreams are filled with a horror he can barely understand.

  The Tremain brothers can claim this kingdom for their own, but only if they are willing to pay a terrible price.

  Contents

  About Claim the Kingdom

  Dedication

  I STRANGERS IN A STRANGE LAND

  PROLOGUE

  ONE

  TWO

  THREE

  FOUR

  FIVE

  SIX

  SEVEN

  EIGHT

  NINE

  TEN

  ELEVEN

  TWELVE

  THIRTEEN

  FOURTEEN

  FIFTEEN

  SIXTEEN

  II TRADERS

  SEVENTEEN

  EIGHTEEN

  NINETEEN

  TWENTY

  TWENTY-ONE

  TWENTY-TWO

  TWENTY-THREE

  TWENTY-FOUR

  TWENTY-FIVE

  TWENTY-SIX

  TWENTY-SEVEN

  TWENTY-EIGHT

  III CIRCLES OF FATE

  TWENTY-NINE

  THIRTY

  THIRTY-ONE

  THIRTY-TWO

  THIRTY-THREE

  THIRTY-FOUR

  THIRTY-FIVE

  THIRTY-SIX

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  About John Fletcher

  Also by the Author

  Copyright

  To Elizabeth

  I

  STRANGERS IN A STRANGE LAND

  PROLOGUE

  He recoiled, staring down at the face of the girl standing beside him at the rail of the ship.

  ‘I couldn’t do that!’

  Beneath their feet the hull of the transport creaked and swayed in the light breeze. The seas rumbled, streaked by an occasional blink of foam. Above their heads the soaring masts and oblong shapes of the sails were black against the stars.

  ‘Course you could.’ Coaxing.

  ‘I wouldn’t dare.’

  ‘I knows you better’n that …’

  At the stern, the binnacle light cast fluttering shadows across the helmsman’s face. Beyond him, the wake was a twisted skein of silver under the moon.

  He said nothing.

  His silence made the girl angry. He felt her draw herself together and start to turn away from him. At once he put out his hand to restrain her.

  She tossed her head. ‘If you cared for me like you’m always saying …’

  ‘I do. You know I do.’

  ‘Then do it!’ Her voice was urgent. ‘Tesn’t for me I be askin’. Tes for my brother. ’Twill kill him, locked away all those years.’

  ‘Other people manage.’ The words were out before he could stop them.

  ‘Easy for you to say!’ Spitting at him. ‘You’re a free man. You don’ know what tes like.’ Her voice changed. Gently, she put her hand on his arm. ‘You will do it for him, won’t you?’ Beseeching. ‘For us?’

  He hesitated, filled with terror at the enormity of the plan. ‘The risk …’

  She glared at him furiously. ‘I thought you was a man!’

  She wrenched herself free and ran stumbling down the deck. He went after her, catching her just before she reached the hatchway to the convict hold. She struggled, kicking and twisting against his hands, swearing under her breath, but he held her easily. By the rail, the sentry’s crossbelts gleamed white in the darkness as he stared out at the sea, earning the coin he’d been paid to shut his eyes to what was happening on deck.

  Her shoulders heaved beneath his hands as she sobbed. He held her to him, pressing himself against her. Her body was soft and infinitely desirable beneath the shabby clothes.

  He heard himself say, ‘If I do agree …’

  She turned to him at once, eyes shining in the starlight. ‘Yes?’

  ‘What about your promise?’ He stared down at her, guts twisting with desire.

  She smiled. The tip of her tongue touched her lower lip. ‘What about it?’

  He stroked her hair, her neck. She did not move away. He fondled her breasts, feeling himself huge, aching.

  ‘Don’,’ she murmured. She pushed his hand away, looking around the deck at the helmsman, the shadowy figures of the watch, the sentry staring at the surging waves. ‘People can see.’

  ‘It’s hard, waiting.’

  She stared up at him, a frown creasing her forehead. ‘You sayin’ you won’t help him otherwise? You puttin’ a price on it?’

  ‘I’m not, no. I wondered if you were.’

  She reached up and touched his cheek. ‘Course not.’ Her voice became businesslike. ‘How will you do it?’

  ‘I said if.’

  Her expression turned ugly. ‘Don’ mess wi’ me! Be you willin’ to help my brother or not? Say.’

  He hesitated. What she was asking was insane. His hands were wet, his breath tight in his throat. His eyes were mesmerized by hers. He felt himself weakening. Appalled at his own stupidity, he made up his mind.

  ‘All right. I’ll help him to escape. Yes.’

  Her eyes closed. He held her as, momentarily, she swayed. Then she smiled up at him. ‘Bless you.’ Her voice was soft again, caressing him. Her hand touched his. ‘How?’

  ‘I don’t know.’ Her persistence irritated him. ‘We’ll have to see when we get there. I’ll get a note to you somehow.’

  Eyes narrow, she appraised him. ‘You mean it? You swear?’

  ‘I swear.’ He tried to smile, ‘Just make sure you keep your promise afterwards.’

  He knew he should make her do it first. He would have no hold over her later. It was no use. He wanted her more than anything on earth but not in payment. She had to give freely or not at all.

  ‘Waiting’s hard for me too,’ she said.

  Standing on tiptoe, she reached up to him and brushed her lips against his. Then she turned swiftly and was gone.

  He heard her feet clatter down the ladder into the darkness of the hold. Alone on the gently swaying deck, the breeze lifting his hair, he touched his mouth gently with his forefinger and wondered, appalled, what he had done.

  ONE

  Cash Tremain stood at Bellona’s rail, watching the land rise up out of the dawn haze that lined the western horizon.

  Five and a half months, he thought. Excitement frothed in his veins. Five and a half months from London Town and here we are. At last.

  It was a hot, humid morning – Tuesday, 12 February 1793.

  The vessel steadied on its approach, barely rolling as it slid through the water on the light morning breeze. The rays of the rising sun lay golden on the low olive-green cliffs that extended from one horizon to the other, foam gnashing white at their base. There was a shout behind him and a rush of bare feet as the crew ran to alter sail.

  Cash felt his brother Jack come and stand at his shoulder. He did not turn his head. Jack was older by two years but in all things Cash took the lead and always had. Jack stood with his face turned towards the land, knuckles white as he grasped the sun-warmed rail.

  Some yards away was gathered a group of the passengers with whom they had shared the crampe
d quarters of the ship for so long. They would all be glad to get ashore after the wet, interminable voyage but for now their expressions were uneasy as they looked out at the approaching land and wondered what lay ahead of them.

  ‘Some strange,’ Jack muttered, the Cornish accent strong in his voice. He, too, sounded troubled.

  Cash had no such doubts. Exhilaration sang in him. His long black hair flew about his face. He was elegantly dressed in pale green breeches, knee-length boots, a fawn frock coat with silver buttons and a white stock. He was five feet ten inches tall with good shoulders and an easy, athletic stride.

  His feet tapped impatiently on the wooden deck. He felt he could shout, jump, run. ‘Strange?’ He shook his head. ‘It’s wonderful.’

  Now he could hear the faint booming of the surf as it broke sullenly against the base of the cliffs.

  The hull creaked and complained softly beneath their feet. Cash turned and squinted upwards, the sunlight warm on his face. Along the yards, sailors were silhouetted against the brilliant blue of the sky as they worked to reduce sail. Clouds of gulls screamed above the wake or rocketed shrieking past as the land approached.

  Bellona slipped through the entrance into the vast harbour that lay within. After the space and movement of the open sea, the sudden hush was like entering a cathedral. The land lay all about them. Cash’s eyes gloated on it. It had a dry, peppery smell, of smoke and soil and drought. He breathed deeply, drawing the smell deep into his lungs.

  ‘There’s nothing here,’ Jack murmured, his voice still uneasy, striving to come to terms with the unfamiliar. ‘Not a house. Not a living soul. Nothing.’

  Cash laughed. ‘That’s why we’ve come, my handsome. To make something of it.’ This strange land – ancient but new. His excitement threatened to boil over. He couldn’t wait to get ashore.

  *

  Moving quietly through the calm waters of the harbour, Bellona finally reached the settlement six miles from the entrance.

  There were rocks along the western shore of the cove. To the east a low headland was crowned with trees. There were two jetties, one on either side. A dense stand of eucalypts grew about the mouth of a stream. Elsewhere, most of the timber had been cleared. The buildings of the settlement spread across the low hills that overlooked the water. To the east, a large house with a flagpole stood amid extensive and well-ordered gardens – the Governor’s residence, most likely. Close by, a line of stone-built cottages skirted the crest of the hill. On the other side of the cove were several brick buildings – store-houses or barracks, by the look of them. A group of red-coated figures was drilling in front of one of them. Perhaps forty or so smaller huts were scattered here and there across the slope of the hill and here, too, Cash could see people moving, some alone, others in small groups – Jack wouldn’t be able to complain there was no one here.

  A three-masted barque lay at anchor just within the mouth of the cove. Rowing boats moved quietly through the water or were drawn up on the patch of beach beside the eastern jetty.

  A small crowd was gathering by the water’s edge, waving and calling as Bellona’s anchor cables rumbled through the hawseholes and the anchors went splashing down. The women’s dresses, blue and red and yellow, provided a touch of gaiety against the olive-green uniformity of the bush. He could hear the excited cries of children as they ran down the hill towards the cove.

  Sydney Cove. Cash’s eyes, as blue as the sea, feasted on the land he had come so far to reach. His future was here. There was nobody back in Cornwall. Smallpox had taken his mother and most of the family when Cash was three. So long as he could remember there had been only his father and Jack. His father had come out as a captain in the New South Wales Corps, back in 1790. Cash was twenty years old and had come to New South Wales to make his fortune.

  TWO

  They were the first ashore.

  Jack at his elbow, Cash stood in the bows of the cutter as it came alongside the jetty. Eagerly, he scanned the faces in the crowd. They had sent a letter aboard Royal Admiral, the last vessel to leave England before Bellona. Their father should be expecting them.

  For a moment Cash could see no one he recognised. Then, from the shadow of a building at the far end of the jetty, a familiar broad-shouldered figure moved into the sunlight. Cash waved both arms frantically in the air.

  ‘Dad! Dad!’

  Before the waiting seaman could throw a line ashore, Cash leapt over the bows, stumbled on a loose plank and raced down the jetty. His eyes were fixed on the tall man in the scarlet and gold uniform of a captain in the New South Wales Corps who stood waiting for him, a lop-sided grin on his swarthy face.

  He flung his arms around his father, then stood back laughing, eyes bright. They were of a height although Gough Tremain was by far the heavier of the two.

  ‘Here at last, Dad! Isn’t it marvellous?’

  They grinned at each other. Gough Tremain was in his middle forties. He had dark eyes and long black hair and looked like a pirate.

  Cash seized his father by the shoulders and tried to swing him exuberantly around. Gough staggered and pushed him off, laughing.

  ‘Easy, boy! By heavens! You’ll have me on my back directly.’ The Cornish accent was as strong as ever. He dusted himself down, straightening his scarlet jacket. ‘Where’s Jack?’

  ‘Here I am.’

  They both turned. Jack had come down the jetty behind Cash, walking almost as quickly but a good deal more sedately. He smiled and held out his hand. ‘Hello, Father.’

  *

  Gough Tremain’s house was at the end of a lane of brick dwellings overlooking the water. It was small and had a tiled roof. At the front, a paling fence surrounded a patch of garden. Behind, another lane led upwards to the crest of the hill. Gough pushed open the front door and went inside, the brothers following him. The walls of the tiny sitting room were whitewashed but otherwise bare, the wooden floor devoid of covering. Polished brass candlesticks stood on a shelf beside a second door leading to the rear of the house. A scuffed wooden table with a couple of chairs stood before the empty fireplace, another table against the wall. Daylight came through glazed sash windows set on either side of the front door. Despite the closeness of the day both windows were closed but the room smelt clean. A handful of flowers stood in a pot on the side table.

  ‘Not much,’ Gough said. ‘But it’ll do until we get something better.’

  Jack studied the windows. ‘You got glass, then?’

  Gough nodded. ‘One of the store’s ships brought some.’

  ‘Smart,’ Cash said.

  Gough grunted. ‘Should be. Cost me a stack, that glass.’ He opened the rear door. ‘Mrs Clark,’ he shouted. ‘You around?’

  Mrs Clark, Jack thought. That explains the flowers.

  The woman who came in was in her thirties with dark hair and eyes and a pert figure nudging the cheap dress.

  Gough said, ‘Mrs Clark gives me a hand around the house. These are my sons,’ he told her. ‘Safe and well from England.’

  She bobbed her head at them. ‘Welcome to New South Wales.’

  Jack looked at her. Gives a hand around the house? he thought. Maybe she does, but it won’t be the only thing, not if I know Father.

  ‘This calls for a drink,’ Gough said. ‘Not every day your boys come all the way round the world to meet you. Get us some rum, Mrs Clark.’ He handed her a bunch of keys.

  She brought a bottle and three glasses and withdrew.

  Jack raised an eyebrow. ‘You keep your liquor locked up?’

  ‘Keep everything locked up. We’re surrounded by convicts, here. Steal anything that’s not nailed down.’

  ‘Does that include Mrs Clark?’

  He shook his head. ‘Knows better. Give her a hiding, she tries that. Still a convict, mind you.’ Gough poured the drinks and handed them each a glass. ‘To safe arrivals and future prosperity,’ he said and drank. ‘I carry a knife all the time. Even in bed. Can’t be too careful, place like this.’<
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  ‘You’re not saying everyone here’s a convict?’ Cash asked.

  ‘Of course not. There’s the Corps, the civil administration and now the first free settlers.’ He grinned. ‘You, among them. The governor’s giving a reception this evening. You’ll have a chance to meet everyone then.’

  Jack raised his eyebrows. ‘A reception?’

  ‘To welcome the new arrivals. He should have one or two announcements to make as well.’

  ‘New arrivals,’ Cash said. ‘That’s us.’

  ‘Plus a hold full of convicts,’ Jack said. ‘I doubt anyone will be welcoming them.’

  ‘Hardly a hold full,’ Gough said. ‘Seventeen, by the manifest. All women.’

  ‘There were three men, too,’ Cash said.

  ‘Must have been added at the last minute then. Not that it matters, seventeen or seven hundred. They certainly won’t be invited.’

  Jack scowled. ‘Half of them wouldn’t be here at all if there was such a thing as justice.’

  Gough’s face darkened. ‘That’s a damn fool thing to say.’

  ‘It’s the truth.’

  ‘Better off not saying it,’ Gough said harshly, ‘truth or no truth.’

  He stared at his older son, measuring him. Nudging six feet, he was the tallest of them. Well-built, too, with the same black hair as himself. It was only when you saw the tentative mouth and uncertain eyes that you noticed the difference: no one would ever mistake him for a pirate.

  Cash looked thoughtfully at his glass as he twisted it to and fro in his fingers. ‘If you were a convict and wanted to escape, how would you go about it?’

  ‘I wouldn’t. Get away into the bush, the blacks will kill you. The authorities get hold of you, you’ll wish the blacks had killed you.’

  ‘But suppose you were determined to try anyway?’

  ‘Reckon I’d smuggle myself on board one of the ships in harbour.’ Gough raised heavy eyebrows at his son. ‘Why?’