Kitty Page 27

Sergeant Royce nodded.

  ‘That’s a lot of beds!’ Kitty said.

  ‘No, they don’t have beds, they sleep in hammocks,’ the sergeant said. ‘You know, like sailors’ quarters on board a big ship.’ He blushed, realising that he had just implied that Kitty would be familiar with the sleeping arrangements of seamen.

  Kitty averted her eyes from his obvious discomfort, but the embarrassing moment was deflected by the sound of footsteps approaching along the corridor.

  A man in convict garb entered the room, and she prayed that he was in fact Avery Bannerman.

  ‘Uncle! It’s so lovely to see you at last!’ she cried, and rushed to him with her arms open.

  ‘As it is you, niece,’ ‘Uncle’ Avery said without batting an eyelid.

  Kitty pecked him on the cheek and stepped back as though to get a better look at him, then stumbled slightly and leant heavily on the table.

  ‘Oh dear,’ she said to Sergeant Royce, who had moved forwards in consternation. ‘I feel quite faint. It’s the excitement. I couldn’t have a drink of water, could I?’

  Avery Bannerman sat down at the table.

  The sergeant hesitated, then nodded.

  ‘Oh, thank you so much, Sergeant,’ Kitty said, knowing that he would have to go all the way downstairs, probably over to the mess-hall to find a cup, then to the standpipe, wherever that was, for the water, and then back upstairs again.

  They waited until he had gone, then Bannerman said calmly, ‘And who might you be?’

  Kitty looked at him and felt her nervousness come galloping back. Sergeant Royce had been surprisingly easy: this bit would be a lot harder.

  Avery Bannerman was probably in his forties. His brown hair was streaked with grey and pulled back in a short queue, and he was clean-shaven. He had a long face, with hooded eyes, full lips and deep grooves that ran from the sides of his nose to the corners of his mouth. The overall effect gave him the appearance of a bloodhound, but the intelligence in his startlingly pale blue eyes was unnerving. Kitty felt as though he had seen straight through her already, and was merely waiting for her to present whatever request she had come with.

  She cleared her throat.

  ‘Come on, girl, out with it,’ he said, withdrawing a clay pipe from the pocket of his shirt and tamping tobacco into it.

  Kitty stared at the pipe, fascinated and more than a little shocked. It was in the shape of a woman’s bottom: the bowl was her naked buttocks and her legs narrowed to form the stem. The mouthpiece was a tiny pair of high-heeled shoes. It reminded her of Mr Bannerman’s enthusiasm for women and she self-consciously loosened her shawl and allowed a hint of her cleavage to be revealed. Mr Bannerman looked, not even trying to conceal the fact. Gritting her teeth with embarrassment and discomfort, Kitty let the shawl slip a little further.

  When his pipe was packed to his satisfaction, Bannerman took out a box of matches and lit it, the noxious stink of the white phosphorus filling the room. Kitty wondered how he’d managed to secure such a precious and costly thing as matches in here. But, observing the superior cut and stitching of his convict shirt, the gold ring he wore on the little finger of his left hand and the velvet ribbon tying his hair back, she realised that he was the sort of man who could probably secure just about anything he liked. Except, obviously, his freedom. His accent was a lot more refined than she had expected, too. Not upper-class, but certainly not cockney costermonger either. He must have been considered spectacularly vexatious by someone in the courts at home to get himself transported; the middle class mostly served their sentences in England.

  ‘Somebody has sent you, am I right?’ he said, drawing deeply on his pipe and letting the smoke curl out between his lips.

  She sat like a stunned rabbit, not knowing what to say.

  He inclined his head towards her breasts and smiled, revealing big yellow teeth. ‘Someone who knows me, knows what I like.’

  Kitty resisted the urge to yank her shawl back across her chest. ‘I need some papers,’ she said, hoping her voice wouldn’t betray her nervousness. ‘I’m told you’re the best forger in the business.’

  ‘I am that,’ Bannerman said. ‘Who sent you?’

  ‘Rian Farrell.’

  Bannerman’s eyebrows went up interestedly.

  ‘Well, not Captain Farrell himself,’ Kitty said. ‘He’s in gaol at the moment.’

  ‘Yes, I had heard that. That was very careless of him, wasn’t it?’

  Kitty frowned. ‘Do you know Rian Farrell?’

  Bannerman shook his head. ‘Not very well, although our paths do cross from time to time.’

  How could that be, when Mr Bannerman was stuck in Hyde Park Barracks and Rian was more often than not off sailing the high seas? Kitty wondered.

  ‘I’m here on Rian’s behalf,’ she said. ‘His crew sent me. Walter Kinghazel, the customs and excise man—’

  ‘Yes, I know who he is,’ Bannerman said, waving his pipe dismissively.

  ‘Mr Kinghazel arrested Rian on trumped-up charges of failing to pay customs duties on goods he unloaded here last year.’

  ‘Really. And how do you know the charges are trumped up?’

  ‘Because he paid the duty but the receipts have been lost,’ Kitty said. ‘We’ve looked everywhere for them but they’ve vanished.’

  Bannerman’s long face remained impassive.

  ‘And we need the receipts to get Rian out of gaol. It’s very important, Mr Bannerman. He could lose the Katipo, or be gaoled, or even executed.’

  ‘Yes, I’m more than aware of the punishments meted out by the current judicial system, thank you.’ Bannerman put an elbow on the table. ‘Are you Captain Farrell’s paramour?’

  Kitty flushed. ‘No!’

  Bannerman laughed. ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Kitty Carlisle.’

  ‘So what would be in it for me, Kitty Carlisle?’

  ‘Money? We can give you—’

  ‘What would I do with money in here? As you’ve possibly noticed there isn’t a lot to spend it on.’

  He was right, and Kitty knew it. She tried the next items on the list Hawk had suggested. ‘Tobacco? Spirits? Firearms?’

  ‘I have all I need of those for now, including a very fine pearl-handled pistol,’ Bannerman said. ‘No, you have nothing I might want.’ He let his eyes wander across her face and down again to her bosom. ‘Unless…’

  He let the word hang. The silence between them expanded to fill the small room, and Kitty felt her heart begin to thud as she realised that the possibility she hadn’t allowed herself to seriously consider might actually be about to happen.

  Bannerman sat back. ‘Put those away, girl,’ he said, nodding at her chest. ‘I can’t do much with you in here, tempting though you most certainly are. Go on, cover them up before I change my mind.’ His pipe had gone out; he up-ended it and tapped the ash out onto the floor. ‘I’ll give you what you want.’

  Faint with relief, Kitty closed her shawl. ‘But what about payment?’

  ‘Tell Farrell he owes me. Don’t worry, he knows I’ll collect. One day.’

  ‘Will you need anything to do the…job?’ Kitty asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Bannerman said. ‘You can’t pluck the tools you need for a high-quality forgery out of thin air, you know. Not even I can do that.’

  Kitty nodded. ‘What is it you want?’

  ‘A genuine customs receipt, a recent one with Kinghazel’s signature on it. Five sheets of the official watermarked paper he uses and a government customs and excise stamp. I’m sure there’s someone you can bribe for those. A range of pens—steel nibs, not those bloody awful quills—fine and thick, black ink and some blue as well, just in case, and blotting paper. That should just about do it.’ Bannerman rubbed his hands together enthusiastically. ‘I haven’t done a decent forgery since…well, for a good few months now.’ He looked at Kitty dolefully. ‘It can get very boring in here, you know.’

  She nearly laughed. ‘I’ll get everything to you
as soon as—’

  ‘And how is your father?’ Bannerman interrupted.

  Her father? She opened her mouth to say that her father was dead but shut it again quickly as Sergeant Royce appeared in the doorway carrying a glass of water.

  ‘I’m sorry it took so long,’ he said breathlessly, ‘but I couldn’t find any lemons. I thought you might like a slice of lemon in it. I had to go outside the barracks to get one.’ He handed her the glass and bowed slightly.

  Kitty had forgotten all about her drink of water. She drank the lot off in one go, stifling a burp as she handed the glass back. ‘Lovely, thank you, just what I needed.’

  ‘Feeling all right now?’ the sergeant asked.

  ‘Yes, thank you, although I must be going. I believe our ten minutes is well up, don’t you, Uncle?’

  ‘I would say so,’ Bannerman said.

  ‘I’ll show you out then, shall I?’ the sergeant suggested.

  Kitty stood. ‘Well, it was lovely to see you again, Uncle Avery, and I’ll be back to visit you again as soon as I can.’

  ‘Very nice,’ Bannerman said, also getting to his feet.

  Kitty followed the sergeant out into the corridor. He took her elbow again going down the stairs and kept his hand there as he escorted her outside, grinning widely at two guards standing near the door as they went past.

  At the gates he stopped. ‘When do you think you might be visiting your uncle again, Miss Carlisle?’

  Kitty swept a strand of loose hair off her face. ‘I’m not sure, Sergeant. It depends.’

  ‘Well, I hope I’m on duty when you do. Perhaps you would allow me to take you on a tour of…something?’ he finished lamely.

  ‘Perhaps,’ Kitty said, trying not to smile. A tour of the barracks wouldn’t be at all appropriate for a lady, and he’d realised it. His open face and bright eyes really were rather appealing, and her heart softened. ‘Yes, perhaps we could do that,’ she said, knowing that they never would. ‘Thank you so much for your help today. I’m not sure what I would have done without you.’

  Sergeant Royce beamed and touched his fingers to the peak of his cap. ‘My pleasure entirely.’

  She was in such a hurry to get to the Bird-in-Hand where the others were waiting that she spent some of her precious money on a cab back to The Rocks. But the driver said he wouldn’t even think of taking his horse up the steep little lanes that led to Gloucester Street, and made her get out on George Street. So she ran the rest of the way, arriving flushed with both victory and exertion. Everyone looked up expectantly as she burst into the pub, and cheered as they saw the jubilant expression on her face. She sat down, her hand up against the barrage of questions, waiting until she’d regained her breath.

  ‘Yes, he said he’d do it,’ she said when she finally could. ‘But we have to get him a few things first.’

  ‘What does he want,’ Sharkey said eagerly.

  Kitty reeled off Bannerman’s list.

  ‘We should be able to get all that,’ Mick said. He turned to Pierre. ‘What about that mate of yours, the “handy” one?’

  ‘Oui, he can do that for sure,’ Pierre said. He rubbed his thumb and index finger together. ‘With a little inducement he will get anything.’

  ‘And what about payment?’ Hawk asked Kitty. ‘What did he accept?’

  ‘Well,’ she said, ‘he didn’t want money. Or whiskey or tobacco.’

  Wai gasped. ‘Oooh, Kitty!’

  Kitty looked around the table at faces that now wore comically shocked expressions, even Sharkey’s, and wanted to laugh.

  ‘Don’t worry, he said Rian could owe him.’

  Hawk and Sharkey exchanged worried glances.

  ‘What?’ Kitty said. ‘Have I done something wrong?’

  ‘No,’ Hawk assured her. ‘It is just that when a man owes a debt to Avery Bannerman, it is not always a good thing. He is a very powerful man.’

  ‘Well, it’s not a good thing to be facing the gallows, either,’ Kitty retorted. ‘Surely we can worry about that later?’

  ‘Rian probably will,’ Mick said.

  ‘No,’ Gideon disagreed. ‘There will be a way around it.’

  ‘I hope so,’ Sharkey muttered. ‘That sort of thing can come back and bite a man in the arse.’

  Suddenly Kitty didn’t feel quite so pleased with herself. ‘I’m sorry, but he wouldn’t accept anything else.’

  ‘Nothing else?’ Sharkey said sceptically.

  ‘No, not even that,’ Kitty snapped. ‘He said…oh, never mind.’

  Hawk reached across the table and touched the back of her hand, the first physical gesture he’d made towards her since he’d had to cut off her hair. ‘You did what you were asked to do, and you did it very well. We are all very grateful. Rian will be, too. Thank you, Kitty.’

  Mollified, Kitty nodded. She caught Haunui’s eye and he winked. She was pleased; if he thought she’d done well, she must have.

  She asked, ‘When will I have to go back to the Barracks?’

  ‘As soon as we can get Bannerman what he wants,’ Mick said. ‘Why, was there some sort of problem?’

  ‘No, actually, not at all,’ Kitty said. ‘It was surprisingly easy. There was a young man there, a Sergeant Royce, who was very helpful. I think, well, I think he’d go out of his way to help me,’ she finished,

  embarrassed.

  ‘Is that right?’ Mick said, ‘That’s good to know then, isn’t it?’ Hawk glanced at Sharkey again, then leant over and whispered in his

  ear, ‘Rian will not think so.’

  Sharkey whispered back, ‘Too bad, if it comes to a choice between

  that or the rope.’

  Chapter Seventeen

  Getting hold of what Avery Bannerman wanted was easier than anyone expected, but took longer than anyone had accounted for. Rian was due to go before the magistrate in a week’s time, and they had to have the documents ready by the day before at the latest. They already had a genuine, earlier, customs receipt signed by Walter Kinghazel among the Katipo’s papers, and Kitty and Wai went out and bought the pens, ink and blotting paper, but they had to wait several days for Pierre’s friend to deliver the special paper and the official stamp.

  In the interim, Bodie’s kittens arrived. She had them messily on Haunui’s bed, after turning around and around on it for nearly twenty minutes and scratching at her belly with a very cross look on her face. There were five of them: two tiny black versions of Bodie and three grey tabbies. They were entrancing with their little screwed-up faces, pink tongues and miniature toes that opened and shut when they were feeding. Bodie, however, didn’t appear to have grasped the concept of motherhood particularly firmly, and would get up and wander off when they were suckling, leaving them squeaking and searching blindly for her teats. Wai was delighted with them and so was Kitty, because it gave Wai something to take her mind off her own impending motherhood. Haunui was less enamoured, as Bodie seemed to have formed the impression that his bed was now her nest. Consequently, he spent his nights sleeping in the shape of a tortured ‘S’ to accommodate them all, too frightened to roll over in case he squashed them, and too soft-hearted to kick them out.

  The kittens were a welcome diversion, but Avery Bannerman’s special paper and stamp finally arrived and Kitty prepared herself for another visit to Hyde Park Barracks, guiltily asking Mrs Maguire for the evening off on the pretext of wanting to be with Wai during the midwife’s visit. She didn’t bother with the low-cut, rose-coloured dress this time, realising that she could conceal more if her neckline was more modest, which was the case with her cream and red-sprigged dress.

  The pens were easy—she slid those between her breasts, telling herself she must remember not to bend over too energetically for fear of stabbing herself with the sharp nibs. The ink bottles and the stamp fitted into her reticule, just, and the blotting paper and the customs receipt were tucked into her bodice, but the special watermarked paper posed a problem because it could not be folded before Bannerm
an had performed his magic. Mick said why not just shove the lot in a bigger bag, but Hawk said no, anything larger than what Kitty had carried last time might arouse suspicion and be searched. Finally, Enya came up with a solution. She took a piece of fine muslin about two feet square, folded and hemmed it to make a sort of envelope, and stitched it inside the front panel of Kitty’s dress, just below the waistline. Kitty would just have to be careful, whenever she bent over or sat down, not to crease the sheets of paper inside it.

  Then, almost before she knew it, Kitty was walking through the barracks gates again, more confident this time but still more than a little nervous because of the contraband she was carrying. If she were to be caught, she could well end up behind bars herself.

  There was no one in the small waiting room when she entered the building, but one of the guards she’d seen last time had tipped his cap at her when she’d come through the gates. Sergeant Royce, however, was nowhere to be seen. She stood for several minutes, wondering what to do, then decided to go upstairs by herself in the hope of finding someone else to fetch Avery Bannerman for her; time was running out. He was possibly still having his supper, but if she could find one of the guards he could surely tell her that.

  She had barely set a foot on the bottom step when a voice barked, ‘Stop!’

  She froze, feeling the blood in her veins turn to ice, suddenly too frightened to turn around.

  ‘Wait,’ came the voice again. ‘Miss Carlisle, wait!’

  She did turn then, and felt her legs go weak with relief when she saw that it was Sergeant Royce.

  ‘My friend out at the gate said it was you,’ he said, hurrying towards her looking both delighted and alarmed. ‘You can’t go upstairs by yourself, it isn’t safe.’

  ‘Oh dear,’ Kitty said. ‘I’m afraid I wasn’t thinking.’

  And she wasn’t either—the sergeant’s shout had very nearly scared the wits out of her.

  ‘How are you?’ he asked shyly.

  ‘Very well, thank you, Sergeant.’

  ‘Have you come to visit your uncle again?’

  Kitty nodded, hoping he couldn’t hear her pounding heart.