Caroline takes Quill and the Swanston boys along mountain trails to find mosses glowing bright green, light green, soft and spongy like large cushions. They find tender green carpets on the underside of logs. Orange- frilled fungi are growing on the remnants of trees long fallen. There are red- and-white-spotted toadstools, purple toadstools, curling golden fungi and white discs dotted with chocolate, small yellow fungi, soft brown fungi sprinkled with pink tendrils that quiver on embankments and dark st eppes of fungi hard to the touch that grow layered upon limbs and trunks. Back at their desks, the boys learn of battles and discoveries, heroes and villains, kings and queens, gods and empires. Much is discussed and recorded in their workbooks. Mathematics, Astronomy and Geography are slowly absorbed. Caroline has them memorise a poem each week, and for each boy she makes a list of spelling words to affix by their beds. She makes new lists as they go on, until the boys have mastered many peculiarities of English, Latin and French—exc ept Robert, who cannot get his words organised no matter how hard he tries. His sketches reveal his astute observation of the plants on the farm, and daily life. She has several of his works in pencil pinned up in the hallway of the cottage. There is one of the tall wrought- iron gate at the entrance to the kitchen garden and another of the chickens. Bessie having received at last a ticket of leave and being free now to live with Caroline and Quill, has moved into one of the attic rooms. The house is newly settled with her there. Beside Quill’s bed is one of Robert’ s illustrations of Malachy , the little black cat who has stolen their hearts and has never caught a mouse. It is hard for Caroline to believe it will soon be a year since they arrived in Van Diemen’s Land. It feels much longer, almost as if she has always been here, and yet still it is new and surprising, too. The garden has flourished and there are gooseberries ready to be picked. She is filling a bowl with fruit when Cornelius arrives.
‘You must join us to eat the pie these are to become, Cornelius,’ she says. ‘Thank you, Mrs Douglas,’ he r eplies. ‘Did something happen?’ she asks, noting his expression. ‘In a way ,’ he r eplies. ‘But I believe it wouldn’ t be right to hold it back.’ ‘Am I to be worried, Cornelius ?’ she asks, setting down the bowl and wiping her hands on her apron. ‘I do not believe so,’ he says. ‘And it may sound peculiar , but Mr Broughton came to me in a dream and insisted I tell you something of importance.’ ‘Well,’ says Caroline, ‘you have me intrigued.’ ‘There is a cellar , Mrs Douglas,’ Cornelius says. ‘Under this cottage.’ ‘A cellar? Here?’ He nods. ‘It’s been closed up all these years. It was his place of work, but anything might have happened down there since. Rats and such.’ ‘Should we take sticks?’ she asks. He smiles at that. Inside the cottage, Cornelius stoops under the beam that divides the front rooms from the kitchen and the storeroom. He indicates a section of timber in the wainscot. Bending, he slides the timber up to reveal a gap. She hears a bolt slide. A trapdoor drops open in the floorboards, neatly disguised. There is a ladder. Is she really going to descend into that darkness? ‘As I recall ... ah, yes.’ He has reached in and brought up a lantern coated in dust. He shakes it. There is still oil. He brushes the glass clean with a cloth from his pocket, then he produces a flint and lights the wick. ‘There is a chance the air is poisoned,’ Cornelius says, watching the flame lengthen. ‘That’s why we light the lantern. If it goes out, we leave. Mr Broughton was very careful about that. People die from wine gas.’ He begins the descent down the ladder, then calls up to assure Caroline that the air in the cellar is safe. At the bottom of the ladder, Caroline finds an earthen floor and long low beams leading away into rows of wooden barrels and racks of bottles. The air is cool, any noise of the world above quite diminished. There is no smell of vermin, only the smell of oak and wine. ‘Can any of it be good still?’ she asks. ‘After all this time?’
‘The barrels will almost certainly have soured,’ Cornelius says. ‘As for the bottles, we won’t know unless they are tasted.’ He indicates chalk marks on the barrels as they walk the rows. ‘One number is the year, and the other is the grape. The bottles beyond are all marked the same. These were the ones Mr Broughton put aside, to see what time did to the flavour .’ Caroline retrieves two glasses from the kitchen. When she returns, Cornelius is holding a bottle. He unwinds the string and nudges out the cork, filling one glass with a measure of honey-coloured wine. There are no bubbles, but the colour and clarity are good. ‘You will not try it?’ she asks. He shrugs. ‘It’ s what you think that matters, Mrs Douglas.’ ‘Caroline,’ she says. ‘My name is Caroline, Cornelius, if you could become comfortable with that.’ ‘Mrs Caroline,’ he says, and his smile illuminates his eyes. She lets the flavours settle on her tongue, and senses within the texture of the wine some memory of the bubbles from its earlier life softened to vanilla, moonlight and a memory of raspberries. ‘It is a mixture of varieties,’ says Cornelius. ‘Chardonnay , meunier and a grape called black cluster which Mr Broughton brought in from a Mr Gunning, who had a vineyard over the hills in Richmond. It was a sad story, that, but the grapes, he said, were very good.’ ‘How did he manage access? Those barrels did not come up and down the ladder .’ ‘There’ s a passage back there, and a trapdoor at the far end that opens into the barn, with a slope for rolling the barrels down. You’ll also find two presses.’ ‘Mr Broughton dug all this out?’ Caroline asks. ‘Convicts. That was in the years of assignment. Mr Broughton knew how to secure good labour as soon as it arrived on the wharf. A lot of men worked here.’ Caroline takes another sip. Already the flavour of the wine is changing as it meets the air . Becoming softer with a hint of raisins. ‘Has Captain Swanston seen all this?’ ‘He had no interest in the vineyard,’ says Cornelius. ‘He does not know it is here at all?’ ‘I do not believe so, Mrs Caroline.’ ‘Did he not inspect the house?’
‘He did,’ says Cornelius. ‘It was filled with hay back then.’ ‘And you did not mention it ...’ ‘Captain Swanston had made his disregard for the vineyard very clear to me. But I have seen a lot of people come and go over the years. I thought there might yet be someone ...’ ‘Will you tell me about your dream last night, Cornelius?’ ‘Well, Mrs Caroline, I saw Mr Broughton there in the vineyard. He walked towards me, full of life in the way he always was, and he said, “You will have to show her , Cornelius. You will have to show her .”’
‘The scale of the endeavour overwhelms me,’ she says to Georgiana Swanston. ‘Though the cake and biscuits always meet with the boys’ approval.’ ‘If only all workers could be inspired so easily .’ The two women survey the vineyard from beneath the large gum tree where they have spread a blanket and cushions. The boys are at school and Bessie has delivered a tray bearing a pot of mint tea, two glasses and a plate of shortbread, which Caroline has taught her to make. ‘Will you continue with it?’ asks Geor giana. ‘Quill and Robert remain enthusiastic, but there is no hurry. Without a person experienced in winemaking, the Walkers tell me that medicinal wine and vinegar is all that can be anticipated. They are willing to assist in that.’ ‘Can you not advertise for workers?’ ‘I am reluctant to make my interest in the vineyard a matter of public notice. I know my reclusive ways have already caused consternation. The business of calling on one another and being expected to return such visits, it does irk me. The time that is required for such distractions!’ Georgiana laughs and nods. ‘Am I strange to be so uninterested in the habits of our society?’ Caroline asks. ‘Last week I was in the vineyard—weeds are growing at an astonishing rate after all the rain—when the Sweet sisters, who are anything but, came by. In order to greet them I was forced to scrub my face, tidy my hair and don a suitable gown. Then I had to endure an hour and a half of mindless and often offensive observations on this person or that. It was exhausting.’ ‘Dear Caroline, I have known few women with your industriousness of spirit. Most consider it highly improper to place their hands in the earth. But here we are, a long way from the strictures imposed on us by our mothers. At least, I like to think so.’ ‘It eases my heart to be outside.’
‘And mine,’ says Georgiana. ‘It’s a sweet relief, unlike the Sweet sisters. I will do my best to set those wagging tongues at ease by telling all I meet that you are k ept very busy with our boys. I shall say you are a person of retiring disposition bruised by your widowhood. Any attempts to hurry you from your time of healing are r epugnant and unchristian.’ Their eyes meet and Caroline feels that they understand one another perfectly . ‘You do realise that the women visit to assess you for their sons, grandsons and n ephews?’ says Geor giana. ‘Because the only possible fulfilment is as a wife?’ Caroline asks. Georgiana laughs. ‘My dear, do not judge all by your early experience. I have found great contentment in matrimony . But here you are an object of curiosity and no small amount of envy, I expect. This colony defines women by only two standards: married or concubine. It is shocking, I know, but widowhood is not sufficient to curtail the suspicions of those men who believe a modest woman is one who is either chaperoned by a parent or constrained by domestic life. It seems you are not to be left alone, dear Caroline. As soon as you lay aside your black frocks, I fear a scene about your home as if you were a Penelope. Every invitation will be forthcoming. Every eligible man—those barely with whiskers and those with whiskers that have long been grey—will be gathering in your courtyard.’ ‘Alas, there is no Odysseus to return to me,’ Caroline says, ‘and make short work of them all.’ ‘Still, I am sure it cannot be easy to be here alone,’ Georgiana says. ‘You had not planned to be so, and you ke ep your husband’ s absence locked within yourself. Will you tell me something of him?’ Caroline understands that her employer and friend has been patient in resisting this conversation. She folds her napkin, pauses and sighs. ‘We were married in New York and took our honeymoon at Niagara Falls. An expedition more than a romantic es cape, to be truthful, but he was much taken with the idea of adventure and I was eager to see the famed waterfall. It is the most extraordinary expanse of water in all the world, I think. The sound is deafening. My husband took an early morning walk along one of the rivers that flows into the falls while I was still asle ep. Another walker saw him out on a rocky promontory . Apparentl y he slipped from a rock and was carried over. His body was found floating near the shore three days later .’
‘Oh, my poor darling friend, I am so sorry,’ says Georgiana, taking Caroline’ s hand. ‘What a shocking thing.’ ‘It is a hard thing to confess, and I have never said this before’— Caroline hesitates before proceeding—‘but I say it to you by way of relieving myself of a burden I have carried since it happened ... I knew by then, and perhaps he knew it, too, that we had made an unwise choice. It is this that has perhaps unsettled me more than anything. That he might have chosen ...’ There is an extended version of this story. Names and occupations. A family history. It is a story that could expand should more ever be required, but Caroline knows that brevity assists deceit. In years to come, she will tell versions of this story to her children and they will pass it on to their children, and so it will be woven into myth, generation after generation. Her first husband died falling into Niagara Falls while they were on their honeymoon. She arrived here as a young widow. They had planned to come together . Caroline never mentioned her aunt Henriette, nor that she had been both her apprentice and accomplice. That story was never revealed in all her long life.