me to set up a boarding house once my husband’s ill health made me unable to work for him any longer.”
“Does Mr Belfroy live close by?” Nicola sipped the tea handed to her. It tasted different to that of home, but it was not unpleasant, and like most things she would become used to it.
“Oh no, dear, he’s on yonder side of the harbour.” Mrs Eldersley flicked at a speck of fluff on the bed’s thin blanket. “Poor man is at a loss since his lovely wife died some months back. She went to the grave taking their newborn son with her. Most tragic.” She shook her head in sadness. “I did think Mr Belfroy would lose his head over the whole incident. She was much younger than him and not of his class, not that he cared, even if others did. Now I believe he thinks he’s too old to try again. You see he saved her, his wife, I mean, saved her from a marriage to a brute of a man. Such a kind soul is Mr Belfroy.”
The distant sound of the front door bell tinkling brought Mrs Eldersley’s head up with a snap. “I do hope that’s not more ladies arriving. Three left yesterday and with only you here I was hoping for a bit of quiet. Now drink that tea and eat up that cake. Mr Belfroy said you’re nothing but skin and bones and he won’t have it and neither will I.” With a hasty exit she left Nicola alone to the silence of her room.
After finishing her tea and a piece of cake, Nicola felt better, more able to concentrate. She gazed down at her trunk. Within its age-worn timbers rested her most treasured possessions. The last link she had to her family, her home.
Reverently, she unlocked the weighty lid and carefully pushed it back until it laid bare her life. The musty odour of the ship’s hulk cloaked the contents. Nicola gently lifted out the top layer of clothes and put them on the bed. She ran her fingertips over the leather bound books stacked in the corner before taking them out and placing them on the floor rug she knelt on. Little boxes of personal items joined the books, along with a pair of supper slippers, her jewellery case, and a small hatbox containing her best black felt hat, her paints, an old sketch book and a pouch of charcoal. In another corner, she picked up her mother’s blue woollen shawl and buried her face into it, trying desperately to smell her mother’s faint lavender scent. Wrapped sheltered in the folds of her father’s handkerchief, she took out the miniature portrait of her parents. Nicola smiled at their familiar faces.
“Mother, Father,” she whispered. “Well, I am here, on the other side of the world. Who would have thought?” She ran her fingers tenderly over the frame. “It has been a long journey, but I am safe and well. You would have been most interested in all that I’ve seen, Father.” Her gaze shifted to look out the window at the endless blue sky and she imagined her parents looking down on her with pride.
The clamour of footsteps on the wooden stairs outside her door made Nicola rise from her knees. She began picking up her items when another knock sounded before the door opened again.
“My dear, Miss Douglas,” Mrs Eldersley hustled in, “let me introduce Miss Robinson.” She pushed in front of her a rosy-cheeked, sparkling-eyed, curly black-haired young woman, who was already laughing at Nicola.
“Pleased to meet you, Miss Douglas,” the newcomer boomed loud enough to make Nicola take a step back in surprise.
“Likewise, er…Miss Robinson.” Nicola offered her hand and found it pumped up and down.
“Call me Meg. You just docked have you? Fresh meat and all that, hey?” Meg laughed and picked up Nicola’s sketchbook. “You draw? I just landed in from the bush out west. The countryside here is a God-awful place that is all dust and flies and nothing, miles and miles of nothing. Can you imagine? I couldn’t until I saw it for myself. And then there’s the threat of Bushrangers. A gang of them held up an inn only ten miles from where I was staying. Imagine that.” She put down the sketchbook and picked up a book. “How did you like the voyage? I’ve heard it’s a bothersome bore. I was born here, see, never been to good ole England.”