The Makings of Evil
Part Eight
Liverpool ~ February 1760
It had taken many many months, but finally everything had been packed up. The furniture had already been sent on ahead of us so the new house would be ready. All that remained were the inhabitants of the household and many trunks with all their belongings. I had packed my things in a case with my parents. My few clothes and books and my two bears. I had turned seven only a week before and Mrs Allard had baked me a cake. It was the first one that anyone had ever made just for me and I shared it with my parents in my bedroom with some milk. My parents were always kept so busy now that I treasured every single second I had with them. One the morning we were to leave, I stood in my bedroom in the turret of the house and looked around it one final time. It had been a year, almost to the day, that we had arrived here. I felt my fathers hand on my shoulder and I turned round and looked up at him.
"Time to go, darling, to the new world." He smiled and picked me up and I snuggled against him. "Getting big now, won't be long before I can't carry you at all." He carried me downstairs to my mother and the other servants and placed me on the floor. We were to travel by carriage to the dock. The Collins family travelled in the front carriage and then their cases and trunks followed then by several more carriages with the servants. I was in one with my parents, Mrs Allard and Mary, who had not only a black eye this time but also a bruise on her jaw and round her neck. She did her best to hide them when she saw me stare.
It was a very cold morning and the sun still had not risen. There was fog all round and the stench of rotten fish and sewage hit me before I had even got out the carriage. All around, fishing boats were bringing in their catch from that morning and getting ready to start selling them. Up ahead was the large ship that was there to take us to our new lives in Maine. I sighed at the thought of the thirty day journey on board. It reminded me of the journey over from Martinique. It had not been as long as thirty days but it was not very pleasant. We had shared a ship with all sorts of people wanting to start new lives in England which at the time my parents had thought very strange since most people were immigrating to America and Canada at the time, trying to leave Britain. I had just guessed they were running away too. Those people had been filthy and most of them were ill. This time, no other travellers were coming on the ship. I looked out to sea and frowned. I was sick of moving around. I truly hoped this would be the last time we moved country. I stood by my mother as she checked a few things in our bag. Just as I was waiting for her, Barnabas walked past with his mother and father, walking onto the ship. We looked at each other and our eyes met, giving each other a small secret smile and not showing anyone we were friends like we had talked about six months before. My mother noticed and gave me a nudge.
"Angelique, don't stare at him, learn your place." I ignored her and continued to watch him until he was out of sight on the deck. My father came and stood by my side.
"You look pale, are you alright?" I looked up at him and shook my head.
"I am scared, Papa. I do not like being on the sea and I do not like how we must keep moving around."
"This will be the last move, I know it will be. The family are making permanent roots there and I can see us being with them for a very long time." I nodded and followed my parents onto the ship and looked around. I smiled slightly when I saw Barnabas, his mother was fixing his coat and he was trying to get away. His mother, Naomi Collins, was instructing one of the servants to keep a close eye on him, terrified he will fall overboard. He looked over at me and smiled before my mother took my hand and led me down to where the servants would be staying for the next month. It was not bad. It was better than the ship we had got from Martinique, fewer rats on here even though there were still s few scuttling around. The woodwork was slightly damp and the salt sea smell drifted off it filling the whole galley. My mother took me to where I would be sleeping for the duration of the long journey. I sighed as I looked at it, a sack on the floor that had been half packed with straw but it was spilling out the sides, and an old grey blanket the rats had been nibbling. I wondered how much better the cabin the Collins family would be sleeping in was. I knew it wasn't going to be much better than what we had but they might get beds and have proper covers and not ones that had been chewed on by rats.
It took a few hours for things to be ready before we set off on the long journey. There were people running all over the deck and as I expected, Naomi was desperately trying to keep Barnabas away from the edge of the ship as she was still scared of losing him by drowning. I still thought he should learn to swim. I sat on a pile of rope and smiled to myself as I watched him struggle in his mother's arms. He was a young gentleman but still had moments like this like the young boy he was. Eventually she convinced him to go below the deck. A tutor had been brought on board so he would not miss a moment of learning. As he walked past he gave me a flash of his cheeky boyish grin and as usual I couldn't help but smile back. A few moment later my mother called me to help prepare food and while we were doing that we were given our duties. My job was to wash bed sheets and scrubbing the deck. Whether on land or on sea I could never get away from the scrubbing. I sighed and helped with the meal and went to scrub the deck as I had been told. It would seem that sailors were considerably more dirty than upper class families and the mess they had already turned the deck into made me ruffle my nose in disgust but I went on and did it anyway. I was wondering how many times a day this would need to be done. I could feel Joshua's eyes burn into as usual as I worked and as usual I tried to ignore it. I still didn't understand why he looked at me in that way.
The journey to Maine was more difficult than I thought. As it happened, I had to clean the deck between three and five times a day. A lot more rats had managed to come aboard than I thought but I was used to rats. Mrs Allard was not, and it was amusing to watch her scream and run from them. I was sad that I never saw much of Barnabas. His mother had him in the cabin all the time. I suppose she didn't want to mix too much with the sailors as well as her fear of him drowning. we still had another ten days on board the ship so had been on for twenty. Not enough provisions had been packed and the rats had got into some food which then was thrown overboard. I had also seen a man get thrown off too. He had died after eating food the rats had gotten into. What food that was left was given to the Collins family, but like the rats I was used to the hunger. On the rare occasion I saw Barnabas, he would always have something for me to eat and I would share it with my parents.
Over the next few days things got worse. More men got sick and a few more died. My mother and father had a special herb they made me take to stop me from getting sick too and it worked. When land finally came into sight, an almighty cheer went up from all people on board the ship. I remember my father picking me up and sitting me on the railing so I could get a better look. A smiles spread over my face as we got closer. It was our new home ahead. From what I could see there wasn't much there but a few houses and a small street. I could see the large mansion we would live in until Collinwood was built and I knew the Collins family intended to build a settlement. They were going to name it Collinsport. I was determined to never have to leave again. I was tired of moving around and I never wanted to lose Barnabas. I could hardly begin to imagine what Collinsport held for my parents and I or how things that happened here would change the way I was forever.