Chapter XXII: Gathering in the Threads
Maurice found his favourable expectations of Sydney fully realized. His notable escape from death at Macquarie Harbour, his alliance with the daughter of so respected a colonist as Major Vickers, and his reputation as a convict disciplinarian rendered him a man of note. He received a vacant magistracy, and became even more noted for hardness of heart and artfulness of prison knowledge than before. The convict population spoke of him as "that —— Frere," and registered vows of vengeance against him, which he laughed—in his bluffness—to scorn.
One anecdote concerning the method by which he shepherded his flock
will suffice to show his character and his value. It was his custom
to visit the prison-yard at Hyde Park Barracks twice a week. Visitors to convicts were, of course, armed, and the two pistol-butts that peeped from Frere's waistcoat attracted many a longing eye. How easy would it be for some fellow to pluck one forth and shatter the smiling, hateful face of the noted disciplinarian! Frere, however, brave to rashness, never would bestow his weapons more safely, but lounged through the yard with his hands in the pockets of his shooting-coat, and the deadly butts ready to the hand of anyone bold enough to take them.
One day a man named Kavanagh, a captured absconder, who had openly sworn
in the dock the death of the magistrate, walked quickly up to him
as he was passing through the yard, and snatched a pistol from his belt. The yard caught its breath, and the attendant warder, hearing the click of the lock, instinctively turned his head away, so that he might not be blinded by the flash. But Kavanagh did not fire. At the instant when his hand was on the pistol, he looked up and met the magnetic glance of Frere's imperious eyes. An effort, and the spell would have been broken. A twitch of the finger, and his enemy would have fallen dead. There was an instant when that twitch of the finger could have been given, but Kavanagh let that instant pass. The dauntless eye fascinated him. He played with the pistol nervously, while all remained stupefied. Frere stood, without withdrawing his hands from the pockets into which they were plunged.
"That's a fine pistol, Jack," he said at last.
Kavanagh, down whose white face the sweat was pouring, burst into
a hideous laugh of relieved terror, and thrust the weapon, cocked as it was, back again into the magistrate's belt.
Frere slowly drew one hand from his pocket, took the cocked pistol
and levelled it at his recent assailant. "That's the best chance
you'll ever get, Jack," said he.
Kavanagh fell on his knees. "For God's sake, Captain Frere!"
Frere looked down on the trembling wretch, and then uncocked the pistol, with a laugh of ferocious contempt. "Get up, you dog," he said. "It takes a better man than you to best me. Bring him up in the morning, Hawkins, and we'll give him five-and-twenty."
As he went out—so great is the admiration for Power—the poor devils
in the yard cheered him.
One of the first things that this useful officer did upon his arrival in Sydney
was to inquire for Sarah Purfoy. To his astonishment, he discovered
that she was the proprietor of large export warehouses in Pitt-street, owned a neat cottage on one of the points of land which jutted into the bay, and was reputed to possess a banking account of no inconsiderable magnitude. He in vain applied his brains to solve this mystery. His cast-off mistress had not been rich when she left Van Diemen's Land—at least, so she had assured him, and appearances bore out her assurance. How had she accumulated this sudden wealth? Above all, why had she thus invested it? He made inquiries at the banks, but was snubbed for his pains. Sydney banks in those days did some queer business.
Mrs. Purfoy had come to them "fully accredited," said the manager with a smile.
"But where did she get the money?" asked the magistrate. "I am suspicious
of these sudden fortunes. The woman was a notorious character in Hobart Town, and when she left hadn't a penny."
"My dear Captain Frere," said the acute banker—his father had been one
of the builders of the "Rum Hospital"—"it is not the custom of our bank
to make inquiries into the previous history of its customers. The bills were good, you may depend, or we should not have honoured them. Good morning!"