Bryce Courtenay - The Potato Factory

'Ya bloody bastard!' a voice shouted from the centre of the crowd.

'Who said that?' Tiberias Potbottom called out, jumping up and down to try to see into the lines of assembled women.

'I did, ya fuckin' ape!' Ann Gower called as two guards moved into the crowd of suddenly thronging and excited women and grabbed her. 'You murderers!' she shouted again as she was pulled away and led from the deck. 'May ya rot in 'ell!' A guard struck her on the side of the head with his truncheon, so that she fell to her knees and was dragged down the hatchway.

Mary was placed over an empty barrel, her arms and legs held by the wrists and ankles, each limb by a separate male prison guard. The matron of the hospital, who had so recently nursed her back to health, was then required to fully expose her back. Mary was given a small square of folded cloth to place between her teeth.

The sky above was brilliant blue with no cloud to interrupt its surface, a storm having come up during the night so that the ocean and the sky seemed to shine in a world washed clean. The ship sailed steadily at eight knots to a breeze from the south-west, its prow cutting majestically through the waves. Even the sun, though warm, was not torturous, the breeze cooling the deck where Mary lay sprawled over a barrel in preparation for 'the Botany Bay dozen' – that is, twenty-five strokes of the lash. Potbottom stood over her wielding the dreaded cat. He was so tiny that the lash, with its three knotted leather straps attached to a wooden handle, seemed too big in his hand.

That he should have been allocated such a task was unusual in the extreme. Had such a need befallen a male convict ship there would have been some person skilled in the use of the whip. But flogging was exceptionally rare on female convict ships, and no such expert existed on the Destiny II.

While Potbottom gleefully held on to the whip handle with both hands, he was not himself sure quite how it should be used for maximum effect, so he slapped it down upon the deck at his feet to get the hang and angle of its correct use.

Meanwhile Joshua Smiles produced from the pockets of his top coat the two small knee cushions, 'Jesus' and 'Saves', which he had carefully strapped to his legs so that the two words embroidered in red against a white canvas background might be clearly seen by all. With his back turned to Mary and his eyes fastened upon the topgallant sail, he kneeled upon the deck, having first respectfully removed his top hat and placed it beside him.

Potbottom, the awkward whip in hand, observing the surgeon-superintendent to clasp his hands in prayer and then, no doubt by pre-arrangement, to briefly nod, brought the lash up above his shoulders and hard down upon Mary's back.

'Oh merciful God forgive this poor wretch her transgressions,' Joshua Smiles loudly intoned, his voice directed upwards at the topgallant sail.

He paused after delivering this single sentiment, then once more nodded. Whereupon Potbottom again wielded the lash.

'Oh Lord Jesus may she repent her sins and accept your merciful forgiveness!'

Pause, nod and Potbottom's lash came down a third time. Thin welts like the beginnings of a spider's web now began to rise on Mary's back.

Thus the prayers, the nods and the whipping continued until the twenty-five strokes were completed. Mary's back was now bleeding profusely and covered with ugly welts, much to the satisfaction of Potbottom.

Many of the convict women were weeping as Mary was lifted to her feet and the gag removed from her lips. Sobbing and sniffing, both her eyes still ringed purple from the beating she'd taken, her clawed and withered hands clasped to her trembling breast, Mary was in all appearance a most forlorn and heart-rending sight.

Witnessing her misery and dejection the convicts increased the volume of their weeping. Mary was pushed back on to her knees and the prison matron stepped up to her and commenced to crop Mary's hair close to her scalp. The soft, pale hair fell to the deck, where a sudden zephyr blew it about and then carried it out to sea.

When this initial cropping was completed a bowl of soapy water was produced by one of the prison assistants, who proceeded to lather the hair remaining on Mary's head. The matron then exchanged her scissors for a cut-throat razor and shaved Mary's head, the uncaring blade removing the crusted scabs where her hair had been previously yanked out from her scalp, so that the blood, turned pink with the foamy lather, ran down Mary's face and neck.

The howling of the convict women increased in intensity and, while prison guards drew closer with their truncheons at the ready, Potbottom jumped and skipped beside them, bringing the lash down upon the deck as a gleeful warning to any who would promote a further mischief.

Mary was taken to the hospital and made to wash. Her uniform was stripped from her and she was given an old and tattered garment to wear. It had been washed soft, ready to be used as a rag, and so brought some comfort to her burning back. When her bloodstained uniform was returned to the mess a quarrel broke out among the whores, each of whom wanted to wash and repair it. Mary was then taken to the coal hole, the darkest and gloomiest part of the ship, where she was locked up with the supply of coal used in the vessel's kitchens.

There is nothing as destructive to the mind as complete darkness and silence. If there be a hell then eternal fire would come but a poor second to an eternity filled with complete solitude, for humans are gregarious creatures, in the main, and not designed to be alone. Soon the will to live breaks down and the mind ceases to see things rational and coherent; instead, nightmares grow out of a darkness populated with beasts and demons and hob-goblins with sharpened teeth and long treacherous claws.

It was most fortunate therefore that a prison guard, bringing Mary's ration of water and ship's biscuit, took pity on her and agreed to bring her abacus to her. Had it not been for this, the week spent in the coal hole might well have robbed Mary of her sanity. In the pitch darkness she would work the beads until her fingers were raw. Her mind grew to memorise the numbers of red and black upon the wire rails, and she spent hours making the most bizarre calculations to keep her mental condition sharp. She knew the height and width and circumference of the dome of St Paul's, and worked out the number of bricks it would have taken to build it. She knew the width and the length of the Mall and estimated the size of a single cobblestone, whereupon she worked out the number of these contained in the entirety of this regal way. It was with this kind of foolishness that she remained fully possessed of her wits in the darkness and silence of the dreadful hole into which she had been cast.

Sometimes Mary's hands became too painful and she was forced to leave her abacus alone. When she did so, her mind became filled with the spectre of Tiberias Pot-bottom, who now possessed her luck.

Mary was philosophical about the fifteen gold sovereigns he had stolen from her, but this was not the case with the medal. Potbottom's wearing of Ikey's talisman was an abomination. The usurping of her future luck was not a robbery but a snatching of her very soul. The legend inscribed upon it, 'I shall never surrender', was a determination she now regarded as endowed to her along with the luck it possessed. Mary told herself that without this talisman, her life upon the Fatal Shore was most surely doomed. She had convinced herself that without the determination it engendered and the luck it brought as a consequence she would be helpless. It also concerned her that in wearing the medal, Potbottom's own determination, the very power and potency of his evil, was greatly enhanced.

Mary truly believed that what had befallen her on board ship was simply a continuation of her previous life. The Destiny II was still in her mind English territory, thus resulting in English circumstance. The luck Ikey's talisman contained was hers for a foreign land and remained Ikey's until she reached her destination. Lying in the darkness of the coal hole, Mary became obsessed with the urgency of retrieving the medal, for while Potbottom wore it about his neck, Ikey, wherever he might be, went unprotected. Furthermore, if she arrived in Hobart without the blessing of the golden charm, she would have no reason to live, her dreadful fate having been already sealed.