The Lace Balcony by Johanna Nicholls

damned thing the hole has in its favour.
    Standing naked to dry in the sun, his long-limbed body still muscular, but now as pale as a turnip, Mungo took pleasure in shaking his head in the manner of a dog emerging from a creek, sending out a spray of water. He was suddenly aware that the length of his hair served as a calendar, a rough indication of the length of time he had been incarcerated in solitary confinement. His head had been shaved when he entered the hole. It was now close to his jaw line.
    He was surprised when Ricketts handed him a neatly folded pile of slop clothing. Mungo instinctively raised it to his face, overcome by the fresh smell of sunlight and eucalyptus on clean Indian cotton.
    â€˜These have been washed in eucalyptus soap!’ Mungo exclaimed.
    â€˜Aye, the Isabella brought us a nice motherly woman amongst the batch of Volunteers. One woman to eight male do-gooders. She tookit on herself to oversee prisoners’ laundry during Logan’s absence. So enjoy clean slops while you can, lad.’
    Feeling as if he had been reinvented as a man in a fresh body, Mungo marched with his head high towards the office near the Commandant’s quarters. From the corner of his eye he made out the figure of a woman in a dark green gown seated on Logan’s veranda, a young boy at her knee as she fanned the little girl she nursed in her arms. From the line of her head, Mungo felt sure the lovely Mrs Logan was observing him, but tempted as he was to drink in the gentle beauty of this rare domestic scene, he kept his gaze resolutely fixed ahead.
    A cat might look at a King, but to be caught staring at Letitia Logan would cost me two hundred stripes of the cat. Logan has caused men to be flogged to death for lesser ‘misdemeanours’.
    But Mungo’s head swivelled around when he glimpsed a flash of a red military coat. The officer joined Mrs Logan on the veranda. No mistaking Logan. Dark auburn hair, the handsome face clean-shaven except for long sideburns, the Commandant was noble of bearing. Logan reached down and ruffled his son’s hair and little Robert Abraham looked up at his father in awe, the man a hero in his eyes.
    Mungo was confronted by the paradox of Logan’s nature. As a soldier his valour was unquestioned, one of the celebrated Die Hards who had fought on many fields of battle, carried out the Duke of Wellington’s orders and routed the French during the Napoleonic Wars – though Logan’s exact role was unknown.
    An audacious explorer, he had conquered the almost vertical mountain he named Mount Lindsay, the highest known peak in the Colony. Logan’s brother officers appeared to admire him. As husband and father he was said to be loving and protective. Yet in Mungo’s eyes Logan’s humanity ended there. As Commandant and Magistrate he was a tyrant. Every convict at Moreton Bay who had managed to retain half a brain fervently wished him dead.
    Ricketts pointed out a newly erected, low-roofed timber building. ‘There you are. This new bloke lives and works there on his own, but he’s said to be connected to Logan in some way. A new settler. You better watch your step. He could be working on God’s side of the fence – or Logan’s.’
    After the guard headed in the direction of the chapel, where he served as a lay preacher, Mungo hobbled up the veranda steps and entered the office.
    Alone in the room was a man Mungo judged to be close to thirty. He looked up from his desk and paused in the act of sorting papers. His sandy-red hair was tied back in the old-style queue, his eyes unnaturally bright, his skin covered by a film of sweat that suggested either failing health or failure to adapt to the semi-tropical climate. His voice had a strong Scottish burr and his manner was surprisingly mild.
    â€˜Your full name, lad?’ he asked.
    Caught off-guard, Mungo almost revealed it. ‘Sean O’Connor, Sir.’
    â€˜Ah, Irish.