Chapter 36
There were no big, dull men waiting to claim Bridie’s hand in marriage when Lady Sophia dropped anchor in Hobson’s Bay. Not even a wharf for her absent suitors to stand on. Only a wooden jetty poking out from a squalid settlement called Williamstown. That’s if you could call the stone warehouse, gaggle of wooden huts, severed trees, pigs, dogs, sheep and rough looking men a settlement. It smelled worse than Covent Garden after market day—a ripe, rotten stench of privies, animal slaughter and tanneries.
Bridie stood on the main deck that first night and watched dusk soften the outline of its buildings. A punt crossed the nearby river mouth, an offender released from the stocks with a good-natured slap. Men read notices from Williamstown’s single remaining tree. She shivered. Ho
