The cold grey morning was not welcoming but Lucan had risen to meet it. He looked toward the sea, misty and dark. A new day. A new life. Lucan walked along the wharf where the Merkara lay moored. He had acquired passage for himself and his sons. The steam ship's bulk moved on the water, eerily impeding. Lucan sucked in his breath, drew his shoulders back and exhaled. The wagon he hauled wasn't heavy. Their possessions were few. A water keg, bedding, utensils and clothing.

"Covey, you hold on and don't let go."

The small boy beamed at his father.

Smiling, Lucan said, "I don't want ta lose ya, so Da needs you to hold onto the strap so you don't fall."

Lucan hitched Riley higher onto his hip. The wharf was long and curved to the left. Gas lanterns lined the way, not lit, but on guard. He walked close to the rails, away from the train tracks, where loads were being moved back and forth from the ships. He looked at the water, into its black depths, which swirled in slow waves against the wooden piers. The wind blew cold in his face. Young boys hauled in fish with small nets. They climbed on the rocks near the wharf calling to each other and waving to onlookers.

Lucan turned his head toward the crowd, coming and going, horses and carts carrying crates, men with stooped backs and grey beards, others, younger, shouting and running for ropes. Women, crying, dabbing their eyes with lace handkerchiefs pulled their bonnets lower and their embroidered shawls tighter while long skirts dragged in water and mud.

Lucan wove this way and that through the throng.  No one cared or wondered who he was.  Just a man with two sons...

He thought of Kat and her want for them to leave and move on.  Now he was here, dressed in his jacket and cap...

With no Kat.

"Steerage to the left and down the stairs."

Lucan looked in the direction the young sailor had pointed. He shifted the cumbersome pack on his back and steered Covey in front of him toward the top of the stairway. Covey stumbled on the blanket he was carrying.

"Ah...for Christ's sake get ya damn brat movin'!" a gruff voice yelled from behind.

Turning to see who had spoken, Lucan scowled. There were the too many faces. He gave Covey a nudge. "Pick it up, lad. Tuck it under your arm."

Covey did as he was told. Lucan smiled down at him. "Hold it tight now. I'm right behind you."

As they began their descent Lucan heard the impatience of the people behind him but he was determined not to let it affect him. Covey dropped the blanket once more. Lucan struggled to pick it up.

"Ere. I'll take the babe." The middle aged woman beside him smiled sympathetically. "Mines big enough ta walk theyselves and I can see your havin' trouble."

Nodding his thanks, Lucan passed Riley to her. He picked up the blanket and tucked it under his arm. "Keep movin', lad," he said to Covey.

"Ain't they got any mother, mista?"

Lucan turned back to the woman carrying Riley and shook his head.

"Is she dead?"

He nodded but said nothing hoping his silence might make her understand he didn't want to talk about Kat.

"Me names Lottie and if ya wants a hand you sing out. Got me two strong young daughters that would be willin' ta see to 'em every now an then."

"Lucan Hayes, mam, and I'll keep that offer in mind." Lucan smiled gratefully at her, realising she was trying to do him a kindness.

The area at the base of the stairs was dimmer. It smelled of tobacco smoke and human sweat. Lucan stood in the crowded corridor waiting to make his way down the next set of steps to where the steerage passengers were housed.

Another sailor was yelling out instructions. "When ya get to the bottom it's single men to the stern! Families' mid-ships and the fair ladies to the bow!" The sailor raised his eyebrows at an attractive dark haired young woman. "Gotta keep all you pretty fresh females from the clutches of them wily fellas."

She giggled and covered her mouth with her hand.

Again, he called out his instructions. "Men to the stern! Families' mid-ships and ladies to the bow!"

Ushering Covey forward, Lucan handed him the blanket. "Hold it tight, lad," he said as he lifted Riley from Lottie's arms. "Thanks very much."

Lottie grinned. Her front teeth were missing. She pointed at two freckle-faced teenage girls behind her. "These are me lasses. Katherine and Victoria, and that big oof is me 'usband Herb."

Holding his hand out, Lucan said, "Pleased ta meet you."

Herb grunted, "Irish are ya?"

Sensing Herb's disapproval, Lucan nodded a farewell and started to make his way toward mid-ships where families were instructed to go.

"Oi! You there!"

He felt a heavy hand on his shoulder and turned to see another sailor who had been directing people to their places, standing behind him.

"Where do ya think ya goin'?" the sailor said.

"They said families' to the middle."

The sailor looked from Lucan and at Covey and Riley. "Where's your wife, she should be with ya now, not later." He scanned the crowd of moving people.

"I'm on my own. Me wife's dead."

"Well, ya in the stern, lone men to the stern, don't you people listen?"

"I have a family. Two sons." Lucan frowned.

"But you ain't got a wife, so that makes you single. To the stern unless ya want trouble."

Lucan shook his head and made his way toward the ships stern. It was darker. The air was stale. The smell of sweat and tobacco smoke lingered. Another more intrusive scent mingled with the others. He realised horses, cows, pigs and fowl had also been housed somewhere close by.

In the dim light Lucan made his way through the crowd of men. He found a vacant spot near the ship's hull, as far from where he believed the animals were kept. He placed Riley on the floor and shed the pack from his back before rolling out the bedding and linen.

"Covey come sit here with ya brother while I settle us right," Lucan said as he pulled an apple from his pocket and cut it in half with the knife he kept in his boot. He handed a piece to each boy before sorting their belongings.

He left the cooking and eating utensils; cups and drinking can in the sack. Stood the three-gallon keg for water beside it, rolled up what clothing they had and pushed them under the blanket to create a pillow. Lucan had brought a little food with them but had been told supplies would be issued and it was possible to buy extras, such as bacon, pickles, ham and sauces if he had the money.

Sitting beside Covey and Riley, he took another apple from the pocket of his coat, bit down and looked around.

Men, young and old, different in size and colouring, crowded the area. Some laughed with their neighbours, filled with the excitement of the journey and the prospect of a new life. Others sat quiet and solemn, were doing just as he himself was doing, surveying their surroundings, weighing up what the voyage would bring and perhaps what their futures held.

Lucan focused on the back of the large bald-headed man in front of him. His broad shoulders were hunched. He held his arms in a way that suggested he was either praying or holding onto something. The shirt he wore had once been white, but now tainted with age. The suspenders that supported his dark trousers were stretched tight over the width of his back and shoulders. Lucan studied the man's head. He realised this man was not completely bald but had shaven the base of his scalp clean. His ears were pinned tight against his skull and Lucan wondered what he did for a living.

"Da! Da!"

Riley beamed up at Lucan, his hand held out towards his father's apple; his own piece lay on the floor covered in dirt out of his reach. Lucan smiled and cut off a small slice of his apple and gave it to him.

"Mista!" The bald man had turned around. He held a crucifix tightly in his hands. "You have two sons, yes?"

"Yes," Lucan said.

"Mine name is Johann. I come to travel to Aus-tray-lee-a, yes." Johann leaned over and held his hand out.

Lucan shook the man's hand and touched his chest as he said, "Lucan, and this here's Covey and Riley," he added tapping each boy on the head as he said his name.

Johann smiled. "Day just like you, yes?"

Lucan agreed and couldn't help but smile at this large man with the egg shaped skull. "And where ya be from, Johann?"

"I coming from Germany. I go to Aus-tray-lee-a to make money. I find gold." He shrugged. "If not I box. Make much money with these." He held up his fists. "What you go to Aus-tray-lee-a for, Lucan?"

Swallowing the piece of apple he was chewing, Lucan said, "I got me an uncle there, says he can get me work." Lucan looked from Johann and at his sons. "Their mother is  dead and we ain't got no other family." He paused. "I reckon life there can't be any worse than the one we're leavin'."

"You box, Lucan? You big enough." Johann squeezed his biceps to show Lucan what he meant.

"No." Lucan laughed and shook his head. "At least not in the way you're meanin', Johann."

"How you get so strong?" Johann said with a grin of disbelief.

Moving his arms up and down as if he were holding a pick, Lucan said "Workin'. In the pits diggin' coal."

"Ah..." Johann nodded. "Make you plenty strong, eh? You should box, make much money."

Lucan laughed once more. "Only if I be winning, Johann. Otherwise I'd just be gettin' meself a good hidin', eh?"

Johann's smile broadened and his egg shaped head bobbled up and down. "Ah yes only if you win."

Two sailors stood in front of them, the smaller one called for silence. His voice boomed above the noise of the men. "Food rations will be handed out every Monday afternoon. If you miss your allocation you'll go hungry." He unfolded a sheet of paper and held it high in the air for all to see. "This is a list of ya supplies. It'll be posted on the bulkhead and another will be on the door of the supply room. I'll read it now for those that can't. Biscuits, three and a half pounds, pork, one pound, beef, one and a half-pound, tea, one ounce treacle, one third of a pound, sugar, twelve ounces, oatmeal, one pound, raisins, eight ounces, suet, six ounces, lime juice, six ounces, water, twenty-one quarts and peas, one and a half pints." He took a deep breath and handed the sheet of paper to his off-sider who tacked it to the bulkhead.

"If you got the money you can buy more from the store officer but, like I said only on Monday afternoons and there'll be no alcohol brought on board. It can be bought from the store too. No gamblin' and no card playin' on Sundays and I'm warnin' you now any fightin' means imprisonment. The captain don't take any nonsense. He and the doctor will be down every morning to make sure you're all outer bed. Breakfast should be eaten the same time as the saloon, second and third class passengers; that bein' eight thirty and lunch at twelve thirty."

He stopped talking, put his hands on his hips and looked around. "If ya got any questions now's the time to ask 'em."

Johann grinned at Lucan. He held his fists in the air. "We make sure when we box not to get caught, yes?"

"I won't be boxin', Johann," Lucan said with a shake of his head.

"Yes." Johann nodded and chortled. "We make secret boxing matches, make much money you and me, you'll see."

Top photo is Merkara, built in 1875.  Just out of interest, Merkara ran aground in Morton Bay, Brisbane, Queensland, in 1895, she is classified as being shipwrecked but was re-floated. There is documentation that another Merkara was built in 1914.

Photo copyrights - Top - Merkara - www.wrecksite.eu/wreck.aspx?56434

Wharf - MAAS Collection - Museum of Applied Arts and Sciences.