And Susannah thought, 'when love comes from some unearthly place, when it comes from a place where forces unseen bring two people together, it has an unstoppable force, stronger than anything that can be seen or touched, stronger than our mortal shells, the kind of love that transcends matter and time, this is our love.'

In the days when his flesh had burned with pain, she had cared for him with such genuine devotion he had been moved by her and from this his love had grown. Now, each night when she gently massaged lotion into his back and sang with a voice so sweet he felt sure it came from God himself, he was full of adoration for her. He recognised the bond they now shared, a bond forged from the love and tenderness of a woman who would not be beaten down by circumstance.

“I knew that others had faced the noose for crimes less than this. I’d always heard talk of God and the hereafter. I don’t think I am scared of death. I didn’t think so at the time. I thought if I am to die and meet my God and if He is merciful He would not judge me harshly. If He was all knowing as they preached, then He we would know I only took what was fair. No, it was not death, it is not death I fear Ed, it is having this life taken from me.”

Susannah marvelled at them, they were creatures of the sunlight. They wore skin as gold as honey and grew taller and stronger than would have been allowed by the fetid air and lack of food in London. They were blessed as any children could be. They frolicked in the open air, on a spot on the planet that tilted at just the right angle to the sun, delivering to them a temperate climate, free of the bitter cold of the place from where Susannah had come. There was so much joy

Susannah had brought his cot into the open air while she scrubbed the washing across the washboard in the wooden tub, wringing it and hanging it on the prop up line to the side of the house. Little Mary picked up the fallen purple flowers from under the white oak, sniffed them and then dropped them like gifts upon the feet of her baby brother. Susannah hummed a simply tune she had heard some of the new convict women singing, but the words were what Susannah liked most and as

And there, right in front of her were the images of her dreams, the tall straight green pines, thick and woody, covering the island. ‘This is the place’, she thought aloud. “What do you mean, what place is that?” “Ed Garth, this is the place in my dreams.”

To Susannah the promise was truer than anything in her life had ever been. Whatever imaginings she may have had they had not been of grand houses, jewels or fine clothes, they had been of fresh air and freedom, of food and shelter, of love and rebirth and this place held that potential for her. She could not remember ever having joined in with three cheers for anything before and although the cheers were meant to be an affirmation of allegiance to the King, to her it was a

To Norfolk Island... It was a Thursday, the summer heat rising from the harbour in a fog, the morning of Saint Valentine’s Day, just over two weeks since they had arrived at Port Jackson. 'A day for lovers', Susannah thought and she wondered whether she possessed the key to unlock Edward Garth’s heart, 'after all', she thought, 'if I am to live in some remote place I want to at least spend it with someone I have an attraction to.' Along with the excitement of this possibilit