They spoke in a barely comprehensible shorthand that Evangeline only understood through context and pantomime. They called porridge burgoo. They called the stew they ate lobscouse. She didn’t know why. That was just how it was. The sailors received far more daily provisions than the convicts: a pound of biscuits, a gallon of rum or wine, a cup of oatmeal, half a pound of beef, a half cup of peas, a slab of butter, and two ounces of cheese. Sometimes—rarely—the women would get a taste of their rations.

Some of the women learned to fish. When their morning chores were finished, they cast lines overboard baited with chum, using twine and thread, with padlocks and bolts for weights and hooks. In the afternoons they cured the mackerel and sea robins they caught in the sun. Before long a barter system developed between the convicts and the crew. Dried fish could be exchanged for biscuits or buttons, stockings the women knitted by hand traded for brandy, an even more desirable commodity.

If a convict did something wrong, punishment was swift. If she got into a fistfight or was caught gambling, she’d be locked in a small, dark room on the orlop deck called the hold. One woman, accused of stealing a crewman’s tortoiseshell comb, was forced to wear a placard around her neck that said THIEF for a month. A narrow box chained to the main deck was used for particularly grave offenses, such as disrespecting the captain or surgeon. The unfortunate convict was buckled into a waistcoat that wrapped around her limbs, then locked inside the box. If she screamed or cried, a cistern of water was poured on her head through the breathing hole. The solitary box, sailors called it. Convicts called it the grave.

For repeated offenses, a convict’s head was roughly shaved, like that of an inmate in an insane asylum.

Some prisoners complained to anyone who’d listen. Others bore their burdens with stoic good cheer. It was hard work to keep boredom at bay, and a number of them simply gave up. They ate with their hands and were unashamedly naked in front of one another, spitting and belching and farting at will. Some, out of sheer boredom, began making trouble. Two got into a brawl and took turns in the hold, subsisting on bread and water. Another who swore at the captain was locked inside the solitary box for an entire day. Her muffled yelling and swearing got her an additional half day, plus an unwelcome shower through the breathing hole.

Evangeline clung to her dignity like a life preserver. She kept her head down, minded her own business, attended divine service, worked on her quilt, and did her chores without complaint, even as her stomach swelled, and along with it her feet and hands. After breakfast, kneeling beside other convicts, she dipped a rag into a tub of seawater, wrung it out, and washed her face, the back of her neck, between her fingers, under her arms. Daily she aired her bedding; once a week, on washing day, she scrubbed her clothing, hanging it to stiffen and dry in the salty air. She still turned her back when she changed out of her dress.