Morgan's Run

An Indecent Obsession

The Thorn Birds

Tim

SIMON & SCHUSTER

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This book is a work of fiction based upon eighteenth-century events and persons.

Copyright © 2000 by Colleen McCullough

All rights reserved, including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form.

SIMON & SCHUSTER and colophon are registered trademarks of Simon & Schuster, Inc.

ISBN-10: 0-7432-1467-6

ISBN-13: 978-0-7432-1467-4

For Ric, Brother John, Wayde, Joe, Helen, andall the other many hundreds of people alive today whocan trace their roots directly to Richard Morgan.

But most of all, this book is for my beloved Melinda,the five-times-great-granddaughterof Richard Morgan.

We are born owning many qualities; some we may never know we possess. It all depends what kind of run God gives us.

PART ONE

PART TWO

PART THREE

PART FOUR

PART FIVE

PART SIX

PART SEVEN

Author’s Afterword

Morgan’s Run

PART ONE

From

August of 1775

until

October of 1784

“We are at war!” cried Mr. James Thiftlethwaite.

Every head save Richard Morgan’s lifted and turned toward the door, where a bulky figure stood brandishing a sheet of flimsy. For a moment a pin might have been heard dropping, then a confused babble of exclamations erupted at every table in the tavern except for Richard Morgan’s. Richard had paid the stirring a

“Come in, Jem, read it to us,” said Dick Morgan, Mine Host and Richard’s father, from behind his counter.

Though the noonday sun shone outside and light did diffuse through the bullioned panes of Crown glass in the windows of the Cooper’s Arms, the large room was dim. So Mr. James Thistlethwaite strolled over to the counter and the rays of an oil lamp, the butt of a horse pistol protruding from each greatcoat pocket. Spectacles perched upon the end of his nose, he started to read aloud, voice rising and falling in dramatic cadences.

Some of what he said did penetrate the fog of Richard Morgan’s worry—snatches, phrases only: “ ‘in open and avowed rebellion. . . . the utmost endeavors to suppress such rebellion, and bring the traitors to justice. . . . ’ ”

Feeling the contempt in his father’s gaze, Richard genuinely tried to concentrate. But surely the fever was begi

Mr. James Thistlethwaite was arriving at his peroration. “ ‘The die is now cast! The colonies must either submit or triumph!’ ” he thundered.

“What an odd way for the King to put it,” said Mine Host.

“Odd?”

“It sounds as if the King deems a colonial triumph possible.”

“Oh, I doubt that very much, Dick. His speech writer—some scurvy undersecretary to his bum boy Lord Bute, I hazard a guess—is fascinated with the balances of rhetoric—ah?” This last word was accompanied by a gesture, forefinger pointing to mouth.

Mine Host gri

“Dick, Dick! My news merits one on the house!”

“No it does not. We would have heard sooner or later.” Mine Host leaned his elbows on his counter in the place where they had worn two slight depressions and stared at the armed and greatcoated Mr. Thistlethwaite—mad as a March hare! The summer’s day was sweltering. “Seriously, Jem, it is not exactly a bolt from the blue, but these are shocking tidings all the same.”

No other voice attempted to participate in their conversation; Dick Morgan stood well with his patrons, and Jem Thistlethwaite had long enjoyed a reputation as one of Bristol’s more eccentric intellectuals. The patrons were quite content to listen as they imbibed the tipple of their choice—rum, gin, beer, Bristol milk.

The two Morgan wives were there to move about, pick up the empties and return them to Dick for refilling—and more slashes on the slate. It was nearly di

His father was glaring at him. Miserably aware that Dick despised him for a milksop, Richard searched for something to say. “I suppose we hoped,” he said vaguely, “that none of the other colonies would stand by Massachusetts, having warned it that it was going too far. And did they truly think that the King would stoop to read their letter? Or, even if he had, yield to their demands? They are Englishmen! The King is their king too.”

“Nonsense, Richard!” said Mr. Thistlethwaite sharply. “This obsessive concern for your child is fast addling your thinking apparatus! The King and his sycophantic ministers are bent on plunging our sceptered isle into disaster! Eight thousand tons of Bristol shipping sent back unloaded from the thirteen colonies in less than a year! That serge manufactory in Redcliff gone out of business and the four hundred souls it employed thrown upon the parish! Not to mention that place near the Port Wall which makes painted canvas carpets for Carolina and Georgia! The pipe makers, the soap makers, the bottle makers, the sugar and rum makers—for God’s sake, man! Most of our trade is across the Western Ocean, and no mean part of that with the thirteen colonies! To go to war against the thirteen colonies is commercial suicide!”