Prison

Evan only had two days on the island. First of all, he went to the governor's mansion to meet him and get some insight into the island itself.

The governor's mansion was in the heart of Jamestown. It was quite big and almost on par with the lavish mansions back home in London.

The governor of St. Helena Island was a middle-aged man with black hair, a clean shave, and ordinary looks. His name was Lord Berek Brookstone. On first impression, the man looked to be content with his current lifestyle. He had a beautiful wife and four children, two boys and a daughter.

Berek was a commoner ten years back. His father was a merchant who traded spices. He would buy spices from the Indian subcontinent and a few other products from further Asian countries and sell them in Europe and Britain.

Everything was good until one day he met his end with pirates during one of his voyages. Now usually the pirates would not slaughter people left and write and just take all the valuable cargo but Berek's father was quite unlucky as he had met with a particularly vicious pirate group and intimately lost his life.

At that time, Berek had completed his education and a load of his whole family had fallen onto his shoulders.

Berek then started doing minor jobs here and there in the finance sector as he had gotten a degree in finance and business studies. But that was obviously not enough for him and so he decided to make a bold decision.

He used all the savings from his father and the money recovered from his life insurance for investment in various emerging companies. Berek was an optimistic person and from his school days, he believed that industrialization would thrive the most in the future.

He invested in innovative and emerging industries which he judged to have potential and some of his bets landed on the spot as he earned a hefty amount from his shares in those companies.

But his ambition only grew and he yet again took a gamble and invested all that money and went into politics. With the initial capital and his witty personality, he then went on to become a reformist and an influential political figure.

The crown rewarded him with the title of Viscount and that's how he entered into an aristocracy.

Just as his ambition was about to sore even more... He fell in love and got married. After having his own family, he decided to not take unwarranted risks and get in anyone's way and end up down in the gutters once again.

When the crown took over St. Helena Island from the East India Company... The government offered him the post of governor and Lord of the Island and after giving it some thought, he happily agreed.

After listening to this story in conversation with Lord Brookstone himself, Evan was truly astonished and learned various lessons from it as well. He thought that the world is truly vast and there are many extraordinary people.

Both of them became good friends during their chat and after getting properly acquainted. Lord Brookstone even invited Evan and James to hunt and Evan agreed.

The first day Evan spent knowing more about the island, especially how its economy worked and such. He then went on sightseeing the whole Island as there were many good places to visit. He also spent some time hunting and even managed to hunt a wild boar.

While he was spending the time on his way, his officers preferred to spend their time on activities such as drinking in taverns, spending a good time with the ladies, gambling, and having fun in the town.

The first day was spent like this and Evan was truly refreshed from the punishing voyage. There would be a few more months of travel to reach India and that is depending on the weather.

The next day, Evan woke up early in the morning. It was rather cold but the peaceful atmosphere had its serenity. He then cleaned his teeth and body and had some breakfast.

For breakfast, there was an omelet, bread, tea, and some sweets. Overall it was great and certainly better than dry meat and rock-hard bread.

After that, he decided to spend some time for himself alone. He was just going to chill out and read books all-day until a knock sounded on the door.

"Come in," He said while continuing to read his book.

James entered the room and sat on the chair in front of Evan.

"I have something important to report," James said calmly.

Even peeked at him and then after a few moments finally kept the book aside and asked, "What is it?"

James hesitated for a moment and sighed, he then said with an awkward expression, "I believe it's better if you see it for yourself, My Lord,"

Evan could not figure out what the matter could be and was somewhat dissatisfied with being disturbed when he had the whole day planned out. But suspecting that it could be something important from James' expression, Evan nodded and said, "Fine, let's see what you've got."

Both of them left, and James guided Evan into the forest onto a rigid pathway that was meant for only traveling by foot. After avoiding the thorny plants and rocky obstacles... They finally reached an open space near the lake.

What Evan saw was a highly guarded building made from bricks and stones. It looked to be quite sturdy and was compounded by all sides with thorny fences.

It was obvious that the building was most probably a prison.

"This is..." Evan muttered.

"Yes, it's the prison where criminals from overseas are brought and kept in isolation. Generally, the ones who rebel from various British colonies around the world." James said.

Evan had heard of such prisons. He had also heard some really nasty rumors about them such as the inhuman treatment of the prisoners in such isolated prisons. They would be kept in a dark and cramped cell with a very small source of sunlight coming in. The cell would be crawling with insects and who knew what. There would be nothing such as hygiene in these prisons and the prisoners would get extremely bad and very less amount of food. On top of that, the prisoners would also be required to do tasks of hardships now and then, It was basically hell.