Jacob's Ladder

by Donald McCaig

  Although dusk was settling over the garden and lay musky in the old woman’s garden room, the lamps were unlit, and the girl was drowsy. She sat up straight and asked, “Could I have another cup of tea?”

  “There’s a bell behind you, if Kizzy elects to answer it.”

  The girl yawned behind her hand. “Excuse me. It has been a trying day.”

  “Yes.” The old woman smiled. “My family plans to come here next month. Would you care to meet them?”

  “Why, yes. Thank you.”

  “They will try to persuade me to sell the bank. Mine was the second Virginia bank to reopen after Mr. Roosevelt’s bank holiday!”

  Vaguely, she added, “I just may oblige them,” but then her voice strengthened. “I have been a woman of business since eighteen hundred and sixty-four!

  “You cannot imagine how I loved the unsullied pages of the ledger, the clean smell of newly imprinted bills and receipts, the office at Market and Water where I executed Silas’s business. Every morning I’d arrive half an hour earlier than Silas’s old clerk so I could neaten my office. ‘My office’—how sweet those words! Kizzy’s husband, Mingo, drove me in and vanished until the end of the day. I often brought Jacob. Wilmington’s businessmen were not unaccustomed to women—Mrs. DeRossette was not the only woman speculator—but my Jacob, playing quietly or sleeping in the little bed I’d fixed for him in a corner, my Jacob discomfited them. Jacob seemed satisfied to be with me, and his seeming indifference to other children suited our circumstances, but one day ragamuffins were playing noisily on the wharf, some improvised game with stick and ball, and Jacob watched them with the forlornest expression on his little face.

  “ ‘Why dear, are those tears I see?’ I asked.

  “Jacob rubbed his eyes but kept them fixed on the other boys. ‘No, Mama.’

  “ ‘Then what is it? Are you unhappy?’

  “He turned to me then and in his most earnest voice asked, ‘Mama, will I always be lonely?’

  “ ‘Dearest, you will lack for nothing. I will always love you. You know I will.’

  “ ‘I am not like them, am I?’

  “ ‘Those boys? Why, they are street urchins of . . . of the poorest class.’

  “In a tone of absolute conviction Jacob pronounced, ‘I will always be lonely.’

  “Though I prompted him on numerous occasions, Jacob never again spoke about the matter. Like mine, my son’s will, once fixed, was unalterable.

  “Silas left for Richmond, where he still hoped to influence government policies. His clerk thought Silas a fool to entrust his affairs to a woman. Randall, I believe the man was called. Perhaps it was Rawlins. The man did work when the Wild Darrell was in port but spent the remaining days of the month gossiping and nurturing his connections. Thus my insistence on regular hours discomfited him.

  “Government purchase orders had to be executed perfectly. A single inadequacy in the description of a napoleon cannon—omission of the foundry name, batch number, or proof marks—would delay payment until the defective paper was corrected. In my first week, I unearthed dozens of defective unpaid purchase orders. Since our goods had, in some instances, been delivered to the army months ago and since the manifests had been discarded, I invented the details I could not provide, to the clerk’s vocal dismay. Since the value of the Confederate dollar dwindled monthly and sometimes weekly, these delays were consequential, and the first improvement I made in Silas’s fortunes was repairing and rebilling those purchase orders.

  “I had never been in a bank before and will never forget my first interview with Mr. Shemwell, at the time president of the Bank of the Cape Fear. I required Silas’s former clerk—was it Rendall perhaps?—to accompany me to Shemwell’s offices at Front and Princess streets, and after I was introduced, I dismissed the man.

  “Jacob accompanied me, his little hand in mine. Jacob could be restive when we were alone, but whenever I was doing business he was extremely well behaved.” She paused in her narrative. “Jacob was so young. I wonder now how much he understood of our circumstances. How I wish I could ask him now.

  “Mr. Shemwell’s office was a powerful male’s lair. A portrait of President Jefferson Davis established Shemwell’s patriotism, the enormous safe in the corner his wealth, and brass cuspidors testified to his vices. Though his desk chair had arms and cushion, his visitor’s chair was poor and plain. Since the unfortunate seated in that chair would have been interrogated by the bland facade of his mahogany desk, I set Jacob in it, and when I could not locate a second chair I stood helplessly by until Shemwell himself fetched me one. I may have been the first woman to penetrate Shemwell’s sanctum sanctorum, and he wasn’t sure whether to be offended or ill at ease. Although he would have liked to refuse, at my request he produced Silas’s accounts.

  “I smiled helplessly. ‘Oh dear, Mr. Shemwell. I did not expect the records to be so extensive. Please could I remove them to study at my husband’s office?’

  “Since he finally had something he could deny me, Shemwell did so.

  “ ‘In that case, sir, I shall have to examine them here. I hope it will not discommode you.’

  “Well, of course it did, but he was well boxed, and I spent all day deciphering Silas’s accounts. When Jacob needed to visit the necessary, I enlisted Mr. Shemwell’s clerk to accompany him. Finally, at four o’clock, I was finished, and when Mr. Shemwell returned to his office, I was in his chair, my ledgers spread across his desk. Thumb tucked safely in his mouth, Jacob napped in the corner. With a parental nod toward Jacob, I whispered, ‘What does the Confederate dollar trade at?’

  “ ‘Twenty-two to one, madam. That’s twenty-two Confederate dollars to one dollar in gold,’ Shemwell explained in a hoarse irritated murmur.

  “ ‘I wish you to convert my husband’s Confederate currency into gold. I also note that Silas has a substantial investment in Confederate nine-percent bonds.’

  “ ‘Mr. Omohundru has subscribed to every new issue.’

  “ ‘And what is the present discount for those bonds?’

  “ ‘I fear, madam, buyers are not plentiful. Mr. Omohundru’s cotton promissories are more negotiable. They promise payment in cotton on the Wilmington wharves one year after a peace treaty is signed, and British merchants still make a market in them.’

  “ ‘You financial gentlemen are so clever. How I admire you. Please sell the cotton promissories.’

  “Shemwell spread his hands helplessly. ‘Madam, Mr. Omohundru is a patriotic gentleman. I am afraid I could not close out his position without explicit instructions.’

  “Since I had anticipated this difficulty, I handed him Silas’s irrevocable power of attorney.

  “Shemwell wiped his glasses, tugged at his beard, and seemed as if he might wish to utilize one of his spittoons. ‘Madam, I regret I cannot execute your instructions until Mr. Omohundru arrives back in the city and confirms them in person. I am so sorry.’

  “Businessmen make me so angry. They are perfectly happy to sell to you but not to buy, perfectly pleased to hold your money but won’t trust you to hold theirs. It is a boy’s game, business, and not suitable for girls! I was furious. ‘Then, sir,’ I whispered, ‘you must produce all of Mr. Omohundru’s cash, gold, and certificates. I understand the Bank of Commerce is sound.’

  “Shemwell neither wished to produce Silas’s wealth nor to be seen as one who would not. He hated whispering to accommodate a child who had no business with him and shouldn’t have been sleeping in his office. He said he would trade the cotton-denominated bonds, and I said I would trade the nine-percent bonds myself. Shemwell had no real choice, and deprived of the full volume of masculine speech, couldn’t debate me. When he knelt before his safe, I woke Jacob and answered his little boy’s questions. Yes, we were going home soon. Yes, he could ride up in the driver’s box with Mingo. Yes, we’d go as soon as nice Mr. Shemwell fetched my bonds.

  “Silas once told me that respectable widows made a livelihood by meeting at the Confed
erate Treasury to sign these bonds. The bonds are now worthless but bear signatures from the first families of Virginia.

  “Fortunately, a blockade runner, the Kestrel, had been slow unloading and overstayed its safe departure. With no duties until the next dark moon, its crew took quarters at the City Hotel and determined to drink Wilmington dry. Like most blockade runners, the crew were young and reckless, and it occurred to me that young men with so much gold in their pockets might be willing to invest in nine-percent bonds, especially if approached late in the evening by a handsome but shabby young woman with charming airs. I visited the City Hotel during hours when respectable women were not abroad, and though the youths made suggestions to me that were not proper, they didn’t force themselves on me, and when the Kestrel sailed its crew owned Silas’s nine-percent bonds. I did not mention Silas to these young men, and if they believed me a Confederate maiden in reduced circumstances, well, they were young men, and I am certain their ownership of nine-percent bonds was no worse for them than the whiskey their money might otherwise have obtained.

  “A week after my first visit, when Jacob and I again visited Mr. Shemwell, that gentleman informed me that the Confederate dollar was now trading at twenty-four to one, but he had hopes it would attain a better rate when Abraham Lincoln was defeated for reelection.

  “ ‘How much of Silas’s currency have you exchanged for gold?’ I asked him.

  “ ‘Madam, as I told you, in my considered opinion we will soon see a better rate.’

  “ ‘And the cotton-denominated bonds?’

  “Those he had managed to exchange. Some of them, he informed me, into his own account.

  “ ‘The currency I asked you to exchange at twenty-two has not been exchanged and now trades at twenty-four?’

  “He said that was unfortunate, but I had his assurances, his professional opinion, his long experience in these matters . . .

  “I told Jacob that kind Mr. Shemwell was giving us a lesson in arithmetic to which he should attend, that Mr. Shemwell had proved that twenty-four to one was a better rate than twenty-two to one and he might soon demonstrate that thirty to one was better still.

  “Mr. Shemwell was angry and wished to express sentiments unsuitable for the ears of a mother with a child of tender years at her side. With difficulty he restrained himself. To spare Mr. Shemwell further pain I instructed him to turn over Silas’s currency and gold and the proceeds of the cotton bond sales, which were to have been, he would recall, denominated in that same precious metal.

  “Mr. Shemwell was shocked. ‘Madam! That is a great deal of money!’

  “ ‘Not so much as it was, sir.’

  “From his safe Shemwell produced Confederate bills, a few—too few—British government bonds denominated in sterling, and four heavy bags of gold. While I counted, Jacob clinked gold double eagles and rolled them across Mr. Shemwell’s floor.

  “Armed toughs accompanied me down Princess Street to the Bank of Commerce, with which I established a satisfactory relationship. The sudden appearance of so much currency on an illiquid market depressed the rate, and I exchanged the last of it at twenty-seven Confederate dollars to one gold. In my early days in trade I had more fondness for gold than the metal deserves, but I was surely correct in valuing it more highly than Confederate paper.

  “Federal cavalry frequently disrupted the Wilmington & Weldon Railroad. We could not bill for military goods until they were delivered, and our connection to Petersburg and Richmond was increasingly tenuous. Every afternoon, I visited Silas’s warehouse to encourage his workers, to expend every effort to get our goods to the trains. My discreet gifts to railroad employees ensured there were cars for them. In this manner I kept myself occupied until Silas returned, on the waning of the moon, September 12th. Silas was wornout and despondent.

  “In Richmond, Silas had inventoried government warehouses which bulged with supplies while the army starved. When Secretary of War Seddon asked Silas to report on the movement of goods through Wilmington, Silas offended the man by saying what passed through Wilmington was of no consequence if it got no farther than a Richmond warehouse. The man in charge of those warehouses, Commissary General Northrup, was a distant cousin of the Secretary of War.

  “After this meeting, Silas’s opinions were not sought again. Without family connections, Silas had no authority beyond his experience and knowledge, neither of which impressed our government.

  “When he returned to Wilmington, Silas was in a bleak humor. To raise his spirits, I detailed my accomplishments, but he was indifferent. He remarked that the railroad journey from Wilmington to Petersburg, which had once taken thirteen hours, now took twenty-four.

  “The next morning, I closeted my hopes for Silas’s approbation, and Jacob and I departed for the office. In the early afternoon Silas arrived at the warehouse, where Mr. Shemwell arrived soon after. Shemwell complained indignantly about my behavior and judgment. In Shemwell’s opinion, the Confederate dollar would rise against gold, and cotton-denominated bonds were as good as gold. ‘Your wife has extracted every penny of your money from my sound banking establishment and entrusted it to . . .’

  “Silas put a finger to his lips. ‘Shhhh.’

  “ ‘She has cashed your nine-percent bonds. Exchanged . . .’

  “ ‘Shhhh . . .’

  “ ‘Sir!’

  “Finger pressed to his lips, Silas withdrew silently into the interior of his warehouse and when Shemwell would have pursued, closed the door in his face.

  “That night, the first of the dark moon, Silas, Jacob, and I dined in a private room in the City Hotel and afterward waited on the wharf for the Wild Darrell. Neither Jacob nor I had ever seen the docking of our own blockade runner, and I don’t know who was more excited. Every time Pilot MacGregor sounded the Darrell’s steam whistle, Jacob shrieked and covered his ears, and I knew exactly how he felt.

  “The Wild Darrell was the most beautiful boat I have ever seen, low and gray and smart as a fresh-minted gold piece. Looking at her, I could have been satisfied if the war went on forever.

  “As soon as the hawsers were wrapped, stevedores swarmed over her while the sailors rollicked ashore for their customary celebration. ‘Come,’ Silas said quietly. ‘You must see this once. It will give the child something to remember.’

  “A room on the second floor of the City Hotel was reserved for the Wild Darrell’s crew. In a city where many children went to bed hungry, the seamen’s table was laid with hams and roasts of beef, chickens, crabs, oysters, and wooden buckets containing bottles of iced champagne. MacGregor was already drunk and boldly toasted Silas, ‘To him who has made our prosperity possible!’

  Silas raised his own glass in salute, called for attention, and explained that I, his wife, was now clerk of the company and instructions from me were the same as instructions from himself. Silas said he was proud of their long association and glad to count such skilled seamen as friends. Silas said that words were poor thanks and proposed, as per custom, to promptly pay their wages in gold. He added—rather slyly, I thought—‘If my wife should approach you with nine-percent Confederate bonds, you needn’t feel positively obligated to buy them!’

  “Apparently my bond dealings were news in Nassau, because the sailors found this sally amusing.

  “I took no drink and Silas took only what he could not politely refuse. A glass with the drunkard macGregor was a bitter draft, but Silas downed it manfully.

  “When we returned home, I warned Silas that MacGregor might have been drinking during his passage through the blockading fleet and that our ship was imperiled.

  “Silas wore such a sad expression on his face. ‘When I was younger, I thought success assured to those who pressed their endeavors with honesty, energy and honor. . . .’

  “I was impatient with his despair and unfortunately I told him so. Without another word to me, Silas took his still packed suitcases to the railroad station, where he waited until morning for the Richmond train.

/>   “In Silas’s absence, I hoped to improve his opinion of me by attending to his business. The Wild Darrell sailed on time, but not before I told MacGregor his failings were remarked. The rogue swore he hadn’t started drinking until safely across the bar in the Cape Fear River and next passage he would wait until he stepped off the Wild Darrell for his first drink. MacGregor loved that boat, and he was the finest pilot on the coast—a fact which comforted me more than it should have. In those days I overvalued talent.

  “Other boat owners and speculators were surprisingly willing to share their hard-gained knowledge with a keen and flattering novice. That month was one of the happiest of my life and flew by so rapidly that Silas was back before I missed him. Silas didn’t say much: they still would not listen to him in Richmond, his advice was unheeded, Lee’s army starved.

  “The first night of the dark moon, our little family dined at the City Hotel, and in a desultory manner, Silas asked Jacob what he had learned at the office. When Jacob recited his child’s sums, Silas was briefly interested and called him ‘Marguerite’s little tradesman.’ That night we waited on the wharves for the Wild Darrell, until, at two-thirty in the morning, the fateful telegram was brought to us.

  “Fort Fisher, at the mouth of the Cape Fear River, was an enormous ring of sand forts, surrounded by swamps and mosquitoes. From its parapets at dawn we could see onto Frying Pan Shoals, where the poor Wild Darrell had been driven by the blockaders. Though the crew had reached shore, the surf was too rough to salvage the cargo, and we watched as our beautiful gallant ship broke up. Silas showed no emotion, but I was sick at heart.

  “Silas told me to pay the crew.

  “I said, ‘But I am sure MacGregor was drunk. And the crew must take the same financial risks as we do. As we have lost everything, so must they.’

  “Silas looked at me as if he had never seen me before, never known me, never seen me nurse Jacob, never listened to my singing, never touched my skin. He nodded. ‘As you prefer, madam. The company is yours. Run it as you see fit.’