Winstanley—nose up, fingers tapping more quickly than the clock ticking on the mantlepiece—said, “Yes, yes, and yes. I believe we can expect some resistance to such a meeting now from my predecessor in this position, but I also have faith that I can effect such a meeting through means and connections of my own.”
Barnabas, looking at the engraving of Rodney damaging the French fleet, hopped to his feet, threw one hand in the air and said, “Let’s go . . . now!”
Mr. Winstanley declined the offer to dine with Barnabas and Sanford, taking his leave with a statement that he had much to do on their behalf and would start at once that very evening. As he left, Reglum and Dorentius arrived as scheduled to join the McDoons for dinner.
Over a plain roast of mutton (with just the merest hint of mint-jelly, as Cook strove for economy, much to Barnabas’s chagrin), Reglum announced that he was removing himself to Woolwich.
“Figs and farthings, Woolwich? Whatever for?”
Reglum reminded them that he was a military man and that Woolwich was an ideal placement; he was joining the staff of the Royal Military Academy at Woolwich, which was next to the Royal Arsenal and the Royal Artillery Barracks.
“While you build the Indigo Pheasant,” said Reglum. “And Maggie and Dorentius here create and have installed the Great Fulginator, we must also look to the ship’s defenses. I will get us supplied with the latest in gunnery and ordnance—so necessary, as you know, if we are to traverse the Interrugal Lands successfully.”
“All the more important with the Owl taking a direct and personal interest in our little adventure,” added Dorentius.
“Precisely, thank you Dorentius. And then there’s the Ornish waiting for us on the other side, with their rapid-fire cannons. I want to learn what might best be applied to the Pheasant in terms of bombardment geometry, range-finding, that sort of thing. Also, we will need gunners onboard or will need at the very least to train to professional standards some of the volunteers Billy Sea-Hen is recruiting. No place better than Woolwich for that. Oh, and I will also have a secondary appointment at our sister college, the Addiscombe Military Seminary in Croydon.”
“Where the East India Company trains gunners and engineers for its army,” said Dorentius, in his most helpful voice.
“Spot on again, Dorentius, thank you.”
Cook entered with a plate of four small boiled sweets, one for each of the men at table. She looked apologetically at Barnabas (whose face had fallen when he saw the dessert) and indicated with her eyes that the fault lay entirely with Sanford; Sanford saw their exchange, and said nothing, maintaining a face of resolute determination.
“Well, bells and butterflies, that is all very stimulating news, Mr. Bammary,” said Barnabas while he nibbled on his sweet in a vain attempt to make it last. “We shall of course miss you being near us in the City, but neither Woolwich nor Croydon are more than an hour or so by chaise or by the Thames ferry for the one, so you will not have gone so very far. Jolly good thinking that, about the cannons and all—we’ll need as many of ’em as we can get, to handle whatever the Owl and the dismal roads may put in our path!”
The four men toasted to Reglum’s new position in Woolwich, and to the success of the Indigo Pheasant.
“Also, ahem, I do not mean to intrude where I am not welcome,” said Barnabas. “But Mr. Bammary, besides the guns and geometry, might there be any other reason for your decision to remove to Woolwich?”
Reglum shook his head and did not reply.
“Ah, well, I see then, and I apologize if I am too forward.”
Dorentius shifted the topic in the next moment by announcing that the Chancery Court had probated the will of the merchant “de Sousa” and had that very day accepted him and Reglum as the sole heirs.
“The money was, of course, never Salmius Nalmius’s in his own right,” said Dorentius. “Nor will it be ours as private persons. It was and is property of the Yountish people, held in trust by the Queen and her duly appointed representatives.”
“How much?” asked Sanford.
“Just over three thousand pounds sterling, net of all charges, fees, and etcetera,” said Dorentius. “We will deploy the majority of that amount towards equipping the Indigo Pheasant—as we are sure the Queen and the Chancellor would approve.”
“How soon?”
“I think you have a better grasp of your English judicial pace than we do, Mr. Sanford, but we are told by the Chancery solicitors that we can expect the first installments within the next few months, subject of course to how fast the assets can be liquidated, and etcetera.”
All four men toasted anew. Barnabas asked if that news did not also call for more sweets but Sanford rejected the motion.
As Reglum and Dorentius made ready to leave, the maid admitted a messenger in at the front door.
“Begging your pardons, sirs, I came as instructed, which is to say, as quick as rain and lightning, by St. Adelsina, I did.”
“Out with it, man,” said Sanford.
“Yes sir, here it is: I am ordered to tell you that your Chinese visitors will arrive within the next few days, sir, wind permitting. They are in an East Indiaman that has anchored in the Kentish roads just off Ramsgate, awaiting a turn in the wind to allow them to beat up the Thames. I came chip-chap straight up the Watling Street from Ramsgate to tell you, wore out three horses on the way. They will be staying in Devereux Court off the Strand, next to the Outer Temple and the other Inns of Court.”
After Barnabas tipped the messenger and sent him on his way, Reglum said, “‘The osprey pulls a fox from the ocean!’ So long as the fish-hawk stays aloft on his way back to shore!”
“We will, we will,” said Barnabas.
“We must,” said Sanford.
Sir John Barrow, Second Secretary of the Admiralty, was a man of vast and varied experience. He had visited China and lived for a while at the Cape in South Africa. He had seen and heard many strange things. Yet now his face was a picture of perplexed indignation, as if he had been told that the giants had walked down off the Guildhall Clock or that a temerity of dragons was soaring around the dome of St. Paul’s.
“Allow me to understand you completely,” he said. “Behind this entire project is a young woman of dark complexion, a child of Africa, who you are telling me is a gifted mathematician, some sort of black, female Newton?”
It was the second Tuesday after the day Winstanley had met with Barnabas and Sanford; as good as his word, and—confirming initial impressions—supremely well connected, Winstanley had gotten the meeting with Sir John. Besides Sanford, Barnabas, and Winstanley, five other individuals sat in the Admiralty chamber with Sir John: the two black-clad men known only as Mr. I. and Mr. Z.; James Cumming, the head of the Revenue & Judicial Department for the East India Company’s Board of Control; Lieutenant-Colonel James Salmond, head of the Examiner’s Department at the E.I.C., and William M’Culloch, Assistant Secretary for Revenue, also of the E.I.C.’s Examiner’s Department. Conspicuously absent was any representative from the Treasury.
“Very well,” continued Sir John. “I see from your faces and the scraping of your feet that this is exactly what you would have me understand. Gentlemen, I trust you understand in turn the gravity of the circumstances, to wit, that our government has invested a full ten thousand pounds sterling—and is presumably being asked now to invest further sums—on the basis of this girl’s alleged and purported capabilities. A girl born enslaved on a tobacco plantation in Maryland, a pauper’s daughter educated at the whim of charity, until very recently a servant!”
No one spoke.
“Within the confines of this room, we may acknowledge that our sovereign is mad, and our prince-regent a wastrel,” Sir John plowed ahead. “Yet their government is neither. We will not be played for fools or spendthrifts. We did not beat Napoleon being either. We are not building the greatest empire since the Romans, based on projects of dubious outcome. Do I make myself clear?”
The meeting laste
d exactly one hour. Sir John asked all the questions and issued all the orders.
“The Chinese have not declared themselves to His Majesty’s Government,” he intoned. “But they are here in London and we must view them as a de facto embassy. Lt.-Col. Salmond, please have the E.I.C. extend all courtesies and receive the Chinese as soon as can be arranged, with all due protocol and circumstance. In the meantime, what is their purpose in being here? They have come a very great distance at great expense—the Emperor of China does not send us even his semi-official ambassadors on any regular basis; in fact, he has never sent us any ambassadors at all. Do they know aught of Lord Amherst’s embassy to Peking?”
He looked directly at Sanford and Barnabas, and said, “How very strange a coincidence—if coincidence it be—that both you and these Chinese are connected with that funny Dutch couple at the Cape.”
“The Termuydens,” ventured Barnabas.
“Yes, yes. I knew them rather well, actually, when I lived at the Cape. Rum pair, the both of them. Marvellously sociable, to be sure, quick with the most comical and far-fetched stories, but I always felt that there was a secret or two lurking behind that gay façade of theirs. Now I am very certain they have been hiding something. I think you know what that something is, and my two associates here indicate the same.”
Mr. I. and Mr. Z. bowed slightly.
“Of McDoon & Co. we know a fair amount,” continued Sir John. “Respectable house—no, do not bow, I simply state facts—long tied to the India trade, especially on the Malabar coast, and to the North and East Seas in Europe, Hamburg and all that. Known for wise dealing, honourable and, above all, profitable. Yet now, the house of McDoon is—again, I simply state facts—on the verge of ruin, having overextended itself trying to build a ship called the Indigo Pheasant. So, I ask myself, what has caused this sudden and unforeseen reversal in fortune? Standing before me, neither of you appears to have lost your wits or qualities since you returned from your long stint abroad, so what might be the reason for such a downturn, . . . unless something happened on that sojourn overseas that could possibly be the threat or challenge, hmmm?”
Sir John proceeded in his shrewd way. As the clock rang the three-quarter hour, he said: “The ineluctable conclusion thus far is that McDoon & Co. will lose the Indigo Pheasant, see it acquired in whole by the firm of Coppelius, Prinn & Goethals (Widow), in the very near future unless you receive a significant infusion of fresh capital. Capital, which equally inescapable, can only at this juncture come from His Majesty’s Government in one form or guise or the other. Is that how you read this at Cannery Row?”
Mr. Cummings nodded in agreement.
“And at Leadenhall?”
The lieutenant-colonel and Mr. M’Culloch said “yes” in unison.
“Most unfortunately, the government can not snap its fingers and produce funds willy-nilly. In fact, the hounds from Treasury are already barking hard about the initial investment. What funds His Majesty’s Government do possess are claimed by the Foreign Office and the Office of War for various initiatives necessary to protect the Crown and expand the Empire—I am certain that you have read in the papers about some of those undertakings, yes? Nevertheless, the affair of the Indigo Pheasant seems bound up in our imperial policies, like as not. The Prime Minister himself has taken an interest. Your little ship and whatever project is additionally linked to it have become matters of some importance at Whitehall and at St. James.”
Barnabas and Sanford shook their heads, half in relief, half in disbelief.
With five minutes left on the clock, Sir John said: “Finally, we come to the most peculiar piece to this entire peculiar business. Are you aware that several of your associates, including a member of your own family, have applied for patents relating to the equipment to be installed on the Indigo Pheasant?”
Barnabas and Sanford were stunned.
“Oh my, I see this comes entirely as news, and not happy news either. Yes, last month the lawyer Sedgewick—very well known to you, and also to us—applied for six patents at the Six Clerks Office at the Court of Chancery, all done in good and proper order.”
“Sedgewick?!”
“Yes, on behalf of one James Kidlington, also well known to us, and—I hesitate to say it—the Miss Sarah McLeish. Your niece, Mr. McDoon.”
“Kidlington! But he has nothing to do with making the technology aboard the Pheasant! Sally? Sally?!”
“Yes, she is presented as the chief author on all six patents. What most intrigues us is the nature of the devices and technologies for which patents are sought.”
Mr. I. handed Sir John a paper dense with writing in a fine hand.
“‘Intent to apply for an engine, partly powered by steam, to be known hereafter as a Fulginator,’” read Sir John. “The preliminary specification is—mildly put—cloudy, vague, a taunt to real comprehension. We flatter ourselves at Admiralty in being very well-informed on most matters, particularly as they relate to novel technologies, yet we have never heard of a science called ‘fulgination.’ Trust me when I say that we have burrowed through our extensive library and archive this past month searching for so much as the whisper of a suggestion as to what ‘fulgination’ might be, and have found . . . absolutely nothing. But I see from your faces—do not deny it!—that the art is not unknown to you.”
The clock chimed the top of the hour. Sir John handed the paper back to Mr. I., and stood up.
“Another group of people sits two rooms away awaiting my presence,” he said. “Involving the bold young Raffles and his plans to create a city he calls Singapore on the Straits of Malacca. There, some advance notice on a trading opportunity, I presume—perhaps a chance for McDoon & Co. to earn some of the capital it needs for its Pheasant. In the meantime, we will continue to monitor your difficult and—for the Crown—potentially unfortunate set of circumstances. Mr. McDoon, Mr. Sanford: you will hear from us again soon.”
With that, Sir John strode out of the room, followed by all the E.I.C. and Admiralty officials, leaving Sanford and Barnabas to find their own way out.
“Oh, beans and bacon, Sanford, I don’t know what to say!”
Sanford said nothing, but he left thinking many thoughts, each thought possessing the clarity of very cold, still water, and the sharpness of air breathed at a mountain-top.
At the very moment that Barnabas and Sanford were leaving the Admiralty, Sally was drinking tea with James Kidlington at Hatchards on Piccadilly. Hatchards was one of their favourite rendez-vous spots, a decorous haven to which they repaired two and even three times a week. One of London’s leading bookshops, Hatchards had instituted the practice of serving tea in their private reading room (Hatchards deftly met all the proprieties: its white-gloved stewards brought out the tea to customers, but respectfully understood that the ladies must be allowed to pour and offer the tea themselves). Delicate society widely regarded Hatchards as one of the few places a single young lady could, without danger to her respectability, venture on her own; being seen there with a gentleman was likewise accepted, or at least did not start too many tongues into the courseways of gossip.
The reading room had been refreshed after the wars ended, setting the tone for shops and places of restoration throughout the West End (the bookshops at Paternoster Row and elsewhere in the City, once frequented by an eager Sally, remained dour, strictly mercantile places). The wallpaper was broad stripes, a crimsony claret bordered by pale gold alternating with bleue celeste. The wainscoting was made of a mellow rufous mahogany, with steadily darkening undertones. Hatchards had just put in gaslights, casting a gentle glow from brass sconces, making diffused shadows across the wallpaper and along the dado, seeping down into the mahogany below. On one wall was an elegantly understated black clock with a white face and gold numbers and hands. It announced each hour with a low, lingering, deep-bellied note, reminding visitors that time was in fact passing but reinforcing in them the complacent conviction that here in Hatchards they were insulated from the press
ure of that passage.
On a large table upfront, the kind with massive lion’s paws carved as the feet, lay neatly arranged all the day’s serious newspapers and all the important journals and reviews. Just beyond was the main room, its walls lined floor to ceiling with books. Patrons conversed in a hushed mood of reverence, votaries at the temple. The noise of Piccadilly and the streets beyond receded to a swash of muted sound, as if those fortunate enough to be on Hatchards’ premises were enclosed and protected within an ornate whelk.
Sally needed the refuge of Hatchards especially badly that day. She had had even less sleep than usual; her tossing and fretting had driven Isaak away long before dawn. That bird with the ridiculous name had been the culprit, his endless nocturnal whistling and gurgling the source of her insomnia. It was not right that everyone loved the intruder so, and made such a fuss about it coming with them on the return-journey to Yount. She—Sally—had named the ship. The ship was the Indigo Pheasant; it was emphatically not named for a ragged, party-coloured grackle. Why would not the others see that? Because they were enthralled by Maggie, whose chief talents (so it seemed to Sally) were to unearth unhappinesses and to traffic in arrogance and pride, and whose only beliefs were in herself alone and in the unchallenged supremacy of her plans and designs, as opposed to those of anyone else.
Thus she pinned all her hopes for the day on James; seeing James was to be the antidote for her trickling anger and growing frustration. At Hatchards, she could escape the conglomerated contempt for James shown by the rest of the McDoon household. Alone with James, Sally felt free of their criticism, and could see again each day for herself the depth of feeling, the cleverness, the adroit and caring little gestures that James embodied, and that James so quickly and willingly shared with her.
The Indigo Pheasant: Volume Two of Longing for Yount: 2 Page 17
