by Ashe Barker
Victoria shook her head. “I can’t, not right now. The mill is so busy, and I have much to settle.” She glanced up, softening her tone as she took in her mother’s anxious expression. “Maybe later in the year. When the weather improves.”
The older woman bestowed a considering gaze on her eldest child, then nodded. “In the summer then. Definitely. I insist. Georgina, please pass your sister some potatoes.”
Between them Hester and Georgina Wynne ensured that Victoria was well supplied with food, then they both peered at her as she pushed their efforts around on her plate.
“Is the beef not to your liking? I believe Mrs. Bridger purchased it especially with you in mind.” Georgina’s question several minutes later interrupted Victoria’s frantic head-spinning.
“What? Yes, it is very nice. Perfectly tender. Mrs. Bridger has done well, as always.”
“Then why do you not eat it? We have the finest cook in town, you always say so. You should do her food justice.”
“As I said, I am tired, and not especially hungry I find. Please convey my apologies and my appreciation to Mrs. Bridger.” Victoria laid down her knife and fork and crumpled her napkin before tossing it onto the table. She rose. “I wonder, would you both excuse me, please?”
“I trust you do not intend to return to work.” Hester’s tone was tart as she watched her daughter’s progress toward the door.
Victoria paused, and half turned. “No. Well, not really. I do have some figures to look over. Not much, I promise, just an hour or so. I’ll be in the library.”
“Very well, dear. I’ll pop in and say goodnight later then.” Hester sounded less than impressed, but Victoria was too accustomed to managing her own time to take much notice. She left them to the remains of their meal.
In the library she sat for some time and stared at the empty sheet of paper laid out before her, her quill idle beside it.
She needed to write to him, to this Mr. Adam Luke. It was necessary to explain that Edward had been entirely remiss in staking Wynne’s mill in a card game, and that the situation required to be rectified without delay. She glanced at the business card her brother had dropped on her desk as he left, and which she had scooped up and shoved in her pocket as she did likewise.
Mr. Horace Catchpole, Solicitor and Commissioner For Oaths.
The address was a smart street in the city of London. It would appear Mr. Luke could afford the best. Lacking any details of the man himself, she would have to contact him through his legal representative. Victoria sighed and picked up her pen. She dipped it in the ink and started to write.
Dear Mr. Catchpole,
I correspond with you as you are the legal representative acting for Mr. Adam Luke in the matter of Wynne’s Weaving Mill, Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire. I am the proprietor of that establishment and would like to take this opportunity to clarify a misunderstanding that I believe may have arisen in respect of the future of this enterprise.
My brother, Mr. Edward Wynne, may have left Mr. Luke under the mistaken impression that this business and associated properties were available to be disposed of in payment of a debt. This is not the case. Wynne’s Weaving Mill is a thriving, going concern and Mr. Wynne had no right to offer it as he did.
I appreciate this may cause some difficulties, but those are not of my making, nor are they mine to resolve. I must ask Mr. Luke to confirm that Wynne’s remains in my control, and further I urge your client to take up any outstanding financial issues with my brother.
Yours faithfully,
V. Wynne
Victoria folded the paper and slid it into an envelope. She addressed it with care and set it aside to post first thing in the morning. It would go first class, and she would take it to the post office herself, preferring not to entrust the missive to a curious servant who would be sure to chatter about Miss Wynne’s urgent correspondence with a London lawyer.
She was not entirely happy with the wording of her letter, knowing full well she was making claims that went beyond her legal status in this affair. In short, she was bluffing. She hoped though to give Mr. Luke reason to pause, and to enter into a dialogue with her. If she could meet with him, explain the true nature of her brother’s involvement in the mill, Mr. Luke would be forced to agree with her that it would be wholly inappropriate to continue with this charade.
Meanwhile, she would continue as normal. There was no reason whatsoever to disturb her mother or Georgina with this nonsense.
By unspoken mutual consent, Victoria and her mother had divided up their responsibilities after her father died. Hester took charge of all matters of a domestic or social nature, and cared for Georgina. Victoria devoted herself to the mill and to ensuring they remained prosperous. She might even go so far as to allow that they were wealthy, though they lived relatively simply. Certainly, their living standards had not declined in the years since Edward senior was taken from them, and Victoria took great personal pride in that.
She had received no formal training, but had been fascinated by the mill and everything to do with it from an early age. As soon as she could walk she had been in the habit of toddling the short distance from the garden at Wynne House to the back door of the mill. She would clamber up those wooden stairs onto the floor where the offices were located, and look for her papa. She would invariably find him engrossed in his ledgers, his fingertips stained with ink as he recorded rows upon rows of figures in his neat, precise hand. Often Mr. Timmins would be there too, scratching in the books, tallying up invoices and receipts. He was a much younger man then of course, but he had infinite patience with the small girl who dogged his progress around the mill.
In contrast, her brother spent his time adventuring with his friends, and as he grew older, cavorting with girls from the town. He spent less and less time at home, and none at all in the mill. Her father saw no real problem with this; the lad was merely sowing his wild oats as all young men must. He would do his duty perfectly well when the time came to settle down. The elder Mr. Wynne harboured no doubts that his son would have a head for the business—it was in the blood after all. You only had to look at little Victoria to know that.
Victoria didn’t cavort, and had no adventures. She grew up among weavers and engineers, and revelled in everything connected with the textile trade. She knew how the machinery operated, she understood exactly how the finest cloth was woven, how much it was worth down to the last half penny, and who would likely buy it. She had assumed throughout her childhood and adolescence that she would have a role in the mill when she grew up. She was quick with figures, could calculate cash flows and projections in her head, and knew all the most reliable suppliers of the finest wool. She expected to run Wynne’s with her father, and eventually her brother, so she was devastated when Mr. Wynne explained to her, gently but firmly, that the proper place for a gentle young lady of means was in the drawing rooms of their friends and acquaintances, or aiding those less fortunate through charitable works. She should not aspire to a life of managing a workforce and arguing with other mill owners about the price of cloth.
Victoria endured almost a year of that existence while her father continued to run the mill without her aid, and considered herself to be in her own personal purgatory. Her ordeal ended with his death but even so, she grieved deeply over the loss of her beloved papa, and not a day had passed in the ten years since that she did not miss him. When Edward junior announced his imminent departure, she silently rejoiced, always knowing she would step in. Her mother offered no objections to Victoria’s new status, and the pair of them slipped into an easy alliance that served them well on the whole.
Their only source of disagreement was Edward. Hester fretted over her son’s antics and his frequent demands for cash. She worried about him. Victoria was simply glad he had gone. She paid up when she saw no alternative, and life continued well enough. Until now.
Chapter Two
“Damned traffic.” Adam Luke scowled at the spatter
s of mud speckling his fine shoes, deposited there in the wake of a brewery dray that had splashed though a muddy puddle right alongside him. His housekeeper would see to the matter, but even so, it added to his general irritation at the way his affairs were proceeding today.
Adam valued good timekeeping in others, but today he was late himself. He was scheduled to meet with Mr. Catchpole at noon sharp, and it was already after one. His earlier business had overrun, his fellow directors of the London Electrical Company quite unable to arrive at a decision. Sometimes he wondered if any one of them would be able to discern the time in a roomful of clocks. That alone was enough to aggravate his temper, but their obstinacy in the face of what appeared to him to be a sound and exciting business venture confounded him entirely. At last, unable to convince them of the wisdom of investing in the proposal before the board, he accepted defeat with his usual imperturbable expression whilst inwardly seething. He made his excuses, prior engagement and all that, and took his leave.
Now, his collar turned up against the drizzling rain that persisted after the main deluge had passed, he strode purposefully along Gresham Street in the direction of his solicitor’s chambers, his cane rapping on the wet pavement as he went.
When he arrived at his destination and entered, the three clerks in the outer office glanced up as he marched in. One of them, the senior assistant to Mr. Catchpole and his partner Mr. Herrington, leapt to his feet to greet him.
“Mr. Luke, how nice to see you. Mr. Catchpole is expecting you. May I take your coat?”
“Thank you.” Adam shrugged out of the formal overcoat, which was borne away at once by the eager clerk. A junior assistant stepped forward to relieve him of his hat and cane, just as Mr. Catchpole himself appeared in the doorway of his inner office.
“Ah, there you are. May I offer you a little refreshment? A tray of tea perhaps, or maybe something more fortifying in this dismal weather.”
“No, nothing, thank you.” Adam turned to his lawyer. “I apologise for my tardiness; a prior meeting took rather longer than it should have.”
Horace Catchpole waved the apology away. “No matter, no matter. You are here now. Won’t you come in, please? I have everything ready for you.” Adam followed the man into his inner sanctum.
Horace Catchpole’s office was a complete mystery to most of his clients, and Adam Luke was no exception. A scrupulously tidy and well-ordered man himself, he found the chaos that surrounded the workspace occupied by his lawyer little short of baffling. Despite his apparent disorderliness however, the solicitor was efficient, meticulous in his attention to detail, and could be inventive when such was called for. He had extricated Adam from any number of legal complexities, which tended to be the lot of those intent on trading abroad. Adam’s business affairs frequently brought him into contact with unfamiliar commercial and taxation legislation, which was where Catchpole came into his own. He was invaluable, even if his filing system resembled a jumble sale and his desk a war zone. Bundles of papers were piled on every available surface, all of them tied with neat red ribbon. Books filled every inch of shelving, and the overspill was piled on the floor, teetering in precarious columns that threatened to topple at any moment. A man might be injured or killed if he stood in the wrong place for too long.
Adam eyed the scene with some trepidation, then took a seat on the opposite side of Horace Catchpole’s desk. He felt himself to be out of range of the most perilous stack of legal tomes, but even so he would try not to linger.
“I will not take up too much of your time, Horace. You have papers for me, I believe. And correspondence?”
“Indeed, yes. I have the contract for the cargo of silks from Constantinople, and for the acquisition of building land adjacent to the Hudson River. You also have several offers for The Nymph, and confirmation that her replacement will be delivered to your shipyard within the month.” The lawyer remained on his feet, peering into the disorderly array of papers on his large side table. He seemed to do no more than sniff the air as far as Adam could tell, then dived into the morass to retrieve the bundles he required. He set four sets of documents on the desk, shoving aside the sheets he must have been working on when Adam arrived. “If you would like to peruse these, we can conclude the necessaries and get on.”
“Indeed.” Adam reached for the first bundle, the land in America.
“Are you sure you won’t take a drink? I have some fine whisky somewhere about, I am certain of it.” The solicitor gazed about the room, an air of optimism apparent on his thin features.
“Quite sure, thank you.” Adam rarely drank during the working day. He found his commercial affairs prospered the better for it.
Almost an hour later they had concluded the pressing matters in the assembled documents. Adam laid his pen down, having signed the contract to purchase several thousand rolls of the finest Persian silk currently languishing in a warehouse in Turkey. He was confident of a ready market among the dressmakers of London and Paris. He glanced up at his man of affairs, who was scanning the finished papers. “There is one other matter I wished to discuss with you, Horace. Do you have a few more minutes? I am aware I was late, so if you have other clients waiting…”
Mr. Catchpole shook his head vigorously. “No, of course not. I am entirely at your disposal. And if you have a few minutes more, I also have a further matter requiring your attention, one that only came to light this morning.”
“Very well. We’ll deal with that too.” Adam leaned forward, his elbows propped on the desk. “I was late this morning because I was attending a meeting of the board of the London Electrical Company. You will recall I purchased shares in the business, and was offered a seat on the board last year.”
“I do indeed. You exhibit a very modern turn of mind, Mr. Luke, if I may say so.”
“I am aware of your mistrust of electricity and its various applications, but I remain of the view that our future lies in such experimentation. I spent the greater part of this morning with London Electrical discussing the work of one Alexander Graham Bell, a Scot now resident in America, who has been experimenting with a system of communication based on converting electrical impulses into sound. He recently demonstrated his device, the telephone, to the queen.”
“Yes, I heard of this. Her majesty encourages such enterprise, I gather.”
“She does, and as usual I find myself in agreement with her. Mr. Bell has developed a method of sending the human voice across distances, potentially taking communication into whole new dimensions. It is considerably more sophisticated and versatile than the telegraph, and will be more accessible to all.”
“Will be?”
“Yes. The work requires further development, but I am convinced it is worth investing in it. Unfortunately and despite my most persuasive efforts, London Electrical was not of the same view and has refused to sponsor Mr. Bell’s company to undertake the work necessary to bring this invention to a mass audience.”
“I see.” Horace Catchpole’s expression was guarded.
“I consider that a short-sighted view at best. I wish to sponsor Mr. Bell’s work, in exchange of course for a guaranteed share of his profits should he succeed in patenting and distributing his device. I think five hundred pounds will suffice for now, but I may be agreeable to further sums should the results appear to show promise.” He reached into his inner jacket pocket and retrieved a folded sheet of paper. “Here are the details. Please, would you make the necessary arrangements?”
Horace took the papers and added them to the general mayhem on his desk. He scowled at the documents but offered no further comment on the investment. “Of course. I will send a note to you when the contracts are prepared.”
“Thank you. Am I to understand that you have another matter requiring my attention?”
“Yes, sir. You will recall that industrial property you acquired last month in lieu of a gambling debt? A textile mill, I understand, in Yorkshire. You asked me to action the transfer o
f the property into your name, to arrive at a reliable valuation, and to make arrangements for its disposal.”
Adam sat back in his chair. “Yes, I remember. Young Edward Wynne at his inebriated best. The man is an idiot and a drunk, but I would not usually have taken advantage. He did owe me in excess of two thousand pounds though by the time I cornered him in Crockford’s about to fritter away even more. Rather than insisting he pay me before squandering what might remain of his funds, I invited him to share a game of faro and reclaimed the debt that way. I trust the valuation has shown my judgement to be sound?”
“Yes, sir, it was indeed sound. The property is worth considerably more than Mr. Wynne owed to you. It turns out his mill is a working concern, not an empty and disused building as we had assumed, and there is residential property also included in the holding.” He rummaged among the chaos littering his desk for a few seconds, then spread a sheet of paper out on the only clear space right in front of where he sat. “Ah, yes, here we are. Several small cottages, and a mill owner’s house extending to twelve bedrooms, and set in ten acres. You made an excellent bargain, Mr. Luke.”
“How excellent?”
“The mill alone is likely to sell for as much as fifteen thousand pounds. With the associated housing the value rises to something in excess of twice that sum.”
Adam let out a low whistle. He was beyond surprised, acknowledging that his estimation of Edward Wynne may have been a tad ungenerous given that the man was in possession of such a lucrative property. On second thoughts though, the young fool had relinquished the asset with an ease bordering on careless. Adam allowed himself a rare smile. The feckless Mr. Wynne doubtless had no idea what he owned. Correction, used to own.
“I am delighted to hear it, Horace. But you indicated an issue had arisen?”
“Yes. I received this letter in yesterday’s post. I would have responded immediately, but as we had this meeting planned for today I preferred to seek your view first.” He selected another sheet from beneath the one he was reading from, and passed that to Adam. “A letter, sir, from an individual claiming to be the owner of the property in question, and if I am interpreting the meaning correctly, disputing your interest.”
