Virtue’s Reward (A Poor Man at the Gate Series, Book 11)

by Andrew Wareham

  “It was Napoleon who said we were a nation of shopkeepers, was it not? A nation that defeated his Imperial ambitions! It is hard, James, to deny such men a voice in our affairs. You are right, I think. A moderate measure of Reform that will bring them into our counsels, that can only be good. But not the denizens of the gutter – they have nothing to say in Westminster. The navigators and the farm labourers; the dustmen and the road sweepers; the carters and the soldiers and the sailors – what interest have they in government?”

  “None indeed, Rothwell, and you will not find me, or I believe any except the most rabid of Radicals, suggesting otherwise.”

  “I think we are in agreement there, James. What of our colonies? How is the world treating them?”

  “The Sugar Islands will hardly survive the abolition of slavery. Yet they cannot turn the march of progress backwards. Slavery must and shall go – and they must seek their own salvation afterwards, however they may. The Mediterranean islands, Corfu and Malta, are healthy indeed, bastions against the tyranny of the Moor and bases for British trade and influence. Canada shows the potential for riches and is a fine place for men and women to go to work and prosper. The Cape – a different matter; prosperous, but would be more so if only those bloody Dutch-Malays would do as they propose and flee north away from our jurisdiction. They upset the blacks by enslaving them and then demand the army’s protection against them! Nasty people! India is not my concern, of course – a jewel of our crown! The Antipodes, Terra Australis Incognita as it was used to be called, will one day be a great nation, built on the backs of our criminals, which is very strange when one considers it!”

  Rothwell was taken aback – he had only enquired out of courtesy, had not really imagined that there were so many places under English control.

  “Africa is the place, Rothwell.”

  “It is, James?”

  “A vast continent and almost unknown to us. There must be gold and jewels; ivory and hides; cocoa and coffee and a hundred unknown crops – all waiting the adventurer’s footstep. If we do not take Africa, then who will? The French? The Prussians? The Russians, perhaps? The Dutch? Talking of which, the Dutch that is, what is this of your brother, Rothwell?”

  Rothwell was immediately defensive – some damned fool had been talking! Nothing was to be known about his brother’s unwise activities.

  “One of those affairs, James. All, or much, went astray, it would seem, but all is to be kept quiet, of course.”

  “Oh! Them! Spies and bogey-catchers! More trouble than they are worth, if you ask me! Useful in their place, but they must be kept in that place, firmly!”

  James limped across to the door, accompanying Rothwell as courtesy demanded. He made no attempt, however, to lead him down the pair of stairs to the front door; there was a limit to manners. He wondered again whether he should not have his offices moved to the ground floor, but the rule was almost inflexible in government – ‘the more senior, the higher’. Better not to breach convention.

  Rothwell waved to a cab and returned to his town house, noticing that Town stank more than normal. There had been no rain for a week and the River Thames was thicker, more soup-like than ever. He called for the housekeeper.

  “Water, Mrs Evans.”

  “Yes, sir. All of ours comes from the rain butts, sir. Every gutter runs to its down-pipe and all is collected, sir, not none going to waste, except, that is, sir, for the water-closets what uses town-water piped from the wells.”

  “Very good, Mrs Evans. I would not wish to think that any water that we drink or which food is cooked in, or crockery washed-up, came from the Thames.”

  “Not a bit, sir. All from the roof. Best lead guttering and pipes, all mended every year as is.”

  “Excellent, indeed!”

  He joined his wife in her rooms, discovered her brother to have come visiting.

  They made stilted conversation for a few minutes before the young man took his leave.

  “Good of him to call, my dear. It must be nearly a year since last you saw him.”

  “Almost, George. He is worried about something; he is in trouble, I think, but could not bring himself to say what.”

  “Money?”

  “Perhaps; he is a fool where money is concerned, probably because he cannot count beyond five.”

  “He has ten fingers, surely, Corinna.”

  She held up her left hand, fingers spread, used the right to tally off the digits, one after another, slowly.

  “He has but one hand available, George.”

  He laughed, guiltily – it was unkind to mock the poor little chap.

  “Should I call on him? Ask what is wrong?”

  “No. He is afraid of you, for saying things that he cannot understand.”

  “But I only said ‘hello, old chap’ to him!”

  “Exactly.”

  Rothwell shook his head; he was not at his best with those of lesser intellect, he knew.

  “I shall tell Mama. If she does not know what his problem is then she may be moved to ask him. But only if she fears he may create a greater scandal than is ordinary. It would be best if he was to take himself off, you know, George. Perhaps you might challenge him to swim the Thames from the north bank to the south – he will always accept a wager.”

  That was a little unkind for him to consider, although he agreed that the young… ‘gentleman’ he supposed he must call him, was a blot waiting to obscure the family escutcheon.

  “We must, as you say, discuss the matter with your mother.”

  “Nothing about that one would surprise me, my lord. He was a seven-month baby, you know, and I have occasionally wondered whether that might not be the source of his problems. He was not expected to survive – but I never was lucky, you know, my lord.”

  Lady Massingham, a tear in her eye, called for refreshment, tossed down the glass the butler brought and accepted it refilled. Rothwell sipped at his glass and shuddered – neat brandy was not to his taste before noon.

  “Do you think that I should pay him a call, my lord? Do you have a direction for him?”

  “Perhaps he could be a mite shocked to see you on his doorstep, ma’am. A note first, do you think?”

  “He would have to get his man to read it to him and I prefer to keep family business private.”

  Rothwell surrendered and gave her the address of her son’s rooms.

  Lady Massingham appeared at the Town House towards three next afternoon, in a state of some shock and in urgent need of sustenance. Rothwell raised an eye to the butler, told him to bring brandy and keep the decanter close to hand; he might consider, in fact, pulling a keg up from the cellar. He received an unmistakable frown for his wit.

  “Oh, thank you, my lord! So considerate of you!”

  The brandy disappeared and a refill went the same way; by the third glass my lady was capable of rational speech.

  “At your strong suggestion, my lord, I visited the little beast this morning. You may note, I trust, the element of self-sacrifice involved! I had not seen him since my darling Corinna’s wedding – you were there, you must have noticed him – and I had had no intention of making the slightest contact with him in the immediate future, ideally not until his funeral. Be that as it may, and I trust the good intention will be noted in my favour when I look St Peter in the eye, I set aside my scruples and knocked upon his door this morning. It was opened by an ambivalent youth who claimed to be his man – a most unlikely ambition for this particular person, I would observe. He led me to my son’s rooms where I met the wretch, dressed all haphazardly and drinking a mug of porter, would you believe! I gave him good morning and asked what sort of disgusting scrape he had fallen into on this occasion.”

  Hardly the most tactful approach, Rothwell thought.

  “Would you believe, my lord? He burst into tears and called me ‘his dear Mama’, seeming to believe that I had come to his rescue.”

  “Foolish youth!” Rothwell commented.

  “Well
said, my lord! I instructed him to give me the round story and he, eventually, told me all. He has bought shares, it would seem, in a railway to be built from London to Paris, crossing the Channel by means of a tunnel! Because he was an early investor, he told me, he was permitted to purchase his shares of one hundred pounds sterling at a premium of just ninety!”

  “How many, my lady?”

  “Just one hundred, in the first instance, due to be paid at the end of this month, but he has signed a document allowing a call for the same amount at the December Quarter Day.”

  “Nine thousands immediately and as much again at year’s end. Where was he to find these sums?”

  “An acquaintance – a close friend – told him he might sell the shares on the Exchange for their full price, thus to clear a profit of one thousand on each occasion. He discovered only last week that the shares cannot be sold at all, why, he is unsure. He has not seen his friend for some weeks, and cannot understand that either.”

  “Foolish – as we already know. Place the matter in the hands of your lawyers, ma’am. Let him be placed under medical restraint for a while – actually admitted to a madhouse under the care of a known doctor – while an order of the High Court is sought. Better the loony bin and a mite of public scandal than the loss of eighteen thousand pounds!”

  Ladies Massingham and Rothwell were both impressed by his masterly grasp of the situation, agreeing that his was far the best course of action. Possibly Lord Massingham could be sent to join him at an early juncture.

  Rothwell had no attorney of his own in Town and knocked on Mr Michael’s door in the morning, explaining the problem and suggesting that he was the nearest sane male relative of the Massinghams.

  “Indeed, my lord, you have a direct interest in the estate as husband to the heiress. I shall contact Massingham’s people this day and discuss the best order that we might seek in court. An injunction upon the projectors of this so-called railway as well, and a writ in damages against them for driving the poor gentleman out of the very few wits he possessed. They will run away, of course, and will never be discovered for using false names in the whole affair. The end result must be that the Massingham estates will be placed into trusteeship – for my lady, being a female, may not be permitted custodianship. I shall offer your name as a trustee, my lord, including myself and one of Massingham’s people to make a balance and ensure that you do not abuse the estates to your own personal gain.”

  “But, if I am in effect to be heir, I could hardly do so.”

  “Quite, my lord, but one must follow the forms. I shall discover the income of the estate and make proposals for the maintenance of Lady Massingham and to cover the bills from the mad doctor. The remainder to fall into your hands, my lord, to be exercised for the benefit of future heirs, primarily, as you have pointed out, yourself. I shall investigate the reasons for the non-existence of an entail, which fact was established in the Wedding Settlements, I believe; there may be a statement of intent in a previous Will which may be held binding. The title, one understands, falls to a distant cousin; the estates do not, as we know.”

  “You seem well-informed already, Mr Michael.”

  “Your esteemed father, the Marquis, begged me to hold ready to intervene in your interest should the occasion arise while you were out of the country, my lord.”

  "He must know more of Lord Massingham than I, Mr Michael."

  "Lord Massingham is a gentleman of some notoriety, my lord. As a consequence, an injunction may be obtained within the day, sir, but the order of trusteeship in madness must be sought in Chancery and will inevitably take time, both father and son to be declared incompetent at one and the same moment... Assuming it to be unopposed then an interim order may be issued which will allow for the proper maintenance of the estates... The whole process will take as much as five years to complete, and the costs will not be small, and that cannot be avoided, I fear, unless the pair of them have the good taste to cock their toes up first, but we may expect you to have practical authority to take control within a very few days, my lord. The family has land in Southern England and substantial holdings in the North Country which include coal and iron mines - which account for a part of their wealth. The bulk of the Massingham's income derives from urban land, however, in London and Norwich and Bristol particularly, but also in Cardiff and Leeds. The rents total not less than fifteen thousands per annum, quite probably substantially more; there is, one understands, reason to question the probity of the agents who collect the monies but Lord Massingham would not bestir himself actually to investigate the matter."

  "Be assured that I shall, Mr Michael."

  "There will be a number of other issues to set right, I believe, my lord."

  Rothwell returned home in thoughtful mood - he had certainly become substantially richer in the space of the morning, but he had also become responsible for a run-down and probably criminally exploited set of estates. He had in the next few months to visit every one he believed, and that would demand travel as far north as Cumberland and south to Somerset with a diversion into Norfolk as well, calling into parts of Yorkshire en route.

  He took horses to Kettering next morning to confer with his father.

  "I cannot become a member, sir, not in these unforeseen circumstances - I would not be able to sit in the House as much as one day a week, I believe."

  "You say that Massingham and his son are both to be placed under restraint, George? A shocking affair! To become public knowledge as well if there is to be a court action."

  "Unavoidable, sir. I have reason to believe that Massingham is being milked of thousands each year by corrupt agents, and that needs be ended. When once I have the reins in my hands then I shall bring an end to their misconduct, have no doubt of that, sir - but I must needs do so in person."

  "I say again, shocking! That a noble family should be so reduced, and be associated with us as well. The incomes will be greater than forty thousands, I doubt not, when you are done. You must speak with your grandfather - if financial affairs need be untangled then he is the very man for the task! A word as well in the ear of Mr James Andrews is the best course. He has access to His Grace the Duke of Wellington on at least a weekly basis - the Duke having conceived a liking for him. He will explain that you have come into your inheritance on the wife's side and have found all to be in a state of chaos. The Duke will understand, of course, we all know of the Massinghams! He will appreciate that you will be busy indeed for the next years. You will be, you appreciate that, do you not, Rothwell?"

  "It was never my intention, sir, to become active as a landlord, but I have no alternative. I cannot beg Frederick to assume the burden for me and there is no other in the family."

  "Captain Hood will no doubt be of assistance, but I know him to wish to spend a year or two at Margaret's side - they are a very attractive couple, you know, George, so much taken with each other. I believe they wish for children and are on the way to fulfilment of that desire - though your mother will tell you more of that, I doubt not! Has it occurred to you that a marquisate with an income of fifty thousands and more might look to rise in the world? If you are not to be a political figure, then you might give thought to other forms of service. There are Boards requiring a day or so a month, and charitable institutions and such that could attract your interest."

  "To become a prominent personage, in fact, and eventually be recognised as such and promoted in this world..." George thought for a moment and realised that he might like to be a duke. "The more reason to excise any embarrassments, sir."

  "Such as Frederick?"

  "Indeed, sir. He is my brother, but he has made such a fool of himself that he must be pushed out of harm's way."

  "He is to travel here next week, you will be pleased to know. He is to wear eyeglasses henceforth, we discover, but he will be able to read easily, for which we must be thankful. He has not picked up his brushes yet - I do not know that he will ever do so, in fact... I have had word from Mr Henry Star of
a plantation to be bought in the State of Virginia and discover it to be not far removed from that of the good Colonel Miller, whose son is not unknown to us. The Colonel has in fact written to assure me that he will, as he quaintly expresses himself, 'take young Frederick in hand' and introduce him to plantation society and perhaps 'point him in the direction of a wife', a lady being essential to the good order of any plantation, he says."

  "An overwhelming gentleman, perhaps, sir? One who knows his own mind and everyone else's."

  "Certainly a gentleman of a managing disposition, of that there is no doubt. The Vienna Goldsmids are very upset, by the way, to hear of Frederick's injury and of the need for him to 'convalesce in a friendly clime' - an expression which tells us they know exactly why he must be sent to America. They have sent instructions to their young man in New York to transfer Frederick's account from Vienna to his care; it would seem that Frederick earned several thousands in commissions due to a fortunate falling out with the Esterhazys."

  "In the right place at the right moment, one suspects, sir."

  "I believe so - there was a potential scandal that was well scotched with Frederick's assistance. He was able to act as an intermediary between the Jewish bankers and the Austrian aristocracy, enabling them to speak to each other and avoid legal and diplomatic upsets that were otherwise inevitable. There is a little of goodwill there, I believe, which may one day be of advantage to the family - always useful to have a faint feeling of obligation from a family as great as the Esterhazys!"

  Thomas Clapperley landed in Bristol after five months at sea, winds having been unfavourable and the brig having pottered through the Sugar Islands before actually making the Atlantic crossing. He was very much displeased, convinced that he had been set up, actively defrauded by Henry Star; he had devoted many hours to considering all that had happened in New Orleans and recognised that he had come up against a master in the field of sharp practice. One day, perhaps, he would take his revenge. For the meanwhile he needed to reach his father's house in Lancashire.