The ringleader of the Blacks demanded his speech and proceeded to call the Wrath of Heaven down on those who had condemned him; there was no fortuitous thunderstorm and his words went unheeded by the great majority. James heard whispers behind him, the servingmen who had assisted him quietly saying that it didn’t seem that the Lord was paying much attention to his prayers today.
The five condemned were offered hoods, mostly as a courtesy to relatives stood watching – the blood suffused faces of the hanged were not a pretty sight. Nooses were looped round their necks, the slack taken up and the knots carefully positioned either to strangle slowly or to at least displace the vertebrae of the neck and cause immediate unconsciousness if not to kill outright. The ringleader kicked and jerked for a quarter of an hour before finally stilling, the Militia ringing the scaffold and preventing any relative from swinging on his legs to speed his passage. The ropes were cut and the five dropped into their coffins, carefully placed under their feet, and they were carried away to the wagon, the crowd hearing the tapping of a hammer and assuming they were being nailed down, a clever move on the part of the Resurrection Men who did not fancy being lynched on discovery.
The whole process of hanging the five and readying the gallows for the next batch took nearly an hour, and the sky was clouding up, a strong chance of rain. Sir Charles bade the Sheriff’s officer to speed things up and the next four came at the run, speeches cut ruthlessly short, knots placed to deal with the business quickly. The thirteenth coffin lid was lowered just as the first raindrops fell, enabling the platform party to get inside almost dry, just in the mood to enjoy the bowl of rum punch awaiting them.
“Highly successful, Mr Andrews!” Sir Charles was very pleased with himself. “I doubt we shall see more disorder in Burton for the next many years!”
Robert was inclined to agree – most of the unemployed and single men had been taken away, either by gallows or transportation, and there were very few left to create any trouble. The message would have been driven home to the adjoining villages as well and the troublemakers there could be expected to draw their horns in. A longer term solution was still necessary, however.
“I think you must be right, Sir Charles. It remains though to prevent the same thing happening again in a few years time. I would think this to be a good moment to encourage emigration, to spend a few pounds to get rid of the excess population, much as was done in Finedon two years ago.”
Sir Charles demurred, he felt he had already wasted too much of his substance on the affairs of the ill-conditioned. Perhaps, he suggested, Mr James might bring this matter before the House of Commons so that government could consider funding emigration to Africa and Botany Bay on a proper scale rather than in local penny packets. It would be more of a Utilitarian approach, as well, to use available English labour to build prosperous colonies for England rather than throwing them away on America.
Henry Star was a busy man, his importance increasingly known in his adopted city. It had been suggested to him that he might give thought to elected office, but he had declined the opportunity, certainly in the short term.
“I am flattered and honoured, gentlemen that you should offer me your trust in such a fashion, but, I cannot agree with your suggestion. I am English born, gentlemen, as you all know, and I think that the government of the American people should lie in the hands of men who have been here more than the very few years I can claim. It seems to me to be only just and fair that it should be so. In twenty years time, then it may well be a different matter – I feel that I will by then have proved myself to the satisfaction of all.”
He demonstrated his bona fides by making a substantial donation to the funds of the Southern Republicans, a moribund party but still with a few important, and hungry, figureheads.
He was, in fact, far too busy building his fortune to dabble in the dangerous waters of politics. New Orleans was as much French in its political habits as it was American, and assassination seemed to be an accepted tool of campaigning for state representatives and for the national system. The Duellists Guild, based along the river in Natchez but very active in New Orleans itself, had been in existence since Spanish days and had evolved into an open supplier of assassins who could be hired to provoke a political, or business or romantic, adversary into an ‘encounter of honour’ which the professional of the Guild would invariably win. Most businessmen hired bodyguards, commonly from the Guild, whose job it was to forestall any attempt to create a duel, but politicians were in the nature of things much more vulnerable and Henry wanted to live for a number of years yet, so he made his neutrality expensively clear.
The tobacco trade had, as he had expected, been closed down by the Spanish authorities, but he had been able to turn his attention to the almost equally profitable supply of rifles, pistols and shotguns to the small towns of the frontier. Americans were pushing west from the Mississippi valley more and more every year and were coming into conflict with Indian tribes, with the Spanish and very frequently with each other. Even the most peaceful of settlers needed to hunt meat and kill vermin so the demand for firearms was always high and could not be met from domestic sources.
American gunsmiths were amongst the best in the world and produced rifles and pistols of the highest quality, crafted slowly by hand in small workshops. They did not yet have manufacturies to compare with those in England. Birmingham alone produced more long guns in a week than the whole of America made in a year, and at a far lower price. The English guns were generally of a poorer quality than the American, but they were good enough for the average user. A Kentucky long rifle might well be accurate to an inch at a quarter of a mile, but most of the men who fired them were pleased with themselves if they could hit a deer at fifty yards. They did not need and could not use the precision that such weapons supplied and were perfectly content to buy cheap guns that were good enough for their day-to-day use.
Henry imported a thousand thirty-six inch barrel, point seven-five calibre rifles each month, selling them at fifteen dollars and making two in profit after paying all of his costs. In addition he brought in as many pistols as his agent could lay his hands on, percussion and flintlock alike, single or double barrelled depending on his supplier; any man who needed a pistol required two at least and most who travelled west preferred to carry half a dozen, muzzle-loaders being slow to recharge.
A typical wage hand did well if he could earn forty dollars a month. Henry never made less than sixty times as much and started to look about him for ways to invest his funds.
Plantation land was available and was an obvious way of establishing himself as a gentleman, but the agricultural economy was based on slavery and sooner or later that must be abolished, it seemed impossible to his English background that it could last forever. Most Southerners appeared to believe that there could never be any change, that the world as it was currently organised was perfect and immutable; to Henry that simply said that they were ignorant backwoods peasants.
What could protect his wealth, ensure that the family he expected to create might remain rich forever?
It took little thought to identify a product for which the demand would be eternal, the profit certain.
Investigation of the brewing and distilling industry in New Orleans led Henry to take ship to New York. The rum made in the Louisianas was of the poorest naval quality, fit for making sailors drunk and cheap. Gin was distilled by the thousands of gallons, a base of yams and molasses the normal ingredients. Gentlefolk imported all of the liquor that touched their lips.
Colonel Miller was happy to direct Henry to a broker friend who knew of a distiller of high grade spirits who was in need of a new investor. His own original partner had died suddenly and before the age of fifty and his widow had, quite lawfully, demanded her inheritance of half of the business in cash. She must be paid, either from the survivor’s own pocket or from the proceeds of selling up the concern.
“Mr Herrick might be able to borrow the money he requires, Mr St
ar, but would have to assign fifty per cent of the business as security and with no guarantee that a downturn in trade might not leave him bankrupted by his new creditor. Far better, the course he would much prefer, would be to sell his late partner’s half of the undertaking to a sensible man of affairs who would be content to leave the day-to-day running of the firm in his hands and who would accept that his investment was to be long term, ideally a lifetime’s commitment. I have seen his books, Mr Star, and can assure you that over the last twelve years he has seen a return never lower than eight per centum, and once as high as twenty. The war years, of course, with their higher taxation accounted for the lowest returns.”
“He would wish me to be a sleeping partner, in effect?”
“Not in the English sense, sir, no. American law does not yet allow for such an entity, although there is an expectation of a modernisation of our practice in the early future.”
“What does he value the firm at, sir?”
“One hundred twenty thousand dollars, Mr Star. A half partnership therefore of sixty thousand.”
“What if Mr Herrick should find the need to expand?”
“Was he to invest, shall we say twenty thousand in a new set of buildings and stills then you would have the opportunity to invest another ten thousand dollars, or see your holding diluted to about forty three per centum if you preferred to remain at sixty thousand.”
Henry retired to think the proposition through. Assuming that Mr Herrick was as sharp a businessman as he was, and it was never wise to expect any other man to be a fool, then a partner a fortnight’s travelling time distant could be expected to suffer. Henry knew very well that in such circumstances he would cook his books most enthusiastically, so, if he was to invest with Mr Herrick, he must have some protection on the scene. He consulted with the colonel.
“A banker in New York, one with some degree of personal commitment to you, Mr Star, would be ideal.”
‘Personal’, not a business relationship then. Henry quickly realised that the colonel must have a banker friend or client who had a marriageable daughter who was available to a younger son of the English aristocracy who was wealthy in his own right. That suggested probably a relatively small amount of cash as a dowry, counterbalanced by a substantial element of interest acting in his favour. What would a banker want from him, what could he supply?
Spanish land seemed the most likely answer. The federal government exercised some control over the allocation of the new lands being opened in the northern parts of the continent and insisted on the creation of prosperous farms rather than great estates, but the Spanish land grants were commonly huge, measured in tens of square miles rather than by the acre. The Spanish grasp on its colonies was weakening, the country impoverished by the vicious French subjugation of the last war and unable to maintain garrisons throughout the whole of South and Central America. The opportunity was there for American expansionism to flourish, although the English seemed to be doing much better at the moment, the bulk of the Anglos being ex-officers from Wellington’s army turned adventurer and buying or marrying into the great ranches.
Henry had contacts amongst the French settlers along the Gulf Coast and could well expand his activities there. He sold them guns at the moment. What could he buy from them?
He intimated to the colonel that it was definitely time for him to settle down, to become a respectable family man and take his place amongst the leaders of the country. The colonel agreed that that was an excellent idea, invited him to a small dinner he was hosting just two night’s hence.
Mr Chard, the banker and eminent New York judge, was accompanied by wife and daughter, both of whom tittered mightily on introduction to Mr Star, the Honourable Henry Star, but that title was only to be used in writing, they understood. They made it very clear that their sole interest lay in Henry’s entrée to the English aristocracy while Mr Chard was concerned exclusively to talk money.
Henry made an effort to talk to Miss Chard, Grace Chard he discovered and quite inappositely named. She stood as tall as him and very nearly as broad at the shoulders, inevitably even more so at the hips, massive in the bust and no less so at the rear, with a full head of wavy dark-brown hair. If not actively stupid, she was certainly dull. She had no conversation. After ten minutes they were called to table, Henry sat next to Mrs Colonel Miller and thankful to be there; if Chard wanted him to marry that great lump then by God he would pay dearly!
Mr Chard, it eventuated, was a man of vision. Henry cringed on hearing these ominous words – another crackpot, he had seen too many of those already in his short life.
“Steamships, Mr Star!”
Henry nodded cautiously. There was a masonry dock almost built on the New Orleans waterfront, but the sternwheeler it was waiting for was nowhere to be seen.
“The Mississippi is the key to opening the whole of Middle America, and steamships will be the tool to open the lock!”
Rather mixed and muddled, Henry felt, but he should not demand literary genius of a banker. He muttered his agreement, showing little overt enthusiasm. Chard interpreted his response as simple, business-like taciturnity, was inclined to approve, one should never commit oneself too early.
“River boats are not sea-going vessels, Mr Star. It does no good at all to build in New York with the expectation of coasting it round to the Gulf.”
That was experience speaking, Henry was sure, explained why there was still no steamer on the River.
“Thus, Mr Star, we must build in New Orleans. More correctly, we must assemble the boats there. There would be small gain to setting up an iron works on the Gulf Coast. We must bring in plate and cast iron, the boiler ready-made, the pipework from our Northern manufacturers. The wooden hulls could be made from scratch, as it were, but all of the metalwork must be done elsewhere.”
So! Not Spanish lands, and Henry thought the better of him for it, but he knew nothing of iron or ship building. But the Andrews family did, and the connections between Star and Andrews were well-known in England, but not in the States to his understanding.
A few words from Colonel Miller explained all.
By the end of the evening it had been agreed that if a yard was proved practical then Henry would be in for forty per centum, acting as ‘advisor and facilitator’, and wed to Miss Chard. His first function would be to return to England for a few weeks to arrange for access to Roberts’s steam expertise. The ground for cooperation across the Atlantic had already been broken by Thomas Miller who was currently visiting with Lord Andrews.
Henry was already comfortably rich and now had, with luck and good business sense, every prospect of becoming wealthy. The price of that wealth was sat, wedged into a not-small armchair and smiling tentatively at him; he envisaged waking up next to her and suppressed a shudder. Still, he would not always have to wake up at her side. He returned her smile.
Book Five: A Poor Man
at the Gate Series
Chapter Five
“Lord Castlereagh has called on me again, Mr Robert.”
Mostyn would not cross the boundaries of formality, seemed to think he was stretching civility to its limits by using his son-in-law’s first name at all.
“The same problem, sir?”
“Short of cash at a moment of urgent need. Only five hundred this time. A ‘monkey’, I believed him to say.”
“Gamblers’ slang, sir, from the world of horse-racing originally. Probably thieves’ cant as well, but that I am less sure of. Commonly used by young men about the town, sir, not so often, I would imagine, and hope, by Cabinet Ministers. It might well be indicative of the company he was keeping when the demand arose.”
Mostyn, a man of austere habits, was not pleased.
“He has repaid all of his previous advances, exactly to time, and bearing in mind his position I would not feel it wise to refuse his business, but I cannot like it, Mr Robert! He is paying off blackmailers, that I am quite certain of.”
“I cannot imagine why he
does so, sir. Surely government has its agents, men of very little scruple, I am given to understand, who could find a better way of dealing with such nasty criminals.”
Robert was sufficiently concerned by the conundrum that he made his way to Michael’s office. His father had told him enough of the lawyer that he knew he had ‘connections’ and could make inspired guesses about the activities of the covert arms of the state.
“Mr Mostyn had mentioned his surmise about Lord Castlereagh on a previous occasion, Mr Robert. It seems not unlikely, from the little I have heard, that the Prime Minister may have become aware of the nature of my lord’s embarrassments and have been distressed by them. Lord Liverpool tends towards a degree of Puritanism in his ordinary life, I understand, and has no love for laxity, although his loyalty to his colleagues is such that he would find it impossible to dismiss Lord Castlereagh from his administration. I think it not unlikely that a first blackmailer may have been taken up, shall we say, in a quite exemplary fashion and another despatched to Botany Bay without the formality of a trial, but that further aid has been refused. I am given to understand in fact, from other sources available to me, that Lord Liverpool has threatened to have any other blackmailer he becomes aware of sent to open trial.”
Appearance of a blackmailer at the Old Bailey would result in his condemnation to death, and not a hope of a reprieve. It would also involve the giving of evidence in open court, in the presence of scribblers for all of the newssheets, every word publishable because it would be privileged. The opportunity to pillory one of the Tory grandees would be impossible to refuse, even for those newssheets that supported the government; any paper that refused to run the story would find its sales destroyed.
Lord Castlereagh’s reputation would be smeared beyond hope of redemption and his wife, who had a very bare tolerance for him already, would undoubtedly leave him and seek an order of the High Court to protect her income and her place. He would be humiliated, compelled to resign from the government and at very best to seek refuge in the obscurity of an Irish estate, never to be seen in society again.
Privilege Preserved (A Poor Man at the Gate Series Book 5) Page 11
