“As well, Papa, we have as many as one hundred acres in sheltered patches underneath the slopes, and they are to be worked by our men to make kitchen gardens and a small ornamental set of lawns and flower beds and a shrubbery about the new house. There is a field sufficient to pasture a few milch cows, and the Head Gardener’s wife will run a small dairy and creamery – we shall have our own butter and a little of cheese besides. Good foodstuffs suitable for a growing family are hard to come by in the new towns, surprisingly so, and we shall be pleased to reduce our reliance on the Home Farm at Freemans.”
Tom was pleased to hear that the land would not be a burden to them; he had been worried that Charlotte’s ambition might have overstretched their finances.
“Is all well with Joseph? He has been more than usually reticent in his few days at Mount Street.”
“His wife is none too healthy in herself, I believe – she is not having an easy time of this baby, and still has three or four months to carry. As well, he is driving himself unmercifully, is back to his old habits of working sixteen hours a day with a dozen different projects on the go at once. He is, he tells me, much taken by the ‘compression of air’ to power tools for making ships – and just what that signifies I have not the least idea, though it certainly involves ‘hot rivets’, whatever they are.”
Charlotte had had a far broader education than most girls, but engineering and the sciences had not been part of it.
“He has a small locomotive engine building, though, to be sure, I am given to understand that ‘small’ is very much a relative term. Its function is to be to transport very large weights through very short distances, he tells me; thus great pieces of newly cast iron which need be shifted from one part of the foundry, or ‘shop’, he calls it, to another may be moved the more easily. Or so I believe he told me. As well, he has discovered, or perhaps invented - one cannot always be clear of the distinction between the two - a new means of attaching locomotive engine wheels to their axle trees – a matter of ‘bearings’, which are to be made in part of a white metal. Though he did not explain to me the advantages inherent in that colour, I gather it to be of some considerable importance and his mind is much exercised by the matter of supplies of tin, one believes from the Malay States which are to an extent under the aegis of the Honourable East India Company.”
“I must bring the matter to Robert’s attention – Mostyns has interests in India now and might well be in a position to improve our access to tin ores, or the ingot metal itself. I had thought, in fact, that we took much of our tin from the Stannaries in Cornwall.”
“Ah! Now that I do know the answer to, sir! The tin mines are wet and the steam pumps unable to cope with the influx. Joseph has several times informed me that existing engines will raise water through no more than one hundred feet and that he cannot build a more powerful engine except with higher pressures to the boiler which in turn demands stronger metals for pistons and cylinders and condenser, and more efficient packing for the joints and, I believe it to be ‘glands’, though I suspect he has a different understanding of the word.”
Tom had no understanding at all of the word, was little moved by it.
“Is he pressed for money, do you believe?”
“Matthew thinks not, Papa. The works in Wigan are now carrying a night shift and are producing turning lathes and drilling machines for which the customers are queuing with their purses gaping wide. The profits are so high that there is to be an extension to the works, and the word is that Mr Stephenson has begged that its new production will be dedicated to his needs – and that, one gathers, is a matter of some pride.”
Tom was worried that the boy – he could not think of him as a man – might not make old bones, burnt out before he could ever become middle-aged.
There was nothing he could do, except hope that his wife might not become a source of too many problems to him. If she should be better advised never to become pregnant again, which was not impossible where a first carrying proved hazardous, then Joseph would be forced to abstain from her bed, which would inevitably send him elsewhere for physical comfort, and that could present any number of difficulties. He would have to beg Robert to offer his practical advice on the matter of running two distinct households.
“You have spoken to James’ new wife, I presume?”
“Not at any great length, but sufficient to be happy that she will suit him well. She will not, for example, outshine him in the field of the intellect, but she is a pleasant girl and certainly more practical than I am. She will run his household correctly, and enjoy doing so, and she will take care of his health, without playing the nanny, and she will defer to him, and be pleased to do so. Add to that, Papa, she is an open soul, one who thinks well of others and will be liked by them as a result. She will not be a great political hostess, but James’ colleagues will always be happy to dine with him and there will never be the fear of his house becoming a hotbed of intrigue. I do think he has chosen very well, and, most importantly, for he is in many ways a simple man, for an affection which is thoroughly returned.”
“Frances has said the same of her. I am very glad to hear it, he deserves his good fortune – he has had enough of bad.”
David Mostyn wondered whether he deserved his good fortune, for he was profiting mightily in all of his endeavours. The absence of other European banks in India gave him a free rein in the merchant community; not with the East India Company itself but with all of the country merchants who had previously existed on credit supplied from London or on precarious loans from the financiers to the princely houses.
Rates of interest were commonly much higher than those prevailing in London and bullion had been used far more than paper.
He found himself able to make loans by the issue of Trade Bills and was finalising his arrangements to print his own banknotes, having been informed, in rigorous terms, that it would be wiser to use an English firm with printing paper of a type unavailable in India. The profits were potentially immense, for he would be able to make his loans in paper and take much of the repayments in gold and silver coin which would provide the backing for the issue of even more paper.
Inevitably, he was financing an increasing proportion of the opium trade to China, but the whole of the economy of the Europeans in India was dependent on that business. He regretted that Mostyns should be involved in such a trade, for it might eventually harm the name of the firm, and his father would certainly be distressed if word reached him in London, but the profits were far too great to be refused and everyone was in it and still remained respectable.
The same could not be said of the slave trade, which was even more profitable but was not publicly discussed amongst the European firms involved. The slavers were not held up as models of British enterprise and exemplars of the new capitalist system that Adam Smith had advertised with such satisfaction; in fact, as far as authority was concerned, they did not exist and Captain John, sat across the desk from him, had never been seen in Bombay.
“The naval patrols in the Red Sea and the waters adjacent have been very efficient, Mr Mostyn. I have lost no ships to pirates this season.”
There had been an upsurge in piracy in the previous year and one of Captain John’s competitors had lost his largest ship and his own life. The mercantile community, led by Mostyns, had expressed its alarm most strongly and a small flotilla of sloops and frigates had sailed north as soon as the monsoon had permitted and every armed dhow that might have been piratical had been vigorously pacified. The navy permitted, in fact encouraged, its captains to summarily hang pirates caught on the high seas and was quite flexible in its interpretation of evidence of ill-intent, which resulted in a great reduction in the number of actual and potential marauders in the dangerous seas.
It had been explained to the merchants that piracy was a way of life to many of the trading communities along the African shores of the Indian Ocean, so it was entirely sensible to assume that every vessel haling from those coasts was ab
out to become piratical, if it had not already done so. Many of them were found to carry slaves when they were stopped, which further justified draconian action against them, so the navy said.
“Competition from the small Arab traders has been much reduced as well, Mr Mostyn – I fear the pirates must have driven them off the seas.”
“An ill wind, Captain John.”
“It is indeed, sir. I intend to indulge myself in only one more season in the trade, Mr Mostyn. I am selling up, in fact, to a consortium of local merchants who will buy my ships and retain my crews and ships’ masters and who are to employ a European-seeming gentleman as the apparent owner. In exchange for my good word with you, and to maintain the appearance that they are English owned and run, they will borrow ten thousand pounds per annum from Mostyns, paying sixty per centum, and they will pay me a share of their profits amounting to not less than five thousand pounds sterling annually.”
Indian money-lenders would be able to pick up slave children for virtually nothing and would be supplied with healthy adults for pennies; they could operate at a far lower cost than Captain John could achieve. By retaining European ships and crews they would guarantee immunity at sea and in foreign ports, and could run larger cargoes than their own vessels would carry. Provided they could maintain their front there was the chance of a much greater profit than was to be achieved in their own names.
“I presume that I could rely upon the goodwill of these gentlemen?”
“They would be aware of their need of your services, Mr Mostyn.”
“Then I shall be very pleased to assist these gentlemen in every practical way, Captain John.”
The word would be passed on and Mostyn could expect to find himself the recipient of the occasional gift of silks or ivories or gemstones, all on a personal basis, between friends.
“Do you intend to return to England, Captain John?”
Mr John Starling would certainly be doing so at the completion of his next season’s business, when all of the arrangements had been made at the Persian Gulf end of the trade.
“Will you enter into business in England, sir?”
Captain John thought he would, as an importer of goods from the Gulf, probably.
“Persian carpets, sir?”
“Quite possibly, Mr Mostyn, though I am inclined towards apothecaries’ supplies, I believe.”
The demand for opium and hemp – perfectly legally – was very high in England and John Company rarely supplied enough to satisfy all of its customers, the bulk of its production going to China. Persian opium would be very welcome in London – the aficionados claimed it to be of finer quality than the Indian product – and cannabis in all of its forms was regarded as one of life’s little luxuries, and so much less noxious than the weed, tobacco.
“I will inform the London office that you are intending to return in the next eighteen months, Captain John – actually, of course, I shall tell them to expect the arrival of Mr John Starling. Do you intend to base your new business in London, sir?”
“Possibly, though I might be more inclined to establish myself in Liverpool, where there was used to be family connections. I recognise no family now, so such a consideration need no longer hamper me, though it is not impossible that it might embarrass them a fraction to discover me in their midst - but I doubt they will turn cannon on me a second time.”
The captain spoke quietly, dispassionately, but the banker decided he would much prefer not to be ranked amongst the gentleman’s enemies.
“Would you wish enquiries to be made in Liverpool, Captain John? I could probably discover some information about your ex-family before you returned.”
“Thank you, Mr Mostyn, but there is no need – they are sufficiently prominent that their current activities will be publicly known.”
Who were they? Who was he, for that matter? Was Mostyns likely to face repercussions for having this man as a customer? There was nothing to be done, he feared, other than to warn his father that Mr John Starling, though a rich businessman, was nonetheless to be treated with some degree of discretion – there was a possibility of scandal.
Major Wolverstone was now a pillar of Bombay society, rich, respected and settled with wife and son, the head of his own house. He remained as the representative of Roberts but was the largest single trader in teak logs to England and was well up amongst those sending jute to the mills in Glasgow; he was part-owner of the shipyard producing paddle steamers for the local coastal waters and was involved in negotiations to build on the Ganges, to take a small percentage as facilitator and agent.
Ten years and he would be very rich, he believed, and then he would have to take the decision whether to return to England or make India the family home. When first he had arrived in India it had seemed to be a paradise where he could live out the whole of his life; had he remained single he might never have changed that opinion. Now, he had to ask himself what the future would hold for his son and grandchildren – could they become citizens of the country or would they always be outsiders? The more he came to know of India, the more he decided that he could not be part of the land – he would always be a foreigner, and one day he, or more likely his descendants, would find that there was no longer any welcome.
Better to go while his son, and any other child, was still young and could learn to be English in England – he was increasingly sure that the family would go home when young Kit was eleven or twelve years old. For the time being, the boy could discover much while he was here, as soon as he was old enough; it was early to be making plans for his education. He wondered if he should discuss the matter with his wife, though they rarely talked about anything other than local gossip.
“What of the tea trade, Major Wolverstone?” She was never less than formal in his company, would not use his Christian name, perhaps hoping to discourage any great tendency to intimacy.
“We should buy into tea plantations in the north as the possibility arises, I agree, ma’am. I do not think we should seek further involvement in Ceylon until the plantations there have proved themselves. Your father tells me that the soil is not always suitable for the varieties of tea we have so far planted – there are other sorts, I gather, and he is seeking to discover the best, but I suspect he will be several years in the endeavour.”
“Then his agents must act for him – I believe his wife wishes to return to her estates in Ireland.”
Benson’s marriage had been immediately fruitful and his wife now had a half-brother a few months older than her own son. Early residence in Ireland was desirable if he was to buy a title and create a dynasty, and he had the wealth to do so and lacked the will-power to resist his young wife’s insistence on a return.
That created an interesting difficulty – what was to be done with the Indian firm? Benson’s daughter might blithely talk of ‘agents’, but who were they to be? The business would need to be run by a highly experienced manager, one with knowledge of India, and there were none of those unemployed and looking for a post, nor ever would there be. Firms that required new staff hired them in England or Scotland and brought them out as young men to learn the trade over a number of years.
There were a few unemployed Europeans always to be found – businessmen who had gone bankrupt and lacked the cash to pay for a ticket back to England as a general rule or Company officers who had been invited to withdraw from their regiments; these embarrassments were normally found a post in the back-country, tucked away out of sight as Collectors or lesser administrative wallahs. It was accepted that no sahib could be allowed to descend to the gutter, it would reflect upon the whole caste, but they would certainly not be put in charge of a large and currently profitable firm. Nor could any Indian or half-caste be given the managership of a large English firm – John Company would not allow it, that was a precedent not to be established.
There were two possibilities – the most obvious being to sell up; it would not be difficult to find a buyer, particularly now that there was a bank th
at could organise payment in London. Other than that, the management of the firm must devolve upon another member of the family, the sole person thus qualified being Wolverstone. It was superficially attractive, but not if the major himself was to return to England in a few years.
Benson himself had no doubts of the better course.
“I would wish to sell to you, Major Wolverstone. That part of the firm that is set in trust for your wife will descend to her immediately, in full clearance of all of my obligations to her. After all, as your wife she will share in the business on your death, so her further inheritance is not in fact jeopardised. I believe that Mr Mostyn will make a very substantial advance, some fifty per centum of the value of the firm, payable into my London account with the bank; you would then repay that loan over several years, from earnings, the remainder of the profit split equally between us for the next seven years, after which all is yours.”
It sounded like something for nothing and Wolverstone was immediately suspicious.
“Let me see now, sir. Mostyns makes payment to you in London, in an account that you hold there?”
“I have agreed to leave the bulk of the sum on deposit with them, they paying an income annually, of course. My personal fortune, which they will also transfer to London for me, will be available for me to withdraw at need.”
“Paid in their banknotes, I presume.”
“I should imagine so, yes.”
“I make part of the profits over to Mostyns here to pay off the debt, a matter of some five or so years, I would expect. Also, I pay to you fifty per cent of the remaining profits made by the Benson assets, through the good offices of Mostyns, I presume. Most of our profits in India come to us in gold coin, I believe.”
“Mohurs, old pagodas, silver Maria Theresas and Portuguese Joes and various local coins of differing weights and probity – primarily in bullion though we do receive chests of opium on occasion. We almost never accept any sort of paper; there is simply no great quantity circulating.”
The Old Order (A Poor Man at the Gate Series Book 7) Page 13
