Burke in the Land of Silver

by Tom Williams

  Burke had William bring an easel onto the deck. A quantity of watercolour paints emerged from the hold and Burke would stand for hours, brush in hand, recording the patterns of light on the water. He was, as with all things he set his mind to, a competent artist, and passengers and crew grew used to seeing him in the throes of creation.

  The Rochester stopped briefly at Rio de Janeiro to take on food and water before sailing on to Monte Video at the mouth of the Plate. As they arrived at the first Spanish town they had seen in the New World, Burke was on deck with the dawn. When his fellow passengers grouped round his easel to admire his efforts, he explained that he had wanted to catch the first rays of sunlight glinting on the walls of the city. Several gentlemen commented on the way that he had, indeed, caught the special quality of the light sparkling off the ocean. (‘Effervescent,’ declared one bewhiskered old buffer and Burke smiled politely, although all the word meant to him was mineral water.) None of his admirers noticed that, masterfully as he had captured the colour of the sky, the painting was otherwise notable mainly for the detail it provided of the defences.

  Leaving Monte Video, Burke saw the water change from the blue-green of the Atlantic to the silt-laden dirty brown of the estuary of the Plate. The change in the colour of the water was the only way to see that they had moved from the open ocean, for the far shore of the river was so distant that it was invisible from the deck. The Rochester struggled against a wind that had swung westerly and was now trying to push them back out to sea. Only after several hours as the ship tacked to and fro, fighting not just the wind but the current, was Burke able to distinguish a strip of land on the far horizon. O’Gorman was standing beside him on the deck and Burke turned to him and smiled.

  ‘You’re nearly home, Mr O’Gorman.’

  ‘Not so nearly as all that. It will take us another day or so to get to Ensenada.’

  ‘Ensenada?’

  ‘Where we take on the pilot.’

  Burke nodded. He should have realised that the mud would mean uncertain shoals in the approach to Buenos Aires and the Spanish made sure that the English had no reliable charts. They would need a pilot for the end of their journey.

  The following afternoon the Rochester dropped anchor about half a mile from the shore. Through his glass Burke saw what looked like a poor fishing village – little more than a collection of wooden shacks – clustered around a fine edifice of white stone with a gilded campanile. The Captain called down from the aft deck: ‘I see you’re admiring the harbour office, Mr Burke. Would you like to meet the pilot when he comes aboard?’

  Burke could see the pilot climbing into a boat that bobbed at the end of the harbour office’s own jetty. Even at this distance, the brilliance of the man’s gold braid was dazzling.

  ‘I’d be delighted, Captain.’

  Burke joined the Captain as the pilot boarded. In the exchange of greetings between the three of them, someone suggested that Burke might sketch the pilot and the pilot, shrugging with an affectation of modesty that sat badly with his grandiose uniform, said that he had no objection. So it was that Burke stood sketching throughout the approach to Buenos Aires, and if his scribbles included detailed notes of the pilot’s directions and the shouts of the leadsman as he called the depth of the channel, those notes were concealed in the various studies he made of the details of the pilot’s uniform and the outlines of the scene before him.

  That night they lay to. As the sun rose the next morning, they sailed the last few miles to Buenos Aires – the City of Good Winds in the place that some called the Land of Silver, Argentina.

  Burke was, again, early on deck. O’Gorman had told him so much about this city. It was rich, it was splendid. It was, James had convinced himself, a suitable stage on which he could at last play a role that would get him noticed.

  As he looked over the brown waters of the Plate to the miserable dwellings on the shore, he felt his heart sink. The buildings here were shacks, no better than those at Ensenada. And, even where he stood on the Rochester, the place stank. There was no clear shoreline. The silt dumped by the River Plate meant that water and land merged into hundreds of yards of mudflats, filled with the garbage of the city, now just a few miles upstream.

  As the Rochester eased itself along the channels through the shallows, the shacks on the shore (Burke could not think of it as a riverbank) grew larger and less dilapidated. Here and there were substantial buildings of brick or stone. Now, in the distance, Burke began to see the domes and spires of churches standing tall on the horizon. His military eye was also quick to notice the fort jutting from the shore, its batteries of cannon commanding the approach.

  The Rochester hove to almost opposite the fort, where the buildings were most impressive. The September sun shone on the pale stone of the houses and the towers of the churches. Burke was surprised to see that, although generally Spanish in style, most of the buildings were not white but ranged from pink to deep red. O’Gorman had emerged on deck and stood beside him, looking over the city with a proprietorial eye and Burke turned to him to remark on the colour of the buildings.

  ‘I see your painters favour a roseate hue.’

  O’Gorman’s face creased with a puzzled frown, which cleared as he realised what Burke was talking about.

  ‘The red? No that’s not painters. They mix the plaster with bull’s blood, for there’s more of it than we can make any other use of, and it does make excellent plaster.’

  The mud made it impossible for ships to dock and a fleet of rowing boats was already pulling out toward them to take off cargo and crew. Ashore, a small crowd was gathering along the water’s edge, the women holding their skirts high to avoid the filth. There was no wharf but a few piers projected from a track that seemed to have been made simply by throwing rocks and rubble onto the foreshore. Carts manoeuvred unsteadily along the rough surface: the noise of iron-rimmed wheels scraping across the rubble setting Burke’s teeth on edge. Aboard, the whores were lining the ship’s rails and the shouts of the stevedores rowing toward them suggested that they were already setting their price. Aloft, some of the crew were reefing the sails, while on deck rope ladders were being lowered to allow the passengers to make their uncertain way to the boats below. Merchants were shouting for the hold to be opened and servants were pushing and jostling to retrieve their masters’ possessions.

  Burke and O’Gorman pushed their way through the crowd of steerage passengers to be amongst the first rowed ashore. William was to follow on with the baggage.

  Burke’s initial impression of Buenos Aires was of the stink of mud. The smell surrounded them as they were rowed to the ramshackle pier, but then he was scrambling ashore and suddenly there were more important things to notice than the smell. All of his attention was concentrated on the woman he saw standing on the rough planking, apparently waiting for someone on board the Rochester.

  The first thing he noticed about her was her hair. Thick and black, it tumbled out from the simple sunbonnet she was wearing, framing a face almost perfectly oval. As he watched her, she turned and noticed him, dark eyes appraising him, and then, to his astonishment, O’Gorman strode toward her and, with a proprietorial air, took her hand and led her toward forward.

  ‘Mr Burke, may I present my wife, Ana.’

  Burke took her hand and raised it to his lips. ‘Mrs O’Gorman, I’m delighted to make your acquaintance.’

  ‘And I yours. Mr O’Gorman wrote from England to say that he was to bring a guest, but he was able to tell me no more. For the past week I’ve been wondering who it could be. And now, here you are.’

  She looked at him quizzically, her head tilted slightly to one side. She was obviously waiting to learn more about her unexpected house guest, but Burke did not judge this the time or place to explain himself. ‘I am new to Buenos Aires and a mutual friend asked your husband if he could, most kindly, provide me with accommodation while I acquainted myself with the city.’

  ‘Indeed.’ Ana O’Gorman was clearl
y unconvinced. ‘A man of mystery. Well, you will have plenty of opportunity to tell me all about yourself as we walk home. It seemed pointless to drive down in the chaise, as there would be three of us, and my husband,’ (she smiled at Burke, as if enrolling him in some long-running domestic dispute) ‘objects to the expense of a carriage.’

  She had a voice, Burke thought, that sounded as if it were on the verge of laughter. Soft and deep, it had the merest trace of an Irish lilt.

  ‘We do well enough.’ Her husband’s brogue seemed even stronger in comparison to hers. ‘We don’t need the show of a carriage.’

  O’Gorman led them away from the water and into the town. Once off the filth of the foreshore, the soldier in Burke admired the road, which was well paved and arrow-straight.

  It took only a few minutes for them to arrive at O’Gorman’s house, for he had business on the water often enough not to want to live too far away. It was immediately apparent that the O’Gormans did indeed do ‘well enough’. Most of the buildings they had passed had been two floors high, with narrow windows and high doors the only breaks in their plain facades. O’Gorman’s house stood three storeys high, with lamps either side of the grand entrance, and elaborately carved panels on the doors. On the higher floors, wrought-iron balconies stood in front of windows open to catch the whisper of a breeze. It was a home that reflected O’Gorman’s standing in the British community. As a young man, Burke had dreamed of living in a house that gave every visitor visible proof of the owner’s prosperity, but his father had failed at every commercial enterprise that he had ever attempted and their home had born witness to his wretchedness. O’Gorman might not be a gentleman but this house showed that he was successful and rich and, therefore, not totally to be despised.

  The place was built around a central courtyard, the rooms leading off it through French windows. The pattern was repeated on the upper floors, where an interior balcony provided access to the bedrooms.

  O’Gorman’s wealth was reflected in the second courtyard leading from the first, with a kitchen and laundry room on the ground floor and a floor of servants’ bedrooms above. It was here that Burke sought out William on the afternoon of their arrival. He had explained to O’Gorman that his valet would have to have his own room. O’Gorman had objected, on the grounds that it was bound to annoy the other servants, who could expect no such luxury of privacy, but, as far as Burke was concerned, it was essential that William could come and go without notice, so a separate room had to be found. The arrangement also allowed Burke somewhere private to store materials he did not want viewed by strangers. It was an irony of living with another man’s staff that the servants’ quarters were the only place where you were safe from the prying eyes of the servants themselves. Burke could never lock the maids out of his own room but William could defend his quarters from intrusion as fiercely as he wished.

  Burke looked about him. Beside the bed, there was a wardrobe – not for the servant’s clothes but so that he could store his master’s garments. A washstand with a bowl and a jug were available for grooming and there was even a small mirror tacked to the wall.

  ‘They’ve done you proud, William.’

  It was unusual for a gentleman to explore the servants’ quarters but it was reasonable that he might want to be reassured as to the safe arrival of his baggage, and the room provided a private spot for their first council of war. Burke found that he preferred such meetings in a room like this rather than in his own splendid quarters. Somehow, he felt more relaxed here.

  ‘We’ll need identities. I’m Mr Burke to O’Gorman and, as he is bound to let slip my name to the English community, I’d best be Mr Burke to all of them. But I’ll be a Frenchman to the French. Do you have the visiting cards?’

  ‘I do, sir. There’s two Frenchmen available – a count to impress those who favour the old regime and Victor Bergotte for those who prefer their aristocrats decapitated. If you want another alias, we have our Prussian – Captain Otto Witz. He’s been a useful gentleman before. Then there’s –’

  Burke cut him short with a wave of his hand.

  ‘I am sure that Captain Witz will do for the Spaniards and Victor Bergotte for the French. You, I think had best be yourself, at least for now. But you should show some disaffection with your lot. The odd complaint, a bit of surliness. I want you to be able to travel freely among the lower orders and a suggestion of rebellious spirit might help.’

  ‘It will be a pleasure, sir.’

  ‘Hmm. So long as it’s not too great a pleasure, William. I don’t want your sergeant complaining that I have got you into bad habits.’

  ‘I trust Sergeant Geraghty will never have cause for complaint, sir.’

  Burke looked around the room once again.

  ‘Well, you seem settled and I’m sure my quarters will offer everything except security, so we’ll to business. I think I’d best start slowly. O’Gorman should give me an entrée to what passes for Society amongst the merchants and I must try to build on any acquaintance I may form amongst them. In time, I should acquire some useful connections and then we shall see what is really happening here at the end of the world. Meanwhile, your position as a servant should give you ready access to the working people. Keep your eyes open and let me know if there is anything I should be aware of: rumblings of revolt; secret societies; radical infiltration. If the French have infected this country with their revolutionary pox, I want to know.’

  William nodded.

  ‘If anything’s going on, I’ll hear about it, sir. Servants gossip.’

  ‘Just so, William. And, with any luck, so do their masters. Anyway, tonight I dine with O’Gorman and the lovely Ana. I hope she gossips. She looks the sort who might. In any case, I look forward to a conversation that does not revolve around the price of leather.’

  ‘Very well, sir. I will come to your room before dinner to assist with your dressing but I take it my services are not required at the meal itself.’

  ‘You are, as ever, correct in your assumption, William. I will dazzle the mistress, leaving you, I hope, to astonish the maid – or anyone else you can make an impression on.’

  Burke stretched and yawned. ‘If I am to impress my hostess, I think I had best rest and bathe: I am sure everything about me smells of salt water.’

  *

  Burke joined his host in his sitting room for drinks before dinner. O’Gorman had wanted to make the arrival of his visitor an excuse for a gathering of English expatriates around his table, but Burke had impressed on him that he wanted his stay to be as discreet as possible and had eventually prevailed upon him to make it a family meal with just Ana present. Ana, though, was determined to make an impression at the first meal with her new houseguest, so the men were kept waiting while she prepared her entrance. They passed the time sipping sherry that Burke thought remarkably poor for a Spanish province. They had exhausted most of the possible topics of conversation on the voyage, so the two men sat silent awhile. Burke took the opportunity to look around the room, which he judged and found wanting. It confirmed his suspicions that O’Gorman was a man with plenty of money but very little taste. The furnishings, he decided, were unfashionably substantial and the carpet hideous. The heavy velvet drapes were acceptable but they hung untidily. The servants, Burke decided, were unreliable.

  When Ana made her entrance, though, he found nothing to complain about at all. Her gown was not of the very latest style but the embroidery – flowers and leaves intertwined across the whole of the fabric – was exquisite and the low cut, trimmed about with lace in a way that no longer found favour in London, showed off her breasts to a degree that was more than acceptable.

  Ana’s arrival, Burke decided, made the evening a much more entertaining prospect. As they entered a dining room where the table was scarcely visible for the serving dishes crowded upon it, he resolved that he would enjoy his meal.

  Burke was confident that O’Gorman would dine well, but he was not prepared for the sheer quantity of f
ood laid before him. First came a meat course – but it resembled no meat course that he had ever seen before. Steaks that would barely fit on the chinaware (itself of the best quality) contended for pride of place with a huge sirloin, glistening in the centre of the table. Then there were meat pies and pastry parcels packed with mince, rack of lamb, tongue, and a ham.

  After almost three months of ship’s rations, Burke had no need to feign enthusiasm as he sampled dish after dish but he did not allow the food to distract him from conversation with his hostess. Ana, for her part, scarcely touched the food, simply nibbling a little here and there while keeping up a steady stream of questions to her guest. Was it true he was a spy? (He winced at that: O’Gorman could reasonably have been expected to tell his wife, but it was galling even so.) Was he really a military man? How long had he been in the army? Had he been to South America before? Did he like Buenos Aires?

  ‘Madam, I wish I was as skilled as extracting intelligence as you clearly are. If I could only introduce you to the Viceroy’s court, I am sure we would gather all the information we might ever need.’

  Burke noticed how small her teeth were as she laughed before plunging on with new questions.

  ‘You plan to seek audience with the Viceroy, then?’

  ‘I would prefer to meet him socially. And not, perhaps, in the guise of a British merchant.’

  ‘Then you must get an invitation to one of his Friday soirées. His Excellency likes to think that he is a cultured man and he tries to fill his house with men of discernment. But what will you be, if not British?’

  ‘I have been known to pass as a Prussian, madam.’

  She cocked her head to one side as if appraising the upright figure at her table against the ideal of a Prussian.