The Vice Of Virtue (A Poor Man At The Gate Series Book 10)

by Andrew Wareham

  The cousins were introduced to an unending stream of matrons and their husbands and daughters, were prodded into inviting a number to dance, ordered strictly to remember who and when. The waltz was now the music most often played, had taken over almost entirely from the country dance, to the distaste of the older generation who still regarded it as rather fast and disapproved of the sight of young misses clasped in gentlemen’s arms. It had the great advantage of simplicity, the steps easy to remember and the time sufficiently repetitive that even the clumsiest and worst-coordinated of gentlemen could make a reasonable hash of it. Rothwell found that his painstaking practice had been adequate – he would never bear away the palm for elegance, but he did not make himself a laughing-stock. Joseph, less awkward and also less self-conscious, discovered he could dance as well as most on the floor but did not really care – any young lady who found a disgust for him because of his dancing was fully at liberty to go elsewhere for a partner.

  The young ladies passed in an unending whirl before them, Rothwell noticing only that some were more handsome than others but none catching his eye until immediately before supper he found himself in the company of a truly beautiful miss, a girl in her first Season but not at all shy, very willing to talk with him.

  He was almost tongue-tied, drinking in the golden hair and diamond-bright, gleaming blue eyes, jewel-like to his perception, predatory in the opinion of others of his family.

  “Who is that, Jennifer?” James enquired, stood at the side where his leg condemned him.

  “Massingham’s girl. He is a vicious, unprincipled, drunken boor; his wife can best be described as a suitable match for him. The son is a fool, almost literally, and keeps company with the most asinine of young men; he will not wed, it would seem, due to his well-advertised predilections, so that the title dies with him. The grandfather married very old, was sixty when he sired Massingham, assuming that he did; he died soon after, the strain presumably too great for him, and was himself an only son and there are no relatives. The estate will descend by Will – a marriage settlement should predicate that all is well there, ensuring that Trustees are appointed at the father's death to control the son’s profligate expenditure, him to be officially declared incapable. Huge estates - the girl will be a rich catch, but she cannot have been brought up well – she will be a bad wife for any sensible, or sensitive, man. She has beauty, that is undeniable, but I would be amazed if she possessed either principle or discretion!”

  “Rothwell seems quite smitten.”

  “A pity! I shall do all I can to discover another who may outshine her in his eyes.”

  Lady Jersey the meanwhile had made a point of speaking to Joseph, finding him on his best behaviour, knowing that the Family must keep on good terms with the Grande Dames of Society.

  “I would wish, Mr Andrews, to introduce you to a young lady who is my god-daughter. Lucilla was to have been married at the end of last summer, but her fiancé fell whilst riding, broke his arm, a commonplace injury, but succumbed slowly to the lockjaw. She was somewhat distressed, as goes without saying, but the match was more of her parents’ making than her own. She did not dislike Mr Howells, but there was no great romance.”

  Joseph murmured the appropriate commonplaces, looked a little surprised at such a confidence being made to him prior to the young lady’s acquaintance.

  “Her parents have been busy again and are urging her to another engagement, but with a young man – not so very young, actually – of less attractiveness than yourself. Little more than a local squire, in fact. Was she to meet you, and you her, then you might both find yourself in the way of a very practical union. She will bring no more than five thousand pounds with her, but the family is related to half of the great houses of England. I would not generally be so expansive, Mr Andrews, but you are generally held to have buried your heart with your wife, and are thought to be making a necessary and sensible attempt to establish your family. If I am wrong, then please to correct me, sir, and be sure that I shall be wholly understanding.”

  “You are very good, ma’am. Thank you. You will know that I am, almost by default, becoming rich – my interest in steam and manufacturing has made me well off already. A fortune is pointless without an heir, and my family places demands upon me – not in any way unwelcome I assure you. An estate is within my means, or will be within a short while, but I will not retire into tedium on the Land – I cannot! Manufacturing is not respectable, I believe, and I shall never cease to carry the taint.”

  Lady Jersey laughed, shaking her head.

  “A manufacturer who has amassed twenty thousands and has taken to a farm is seen as an upstart. One who has cobbled together half a million and bought an estate is a rough diamond whose children are fit to wed with the highest in the land. It is possible to be very rich and still not be accepted by Society, yet I can assure you, Mr Andrews, that you would have to devote yourself to achieving ostracism – it would not be easily attained!”

  Miss Lucilla Markham made her curtsey later in the evening, danced once with him before the ball ended, showed herself to be sensible, well-presented, attractively rounded and with a very acceptable face showing intelligence, he thought. Hazel eyed, soft brown hair, darker of complexion than was fashionable, but she talked well and Joseph made an effort to interest her – she was a pleasant, bright girl and could probably make an excellent wife. He had always been more attracted to fairer girls, but appearance was not so important, perhaps. If none better showed over the next four weeks then he would make a determined attempt upon her; in the absence of love then a mild affection would suffice.

  Breakfast was taken late, at midday, as would be the case for the next two months of the Season, James and Joseph both hungry – Joseph for having danced for several hours, James because he had spent much of the early morning with files from his Office.

  “One of the drawbacks of dismissing one’s existing staff is that one must tolerate the errors of the new young men. At least, they are made in good faith!”

  “You made a clean sweep, James?”

  “His Grace did not feel that his new administration should be stigmatised by the prosecutions of a large number of the younger sons of the gentry for fraud and peculation – for, as you will appreciate, if one ministry had called in the Law Officers then all of the others might have done so. I therefore simply got rid of all of my predecessor’s staff. I believe that other Ministers of the Crown are following suit, at least to the extent of removing the more flagrant offenders. There have been murmurs, but the spirit of the age is less favourable towards corruption, I believe.”

  Joseph was unaware that there was an ‘age’, or that it had any metaphysical dimension, but was disinclined to argue – a reduction in theft by the government must be applauded by any tax-paying man.

  “You seem busy, James.”

  “The Sugar Islands are rapidly progressing into decline and decay – and are thus less able to generate their own revenue and maintain their own facilities. Harbours and military installations must be funded entirely from London now – which means some must be abandoned, their garrisons withdrawn.”

  “That will, of course, make them even poorer and so accelerate the process of decay.”

  James could not understand why that should be so, but would never argue at the breakfast table. Joseph found the proposition so obvious that he could not see a need to explain.

  “This business of steam railways, Joseph – is it actually going ahead?”

  “The Liverpool to Manchester railway will open next year, will be running passenger traffic by the year Thirty. It is a certainty, brother.”

  “And should we offer encouragement, do you believe?”

  “Strongly! Amongst other factors, a marching battalion of foot expects fifteen miles a day if it is to travel one hundred miles. One might push the men to twenty-five miles if there was to be no further movement for a week, but if you wish to transfer a battalion from, say, London to Manchester, then y
ou really must allow a month if it is not to arrive exhausted and with half its men straggling footsore and useless for the rest of the year. By railway a battalion could take to its carriages at dawn and disembark in Manchester before dusk, fit and in no way out of breath and with no losses.”

  James had not considered that possibility.

  “With the increasing number of riots that is a very important point, Joseph. We may have fifty thousand soldiers and militiamen available at any given moment in the country as a whole, but often we have none within a day’s march of the trouble spot. With your railways we would always be near at hand. I will talk to the Home Secretary – reluctantly!”

  “Will we see his police force in the near future, brother?”

  “In London, certainly. Elsewhere, not yet. There seems to be agreement that we shall not have a single, national body, directly controlled by the government. We could never find a majority in either House for such a Napoleonic constabulary – the whole of our history is against it. So we will probably have to allow each great town and city to enrol its own force – if it has a council to collect a local rate to pay for it – because if the government is not to control the police force then it will certainly not supply the cash for it!”

  “I am not convinced that is a wholly wise policy, James.”

  “Policy? I am not aware that there is such a thing, Joseph. Personal opinions; bias; arrogance; ignorance; all alloyed with a degree of unwillingness to allow government actually to interfere with the lives of the powerful. I have often wished that there was such a thing as a ‘policy’, because then I could refer to it when trying to do what is best for a particular colony. Instead, I guess, because I never know sufficient to make an informed decision, and if I do not take action then no action will be taken at all. Do not look for wise, impartial, intelligent answers from government, Joseph – they will not come!”

  “Thus, one must not look for a sensible plan for the railways in this country, James – they will simply grow where people choose to build them rather than where they might be best placed.”

  “Exactly, Joseph – there will be no lead from government.”

  James’ wife appeared after breakfast, a card in her hand.

  “Mr Simon Nash, James, left cards with us. Do we know him?”

  “Not off hand, no… Joseph?”

  “I know the name… but I am not sure that I have ever met the man… Irish, I believe, let me think… Got him! Nephew to Major Plunkett, his sister’s son! You remember the story, James?”

  “Arranged marriage, I believe… Plunkett came on a visit after Waterloo, said that his sister was wed to a naval captain who was sent to sea after three months and came home no more, but won prize money before he was sunk. There was a substantial estate already, inherited long after he had taken to the sea – a dead brother, perhaps two, and he unwilling to leave the service in time of war – which is only right and honourable, when all is said and done. The son would have been born at the turn of the century, would be eight-and-twenty or thereabouts now. I believe his mother moved to Worthing, or somewhere on the English coast, on his majority.”

  “So, James, he is a Masters by birth, as well as this Irish family, Nash, and he has wealth?”

  “Unless he has been spendthrift, yes.”

  “You should pay him a call, sir, in courtesy. Our hosts of the next evenings would be very happy to greet another eligible gentleman, if such he may be. Do take some care to assure yourself that he is fit to be presented to Society!”

  “What is the address?”

  “Irish, but written down is his hotel, which I do not know but is close to the Clarendon, so should be acceptable.”

  She shooed them out of the house, taking a cab in the late spring rain.

  “What does she mean, ‘fit to be presented’, Joseph?”

  “No Irish mud on his boots.”

  “Ah!”

  They found Mr Nash in his hotel, discovered him to be dressed correctly for time and place, though not probably by a London tailor – Belfast’s best, they suspected, and acceptable enough to all except a dandy.

  “I came to England to visit my mother, not realising it was the Season, as you call it here, and she suggested I might spend a few days in London – being unwed, to her annoyance. It was in her mind that I might come to know my relatives, some of whom must be in Town, and then perhaps return in September, equipped with a few invitations.”

  It was a practical plan. They talked a while and managed to discover that he possessed a substantial estate and probably a respectable income and had not appeared in London before due to a love of travelling that had seen him in most of the capitals of Europe in the previous few summers. Now, however, he felt that he had a duty to settle down, to establish himself.

  Sitting in the hotel lounge Nash called for refreshments, coffee for all three; the waiter returned within five minutes, too slow for Nash who rebuked him harshly, showing little care in his choice of language.

  "Damned lackeys of today, gentlemen - no respect, no sense of place!"

  The hard Ulster accent grated on both. They busied themselves with their cups.

  "You will know that I am involved very much with steam, Mr Nash?" Joseph asked.

  "I did not, sir, but you are the youngest son, are you not? I could hardly dirty my own hands in my position, but for you it will be different. There is a linen mill on one of my manors which produces a very fair income, or so my agent tells me. Tell me, sir, does this steam offer anything for our future?"

  Joseph fortunately was amused, rather than affronted as James seemed to be.

  "It is worth ten thousands a year to me - at least computation, Mr Nash, and I confidently expect that to double over the next five years. I would not be surprised if I could sell my industrial holdings for twenty times that sum. I have picked up land here and there across the North Country as well, out of the way hillsides with coal underneath them mostly - all of which will be of value in twenty or thirty years from now when the railway lines run through the valleys at their feet."

  "Railways - I had heard of a proposal to build such a thing, but not in my own country, perhaps."

  "Liverpool to Manchester within two years, London to everywhere within twenty, or less!"

  "Passenger carrying and cheaply, sir?"

  "In time, yes!"

  "Then I will oppose them in my own lands, sir! We do not want the damned potato-eating croppies wandering at will across the whole of the country! We have problems enough keeping them down as it is - we want no additional provocation to disorder!"

  "'Croppies', sir? I do not think I have met the term."

  "Damned Papist rebels - their hair short to keep the lice at bay, or so I presume."

  "Ah!"

  "Steamships now, Mr Joseph - they seem to be all the rage in England."

  "The Andrews family, through their Roberts Shipyards, are leaders in England and just possibly in the whole world, sir. There are American enterprises that might dispute that claim, perhaps."

  "I travelled in one, to Liverpool. Dirty, smelly, noisy, but fast and keeping to a schedule. Not so bad an innovation, it would seem. I had some thought of investing a few thousands if a yard was to be built in Belfast, say - not as a working partner, as goes without saying, I trust."

  "But of course, Mr Nash."

  They made their farewells, having invited Nash to accompany them to a reception on the following evening, not a ball but a small affair of some one hundred or so talking and listening to a little music and meeting old friends gathered together.

  "An event for us politicians mostly, Mr Nash - exchanging scandal on a friendly basis, for a change. A fine place to be seen for a new face on the London scene."

  Nash promised to join them, made his thanks, as graciously as he knew how.

  "Not my choice as a boon companion, James! Just a little acerbic for my taste!"

  "Compared to many of the Irish members, Joseph, he is a cultivated gentle
man. What did you make of his income?"

  "Less than mine, but only by a little, would be my guess."

  "That was what I thought. But, it may be what we were intended to think - he might be in search of a well-endowed bride, after all."

  They had no wish to introduce a fortune-hunter into Society - it would reflect upon them eventually.

  James penned a note to Michael, sent it by footman before they left for the evening's entertainment.

  Michael was able to access his files on the family, responded next morning.

  "You were wrong, Joseph - Mr Nash's income would appear to be somewhat in excess of yours. Broad estates, though a low rental income, as seems to be the normal in Ireland, but holdings of Consols measured by the hundred thousand. He is a rich man. Michael describes him also as being well in with the Irish government people, primarily because of a great willingness to flog, transport or hang any Papist who so much as looks cross-eyed at any of his sort. He is a magistrate, of course."

  "Do we wish to be associated with him, brother?"

  "I know not. I shall enquire of my lady."

  Jennifer had no doubt that Mr Nash should be brought to the notice of Society - his birth and wealth were both unimpeachable; minor quirks of personality could be overlooked, she said.

  "He will, after all, spend the bulk of his days in Belfast, or thereabouts, and will not come to the attention of the civilised - he will have few opportunities to embarrass us."

  Book Ten: A Poor Man

  at the Gate Series

  Chapter Two

  Eustace Hood became increasingly concerned as he travelled across the German states, making good time on roads somewhat better kept than was the English norm, but stopped surprisingly frequently by soldiers, gendarmes and local police. The military and gendarmerie officers were all unfailingly courteous, but without exception required evidence of his identity and nationality and a reason for his presence.

  "Travelling to Prague, Captain?"