A Victorian Gent (The Making of a Man Series, Book 1)

by Andrew Wareham

  "One eighth part of an ounce of pure opium, made up into a bolus to be swallowed more easily, will end any pain for a few hours, Mr Burke... There are certain drawbacks to taking opium in such a way for more than a very short while, of course. The habitual user, the opium eater, can be a sad character."

  "The soldier in agonising pain is an even more sad sight, sir. Modern warfare would seem to be bloodier than anything that has ever gone before, and medicine must be appropriately heroic. I will say that I have stood on the field of battle - I was present with a battalion at Bull Run - and I have no doubt that opium is a lesser evil than the anguish of the wound caused by the Minie round."

  Robinson was impressed, the more so for having eaten well for a month - the ingestion of a few beefsteaks had given him a great respect for Mr Burke.

  "It is not difficult to mix opium together with an inert substance such as china clay - kaolin - which I already grind fine and dry for use in the Elixir. Rolling the pill then in a dusting of sugar will make it far more palatable to the sick man. Another dry warehouse, a pair of benches and a dozen or so of ladies with nimble fingers and myself with a set of scales to weigh out the active substance - easy to arrange, sir. How would we wish to pack the pills?"

  "Wrapped in cotton in cardboard boxes, let us say in dozens, twelve to the gross - a convenient size for carrying in a medical orderly's pack. Purchase tea-chests to transport them across the Atlantic, stored dry and bilge-free. I do not know what prices might be in Washington, but I have a correspondent there who may be trusted to sell our product at best. We should aim perhaps to send twelve gross a week in the first instance. I am sure that there will soon be a call for far more than that."

  "One might expect to pay tuppence for a pill in Liverpool, sir, which would be about five American cents. To make a worthwhile trade one might be obliged to think bigger, Mr Burke."

  "Difficult, for there are only so many of wounded men, after all. Perhaps one might consider other medical perquisites."

  "Bandages, both cotton and linen; lint; soothing lotions; soap - ordinary lye soap irritates open wounds intolerably, one understands. Simple, basic medicines as well. All of these things will be made in small quantities in America, but there will be dozens, hundreds maybe, of military hospitals requiring their initial supplies. Blankets, even, may be in short supply."

  Opium pills would inevitably be difficult to obtain; the firm that had quantities to hand, at a very fair price, might well be able to encourage the purchase of its other products.

  A first consignment to the States used most of Dick's capital; he needed the income from the Elixir to get by on until payments came back across the ocean. He turned his mind to consideration of the local prospects.

  Washington was not an easy city for the businesswoman to operate in, Miss Parsons decided. She wanted to get out of the unpleasant, even if highly profitable environment. Not a day passed that she was not propositioned, more or less crudely, by one of the dealers in the city firms she dealt with; she dared not venture out of doors after dark into the streets full of drunken soldiers except with her bodyguard looming large at her side.

  She wrote hopefully to Major Burke in Liverpool, suggesting that the firm might consider relocating to England, leaving only a small office to oversee sales in the capital. For the while she had to haunt government offices, negotiating with inevitably nasty little men to sell the supplies the soldiers so badly needed. Every deal involved a bribe, often more than one, with the suggestion always that the gentleman might be happy to take his sweetener in kind rather than cash. Even the sale of opium pills, directly to medical men in the military hospitals, could not take place without a kickback of a few dollars and the practised avoidance of groping hands.

  On the positive side, her existence was profitable beyond belief. Prices had risen with the outbreak of war and now were climbing through the ceiling; government functionaries handed out Treasury Bills with no consideration for value, throwing them into their cronies' hands if there was a chance of even a small amount of gold in exchange.

  Elizabeth had come back from Kansas City with the proceeds of the sale of the hotel in silver and gold coinage, having left the local bank notes in Mr Heron's legal hands, he to have freedom to invest as he would in farmland or timbering. The rate of casualties in early days had led him to the belief that there would be a number of farms left without a male worker within a very short while, and that their female owners would very often choose to sell out in a buyer's market.

  For the while, possession of gold, or even the less attractive silver, drew the attention of purchasing officers in a very positive fashion. As little as fifty dollars in coin commonly allowed her to rack her prices up by a thousand or more, payment in paper made almost instantly. She forwarded the returns for Dick's first shipload inside a month, at a profit of nearly one hundred per centum, to her and his pleasure.

  She kept up a hopeful correspondence as well, keeping him awake to the gossip in the more informed circles of the city, though she had no access to the very few who were actually certain of what was going on.

  'Mr Lincoln is faced by domestic difficulties, one understands, his wife suffering nervous problems and his children not entirely well, the oldest boy somewhat given to instability. The behaviour of the Commander-in-Chief does not assist him in his problems. General McClellan behaves often as if he were President and Mr Lincoln no more than a not very bright secretary; while there seems to be no other General at all, then the Young Napoleon can strut with impunity. Should a replacement show himself then the President will no doubt turn to him. The war goes badly in the East, primarily because the Army of the Potomac does not fight it.'

  She read through the despondent paragraph, then added that progress was occurring in the West and that various generals were showing ability there. McClellan was obviously jealous of the successes these others were having and was making more frequent references to his great plan to end the war in a single stroke by taking Richmond. He was building a massive army and was using his undoubted skill to equip and train it; his detractors wondered increasingly loudly whether he would ever fight it.

  'On a more commercial note, there is a shortage of goods for the housewife. The factories of the North have turned to weapons of war and the needs of the civilian population are to an extent ignored. Some loads of everyday utensils for the kitchen would sell well, while items that might be viewed as more of a luxurious nature are very difficult to come by. Good brandy is hardly to be found any more and laces, silks and satins are snapped up when, rarely, they are discovered.'

  'I am giving consideration to my future in America and wonder whether you might not have advice upon it.'

  Dick had much advice for her, all of it hinging on her staying in America for the next year, or two.

  The consideration of profit demanded an active agent in Washington, a partner rather than a mere manager, and Dick was impressed by returns that doubled his money in five months. Additionally, it was quite clear that Miss Parsons did not expect to retain her single state for very long after reaching Liverpool - and he had no real objection to that idea, except for its impossibility.

  He wrote as encouragingly as he felt he could risk, suggesting that she should very definitely come to England, but not quite yet.

  'Our business enterprises in Liverpool flourish and will very soon expand, possibly to London, certainly to Manchester and to Sheffield and Leeds and then to Birmingham, that other great metropolis. I expect to spend more days aboard the railways - as the English call them - than at home, not that I have a home as such yet. I have rented a small house for my needs, quite inappropriate for other than the bachelor existence.'

  Enough of domestic matters, he felt.

  'I have located the stock of a silk merchant who recently fell into insolvency due to unwise speculations - he came to believe that he was a gentleman and, among other stupidities, took an interest in the Turf, buying some slow horses at very high price in
the belief that they were Derby winners. I have arranged with the Trustees in Bankruptcy to take his silks and brocades and laces against six-month Bills, and have placed all aboard fast steamer for New York. I trust you will be able to move the stock at a profit.'

  'What can you tell me of woollen cloths for uniforms? Is there a call for heavy blue winter weights? I have reason to suppose that I can lay my hands on material of the correct colour. It will not necessarily be entirely waterproof, nor yet of the best possible weave, but it should be adequate for soldiers.'

  This letter, one of a weekly flow, accompanied the silks and would, Dick trusted, keep Miss Parsons in Washington for a while longer. He set his pen down and made his way from his house, which served as office as well, being close to the centre of town, towards the chop-house where he was to meet Mr Robinson.

  The chemist's few weeks of short commons had had an effect upon his constitution, it seemed; he had made up for the lack of food in enthusiastic fashion and was rapidly becoming plump. Another year should give him a very prosperous appearance.

  Dick was a little early, sat with a copy of the Times for a few minutes. He glanced idly at the advertisements on the front page, wondered just how soon it would be before the Elixir was to be placed there; it would not cost too much and added a touch of class to any product.

  "To be seen in the columns of the Times, you know," always rather impressive.

  He glanced down at the Announcements, 'Births, Marriages and Deaths' - 'Hatched, Matched and Despatched' in common parlance. He spotted his own name, looked idly at the small print - Burke was not that uncommon a surname. He froze in outrage.

  "To the wife of Mr Richard Burke, heir to Sir Godby Burke of Burke's in Dorset, a daughter."

  "The damned whore is still at it! And laying claim to my name!"

  He caught a waiter's eye, demanded brandy.

  This had to be the work of the Old Man! He had evidently screwed the Carterets for the baronetcy that was the price of the marriage, and of discreet silence. He could not claim that Dick was dead, of course, nor could he have set a hue and cry for him - if his wife had produced a legitimate daughter then she had to have had a husband somewhere in the background, in good odour even if invisible.

  What was he to do?

  A lawyer might well be his first recourse. He had to discover what exactly was the position in Dorset; anonymously - he had no wish to step down at the local railway station and present himself to his parent. Prodigal sons were not often found in the merchant classes, he believed.

  Robinson appeared, noticed nothing in Dick's manner, discussed business in the most normal fashion.

  "Coughs and sneezes, Mr Burke! The plague of the modern age!"

  Coal fires in one hundred thousand houses; steam engines both stationary and locomotive; foundries and breweries and brickworks by the hundred; all combined to fill the air with soot and smoke and noxious gases. Any windless day in Liverpool became foggy within the hour; two days without a breeze could reduce visibility in any city to less than one hundred yards. It was not as bad as London where the occasional week of calm produced the brown 'Peculiar' in which faces could not be recognised at thirty feet. The inevitable result was a population that coughed and wheezed and whistled when it breathed; 'bronchitis', 'catarrh', 'asthma' - the doctors invented new names by the dozen and ordinary people sought relief where they could find it. Proprietary, 'patent' medicines flourished.

  "'Mrs Mary Boswell's Antique Linctus for the Soothing of the Irritated Throat', Mr Burke - another ancient potion long known in her family and of value to adult and child alike."

  "A valuable nostrum, I doubt not, Mr Robinson. Priced reasonably, one presumes?"

  "Indeed, Mr Burke. I estimate a profit of not less than fifty per centum, rising on the larger bottles!"

  "Does it work, sir?"

  "It will soothe the throat lacerated by repeated coughing, Mr Burke, and will enable the child to sleep more easily. It is as a child's medicine that I would primarily view it."

  "Excellent - people will spend out for their children when they would keep their hands in their pockets for themselves. What does it contain?"

  "A little of opium, for sleeping; extracts of the coca leaf which serve to numb the throat; molasses to render the mixture palatable; a little of medical alcohol in which to mix the suspension; mint leaves and juniper berries for the tang they impart - such a healthy flavour!"

  "Coca leaf? The South American plant? Is it not the prime constituent of Cocawine, that drink reported to be favoured by Her Majesty and others?"

  "It is indeed, sir! What could be more healthy or better recommended?"

  "Can the ingredient be purchased easily, Mr Robinson?"

  "It is to be found in any of a dozen medical importers, sir."

  "Then we must go forward with your proposal, I believe, Mr Robinson. Have you a costed proposition?"

  Robinson had learned business habits, had all to hand. He suggested that they should simply set up another line in their largest warehouse, all to be produced by the existing firm.

  "The profits share must be amended, Mr Robinson."

  Giving Robinson another five per cent as a voluntary act would probably keep him sweet for years; Dick did not want the chemist to dissolve their partnership and set out on his own.

  "Let us visit our lawyer, Mr Robinson."

  They gave their instructions simply and quickly and Robinson trotted off to oversee the women filling the bottles and putting the pennies and shillings into his pocket. Dick remained behind for a few minutes.

  "I wonder, Mr Mayhew, whether you could assist me in another, and delicate, matter."

  The back-street lawyer's eyes lit up - he loved delicate matters; he assured Mr Burke of his absolute discretion.

  "You will be aware that I came to Liverpool from the States, Mr Mayhew, where I had been caught up with the War and before that in the confusion that reigned in Kansas."

  Even if the lawyer had never heard of 'Bloody Kansas' he should be able to quickly find out, and then guess that Mr Burke had not come back to England with entirely clean hands. It might be good for a not particularly scrupulous solicitor to suspect that his client was a man of blood; it could act to reinforce professional etiquette in the most direct fashion.

  "I left England precipitately - 'fled' might not be an overstatement, indeed - due to a somewhat rancorous dispute with my father relating to the paternity of the child my wife bore after seven months of my arranged marriage; a ten pound boy. I was, you will appreciate, a very young man at that time, and naive. I have not been seen in Dorset since."

  Mayhew analysed his client's statement and put two and two together, ending with a reasonable and appallingly scandalous answer. He said nothing.

  "Now, Mr Mayhew, I discover this in the Times."

  He placed the newspaper in the lawyer's hands.

  "Oh my stars! What, sir, do you wish to do?"

  Mayhew was shocked and gleeful - he had never heard of so damaging an action. If this went to the High Court then there was a case any Silk would wish to be associated with - it was a cause to make a reputation on - just think of the cross-examinations, the newspaper headlines this could produce!

  "The lady, your wife, sir - there is no mention of her name."

  "She was a Carteret."

  That changed matters - the family was noble and well-related politically, and many of the clan were very rich. They would wish for silence, and had the power to buy and enforce it. There would still be room for a great deal of financial profit, however, indeed possibly considerable scope for a lawyer with initiative…

  "I would wish in the first instance simply to obtain information, Mr Mayhew. Can that be done?"

  "Easily, sir - the advantage of being known, Mr Burke. Where the wife of an ordinary gentleman might enjoy anonymity, the daughter of my Lord Carteret will be noticed wherever she may be. Sir Godby as well, will have made himself visible. A recent creation, sir?"

/>   "Very - it was quite unknown to me when I left some two years since."

  It occurred to Mayhew that Mr Burke had been ‘very young’; he did not seem so old now, except one looked at his eyes.

  "I must ask, Mr Burke, whether you are of age - if not, your father would still have some authority over you and you might wish to remain undiscovered by him."

  "I am one-and-twenty, Mr Mayhew."

  "Excellent, sir - so much becomes easier in such case. Are you considering a Bill of Divorce, sir?"

  Dick shook his head instinctively - divorce was scandalous, would blemish any businessman's name for the whole of his life. Even the aristocracy did its possible to avoid Bills of Divorce, resorting to the process only in absolute extreme.

  "I should be very unwilling to do so, Mr Mayhew. Among other things it is a slow and expensive process, is it not?"

  "Very much so, Mr Burke. Even where there is no defence in law - as would seem to be the case here - it is none the less possible to offer a deal of obstruction and delay. Pleadings may be lost, affidavits queried, letters remain unanswered - all with no recourse except the judge be sympathetic - and the aristocracy may expect far more friendship than may be offered to any mere 'mister'. Five thousand pounds, at minimum, and seven years at very least, sir, if you go the route of divorce."

  They agreed that it was a very last resort.

  "Annulment is possible in certain circumstances. Generally speaking, one might have to persuade a judge that a marriage had never been completed, in the physical sense, that is. That can be difficult."

  Dick started to grin - he had a limited sense of humour, but he could see the funny side of trying to make a judge believe that he might well be the only man in the south of Dorsetshire who had not had congress with his wife.