The Privateersman (A Poor Man at the Gate Series Book 1)

by Andrew Wareham

  Martin had no direct correspondent in Antigua, but he had contacts with Mr Lacey in Liverpool who was banker to the sugar there. Mr Lacey had not closed his doors because Martin had been able to put fifty thousands across to him on the night Tom had delivered the guineas; he had already paid back fifty-five thousands, with his best thanks, and would be able to make an anonymous gift to Mrs Laetitia on the island, the more so because the planters who had sold their sugar through his offices had received their money and knew that they owed him debts of gratitude at least – they would ensure that no nosey-parker asked awkward questions.

  Two months into the depression Martin begged the favour of an interview with Tom.

  “I know that you are unsettled in the manufacturing life, Mr Andrews, and that mere money-making must seem a little pointless now. I am able to put you in the way of an opportunity that rarely arises. My Correspondent in Kettering, being aware that Martins is solvent, and must have at least one of very wealthy depositors to have kept it so – the whole country in fact, the financial part that is, must have made that surmise – two tons of gold attracts a remarkable degree of attention, you know! Where was I? Ah, yes, Kettering – a very rich iron town, as you will know, one of the earliest in the whole Midlands, finding problems now for lack of charcoal and distance from the nearest coal mine – there was used to be Rockingham Forest surrounding the town, but it is all gone now, every last tree gone to charcoal! Just to the south of the town, across the river, the Ise, there is a large and old-fashioned estate, the Quillers, the family that owned it, said to be Papist, certainly reclusive and out of favour with government and their peers; they died out some five years ago, no male issue, no cousins or nephews; one daughter, a spinster of uncertain years, not in the way of marrying certainly, who inherited and sold, is reputed to have retired to Rome to die in an odour of sanctity – or what passes for it amongst the Papists!”

  Tom, who was not entirely certain of the distinction between Papist and any other sub-division of Christianity, and had thought them to be Irish anyway, smiled his sympathetic understanding - very strange and not really English, he implied.

  “A Mr Rockingham – my correspondent understands the name to be of choice, not birth – was an ironmaster who was generally held to have made his fortune during the last war, certainly was prominent in the business community; he decided to set up for a gentleman and bought the estate. Quite rightly, he enclosed and began to improve the estate, but it transpires that he borrowed heavily to do so – his fortune stretched to the initial purchase but no further. Unfortunately for him, he went outside of the normal banking houses for his funds, for reasons of secrecy, one presumes; he went to the Jews! He failed to make his payments last month, asked for time, a friendly accommodation, he hoped, and was rapidly taken up and is temporarily held in a sponging house, under arrest but not yet cast into debtor’s prison. If he can sell and pay off his debts then he may yet come out of the affair with a few thousands, enough to live upon in retirement. He married late in life and has a son of about eight years, a wife as well, but she is of lesser importance; he had intended to bring the boy up as a country gentleman, it would seem, but must now be content to bring him up at all. If he does not arrange an early sale then he will find himself in court and his assets taken from him and placed into administration, the costs involved wiping out any surplus there may be – he will lose everything and may never be able even to regain his freedom. He has no choice, and cannot hold out for a high price, or indeed for anything more than a bare minimum.”

  Tom nodded – it was obvious where Martin was leading. Did he want it? An estate, at Kettering, where was that exactly? The geography of England had never been one of his strong points – there was a map on the wall behind Martin, just too far distant to read the small print easily from where he was sat. He stood, grinned an apology and leant across to check the location of the town. Smack in the centre of lowland England, well away from Dorset and a respectable distance north of London.

  “Tell me more, Mr Martin.”

  “He owes perhaps ten thousands to the Jews, probably as much again to builders and road contractors and for drainage and bridges and who knows what else – it behoves the great man of the manor to be open-handed, and he was certainly that, even when his hands were technically empty. Twenty or so thousands in his pocket besides and he would go into his retirement; less than that and he might try to fight, to drag things out for two or three years.”

  “So, forty thousands that would probably turn into somewhat more with fees and interest and extra debts turning up out of the blue. In exchange a large estate bought cheap. How large, Mr Martin?”

  “Precisely, to the last acre, I do not know – indeed, the last stages of the enclosure are still in completion so probably no one knows for certain yet. The farms will be paying no rents this year and there will be money still to spend – enclosed land must be fenced and drained and set immediately to work; roads must be built, drains finished, new farmhouses built perhaps. There could be another ten thousands to go yet this year and three or four a year for each of the next five. After that, enclosed arable pays rent of thirty shillings an acre typically and the Thingdon Estate will be mostly wheat land and will amount to about seven thousand acres. So, an income of about ten thousands gross, but with expenditure to be made each year on improvements and always the risk of a bad harvest or failing prices – over a ten year stretch you would probably expect to net five thousands on average.”

  Roberts and the mines would be worth at least five thousands this year, probably twice as much next – a clear ten thousand a year that would make him very rich indeed, would mean that he could afford to live a life of leisure, which would rapidly become very boring – he would be able to choose what he wanted to work at – perhaps he could encourage engineers to come to his shops and build new inventions, better steam engines, new ways of mining, of producing iron, or maybe he could improve the world of agriculture – farmers were generally backward, primitive sorts of folks – there would be a lot to do. Maybe, just possibly, he could look about for a wife and set up as a family man, probably he ought to, on an estate that needed an heir. Joseph would be pleased to see him settled in domestic bliss, though not, he rather thought, blessed ten times over.

  “I would be able to keep the mines, and Roberts, Mr Martin? I have heard that ‘gentlemen’ do not approve of trade.”

  “You would, but at a distance, with managers to do the work for you, you would have to pander to their prejudices to that extent. As well, Mr Andrews, you may not have considered the political implications of your position if you buy – the estate effectively controls the nomination of the local member – he is elected by about thirty burgesses of the old village of Finedon, some eighteen of whom will be your tenants, the estate owning the freehold of their shops or cordwainer’s sheds or blacksmith’s yards. It is one of the old rotten boroughs, the electorate small local men exclusively and possessing neither political knowledge nor independence of mind and they will be obedient. Your name will be known in Downing Street as a result and the government of the day will always wish to sweeten you if it can be done at little expense; the barracks in Lancashire may well be instructed to go to Andrews Pit for their coals for winter firing for example; as another instance, a minor knighthood would be yours for the asking – not the Order of the Bath certainly, but one of the lesser honours – and a baronetcy would be quite cheap, two or three years of good behaviour, a ‘loan’ of ten thousand to the Prime Minister’s personal funds and you could be Sir Thomas Andrews, Bart..”

  “A hereditary title, Mr Martin, would not be of great interest to me in the absence of an heir.”

  “Purchase the Thingdon Estate, Mr Andrews, and your chances of remaining unwed will be very slight indeed! You will be a rich landholder and the hunt will be up – to be an acceptable parti to the gentry, Mr Andrews, you must have birth and breeding or lands and riches, ideally both but either will suffice at a pinch.
”

  Tom laughed delightedly, but could not really imagine himself as a fox with a whooping, tally-hoing pack of genteel young ladies at his tail.

  “Make the offer, Mr Martin.”

  It took six more months to make the offer and negotiate the price with Rockingham’s lawyers and creditors, a three-way fight with no community of interest between them. The initial demands were outrageous, scaled down to the unrealistic and eventually to the possible in the current economic climate; a year before good fields had sold at twenty pounds the enclosed acre and there would have been competition between a dozen buyers for each parcel of land, the estate split up farm-by-farm. Now there was only one possible purchaser and last year’s prices were irrelevant. Rockingham’s people found this incredible at first – they were all lawyers and did not believe in change – and then exceedingly difficult to swallow. Clapperley informed them by letter that he would oppose bankruptcy proceedings on the grounds that an offer had been made that would cover Rockingham’s debts at twenty shillings in the pound and leave him a surplus; no judge would take action against a solvent debtor and they would have to come back to Clapperley, weakened by their failure at law.

  Clapperley travelled to Kettering and made an initial offer of twenty thousands, cash; they countered with one hundred and forty thousands, claiming to have an interested party who was busily putting his finances together. Clapperley smiled deprecatingly, said he would like to meet this gentleman who could find any source for finance in the climate of the day; his offer, he reiterated, was in gold coin. The creditors’ lawyers, who were very little concerned with Rockingham’s fate, signified that they would have no objections to any offer that paid them in full and ostentatiously rose from the table. Rockingham’s attorney, a local man in the company of wolves from London and the north country, out of his depth and aware of the fact, brought the meeting to an adjournment, needing to seek instructions from his principal. Clapperley assented and raised a questioning eyebrow to the creditors’ barristers, who obligingly congregated in his room at the Periquito Hotel an hour later.

  “My client will be very pleased to make immediate payment of your claims, gentlemen, including, of course, outstanding interest and fees to your calculation. I believe you may have heard of Martin’s Bank in St Helens?”

  They had – everybody who was anybody had heard of two providential tons of gold coin appearing in the banker’s hour of need.

  “Your client was the gentleman who came up trumps, as one might say, Mr Clapperley?”

  “He was, sir – he had foreseen the inevitability of a collapse and had turned his not inconsiderable wealth into gold – and, I might add, had persuaded me to do the same with my small savings, greatly to my pleasure – and has, of course, been able to make purchases to his own choosing since. I believe it might not be stretching the truth to call him a millionaire, vulgar though the expression may be.”

  A man in possession of even one hundred thousands was rich, was one of very few indeed; they contemplated a million, and the power it conveyed. Inevitably, they then contemplated Rockingham, a failure, worth nothing except the purchaser took pity on him. It was then simply a matter of disposing of the affair carefully and tidily in lawful fashion – the estate was so big that its transfer must be a matter of public knowledge, so they had to wrap everything up neatly – it would be best to pay poor Rockingham off.

  “How old is Mr Rockingham, gentlemen?”

  They thought him to be about fifty, too old to make a comeback in business.

  “Then if we were to put twenty thousands into Consols, in his son’s name, in trust, the income to come to him until his son’s majority or inheritance, he would have a respectable income on which he could live quite comfortably, with no grounds for complaint.”

  “Eminently fair, Mr Clapperley, generous in fact – but might I venture to suggest that five hundred pounds extra would buy him a house and gardens, and another thousand would give him living money for the first year?”

  Clapperley agreed, modifying the proposal to the extent that he would buy Rockingham a house, at least twenty miles distant from the estate and town – out of sight and mind.

  The lawyers shook hands on the agreement – nothing so vulgar as a deal – and departed, the creditors’ people to speak sternly to Rockingham’s man, Clapperley to catch the overnight mail coach north to Birmingham and thence to St Helens, so as not to be present at the scene – there could then be no hint of collusion. Once at home he called on Tom, told him it was all over bar the last minute details, that he could make his arrangements with Martin for the payments to be made.

  “Joe, I’m getting out.”

  “What’s taken you so long, brother? You’ve had the itch in your pants these last five years, and even more so since your pretty lady left. If you want to break up the partnership – which may be for the best if you are elsewhere and can’t be got hold of day-to-day – then how’s about a straight swap? My quarter of Roberts is worth much the same as your three parts in the cotton, I reckon.”

  “Done! Saves arguments that way, Joe. I will be keeping Roberts, both sites, and the mines for an income. The Masons can run the works between them, I’ll put George up to fifteen parts in the hundred on the profits, and Paddy Reilly will take over at the mines except that he can’t do the bookkeeping and sales so well, so I have to find a manager I can trust to work with him. At the moment that’s a problem, because there will be a hundred men out of work who could do the job and would come begging for the chance, and trying to pick between them will be a real bugger!”

  “Easy done, Tom. My junior clerk is the man you want – he’s learnt all about running my offices and all he is doing is waiting for old Higgins to drop dead so he can step into his shoes. His name’s Paisley and he’s an Irishman, so he’ll fit in with your people.”

  Neither man had heard of a place called Ulster.

  “What about your house, Tom? Not a lot of sense keeping it on for a couple of weeks a year.”

  “I hadn’t thought about it. Do you want Bennet?”

  “I’ll take her and the house both, Tom – it will save me building another wing onto the Lodge – we shall need more room.”

  “She’s not!”

  “She is!”

  “Number nine?”

  “That’s right – six boys to two girls, so far.”

  “Take it as a gift, Joe – a wedding present, because I never did have time to get round to a proper one as I remember.”

  The question of Clapperley arose – what to do about his knowledge of all of their dealings. Joseph had never had close contact with the little lawyer, disliking him from the first, detesting him as he came to hear of his personal habits and amusements; Tom, at a distance and unable to keep an eye on him, was sure he would be put in the way of temptation and the fraud resulting would be both expensive and, eventually, scandalous. They decided after long discussion that they could either buy him or shoot him, and that it was, marginally, better to offer him money, though putting a bullet through his head, or other portions of his anatomy, might be doing the human race a favour. He would be given control of Tom’s speculative money, with an absolute freedom to invest where and how he would, and the major firms, Roberts and Star Spinners, would be made into joint-stock companies, ninety-five per cent held by Tom and Joseph respectively, five per cent of each in Clapperley’s name, ‘in recognition of his loyal service to them’.

  Clapperley, easily sufficiently astute to recognise their motivation, showed admirable gravity and gratitude as he accepted their gift, worth ten thousands at the moment and up to five times that when conditions returned to normal. Fifty thousands, an income of two thousands a year, irrespective of his other activities, was a genteel fortune, more than many of the County lived on; it was too much to jeopardise and would keep him honest, as far as Andrews and Star were concerned; he laughed to himself as he came to his conclusions, candid enough – in the privacy of his own thoughts – to know
that he was a villain, and not caring in the slightest. He would take a wife, he decided, buy a large house and settle down to father an heir and become respectable; it would mean frequent congress with a female somewhat older than his tastes habitually ran to, but he felt he could make the sacrifice – a few years and he could become a member and then either very wealthy or politically powerful – which amounted to the same thing.

  The little house, which Tom had bought back from Mary in exchange for her larger premises in Corfe, and its occupant provided a temporary problem, but one Mrs Morris solved, able to find another gentleman who needed discreet accommodation and could pay for it and would keep Mrs Johnson and Martha in their places – Tom felt he owed them that much.

  Tom spent several hours in conferences with Martin, begging his advice, and listening to it. Martin, like many other country bankers, had been born to the County, fourth son, sharing only the tiniest inheritance and obliged to take up a profession. His eldest brother had inherited father’s three thousand a year; the next had become a midshipman and was now a retired Rear-Admiral, without squadron, a ‘yellow’ admiral living on half-pay and memories; the third had become a soldier in a very unfashionable regiment of the line, all the family could afford, and had gone to America and never come back – he had taken up, somehow, a large tract of land in Virginia, a woman involved, they understood, and had changed allegiances early in the War – he was never mentioned; Martin himself, cleverest of the boys, had been bought a place in the bank of a relative, a cousin of sorts, where he had learned the business and married the daughter to keep it in the family, there being no son, in the fullness of time becoming the Martin of Martin’s Bank. He was an authority on the mores and ways of the County, Tom’s sole reference to that unknown class; it was necessary to the running of the estate that Tom should fit in and although he had no particular desire to rub shoulders with the lesser gentry he would have to keep on terms with them, their terms.