In truth, this was not a million miles from the underbelly of the Fry’s business. Deceit was part of manufacturing choc-olate, although the Quakers did not admit it. Old Mr Fry, like many of his competitors, employed fellows they hesitated to call spies to fall into conversation with workers at rival fac-tories and procure the recipes of the most popular lozenges, jellies and chocolate confections. Culinary turncoats were paid plenty, but they required coaxing. The Frys had a reputation for innovation. Fry’s history was littered with delicious, innovative fancy goods. Richard’s grandfather had initiated the use of the steam engine, first at his apothecary shop and later in the factory. The machine had exponentially speeded up production of their most successful product to date – Fry’s Finest Cocoa. Many an apothecary making cocoa in his back room would have given his right hand to be initiated into the mysteries of the locked third-floor kitchens at the Fry manufactory, which was in the charge of Richard’s stolid elder brother Francis, also head spymaster for the family business. Francis was adept at winkling out secrets be they guarded by Menier in Paris or the more recently opened business run by the Rowntree family further north. It was not for nothing that the Fry’s enterprise was the largest and most successful in England and that Richard was a fellow with a curious mind – it might bode well for his future in the chocolate trade if only he were to direct his curiosity the right way.
The day the Bittersweet docked in Bristol, Richard had sneaked out for the afternoon. He diced for almost an hour till the table dried. Then he set off towards the dock, where his gentlemen’s clothes were secreted in a barrel. While he enjoyed the hearty unravelling of an evening in Bristol’s less salubrious quarter, this was not a pleasure he might afford himself tonight. This evening, the Frys would attend a recital. The thought gave him a thrill. If the respectable doyennes only knew how he’d passed his afternoon, they’d be hor-
rified. He was cutting it fine. He’d have to scrub himself raw to remove the smell of poverty in time for dinner.
Richard barrelled down the alleyway. Three stevedores walked together in a clutch and he stiffened to fight them if he had to, but the men passed, speaking English peppered with Gaelic. As he cut into his hiding place, he wasn’t looking where he was going and collided with an oncomer. Instinctively he pulled up his fists.
‘You need to mind where you’re going, friend,’ he snarled, his accent not displaying the usual well-educated vowel sounds of a chap who routinely read Homer and debated the finer points of the Bible with his relations.
The man looked up and for a split second there was the possibility that things might turn nasty. Then recognition lit in the fellow’s eyes.
‘Richard? What are you doing in that get-up?’ Francis asked his younger brother.
‘What are you doing here?’ Richard parried.
‘There’s a ship docked with a new supply,’ Francis said. ‘Cacao beans. They’re the best I’ve seen in a while. The bondsman tipped me off and I came to have a look on the sly. Richard, you’re filthy.’
Richard’s eyes burned. In all the years, he’d never been caught, though once he’d had to hide behind a water butt as his father passed in a carriage.
‘What kind of beans?’ he enquired, for if a fellow wanted to distract a member of the Fry family, asking a chocolate-related question was the quickest way to do so.
Francis’s mouth split in an easy grin. ‘There’s even some wild. Brazilian criollo, mostly. The ship set sail from Natal. Thank God it docked here, not London. I haven’t seen it before – a scruffy old barque – but they must know what they’re doing. It’s a godsend. There’s been too much forastero of late. If we can strike a deal, here will lie our remedy.’
Traffic from the Brazils had been inconsistent because of the war, with most beans loading from Trinidad. The top end had been hard to come by.
‘The captain has asked about us, of course,’ Francis continued. ‘It was the first thing he said. The bondsman put him off till tomorrow, so I thought I’d sneak down and see. Father will be delighted. What are you doing here, boy?’
Richard shrugged. He felt like a child caught at midnight in the pantry, jam smeared across his lips. ‘A man’s conscience is his own,’ he intoned. It was a family phrase.
Francis giggled. ‘Well, that may be, but a gentleman’s toilette is the business of those around him.’ He wrapped an arm around his younger brother’s shoulders. ‘I’ll walk with you,’ he offered. ‘If Mother catches you looking like that, she’ll faint.’
*
Henderson wondered if his father had not meant to lead the life of a respectable planter but the complexity of the lading papers required to pay duty had driven him to a life of smuggling. The captain had been in the office of the bonded warehouse for at least an hour. Progress was inhibited by the fact that the clerk was drunk. The only reason Henderson continued to listen to the fat old sot was that he was talking about the Frys. He appeared enamoured of the entire family.
‘Very generous,’ he slurred, rubbing his swollen red nose. ‘Old Mr Fry was very kind when my wife passed away. They’s fair-minded, they is, the Frys. The boys an’ all.’
Despite his inebriation, the fellow wouldn’t make a stab at how the illustrious chocolate maker might view a shipment of several tonnes of cacao of Brazilian origin except to repeat that Mr Fry was a generous personage, ‘wunnerful’ if ever there was a crisis, but would not inspect the shipment until tomorrow at the earliest.
Henderson paced. This was taking too long. Maria had started packing when he left the ship and quite beside that there were the men to consider. The Bittersweet’s crew were restless.
‘Sir,’ he said, ‘might I induce you—’
The clerk hiccupped loudly. ‘Aw,’ he said, and hiccupped again.
The captain’s temper was wearing thin. ‘I should like to dismiss my crew, sir. It is getting late and I have matters to attend.’
‘I seen one of your fellows off the ship like a shot.’ The drunkard’s eyes were suddenly hard. ‘Going by that, the rest might not even be aboard when you get back.’
Henderson paused. The man in question was Sam Pearson, whose hot temper had not abated for the duration of the trip. The captain had no desire to explain the boy’s behaviour, but if his departure had been noticed, he would have to say something. Such ill discipline reflected badly. He held an impassive expression, as if he were holding a better hand.
‘A passenger. I expect he wanted to see to his business. As do we all, sir.’
The drunkard’s thick fingers sorted clumsily through the papers as if they were made of strips of leather. The smell of stale spirits hung like a cloud. Henderson craned to stare out of the grubby window in the direction of his ship. The afternoon sky was grey outside the casement. It folded over the city like a pewter roof. Now Henderson had docked, he was nervous – not of this simpleton, but of what might transpire. The terms of honest trade were unfamiliar and he had yet to settle into them. He had calculated a price for the beans – a minimum amount – but he had no idea if it was reasonable. Like all luxuries, the duty on chocolate was high and he needed to take that into account. Different commodities had different values in different ports. A good price in New York might be of the middling sort in Bristol or vice versa. It was a comfort that Will had been cheerful about the cargo’s value in English waters. Still, Henderson would need his wits to determine what the best price was here and achieve it. Before he had buttoned his lip and descended into what felt like a protracted and furious sulk below deck, Sam swore the gentlemen he worked for were reasonable, which was promising, and this fellow in the bond clearly admired Mr Fry’s personal qualities, which was promising again. But would it come off? The one thing (in fact, the main thing) about smuggling was that it afforded large margins. Henderson was accustomed to clear profit, and plenty of it. How paying duty and dealing with legitimate men of business might affect that, he had yet to figure.
The warehouseman reached for a small brass sta
mp on a piece of twine. He inked it and pressed the face onto each page of Henderson’s papers. Then he held the sheaf towards the captain. ‘Good day, sir.’
On board the crew waited, the deck in order. Clarkson had begun to resupply. Despite the prospect of fresh meat, the men were expectant, like greyhounds about to be let loose for a run, a flash of teeth and a tensing of muscle. Tomorrow, Big Al Thatcher would have his work cut out. The men got into fights routinely and it was a surety that more than one would return with slashed skin and a dose of the pox. The captain lifted the lading papers high.
‘Off you go,’ he said.
The men cheered and crowded to disembark. Tonight, the Bittersweet would be left with a skeleton crew, chosen by ballot.
Henderson loitered on deck. He regarded the lading papers in his hand. Well, it’s too late now, he thought. Here he was, a respectable merchant, his fortunes in the hands of the unknown Mr Fry. He tucked the evidence into his pocket and was drawn to more pressing business by the sound of Maria’s trunk being hauled on deck by two of men remaining. She was leaving. He stood in her open door, watching as she hugged the wet-cheeked cabin boy and gave him three leather-bound books she had put aside.
‘You must practise your reading,’ she said gently. The books were worth a year’s wages.
‘I promise,’ the child whispered.
‘Here.’ She thrust some coins into his palm. ‘You have looked after me so well. Thank you.’
Henderson knocked on the door frame and the boy let go of Maria’s skirts and skulked into the hallway.
‘Come in,’ Maria said as she pulled a dark woollen cape over her shoulders.
Henderson’s things had been returned to the cabin. They lay forlornly to one side.
‘I had hoped we might have dinner. I hoped you might wait for me to sell my cargo and afford me the pleasure of sailing you up the Thames,’ he said.
Maria looked at her feet. She had a great deal to do and she felt in the humour for none of it. Somehow, the trip to the capital hung heavily now – a list of tiresome things that ought to be a pleasure. She wanted to tell Henderson that she wished things might be different, but, doing that, she would open the floodgate to a conversation in which she could not possibly indulge.
Henderson moved forwards and Mrs Graham jumped back with her hands before her.
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘We cannot—’
‘Maria, is this because I kissed you?’ he asked. It had been weighing on his mind. The question cut through the cabin like a knife. Her eyes betrayed her nervousness. There seemed no trace of the girl who had wheeled with the terns.
‘They are waiting for me in London. It will be quicker to take the coach. I am charged on behalf of a princess. I have a commitment to London’s greatest publisher.’
There was no measure in arguing, but he wanted to try. ‘I wager you have feelings for me, madam. I know it. My offer stands.’
Maria’s flexed her ankles beneath her skirts. ‘I can’t and I won’t, sir. The stakes are too high.’
Henderson looked at his feet. He had pushed her to come aboard and he had as good as kidnapped her to make her stay, but the lady had every right to her wishes.
‘We shall be friends,’ she said. ‘I hope to be of use to you, sir.’
‘I’ll organise a cab. Might I accompany you to the staging post?’
Maria nodded. ‘I should like that.’
The rain was spitting and the air was edged pleasantly with cold. The cloud brightened as Mrs Graham stood on the dock, her trunk and the three leather bags coming down behind her, her feet on solid ground for the first time in weeks. Perhaps she might feel more herself in this weather, on English soil. It had been a long while.
She delighted in the chill on her skin. ‘I dreamed of this in the jungle, and now it seems so strange.’
She breathed in, taking in the scent of the Fry manufactory, which was nearby. People strolled the streets by the tall building simply to enjoy in the scent on the air. The chocolate beans gave off an exotic richness before they were cooled and sent for winnowing. The smell was reputed to be a more tempting than baking bread.
Henderson handed her up. The driver had a vile running sore on his face. When he smiled, it looked eerie, like a shifting porthole that looked inside the man’s body. Henderson tried to ignore it. Had English summers always been like this? He couldn’t remember. ‘The staging post,’ the captain ordered and slid onto the seat opposite Maria.
Bristol town was close to the harbour. They trotted through the first streets, built of brick, until they passed a fine square that seemed constructed of Portland stone but might only be stucco. Some of the houses looked as grand as those in Bath, or at least the pictures Henderson had seen of them. Along the concourse there was a run of shops with canopies over the doorways. The driver shouted the sights as they passed them. ‘Along there’s the Corn Exchange.’ His voice was sing-song. ‘And we’re coming to the Theatre Royal.’
Maria found herself having to hold back from observing everything as if she might have to write an account of her arrival – a succession of first impressions of this alternately grand and shabby provincial town, and a description of the afflicted driver for colour.
I’m in England now, she scolded herself. Everyone knows what it’s like.
The cabman continued. ‘King Street. Very famous,’ he said, without declaring why.
The stage left from an inn near the theatre, but the day’s coach was already gone. The courtyard would not have been out of place in the countryside – a shock after the sophisticated crescents of fine houses they had passed. A scatter of chickens pecked at the muddy ground, avoiding the wide hoofs of a piebald carthorse. At the door, two men haggled over a cask of spirits – an unexpected delivery of rum. Maria widened her shoulders. This movement caught the attention of one of the men. He put up his hand to halt the conversation and both fellows stood back to regard these new, well-dressed customers as they enquired about travelling to London.
‘The Rocket is gone. It leaves at four o’clock, madam.’ The man spoke in a West Country accent so thick that Henderson and Mrs Graham had to concentrate to follow it. ‘That’s every day ’cept Sunday, of course.’
Henderson puffed. The man wouldn’t know four o’clock if it slapped him in the face. Such timetables were hit-and-miss affairs. The coach, like every one in the country, went when it was ready or when it was full. Still, there was nothing to be done. Maria, meanwhile, peered inside the hostelry and evidently liked what she saw. The place was tidy and a pleasant smell of roasting meat emanated from the kitchens. The clientele looked reasonably respectable. There were no rolling drunks or prostitutes, or at least none that might be obviously identified.
Maria oversaw the taking down of her trunk, tipped the cabman without staring at his deformity and then made sure her things were properly in the care of the inn’s boy – a muscle-bound fourteen-year-old whose clothes were clean, if ragged at the edges.
‘I’ll take a room,’ she said, dealing with the man in the doorway. ‘And I’ll try again tomorrow.’ She spoke slowly so he would take note. ‘The Rocket leaves tomorrow, does it?’
The man nodded. ‘Yes’m,’ he said. ‘Four o’clock. We got a nice enough room, if it pleases you. We’ve had fine ladies stay before. I’ll send your bags up, shall I? And if you want a box for the theatre tonight, you let me know.’
Henderson bit his lip. She might have decided to return to the Bittersweet. Mrs Graham was drawing a line. He felt a glimmer of the panic he’d experienced on the dusty streets of Natal when he’d thought he might not speak to her again. Behind him, the clouds parted and the sun shone through. Matters in the courtyard seemed to pick up pace as a pretty serving girl crossed the cobbles and a boy tending one of the horses laid into his work, showing off for her benefit.
Maria turned. ‘I might like to walk. It’s been some time and I saw some parkland near the crescent. We have a fine spell, if cloudy. Will you take
a turn with me, Captain, and perhaps if it is not too much to ask, you might join me for dinner?’
Henderson beamed. He bowed and held out his arm. ‘A promenade,’ he declared.
Maria laughed. ‘Well, we have been aboard the Bittersweet and, fine vessel though she is and though the vista be excellent, she is two minutes in one direction and less than a minute in the other. It’s not much of a stretch.’
Henderson nodded. At least it was something.
It was not the general habit in Bristol to promenade in the afternoon or early evening. Such practices were dangerously continental and could be unpleasant when the weather was inclement. The rain earlier had been only a spit. After the biting cold and high storms of April, the oncoming summer was welcome to many in the city, though to those returning from the tropics, the thin sunshine felt brisk where it broke through. Still, there were some ladies and gentlemen in the park clustered under umbrellas. The complexion of the hoi polloi was universally pale compared with Henderson’s and Maria’s. It was almost impossible not to pick up some colour on deck, and though Henderson’s visage had seemed pale in Natal, it was clear in this company that he was well travelled. Two of the women on the other side of the lawn looked like ghosts, the captain observed, and walked with their eyes cast skywards, cutting grand, if distracted, figures as they hurtled along.
Behind them, the curved terraces of high houses reached over the trees, as if the buildings stood on tiptoes to maintain a view of the park. From the side streets, the occasional tinkle of a service bell fetched across the grass as a door opened at the haberdashery and a lady strolled inside past the piles of straw hats and piece goods. In the park, the blossom was out, the young leaves were bright and along the boundary there was a swathe of newly planted ash trees. Church bells struck six o’clock – time for evensong.
‘I feel like breaking into a run,’ Maria said. ‘There’s so much space.’
On Starlit Seas Page 18