Respectable Trade

by Gregory, Philippa

  There was a little silence. “They plan to convert Africa to Christianity and civilization?” Mehuru asked.

  Stuart Hadley nodded.

  “Then Africa is lost,” Mehuru said simply.

  STEPHEN WARING STOOD IN the doorway of the Custom House, breathing the warm night air. Other members of the Merchant Venturers’ Company went past him into the dark gardens, some of them weaving unsteadily from the wines at dinner and the heavy drinking that had followed.

  Sir Henry came up behind him and took his arm. “Walking home?” he inquired.

  “Why not?” Stephen replied easily. He tossed his cigar away and whistled for a linkboy to light their way. As they drew away from the others, he said, “A pleasant evening, I thought.”

  “Very.”

  “I am sorry for that Josiah Cole,” Sir Henry said suddenly.

  “Oh, why so?” Stephen asked. “He wants his Hot Well, and he has bought it.”

  “He’s paid a high price for it,” Sir Henry said. “And we both know he will regret it.”

  “It’s his choice,” Stephen said comfortably. They strolled slowly over the lowered drawbridge. The tide was on the ebb, and the riverbank was starting to stink. The dark mud and water reflected the boy’s moving light.

  “Still, he might get his money back,” Sir Henry predicted cheerfully. “If he can hang on.”

  “More important, the Venturers have got their money back,” Stephen said. “Anything he pays in rent hereafter represents a profit to us.”

  “Where d’you want it invested?” Sir Henry asked. “Clifton? The Downs?”

  “I think we should spend money on the port,” Stephen said. “We lose trade to Liverpool every day. We must straighten the river and make some deep-water anchorage. It is madness trying to run a commercial port out of a tidal harbor.”

  “Oh, aye,” Sir Henry agreed lazily. “But you won’t see a profit inside fifty years.”

  “Still, it should be done.”

  “I’d have thought you would have wanted some investment in Clifton,” Sir Henry teased. “I heard that you had plans for terraces and assembly rooms and all sorts of grand projects.”

  “Did you?”

  “But I said that Clifton would never be anything more than a pretty little out-of-the-way place.”

  “D’you think so?” Stephen asked interestedly.

  “It won’t grow until it can be supplied with water,” Sir Henry assured him. “Limestone. You can’t have a town on limestone. It’s dry, bone dry. To reach the water, you’d have to drill, oh, three hundred feet.”

  Stephen nodded. The bobbing light of the linkboy’s torch lit his face and then hid it again. “Would it be that deep?” he asked pensively.

  “But if you hit water, then prices in Clifton would go through the roof,” Sir Henry pointed out.

  “Lucky, then, that we all own land there,” Stephen said simply. “And that the company owns the whole manor, Clifton, and Durham Down, too.”

  “Satisfactory,” Sir Henry said. He paused at his doorway on College Street. “I like talking to you, Waring. You are always so uninformative.”

  Stephen laughed shortly. “I thought we had understood each other very well,” he said.

  BY JULY, FRANCES WAS well enough to get out of bed but was still easily tired and short of breath. Dr. Hadley called once every week and one day detained Josiah for a quiet word as he walked to his waiting phaeton. “The air does not suit her,” Stuart said. “It is low-lying here, and the river mists are very unhealthy. You can smell the diseases like a fog. Any day now I expect to hear that we have cholera in the old town. Already there is typhoid fever not half a mile from this house. And all the drains from the old town flow into the river that surrounds you. She has a weak heart; she could not survive a major illness.”

  Mehuru was holding Stuart’s horse, straining to hear.

  “I cannot move house!” Josiah exclaimed. “We have only just bought this one!”

  “That is a pity,” Stuart said carefully. “Could Mrs. Cole perhaps go away to the country for a visit once a year, especially now in midsummer?”

  “She could go to the Hot Well spa every day,” Josiah offered. “I have just bought the Hot Well spa, you know, Doctor. She could go there daily.”

  “No, that is not what I mean. She needs a more airy situation in summer and a warmer climate in winter like France, or Italy. She needs warm, dry air, especially in wintertime.”

  Josiah shook his head. “We have never traveled abroad. I would not know how to manage it.”

  Mehuru’s face was like stone, his impatience burning inside him.

  “It could be managed,” Stuart said earnestly. “And I do fear for her if she spends the next winter in Bristol. She is delicate, I am afraid, and another serious chill and inflammation like this one could even be fatal.”

  Josiah looked shocked. “Frances might die?”

  “She could live for years,” Stuart said quickly. “But these delicate lungs are very difficult to predict. If it is possible for her to go somewhere warm every winter, then she would grow stronger.”

  Josiah was badly shaken. “I will consider it,” he assured Stuart. “It is just that we have never thought of such a thing. My sister and I have never even taken more than a day’s holiday. We have never been away from Bristol. I would not know how to set about it.”

  Mehuru fidgeted at the horse’s head, unable to stand still for anger.

  “Arrangements are easily made,” Stuart said. “No doubt Mrs. Cole would know people who travel abroad. She has many friends and family, does she not?”

  “But she would be away from Bristol for such a long time,” Josiah protested. “I bought this house for her enjoyment, and only she knows how it should be run. I thought this house would suit her very well.”

  “I am sure it does,” Stuart soothed him. “But in very hot weather such as these last few weeks, it is not salubrious for anyone. And it may be that next winter she will need a little time in the sun. That is all.”

  “I will consider it,” Josiah assured him. “I would spare no expense to keep Frances in the best of health. Whatever a trip abroad would cost, I would be prepared to pay. Anything that I can do shall be done.”

  He shook Stuart’s hand and turned back into the house.

  “Fool,” Mehuru spit through his teeth, released at last. “What a fool!”

  “I pity him,” Stuart said shortly. “He chose a woman to bring him money and connections, and he finds himself obliged to provide things for her which he does not even understand.”

  “He runs a shipping company.” Mehuru’s voice was an angry mutter where he wanted to roar. “He has three damned ships going anywhere in the world. He could put her on a ship, couldn’t he? He could send her to Africa, couldn’t he? Or to the Sugar Islands? Good God, if she were my wife and you told me she needed sunshine, I would carry her on my back if there was no other way.”

  Stuart smiled wearily at Mehuru’s rage. “Do you love her so much?”

  Mehuru checked, looked at Stuart’s face for any signs of mockery and saw none. “Yes,” he said shortly.

  Stuart shook his head and climbed up into the high perch seat of the phaeton. “Then I am sorry for you,” he said conversationally. “And for her, too.”

  Mehuru would not release the horse but held the rein, forcing Stuart to wait. His expression was sharp, as if with a pain held inside. “Because she is ill? Is it worse than you told Mr. Cole? Do you pity me because she will die?”

  Stuart kept his true opinion of Frances’s health to himself. “I pity you because there is nowhere for you,” he answered. “She cannot leave him, you cannot freely love her. If I were you, my friend, I would rather go to Sierra Leone with all the risks that entails than fall in love with a married woman, the niece of a peer of the realm, and my owner.”

  Mehuru’s face lightened. His smile started at his eyes, and then his whole face lit up into an irresistible beam. “When you exp
ress it like that,” he said ruefully, “it does not sound like a very good idea. But, Stuart, when I touch her hand, it is more than the whole world to me.”

  The two men were silent for a moment.

  “Have you any news from France?” Mehuru asked. “I read in Josiah’s newspaper that the Bastille had fallen. How far do you think they will go?”

  Stuart was instantly animated. “Who knows? It is great news for all lovers of liberty. They will be sick with fear in Westminster. People are taking their power all around the world. The future must belong to us.”

  “They will free the slaves?”

  “Certainly. I imagine they will make their colonies departments of France and we will see black Frenchmen representing white constituencies.”

  Mehuru smiled. “It is like a miracle.”

  “And so fast!” Stuart said. “They will bring the king to realize that he must consult the people. And our king,” he lowered his voice, “God help him, the poor madman, will become a people’s king also. The trade will end, slavery will be abolished, workingmen will get the vote. These are great times.”

  “There must be a place for me,” Mehuru said determinedly. “In these times of change. I must have a voice.” He thought for a moment. “And I must have Frances,” he continued. “If prisons can be opened, then marriages can be ended. If we are to be free, we must be free to love as well.”

  “She surely could not leave him for you?” Stuart asked. “It would be her ruin.”

  “In an age of miracles?” Mehuru reminded him. “Why should it not be possible?”

  Stuart shrugged. He could not bring himself to tell Mehuru that he thought Frances would not live long enough to see the freeing of English slaves. He could not tell Mehuru that to free a lady such as Frances from her loveless marriage would be a harder task than to free Mehuru from slavery.

  “Will you let my horse go now?” Stuart asked. “If it is all the same to you, I have other patients to visit.”

  “I was thinking of my home and how good the sun is there,” Mehuru said absently. “If I could take Frances there, how well she would be!”

  “Look, here’s someone calling on you,” Stuart said.

  A large traveling carriage with a crest emblazoned on the door was drawing up behind the phaeton. Stuart glanced from it to Mehuru’s face and was surprised to see a look of coldness and hatred such as he had never seen before. All at once Mehuru’s charm and warmth had frozen into a grimace of absolute distaste.

  “Who is it?”

  “A man called Sir Charles Fairley,” Mehuru said. His voice was sharp with contempt. “When he visited before, he raped a woman, a Yoruban slave, and when she ate earth, he had her bolted into a bridle. She is dead now. He was poxed, and he made a baby on her.”

  Stuart covertly glanced across at the carriage. The footman was putting down the steps, and a black slave got out first to assist Sir Charles.

  “A slave owner,” Stuart observed quietly.

  “A Sugar Island nabob,” Mehuru said. “He should be hanged.”

  Stuart could not disagree. “And soon he will come home to retire and buy a borough and stand for Parliament,” he predicted. “Truly, we have to cleanse England. But next spring . . . Mehuru! Next spring!”

  Mehuru’s face was dark. “You are hopeful,” he said curtly. “But I saw how sure you were last time, and your man was talked into silence.”

  “This time it will happen. We must keep up the campaign to support it. We are wiser now; we know our enemies. And then your fine friend will find his business is very much changed.”

  Mehuru watched Sir Charles swagger past them up the steps to the house and nod to his slave to hammer on the door.

  “I wish his business could be ended completely,” Mehuru said. “And his slaves freed.”

  “I, too. But we have to move in small stages. First we ban the trade in slaves, and that will force them to treat their slaves better. Then slavery is abolished altogether; it will just wither away, Mehuru. Slowly they will pay wages, and your brothers will earn their freedom. We will see it. In our lifetime we will see it.”

  Mehuru gave him a wry smile. “You are confident.”

  “I am certain! Now let me go, Mehuru. I have work to do.”

  Mehuru nodded and stood back from the phaeton. Stuart clicked to his horse and drove off.

  Mary answered the black slave’s knock, and Mehuru saw her look of shock when she recognized Sir Charles, before she drew back to allow him and his slave into the house. Mehuru followed them in.

  Frances was seated in the morning room embroidering Josiah’s waistcoat, but when Sir Charles came in, she put it aside and held out both her hands. “Sir Charles! How delightful!” she said. “And you are so early! The roads must have been very good.”

  He kissed both her hands and thought privately that she looked very pale and drawn. “The roads were filthy with dust,” he told her. “But at least they were passable. I do not know how I shall tolerate them in wintertime!”

  Frances laughed and nodded to Mary. “Fetch the tea tray, Mary, and tell Miss Cole that Sir Charles is here. Will you have tea, Sir Charles? Or in this hot weather would you like some lemonade? Or shall you have some punch? I remember your preferences!”

  “I will take some punch,” he decided.

  Frances sat down and gestured to Sir Charles to take a chair, but he stood before the window gazing out over the square.

  “And how do you like your new home, ma’am?” he asked. “You are very grand here. Quite a change!”

  Frances kept her smile fixed on her face. “It is a little small after Whiteleaze,” she remarked, as if she had never served dinner and then withdrawn to the fireplace in the same poky parlor over the warehouse. “But we are very comfortable here.”

  “And in the height of fashion,” Sir Charles commented, looking at the corner of the room where two red porcelain dragons glared at each other in a fixed snarl.

  “Do you stay in Bristol for long?” Frances asked.

  “No, I shall drive on to Lord Bartlet when I have signed my paper with you,” Sir Charles said. “Miss Honoria is already there. Between you and me, Mrs. Cole, I think there may be a match of it between her and Lord Bartlet’s son.”

  “Not Sir Frederick!” Frances exclaimed, thinking swiftly that Lord Bartlet must be hard-pressed indeed if he had let his son and heir be caught by such a one as Miss Honoria, whatever her fortune.

  “No, his second son, Nicholas.”

  “Ah, Nicholas,” Frances said. Good for neither church nor army, Nicholas would do very nicely with a Sugar Island heiress. “He is such a pleasant young man.”

  “A good match,” Sir Charles said with satisfaction. “Nothing is settled, mind, but Lord Bartlet and I have tipped each other the wink.”

  Frances smiled politely but inwardly shuddered at the thought of the impoverished old gamester winking his red-veined eye at Sir Charles. Compared with that crude bartering, her own marriage to Josiah seemed a love match.

  “I will not delay you, then,” Frances said. “I have the lease to hand.”

  She went to her writing table, took out the lease, and spread it before Sir Charles on the parlor table. He seated himself and read through the clauses. He did not notice that he had not bought the mineral rights.

  “You sign here,” she said politely.

  Sir Charles signed.

  “And here are the accounts for your capital laid with us,” she said. “There is no interest to show yet, for it is paid annually. But you can see what investments I have made on your behalf, and Lord Scott has suggested a colliery in Kent for an investment of one thousand pounds.”

  “Excellent, excellent.” Sir Charles beamed. “His lordship is most kind, and I am very glad to have you take care of my capital. I should not have found my new house without your good offices, Mrs. Cole! I am indebted to you!”

  Frances smiled. The parlor door opened, and Sarah came in, followed by Mary with the tea tr
ay and Mehuru carrying the punch bowl on a silver tray, which he set down before Sir Charles.

  Frances was instantly aware of Mehuru’s anger. It was present in the precise way that he placed rum, water, sugar, and lemons within Sir Charles’s reach. It was present in the way he looked at her with his eyes like a black frost and said, “Will that be all, Mrs. Cole?”

  “I say, he speaks well!” Sir Charles exclaimed, swinging around in his chair and inspecting Mehuru as if he were some exotic pet.

  “We have made much progress since you were last here,” Sarah said pleasantly. “My sister has been tireless. They can all speak and understand English now, and the two younger men and this one can even read.”

  “Well, that is remarkable,” Sir Charles said, staring frankly at Mehuru. Mehuru stared back, his face blank and insolent. “Make him read for me.”

  Frances drew a breath. “He has other duties now. He will read for you another time.”

  “A handsome buck,” Sir Charles commented.

  “You can go, Cicero,” Frances said quickly.

  His bow was an insult.

  “I tell you what I shall send you,” Sir Charles exclaimed. “Little slave collars, very pretty.”

  Mehuru checked in the doorway and looked back to meet Frances’s anguished glance.

  “They’re the very thing,” Sir Charles went on. “Like a dog collar, you know, but finely made. A little chain and on the front a little metal tag—I like silver myself—with the slave’s name engraved. They all wear them in London. They look very smart. You shall jot down their names, all of them, and I will send you a set.”

  “You are very kind,” Frances said. She could feel her breath becoming shorter in her anxiety that Mehuru would make a scene.

  Mehuru wheeled around in the doorway and suddenly strode into the room. Frances started up, and her workbox spilled to the floor with a clatter, shedding silks and ribbons and bobbins of cotton. “Oh, how careless!” she cried. “How careless of me! How silly I am! Cicero, fetch Martha or one of the girls. Go at once, please! Go!”

  For a moment he hesitated as if he would defy her.

  “At once!” Frances insisted, her voice sharp with fear. “Go and fetch one of the girls at once, please.”