Dire Shenanigans (The Making of a Man Series, Book 2) Page 8

  Bleaker produced a file of reports, copies of those he had given Clausen but which had not reached her.

  She read, picking out the important points very quickly, to his admiration; he would tell his friend Jonathan just how clever she was when he got home that night.

  “Very clear, Mr Bleaker, thank you. We shall require a night shift to increase production, it would seem, and a second converter. Please to produce specifications for the converter as soon as may be – I wish construction to start at earliest. Set on men for a night shift as soon as you can. I have taken a contract for steel plate and another for mild steel railroad track and I am negotiating a price for the steel tyres to be used on locomotive wheels. I wish as well to investigate the design and manufacture of boiler plate, and probably the boilers themselves for railroad locomotives. You will, I should imagine, require a drawing office and young men to work in it; a design for its building first of all, if you please. Will you wish to employ assistants in the engineering function?”

  “Probably, ma’am. Can I inform you tomorrow?”

  “Of course – numbers and functions to me in writing, if you would be so good. If you should happen to see Mr Clausen, please ask him to attend me in the office at his convenience.”

  “He is at the loading bay, ma’am, considering the design of a new crane to work the railroad wagons.”

  She wished Clausen would spend less time deliberating and more time doing, but at least he was busy. She put him out of her mind – he was a competent engineer, but those were not such rare beasts, after all, America was an educated country. She looked at her diary and her list of projects for the company; there was not a chance of her leaving Pittsburgh for a year at least. Major Burke would have to wait… or so she hoped.

  “That is the seventh shop purchased in three months, Mr Robinson – I think we can feel pleased with our endeavours.”

  Sergeant Bill, William Williams in Liverpool, took pains to spend an hour or two with Robinson each week he was in Liverpool, reporting to him as junior to senior, which pleased the man greatly.

  “How many of these chemists shops do we expect to end up with, Mr Williams?”

  “As many as possible, Mr Robinson. We are expanding rapidly out of the Lancashire area already. One in every town centre in this country, I would eventually hope, sir, and a number in the larger suburbs as well! Towns such as Manchester, Birmingham and London, of course, could be home to twenty or thirty apiece of our own shops. Robinson and Burkes will become a household name in England, and then in Wales and Scotland.”

  “Hundreds, then! But not in Ireland?”

  “Too poor, sir, except perhaps in the very biggest cities, in Dublin and Belfast. They can wait.”

  “A pity, but we shall do all we can for the health and well-being of our English fellow-countrymen first.”

  “Hopefully, sir. Our shops are averaging five pounds a week clear in hand at the moment, which is respectable. When they are all selling our preparations to as many customers as they can cram through their doors then that sum will be much increased. As well, sir, what of other products? When you were the owner of your shop and no more, what were you asked for? We should aim to fill our shelves with our own goods. What could you devise, sir?”

  “Spots!”

  “Most people have got enough of them already, Mr Robinson.”

  “Exactly, Mr Williams! Just so! I can see it in my mind’s eye! Mary Boswell’s Wholesome Remedy, sir, ‘Nature’s way of cleansing the skin and opening the pores’; in a green bottle with a picture of an English Rose on the label!”

  Sergeant Bill was impressed – a product that must appeal to every spotty youth and young lady in the whole country. It could not fail to sell.

  “What will its constituents be, Mr Robinson?”

  “Oh, this and that, Mr Williams – everything of the tried and tested. A drop or two of hydrochloric acid as a base; a little of carbolic for its purifying powers; soap, of course; scent of some sort. The hydrochloric will exfoliate, removing the very top layer of skin and the spots with it, with reasonable good luck; carbolic will prevent infections and soap will keep them clean, which might have prevented the spots in the first instance. Very many people will discover their spots to disappear and never return, thus providing a flow of testimonials that will satisfy all but the most prone to carp and criticise.”

  Sergeant Bill was glad he was no longer young and beset by the need to appear handsome.

  “Tooth powder as well, will sell in our shops, Mr Williams. Fine sand in a chalky suspension, with a mite of flavouring added – it will clean teeth admirably.”

  “Our new factories will be kept busy, sir.”

  “They will indeed, Mr Williams. That was such a clever idea of yours – asking just what people who came into the shop actually wanted – I would never have considered that. I can think of a dozen products immediately!”

  “Mary Boswell is to be a very busy lady, Mr Robinson.”

  “It would seem so, sir! And we shall be very rich as a result!”

  Sergeant Bill thought this to be a very good idea, and started to wonder what he should do with money if he actually made some. He was in his mid-forties now and might expect to live for another twenty or so years – few men saw seventy these days, despite the ‘three score and ten’ offered by the Good Book. Perhaps he should find a wife, one not too old to bear him children; if he had money then he should leave it to a person close to him, and he had no relatives at all that he knew of. He decided to talk the matter over with Sir Godby when next he returned to Dorset – he had done very little without his advice for years now.

  “It makes sense to me, Sergeant Bill. I wish you better luck than I had!”

  Sir Godby laughed, with a twisted sort of smile on his face.

  “I must go up to London, Sergeant Bill – with Painter at my back, fear not!”

  “Business, sir?”

  “I’m selling up the firm, getting out of soap and fats, have received an offer that can only be called very generous, from a London merchant house. Thing is, it’s so bloody good a price that I don’t believe it!”

  “You think they intend to cheat you, sir?”

  “Wouldn’t you? They are offering part in cash, part in Trade Bills at six months and more than half in shares in their firm, at current market price. That’s the bit I don’t trust, so I am off to speak with the fellow who has been my broker for this last twenty years; if their price had recently been artificially inflated then I might find myself with shares worth much less than I expected. As well, I need to talk with the young gentleman who has been my other broker for three months and who is dealing in gold shares for me – not that he knows me as Sir Godby Burke, you will appreciate. I understand that Carteret has bitten and has bought almost all of the issue; now he is considering the loan stock but is seeking a discount – being a very clever man!”

  “I am not sure I understand, sir.”

  “My man has wound the loan up to fifty thousands, at eighteen per cent face interest – an income of nine thousands a year! Lucky to get four per cent on government stock, six per cent from any commercial venture – it is three times higher than he could reasonably expect. Now Carteret is trying to get sixty thousand pounds worth of stock for his fifty thousand – an extra nine hundred pounds a year, putting the interest up to a real rate of just less than twenty per cent. I must go up to sign the contract – in the name I am using for this business.”

  “What will he actually make, sir?”

  “Nothing! The firm does not exist; there is no gold mine; it will go bankrupt and pay not a penny to any creditor, of whom it has none in the way of trade and so none to complain to the police. The sole investor, although he does not know it, is Carteret. There will be a letter supposedly from the new colony – the gold field discovered to be no more than a dusting of alluvial pebbles, the money all spent on a barren deep mineshaft, the firm bust – and he will hear no more. I shall not be seen and the b
roker will be in Australia, where he has kin, with the five thousands he has been paid, and the City of London, when it hears of the affair, will laugh loudly and point out that no man in his right mind expects to get something for nothing.”

  “And you suspect that the firm wishing to buy you out are attempting much the same with you, sir?”

  “They are offering half as much again as the firm is worth, Sergeant Bill. I have warehouses on the waterfront in Bristol and Poole and Southampton and an office in Blandford. The warehouses have large yards and stables, of course – so it could be that they know of, perhaps, a railway line or a new dock proposal that would greatly increase the value of the land. They might be legitimate, so I must try to find out what they know. If they are honest then I will profit again from the eventual rise in the value of their shares.”

  “And if they are not legitimate, sir?”

  “Then I take their offer, sell the shares immediately on the Exchange and discount the Trade Bills, all anonymously. That way I lose probably ten per cent on their face value, which is still a damn sight more than my firm is worth!”

  “What then, Sir Godby?”

  “Then I build up my son’s business for him, as promised and discover some way of making his inheritance safe.”

  Sergeant Bill thought that was a rather peculiar statement, but it was not really his business.

  Book Two: The Making

  of a Man Series

  Chapter Four

  “Your esteemed father suggested that you might be able to pick out elements of interest to me in your accounts rendered, Miss Oakes.”

  The young lady smiled, blushed a little, almost met his eyes and stretched out a bare left hand to select a ledger. She was wearing a high-cut and demure dress for the office, but managed to turn just enough to state that her bodice was not empty. Dick was very much in favour. She spoke confidently in an educated, eastern accent - she had been away to school, it seemed.

  “We buy in almost all of the metal parts that we require, Major Burke; our forges are more for repair work than for making new. Timber is a different matter – we purchase boards and beams and saw and plane and turn all that we need – both hardwoods and soft. Ropes and cordage are all walked elsewhere and sold to us by the fathom – commonly, of course, hundreds of fathoms. There is a need as well for paint, varnish, turpentine, various oils and waxes, grease and putty and glass – all for the finishing of the boats. Separately, the army and the navy supply armaments and rations and uniforms, all of which are delivered here but are stored in their own commissaries and are issued according to their own scheme of things.”

  In time of war, when expediency and the need for immediate results could well overcome financial prudence, the simultaneous existence of three distinct purchasing agencies supplying one ship in construction was an invitation to the thief, the embezzler and the common-or-garden shark. Experience of Washington had demonstrated to Dick that the profiteers had crawled out of the woodwork to scrounge everything they could at the same time that the patriotic had rushed to give their all for Father Abe. War brought out extremes of both self-abnegation and greed, it seemed.

  Had he still been a moralist seeking a life of service as a divine, Dick would have been distressed by these reflections; as it was he decided that he wanted his share.

  “Can you show me specific examples where prices have risen extraordinarily, or where quality may appear to have fallen, Miss Oakes?”

  “I can do better than that, Major Burke. Cables, sir, for anchors and mooring at wharfside, the largest of the sort, some six inches in circumference. They stretch, sir, as they are put into use and become wet; they may actually contract if left coiled and dry for any length of time, for example in railroad wagons or riverboat holds while being delivered. As a consequence it is common habit to allow ten per centum on length. Thus, a cable of two hundred yards in length, which is the standard, may actually be as little as one hundred and eighty in extreme circumstances, or indeed a whole furlong in others.”

  That seemed reasonable to Dick; it might be possible to specify that a cable must be of its given length at a particular humidity and temperature, but how would one ever test it?

  “I have reports here, Major Burke, from the captains of the original six turtles and from their counterparts in the latest gunboats to leave our yard. Their mooring cables differ in length by as much as forty yards – twenty per centum!”

  “And the price does not reflect that, Miss Oakes?”

  “The price has more than doubled in the last six months, ‘due to wartime shortages of material and labour’, sir!”

  “Nasty! It is possible, of course, that the rush of men to the colours has deprived firms of their workers.”

  She shook her head, causing, he noticed, some very interesting movements under her dress.

  “Not at all, sir – they have replaced their men with escaped blacks! Slaves are coming up the River in greater numbers than ever; often, it is said, aided by the runners of smuggled cotton, who direct these fugitives to the enterprises of their companions in crime.”

  “So in fact they are paying lower wages to their workers.”

  “They are profiteering in every possible way, sir. Cables said to be of best hemp are very often of inferior fibre and snap under any undue strain.”

  “I must take a note of these suppliers, Miss Oakes, and pay them a visit.”

  She was happy to give him a list of firms and of their owners, where known.

  Dick spent the whole of several mornings at her side, and was very pleased to accept an invitation to dine from her father.

  Afternoons and some of his other evenings he spent in a fashion that might not have gratified Miss Oakes.

  Major Schafer had welcomed Dick into his mess, identifying him to his awestruck junior officers, none of whom had smelt powder yet, as one of the few Union heroes of Bull Run.

  “First Bull Run we must call it now, gentlemen!”

  News of the second defeat at Manassas had just reached them, together with McClellan’s detailed explanation of why it was not his fault. Morale was low and the presence of a fighting officer lifted them.

  Naturally, they asked what had gone wrong and how it could be righted.

  “Drill to an extent, gentlemen, and marching – your men must be able to cover their fifteen miles a day for each of five days and fight on the sixth, all in good order. More than that is not in the hands of the regimental officer, I fear.”

  A very young lieutenant, still with a weak head that could not handle glasses of spirits on top of table wines, incautiously pointed out that General Grant had attacked the enemy and won, more than once, while General McClellan had achieved defeat both attacking and running away.

  The senior officers managed not to hear the comment while the juniors hurried their comrade away from the table; such things were far better not said in public.

  Privately, Dick and Schafer agreed that the young man was right. The Little Napoleon was too much interested in preserving his army as an aid to his political ambitions, too little concerned to fight the war.

  “He should be reminded that Bonaparte rose to power on the back of successful campaigning, and fell into obscurity after his defeat at Waterloo. He seems to be attempting to rise on the back of a series of defeats, and I am increasingly doubtful of his chances of success.”

  Schafer volunteered to escort Dick back to his hotel, diverting him en route to a house of entertainment which nowadays he ‘occasionally’ frequented; he commented that his chances of surviving the war to buy a farm seemed so low that he had as well enjoy himself while he could. Dick reached his own room in the dawn, much refreshed.

  The following evening saw him in the less obviously attractive company of Jim Fisk, eating one mouthful to Fisk’s six and listening politely to his boasts.

  Jim Fisk was making money, thousands every day, every hour; he claimed a million in a month. He had his fingers in a dozen pies and could give the
good word that would make any of his friends rich - or the alternative, of course…

  Mr Fisk was much given to threats, it would seem; Dick was tempted to inveigle him into a public place where he could offer menaces in front of an audience and could then be challenged to make good on his mouth. There would be no profit in such an endeavour – but even so, the man was irritating and it might be satisfying to see him standing with a pistol in his hand, and then with a bullet in his fat head. Better not, perhaps, he might have friends and they could be of the back-shooting persuasion.

  “I am myself a poor man, of course, Mr Fisk. The pay of a Union officer is hardly enough to keep me in food!”

  Fisk, intelligent but unsubtle in his ways, took the bait. He invited Dick to eat dinner with him again on the morrow.

  “Mr Fisher, Major Burke!”

  They shook hands and said how pleased they were to meet each other. Fisher was especially glad, he said, to come into actual contact with a hero of the Union; he had been thinking of begging such a one to become a member of his Board of Directors, for the prestige it would bring the company.

  “The merest trivia of an honorarium, Major Burke – a thousand a month in gold, I would suggest, and a few thousand shares, trading on the Chicago Exchange at a good price at the moment. You would do me a favour by accepting, sir.”

  Mr Fisher’s company made ropes of various sizes it transpired, and was considering branching out into iron or steel chains and cables. The demand for their product was huge, absolutely enormous, and their share price could be expected to rise through the roof.

  Dick was amazed by the offer and accepted it in all humility.

  Fisk put him in touch with a second manufacturer later in the week, and then with another couple less than a fortnight later.

  Dick arranged for the gold coin to be put into an account opened for him in Chicago; the share certificates were held by a lawyer in St Louis.

  Miss Oakes gave him the name of a St Louis supplier of cast iron fitments for the gunboats, a gentleman whose deliveries often arrived cracked or rusted and who blamed the problem wholly on the carters, who were employed by the yard. He was a small man and unknown to Mr Fisk. Dick borrowed a squad from Major Schafer and arrived unannounced at the iron foundry where he proceeded to arrest the owner and his two managers and to shut the firm down pending the verdict of a court-martial. He was loud in his argument that the firm was working for the Army and was therefore subject to military law, and the rifles of a dozen soldiers provided all the support he needed.