CHAPTER 22 #2
It would be good to be done with it. It had become an intrusion and distraction.
He would prefer to stay near Langdon’s End and spend his days with Eva.
Not in passion necessarily. That had perhaps come too soon.
He wanted to explain his cruel practicality to her.
He also wanted to ask her about her art, and her plans, and whether she might want to travel to distant lands.
If she did not want him to continue as a lover, he could still be a true friend.
She did not seem to have many of those. Neither did he.
The carriage wound its way through the city, past houses and shops, and into the center where businesses and banks hugged the streets.
On the edge of that district, the shops became scarcer and the buildings larger and less distinguished.
Chimneys abounded. Here were the factories where Birmingham’s industry thrived.
The coachman took him to one of those structures. Gareth had two visits today. This one promised to be the more pleasant one.
Entering the factory was much like gaining entry to a good home. A man at the door inquired of his purpose for visiting. Gareth handed over a card and said Mr. Rockport expected him.
Much as with a morning call, he was escorted to the master of the house.
Wesley Rockport greeted him in his office.
Furnished in imitation of a gentleman’s study, the office had bookshelves that held rows of neatly bound ledgers, and, Gareth could see with a glance, a few large tomes regarding the law.
Of more interest was a long table set flush under a large window so the light could flood in.
Row upon row of small metal objects lined the table’s surface, displaying the products that paid for the room’s moldings and furniture.
Rockport saw his interest and beckoned him to look closer.
Together they viewed and touched the display.
“These buckles are my pride and joy. Steel, they are. Expensive to make. I’ve twenty men who can forge them faster than most, and four who work the designs to their fancy.
It is an indulgence of mine. The brass ones here go for much less, of course, but the volume is huge and the margin impressive. ”
The steel buckles’ production harkened back to a generation ago, when artisans created almost everything made and bought in England.
Like the mills replacing the home weavers, however, modern methods had changed Rockport’s industry, altering design, quality, and even the need for skills.
Lower cost, huge volume, and impressive margins were the hallmarks of successful manufacturing now.
Gareth listened to the rest of the tour, as Rockport pointed out the bits and bridles, the hinges and locks, the fittings, knives, and door handles. Small metal objects, all of them, each with a widely established purpose that fulfilled a necessity.
Rockport invited him to sit in a comfortable chair. He offered coffee and brandy, and sent for the former. He appeared pleased that Gareth had shown interest in his business.
Gareth liked Wesley Rockport. They had gotten on well while escorting the ladies around London. When Wesley had asked him to stop by this factory as soon as they returned north, he had agreed. He assumed there was a reason. He expected to learn what it was after the coffee came.
Sure enough, after drinking his cup, Wesley set it down and sent all of his attention in Gareth’s direction. “Sarah has been speaking of nothing but your family’s generosity. I fear that visits to London will become an expectation of hers now.”
“My apologies, although you seemed to find much to occupy you too.”
“I did indeed. I called on many of our patrons there. I learned some interesting things, regarding their future needs and present problems. I learned, for example, that our orders from the carriage makers have dwindled because the man I hired to call on them had not bothered to do so much, and was drunk most times he did.”
“At least now you can rectify the situation.”
“Already done. I mention it to explain that the most difficult part of this is having to rely on others. That is always a gamble. References and such only go so far.”
Gareth nodded agreement. He wished he could see a clock. He did have that other stop to make, and he wanted to return to Albany Lodge by nightfall.
“I expect you know why I wanted to see you,” Rockport said. “I am hoping that your coming means you are not averse to the notion and I have at least a small chance of convincing you.”
Gareth had no idea what the man was talking about. “Not averse. Such a strong word. I am not averse to much at all, actually.”
“I will be plain then. I need someone to represent this”—he gestured to the table—“and me, on the Continent. Not to carry around buckles to sell, as is done here. I can ship samples to those companies I know of. Not stores and such, but men who would distribute there.”
“If you can ship samples, and have identified distributors—”
“A factor is what I need. A man to see to the contracts there, and arrange the receipt of shipments. A man to broker the arrangement in my behalf. I can’t do it myself.
I’m needed here, and I don’t know the languages.
There are ones I can hire, who present themselves for service such as this, but for all I know they, too, call on the patron drunk, if you see what I mean.
You’ve a knowledge of those things. You gave me quite an education at that first dinner.
I’m thinking you are the man to do it, if you can be persuaded. ”
Gareth did not know whether to be flattered or insulted. Despite the compliments about his vast knowledge of business and shipping, Rockport had just asked him to go into trade.
“I do not think I would care to live on the Continent.”
“Nor would you have to. Such contracts are not signed every day or even every month. When one is ready to go, you could hop a packet, deal with it, and come back. At least hear me out before you decline.”
Gareth agreed to hear him out. Rockport embarked on a fuller description of what this situation entailed.
The more he talked, the more Gareth could not pretend that it did indeed sound remarkably like the way he brokered art collections.
His knowledge of shipping and transport companies, of contracts and bills of lading, of international payments and credits, derived from that avocation, of course.
Without those experiences, he could have never discussed Rockport’s business affairs with him, let alone given him “an education.”
“Now, I am sure you are curious about compensation,” Rockport said.
“There is no need. I regret that I would not want to be an employee, even of a firm as fine as yours. I am not accustomed to it, and would make a bad one.”
Rockport grinned. “Well, now, that is fine with me if it is fine with you. I was prepared to pay you handsomely if necessary. If you prefer independence, so you can represent others in addition—I know of several men who would want to talk about that, in other industries, of course. I’d not want someone who competes with me— We can arrange it be for a percentage and expenses. Say two percent of the sale price?”
Just like the art collections.
Rockport stood and walked to his desk. After pawing through papers, he returned with a letter. “Let me see. This French fellow wants fifty.” He closed his eyes and thought. “Fifty at two percent would be—”
“Hardly worth the journey, or your time, I would think.”
Rockport looked at him, astonished. Then he burst out laughing.
“You are quite the gentleman, aren’t you?
Do you think I do all of this for orders of fifty brass buckles or fifty iron hinges?
” He leaned forward and held up the letter.
“This Frenchie wants fifty gross. At ten shillings per piece. That’s cheaper than he can get them made over there.
He’ll hand them off fast at eleven per, and the shops that in turn sell them will do so at thirteen and be happy. ”
Gareth did the math in his head. The commission on brokering that particular sale would be over eight hundred pounds. More money, and less trouble, than some of those art collections that took months to negotiate.
And there were others like Rockport who needed such a factor.
A gentleman would not be swayed, no matter what the profit, of course.
“I will think about it, and let you know within the week.”
Rockport lifted his glass of brandy. “Here’s to hoping you think rightly.”
* * *
The stationer’s shop was an odd place. Narrow and deep, it held a good position in the center of town.
The proprietor had decided to make the most of that advantage by augmenting his papers with a motley assortment of other items. Gareth strolled past books and patterns, pins and threads, prints and combs.
One shelf even held wooden toys, such as country carvers make.
Deep in the shop he spied Mr. Stevenson helping a woman choose stationery. Gareth waited until the customer had been served. After she left, Mr. Stevenson turned quizzical eyes on the only other potential patron in the shop.
Gareth asked to see some pens.
“Will you be wanting quills or the new ones? I like the latter myself, but some of the gentlemen prefer traditional writing implements.” Stevenson slid a box with an array of new pens onto his counter.
Gareth toyed with them. “Mr. Zwilliger sent me. He said you have excellent items in your shop. He told me to ask if you have any more of those paintings. Good ones, like the ones he bought.”
“So soon? Goodness, he visited a mere fortnight ago. The market in London must be flourishing.”
“It is the Season. The whole ton is in town with money to spare, and spirits are high. That is the best time to sell art.”
Stevenson peered at Gareth cautiously. “If I were to have a few more soon, would you be buying them for him?”
“I would, if they were of the same quality.”
“I can guarantee the quality. What I cannot guarantee is whether more are available yet.”
“When will you know?”
“Hard to say. I can send word and see, if you like.”
Gareth debated whether to continue with the plan he and Ives had put in place. If this man told the truth, and it sounded as if he did since he spoke without dissembling, he was not the mind behind this fraud. The person who brought him the pictures was.
Gareth removed a card and placed it on the counter.
He also placed one of Ives’s cards beside it.
“Stevenson, I have been deceiving you. I am not an agent for your London buyer. Nor will he be purchasing more from you. He is in Newgate awaiting his fate for selling forgeries. Forgeries he says he bought from you.”
“Forgeries! No, you must be mistaken. I sold him simple pretty pictures.”
“You sold him expert copies of works by major artists and old masters.”
“Major—old masters—you are wrong, sir, and I’ll not be impugned this way.”
Gareth waited until Stevenson had collected himself. “Perhaps you were hoodwinked by he who gave you the pictures as well as by he who bought them.”
“Indeed! I think so! If what you say is true, this is most shocking.” He turned and reached up to a shelf behind his counter and fetched a paper fan.
“Give me the name of the man who supplied you with the paintings, and I will find out the truth, I am sure.”
Stevenson flipped open the fan and beat the air near his red face. That pulled Gareth’s attention away from the face, and to the fan. And to the wall behind the fan, the counter, and Mr. Stevenson.
His gaze drifted up to the shelf, then higher.
“Not a man,” Stevenson said, struggling to speak normally.
“A woman. Who would think a woman would do such a thing? What is the world coming to, I ask you? And what if she claims she was unaware and it is all my fault? Who is to believe me that I merely put some pictures in my shop to earn a few shillings? The magistrate? Not likely. This is—”
Gareth half-listened. His gaze had lit on a small painting hanging high on the wall like an afterthought. It showed a view of a field, with a large tree to one side and a ruin to the other. He narrowed his eyes on it.
Stevenson’s exclamations turned into a buzz that barely penetrated his ears. Gareth thought he recognized the landscape, or rather the hand that had painted it. His eyes were almost sure, but his instincts were positive. He had seen the ghost of something similar on the floor of a ransacked house.
Surely not. And if so, it must be a thing apart from those forgeries.
“Her name,” he snarled, interrupting Stevenson. “Give me her name, or join your accomplice in Newgate.”
“Newgate! I’m a Birmingham man!”
“Give me the name, damn you, or you will be a dead man soon.”
Stevenson appeared ready to faint. Gareth reached over the counter and gripped his coats so he did not go down before answering. “Her name.”
“M . . . Miss Russell.”
Holy Damnation. He barely swallowed the impulse to punch the stationer in the nose for daring to utter that name out of all the others in the world.
The man saw it. His eyes widened with alarm.
“Eva, I think her name is.” He spoke fast between short gasping breaths.
“I believe she lives in— That is to say, I am sure she—” All that red drained from his face.
He swooned and became a dead weight. He slid out of Gareth’s grip and crumpled to the floor behind the counter.
Gareth strode to the back of the shop, found some water, and returned. He threw it on Stevenson’s face, then left to the sounds of gasping and groaning as Stevenson came to.