Ellershaw introduced me to the men, whom I recognized as fashionable figures of the metropolis, one the heir to a large earldom, another the son of a wealthy Sussex landowner, the third a young duke himself. They took no notice of me at all, even when Ellershaw pointed to the prints upon my wall, remarking how fantastical it was that I should be in his prints and in his office simultaneously. These men, however, would not be distracted and studied the cloths with all the interest of a milliner.
“These are very fine,” the young duke said, “and I thank you very much for your gift, Mr. Ellershaw, but what does it signify for you? Our wearing this shall not change how matters stand.”
“I want a run, sir. I want that you should appear in public in these new cloths and make it known that you will wear what you can when you can. I wish more than anything that the three of you, so dressed, will create a mania to drain out the contents of our warehouse before Christmas.”
“That is a good joke,” the duke said. “To make the beau monde shell out a pretty penny upon what they can wear only for another month? Yes, I like your joke tremendously.”
The earl’s heir laughed. “I’ll set my tailor to work at once, and I shall be in these new things by the end of the week.”
The men thanked one another and there were many words of approbation before the trio departed.
Ellershaw walked over to his writing desk, where he removed one of his brown nuggets from the bowl and cracked it between his teeth. “That, Weaver, is what I call the Holy Trinity.” He laughed at his joke. “Those buffoons could appear in public wearing only the bearskins of an American savage, and within three days there would not be a gentle-man in London out of bearskins. I have a group of ladies who serve a similar purpose. So I must congratulate you. You have been in my employ not ten minutes, and you have already discovered the great secret of the India cloth trade at home: give your goods away to a few fashion-able people who have the power to set trends, and the trend is set. The new style is written of in the papers and the monthlies, and soon the provinces hear of them, and they clamor for our cloths. They beg us-beg us, I tell you-to sell them our goods for whatever price we care to name.”
“It sounds most agreeable,” I told him.
“It is the business of the modern world. You are still close enough to being a young man, I daresay. When you were born, men brewed their own beer, women made their own bread, sewed their own clothes. Need drove commerce. Now all of those things are bought, and only the most backward of bumptious fools would think to do their own baking or brewing. In my lifetime, thanks to my own work in the Indies, it is not need but desire that drives commerce. When I was a boy, a man might kill for silver enough to buy a morsel to feed his family. I cannot recall the last time I heard of such a thing, but the week does not pass where we do not hear of some heinous crime because a man wanted silver to buy a new suit or a jewel or a fashionable hat or bonnet for his lady.”
I applauded his role in giving rise to such progress.
“It is the growth of industry and wealth, and that is the greatest progress the world has seen. And this growth can have no limit, for there are no limits to the Englishman’s capacity. Or yours, I suppose.”
We took our seats amiably. Not wishing to appear overly susceptible to self-love, I attempted to avoid casting my gaze too often over the prints on the wall depicting the exploits of my own life. It is, nevertheless, a curious thing to find oneself memorialized in such a fashion, and while it was in a particular sense gratifying, I also found it excessively disturbing.
“So you’ve chosen to be one of our brotherhood here at Craven House, to serve the Honorable Company, as we style it,” Ellershaw said, while he chewed his mysterious kernel. “That’s just the very thing for you. A rare opportunity, Weaver, one not to be missed. For both of us, I believe. You see, I sit on the subcommittee that oversees the warehouses, and I believe I shall earn the approbation of the Court of Proprietors when I inform them I’ve brought you along. Now, let’s go have a look about, shall we?”
He led me down the hall and into a small and windowless closet, where a young man sat at a desk poring over a stack of papers and making notations in a complicated ledger. He was only in his early twenties, but he looked studious and dedicated, and his brow wrinkled with bookish labors. He was also, I noticed, rather slight in build, with drooping shoulders and remarkably thin wrists. His eyes were filigreed with red and the bags underneath were of a bluish black complexion.
“The very first thing I must do is introduce you to Mr. Blackburn,” Ellershaw said, “lest he hear of you on his own and come demanding explanations. I want you to have no surprises, Mr. Blackburn.”
The young man studied me. He had a more severe face than I had at first realized, possessed of something of a predatory nature, an impression augmented by a large beakish nose that hooked sharply. I wondered at what personal cost he labored, for he possessed a beleaguered expression one is more like to see in a man twice his age. “Surprises lead to three things,” he said, holding up three fingers. “First, inefficiency. Second, disorder. Finally, diminished returns.” With each of these, he clutched the finger of his right hand between the thumb and forefinger of his left. “I do not love surprises.”
“I know it, and so I have done what I could to keep you informed. This is Mr. Weaver. He will be working for me, overseeing the watchmen on the premises.”
Blackburn reddened a little. At first I thought this was some inexplicable embarrassment, but I soon realized it was anger. “Working for you?” he demanded. “Now? How can you have someone new come to work for you now? The Court of Proprietors has not approved any such post, and no posts can be funded without their approval. I don’t understand this, sir. ’Tis most irregular, and I cannot think how I am to account for it in the employment ledger.”
“Irregular, to be sure,” Ellershaw agreed, his voice all soothing tones, “and because the Proprietors have not discussed it, Mr. Weaver will, until further notice, receive his pay directly from me.”
“Payment from you?” Blackburn demanded. “There are no East India employees who are paid directly by other employees. I have never heard of this. How shall I make note of it? Is this to be a new entry in the books? A new sort of book? A special book just for this, sir? Are we to have new books every time a member of the Court takes a whim into his mind?”
“I had thought,” Ellershaw said, “to leave Mr. Weaver unmentioned in the books altogether.” It struck me that Ellershaw kept his voice remarkably even. To my surprise, though Blackburn was evidently the subordinate, he was the one demanding explanations.
Blackburn shook his head and held up two fingers. “Two things, sir. First, no one is unmentioned in the books.” He tapped one of the folio-size volumes, bound in a very grave sort of black leather. “Everyone is in the books. Second, if we begin to make exceptions, write rules as the notion takes us, then these books are for nothing, and my work is for nothing.”
“Mr. Blackburn, you may either take the time to integrate Mr. Weaver’s unique position, really as a servant to me, into your existing scheme, or you can accept that he is outside of your purview, not your responsibility at all. That being the case, you can safely ignore him altogether, as you would my footman or my pastry cook. Which would you like?”
This pointed argument appeared to gain some sway with the clerk. “Your servant, you say? Like a pastry cook?”
“Precisely. He helps me do my work more efficiently, and so it is my choice to take him on, and it is my wish to pay him out of my own monies. You need not account for him at all.”