Caxton

Sparrowhawk III - Caxton

Edward Cline

ebook ISBN: 978-1-59692-945-6

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The special province of drama
“
is to create…action…which springs from the
past but is directed toward the future and is always great with things to come
.”
— Aristotle,
On Drama

T
he complaint most often lodged against a certain genre of fiction is that,
“Things like that don’t happen in real life!” or, “Life isn’t like that!”

But, they do. And, it can be like that.
Case in point: The American Revolution — a heroic and successful revolt against
tyranny, resulting in the establishment of a republic (if we can keep it, to
paraphrase Benjamin Franklin) whose government was charged with protecting and
upholding life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness — and property, which
facilitates and is integrally linked to the first three political ends. If judged
by the criteria of Romantic literature — it being, in novelist/philosopher Ayn
Rand’s words, a “category of art based on the recognition of the principle that
man possesses the faculty of volition” — then the founding of the United States
was the most glorious and dramatic political event in human history, unimaginable
in fiction before then, and virtually unprecedented since, whether in “real
life” or in fiction.
Most nations can claim a literature, in the form of novels, plays, or epic sagas
or poetry, that dramatizes the early histories of those countries. Britain,
France, and Spain come to mind. But, except for a handful of novels that dramatize,
usually in superficial costume dramas or in sheer action at various levels of
literary worth, specific periods or events in American colonial history, America
has no such literature. A large body of novels exists for the Civil War, the
Indian Wars, even World War II. The colonial period’s list is pitifully, almost
scandalously short. Representative of this specific subgenre is James Fenimore
Cooper’s
The Last of the Mohicans
. The
Sparrowhawk
series of novels
represents, in part, an ambitious attempt to help correct that deficiency.
I say “in part,” because my overall end is to write a story that interests me
as a writer, and not specifically to contribute to this country’s literature.
That could well be a consequence, but it is not my motive. However, I am not
unmindful of that consequence, and so this series will also attempt to do justice
to the founding of the United States. And doing justice to it has meant understanding,
in fundamentals, what moved the Founders to speak, write, and act as they did.
Those fundamentals were
ideas
.

Except for some “cameos” by the Founders, such as Patrick Henry and Thomas
Jefferson, this series does not dramatize the characters and actions of real
historical persons. Instead, it focuses on the intellectual and moral development
of two men, Jack Frake and Hugh Kenrick, Englishmen who come to the colonies
and who reflect the moral and intellectual stature of the men who made this
country possible.

Jack Frake, a boy who was brought here as an indentured felon, and Hugh Kenrick,
an aristocrat who was sent here to complete his education, are two variations
on the same theme: the inviolate, rational, self-made individual. As a former
smuggler, Jack is a veteran of harsh conflict, social ostracism, and criminal
defiance. As a critic of the customs and conventions of his time, Hugh is a
literate rebel against hypocrisy and venality. Jack receives his education in
a Cornwall cave, tutored by a colorful outlaw; Hugh, his in the safety of his
Dorset home and in the best schools in London. Yet, although a social chasm
separates their origins, both men meet at the same point of independence and
self-reliance, and make decisions that affect the course of their lives.

This third volume opens in colonial Virginia. Jack and Hugh, however, are introduced
in the first two titles of the
Sparrowhawk
series, which are set entirely
in the England of the 18th century, in the decades immediately preceding the
beginning of serious conflict between the mother country and her colonies. England
was the proper setting for the outset of this series, for it was chiefly British
political ideas and philosophy, espoused by 17th century thinker John Locke
and his contemporaries and predecessors, that animated the colonials throughout
the 18th.
Book Three: Caxton
moves from the stark cliffs of Cornwall
and the roiling streets of midcentury London to the deceptively placid rivers,
hills and towns of colonial Virginia.

Alarmed by a stealthy, and later blatantly aggressive encroachment on their
constitutionally guaranteed rights by Parliament and King George the Third,
American political intellectuals advocated and applied these ideas to their
own lives to a degree unimaginable to the British political establishment. Unimaginable,
and inimical to it, for while that establishment paid lip service to life, liberty,
and property, in fact it largely rested on a corrupt and corrupting system of
unquestioning servitude, arbitrary expropriation, and a resigned tolerance of
that servitude, expropriation, and corruption.

The taking of such ideas so seriously by men that they would pledge their lives,
fortunes, and sacred honor to fight for them was both inimical to that establishment,
and nearly a personal affront to 18th-century Britain, which prided itself for
being the freest country on earth, which many patriots and persecuted individuals
from other countries looked to as a beacon of hope or chose as a place of resident
exile.

However, American political intellectuals were steeped in Roman and Greek history,
as well as British and Continental political philosophy, and learned from it,
drawing from it important lessons of cause and effect, of means and ends. As
British legislators grew more arrogant and implacable in their demands on the
colonies, the well-read American “activist” would have been knowledgeable enough
to remark: “When Tiberius asked Cato why the Dalmatians revolted from Rome,
he replied that it was ‘because the Romans sent not dogs or shepherds, but wolves
to guard their flocks.’” And, he would have subsequently concluded that he was
not a member of anyone’s flock, needing neither trained dog, nor gentle shepherd,
nor predatory wolf to live his own life for his own reasons.

If conflict is the driving force of plot, then
Sparrowhawk
is a plotted
saga. Jack and Hugh may meet at the same point of independence, and even become
friends, but is their relationship smooth and frictionless? If it isn’t, why
isn’t it? As one character in this present volume remarks: “One of you is the
needle, and one of you the north.” Who is the ideal, and who is the aspirant
to that ideal? That is for readers to find out. And, having found out, to read
on to learn why.

Historical fiction differs from “contemporary” fiction only in the amount of
research required to re-create a period’s culture and society. Other than that,
plot, characterization and action should be its chief attributes. Difficulties
may be imagined in that one’s characters are moving and thinking in a period
defined by its recorded events, and so the element of volition surely must be
compromised. Not necessarily. In the
Sparrowhawk
series, history is always
in the background, and its characters are the story’s movers.

Also, accuracy in re-creating a period is of paramount importance, but should
not govern the course or content of a story. License may be taken and accepted,
so long as it captures the essentials of a period’s customs, practices, and
institutions. If this were not true, historical fiction would be impossible
to write. Victor Hugo could not have had Quasimodo pour molten lead onto a 15th-century
mob from the gallery of a cathedral in
Notre Dame de Paris
, and Hemingway
could not have had Robert Jordan blow up bridges in
For Whom the Bell Tolls
in 1930s Spain
.
Edmond Rostand’s
Cyrano de Bergerac
could never
have flashed his sword in 17th-century France, and Robert Bolt’s (or Terence
Rattigan’s) T. E. Lawrence could never have taken Aquaba in
Lawrence of Arabia
(or in
Ross
) during World War I. The events depicted in these and other
works of historical fiction didn’t happen in “real life,” and often their authors
“fudged” on insignificant historical details to make a point. In fiction, and
especially in historical fiction, what might or ought to have been is more important
than what actually happened.

This is the crucial difference between historical fact and historical fiction.
Aristotle emphasized the distinction over 2,000 years ago in his
Poetics
.
He and John Locke, though they never set foot in America, were this country’s
chief philosophical founders. And
Sparrowhawk
will be judged, I hope,
a worthy testament to their continued role in men’s lives and minds.

Long live Lady Liberty!
Edward Cline
Yorktown, Virginia. January 2004

I
n early October, 1759, the sloop
Amelia
dropped anchor at Caxton on
the York River. From Philadelphia she carried cargo, visitors, and news. The
cargo was expected, as were some of the visitors. The news was not. It was good
news, and important news, and it brought elation to the

Virginia town, prompting some men to propose endless rounds of toasts in the
taverns, and some women to kneel in prayer in thanks and gratitude. Others thought
that the news deserved a regular celebration by firing the old cannon that stood
on the sheriff’s property and holding a dance. One small planter was so excited
that he put his twelve-year-old son on a horse and sent him off to Williamsburg
with the news. Reverend Albert Acland, pastor of Stepney Parish Church, was
pressed by a number of citizens to ring the church bell, but he advised waiting
until the news was confirmed.

The news curtailed curiosity and speculation about two of the visitors who
stepped off the sloop. They were strangers. One was a man of about forty, the
other a young gentleman of nineteen or twenty. Both were finely dressed in clothes
of the very best quality. They were the last passengers to step off the
Amelia
,
once it was secured to the finger pier and the gangway lowered. The older man
was courtly but amiable, the younger grave in the set of his face, almost forbidding.
In the older man, there was a slight hint of deference to the younger. Once
ashore, he made enquiries at the customs house, and paid a pair of idle boys
to carry his and his companion’s traveling bags and follow him and his companion
up the dirt road to the town above the bluff.

Three men were expecting the strangers, who had come on business, but did not
meet them, for the sailing time from Philadelphia to the York River could have
lasted between two and four days, depending on the winds and the water. These
three men were Arthur Stannard, Ian McRae, and Amos Swart. Stannard was the
consignment agent for the London tobacco merchants Weddle, Umphlett and Company.
McRae was the York River’s sole Scottish factor, representing the Glasgow tobacco
merchants Sutherland and Bain. Together, they were the principal creditors of
Amos Swart, whose plantation was ordered into receivership by a county court
in lieu of large and long-standing debts. Swart was persuaded to liquidate his
debts in a single stroke by selling his property, which consisted of nearly
one thousand acres of arable land, a great brick house and its outbuildings,
livestock, wagons, tools and other implements, the indentures of five servants,
and thirty slaves. He agreed to accept whatever price and terms a buyer might
reach with Stannard and McRae, and to vacate the property once the sale was
registered with the Queen Anne County court.

Swart had tried, in the summer, to placate his creditors by holding a lottery,
offering as a prize the unconditional, ten-year lease of three hundred acres
of his best land for a penny a year, and the free use of some of his slaves
to clear and cultivate it. The proceeds from the ticket sales would have erased
some of his debt. But few men purchased the tickets. Swart was not liked. He
had married into his property — Brougham Hall — and out of his class. To the
gentry, he was crude, obnoxious, unread; little better than a fur trapper from
the mountains. To other, smaller planters, he was a cheat, a liar, and a thief.
To all he was a rogue who had come from nowhere and ingratiated himself with
the late, respected Covington Brougham, and had married his daughter, Feli´se.
The daughter died mysteriously one night four months after their marriage. Title
to Brougham Hall reverted automatically to Swart.

That had been six years ago. The townsmen, planters, and sheriff all suspected
murder. The charge could not be proved. Brougham Hall went into decline. Swart
owned smaller properties to the west, in other counties, and it was said that
these were as badly managed by him as was now Brougham Hall. Residents of Caxton
regarded Swart as a blot on their town’s reputation as a loyal and prosperous
community; he was as repellent as a pirate; he was a seducer of virtuous women
and wives; a corrupter of youth; and certainly not a crop master.

When the lottery failed, Stannard and McRae formed an alliance and sued Swart.
The nine-man bench of the county court, composed mostly of planter gentry, examined
the case and with ill-concealed alacrity ordered Brougham Hall into receivership.
Advertisements were placed by the creditors in the
Virginia Gazette
and
the Caxton
Courier
, which appeared twice a month. A stray copy of the
Courier
found its way to Tun Tavern in Philadelphia. The older stranger
and his companion patronized that establishment, had seen the advertisement,
and an exchange of letters between them and the creditors had led to the visit
today.

The older gentleman’s name was Otis Talbot, of Talbot and Spicer, Philadelphia
merchants. He was acting by proxy for Baron Garnet Kenrick of Dorset, England,
having been granted the power and means to purchase any property that the baron’s
son expressed an interest in. By written agreement, once the son reached his
majority at the age of twenty-one, title to such property would automatically
revert to him.

Talbot’s companion was Hugh Kenrick, recently graduated from the Philadelphia
Academy. He was nearly twenty.
They made their way to the house of Arthur Stannard on Queen Anne Street, the
town’s only thoroughfare. The news spreading through Caxton was old news to
them. They understood its significance as well as any Virginian.

France had lost Canada — and, as a consequence, North America.

* * *

Quebec had fallen, and the French had lost their ablest general there, Louis
Joseph de Montcalm de Saint-Veran. His error — and it was not so much an error
as an only choice — was to fight the British on their terms, in the first Continental
style battle in North America. He and his army of regulars and Canadians awoke
on the morning of September 13th to find 4,500 British regulars arrayed against
them, ready for battle or siege, on a plateau called the Plains of Abraham.
In an unusual and daring maneuver — unusual and daring at least for a British
general — Brigadier General James Wolfe had overnight slipped his army up the
cliffs from the river so quietly, completely, and successfully that not even
Montcalm’s sharp-eared Indian allies detected the move. When dawn came, it revealed
the scarlet menace. Montcalm, desperate to remove both the British army and
the Royal Navy from the St. Lawrence River, so that supplies for his garrison
could arrive for the winter without impediment, had no choice but to face Wolfe.
Wolfe, too, was desperate, because winter was coming and he needed to capture
Quebec before the river froze and he and the Navy were penned in.
Montcalm met the challenge, and marched out his army. It advanced
en masse
,
in straight lines, to within fifty yards of the enemy to trade fire. The two
lines of scarlet fired a pair of devastating volleys into the French, then followed
with a bayonet charge. The Canadian militia broke first and ran, then the regulars.
Montcalm, wounded in the stomach, died before Quebec was abandoned by the French
Governor-general and forced to surrender. Wolfe, wounded three times, died on
the field, a happier man than Montcalm.

France was fated to lose North America, no matter how long that theater of
war lasted. Its imperial policy differed radically from Britain’s. It was not
conceived to encourage colonization and the development of agriculture or industry.
The French were there to literally skin the continent for as much as they could
get — in the fur trade. Their military presence was wholly dependent on a corrupt
civil government in Montreal, parsimonious largesse from a French king and his
advisors, whatever it could wring in taxes and obedience from a handful of local
French farmers, and what little it could buy or steal from New Englanders. On
the other hand, Britain’s military presence was sustained by the British-nurtured
civilization on the Eastern seaboard, together with a colonial animus for French
policies. Wolfe could have met disaster on the Plains of Abraham, and it would
not have mattered. In time, Canada would have become British.

To the colonists, the surrender of Quebec, and a year later of Montreal, meant
the elimination of the French threat from the north, and also easier settlement
of the west. It meant the end of “Papist” designs on the colonies and the preservation
of English liberties they enjoyed. It meant a British Canada. It meant a secure
northern frontier.

A British Canada. To Parliament, to Secretary of State Pitt, to the Privy Council,
that meant quite different things, but this was something that would not become
apparent for a long time.

For Virginians, the war with France in North America was almost as distant
a conflict as the war in Europe, fought as it was on the far frontiers of the
colonies. The past disasters of the British army, balanced by its more recent
victories, did not immediately affect the citizens of Caxton. Britain was out
of the European part of the Seven Years’ War, fighting it by proxy with subsidies
to Frederick the Second of Prussia. His changing fortunes, and those of his
enemies the French, Austrians, and Russians, were of only passing interest to
most colonials. George the Second may have gasped in horror, and grown livid
with outrage, when the French occupied his electoral domain of Hanover, and
when his son, the Duke of Cumberland, threw away a victory by assuming that
he had been bested at Hastenbeck by another third-rate general, and signed the
humiliating treaty of KlosterZeven two years ago. Virginians, however, merely
shrugged their shoulders. The war in Europe was being fought over issues, claims
and lands that they and their forbears had disowned long ago.

Neither did the war affect Virginians much in the purse. The colony’s chief
export, and the basis of its prosperity, was tobacco. While French and British
navies and privateers preyed on each other’s sea commerce, British merchantmen
were able to sail regularly, under a flag of truce, to French ports with cargoes
of tobacco bought by the Farmers-General of the Revenue, the French state tobacco
monopoly, and the largest single buyer on the world market. Both Crowns needed
the revenue generated by that trade in order to prosecute the war. The same
c
oncordia discors
had been in effect during King George’s war, or the
War of the Austrian Succession. If the arrangement seemed paradoxical, or suicidal,
or venal, the observation was noted by only a very few minds. The era abounded
with such contradictions: If the French were gracious, civil, and cultured to
a fault, but employed Indian allies specifically for their reputation for unmitigated
savagery and the terror they could instill in English settlers and soldiers,
then the British were stubbornly arrogant, presumptuous and hard-nosed, but
basked in the demonstrable superiority of English common and commercial law.

* * *

“Do you trade in the leaf, Mr. Talbot?”
“Only occasionally, Mr. Stannard. My goods are decidedly
inflammable
.”
This remark caused the parties gathered in Mr. Stannard’s parlor to chuckle
in amusement. Talbot added, “Mr. Spicer and I correspond almost exclusively
with the firm of Worley and Sons, of London, and we trade mostly in dry goods,
perishable only through an act of arson or nature.”
“I see,” said Mr. Stannard. “Worley and Sons? I’ve heard of them.”
“They are Mr. Kenrick’s family’s principal agents there.” Talbot nodded to his
companion. “Mr. Kenrick has recently divided his time between his education
and our office.”
Hugh Kenrick said, “I have spent some years handling made goods, Mr. Stannard.
I wish now to try my hand at producing them, in order to more fully appreciate
their value.”
Mr. Stannard grinned a little at this confession of ambition, then frowned.
“Have you any experience in raising tobacco, Mr. Kenrick?”
“None, sir.”
“With all due respect, sir, it is not merely a matter of planting a seed and
watching it grow.”
“I am aware of the constant attention required by tobacco, Mr. Stannard.”
Talbot said, “My companion has taken an especial interest in the planters west
of Philadelphia, and has invested some time in observing their practices and
methods.”
“Their art does not differ greatly from that practiced here,” Hugh said. “This
region, however, has the advantage of a longer growing and curing season.”
“Yes, that is very true,” conceded Mr. Stannard.
“Undoubtedly, Mr. Swart has retained a staff who manage his business and crops,”
suggested Talbot.
“Oh, yes. Of course. But they are a very unhappy lot, at the moment.”
A floor clock in the parlor struck three o’clock. Stannard gestured to the tea
service that sat on a small table between the seated men. They had already had
the beverage. The guests shook their heads. “Well,” Stannard said, “it would
be unfair to Mr. McRae if I continued our interview in his absence. I shall
send word to him and to Mr. Swart that you gentlemen are here. And, you must
find lodging for the night. I recommend Mrs. Rittles’s boarding house, and if
she has nothing that you approve, then Mr. Gramatan’s inn may oblige you. You
must have passed those establishments on your way here. Perhaps you would like
to attend to that now, sirs, while I arrange for us to meet again at Mr. Gramatan’s
inn. He has the best fare in Caxton, and we can engage a private room there
to discuss our business.”
Hugh and Talbot rose. “That sounds agreeable, sir,” Talbot said.
The agent walked the pair to his front door. “Supper at seven, then, at the
Gramatan Inn.” He paused. “Oh! Forgive me for asking this, sirs. But if the
property is attractive to you, how would you propose to pay for it?”
“With a private draft drawn on Swire’s Bank in London, sir,” Hugh said.
“Swire’s Bank, you say? Well, I’ve heard good things about that enterprise.
Yes, very good things, indeed.”
Talbot asked, “Who are the prominent planters here, Mr. Stannard?”
“Reece Vishonn, of Enderly — that is the name of his place — to the east of
town. Ira Granby, of Granby Hall, which neighbors Enderly. Ralph Cullis, Henry
Otway, and some others. All the original families, you know. To the west, Brougham
Hall, and Morland Hall, once the late Captain Massie’s, now owned by Mr. Frake.”
Hugh’s face lit up for the first time. “Is it
Jack
Frake you mean?” he
asked.
“Why, yes, sir. Jack Frake,” said Stannard. “Are you acquainted with him?”
“I only know of him,” remarked Hugh, not volunteering more.
Mr. Stannard grinned, but uneasily. “Perhaps you do. He saved Captain Massie’s
life in that awful affair with Braddock on the Monongahela, and also that of
one of his sons. Another perished there. Captain Massie led one of the Virginia
companies, you see, from this very county. Unfortunately, the son Mr. Frake
saved died of wounds en route home. The last son, the oldest, was left at home
to look after Morland, but later got himself run through in some drunken altercation
in a Williamsburg tavern. Mr. Frake had by that time completed his indenture
and married Captain Massie’s only daughter, Jane, and with her came three hundred
acres of Morland. Sweet girl, she was. But — she died during childbirth. Mrs.
Rittles was her midwife, and the child, a boy, survived his mother by only a
month. Captain Massie had taken a French ball that passed through one hip and
out the other. The wound flared up again and he died of it. Mrs. Rittles ascribes
a more sentimental cause, that he died of a broken heart; his whole family had
gone.
“Well, anyway, Mr. Frake was like a son to him, and his will left that gentleman
all of Morland, or another six hundred acres. If there were any remote relatives
who could have challenged the will, none came forward. Now, Mr. Frake is a gentleman,
but he’s a solitary fellow, and keeps mostly to himself. He is regarded as a
crop master, and produces between thirteen and fourteen hogsheads of sweet-scented
every season. His staff are loyal to him, and he treats his tenants with generous
fairness. He manages with but six slaves. Stood for burgess two years ago and
promised to work for a bill in Williamsburg that would allow citizens to free
their slaves without the House’s or Governor’s consent.” Stannard chuckled.
“Of course, he was not elected. He has a fine library, perhaps the finest in
Queen Anne County, after Mr. Reisdale’s. Morland runs parallel almost the whole
length of Brougham Hall, from the river to Hove Creek.”
The men were standing on the brick steps of the front door of Stannard’s modest
house. Talbot asked, “Has he or any of the other planters expressed interest
in Brougham Hall, Mr. Stannard?”
The agent nodded. “Some have. But my and Mr. McRae’s terms are not negotiable.
We are asking for cash, or in-kind — or a draft note — to settle Mr. Swart’s
affairs and to clear our own books. Regrettably, few of the others are in better
positions to extend themselves so much without aggravating their own debts.
Mr. McRae and I have resisted all attempts by them to beat down the value of
the property, and we are determined to absorb no loss ourselves on Mr. Swart’s
balances.”
“What are you asking for the property, sir?” asked Talbot.
“Eleven hundred sterling, sir,” said Stannard without hesitation.
Talbot glanced at Hugh, who nodded acceptance. Talbot said, “Well, sir, that
is agreeable, depending, of course, on what we see on the morrow.”
“I am certain that you and Mr. Kenrick will not be displeased.”
“Where may we engage mounts?”
“I shall arrange that for you, sir, and pay the rate myself — ”
A loud report startled the three men and caused them to turn in its direction.
Pedestrians in the street also paused to look toward the river. The noise touched
off a chorus of barking dogs.
“Why, that was the old cannon that sits in front of Sheriff Tippet’s place,”
Stannard said. “It’s fired only on the King’s birthday and Christmas day. What
the devil…?”
“I must apologize to you, Mr. Stannard,” Talbot said. “Perhaps we should have
conveyed the news to you first before discussing our business.”
“News, sir? What news?”
“Quebec has fallen to General Wolfe. That was on the thirteenth of last month.
The general opinion is that the rest of Canada cannot help but follow. Unfortunately,
it will not be to General Wolfe, who died on the field, as did his opponent,
General Montcalm, if the reports are precise.”
“Oh!” exclaimed Stannard, clapping his hands once. “That
is
wonderful
news! Thank God and General Wolfe!” The agent beamed. “Yes, yes! Astoundingly
good news! There will be some form of celebration here to mark the occasion,
I can assure you! Why, I hope your stay permits you to partake of it!”
“We shall see, sir,” Talbot said. He touched his hat. “We take our leave now,
sir, and look forward to supping with you and Mr. McRae this evening.” The visitors
picked up their bags and walked up Queen Anne Street.
Mr. Stannard immediately sent his son, Joseph, who clerked for him, to inform
the Scottish factor of the arrival of the prospective buyers, and then to ride
to Brougham Hall to warn Amos Swart to prepare for a visit the next morning.
He then found his cane and walked briskly down the street to the parish house
of the church, a trim little pine-board place that sat near the red brick, cruciform
church and its wooden steeple. He found Reverend Acland in his garden, picking
beans from his corn stalks.
The minister paused to wipe his hands on his apron. “If you are here about the
news from Quebec, sir, I’m afraid other heralds have preceded you, including
Sheriff Tippet. But, I will not have the bell rung until the post-rider brings
some form of written, official confirmation.”
“Still, it’s wonderful news, is it not?”
“If it is true, yes — in which case I shall deliver a sermon on Sunday on the
subject, and call for a moment of silence to pray for General Wolfe’s soul.”
Mr. Stannard’s excitement propelled him to make an injudicious remark. “I imagine
it may be too late for that, Reverend,” he laughed, “for his soul must have
already journeyed to wherever it was ordained to go!”
Reverend Acland frowned. “If, indeed, he died, sir. The glory of his late career
cannot but have helped compensate for his reputedly dissolute life.” He paused.
“Surely, this is not the only reason you have paid a call, Mr. Stannard?”
“True. Here’s more recent news I wish you to hear and appraise.” The agent told
the minister about his visitors, and described Hugh Kenrick.
Reverend Albert Acland came to Caxton fifteen years ago upon graduating from
Oxford and taking orders. He came from an old family of Anglican ministers,
but found no assignments to his liking in England. He prevailed upon his established
clerical friends to persuade the Bishop of London to post him to a colonial
parish; the colonies were chronically short of Anglican ministers. He sent twice-yearly
reports on his parish and the religious turmoil in Virginia to the Bishop, who
had jurisdiction over Anglican churches in the colonies. He was also in regular
correspondence with former classmates who had also taken orders and maintained
parishes in the British Isles and in other colonies. With church and political
news, Acland exchanged gossip with his distant colleagues about the fortunes
of other men of the cloth, about the fulminations of certain members of government
and Parliament, and about the eccentricities and scandals of many members of
the aristocracy. Much of this gossip found its way into the Caxton
Courier
,
in items written by Acland under a carefully guarded pen name.
By the time Stannard finished speaking, the minister stood openmouthed. “Dear
me!” he exclaimed. “That
must
be the son of the Baron of Danvers, who
is brother to the Earl!”
The agent said, “He has that air about him, sir, though I could not put my finger
on it.” He frowned. “How could you be certain of his antecedents, good sir?”
“I have a colleague in Devon who writes me about the Kenricks and other worthy
families there — about Danvers, and Dorset all in all — that is the Earl’s seat,
and…. My word! To think of a scion of nobility settling
here
!” Reverend
Acland straightened up and discarded his apron. “Come in for tea, Mr. Stannard,
if you can spare the time, so that we may discuss this intelligence!”
In Reverend Acland’s parlor, half an hour later, Mr. Stannard put down his cup
and saucer and said, “Mr. Talbot did most of the talking.” He paused. “And the
lad knew of Mr. Frake!”
“Did he?” the minister said. “How on earth could he know?”
“He did not say, Reverend.”
“Mr. Frake is noted in these parts, but I can hardly believe that his repute
could extend to the metropolis of Philadelphia!” The minister made this remark
with a condescending smirk.
Mr. Stannard frowned in thought. “The lad strikes me as being a forthright gentleman,
sir. There is an easy way to clear any doubts about his identity. I will simply
ask him, this very evening, and apologize for my ignorance.”
The minister waived a hand. “No, no, sir. Not that! If he does not wish to advertise
his rank — if neither he nor Mr. Talbot volunteered the information — we should
not presume to impinge on his privacy. He might take offense and flee, regardless
of his appraisal of Brougham Hall.”
“If that is your advice, sir, I shall heed it.”
“Oh, Mr. Stannard!” mused Acland. “We would be blessed if he purchases Brougham
Hall! A scion of nobility residing here would have many benefits! Why, he could
be appointed to the Governor’s Council, and check certain sentiments there among
the gentry here, and benefit the county in so many ways!” He lowered his voice.
“Perhaps he could contribute to improvements in the parish, and perhaps help
repair our superannuated steeple! A new bell, perhaps! I cannot begin to count
the possibilities!”
“
I
would get back much of Brougham Hall’s tobacco crop!” remarked Mr.
Stannard, more to himself than to the minister, “for such a gentleman could
not but raise the best sweet-scented, instead of the near-trash Swart now sells
to Mr. McRae.” He frowned again. “This has occurred to me just now, sir: If
he purchases the property, we can be sure of friction between him and Mr. Frake,
who is not friendly to nobility. They would watch each other like rival panthers
stalking a doe in the Piedmont.”
“Perhaps,” the minister said. “My memory is foggy, and I must find the letters
from my correspondent in Devon, but I believe there is some evil feeling between
Mr. Kenrick and his uncle the Earl. And, I vaguely recall some other scandal
attached to his name.”
Mr. Stannard shrugged. “Perhaps these matters have little to do with why he
would be interested in the property, sir. Sons of merchants or nobility do not
usually come here for their education and experience. The gentlemen here often
send their sons to London. It is a most curious phenomenon, do you not think,
sir?”