The Iron Master (26 page)

Ten years after that episode William Howarth was closeted in the library at Kersall Park, discussing business.

‘You come alone, I see, Mr Howarth?’ said Humphrey Kersall pleasantly.

Cool-headed, cool-blooded, with a quiet taste for autocracy, he had much in common with Caleb Scholes the iron-master. Between these two ageing lions stepped William, determined to tame the pair of them with his title-holding to Snape.

‘It is good of you to spare me time, my lord,’ said William, bringing forth his plans, ‘and though this is a dark horse which may not even run,’ he added lightly, ‘I thought to show you its paces!’

And he laid out the thick sheets of paper upon the library table, as he had done at Somer Court three years ago.

The Snape, so-named for its pasture, spread much like Belbrook from hillbrow to river bank, as though some long-dead planner had decreed each owner an equal share of rock and marsh. William had cross-hatched the faults in red and marked them clearly: needs draining, needs levelling, to be cleared of scrub, and so on. On the second sheet, headed SNAPE IRON FOUNDRY, he had drawn up the finished works. On the third were his estimates of time and costs in detail. It was a highly efficient scheme for the production of cannons.

‘An expensive animal, sir,’ said Kersall negligently, using William’s metaphor, ‘and if it do run will carry a great deal of money upon its back!’

‘But cannot fail to win its present race, my lord. Iron is the sinews of war, and the war seems like to be a long one.’

‘And you come to me first, Mr Howarth, to do your horse-dealing? That is most amiable of you. May I ask why?’

‘Because you were good enough to take an interest in our present enterprise, which I believe you will agree does very well.’

Kersall gave him a dry look.

‘And perhaps because your Quaker friends would not feel kindly about making a profit from war, Mr Howarth?’

‘Abraham Darby’s ironworks made cannon, my lord,’ William pointed out.

‘Ah, but Abraham Darby was only a titular holder at the time,’ Kersall replied, surprising him. ‘A man who has but three-sixteenths of the shares calls a small tune. Your peaceable partner might see matters very differently.’

William’s expression did not change. He had inherited his father’s mouth and jaw: features expressive in Ned of tenderness and strength, in his son of an uncommon tenacity. His mother’s bright quick intelligence had become in William a steady flame of intent. Every movement, every mannerism, had been schooled to the purpose in hand. He would no more have wasted a sign of approval or apprehension upon Humphrey Kersall than that cool and noble gentleman would have wasted one on him. So they pondered over this latest plan: the older man grey, spare and elegant; the younger man powerful, dark and dignified.

‘Well, my lord, principles are a private matter. It is of business that I speak. You would stand to gain a large profit very quickly. Indeed, to risk least and gain most. Therefore I had thought you might be interested.’

‘Your proposition, Mr Howarth?’ Kersall asked, head held enquiringly to one side.

‘That you, my lord, or you and others of your choice, should lend me the sum of twenty thousand pounds, to be repaid at one per cent above the highest rate of interest, in five years’ time.’

‘You judge very finely, Mr Howarth, as to both time and interest. I would suggest two per cent above the present rate, and give you seven years to repay.’

But this was mere bargaining, both knowing they would settle for something in between. Kersall laid a thin finger on his lips, meditating.

‘Your collateral being, Mr Howarth?’

‘My share of the Belbrook Iron Foundry and the title-deeds to Snape.’

‘Mr Howarth, I would not give you a tenth of the sum for either!’

‘My lord, you are gambling on my ability to continue to double the Belbrook output every year, to have Snape opening in twelve months’ time and begin work on orders which shall make Belbrook seem a tinker’s business. Snape is not an end but a beginning. I am no pot-vendor, to fret over a few hundred pounds’ worth of trade. I am thinking in terms of ten thousand gun-barrels a month! If I cannot make this work in the time given me, then you will take over and repay yourself at a longer interval. But you cannot lose, my lord. Perhaps I could! Like yourself, my lord, I am prepared to look somewhat ahead of the present, and gamble accordingly. The whole world is changing, and it is industry which will lead the rest. I am willing to wager my life upon that!’

Kersall said, with mild irony, ‘Unlike myself, you have a trade to fall back upon if all else fails! Though failure is, to my mind, an excuse of the weak.’

‘My father says that failure is the inability to get up off the ground,’ said William, smiling.

‘It amounts to the same thing. Well, Mr Howarth, you must give me a week to cast about me. I have not such a sum lying around!’

William bowed his head, collected his papers, and waited. Lord Kersall tapped his lips contemplatively.

‘Let us keep this horse of yours secret and well-stabled while I consider him as a proposition, Mr Howarth, shall we?’ he asked, and smiled most charmingly.

‘As your lordship pleases,’ William said, smiling in his turn.

In the hall he met Ralph Kersall, and they exchanged bows: cold towards each other, as became two men with high opinions of themselves and a vast difference in station. But William heard the opening words between father and son as the library door closed.

‘May I crave the humblest of audiences, sir?’ Ralph Kersall asked with mock humility.

‘Deuce take it, Ralph, not money again?’ Suddenly vulnerable.

So that is his other weakness? William thought. I shall do well to remember it.

He knew that a primary weakness had been played upon in the last hour. Humphrey Kersall could not resist the opportunity to own a very much larger share of the Belbrook Foundry in the event of William’s failure; and the further bonus of a second ironworks, in which none of the Scholeses had any part at all, had probably clinched the matter. In the event of success, and Kersall was not a man to back failure though he might gain by it, a decent profit would be made and a promising business partnership consolidated for future purposes.

He sees me in terms of a useful and talented puppet, William thought, who will help him own the whole valley. And I see him as a staircase which I shall mount on my way to greater things. We shall find out who is right.

The late afternoon was cold and clear. Kersall Park stretched before him from terrace to lake, and put him in mind of his future residence.

I must look about me for a different site, he thought. I cannot be too close to Belbrook after all this.

It occurred to him that the ironmaster could see some treachery in using Zelah’s dowry to buy the site of a cannon foundry, in which he would not be asked to take part whether he wished it or not. Then his wife and partner, Zelah and Caleb, would be both morally and personally distressed, and the whole family troubled by divided loyalties.

‘But I am not hurting them,’ he said aloud, striding through the wrought-iron gates without so much as a glance at their fine craftsmanship. ‘Snape is at the other end of the valley. They need never visit it. And we must have more money. There is no way of standing still in this world. We go either forward or back. And I am dammed if I am going back!’

*

The wedding at Bit’s Hill had been a single prodigal gesture in a sorry year. The poor summer brought forth a poor harvest, and the price of grain soared. Only the rich and genteel could afford to eat wheaten bread. Most made do with dark barley loaves, and working folk were encouraged to grow potatoes instead. Young men enlisted, preferring unknown dangers to semi-starvation. And the grave-diggers kept busy, burying the old and weak who died of want.

To that penurious end of the valley, at the end of 1795, came William, with money to spend and the need to build his new foundry as fast as possible. He could not have chosen a more propitious time. Men were desperate for work, and when word went round that labourers were needed at Snape they tramped in from miles around. Among them came the Irish, despised for their poverty, disliked for their foreignness, hated because they would accept less money for the same job.

William had learned a great deal from the building of Belbrook, and he knew how to find good managers to whom he could delegate work. He conceived the organisation minutely, and as a whole. Then he portioned it out to others. Thus he left himself free to pursue future objectives, and yet had a hand upon the reins and could twitch those reins when and how he pleased.

So he stood upon a hastily erected platform, looking exceedingly well-fed and prosperous in the midst of these hungry faces, and harangued the crowd. He was not yet a thorough-going
capitalists
— as Toby would have dubbed him — being still influenced by Ned, who was fatherly towards his labourers. And though he could not hope to know and care for this mass of unskilled men, who would toil for a few shillings and be laid off when the job was done, still he endeavoured to give them a sense of purpose and participation.

‘My name is Will Howarth,’ he cried, and his deep voice reached the furthest worker. ‘I’m offering you hard labour and fair pay!’ This raised a ghost of a laugh and a cheer. ‘You deal well with me and I’ll deal well with you. You’re not just building Snape Iron Foundry, you’re bringing more work to the valley for yourselves and others. And though the first blast-furnace will be fired within the year, God willing, your job won’t stop there. I’ve got plenty of building for you!’ The cheer came more strongly this time, and some of the younger men looked hopeful but the others reserved their judgement. ‘It’s healthy work here. Work with a bit of heart and interest to it. You won’t be cooped up in a mill, watching the bobbins go round. You’ll be making bricks and mortar grow! Give me all you’ve got and I’ll stand by you. There’s my hand upon it!’

His foreman, standing by his side, now threw his cap into the air and shouted, ‘Three good cheers for Mr Howarth!’

They whipped off their own battered hats and gave William something of an ovation. For he looked a splendid fellow, towering above them on the temporary platform, in the full flower of his strength and vitality. And he had come out and shown himself and spoken directly to them: none of your high-nosed, low-born manufacturers, keeping at a distance and letting others do the dirty work.

‘I thank you! I thank you!’ said William, lifting his hands for silence. ‘Now we’ll put matters straight before we start, and then we all know where we are. The wages are a fixed price, whether you’re English or Irish or anything else!’ A murmur of doubtful acceptance. ‘And we don’t employ childer. The only young folk here will be craftsmen’s apprentices with proper articles of agreement!’ Another confused murmur. They were not sure how these rules would affect them in practice, though the theory seemed to be benevolent ‘I’ll be here to set the first spade in the earth tomorrow morning at six o’clock!’ William cried. ‘And I’ll work alongside you. If any man thinks he can dig harder — let him try!’ They loved that, and something like comradeship glimmered in their gaunt faces. ‘And here’s my foreman, Mr Cartwright, to have a word with you about your pay!’

The terms were reasonable but not generous: a shilling a day to fill, wheel and empty heavy barrows of rock and soil from dawn to dark; nine shillings a week as bricklayers’ labourers and spadesmen. But then they were unskilled and paid the penalty for their lack of status. A carpenter would take home a pound or more on a Saturday night, and engineers were paid between twenty-five and thirty shillings a week.

Now William stepped down from his eminence and moved freely among them. A few he recognised as belonging to the villages of his childhood, and to these he spoke personally, remembering their Christian names and enquiring about their families. Most were strangers, and many rough enough to strike fear into any respectable heart such scarecrows as had crowded about the French guillotine to watch their masters die. But William was accustomed to command. If they did not respond to his broad smile they respected his broad shoulders, and his bright black gaze could harden until the other man looked away. Besides, he represented work. They cherished him for that

If summer had been bleak, autumn was savage. Heavy thunderstorms, high winds and driving rain, plagued the labourers and slowed the building projects. In London, King George was mobbed on his way to open Parliament, with cries of ‘No king! No war! Give us peace and bread!’

Relations at Quincey Place were difficult. William could have dealt with tears, reproaches or open anger, feeling his decision to be a rational one, but Zelah and Caleb had withdrawn into a stunned silence. The nature and scope of his enterprise bewildered them, who asked no more than honest trade and fair profit, but his secrecy appalled them most.

Caleb had only said, ‘We are partners, William. I had not expected thee to go behind my back.’

In vain William used their religious dislike of war as an excuse for his reticence on the subject, and pointed out that Snape was four miles away and a completely separate business. They knew very well that if Snape had been on their doorstep he would have pursued the same course. He had made up his mind and they must adjust to the consequences. Brother and sister drew closer together, not casting him out but grieving for the loss of trusts He felt, when he was home at all, that they had to struggle to seem as they once were. Something had been broken. He endeavoured to mend it with affection, with gifts. He was truly sorry for the rift, but unrepentant about Snape.