AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“I’ll wait a little longer,” Livia said. “If I may.”
The queen shrugged off her gown and stepped into the nightrobe. They put a warm wrapper around her shoulders, and she took a seat beside the fire. “Now go,” she told them and turned to Livia, who took a seat without waiting for permission.
“You may not like the news I have, but I swear it does you no harm.”
The younger woman’s face was grave with worry. “It’s not Catherine Sedley? He’s not bringing her back to court?”
“No, no, not as bad as that.”
“What then?” The queen flushed, and Livia slid onto her knees beside her chair and took her thin hands in a gentle grip.
“His sons by Arabella Churchill are coming to court this week,” she said. “The old mistress isn’t coming, don’t fear her—she’s married off and grown plain. But her bastard royal sons—James and Henry—are invited. By the king.”
Mary Beatrice went so white that Livia tightened her grip. “Why now?” she demanded. “He said he would never bring them to court. He said he would never grieve me with the presence of his bastard sons, before I had one of my own!”
“They’re not going to stay,” Livia told her. “He’s granting titles. He’s going to give James Fitzjames a dukedom. He’s going to make him Duke of Berwick.”
“This is to declare him as his son?”
Livia could not deny it.
“So he has given up all hope of having a son from me. And now he tells the world.”
Livia rose up and poured her a glass of red wine. “The king is coming to you this evening, you might make a baby this very night.Giving the Churchill bastard a dukedom is no more than finding him a place in the world. His brother Henry is to go to sea. We can’t stop the king acknowledging his bastards, but any child you have will take the throne, even if there are a dozen bastard dukes.”
“It’s what he thinks of me that matters,” the queen said miserably. “And when he makes his bastard a duke he tells everyone that he has given up on me.”
BRIDGETOWN, BARBADOS, WINTER 1687
Johnnie planned to open an Exchange like the new markets that were springing up in London: big buildings where small tradesmen could rent space for their own shops. He rented a warehouse on Exchange Street, near the merchant meeting house, where all the great planters, exporters of sugar, and captains of ships gathered to do business. It was an elegant street, broad and wide with stone buildings, rebuilt with slave labor after the town’s disastrous fire. The paved street was wide enough to take two carriages passing by, so Johnnie was certain that ladies would drive by the open doors and be unable to resist the temptation to step inside. At the rear of the building were great doors that opened wide enough for a wagon to enter from the quay, which was only yards away.
Here, with almost no competition, with customers desperate for English goods, Johnnie unpacked a selection of housewares, small pieces of furniture, textiles, luxury goods, and fashionable accessories. He had dried herbs, salves, and remedies from the Priory stillroom set out in a display on a small gateleg table that was for sale, as were the hangings behind it. Silks from Venice, forwarded by Sarah and packed by Alys, were hung on all the walls; Johnnie hoped to introduce to Barbados thefashion of curtains at the windows where—surely—they did not need shutters against cold winds? He had rolls and rolls of light fabrics, muslin and silks for bed hangings, as everyone had told him that the gnats and mosquitoes were an agony at night. Johnnie thought that billowing bed curtains might keep the insects out, and even if they did not, they would add London elegance to a faraway room.
Rob had guaranteed a loan from his father-in-law, the Alderman goldsmith, both of them eager to invest in the Sugar Islands. Johnnie had bought everything from trimmings for hats and headpieces, leather and silk gloves, lace for collars, embroidery threads, expensive linen for luxury petticoats, and ells of fabric for dressmakers and tailors. He had several muffs and matching capes. After fifteen years in the East India Company trying to persuade the inhabitants of India to wear English wool, Johnnie was delighted to find that the English in Barbados did not dress lightly for the hot climate but wanted to wear what the English wore in England; and he could sell heavy tweeds as well as he could sell light silk.
Nothing was made on the island but sugar and rum: everything had to be imported. Johnnie could have sold butcher’s knives and blacksmith’s rasps. He could have sold bridles and harness for ox and horses, of course he could have sold the tools of slavery—branding irons, whips, chains and manacles, instruments to pierce the tongue or knives to cut off ears or pierce cheeks. But his main stock in trade was fabric and fashion for the ladies of the island, who had almost nothing to do but dress and sit in shaded rooms, and hope that they were in the fashion of the English court, though inevitably trailing some months behind.
From the very first morning, when Johnnie spoke severely to the two slaves loaned to him from his hotel, and threw open the doors of his store, he knew that he would make his fortune. The carriages were drawn up outside, the ladies poured in, followed by slaves to carry their purchases, avid for anything new from England, desperate for new materials, colors, and patterns; greedy for as little as inches of lace to trim a collar or a ribbon for a hat. There was nothing to do on Barbados but visit other plantations and drink. They had enslavedthousands of men and women and made themselves into bored and lonely prisoners of their own wealth.
The first months went by in a whirl. Johnnie sent a stream of letters to Alys with lists of goods that he needed to replace his sold stock. He paid his takings into the Bridge goldsmith and sent the receipt to Alys for her to draw on the Alderman’s bank. The evening that the innkeeper’s wife mentioned that Mr. Peabody was expected the following day, Johnnie had already earned enough to buy Rowan into his own service and place her as his indentured servant, to run the shop until her ten years were up. Then he would free her, marry her, and make a huge profit in one single brilliant venture.
Mr. Peabody came in his carriage with Bonny seated on the box beside the black coachman, and a black enslaved footman clinging on the back. Johnnie encountered him in the parlor of the hotel.
“Forgive me,” he said with a warm smile. “The landlady said that a gentleman was staying, and I was avid for company.”
“Eh?” Mr. Peabody said, looking around from squeezing limes into a bowl of punch.
“Johnnie Stoney, London merchant,” Johnnie introduced himself, coming into the room.
“Samuel Peabody, planter,” the man replied. “Good to see a new face. Will you take a glass? I’m just making a glass or two. My own rum, from my own plantation.”
“I’m grateful,” Johnnie said, secretly adding fruit juice and boiled water to the stiff mix, so that he had a chance of remaining clear-headed while Samuel Peabody became gradually more red-faced, sweaty, and drunk.
“Coming to plant sugar?” Mr. Peabody asked. “Manage a plantation?”
“No. I have a little shop, fancy goods.”
“Have another,” Peabody served them with another two glasses. “Just as well. Sugar’s a game for an experienced man. Experienced, you know?”
