The Solitary Envoy (3 page)

“Master Cutter, you must please forgive me.”

“Mother!” Erica dropped her hand in alarm, frightened at her mother’s unseen approach. “I was just—”

“I fear Master Cutter has forgotten there are other guests who would wish to offer their birthday greetings.” Her mother’s icy tone was nothing compared to the steel in her gaze. “You must please excuse us if I take my daughter away momentarily.”

Horace gave a short bow. “Of course, Mrs. Langston.”

“Come, daughter.”

Erica swallowed hard and slipped in docilely behind her mother. She should never have spoken as openly as she had. A single glance at her mother’s face was enough to be certain she had heard. Oh yes. Mildred Langston had heard far too much.

At that moment the front door boomed open, and the most wonderful voice Erica knew called out, “Where is my darling lass?”

“Father!”

“Where is my special girl?”

“You came!” In her haste, Erica almost knocked over a slender-legged side table. Thankfully a guest managed to catch the crystal lamp before it spilled oil all over the carpet.

Erica flew out of the parlor and down the hallway to her father, who stood by the open door with arms outstretched. “I was so afraid you would not arrive in time!”

“Heaven and earth could not stand between me and my daughter’s very own birthday banquet!” He enveloped her in his strength and the smell she loved most in all the world, cigar smoke and horses and the spicy bay rum he used upon his face. “Happy birthday, my sweet.”

“Thank you, Father. Oh, thank you.”

Forrest Langston was a burly man with a wide chest and so tall his daughter scarcely reached his shoulder. He wore fashionable muttonchop sideburns, which only accentuated the breadth of his features. “Where is your brother?”

“Reggie’s gone to escort Mrs. Burke home. Her husband has been taken ill.”

“That’s a good lad.” He beamed at his daughter, then turned his affection to his wife, who stood quietly to one side. “And here is my other darling. Hello, my dear.”

“You came after all.” Mildred Langston offered her husband a cheek to peck. “I will instruct Cook to set another place at the table.”

Forrest Langston showed genuine disappointment. “Your husband returns from a month of dusty roads and hard work, and this is all the greeting he receives?”

Mildred spoke demurely. “We have guests, Forrest.”

“Indeed we do. And this is a gala occasion. Even so, I would expect a bit more warmth at my homecoming.”

The hard glint in Mildred’s gaze and voice did not abate. “Your daughter was just relating to young Master Cutter plans I had not been party to.”

“Ah.” Forrest gave a slow nod. “Things are now becoming clear.”

“Things to which I would most certainly never give my approval.” Only the presence of guests in the next room kept her voice from rising. “Things that I most heartily dislike. Now if you will both excuse me, I have guests to whom I must attend.”

Erica did not release her breath until her mother vanished into the parlor. “I’m so sorry, Father.”

“Aye, well, it had to come out sooner or later.” He did his best to offer up a warm smile. “I might have preferred a different timing, is all.”

There came a light tap on the open door behind them.

“Begging your pardon, Mr. Langston.”

“What is it, Carter?”

“Evening, Miss Langston. And a very happy birthday, I’m sure.”

“Thank you, Carter. How was your journey?”

“Long, miss. Very long indeed.” And the old man did look most weary. “Sorry, sir. But Mr. Bartholomew, the gentleman who shared our carriage, is most persistent.”

“Is he?”

“Indeed so, sir. Mr. Bartholomew insists upon having a final word.”

“One word is all he’ll have.”

Erica detected the change in her father’s tone. “What is it, Father?”

“Never you mind, my dear.” But his hidden strength was revealed, that and the chilling severity he rarely showed. Forrest Langston was generally a good-natured man. But he was also one of Washington’s most successful merchants. Any man in such a position must from time to time display a harder resolve.

A figure climbed the bottom stair leading to their front portico. To Erica’s eye, it seemed as though he was drawn from the night’s very shadows. The house’s light pushed the gloom aside just enough to reveal a sharply angular face. His eyes were green and very cold, like the iron-hard surface of a frozen lake.

“You failed to give me your answer, Mr. Langston.”

“I gave you all the answer you deserve.”

“I fear we must disagree upon that point, sir. You have elected—” “I elected to place a substantial sum of money in your bank’s coffers. To date, I have failed to see anything in return.”

“The war affects us all, sir.”

“The war.” Forrest Langston fairly spat the words. “There has been war between you and the French for centuries. You would think by now you’d have managed to sort things out!”

Erica’s breath drew in sharply. Mr. Bartholomew was British. She knew her father did business with British merchants.

There was no alternative. The British navy ruled the high seas.

The merchants’ charters under which her father and so many others chafed forced them to use British ports or pay onerous duties. But from the sounds of things, her father was also using a British banker. This was shocking news. Her father had always spoken of the British merchant banks with vast distrust.

From down the hallway, Erica’s mother called, “Forrest, our guests are waiting to greet you.”

Erica’s father did not look around. “A moment.”

But Mildred was not so easily dismissed. “In case you had not realized, our house is quite crowded with people.”

Forrest turned then and gave his wife a sample of the same tone with which she had greeted him. Only his contained an additional edge, one Erica had scarcely ever heard, and never within the confines of their home. “You
shall
grant me the time required to conclude this matter.”

He returned his attention to the banker standing on the bottom stair. “I see no alternative but to withdraw my funds from your establishment.

This was clearly not what Mr. Bartholomew wished to hear. “I have acted in good faith—”

“On the contrary, good faith is what I have seen the least of in my dealings with your bank. You promised me two shipments, one of coffee from South America, one of spices from the Orient. As you requested, I paid in full, in advance. Half was in gold.”

“Sir, if you will only—”

“You will hear me out!” Forrest’s thunder was loud enough to silence the guests in his own parlor. “Neither of these shipments has been delivered on time. In fact, only yesterday I heard a rumor that one of your leased vessels was spied at anchor in Martinique with her holds utterly bare!”

“Vicious rumors, borne by scandalmongers seeking to do us grave injustices.”

“Then where, pray tell, are my goods?”

“Scarce moments away from arriving, I assure you. There is simply the matter of the additional funds we require.”

Forrest gaped at the banker. “You dare stand here before me and ask for more?”

“The war, good sir. It has laid unexpected burdens upon all of us.”

“The war against Napoleon is as good as over! How could this affect transport from the Orient or the southern Americas?”

A flicker of a smile traced its way across the banker’s features. Or perhaps it was merely a play of the light; Erica could not be certain. “It is not that war of which I speak.”

“Enough of that,” Forrest barked. “Now if you will excuse me, I have guests.”

The banker tipped his hat. “I shall await your good sir on the morrow, then.”

But as the banker stepped into the waiting carriage, Forrest Langston did not turn away. Instead he mused, “I am missing something here. Something of grave importance.”

Erica spoke. “What did he mean of a different war, Father?”

Forrest neither seemed to hear his daughter nor in truth even realize that she stood beside him. He murmured to the night, “Now what was it I did not fathom?”

Erica hesitated. She had ventured to speak her mind once before this night and received the sharp edge of her mother’s tongue as recompense. Dare she do so again?

Her mother spoke from behind them. “Forrest, please.”

He remained as he was. “A moment.”

Erica could not merely stand there in silence. She ventured, “The banker was too assured.”

“Indeed.” Her father stroked his chin as he mused. “Too assured by half.”

“He spoke as though you had no choice but to do as he wished.”

Forrest Langston swiveled slowly. “What did you say?”

“You gave him the advance he insisted upon. He hasn’t delivered the goods. The first ship is two months late, the second almost three weeks overdue. You threatened to withdraw your gold. Yet he did not seem the least bit worried. Instead, he asked for more.”

Her father’s gaze sharpened. “What does that tell you?”

Erica felt a thrill so great she could not quite hide the tremor that ran through her frame. Her father had never before asked her opinion. “Mr. Bartholomew knows something you do not.”

Forrest frowned mightily as another carriage rumbled past their open doorway. “My thoughts exactly. But what, I wonder.”

“We need to discover what war it is he mentioned.”

“Perhaps. As I said, I am missing something. Which is not a good thing.” He turned toward the interior of their home and attempted to regain his original good cheer. “Never you mind. This is your night, not theirs.”

Erica wanted to say more, but she saw how her mother was studying the two of them. As though they were two strangers standing in Mildred Langston’s front hallway.

“Come, my dears,” Forrest said, offering mother and daughter his arms. “Allow me to escort you.”

Chapter 3

By midmorning, Forrest Langston’s office was awash in aromas. Erica loved the flavors trapped inside the air. Her father smoked a pipe of good Virginia leaf on occasion, particularly at night when seated with his wife and family in the front parlor. During the day he favored slender hand-rolled cigars imported from the Spanish island colony of Cuba. He permitted himself one with his morning coffee and one at midafternoon. More than that he claimed would be an improper indulgence, particularly now, when ships from the Spanish colonies were forced to run the English blockades.

When the house was originally designed, Forrest struggled with the best way to keep his goods and his work close at hand yet establish a clear barrier between his work life and his home life. So he built his fine foursquare brick home, and twenty paces away he erected his main warehouse. The warehouse’s broad second floor was one large open room with Forrest’s office occupying the northeast corner and nine clerks, who kept track of all the Langston activities, occupying the remainder of the room.

But during a particularly frigid winter when he had gone down with grippe, he lay abed, frustrated by his body’s unwillingness to rise up and return to work. He came upon the idea of building a broad covered walkway running from the house to the warehouse. But her father was a man who dared to dream big. As he developed his plan, it grew, and no longer was he content with merely a covered walk. So the simple walk became a two-story edifice, the second floor providing new office space for Forrest and his master clerk.

As he congratulated himself on his plan, it occurred to him that the street that ran in front of their house was becoming a major thoroughfare. Why not take advantage of the passing traffic? After much deliberation over what form the downstairs should take, he finally decided that rather than a simple walkway, the lower level could be made into a coffeehouse. He didn’t know of any others in Washington, but such establishments were quite in vogue further south. Forrest and his architect designed two parlors, one for gentlemen and another for ladies, with paneled dividers between that could be opened to form one large chamber.

All the coffeehouse’s furnishings were for sale, including the tables and silver coffee service, wall hangings and paintings, chandeliers and carpets. All these were either drawn from what Forrest imported or others left there on consignment. Once a month there was a proper auction. On those days the crowds spilled out into the streets, and people vied for seats in the main salon. The Langston name was now known from New York to Charleston because of these highbrow auctions.

Erica knew better than to trouble her father first thing in the morning. She waited as he worked through the manifest of a newly arrived ship. She observed how he and Carter ground and brewed a sample of new coffee beans and discussed the flavor. She tasted a cup herself but did not offer an opinion. Her father was very strict about such matters. First she was to learn. She was to study and grow and wait until her father deemed her ready.

Reginald Langston would never be able to abide such a lack of activity. To Reggie, an hour in his father’s office was punishment. He loved to shout and sing and roll up his sleeves and dive headlong into whatever task lay ahead of him. He knew every inch of their warehouses and was known to every captain on every ship that transported Langston wares. He could cover the distance from the warehouses to the Potomac harbors faster than a racing horse, darting over fences and through gardens and making a path where none existed. He could set his hand to any task where skill and strength were required. He helped serve in the coffeehouse, he sorted the incoming beans, he stoked the cooking fires, he rolled hogsheads and stacked goods and even acted as an auctioneer on occasion. Reggie could do anything, so long as he was not asked to stand still.

Which was why it was Erica’s desk, and not her brother’s, now sitting by the corner window in Father’s long upstairs office. Erica loved her brother dearly, but in spite of there being only sixteen months between them, she sometimes felt a full generation older.

“Forrest? Might I disturb you a moment?”

Erica jumped at the unexpected sound of her mother’s voice. Why did she always feel she’d been caught in a misdeed when Mildred Langston came into the room? But the fact that she was seated for the first time in Father’s big office was enough to have her every nerve highly tuned. She leaped to her feet, almost overturning the inkpot. “G-good morning, Mother.”