Flowers in the Blood (68 page)

Two more loads seemed to go to agents. The quality was high and the price more than ten percent above the reserves I recalled.

“Who buys the higher-priced opium?” I asked Olivia.

“Usually those who need it for medicinal purposes,” she replied officiously. “Surely you know the more expensive grades contain a higher percentage of morphine. Anyway, the independents, who buy particular chests for special customers or the pharmaceutical interests, will be finished shortly and then the merchants will settle up the rest. Everything moves more swiftly once the smaller fish are out of the pond.”

“Good,” Sultana said, fanning herself, for the September day was turning out to be typically warm and moist. “I don't plan to stay here the whole afternoon.”

Was that what was going on? Had the expensive parcels gone to the pharmacists? Had I misread the higher prices as the beginning of Uncle Samuel's move? My searching glance caught Abner Rapahel's eye. He made an exaggerated nod in my direction. I remembered my presence was supposed to be obvious, and I gave him as expansive a smile as possible. Perhaps the agent who had accrued the recent lots had been working for him (and thus me) all the while. Being on the outskirts was infuriating. If I only knew where matters stood . . .

I tried to concentrate on what was happening. New chests were opened and several men had gone up to the front of the room to handle the sample balls as the bidding continued. Whether it was considered finer than usual, I was not certain, but the price was over sixteen hundred rupees. The murmurs in the room indicated that something exceptional was happening. The next time the gavel fell, most of the men busily made notes on their sheets. I calculated 1,690. Could I have been in error? I looked around. Others were scratching their heads. I hoped that Raphael's comrades were following exactly how much Uncle Samuel was now controlling, for the whole scheme would collapse if he were allowed to purchase too much of the crop, no matter the price. I went back to my sheet and made tiny ticks next to those lots I thought the same questionable agent had purchased and circles next to those about which I was unsure. Jack Chappell carried on with his fluid song of numbers. “Forty thousand, five hundred . . . five-fifty . . . six hundred . . . eight hundred . . . nine hundred, do I hear ten . . . twenty . . . nine hundred and twenty!”

Twenty-four chests divided into 40,920—was 1,705 rupees! My heart beat wildly. Merchants in the front rows near the Jardines mopped their brows. I forced myself to look at Uncle Samuel. He sat straight and unruffled. His confidence churned my stomach. I gripped the railing. The room swam in a hot mist of rage. He couldn't win! He couldn't! A black waistcoat blocked my view of the gallery.

“Now, you listen to me, Dinah . . .” came a stricken voice that I did not recognize immediately.

I gasped as the spike drove deeper into my chest. I lifted my head, fully expecting to see Edwin. A body blow could not have shocked me more. The face that loomed above me was grimacing with fright.

“I told you to stay away from here. How could you defy me like this?”

“Oh, Papa!” I said with alarm. “It is not what you think.”

“Isn't it?” he boomed so everyone could hear.

I was on my feet in an instant, and Gulliver maneuvered beside me protectively. I felt as though every eye in the room followed my movements as I made my way down the aisle past Mir Sassoon, the members of the Davidson firm, even Gabriel Judah. Once outside, I blinked in the bright noon light of the courtyard. “Now, Papa, please listen to me.”

“How could you do this?” His voice quavered.

“Hush,” I said as I pointed to the open windows that led into the chamber, “or you will ruin everything.”

“So, you
are
the one! How could you pay more than seventeen hundred rupees for a chest of inferior Patna?”

“I didn't, I promise I didn't.”

“Don't lie to me!” he sputtered, his face turning a dusky red. His eyes, which were sunk deeply into his devastated face, protruded with disbelief. Noticing that his hands were trembling, I signaled for Gulliver to take one arm while I supported the other. We forced him to sit on a bench. “What else could you be doing here? Look at you!” he raved. It was almost as though I could hear his feverish brain spinning with confused thoughts. “You are dressed like a hired consort, not like a mother of three young sons. The Luddy money has ruined you! Ruined you! And I thought you were the sensible one!”

“Papa, please, let me explain. Uncle Samuel is making a run on the business.”

“Stop patronizing me,” he snarled.

“I'm trying to prevent it,” I responded evenly.

“You! How could you prevent it?” As Gulliver quickly moved beside me, Papa demanded, “What is he? Your shadow?”

I waved for Gulliver to back off, but he remained in place. “Papa, don't mind Gulliver. He always—”

“Gulliver! Ridiculous name.” He began to cough so hard that he spat up phlegm before he could continue. “I am sorry I lost control of myself.” He shivered and took a deep breath. “I don't know what comes over me these days.” He blotted his lips with his handkerchief. “Now, please tell me—how could Samuel be making the same blunder again?”

As hurriedly as possible, I explained about the embezzled money and our suspicions that his brother-in-law was leveraging what he had stolen to seize this season's opium crop. “What I am doing is helping Abner Raphael and the others prevent this from happening.”

“How can you do that?”

“With certain. . . guarantees.”

“I don't understand.”

I glanced in the direction of the auction room. If I missed much more of the bidding, I would never follow what was happening. “If s complicated. I'll explain more fully when it is realized, but I am not risking the Luddy money. I am keeping my promise.”

My father patted my arm. “You are a good girl, Dinah, but I don't know . . .” His voice faded as though he had forgotten what he was going to say. Then his face twisted. “But where is Edwin? I did not see him—”

“He's not here yet.”

A thought burned briefly in his eyes, then seemed to drift away. “You should go back inside, you must want to see . . .” He seemed tired, beaten.

“Yes, Papa. Watch the agent who is sitting behind Uncle Ezra and next to Uncle Saul's son Adam. I think he is working for Samuel. Also, there is another behind the Davidsons. And the Indian with a shiny forehead to Abner Raphael's left is probably working for us. The other bidders in the consortium will split the lot, even if they buy at a premium. Already prices have been going over seventeen hundred.”

“I know, Dinah. I heard the last two rounds.” As he stood awkwardly, Gulliver took his arm.

“Papa, Uncle Samuel needs about seventy-five percent of the crop to make the numbers work. That means he will have to monopolize almost seven thousand chests. I estimate he's cornered a thousand so far, if that. We can ruin him if we stick him with two thousand and don't let him take any more.”

“Who says?”

“Abner Raphael agreed with me.”

“Raphael is helping you?”

“Yes, Papa.”

My father blew his nose loudly as we entered the room together. He took a seat in the last row next to his nephew Mir. I slid next to Olivia.

“Good to see your father well enough to be here today,” she murmured. “I heard he was ill.”

“He didn't want to miss another auction.”

“I am surprised Zilpah permitted it,” Sultana said disapprovingly.

“He had to sneak away. And was he ever surprised to see me here!” I said to minimize the effects of his harsh words in front of the other ladies. “Why, he thinks that only men should attend these functions. I tried to explain the modern notions, but he wasn't convinced,” I said with a playful shake of my head. “We are both naughty today. Like father, like daughter, I suppose.” I grinned at Sultana. My cousin shot a wary glance to her mother, who had followed every word.

Jack Chappell droned on in the background. “Where are my papers?” I asked.

Aunt Bellore handed them back to me. “Here they are. I kept them in case you came back.”

“Thank you,” I said, furious that she might have attempted to follow my notations. At least I had used ticks and circles, not names or initials. Anyway, even if she suspected the worst, she would not have been able to communicate anything to her husband or their agents before the luncheon break. And even if she decided I was trying to buy lots for myself and told her husband later, it would help push him over the edge. I hoped that my running total of what I suspected he now owned would have been taken for unintelligible figurings. I bent toward Olivia. “Do the prices continue to run high?”

“Yes, they were up to eighteen hundred rupees for a time, but now are running closer to seventeen hundred. A most amusing morning. The men are quaking. Old man Jardine was forced to buy at over seventeen-fifty. He almost had apoplexy on the spot.”

If Jardine had bought at seventeen-fifty, that meant that twenty percent of that batch was mine. “Which lot was that?”

“I don't know.” She waved her hand as if it were of no consequence.

“Lot two hundred fifty-four,” Sultana replied stiffly. “Why?”

“Everything is so much more fascinating if you follow the flow,” I answered smartly.

“Sixty-six thousand and three hundred, and four hundred, and five . . . and six hundred . . .” the auctioneer called out with a tinge of excitement obvious in his tone. I could see Abner Raphael's white beard moving up and down as he mouthed the numbers. “. . . Eight hundred, nine hundred . . . nine-fifty . . . nine-sixty . . . sold!”

The room buzzed with the result. A new high. The Raphaels had it. Pens flew. If Raphael had the lot, that meant I did as well. Instead of calculating that I now owed more than thirteen thousand rupees, I saw the chests as they were taken away and realized that seven were now mine. Where was Uncle Samuel? In the commotion he had left the room. What a wonderful sign! With Jardine, Matheson willing to outbid him and the Raphael Company entering the fray, he had to be feeling the pressure. We had been right. He thought that everybody else would back away at the inflated prices—and well they might have if it hadn't been for my guarantees. If only I knew how many chests he had committed to already. He probably could recover from a thousand, considering that he had bought some earlier close to reserves. Now it was crucial for the others to back off long enough for him to regain his confidence and bid for the second thousand that would plunge him into ruinous debt. Then the merchants could jump in to pay whatever necessary to wrest control away from him.

Mesmerized, I watched while these esteemed men of commerce wiggled a callused finger or blinked a cloudy eye or lifted a proud chin in an elegant ballet of money and power. Jack Chappell was the maestro: strutting, bowing, nodding, gesticulating, frowning, prodding as if he were conducting a symphony. On either side, the British agents, Mr. MacGregor and Mr. Haythornthwaite, were the nervous musicians anxious that every note be modulated to perfection. The merchants—their dancers—fluttered through their paces as the crescendos at the end of each bid were reached. As an audience, we ladies might not have had a deep appreciation for the music, but we knew enough to realize we were witnessing a singular performance.

There was a lull in the action. The auctioneer mentioned the next chests were in batches of forty-eight, and after that set he would adjourn for the noon meal. Murmurs of approval met the announcement. Most of the prices hovered close to the seventeen-hundred mark, some dipped below sixteen hundred. I guessed that Uncle Samuel was drawing ever closer to the two-thousand-chest figure, and I didn't want him to get there cheaply. On the other hand, the less he had to pay, the less my twenty percent would cost me later in the day. This latest predicament consumed my consciousness until a movement directly behind Gabriel Judah caught my attention.

Someone was taking that vacant seat. Could it be . . . ? Yes! My chest swelled with excitement. Edwin had arrived. For the first time that day the stabbing sensation subsided. Edwin wore a gray single-breasted morning coat fastened in front with two pearl buttons. This was not anything I recognized from his wardrobe. His striped trousers became closer-fitting at the bottom, in the latest fashion. He must have spent the morning being outfitted at Ranken's. But why? Why the narrow stiff collar, the silk top hat, the blue-and-silver-striped tie?

“Your husband looks splendid,” Olivia Davidson fawned.

“Yes, he does,” I concurred boldly.

“I wish mine would dress as well, but he favors comfort over style, especially in this heat,” she muttered on, but my attention was not directed at her.

Edwin's seat on the far right of the room was quite near mine. I tried to catch his eye, but he stared at the auctioneer. Was he not about to quell our dispute? Then why was he here? I wondered in a flush of fury.

“Seventy thousand . . . seventy-five . . .” The pace slackened considerably. There were longer and longer spaces between bids. Mr. Chappell had to call smaller increments in between. “Seventy-five and six hundred . . . and seven hundred . . . and eight, do I hear eight? . . .”

Olivia yawned.

Aunt Bellore squirmed.

My eyes were riveted on Edwin, who sat as stiffly as a man about to be photographed for a portrait. There was a movement. His head turned slightly, but not far enough to see me. He was making a movement in my direction. He did want a reconciliation! Just in case, I pasted a slight smile on my lips. I wanted him to know I was not holding a grudge. I was certain the opium pipe had been a momentary lapse. It could be explained. This would pass. If only we could get through the next tense hours.

Edwin raised his arm and brushed back his hair.

“. . . Eighty thousand, one hundred and sixty!” The gavel came down at the same moment as Edwin's hand. Mr. Haythornthwaite gestured toward Edwin. Mr. MacGregor marked something on his pad.

Gabriel Judah swiveled around to stare at Edwin.

No, it had been a mistake! Edwin had been straightening his hair, not bidding! Edwin nodded to Gabriel. He did not think he had made a mistake. He was not trying to get out of the sale!