Page 129 of The Pearl Sister
At this, a few cheers came up from the men which gave Kitty the courage to continue.
‘I accept that some of you here today have already decided to move on. You shall of course be paid whatever is due to you. If you wish to reconsider and stay, you will receive the ten per cent bonus on your wages that Mr Stefan Mercer requested for all his staff in his will.
‘Gentlemen, on behalf of the Mercer family, I beg your forgiveness for the uncertainty that has beset you in the past few weeks. And your understanding that we, amongst so many families here in Broome, have struggled with the loss we have been dealt. Some of you will also doubt the capabilities of a female caretaker. Yet, I beg you to look to the women in your own family and admit their strengths. They run your households, no doubt the family accounts, and juggle the needs of many. I may not outwardly show the strength or the courage to ride the ocean that every one of you displays day after day, but I have a heart full of both. And the blessing of my dear departed father-in-law and my husband, to steer the Mercer Pearling Company into the future.’
Trying not to pant with emotion and stress, Kitty looked down at her audience, and saw they were silent now, straining to catch every word she spoke. As per her request, trays of glasses containing champagne were being distributed around the room. Noel appeared beside her and offered her a glass, which she took.
‘Tomorrow, I will be on the dock to wave those of you who are still with us off to sea. To wish you good fortune and pray for a safe harbour on your return. Finally, I would like us all to raise our glasses to all the men that were lost to us in the recent cyclone. And particularly to our founder, Mr Stefan Mercer.’ Kitty raised her glass. ‘To Stefan!’
‘To Stefan,’ the men chorused as Kitty took a gulp of champagne with them.
Another silence, then someone from the audience shouted, ‘Three cheers for Mrs Mercer. Hip hip!’
‘Hooray!’
‘Hip hip!’
‘Hooray!’
‘Hip hip!’
‘Hooray!’
Kitty staggered slightly and felt a strong arm go about her as Noel helped her into a chair to the side of the warehouse and she sat down gratefully.
‘That was some speech ye gave there,’ he said as they watched the men having their glasses refilled and beginning to talk amongst themselves. ‘Even I was convinced,’ he whispered to her with a smile. ‘I’d doubt there was a man amongst them that wasn’t. Though the Lord alone knows how we’ll pay for the promises ye’ve just made.’
‘We have to find a way, Noel,’ she told him, ‘and find a way we will.’
‘Ye look exhausted, Mrs Mercer. Why don’t ye be off home now and rest? Ye’ve done your bit here, and that’s for sure. Now they’ll be wanting to drain their glasses and get their money, including the bonus you offered them, and, Mrs Mercer, the accounts are drained already . . .’
‘I have the extra amount with me,’ Kitty said firmly. ‘Now, if you have no objection, I would like to greet each of the men personally and pay them what they are due.’
‘I’d have no objection, of course.’ Noel looked at her in awe, gave her a small bow, and hurried away to the clerk in the back office to retrieve the wages.
* * *
At four o’clock that afternoon, Kitty was helped down from the cart by Fred. She staggered through the front door of the house.
‘I’m taking a rest,’ she said to Camira as she passed her in the entrance hall. ‘Could you bring a fresh pitcher of water to my room?’
‘Yessum, Missus Kitty.’ Camira bobbed her habitual curtsey, then studied her mistress. ‘You sick again?’
‘No, just very, very tired.’
Kitty lay on her bed and enjoyed the fresh breeze coming through the open window. In the three hours it had taken to greet each man and ask after him and his family, not a single one had requested his final wages. They had come to her instead with an embarrassed smile, told her of their belief in the Mercer Pearling Company and offered their sympathy – sometimes through a translator – for her recent loss.
The company now had an even larger deficit in the bank, but a full crew and divers and tenders that would set sail tomorrow to restore the fortunes of the ailing company.
Kitty closed her eyes and thanked God for the Wednesday breakfasts her father had insisted on when she was a child. His potted biography of Elizabeth Tudor – even if she had put her Scottish cousin Mary to death – had inspired her speech today.
Though I have the body of a weak and feeble woman. . . Elizabeth had said as she’d addressed her armies at Tilbury Docks, ready to defeat the Spanish Armada.
Forgive me, Andrew, I have done my best for you today . . .
* * *
For the following two weeks, Kitty rose early and was at the office before Noel. She studied the ledgers with a careful eye, using the basic experience she had gleaned from totting up her father’s parish accounts. There were various inconsistencies – amounts of cash withdrawn that she queried with the clerk.
