Chapter 1

 

The Honourable Vernon de Vere Granville, to use his full name, which he did seldom, sipped the excellent brandy, savouring the aroma trapped in the fine crystal goblet. The brandy and the excellent cigar which accompanied it were the culmination of his second dinner aboard the Confederate States Steam Packet Pride of Dixie. A meal that, like the first, he had eaten alone, with 'the sincere apologies of the master and his officers for their negligence towards their honoured guest'. They were, the grotesquely disfigured Chief Steward had informed him 'entirely engrossed in becoming familiar with their new vessel', and were hence regretfully unable to entertain him.

There was also, he thought with a certain smug satisfaction, the enormous benefit he was enjoying in the absence of that pompous old windbag Scrimgour and his bunch of hangers-on. Even more satisfying was the reason for their absence: Lord Derby had demanded the presence of all Tory members for the period of the Reform Act debates and votes. It would be the second time in the past five or six years in which the enfranchisement of elements of what Granville thought of as the hoi-polloi would be put to the vote and Derby, driven by his Chancellor Disraeli and hounded by the Liberal leader Gladstone, was determined that this time, the Bill would become law.

Precisely why a member of the upper classes should want to give the vote to the ignorant and unwashed was beyond him. He could just about see that the Jew Disraeli and that sour dog Gladstone might want to support such a radical measure, but the idea of the ultra-conservative Scrimgour being forced to remain at home and vote must have been galling in the extreme for the old fart. He would vote against, of course - just as Granville himself would have done had he been an MP, but Scrimgour must surely know that his was a lost cause, making his chagrin at missing this trip even greater.

Granville chuckled quietly, easing his shoulders deeper into the plush of the supremely comfortable chair. A greater - but he sincerely hoped not the ultimate - advantage in the situation was that he, Granville, was ensconced in the very cabin set aside for Scrimgour; the finest in the ship, furnished to rival the best hotels in London. No, he corrected himself; not cabin: stateroom. It was far larger than he'd imagined, even after he heard the uplifting news that he would be the sole passenger on this trans-Atlantic trip. More luxurious, too; akin to the subdued elegance of his father's club, with gleaming walnut panelling and dark crimson carpets and furnishings set off with burnished brass fittings. It all looked - and smelled - brand new. That tied in with the Captain's excuses about having to become accustomed to a new ship, but why? It was another question that he added to the list that had been growing in his mind for the past two days. Such as why was this cabin - stateroom - was located in the middle of the ship instead of at the rear, where he'd always understood that the best accommodation was to be found? And why - though he suspected that he knew the answer - why were all the crew that he'd seen so far crippled or scarred?

But all those questions were secondary; the main one, the one that had dominated his thoughts as long as his father had told him - with what looked suspiciously like a twinkle in his eyes - that Granville would be taking his place. That - the twinkle rather than the announcement - had come as something of a shock. He'd always regarded his father as something of an old stick-in-the-mud, but could it be that the old chap had hidden depths? And why shouldn't he? His wife, Granville's mother had died giving birth to their only child twenty-nine years ago and fifty, although a very great age, wasn't actually decrepit. Maybe those prolonged visits to London hadn't been all meetings with government officials and the like, after all. It would also explain his ready acceptance of the dashing Beauregard, who was soon to become Granville's firmest and most intimate friend.

Beauregard Youngblood had arrived in England early in 1864 on board one of the few ships that got through the Union's blockade of the South. He had come with a plea for more arms and another for extended credit. Perhaps his superiors were banking on his relative youth, debonair manner and undoubted charm - and he certainly cut a swathe through the ladies - but his cause seemed hopeless. 1864 was a bad time for the Confederate States, with every sign that things could get worse. They had reached and exceeded their lines of credit, with almost all their investors regretting their bad judgement, while desperately seeking ways to recoup at least some of their losses. He was rebuffed - cordially and with perhaps the personal satisfaction of a dalliance with the denier's wife or daughter - at every turn. It seemed, he'd confided to Granville, as if he would have to make the risky voyage home empty-handed.

That was before he was directed to try Granville's father, Sir Geoffrey de Vere Granville, Baronet of the Realm. Precisely how that direction was performed could not be explained, at least not officially. Nor was it likely that the elder Granville could do much to help the handsome young man. True, he owned factories that made arms and other munitions and he was a very rich man. But, fervent admirer of the cause of the South though he might be, he could not possibly afford the sort of money that was needed. Yet, quite mysteriously, some twenty-five million pounds as well as funds to purchase a considerable quantity of arms became available. A miracle?

Not a miracle, but a heavily concealed gift from a government that feared the victory of the Union, an expansion of its power and the threat it presented to the Empire. It was very last-ditch and almost certainly doomed to failure, but it was considered worth-while by those in the highest places in the land. And inasmuch as the South actually won, it worked.

The elder Granville knew, of course. His son Vernon, as his second in command had very strong suspicions, as did the shrewd Beauregard Youngblood. Some people in the Treasury must have known, of course, plus those at the very top who had arranged the whole thing. And a very few at the receiving end, naturally. But not one other person in the entire world had any idea. It took three months to arrange an ultra-secret and secure shipment via Mexico, with Granville' factories, who'd naturally attracted the lion's share of the orders, working flat-out. That did not, of course, mean that the Honourable Vernon de Vere Granville found himself over-encumbered with work: he was, after all, the son of the owner and a member of the aristocracy. And while the former imposed a degree of obligation upon him, most of the preparatory work had already been done, which left him very much at a loose end.

Being very close in age and having been thrown together in unusual circumstances, the two young men were almost forced into a friendship that soon became quite natural. Beauregard, who soon became 'Bo', at his own insistence, having gone through several weeks of anxiety and fruitless effort, was in the mood both to relax and celebrate; Granville needed no persuasion. The result was that the two young men descended upon London, intent on having a good time. Which, with Granville's aristocratic connections and both with full purses, is precisely what they did.

It began innocently enough; neither having, at that stage, taken the full measure - or morals - of the other. A couple of theatre visits became a number of trips to music halls, every one in turn a little more bawdy and down-market than the last. There followed, quite naturally it seemed, an introduction - by Granville to Bo - to the high-class brothels of Mayfair. That was agreeable enough for a couple of weeks, but now the pair - having reached some understanding of the other's predilections and finding them much in accord with his own - decided to venture a little further afield. Not, it has to be said, because the activities they wanted weren't available in Mayfair, but because the prices in that most exclusive area for the more exotic pursuits would have stretched even their means. Besides, the thought of 'going down-market' held its own attractions, with the implication that the further down one went, the stronger the perversions one could find.

This latter precept was partly true, at least inasmuch that those who provided the services required in say, Islington or Camden Town, were less fussy about any limits they might impose. Indeed, where the girls in the Mayfair establishments were almost - but not quite - celebrities - those in the lesser houses had a value which diminished with the quality of the house. In the lower dens - or the lowest the two could frequent in comparative safety - the degradation and humiliation of the girls was severe. Not quite 'to the death', but whippings and cat-fights until a victim was unconscious were the norm rather than the exception.

It was in these dens that the pair found that they had near-identical tastes in sadism, brutality and inflicting humiliation. As a plantation owner's son, Bo had had many more opportunities to indulge himself and thus knew himself more than did his new friend. "You can persuade a bitch's legs open faster with a whip than a full purse," he said.

Granville, with an Englishman's image of the plantations and slavery - coloured by his own imagination and predilections - raised an eyebrow at his friend. "Do you have to whip your slaves to get them to do what they're told?" he asked. "I'd have thought you could have as much nigger cunt as you wanted just by clicking your fingers."

Bo chuckled, drew on his cheroot, then casually flicked ash. It fell on a thin back, newly marked with the marks of a whip, applied by Bo himself not ten minutes before. The back's owner, ensconced between the American's naked thighs and diligently sucking, flinched but did not break her rhythm. A smile crossed his mouth. "You don't need an excuse to lay a whip on a bitch," he said, glancing down at the girl, who this time shuddered slightly and seemed to increase her efforts, drawing another chuckle, this one satisfied. "'Sides, I didn't saying anything about them being black."

Granville's surprise was such that he jerked, almost dislodging the girl between his own thighs. This one bore the stripes of his initial pleasure across her backside, pleasingly near-parallel raised weals now turned a delightful red-purple. "White, you mean? You whip white women?"

"I just did here, didn't I?"

"Yes, but that's just a whore!"

Bo chuckled. "We got whores a-plenty," he rep-lied. Then he suddenly became serious and his voice dropped. "But that ain't all. There's... other ways."

Granville was both mystified and bursting to hear more. "But..." he began, but was stopped by Bo's raised hand.

"Two things are stopping me telling you," he said, "the first is that I'm on my honour to say no more - in fact I've already said too much - and the second is that... I'm just about to oil this slut's tonsils..."

That second excuse was become something of an imperative for Granville, too. But what really stopped him pursuing the matter - hard though he found it - was the fact that Bo had said the one thing that forbade an Englishman from going further: he had invoked his honour.

 

 

Extract From the History of the Confederation of American States, Volume 11

 

'Nobody can be quite sure just why General Grant called a meeting of all his commanders and their aides on the evening of 8th April, 1865, nor is there any rational explanation for the place; the Appomattox Court House itself. Perhaps it was a last-minute pep-talk, or perhaps he wanted to make some final adjustments to his battle plan. It must have been something that he regarded as important, because a General as talented and accomplished as Ulysses S Grant, the finest commander - indeed, the Commander-in -Chief - of the North's many armies, would not have neglected to warn everyone within the ranks of his gathered host that Robert E Lee, despite leading a ragged, ill-equipped and vastly outnumbered army, was not a man to be taken lightly. He may not have been aware of the fact that Lee had only the day before

received a supply of English rifles that had been held up for months in Mexico by the North's diplomatic efforts, but even he, careful with his men's lives as he was, would have regarded that of any great import.

Whatever the reason, call a meeting he did; a meeting that was well under way when the freight train entered Appomattox... and blew up, with devastating results. The gallant Grant and all his senior commanders were killed in an instant and many, many casualties were inflicted on units that were camped within a radius of almost a full mile. Only one officer of field rank survived the disaster: General Wilbur Smyth, who was two miles away, packing his bags in readiness for an ignominious return to his home state of Illinois; he had been dismissed his post by Grant that very day on grounds of incompetence and peculation. This worthy, suddenly and seemingly miraculously both reprieved and elevated, took full advantage of his opportunity, regarding it as an act of a beneficent God who knew of his true qualities... and led his still shocked and demoralised troops into what has been described as: 'the most comprehensive, ignominious, ill-led and humiliating defeat suffered by any army at any time.'

Pausing just long enough to replenish stocks of food and ammunition and to send a despatch to Jefferson Davis, Robert E Lee, ignoring the scattered, demoralised and most cases still fleeing Northern troops, set his face and army north-east. To Washington, DC...

To victory and tragedy.'