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‘Mind your language, Mr Linton! You have been warned that you will have to address me respectfully.’
‘You can take your respectful address and stuff it respectfully up your…’
‘Mr Linton!’
With all my might, I shoved against him, and somehow managed to haul him to the side, slamming his back against the wall of the crate. Wood wool flew around us like snow in a blizzard. Only conditions were not cold here. Oh no. They were just about to get hot.
‘Mr Linton!’
‘My name is Lilly! Do you hear me? Lilly!’
‘Mr Linton, I forbid you…’
I tried to bite him. To my credit, I must say that I only missed by inches. My teeth sank into the cloth of his precious, nearly-new-10-year-old tailcoat and probably left a good set of teeth marks. Hopefully, they would be expensive to remove, or better yet, permanent!
‘Mr Linton! Be rational.’
‘Rational? Don’t you dare tell me to be rational! It’s you who is crazy; crazy enough to risk your life and mine on this damned adventure! And for what? For a bloody irrigation ditch!’
My hands were still firmly caught in his grasp. I tried to bite again, but this time caught only air between my teeth. We rolled around in the little, dark space we had, bits of wood flying all around us, and I flatter myself that I got a few good kicks in now and again. But I didn’t manage to free my hands, which was a pity. You need hands for strangling someone.
‘You… you… I’m going to kill! Do you hear me! I’m going to-’
Suddenly, he pushed against me with unbelievable force, and I realized that he had been holding back up to that moment. In a flash, he was on top of me again and pressing my arms down at my sides. His legs snaked around me, trapping mine, and preventing me from delivering any more kicks. He had me. I could not hope to escape from his stone-hard prison.
‘Firstly,’ he said, his voice as cold as a winter solstice night, ‘Nobody made you risk your life. In fact, I seem to remember locking you up to prevent that exact possibility.’
I hesitated. Admittedly, he had a point there. A small, but nonetheless existent, point.
‘Secondly, you asked for the contents of the file. It is most ill-bred behaviour to try and bite my fingers off for a truthful answer. And thirdly, if you ever call the masterpiece of diplomacy and engineering which has been stolen from me an irrigation ditch again, I will deduct half your wages for stupidity.’
Colour rose to my cheeks. Thank God it was too dark for him to see.
‘So what exactly is this canal, if not an iri…’ I remembered his threat just in time, and amended, ‘…if not what I said before?’
There was one more moment of silence. I waited. I could feel it in the air: he was finally going to talk.
Yet when he started, it wasn’t at all how I thought he would.
‘Four years ago, a British officer and explorer called Francis Rawdon Chesney submitted a report to Parliament. Nobody paid much attention to it at the time - the country was too busy with the death of King George and the general election. But I heard of the report and tried to get hold of it. Something which, interestingly enough, proved to be more difficult than usual with official Parliament papers. Somebody had taken very good care to suppress this particular paper, which made me only more eager to lay my hands on it.’
He made a pause. By now he had my full attention. I waited with rapt attention for him to resume.
‘Finally, I managed to obtain a partial copy of the report by bribing an MP. It was a costly investment, but one that proved worth the expense. I knew that the moment I got to see the report. It detailed calculations of Mr Chesney as to the comparative sea level of the Red Sea and the Mediterranean. You see, up until this point, the sea levels of the two oceans had been believed to differ significantly. According to Mr Chesney’s new calculations, however, this was not the case.’
I still couldn’t see where he was going with this. Of what earthly importance could sea levels be, no pun intended? Yet I sensed that there was more to come, and so, for once, kept my mouth shut.
‘I sent a man out there to check the calculations,’ he continued. ‘They were one hundred per cent correct. The Red Sea and the Mediterranean were on one level. Yet the fools in the government hadn’t seen the significance of this. And I suppose,’ he added coolly, ‘neither do you?’
I bit my lip. Indeed, I didn’t see how it could be of the slightest significance. What could it matter? The Red Sea and the Mediterranean were separated by land, so what could possibly…?
Land.
Land that could be bridged by a canal.
It all clicked into place. Clearing my throat, I said tentatively: ‘It was of significance because a canal could be built to link the two, without the different sea levels causing a natural catastrophe?’
He was quiet for a moment.
‘Mr Linton?’
‘Yes, Sir?’
‘Your intelligence is greater than that of an average British Member of Parliament.’
‘Err… Thank you, Sir.’
‘Don’t get too excited, though. Nowadays, this doesn't mean much.’
‘Oh.’ I hesitated. ‘And why is it so important to build a canal from the Red Sea to the Mediterranean?’
He sighed coolly. ‘Only slightly greater than an MP’s intelligence, I see. Well, Mr Linton, why do you think?’
‘I have no idea, Sir.’
‘What, Mr Linton, is the most potent instrument of power in our world today?’
‘Um… guns?’
I could almost feel him close his eyes in exasperation.
‘A typical answer, and a very dangerous misconception. The most potent instrument of power in our world today, Mr Linton, is trade. It was trade that built the British Empire, trade that lost it its American Colonies. It was trade that destroyed the might of the Incas, Turks and Chinese and made Europe, and above all Britain, the master of the world.’
‘Um… I think guns played some part in that, too.’
‘Yes, yes. They played a part.’ He waved my comment away as if it were of no more importance than an annoying fly. ‘But if not for trade, Europe would never have become inventive and rich enough to develop the gun and put it to its full use. If not for trade, great ships would not have been built, the world would not have been circumvented, the Americas not discovered, the farthest corners of the world not reached and then subjugated. Trade is what keeps Europe’s power alive today, and it is what has enabled me to build my very own empire. And now imagine, in such a world, dominated by trade, what you could do if you were able to open a new trade route, a trade route to the richest lands of the East which would be only half as long as the existing ones.’