A Secret Ambition

VII

"The most powerful weapon on earth is the human soul on fire." Ferdinand Foch

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VII.

Callan was panicking. Nobody would probably be able to tell that he was panicking, but he was. Callan knew that he was usually a well composed man who managed his stresses well.

And one day he hoped that lying to himself would result in it coming true.

Callan knew that he did not manage his stress well. His office was representative of his brain under pressure. There were thousands of thoughts happening simultaneously at once, and most of them were reminding him that he could not fail.

Receiving the offer of four pence per pound of cotton that morning from Greensborough Mills had about given Callan a heart episode. At first, he had convinced himself that his eyesight had gone, and he was in need of spectacles. But upon staring at the page long enough, he could see that his original offer had been reneged upon and his one and only offer for his cotton would cause him to suffer a huge financial loss, and one that he could not afford.

Accepting this price would ruin him. He would not be able to repurchase from his supplier in the Caribbean. He would have no profits to run his ship, to pay his crew, or even to pay himself. He would be forced to forfeit his ship, and he knew that Sir Richard Frogmore would only be too happy to take the Emerald Eyes off of his hands and to continue on trade relations with Callan's suppliers.

Callan had known that this line of work would be challenging, and it was his stubborn pride that had given him the confidence and the determination to persist. The minute that people like Sir Richard Frogmore, merchants in the industry who had the contacts to really expand one's business, heard Callan's accent, he was laughed out the door and told to return to his potatoes.

The same could be said for whenever he signed his name. His name was not John Smith. His name was as Irish as anything, and he could not be taken seriously. He supposed they were lucky that it was not Fionn Maguire's name on the letterhead, or else they would probably fare worse.

It had taken Callan a lot of time and effort, and a lot of swallowing his pride, for him to form a relationship with Greensborough Mills. They could call him a potato peasant all they wanted if it meant they would buy his cotton at a fair price.

Callan had needed to find their original offer to prove to himself that he had not hallucinated their original offer. And when he had found it, or rather, Lily Bennett, had found it, Callan had the clear evidence that he was still just a joke to them, and those people, the rich, elitist, lazy gombeens, could do whatever it was that they wanted, and he was powerless to stop them.

"What are we going to do, Callan?" Fionn asked quietly, all jokes gone when he saw the state of his cousin.

"I don't know, Fionn," Callan replied in a raspy, frightened voice.

"If you don't get that money ..."

"I know what'll happen if I don't get that money," snapped Callan. "Don't you think I don't. I was the one who thought I could do this. I was the one who made the promises and signed the deal. I'm the one who'll have to face judgement if I don't."

Callan felt physically ill at the thought of what he faced back in Ireland if he failed. If he was forced to sell everything and abandon his ambition, he would be forced to return home, and Callan knew that he would rather die than return like that. He would die for the shame, and his father would turn over in his grave.

Fionn signed as he placed a comforting hand on Callan's shoulder. "It could be worse."

"How?" spat Callan.