The Happy Days of Being a Factory Owner in London – Chapter 16
by MonoThe Informant
Reporting Fagin for secret collusion!
Arna indulged in a final, tiny bout of greed, fishing up one last catch before heading home with the box of gold nuggets and several pearls.
Hitting the absolute final time limit, she dashed into her room and collapsed onto her bed.
The next day, Arna went out and exchanged half the gold and all the pearls for pounds. She used a place recommended by Holmes; the omnipotent consulting detective had assured her the boss was reliable.
Then, her pockets stuffed with cash, she headed straight for Mr. Green’s solicitor firm.
As soon as she entered his office and confirmed no one else was in the room, Arna pulled the stack of pound notes from her bag.
“Three hundred pounds. I’ve gathered enough,” she said breezily. Remembering that she hadn’t given Solicitor Green a gift yet this week, she generously tossed over a gold nugget. “This is for you.”
Mr. Green’s mustache trembled violently as he stared at the gleaming gold nugget Arna had just thrown onto his desk.
It had landed with a heavy thud, echoing through the room like the strike of a gavel.
A second later, his gaze flew from the gold to the stack of banknotes she had laid out before him. He peered closely at the three hundred pounds, then looked back at Arna.
“Young Mr. Aisas,” he said, speaking with extreme caution, as if Aisas were a sleepwalker holding a lit match and they were both standing next to a pile of gunpowder. “While I am quite gratified that you managed to raise the funds on time, I must ask… how exactly did you gather this capital?”
He knew perfectly well that as good a lad as this was, he shouldn’t have a penny to his name—Green had even paid his carriage fare previously.
Arna replied without hesitation: “I fished it up.”
Solicitor Green’s expression grew exceedingly complicated. “…Fishing.”
Did he look like an idiot? Or had he truly grown so old that swindling these days was just this simple, crude, and utterly unapologetic?
“Yeah, it was a lucky day,” Arna shrugged. “It’s a pity I was busy with other things for the rest of the night, or my haul might have been even bigger.”
At this thought, she patted her pocket with great satisfaction. It held the rest of the gold nuggets and money—partly in paper banknotes, partly in the coins she had earned earlier.
The clinking of coins against gold was crisp and melodic, but to Solicitor Green, it was an unbearably piercing sound. His fingers subconsciously gripped the edge of his desk.
“Let me make myself very clear,” he said gruffly, looking rather like a walrus on the verge of a tantrum. “If Scotland Yard comes knocking here to inquire about stolen gold bars, I shall feign a stroke and let them drag you straight off.”
Arna, who had genuinely spent the previous night fishing and had done absolutely nothing wrong: …Is it really this hard to be a good person nowadays?
She had literally just helped crack a massive blackmail case involving three thousand pounds’ worth of jewels yesterday! At the very least, she counted as an outstanding, public-spirited citizen!
Thinking this, she flashed a grin and deliberately lowered her voice into a wicked register. “Since you know what I’ve done… how dare you speak to me like that? Do you have a death wish?”
Solicitor Green’s face instantly went white.
“I’m kidding,” Arna burst out laughing, immensely satisfied as she watched him look ready to flee out the door. “I really did fish it up. I even helped solve a case yesterday.”
She pushed the piece of gold on his desk slightly forward, offering a bright, sunny smile. “Anyway, just take it. It was simply… a discovery. Like finding treasure.”
Thoroughly spooked, Green let out a breath and offered a mock scolding. “You child!”
Before he could finish, he chuckled as well, shaking his head as he swept the gold nugget into his drawer. “I shall file your patent documents today.”
He tutted. “For God’s sake, do not smile like that again. You look like a robber.”
Arna’s eyes widened.
“Impossible,” she retorted. “How could I possibly look like a robber?”
Though she did thoroughly enjoy robbing the thugs who tried to rob her, that was all entirely legal income! Self-defense!
…Perhaps during said self-defense, the assailants’ coin purses somehow inexplicably flew into her possession. That wasn’t her fault! The coin pouches simply had excellent taste and chose the right master, surely?
By the time she returned to Baker Street, Arna was still feeling rather indignant.
“Do I really look like I robbed a goldsmith?” she grumbled, taking a seat at the dining table just in time for lunch. “Even though the fishing yielded a massive haul later, I spent yesterday working a case with Holmes!”
She emphasized, “I am a model citizen!”
Watson was mid-sip of his tea; when Arna’s hand smacked the dining table, he nearly choked on it.
Meanwhile, Holmes didn’t even glance up. He was entirely focused on dissecting an oddly colored pie with his butter knife.
“A model citizen,” he agreed perfunctorily, prying a disagreeable piece of dried fruit out of the pie. “Quite so.”
Watson used his napkin to dab at the tea he had accidentally sprayed onto his waistcoat.
“For God’s sake—did you truly dredge up gold bars?” he marveled. “In the River Thames?”
“And pearls. Nine of them,” Arna added helpfully, plonking down into a chair and snatching a slice of bread. “They were quite lovely too. The biggest one was worth ninety pounds.”
She beamed triumphantly. “I sold mine to a middleman, but I gave Holmes one last night—Watson, you really ought to join us next time!”
Watson looked a bit faint.
“That is—that’s equivalent to nearly two years of a constable’s wages!”
Holmes finally abandoned his autopsy of the pie and leaned back in his chair.
“Indeed,” he chimed in, gleefully adding fuel to the fire. “And observe, Watson: we utilized nothing more than a sturdy wooden stick and a rusted hook. Naturally, we assembled them together and referred to the contraption as a fishing rod.”
Watson: “I always assumed the River Thames contained nothing but fish and assorted factory discharge!”
He felt his entire worldview teetering. “I need a bottle of whiskey.”
Arna smoothly redirected the topic. “Actually, you can fish up just about anything in that river.”
Including trash cans.
“For some people, that is certainly true,” Holmes appended. “Except for fish.”
He continued with great relish, “This reminds me of a case I investigated in the past; it commenced when a passing angler discovered the corpse. Therefore, Solicitor Green’s suspicions are entirely normal. No one incidentally stumbles across legitimate wealth in the River Thames without it involving at least a few skeletons.”
Arna had already finished the food in her hand and began extending a sinful hand toward the biscuits on the side.
“I’ll dig up a skeleton just to make you shut up.” Disgusted by Holmes bringing up corpses and skeletons during mealtime, her appetite soured. She lobbed a biscuit forcefully across the table, fully hoping it would smack Holmes right on the nose.
Faced with this utter farce, Watson wore a dark expression as he retrieved a bottle of whiskey from the shelf.
“This is exactly why I require a drink after lunch,” he stated.
Arna’s eyes darted mischievously.
“Perhaps that isn’t the reason,” she drawled slowly. “Perhaps it’s because you didn’t get to meet the Viscountess yesterday, and you’re terribly disappointed?”
Watson’s eyes bulged.
His face flushed a bright red. He looked at Arna’s picture-perfect innocence, then over at Holmes, who had just snatched the airborne biscuit out of the air and taken a triumphant bite. “Leaving the two of you alone for a single night was unequivocally the worst decision I have made in recent memory.”
He still vividly remembered how diligent, simple, and taciturn young Aisas had been when he first arrived.
Confound you, Holmes!
Since she now had a bit of cash on hand—enough to cover the factory’s daily operations for a while—Arna decided to temporarily stop selling her finished components to the system. Instead, she bought several crates and planned to hoard her goods.
Once the patent was approved and she found a carriage company willing to take them, her profits would absolutely dwarf the system’s “recovery price.”
Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west; do not bully this factory owner for being poor!1With this thought in mind, she sprawled lazily in her chair and contentedly reviewed her interface panel once more.
Excellent, everything was excellent. Her eleven employees were currently in prime condition, though it was a pity her pet slot remained completely empty.
Last night, the black cat with the grey eyes had spotted her returning with a fish. Taking advantage of the brief moment Mrs. Hudson opened the door for them, it snatched the fish in its jaws and made a lightning-fast getaway. Its agility was far too high; it bolted so quickly she couldn’t catch it at all.
…She was back to being a catless savage!
Arna let out a rather melancholic sigh. Looking at the funds she had left over, she decided to be a bit more generous.
—Since she wasn’t strapped for cash anymore, treating the kids to some better food wouldn’t hurt.
Oliver got to eat meat stew twice in three days. Such lavish hospitality deeply terrified a child who had never eaten anything decent his entire life.
He wasn’t the only one; the other children were also whispering amongst themselves, feeling that the Factory Owner’s behavior was highly abnormal.
Aside from the overly sumptuous meals, other changes in the factory didn’t escape the children’s keen eyes.
Mr. Aisas, who previously loved running outside, hadn’t taken his beloved carriage out for a spin lately. His fishing trips had also decreased. Instead, he stayed holed up in his office, often remaining there for the entire day.
When he did occasionally appear, he always wore a wooden expression, looking as though he were in a terrible mood.
Not to mention everyone had noticed the influx of crates around the factory.
The components they manufactured no longer vanished when the children weren’t looking. Instead, they remained piled in the crates, stacking higher and higher until they formed a precarious, tottering tower.
The children felt that the Aisas Factory, much like this towering pile of crates, was on the verge of total collapse.
—Everyone knew that in the past, whenever Mr. Aisas occasionally took his carriage out for a few laps, several crates would inexplicably go missing.
He had definitely been going out to sell those items of unknown utility.
Now, he clearly couldn’t sell them anymore. Or rather, he couldn’t con any more gullible buyers into taking them, leaving him no choice but to let the parts sit in the factory and slowly rust away.
If that were the case, Mr. Aisas wasn’t far from bankruptcy. And if that was true, then those glittering treasures they had once glimpsed inside his safe…
Upon hearing this news, Fagin and Sikes immediately grew tense.
They cursed Aisas endlessly, calling him a fool and an idiot—they had long since claimed those riches as their own property in their minds. Now, someone was recklessly squandering their wealth. How could they not be anxious?
“Listen closely, my dears,” Fagin said.
He was standing in an alley near the factory, rubbing his hands together. Beside him were the Dodger and a few other boys. “Little Aisas’s ship is sinking, yes it is. If we don’t do our best to salvage what we can from that factory, other rats will beat us to it and snatch those things away.”
Oliver, who had been called out to join them, leaned blankly against the wall, saying nothing.
The Artful Dodger scoffed at Fagin’s words and adjusted his cap.
“There’s nothing in there but scrap metal and rusted iron, Fagin,” he fired off effortlessly, acting as though he hadn’t been the very one who stumbled upon Mr. Aisas tinkering with the safe last week. “We’ve been searching for weeks!”
Oliver shot him an astonished look.
Fagin merely sighed.
“No, you certainly haven’t looked hard enough, child,” he said, pointing a bony finger toward the factory. “You must understand, if there were only useless things in that factory, why would this gentleman lock all that rubbish away? There must be something of value inside. This very Saturday, we shall see exactly what’s hiding in the rabbit hole.”
He continued to murmur his plans to the others, adding that he had already come to an agreement with Sikes, and Nancy would be there to assist them when the time came.
While Fagin was still thoroughly immersed in his own scheming, he failed to notice a figure carefully hiding around the corner, eavesdropping on their conversation.
The very next day, this eavesdropper found an excuse to openly walk upstairs, marching right up to Arna’s office door.
“Mr. Aisas!” the apprentice group leader, Lucy, called out loudly. “Mrs. Laura made extra breakfast today and asked me to bring a portion up for you!”
Very quickly, Mr. Aisas—who never refused food of any kind—opened the door.
“Come in,” Arna said expectantly. “What did you all have for breakfast?”
Lucy placed the plate on the desk. “It’s bread, sir.”
As she spoke, she smoothly shut the door behind her.
Under Arna’s puzzled gaze, Lucy said calmly, “I have something to tell you, Mr. Aisas.”
Without waiting for Arna to ask, she lowered her voice and rapidly spilled the whole truth. “I bumped into Oliver, the Dodger, and the others yesterday. They were with a strange old Jewish man… in the alley right behind the factory. They were talking about pulling off something big this Saturday, something to do with the factory, and it seemed to be targeting whatever is inside your safe…”
She paused. “I suspect Miss Nancy knows them as well. They mentioned Miss Nancy.”
The author has something to say:
Lucy: This subject wishes to report that Fagin has committed treason, conspired with outsiders, and brought chaos to the factory! His crimes are absolutely unforgivable!
- Yes, the London police were indeed very poor back then, with incredibly low annual salaries… In the early 19th century, their wages couldn’t even beat out a governess’s… Which is why their turnover rate was so exceptionally high.
Footnotes
- 'Thirty years east of the river, thirty years west' (sān shí nián hé dōng, sān shí nián hé xī) is a classic Chinese proverb meaning fortunes change over time. 'Do not bully the youth for being poor' (modified here to 'factory owner') is a famous catchphrase from modern Chinese web fiction, used when an underestimated protagonist swears future success.
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