Chapter 44: The Talk with Charlotte...

After her conversation with Charlotte ended, Mary ultimately did not accept the money, but instead lent it to Charlotte temporarily. Together, they took a horse-drawn carriage to find Aunt Taylor.

Taylor's tailor shop has changed dramatically. The upstairs has been rented out for living, and the downstairs has been completely converted into shops. The part closest to the street has been transformed into a shop window display, filled with all kinds of hats. Further inside, where the owner used to rest, is now filled with tailoring tools. A boy of about thirteen or fourteen is helping out in the shop; he is Aunt Taylor's son.

After Mary and Charlotte explained their purpose, Aunt Taylor chose the first option. She did not intend to leave Portsmouth, as she had grown accustomed to the city and had no intention of leaving home to start a new business in Manchester.

Mary's asking price wasn't high, less than the hat shop's annual profit, almost like giving it away for free. So, she readily agreed to Mary and Charlotte's terms and paid a sum of money to buy out the hat design entirely.

With Mary's financial support, Charlotte now has nearly three hundred pounds in cash. She plans to follow Mary's analysis and use some of the money to buy several sewing machines in installments, starting production in a small workshop. Perhaps one day she will make her business even bigger than the Brown family's in the past.

As the two girls boarded the carriage to go home, Charlotte gripped Mary's hand tightly. She wanted to say something several times, words of gratitude welling up inside her, but before she could utter them, the carriage arrived at Price's door.

“Mary, thank you. Don’t worry, I will never give up easily!” Mary heard her friend’s voice as she got out of the car.

"Oh, my dear, you're finally back! I was so afraid something might have happened to you at the Browns'. I forgot to remind you before you left, but I heard that the Browns have gone bankrupt. They're even selling their house to pay off their debts. What if you run into those vicious creditors there?" Mrs. Price rushed out of the living room and grabbed Mary, who was still watching the carriage disappear into the distance from the porch.

“Oh, it’s not that bad, Mother. When I went there, neither of the Browns was home. I heard they went to pay off their debts to the creditors. They still have some savings left to move to Manchester,” Mary said, trying to comfort her anxious mother.

"That's terrible. I heard Charlotte has no dowry left. Poor girl. I was even thinking that since she and you are so close, she might take a fancy to your brother."

Mary walked into the living room, about to sit down for tea, when she heard this and put down her teacup: "Mother, I haven't noticed any of my brothers showing any particular interest in Charlotte!"

"I just thought about it, and even if something were to happen, it's completely impossible for the Browns to move to Manchester now." To Mrs. Price, Charlotte, who had no dowry, could only be described as a poor girl, and she didn't bring it up again.

Mary pondered this on her own. She had never connected her friends with her brothers before, but now she felt she needed to think carefully about the attitude of her other friend, Anne.

That day, she and William went to Hyde Park, and Anne went along too. The problem was that the reason she gave was too strange. If they wanted to go to Hyde Park, they could have gone with the General. There was no need to bother William. However, these clues were not enough to tell anything for the time being. Mary planned to pay more attention in the future.

Before two days had passed, the Brown family's house was sold. Mary only found out about it when William mentioned that the house had only sold for around three hundred pounds, lamenting that the Brown family had sold too hastily and suffered a loss, while the Price family's house had sold for two hundred and eighty pounds.

With only three days left, Charlotte's family had to move out of the house. They planned to leave for Manchester as soon as the three days were up. Everyone was busy packing their luggage. In the midst of the hustle and bustle, Charlotte only had time to visit the Price family one more time and give Mary one of her necklaces as a gift.

After Charlotte left that day, Mr. Price, who was rarely home, suddenly launched into a long-winded speech: "These speculators never end well! William, when you send Mary back to London, remember to tell Richard that even if you make money in business, you'll only be looked down upon. You'll be washed ashore by any storm. Only the land is truly reliable!"

Hearing this, Mary, who knew her father's personality well, didn't say anything, but ten-year-old Tom suddenly said, "Dad, I don't want to go with William to be a sailor anymore, I want to go to London too."

"What are you doing in London, you brat?" Mr. Price glared at him. "You don't mean to go into business too, do you? Didn't you see how the Brown family went bankrupt in no time?"

“But Richard has made a lot of money in London. My friends and classmates have all heard about the Butterfly Sewing Machine. Not everyone is as unlucky as the Browns.” Tom became more and more excited as he spoke. “Even William, who works so hard and is so capable, took so long to become a lieutenant. Richard is already rich now.”

During Sam's time at home, his two younger brothers, Tom and Charles, gained a better understanding of life in the Navy. As the romanticism of heroic adventures faded, the harsh and monotonous military life became somewhat unbearable for the two boys.

William had never mentioned that being a sailor involved so much work, and Sam had never encountered dangerous pirates, experienced amazing adventures, or overcome terrible storms during his time as a sailor... He just cruised at sea every day, which was too boring and tedious.

Unlike their brothers who had suffered, Tom and Charles had always had Mary manage the household chores since they could remember. By the time they were a little older and needed to go to school, their older brothers had already found their own way to make a living and eased the burden on the family considerably. They had no memory of the hardship and poverty of their childhood, nor could they work as hard as their brothers.

Mr. Price's forehead veins bulged, and he wanted to take out his whip to lash Tom a couple of times, but was stopped by his eldest son, William. Charles was so frightened that he hid in Mrs. Price's arms. Sam tried to pull Tom away, but he stubbornly stood still, convinced that he had done nothing wrong.

“Father, I haven’t received any notice to go to sea yet. In the meantime, I can take Tom to the HMS Thrush for another look. If he really doesn’t intend to join the navy, there’s no point in forcing him,” William advised.

Mary glanced at Mr. Price, who was seething with anger, then at Tom, who was standing, and Charles, who was hiding, and said, "Business isn't something you can just do on a whim. Richard's initial capital was earned through his own hard work, and the sewing machines often encounter difficulties in the sales process. How about this: if Tom still insists after six months, we'll send him to London to study at Wenshi Middle School, and then decide on his future after he graduates. The same goes for Charles; after all, the Price family is wealthy now, and his brothers no longer need Sir Thomas's sponsorship for their tuition."

Mr. Price fell silent. Although he disliked businessmen and considered them disrespectful, he did not hate making money. However, since he was not the one making money, he could only use his military officer status to express his contempt for those wealthy businessmen.

In 19th-century Britain, officers belonged to a special class, considered members of the "gentlemen's class," but their actual status depended on wealth and family background. Officers like Mr. Price, who were "uneducated, without property, and without social standing," were never respected. Nominal respectability could not solve their actual poverty, a fact Mr. Price understood all too well.

Mary's explanation finally made the father realize that his third son, Richard, had indeed made a fortune in London, otherwise Mary wouldn't have said that she didn't need Sir Thomas's sponsorship of her tuition fees.

At this point, Mr. Price put down his whip and said angrily, "Whatever, but this brat won't be asking me for another penny."

Just after the New Year, the carriage sent by General Maxwell to pick up Mary arrived. William took leave to send his sister back to London, while he planned to visit Fanny, who was pregnant, in Mansfield before returning to Portsmouth.

After learning about the dispute between his father and Tom from Mary, Richard laughed instead: "According to you, Tom is quite bold. I'm willing to sponsor him to study management at Wenshi Middle School. Our company doesn't lack money right now, it only lacks reliable manpower."

During Mary's week away from London, sewing machines were sold from shops, generating a steady stream of revenue—and these were just ordinary sewing machines.

The businessmen who had just signed the franchise agreement were all urging Richard to start producing high-end sewing machines as soon as possible. The wealthy people in the counties were chasing after London fashion, and now any lady without a high-end sewing machine would really be out of touch with the social scene.

Using his franchise, Richard has already established a sales network covering most of the UK. He now plans to acquire a foundry to enhance research and development, enabling the mechanized production of all sewing machine components and further reducing manufacturing costs. In comparison, the tuition fees for his two younger brothers' schooling are nothing to him.

With her free time, Mary continued to contribute to "Ladies' Magazine," this time focusing mostly on sewing machine usage. She hoped that these articles, sharing tips and tricks for machine sewing, would better promote sewing machines and encourage more ordinary families to consider them necessities.

Meanwhile, her conversation with Charlotte after her last trip back inspired her to try creating a size chart. She converted the standard sizes from her previous life into inches, obtaining preliminary values. However, European body types differ from Asian body types, and the specific values ​​would need to be determined after actual measurements.

Once Richard acquires the foundry, he can send people to measure the body data of all workers, first creating a size chart for men's clothing, and then establishing a garment factory to produce clothes that can be sold to these ordinary people.

In Mary's view, the upper and middle classes in society are now used to tailor-made clothes, while for the lower and middle classes, clothing expenses are one of their biggest living expenses. Mass-produced clothes will greatly improve the living standards of these people, which is the charm of technological progress.