For the old rivalry between France and Britain had taken a new turn. If the two powers had been struggling since the previous century for control of the subcontinent of India, the rich sugar trade in the West Indies, and the fur trade of the north, their conflicts in America had mostly been skirmishes, conducted with the aid of the Iroquois, on the upper Hudson or St. Lawrence rivers, far to the north of New York. Recently, however, both powers had tried to grab control of the Ohio Valley to the west, which joined France’s vast, Mississippi River territory of Louisiana to her holdings in the north. In 1754, a rather inexperienced young Virginian officer in the British Army, named George Washington, had made an incursion into the Ohio Valley, set up a small fort and promptly been kicked out of it by the French. In itself, the incident was minor. But back in London, it had caused the British government to come to a decision. It was time to drive their traditional enemy out of the North-East once and for all. They’d gone to war in earnest.

“I should thank George Washington,” John Master would cheerfully say, “for making me a fortune.”

War had meant privateering, and John Master had done well out of that. It was a high-risk business, but he’d figured it out. Most voyages made a loss; but the profits from the few captured were spectacular. By taking shares in about a dozen ships at a time, and averaging his risk, his profits had more than paid for the losses. In fact, he’d been able to double or triple his investment every year. It was a rich man’s game. But he could afford to play.

The real benefit to New York, however, was the British Army. Before long, ten, twenty and soon twenty-five thousand redcoats had arrived from England to fight the French, together with a huge fleet and nearly fifteen thousand sailors. They came to New York and Boston.

Armies and fleets need provisioning. Not only that: the officers wanted houses built, and services of every kind. In addition to his regular trade supplying the Caribbean, John Master was getting huge government contracts for grain, timber, cloth and rum; and so were most of the other merchants he knew. Modest craftsmen, swamped with demand, were upping their prices. True, some laboring men complained that off-duty soldiers were taking part-time jobs and stealing work from them. But by and large, laboring families like Charlie’s could get unheard-of wages. Most people in New York with anything to sell could say with feeling: “God bless the redcoats.”

“I get a lot of building work,” said Charlie. “Can’t complain.”