Chapter 75: Paternal Love
Seeing Carlo’s pained expression upon hearing the word marriage, Emanuele II thought Carlo was shy and said with a smile, “It’s okay, Carlo. This is a step you must go through.
Your two brothers have already married, and now it’s your turn.”
Carlo was of course not shy, but at this moment it was not convenient to explain anything, so he could only nod.
After all, although some members of the British Royal Family had been found to have hemophilia at this time, the harm of hemophilia to the entire European Royal Family had not yet fully emerged.
“Okay, child. Don’t worry, I will keep an eye out for you. If there is a suitable marriage alliance candidate, I will notify the Spanish Government.
But don’t be too harsh with your conditions for finding a queen. After all, for us nobles, political interests outweigh personal love.
If you really like a girl, you can also make her your mistress, right?” Emanuele II touched Carlo’s head again and said with a smile.
When Carlo was not yet an adult, Emanuele would try to avoid discussing topics like mistresses.
But since Carlo was now an adult and had become the King of Spain, such topics naturally needed to be discussed.
“However, child, although you can have mistresses, it’s best not to have too many, and don’t provoke too many married women.
With your identity as king and the royal family’s property, there are plenty of young and beautiful girls for you to choose from.” Emanuele II reminded him: “If you don’t want to ruin your reputation by fooling around, you’d better remember my words, child.”
Although it was almost the default status among European nobles to have mistresses, this did not mean the public would be willing to see their king fooling around with many married women.
After all, as a country’s ruler, reputation was quite important. If the public was offended, lightly it would lead to forced abdication, and severely even being overthrown by revolution, which would be more loss than gain.
A brief fling was fine; usually after it was over, they became familiar strangers.
But if maintaining a long-term relationship as a mistress, it was best to find unmarried girls from relatively clean family backgrounds, so there wouldn’t be too much trouble later.
Carlo could only nod again.
Carlo understood this point as well.
There was no design for condoms in this era, and even contraceptive technology was very backward.
If unfortunately infected with some related disease, it would be completely more loss than gain for Carlo.
Seeing Carlo nodding frequently in an obedient manner, Emanuele II was in a great mood and said with a smile, “I heard you directly copied the Sun Newspaper to Madrid. How is its development now?
You little guy have pretty good business acumen. Now, the Spanish Royal Family’s assets should be quite substantial, right?”
The Sun Newspaper founded by Carlo in Italy had now become one of Italy’s largest newspaper offices. Because Carlo became the King of Spain, after discussing with his father Emanuele, Carlo sold 51% of the shares to the Italian Royal Family, keeping only 49% of the shares himself to wait for dividends.
More than a year later, the Italian Sun Newspaper had become one of the top three newspaper offices in the entire Italy, and the newspaper’s daily sales had broken through Carlo’s initial goal, which was 50,000 copies.
Of course, the reason for such high sales was that the Sun Newspaper had opened branches in Rome and Turin, and combined they broke through 50,000 daily sales.
Although 50,000 copies didn’t seem like much, it directly affected more than 50,000 families, at least hundreds of thousands of people.
If talking about the indirectly affected group, it was probably at least a million people. If the dissemination time was longer, even millions was possible.
After all, most of Italy’s illiterates wouldn’t buy newspapers; the way they got outside information was through word-of-mouth transmission.
If nothing unexpected happened, the sales of the Italian Sun Newspaper would basically maintain at this level, with no significant growth in the short term.
After all, Italy’s illiteracy rate was close to 70%, and before improving the education level, there wouldn’t be that many people buying newspapers.
But no matter what, the success of the Sun Newspaper had already proven that Carlo’s business acumen was quite excellent.
Emanuele held more than half of the shares of the Sun Newspaper and naturally knew roughly how much money his youngest son had made by creating the Sun Newspaper.
“Father, you know that newspaper office income is ultimately a small portion.” Carlo put on a helpless look and said helplessly, “Spain’s development plan ensures that the steel mill won’t lack money, but the Spanish Royal Family doesn’t have that much funds to build the steel mill.
Now the royal family’s income can only maintain the royal palace’s expenditure and the guard regiment of more than 2,000 people. Any more and the royal family would go bankrupt.”
Although Carlo’s current assets had multiplied countless times compared to when he just left Italy, when facing his father, he still had to cry poor when it was time to do so.
The House of Savoy had been entrenched in Italy for far longer than the Bourbon family had ruled Spain, and the accumulated wealth was naturally quite considerable.
Carlo naturally wanted to squeeze some money from his father’s hands, even if through an interest-free loan, it was much better than borrowing from other countries.
After all, loans from other countries not only had high interest rates, but also various additional conditions, which were not conducive to Spain’s future development.
But if borrowing from the Italian Royal Family, although the loan amount might not be large, it was likely to be interest-free or low-interest loan, and without too harsh additional conditions.
For the current Carlo who was extremely short of money, he would take whatever he could get; no matter how little, it was still meat, and he wouldn’t disdain it.
“You child, you’ve become the King of Spain, how come you’re still coming back to cry poor to me?” Emanuele II was somewhat amused but still did not refuse Carlo: “
Speaking of which, you’ve been away from Italy for more than a year. This time you came back, so I’ll give you your annuity.
If you really lack money, I can provide you with 10 million lira interest-free loan quota in the name of the Italian Royal Family, to be repaid within 10 years.
If it’s the Spanish Government that lacks money, let them negotiate with Italian banks. I can’t help them. Even if Italian banks are willing to loan to the Spanish Government, the interest that should be paid can’t be avoided, at most exempting some extra additional conditions.
Those bankers are not doing charity. If Primó wants to borrow from Italian banks, he must be prepared to pay high interest.”
Emanuele II naturally felt sorry for his son, but this did not mean he would support the Spanish Government just because of him.
The Spanish Royal Family and the Italian Royal Family were naturally a close family, but if it came to the interests between Spain and Italy, it was naturally a clear accounting.
Emanuele II would not harm the interests of Italian capitalists because of Carlo, and Carlo naturally understood this.
In fact, Emanuele II’s willingness to provide 10 million lira interest-free loan to help Carlo had already moved Carlo greatly.
10 million lira was worth 400,000 pound sterling. Used to invest in the steel mill, multiplying the assets several times within ten years was no problem.
Using such a sum of money sufficient to build the most powerful ironclad ship as an interest-free loan to Carlo showed his love for his son without words.
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