Chinese Whispers

by Andrew Wareham

  They were led indoors, hardly seeing the buildings as they entered in the early evening light; the consul, recently given the title of Minister at the Legation, welcomed them in the hall.

  “Lord and Lady Eskdale, do come in. You must be tired from your journeying. The passage from Shanghai to Peking is not an easy one! I am Sir Claude MacDonald. Lady MacDonald.”

  The gentleman was dressed for dinner in conventional white tie and tailcoat. He was fit to be seen in Mayfair, presumably setting the standard of dress expected of the whole legation. Magnus had been forewarned but inspected the gentleman in some amusement.

  Sir Claude was of ordinary height and slim build – an active man well into his forties. He was undistinguished in his countenance and, presumably to make his face memorable, had cultivated a thin moustache that extended a good four inches to either side of his mouth in waxed horizontal points. Magnus presumed that he must sleep on his back.

  Magnus made his bow and presented his lady to the couple, said how pleased he was that his wife would have female company in the Legation. Lady MacDonald was well into her thirties although the couple were not too many years married.

  “We dine for eight o’clock tonight, Lord Eskdale.”

  “Excellent, Sir Claude. Nearly an hour in which to change. Have we rooms in the Legation or a separate bungalow?”

  “A substantial suite of rooms, Lord Eskdale, in effect a wing of the building. Quite a good view out to the Tartar Wall, as well.”

  They walked slowly through the Legation buildings, giving their servants time to run the trunks upstairs and unpack a sufficiency of clothing to change for dinner.

  They presented themselves in the ante-room a quarter of an hour before dinner, immaculately turned out and ready to be introduced to the staff they would work with.

  Sir Claude approved of their efforts, was much in favour of impressing the natives by maintaining correct standards.

  “No outside guests tonight, Eskdale. I thought that you and your lady would appreciate the opportunity to simply speak to myself and Lady MacDonald and the functionaries here. We shall invite the Japanese Minister and some of his staff later in the week. Remarkable people, titled of course, and a pleasure to work with – highly efficient. I have some expectation of moving from Peking to Tokyo for my next posting, you know. I much hope so – there is every prospect of forming a great and lasting alliance with Japan. The British and Japanese are kindred spirits, you know.”

  Magnus did not know, but was, he said, very pleased to be told.

  “I believe you have much experience of Africa, Sir Claude. I have never had the privilege of serving in the Dark Continent. It must be a fascinating place, but perhaps much different to China?”

  “Both the east of Africa and the west, my lord. Very different in their peoples and ways but both requiring a firm but kindly hand. They are but children as yet, Eskdale, and need guidance from those who must know far better than they. Their time will come, of course, but not for many years yet. In some ways, I find them similar to the Chinese – they have much to learn of civilised ways.”

  Chapter Three

  The Earl’s Other Son Series

  Chinese Whispers

  “A pleasure to enjoy fresh company, my lady. Legation life leads one to see only the same few faces at one’s table, you know.”

  “Always a problem in China, Sir Claude. There are only a few to work with, and an even smaller number with whom one cares to dine.”

  Ellen was pleased with her response, seeing it achieve an immediate sympathy from Sir Claude. The man was an inveterate snob, she gathered. He was more willing to hobnob with titled Japanese than with mere commoners of his own people, or so she had been told. A pity, but amusing, and of use to her, and to Magnus, which was more important.

  “There is a small cadre of the well-born in Peking at the moment, my lady. The bulk are Johnny-come-latelies, many of them with knighthoods, baronetcies even, but with no breeding behind them. Hart, for example. Nothing more than an Irish shopkeeper, you know, but swaggers with his ‘Sir Robert’ like any dunghill cock!”

  “That is the head of the Imperial Customs Service, is it not, Sir Claude? The sole efficient arm of the Chinese Government?”

  Magnus glanced across and shook his head almost imperceptibly. He would take over the conversation, he implied. He smiled courteously as Sir Claude replied.

  “True, but saying very little, the Chinese having no government worth mentioning. You will no doubt discover the Tsongli Yamen at some point, my lord. It is their bureau set up specifically to deal with foreigners – barbarians, they call us. You will then plumb the depths of incompetence, procrastination and simple foolishness. The Chinese say that their best are represented there. I believe them. As a nation they are inferior, by their own admission. I do not doubt that the Empire of the Rising Sun will soon take their governance in hand, as they should, and bring China into some semblance of modernity. You will know that there is some consideration of a treaty of alliance with Tokyo, my lord? Britain to eschew the ancient policy of isolation and to make a military commitment to the new power of the Pacific?”

  “I had heard the rumour, Sir Claude. How will it affect Russia?”

  “Badly, I doubt not. There is almost certain to be a conflict there within the next few years. The Port Arthur business rankles with the Japanese, you know. The Triple Intervention – which Britain wisely was not party to – was seen as a massive humiliation to the Japanese. They fought a war and won and then their prizes were snatched from them by Russia, Germany and France in consort, Russia taking the apparent lead. Imperial Russia is weak – far more so than she believes. The time will come when Japan attacks and then Russia will crumple before their might.”

  Magnus was inclined to be doubtful, until he considered his own recent experience with the Russian navy.

  “Thinking on it, Sir Claude… You heard of this business in Shanghai a few weeks ago? The Russians showed really rather poorly there, you know. Mutinous and vicious is the best one can say for them. Their response to their problems was less than competent, one might say. I cannot imagine one of our ships going into bloody insurrection, you know, but still less can I envisage one of our admirals having to beg for foreign aid to deal with the matter. Had it been the Navy - the real Navy, that is – then we would have sent our steam picket boats off in pursuit if we had nothing else to hand!”

  “Quite right too, my lord! I understand that the whole affair was mishandled in the most brutal fashion?”

  “On both sides, Sir Claude. Details do not bear mentioning at the dinner table – they were appalling.”

  Sir Claude could not be surprised - as nations collapsed into oblivion, as Russia was clearly in process, then they often fell into barbarianism.

  Magnus agreed, saying nothing of the Japanese behaviour in the war with China just a few years earlier, which had been marked by the most vicious massacres of the civilian Chinese population.

  The ladies withdrew and left the men to their port. Neither was a heavy drinker, but a pair of glasses at least was obligatory upon them.

  “All sorts of rumours about what happened on Otvajni, Eskdale. Both before the mutiny and during the affair.”

  “Take the vilest rumour you have heard, Sir Claude, then double it to achieve the reality. I suspect mutiny broke out on Otvajni simply because her officers included a number who were more perverse than the usual run of Russia’s so-called aristocrats. Nothing more than privileged savages, you know, Sir Claude, who appear in this case to have formed a little clique distinguished by its misconduct and nothing else. The captain a weakling, the senior officers turning the blind eye or taking part, and the ship gone to Hell, quite literally. From the little I have heard about their navy, a junior officer who is of higher rank in what passes for an aristocracy in Russia is able to ignore the orders of his superiors in the service and can do whatever he wishes. I was present when the body of one particular lieutenant was foun
d; he had been obscenely mutilated, before death, I believe. Retaliation by his victims on the lower deck, I do not doubt.”

  Sir Claude was horrified but could not claim to be surprised. He had experience of Africa, he said, where anything could happen and only too often did, not merely among the natives.

  “Thing is, Eskdale, in our Empire, the hierarchy of military rank, if one may call it that, was never subverted. Not uncommonly the case was that a regiment in England might choose to ease an officer of poor moral conduct and standing out of their Mess, send him overseas to get him out of sight where he could not harm their reputation. The ne’er-do-well would end up in the colonies, and only too often immediately get up to his old tricks again. Then he would come to a bad end, very commonly. Found with a revolver bullet in his head. That’s where I came in – having to sign off the investigation of the circumstances, to confirm to London that all was well…”

  Magnus nodded. Suicide covered up any number of sins, was seen often as the gentleman’s way out of insuperable difficulty. An officer who would not do the honourable thing might be assisted in the process of suicide – his honour saved for him, one might say. A miscreant junior officer would have no chance to create a mutiny in the British forces, and no questions would ever be asked publicly.

  “There is a proper way to do things, Sir Claude. But the Russians don’t, so it would seem.”

  “Exactly, Eskdale. The Japanese do, by the way. Funny thing, so do the Chinese, very often. Strange for such a debauched and inferior race, but perhaps they have learned from us. Shall we join the ladies?”

  “We were discussing morning visits, Sir Claude. Lord and Lady Eskdale must make the proper acquaintances in the Legation Quarter, you know. I shall escort them, of course.”

  “Quite right, ma’am. Germany first, then Austria-Hungary. Have to be the French on the day following – put up with their pretensions, you know. Pity that we hear these rumours about a closer relationship between England and France… We should have joined Prussia in 1870, you know. Take back Calais and split the French colonies with Berlin. Would have made for a far tidier world, you know.”

  Magnus did not know such to be a fact, but he would not argue. War with France was a natural state of affairs, when one considered the matter dispassionately. Bearing in mind a thousand years of history, at war with France for more years than at peace, it seemed impious somehow to view the Frogs as allies.

  “Much the same as is the case with America, Sir Claude. If Britain had only grasped the nettle and sent an army to the aid of the Confederacy, then we would not be seeing an American presence in the Philippines today. A win for the South would have reduced America to impotence, for the Slave States could never have governed the country. There would have been another secession and further wars and probably room for the British to have taken California and the West Coast as our own. After all, we have a legitimate legal claim there, Drake having landed first of all and pronounced the sovereignty of Queen Elizabeth. The world would be a far better place today had we only shown resolute.”

  Sir Claude had never met that particular argument.

  “What of slavery, my lord? My experience in Africa leads me to have no love for the institution.”

  Magnus had not thought that far, having raised his argument more for mischief than from any notion of being serious.

  “Most of the blacks in America are worse off today than they were as slaves. No surprise, of course. You can’t give freedom. Liberty must be fought for. Slavery was abolished by the white man, given as a gift rather than earned with their own blood. Had the North lost the Civil War then eventually the slaves would have risen and fought for their freedom, as was the case in Haiti; they would be better off today if only they had.”

  Sir Claude was not at all sure that they should be better off; poverty was good for the soul, after all.

  “A novel point of view, my lord. Now, to consider the German Legation, which you must visit with your lady tomorrow, my lord…”

  Magnus said no more on the topic of liberty, having stirred a sufficiency of trouble for his own amusement.

  “Have there been any mention by the German Legation of their losses on the Yangtse, Sir Claude?”

  “Oh, their Baron Whatshisname? Can’t remember the name meself, all Von this or Van that or Graf or Prinz or whatever. Mostly invented last week, their aristocracy! No, he died and they were upset and blamed the Dowager Empress for the business, but they don’t seem to have been too greatly distressed, you know. I heard a whisper – don’t know whether it’s true – that he upset a number of private apple carts while he was out here. From what I was told, he cleaned up a number of very profitable little pieces of private enterprise by Legation officials. There was a rumour of rifles going inland to warlords in exchange for ingot silver that went into the banks of the officials rather than into Legation funds. As well as that, for a certainty, there was opium picked up from Hong Kong by German ships and brought into China on false manifests, all without the knowledge of the Legation. Baron Whosis got word of all of these deals and put an end to them. On top of that, he insisted on their profits being confiscated and the men themselves sent back to Berlin in disgrace. The ones remaining – the more efficient in their deals – were glad to hear he was gone before he had investigated them.”

  “So, they were done a favour when he was killed, it seems.”

  Sir Claude thought so. He said that it was probable that the Baron had been betrayed by a combination of his own people and a Chinese warlord from inland who had wanted rifles for his own private army.

  Magnus gravely agreed that it was very likely. It seemed that Captain Hawkins had kept the degree of British involvement a secret from the Legation, which he had not expected. Perhaps he did not trust Sir Claude to maintain secrecy, which was worth remembering. If Hawkins could not trust the Minister’s discretion, then neither would Magnus.

  “An unpleasant man and better gone from amongst us, Sir Claude. What of these Boxers, sir? Have you heard much of them?”

  Sir Claude waved a dismissive hand. He had heard too much of them, he said.

  “Local uprisings, no more than that, Eskdale. A few missionaries have been threatened. A few local converts have been killed in widely separated locations and there is a cry of a concerted rebellion. Nonsense, of course! No such thing! There has been and will be no great revolution. There can’t be because of the drought. Half of northern China is starving – they haven’t got time to go into rebellion as well as try to grow or earn food for their families. Add to that the Yellow River problem of course and you can see that they have better things to do than play politics. No, Eskdale, take it from me – there will be no such thing as a Boxer problem.”

  Magnus could not recall the nature of the Yellow River or of its latest destructive manifestation. He knew that the River often flooded and that over the centuries millions of peasants had lost their fields and their lives to the great river. He presumed this was another such calamity.

  “A bit more, this time, Eskdale. The River broke its banks and ended up in a new course, coming to the sea through a new mouth many miles south of the previous one. Flooded out fields and towns and did untold damage to the Great Canal – still not repaired. Only about a half of the grain barges are coming down the Canal now. Grain is short in and around Peking as a result. The Dowager Empress has called for a report on the problem but has done nothing. The local governors can make no repairs without funds from the government. Typical!”

  It seemed to Magnus that these might be reasons for a rebellion. Starving peasants who had nothing more to lose might well rise up against their rulers, or the foreigners who they blamed for their troubles.

  “No, not at all, Eskdale. That’s not how the Chinese mind works. These Boxers are just a religious cult, they ain’t to be worried about. The Empress will send out a battalion or two and they will wipe out the leaders of the troublemakers and that will be an end to it.”

 
; Magnus knew too little of affairs in Peking to argue. He was glad to have his mind put at rest, he said.

  There followed days of tedium. He dressed in his best and made his formal visits and bowed and shook any number of hands. His face hurt from smiling.

  He and Ellen were made welcome by the German Legation, genuinely so, he felt. His actions on the Yangtse were still seen as a friendly act, the white men standing together against the Dowager Empress’ cruel subterfuge. He felt most superior. The British Empire had come out on top in the Great Game, as a sole result of his own actions. They enjoyed a glass of hock and discussed the state of China, agreeing with each other that the so-called Boxers were not a menace, except perhaps to missionaries, and there were too damned many of them in any case.

  “Mostly American, as well, Lord Eskdale. The civilised nations of Europe need not concern themselves too much with such folk, I believe.”

  Magnus smiled and nodded – he could not actually share such opinions, or not aloud, he implied.

  “America is a close ally of Britain, of course, Graf. We must offer our assistance, even when our friendly advice is ignored. The Americans do seem to be pushing their missionaries a distance inland, far from the rivers and the gunboats that could protect them.”

  The bulk of the gunboats were British; they had on occasion come to the assistance of German missions when their own people had had no power to do so. Gratitude had to be expressed, even if not felt, for such kindly aid.

  “The Americans, of course, my lord, have only these Civil War gunboats on the Great River – paddle-wheelers that break down almost unfailingly if they try to sail as much as a hundred miles!”