‘No, Charlie,’ said Fischer, but he could not prevent him. There was an even louder growl from the crowd and this time even Zhang did not try to pacify them. He barked something back that caused Charlie to laugh. ‘He says the Jade Emperor himself was one of the gods who came down to the coolies’ camp last night and that he heard him with his own ears.’ Charlie snarled three words that Herr Fischer recognised: ‘Liar!’ ‘Traitor!’ and ‘Turtle’s egg!’
Fischer watched with horror as a dogspike arced out of the crowd, descending it seemed to him in slow motion and hitting Charlie on the head. He fumbled with his gun but his arms were pinioned from behind. He heard a shot. Obviously Bowers had been quicker off the mark but he, too, was pinioned. Fischer caught a brief glimpse of blood dripping down to the black beard as he hung between the arms of two burly navvies. Then he saw the crowbars rising and falling, rising and falling. He thought he was imagining things. He distinctly saw Charlie’s smiling face rising up above the knot of people who were trying to murder him. Then it continued to rise, higher into the air, and Fischer realised that they had decapitated him and stuck his head on one of the crowbars.
Now he heard the full roar of a crowd. The silence had broken.
He could not take his eyes away from the head of Charlie, which, moving on the end of the pole, seemed as animate as if it had been alive. His young companion seemed to have recovered from his bad temper and his lips were moving in what could have been one of his ironic remarks about the superstition and follies of his fellow countrymen. Then Fischer realised that it was not the tongue moving, but light glinting on the blood that was dribbling from the gaping mouth. He heard an insistent voice in his ear, and saw the foreman, Zhang Haobin, speaking to him urgently, but he could not understand the words. Zhang nodded in melancholy frustration. He closed his eyes as if trying to remember something, then he said in broken English: ‘You. Master. Belong camp,’ and then, patting the stubbled pate of his head to help him remember the right word, ‘Friend,’ he finished, pointing at Fischer’s chest, then his own.
Fischer’s first reaction was one of anger. How dare this foreman call himself a friend? He had just murdered, or allowed his men to murder, in front of his very eyes the best companion he had ever had. A growling sound came from his throat, and his vole’s face snarled, and he struggled in his captors’ arms, wanting to tear with his nails and scratch … Then he remembered Bowers and their helpless position. And he realised that the anxious face in front of him murmuring, ‘Friend,’ seemed genuinely to want to help them.
‘Do what you will,’ he muttered, no longer struggling against those who constrained him, shaken and overcome by an overpowering wave of grief for Charlie. He was hardly aware of the rough but not unkindly hands steering him and Bowers back through the crowd, and up the hill again, towards the office tent from which they had started.
It was the familiarity of his tables and charts that brought him back to reality, and recalled him to his sense of duty. His conscience told him that he was an engineer and that he must do something practical. A decision to bathe and bind the wound on Bowers’s temple was an easy one to make and implement. Coming up with a plan for what to do after that, however, he realised with some alarm, was beyond his experience, and he understood just how much he had come to rely on Charlie for all matters relating to the Chinese. Without Charlie he could not even speak to anyone. He was worse than deaf or dumb. A prisoner in his own tent, Herr Fischer suddenly comprehended that the only person who might be able to help him was Henry Manners.
* * *
The ride had not been the success Henry had hoped. The sights and sensations were not enough to bring the boy out of his shell. Hiram had sat on his pony oblivious of the countryside through which they were passing. Fan Yimei had tried hard to help by describing an excursion with her father as a child, in which he had told her the names of all the flowers and shrubs and what sort of brush-strokes he would use to paint them, and how father and daughter had later run along the path imitating the various birds that skimmed then as now over the ripening fields. Hiram had merely nodded; the thin line of his mouth stayed clenched and the blank eyes in the white face reflected nothing but the nightmares that continued to haunt him. After a while Fan Yimei herself retreated into melancholy introspection. The picnic by the riverbank passed in silence.
On the ride back Henry had tried to excite them with the prospects of their new life in Tientsin. He would give them a letter to pass to his friend, George Detring, manager of the Astor House Hotel, who would install them in one of his best suites and look after them until Manners himself had finished what he had to do in Shishan. Then he would rejoin them and find them a house of their own in the city. That would not be long. His business with Major Lin was nearly concluded. Detring, in the meanwhile, could assist Hiram to find a place in the prestigious Tientsin grammar school. As friends of Manners they would be treated with honour and respect. Fan Yimei, he joked, could even promenade with the English ladies in Victoria Park, and they would look at her over their fans, imagining that she must be some exotic princess of the blood, exiled to Tientsin after a mysterious court intrigue.
His humour had fallen flat.
Neither did Henry’s remarks cheer Fan Yimei. Talk of English ladies had only reminded her of Helen Frances. She had no illusions of what life would be like as the mistress of a foreigner, despised by both races. She knew that, one day, he would tire of her. She wondered if he had already done so. For the two nights in the strange tent she had lain awake waiting for him to come to her, longing for the protection of his arms even though she knew he did not love her as he loved the red-haired girl. She had not understood why he had remained outside on a servant’s bed next to Hiram. She had told herself that it was because Ma Na Si was concerned for the boy and did not wish to leave him alone with his devils. That would be characteristic of his nobility and generosity. She did not feel that he owed anything to her. He had repaid his part of the bargain, and more besides. Rather, she owed him a life, however he wished to tax her for it. Nothing was worse than the hell from which he had rescued her. If she continued to live, it would be on whatever terms he demanded. Even if he did what he threatened, and made her free.
In the meanwhile she could help to look after the boy. As a fellow victim of Ren Ren she was at least qualified to do that. She believed that she could reach him: she had done so once before when she had tended his wounds after his beating by the Japanese. She understood the anguish he was undergoing now, and the causes. She remembered her own nights as a girl in the Palace of Heavenly Pleasure, after the rapes and the beatings and those other humiliations she could hardly bear to recall. She felt again the incomprehension of the child who has been abandoned, that sense of guilt and self-loathing, for no child believes that the evil which happens to it is undeserved. She lived again that greatest shame of all, the closely guarded secret known only to the tortured and the damned and that no time can efface or burying obscure. She knew the love of the tortured for the torturer—the punisher—even as he inflicts his pain. That terrible intimacy, longed for as much as feared. She knew Hiram’s shame, because she herself had shared it: they had both been lovers of Ren Ren. Deep, deep inside them, they shared that shame.
They rode in silence through the chattering summer countryside each locked in their own thoughts. Preoccupied as they were they did not notice the quiet of the railway camp, and only when no mafus turned out to meet them at the stables did Henry grasp that something was very wrong.
‘Hiram,’ he said, ‘I want you to stay here and look after Fan Yimei. If I’m not back in ten minutes, or if you sense anything out of order at all, I want you to get back on your ponies and ride, as hard as you can, away from here. Make for the doctor’s house—you remember the way we came—but stay hidden. Ride off the road where possible. Will you do that for me?’
The two of them were gazing at him in astonishment. Henry grasped Hiram’s hands, and looked urgently into his eye
s. ‘You’re the man here, and you’ve a lady to protect. I don’t know what’s going on but I have to find out what’s happened to Herr Fischer and the others. I’ll probably be back before you know it—but if I don’t come in ten minutes, will you do as I asked?’
For the first time since his rescue there was a spark of animation in Hiram’s eyes. ‘Yes, sir,’ he said hesitantly.
‘Good man.’ He embraced him, then kissed Fan Yimei on the forehead. ‘You’re to stay with Hiram, whatever happens,’ he ordered. ‘Do you understand?’ She nodded, her eyes contemplating him steadily.
‘And take this,’ he said to Hiram, pulling his revolver from its holster. ‘This is the safety-catch. You click it, so. Only use it if you have to—but remember my promise. Neither of you is ever, ever going back to that house.’
He ran to the tent-lines. He peered cautiously round the corner of the first tent, then stepped lightly over the guy ropes and disappeared from their view.
* * *
Bowers was phlegmatically boiling the kettle on the tent stove. There was a bandage round his head, but he seemed none the worse for that. Herr Fischer was pacing up and down, muttering in German. They had spent an hour and smoked six pipes between them discussing what they should do or, rather, Herr Fischer had come up with one inconceivable plan after another, and Bowers had watched him, occasionally shaking his head. When Fischer had exploded his last plan, and laid another curse on the head of the absent Manners, Bowers had suggested a cup of tea.
‘If you’ll excuse me, sir, for hesitating a view,’ he said, when he had poured two strong cups, ‘in situations like these it’s Providence we’d best rely on. We’ve not been served badly so far. We have our lives, and there’s not much even a bunch of coolies can do to break up a good engine manufactured in a York yard. So far so good, say I, barring of course the sad loss of your friend. While the three gentlemen standing outside the door have our guns I think it would be foolhardy to try anything too adventurous, so I say, let’s wait and see what happens.’
‘But what can we do?’ Fischer waved his hands. ‘We are prisoners of murderers and crazy men who believe in demons.’
‘Yes, sir, it’s not pleasant—but you did mention Mr Manners, sir, as being a resourceful fellow. And if there is a government in Shishan still I doubt that they’ll take too kindly to the smashing up of state property. I dare say it’ll all turn out right in the end, sir, if we give it time.’
‘But where is Manners?’ Herr Fischer squeaked in frustration. ‘I tell you, he is picnicking. That is what he is doing. Picnicking with whores. He may be hours.’
He was startled to see the enigmatic Mr Bowers chuckle. ‘Excuse me, Mr Bowers, I see nothing humorous either in our situation or in what I said.’
‘No, sir, forgive me.’ Bowers coughed, his face still red with mirth. ‘I was only thinking how the Lord will sometimes pick the strangest instruments to work his wondrous ways.’
And it was rather in the fashion of a winged saviour or a deus ex machina at the end of a melodrama that, a few moments afterwards, Henry Manners appeared. The two engineers gaped as the tent flaps shook and a figure wearing a coolie’s hat and a railway worker’s straw raincoat straightened to reveal itself as the English Junker. Under his arm were three Remington rifles, one of which he threw casually to Mr Bowers and another to Fischer.
‘Gentlemen,’ he said. ‘Excuse my attire. English serge is a little conspicuous today. I suggest you follow my example.’ He reached behind him through the tent flap and pulled in a bundle of clothes. ‘The three guards at the door are … resting, shall I say?, and won’t miss their garments, but we don’t want to be here when they wake. Coast seems clear otherwise, and I have some saddled horses at the stable.’
‘But my railway camp, Mr Manners? Are you suggesting I abandon it?’
‘Yes, Herr Fischer, considering that it has been overrun by your workers and is already being redecorated with the heads of some of your colleagues.’
‘Heads? My Charlie was brutally murdered but—’
‘It seems others have shared his fate. I recognised your stoker, Bowers. The grin on the end of his pole is nearly as cheerful as Charlie’s. It’s getting bloody out there, gentlemen. Very bloody.’
The black-bearded engineer bowed his head, but his face was steady when he looked up again. ‘There’s no chance of us getting to the engine, sir?’ he asked. ‘If we could only drive that away…’
‘Sorry, Bowers, it’s an ant’s nest out there. Come on, Captain Fischer, your ship is sinking fast. It’s time for you to abandon the poop deck. Sensible rats should be scampering. Now. Before it’s too late.’
But it was already too late, as they found out before they left the tent.
* * *
Hiram saw all that happened. When he and Fan Yimei had noticed the dust on the hill and heard the thunder of galloping horses approaching, Fan Yimei had wanted to return to the camp to warn Henry. He had tried to prevent her but she had beaten the rump of her mare with her stick and lurched off in the direction of the tent lines. Hiram, grasping for her reins, fell off his own horse, which bolted. So he had been lying on the ground, invisible behind a rock, when the stream of uniformed cavalry had poured out of the trees, rapidly overtaking Fan Yimei, whose bridle was quickly caught and her pell-mell canter halted. The officer commanding the troop, an elegant man with a cruel, hawk-like face, had trotted his white stallion up to her, and the two of them had gazed at each other for some time, he impassively, she with a look of defiance mixed with resignation, her eyes wild. In a quick movement the man had lashed at her with his cane, leaving a thin red mark on her white cheek. Then he had snapped an order, and two soldiers moved to take their positions on either side of her. Guarded thus, she could do nothing but follow the column as it continued its ride to the camp.
Hiram watched the dust settle as the horses disappeared among the tents. He had learned as a child, playing with the Shishan street urchins, how to move silently and inconspicuously. With great care he followed in the same route that Mr Manners had taken earlier, keeping within the shadows of the tents and crawling on his belly across the open spaces. He found himself a hiding-place among a pile of tin cans that had originally contained diesel oil and were now left abandoned. From here he had a good view of the administration tent. Here the soldiers had halted in a fan, their carbines levelled at the entrance. Behind them milled several hundred railway workers, peering to see what was going on. The hawk-faced officer had dismounted and was talking to a grizzled railwayman, who seemed to be in authority. He was pointing in turn at the entrance to the tent and to three naked coolies sitting sheepishly on the ground rubbing sore heads. Hiram was relieved to see Fan Yimei still sitting on her pony with her two guards, one of whom was holding an umbrella over her head against the strong sunshine.
He watched as the officer strolled towards the entrance of the tent, and called loudly, ‘Ma Na Si.’
A conversation followed, which he could not make out. The officer returned to his line of horsemen and gave an order. One of the soldiers fired his carbine into the air. The sharp crack echoed round the still camp, followed by a murmur from the assembled railway workers. The officer waited for about a minute, then barked another order. The soldier fired his carbine towards the top of the tent. The bullet nicked the metal tent pole and there was a clanging sound as it ricocheted.
The tent flap opened and three men in Chinese peasant clothes stepped out. One was Mr Manners, the other Mr Fischer and the third was a tall, bearded man he had never seen before. They were holding rifles and, for a moment, Hiram thought that they were about to use them. He pulled the revolver from his belt and slipped off the safety-catch.
Then Mr Manners laughed and threw his rifle on the ground. The others did the same. Quickly six soldiers ran forward and pinioned their arms.
The officer turned towards the crowd and raised his voice in what sounded like a proclamation. Hiram could make out the words ‘safe cond
uct’ and ‘protection’.
Mr Manners was smiling nonchalantly at his captors. Then he looked in the direction of Fan Yimei and started. Her face expressed alarm and she called something Hiram could not hear. Mr Manners tried to struggle out of the grasp of the two men holding him.
The hawk-faced officer looked slowly from one to the other. His lips curled in a lopsided sneer. He walked towards Mr Manners, his sabre furrowing the sand behind him, took a rifle from one of the soldiers, rammed the butt into his belly, and again, down on his head as he fell. Deliberately he kicked Mr Manners in the side, in the face, and brought the gun butt with full force down on the back of his head.
Hiram felt hot tears stinging his eyes. He pointed the revolver at the officer’s back, but the barrel shook, wavered, and inclined to the ground. He stifled a sob of anger and shame, but he could not take away his eyes.
The officer handed over the task of beating Mr Manners to his men. The two soldiers picked him up and he hung in their arms while a stocky sergeant punched him. His face was a mask of blood and bruises. They continued long after he was unconscious. The crowd watched in silence, and the only sounds were the thump of the blows and whimpers from Fan Yimei, who was being held back by her captors. The officer watched sardonically.
After an eternity the officer gave the order to stop. There was no visible life in the body. They left it lying in bloody contortion where it had fallen on the sand.
The two other foreigners had watched in scared silence. The officer now moved towards them and bowed. He gave orders that they should be released from the grip of the soldiers. Two horses were brought for them, and a small company was despatched to ride off with them in the direction of Shishan.
The officer spent some time more in conversation with the railway foreman. Orders were given for the crowd to disperse, and soldiers were sent in the direction of the makeshift station. After an hour the troopers who were left prepared to saddle up. As an afterthought the body of Henry Manners was thrown over one of the troopers’ saddles where it hung limp and lifeless. The cold-faced officer rode out of the camp with his men behind him. He paid no attention to Fan Yimei, still escorted by her two guards at the back of the column. She had long ceased crying and her face was now as cold and expressionless as his.
The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure Page 50