Mr. Campion said that all that the court had required had been done. A marshal had boarded the ship with two deputies and secured all her papers and flags. In this they enjoyed the complete cooperation of Mr. Atwood and his men, who were overjoyed that the court had seen fit to protect their rights and wages.
But then something very odd happened. Mr. Atwood mentioned to the marshal that the black gang and ship’s engineers, who were now all onshore, had complained bitterly that the ship was haunted because they could smell the ghost of the man who had been lost during the storm. Mr. Atwood took the marshal aside and confirmed that there was no one aboard except himself, the cook, and the cabin boy, but he had made an inspection of the engine room the night before, and in fact the cloying smell of death was anything but illusory. He hadn’t mentioned it to the cook or cabin boy, because they were pretty well spooked already, but there was something definitely decaying down in the engine room. After a short search of the obvious hiding places, nothing was found and Mr. Atwood barely escaped the deeply fetid atmosphere without losing his supper. He described the debilitating odor as akin to death tinged with coal dust, machine oil, and raw sewage.
Mr. Campion wisely chose brevity to explain the rest. He told Captain Hammond that the marshal, commensurate with his duties to inspect the whole ship and its cargo, had all the deck hatches and ventilators opened, especially those that accessed the engine room. Within moments the marshal experienced that same sickly odor for himself. Once the atmosphere belowdecks had somewhat cleared, and with the overhead deck hatches propped open, the marshal and his men masked their lower faces with wet bandanas against the stink and initiated a thorough search. With the air of a man who hates to hear his own words, Mr. Campion described how they at last pulled up the heavy iron engine-room deck plates and discovered a dead man in the bilges. Sadder yet, there wasn’t really that much of him that the rats hadn’t gotten to first. The cause of death couldn’t be disguised, for the marshal and his men saw a large rusting blade still protruding from the victim’s skeletal chest.
Mr. Campion raised his arms in frustration and rolled his eyes to heaven. He bemoaned the fact that this whole crazy business now also involved a homicide, which would definitely cloud matters all around as far as the ship’s disposition was concerned. Mr. Campion verbally rebelled at the thought that the one person who should be held responsible for creating this mortal train of events, and the only character with any explanations worth hearing, the darkly elusive Sigmund Malakoff, had taken to his heels with truly professional dispatch, and was now nowhere to be found, at least not under his own name and description. One might think this fact alone would, of course, place Malakoff in the prime position as chief suspect in the homicide, except for one thing: There wasn’t the least hint of a motive or opportunity connecting the two men. Crewmen who had already been interviewed by the city attorney’s office had stated that Malakoff and the missing crewman had never been seen speaking. Not one man could even hint at a sign of discord between the two men. This line of testimony made everything that much more confusing for poor Mr. Campion, and he desperately wanted Captain Hammond to reinterview the crew and passengers once more to help determine the truth. Due to his reputation for balanced and equitable judgment, Mr. Campion trusted Captain Hammond. If anybody knew how to avoid the snares of public expectation, which was always so freely broadcast by the uninformed, it was Captain Hammond. And there was one further fly in the ointment. The crime had taken place aboard a ship of foreign registry, albeit stranded on American shores. The incident would therefore come under the scrutiny of federal authorities very shortly. In fact, Mr. Campion and the sheriff of Monterey, Mr. Winslow—along with the state marshal who had impounded the ship and made the grizzly discovery—expected to be interviewed by federal attorneys any day. The legal problems inherent in the case would now be compounded. A matter that should have fallen under the jurisdiction of state courts might now easily be made to wait upon the machinations of higher authority, and that could take years. The ship’s creditors might have to cool their heels, and in the meantime the people of Monterey would have to look at the rusting old steamship anchored out in the bay, a painful reminder of an extremely unfortunate incident made all the more tragic by murder and mayhem. Something would have to be done about that ship. As a sign of his blossoming frustration, Mr. Campion even spoke of using his authority to condemn the freighter as a navigational hazard and then having the unsightly derelict towed somewhere else less conspicuous. However, he well knew the crew’s lawyers would object and immediately petition for a stay, so he didn’t press the matter.
In his subsequent interviews with the crew, the captain really didn’t learn anything new, but one disturbing fact did resurface to disturb his thoughts. He had discounted it earlier, but since the missing deckhand had been found murdered, he was forced to examine the information from a new perspective. Several men had recounted that there was something odd and disturbing about the way the dead man had tormented and insulted the Indian doctor and his family whenever he got the chance. But when Mr. Atwood heard of it, and called the crewman to account, the man angrily said it never happened, and swore the Indian faker was making it up because the crewman was a Muslim. In any event, Dr. Neruda chose to let the matter rest even though other crewmen said they overheard further incidents of the same kind.
Captain Hammond found it almost impossible to credit the idea that the man he knew as Dr. Neruda, a strict vegetarian Hindu who didn’t even swat at flies, a man sworn by profession to care for the injured and ill, and a trained surgeon of proven caliber, could resort to cold-blooded murder to avenge a lowly deckhand’s insult to his nonviolent religion. The whole idea seemed too far-fetched at best, but what would matter most was the reaction of the federal marshal’s office when they eventually encountered the same testimony. The captain wondered how he should address the situation, especially as Lady Yee had invested so much time and effort in the doctor. This was not the kind of thing she would allow to rest without a thorough examination and explanation.
That very evening after dinner, Captain Hammond invited his wife into his study, and with his notes spread before him on the desk told her in detail about the murder and the crew testimony concerning the victim and Dr. Neruda. Lady Yee listened very quietly, showed no emotion whatsoever, and then asked only one or two incidental questions. When her husband had answered these to her satisfaction, she thanked him for the information and quietly departed.
Despite her superficial calm and almost indifferent demeanor, the captain knew that Lady Yee would now loft all sail and race to disarm all potential adversaries before a legal confrontation interfered with her own agendas. Yet he instantly perceived that Lady Yee thought the idea of Dr. Neruda acting the role of a murderer for religious defamation totally absurd on the face of it. But he also knew she would have to admit that they lived in a world where even groundless accusations caused great mischief and misery to innocent people all the time. She would have to find a way to forestall such an eventuality before any serious damage resulted, and to that end, Lady Yee quietly disappeared into her own sanctum next to the garden parlor, and she didn’t emerge until after midnight.
The next morning at breakfast Lady Yee asked her husband if he had a copy of the crew list. He said he did. Then she asked if it also included the crewmen’s country of origin. Again he answered in the affirmative. Then she asked if the missing Malakoff had left behind any papers or private logs after he rifled the ship’s safe and escaped. The captain said that if any such papers existed, they would now be in the possession of the arresting state marshal, Mr. Sanchez, who, in turn, would be obliged to give them over to the presiding court upon request. Then he smiled and, accurately predicting her next question, told his wife that he might be able to talk Mr. Rice, the city attorney, into letting him see such evidence, if it existed, but he seriously doubted he’d be allowed to take it away for Lady Yee’s personal examination.
Before the ca
ptain arose from the breakfast table, Lady Yee passed over seven elegantly hand-addressed envelopes. She politely requested that these missives be delivered to Mr. Campion, the harbormaster; Mr. Atwood; Mr. Rice, the city attorney; Mr. Sanchez, the state marshal; Mr. Winslow, the high sheriff of Monterey; and Dr. Neruda. There was also an envelope formally addressed to Captain Hammond. When her husband asked what they contained, Lady Yee said they were invitations for high tea on the following afternoon.
Captain Hammond went to his own small trading office near the customshouse and called in a bicycle messenger to deliver Lady Yee’s invitations. Dr. Neruda’s was sent to the infirmary, where he spent most of his time. Then the captain sat back to read his own invitation. He had no idea what the other letters contained by way of instruction, but he was asked to locate Mr. Atwood’s cabin boy, Jojo Toyuka, and have him brought to the house no later than five-thirty the following afternoon, and this seemed odd since the invitation explicitly said that tea would be served at four.
Later that same afternoon, Captain Hammond paid a call on Mr. Campion at his office. There he discovered that Lady Yee had politely requested that the harbormaster bring along any and all papers relating to the fugitive captain, Sigmund Malakoff. And when Captain Hammond later accidently came across Sheriff Winslow, he discovered that Lady Yee had requested the sheriff to bring any reports he might have concerning the missing sailor, now presumed to be the murdered man recently discovered in the ship’s engine room bilges. After a short discussion, Captain Hammond presumed Marshal Sanchez would also have received a similar request concerning the ship’s papers and manifests now in his custody.
The city attorney, Mr. Rice, made a point of stopping by the captain’s office. He was a little confused by his own invitation, as it requested the recipient to bring along an estimate of the ship’s financial liabilities as listed in the court injunction, and he couldn’t quite fathom what that had to do with the fate of the dead man, as it was obvious he had been killed about the same time the ship fetched up on the rocky teeth of Point Lobos. The captain, though mildly amused, commiserated. But he did say that Lady Yee practically invented social frugality, and that he’d never known her to waste so much as a breath of air, thus he was duly persuaded she had something significant to contribute, and suggested that simple compliance was the fastest way to arrive at a solution to the mystery. Besides, he said with a laugh, Lady Yee would see to it that her maniacal chef, Ah Chu, jumped through burning hoops of custard buns and spun sugar to impress her guests. Her teas were always the choicest blends, and her brandy punch was a heaven-bestowed nectar. Mr. Rice said he’d be proud to attend.
Before returning home that evening, Captain Hammond sought out Mr. Atwood at the French House. There he discovered that Lady Yee had requested Mr. Atwood to bring any private logs he may have kept. She knew from long experience that first officers aboard ship often kept their own detailed journals. They never knew when they might be called upon to face official examination. It was considered better form to pen a complaint than voice one. Written private sentiments, no matter how scathing and vitriolic, could not be considered mutinous unless broadcast to other members of the crew to effect a change in command. With so many uncomfortable hours to fill, and so little satisfaction to be had, one would hardly be surprised to see the length of some of their private logs. Captain Hammond often recounted the story of a deck officer he once knew who was so at odds with every ship he sailed on that his journals often ran to four and five volumes of bitter complaints and criticisms. However, no matter how he might have seethed and scathed in private, while on duty he always remained the most amenable, polite, and competent officer imaginable.
Captain Hammond confided that he had been given instructions to find the cabin boy, Toyuka, and see that he arrived at a certain time. Mr. Atwood offered to attend to that detail on the captain’s behalf, and even suggested that the cook, Mr. Beal, might be interviewed as well. He had supposedly known Malakoff the longest and might be encouraged to say a few enlightening words if approached properly. The captain agreed, but said he thought it best if Toyuka and Beal came separately, and were kept apart until after they were interviewed. Again, Mr. Atwood said he would attend to it, and so Captain Hammond thanked him and went home to dinner.
That night the captain decided not to mention what he had learned from the other recipients of Lady Yee’s invitations. He knew that when she was ready to tell him anything, she would make a solid point of it. Until then he decided to avoid any discussion of her plans on the grounds that what he didn’t know wouldn’t keep him awake that night. He did, however, ask whether she had spoken to Dr. Neruda recently, and she said she had not, and would not talk with him until after he had been interviewed by her other guests. Lady Yee admitted that her professional relationship with Dr. Neruda already tainted her as biased on his behalf, and she wished to avoid any suspicion that she had prompted him to say one thing or another. She had hoped her husband might visit the good doctor in the morning and reassure him that all would be well, and that nothing would transpire to injure his dignity or reputation. Nonetheless, it was important for him to bring the documents she suggested, just in case the obvious called for support.
The next day the captain paid a call on Dr. Neruda at the infirmary, and found him not in the least concerned about anything beyond treating a squid fisherman who had been badly burned when his old iron fire basket collapsed. Nothing else seemed very important by comparison, but he said he would wait on Lady Yee that afternoon as requested. He appeared confident that whatever Lady Yee had tabled, he was to have the benefit of it, so he saw no reason to concern himself further.
Though he said nothing, Captain Hammond was privately very pleased that his wife had the power to inspire such secure feelings of assurance in people, and he fervently hoped she could replicate the sensation for her expected guests. If not, then he feared that perhaps someone might be facing a rope, and he sincerely hoped it wouldn’t be Dr. Neruda. Nonetheless, the captain was well aware that religious intolerance and subsequent violence were a blade that cut in both directions. And though he had come to like and respect Dr. Neruda in the short time he had known him, the captain was modestly aware that he was by no means fluent in the subtleties of spiritual turmoil and hostility when it came to Asian religious conflicts. Indeed, aside from the fact that it seemed a constant all over the world, religious bloodletting was an aspect of human affairs that he found almost incomprehensible. If it had been a matter of one distinct religion going for the throat of a diametrically opposed philosophy, it might have been marginally comprehensible, but the truth made even less sense, for it seemed that Christians murdered Christians with the same enthusiasm used to kill Muslims, and Muslim sects appeared to delight in murdering each other with the same fervor usually reserved for the destruction of Christians. And sadly, the same could also be said for Buddhists, Taoists, Hindus, Sikhs, Parsis, and even Jews. They all appeared capable of destroying members of their own faith as well as those who bowed to a different deity altogether. It had come to Captain Hammond over years of experience that the world’s religions formed the foundation for some of the most irreligious and criminally insane conduct ever devised by mankind. The idea of burning human beings at the stake because they refused to acknowledge a different version of the same deity had always seemed like complete madness as far as the captain was concerned. And sad as he was to admit it even to himself, Captain Hammond wouldn’t have been in the least surprised to discover that Dr. Neruda had indeed killed his tormentor. History was replete with such incidences of moral lunacy, particularly when it came to religious conflicts. He intended to wait upon the truth with an open if somewhat skeptical mind, regardless of Lady Yee’s instincts to the contrary.
15
THE FOLLOWING AFTERNOON found Captain Hammond playing host to all those who had received Lady Yee’s invitations, save, for the moment, Dr. Neruda. Guests had brought a folio of one kind or another, and each seemed loath
to be separated from his parcel. However, they were soon too distracted by the culinary wonders that Ah Chu had assembled on the sideboard to focus on much else. Along with four varieties of rare tea and two kinds of coffee, Captain Hammond was pleased to present his own contribution. This was a seductive and inscrutable concoction that went by the dubious title of “Russian punch.” Though the more exotic ingredients included pomegranate and peach nectar, the whole recipe was a secret that depended upon the moral authority of calvados and pear brandy to make its point. If any potable could be said to replicate a wolf in a sheep’s fleece, Russian punch would fit the description quite nicely. It was the captain’s bemused contention that his secret punch could leach the meanest motives from the world’s greatest misanthropes and transform marginally moral men into archangels. The concoction was always served in small glass cups to avoid accidental inebriation. The captain balanced the portions to warm the cockles of the heart and nurture fellowship. Intoxication, he knew, would have the opposite effect.
The captain temporarily took the head of the table and seated Mr. Campion, Mr. Rice, and Mr. Sanchez to his right, and Mr. Winslow and Mr. Atwood to his left. The chair at the opposite end was reserved for Lady Yee, who had not put in an appearance as yet. She had thought it best to let the men loosen up a bit before putting them through their paces. And there was nothing Ah Chu’s marvelous creations could not amend for the better, though she did take the captain’s Russian punch into account when timing her entry.
As the men discussed the fate of the Canadian ship and the possible whereabouts of the villainous Malakoff, a small silver bell sounded, and Lady Yee made her entrance. All the men at the table stood up at once. Captain Hammond was as surprised as his guests to behold his wife attired in a beautifully tailored azure gown cut to reflect the latest Eastern fashion. Her long, luxuriant hair was cunningly dressed to rival any Gibson girl illustration. Her subtle elegance was set off by an intricate gold hair comb. It was set with a spray of finely polished lapis lazuli stones in the shape of a cresting wave. Lady Yee never dressed in this manner, and her husband found it quite alluring and seductive, and so too did the other gentlemen at the table, for all eyes remained on her for the next hour and a half. Captain Hammond knew his wife had planned all of this some time ago. She never let any detail go begging for attention, or wasted a potential asset, and in that regard she had, in fact, accomplished her ends, for all the men in the room, including her husband, paid very close attention to her every word.
The Silver Lotus Page 19