Anna and the King of Siam

by Margaret Landon

  “Your Excellency,” she began without preamble as soon as she had been admitted to his study, “the servants of your brother have beaten Moonshee in front of my house for refusing to prostrate himself. He is a Persian, and not accustomed to prostrating himself before anyone. I strongly object to this insult to an old servant and myself, and I have come to you for justice.”

  The Kralahome stared at her with his habitual coldness. She could not read his look, but she waited confidently. Ever since the time he had helped her in the matter of Lady Son Klin’s imprisonment she had been content to ignore his appearance of indifference, confident that it cloaked a stern morality. But today he refused to be concerned about his brother’s lawlessness.

  “The old man is a fool,” he said with emphasis. “What happens to him is of no concern to me. Keep him out of my brother’s way if you don’t want him beaten again. Or command him to prostrate himself before his superiors like everyone else. If he refuses to follow the customs of the country, why should I protect him? Furthermore, I have no time to waste on affairs of such a trifling nature as what happens to an old Persian servant of yours. And in the future you mustn’t trouble me with things of this sort. You meddle too much in matters of no moment. They do not interest me! Kindly remember that from now on! You may go.”

  “No,” retorted Anna, thoroughly aroused, “I’m not going yet. Not until I’ve said what I have to say. I came to you for justice because the people in this part of the city are under your jurisdiction. You are the supreme law here, and it is your duty to decide such cases as this. You are respected everywhere in Bangkok and even all over the country because you are supposed to be a man of honor. I don’t take much of your time. I come to you only once in a while when some poor human being is unable to get a fair hearing from one of your own judges, who can be bribed, even if you can’t. Believe me, I don’t do this to annoy you. I do it because I trust your integrity. And so far I haven’t been disappointed. But I am disappointed today. You say that what happens to my old Moonshee isn’t important to you, but I think that it is. It’s important because what happened to him was something that your own brother did. Your reputation for justice will suffer if you allow members of your family to take the law into their own hands. You say that a matter like this is a trifle. And I say that it is a big thing when a man in your position overlooks the ruffianly behavior of his brother and condones brutality by refusing to right the wrong done, or even to reprimand the offender.”

  She turned and wept toward the door. “Just one other thing,” she added. “I came to you because I preferred to honor the government of this country by expressing in action my belief that it is capable of administering justice. You have shown me how wrong I am. Very well! Unless you do something to prevent a repetition of this morning’s outrage, I’ll go where the word justice is respected as something more than an empty sound to be ignored when it conflicts with vested privilege. I shan’t need to trouble you again with complaints. I can always take them directly to Sir Robert Schomburgk. Good morning.”

  And she swept from the room without giving the Kralahome a chance to say anything more. As she was leaving the palace she met the interpreter coming in, but she ignored him.

  That same evening she sat on her piazza where the air was cooler than in the house, embroidering a coat for Boy’s approaching birthday. She was planning to invite the few children living in Bangkok for a small celebration. Beside her on a table stood a heavy Argand lamp. She heard nothing, not the sound of the gate opening or closing, nor a footfall. But all at once she felt a heavy blow on the head. As she pitched sideways she overturned the table and the lamp.

  She did not know how long she was unconscious, although it was probably only a matter of seconds. But when she awoke it was to blackness. The light had gone out, and so fortunately had not set fire to anything. Boy was beside her trying with all his strength to lift her from the floor, and crying at the top of his voice, “Beebe, maree! Beebe, maree!” (Come here), reverting in his excitement to Malay. In a moment there was the sound of Beebe’s feet running from the river where she had been bathing. Anna tried to get up, but was too sick and dizzy to move. “Quiet, Louis! I’m all right,” she said weakly, and put her arms around him to reassure him.

  When Beebe came with a lamp there was blood on the floor from a deep gash in Anna’s head. Beside her lay a jagged stone four inches long and two inches wide. Beebe set down the lamp and began to cry, wringing her hands, and wailing, “First my husband, and then my mistress! It will be my turn next, and then what will become of the chota baba sahib?”

  “Beebe, stop it!” Anna ordered feebly. “Help me to bed, and get some bandages.”

  Together Beebe and Boy supported Anna into the house. The blood continued to gush from her wound. Beebe hurried for clean rags and water while Louis leaned over his mother with tears streaming down his frightened face. Beebe was very deft and quick and in a few minutes the wound was washed and bandaged. Anna was so weak that she sank into an exhausted sleep. When she awoke in the morning Louis was in a chair beside her, his head resting on her pillow. Although she was still quite shaky from loss of blood, Anna felt better. Her head was badly swollen, but things could have been worse. The stone had been thrown with great force at close range, and if it had hit her temple might have resulted in a fatal injury.

  When Beebe came in her face was wet with tears. “Moonshee is dying,” she said between sobs. Anna struggled to her feet at once and, supporting herself on Beebe’s arm and Louis’s shoulder, went to see her teacher. She was relieved to find that he was not dying, although he was still very ill. The shame and outrage of his beating evidently troubled him as much as the physical wounds. “Mem sahib,” he said in a whisper, “we must go back to Singapore on the next boat. They will murder us in this land of Kafirs. First me and then you!”

  Anna tried in vain to convince the terrified old man that such a catastrophe could hardly happen again, since she was going to appeal to the British Consul for protection if the Kralahome failed to act. He would not be beguiled. “Such barbarians! Such infidels!” he wept. “They will creep into the house and slit our throats as we lie sleeping in our beds if we stay here another day. We must go by the first boat, Mem sahib, before they have time to kill us!”

  Anna assured him that her wound was only skin deep, and that she was certain there would be no further violence. Trying to convince him, she convinced herself, but so far as Moonshee was concerned her words had no effect. He had no faith in the power of the British Consul to control a people so depraved as the Siamese. In the end Anna was obliged to promise Moonshee and Beebe that they could return to Singapore on the next trip of the Chow Phya. How she would get along without them she did not know, but she could not coax them into staying. They tried to persuade her that she ought to go with them for Boy’s sake if not for her own. But she was adamant.

  Before she wrote to Sir Robert, she sent for Mr. Hunter in his official capacity as secretary to the Kralahome. When she told him what had happened, he looked at her bandaged head and pale face long and seriously. Then he started for the premier’s palace abruptly. The next morning he was back with several copies of a proclamation in the Siamese language signed by the Kralahome himself to the effect that persons found injuring or in any way molesting members of Mem Leonowens’ household would be severely punished.

  As he was leaving to post them in conspicuous places in the neighborhood, Anna remarked, “Oh, by the way, Mr. Hunter, would you be sure to leave one or two in a friendly way at the home of my neighbor on the left there?” The expression on Mr. Hunter’s face as the truth slowly dawned on him was a blend of indignation, disgust, and contempt.

  “The pusillanimous rascal!” he exclaimed, as he hurried off toward the interpreter’s house.

  It was several days before Anna was strong enough to go back to work. The King sent for her twice to help with some urgent French correspondence, but she replied that she was weak and ill and could not c
ome.

  He was upset by the first overtly aggressive move against Siamese territory on the part of the French. It had become known in Bangkok that Admiral de la Grandière, Governor of Cochin-China, had signed a treaty with King Norodom of Cambodia in August. Norodom, who like the other Cambodian princes had grown up in Siam, had been King Mongkut’s personal friend and own appointee for the position of viceroy. He was at that time awaiting coronation by Siamese officials. He wrote hastily to King Mongkut to explain that he had signed the treaty under duress, and had protested unavailingly that by rights de la Grandière should have negotiated any treaty with him through Bangkok. The admiral had tried to flatter the prince by assuring him that France stood prepared to recognize Cambodia’s “independence” of Siam. And under the velvet glove of cajolery lay the steel of sixty ships and their guns, stationed at the mouth of the Mekong River. So Norodom, timorous and uncertain, had signed a treaty dictated by the French, which defined the “conditions upon which His Majesty the Emperor of the French consents to transform his rights of suzerainty over the Kingdom of Cambodia to a Protectorate.”

  Bangkok was seething with speculation. The general view was expressed by Dr. Bradley in his Bangkok Calendar where he said:

  The startling news arrives that the French government has made a treaty with the Rajah of Cambodia (well known as being a dependent of Siam) not only without the least reference of the case to the Siamese government to whom it was unquestionably due, but positively in the face of the King’s disapprobation of anything of the sort. By the treaty as understood here, the Rajah of Cambodia gives France the exclusive privileges of establishing a consulate at the mouth of the Cambodia River, and hence the exclusive privilege of all the trade of that noble stream. If this report be true, it remains to be seen whether Napoleon III will sanction such an act of his officials. To do so would reflect great shame upon that distinguished idea of honesty; that it was a crime, no less, to take advantage of certain circumstances of weakness in the Siamese government to filch from her a grand bit of Siamese territory, while as yet France was in unbroken treaty of friendship with Siam, without the least shadow of any provocation to commit the foul deed, but an enormous lust of empire. We will hope for better tidings.

  When Anna could return to her work, the King scrutinized her thoughtfully. She was still pale, and her head was bandaged. Before they plunged into the French correspondence he remarked: “Mem, there is a house or apartment building nearby our Palace. Should you like to live in it, you may have it when it is finished. Then you can come more quickly when I shall have need of you. You may look at it and see if you like.”

  That was good news, almost good enough to compensate for the blow on the head. It would put her not only on the same side of the river as the Palace, but also on the same side as the British Consulate, and a long way from the interpreter. In addition she would be living in the area policed by Mr. Ames and his constables, and near the new road that the King was having constructed parallel to the river, the first modern road that Bangkok had ever seen. A few people were already talking about importing carriages, while others were riding out morning and evening to get the air. The road made it possible to reach the British Consulate by land from her new residence. She would feel much safer. In the event of illness she would be near Dr. Campbell, and in case of extreme danger, near the best refuge the city offered.

  She was almost comforted for the loss of Moonshee and Beebe. Moonshee still insisted on going, so Anna made reservations on the Chow Phya. But at the last minute Beebe with tears in her eyes refused to accompany her husband to Singapore. She unpacked her things and prepared to stay. He did not urge her when she wept, and said: “How can I leave the Mem and the chota baba sahib alone in this terrible land when they have been so good to me all these many years? They cannot take care of themselves without me.” So Moonshee went alone, not particularly disturbed by his wife’s defection. A wife, after all, was something that a good Moslem could always replace.

  Before the move across the river could be made one more calamity overtook them. Anna had a violent attack of fever. She had been late arriving at school that morning because of the sudden illness of one of her servants. When she reached the gate of the inner city and found that the clock of the observatory had already struck ten, she ran rather than walked through the streets, and arrived breathless at the long corridor leading to her temple schoolroom. Here her progress was stopped by a crowd of women, children, slaves, attendants, all hurrying in the same direction.

  As it was long past the hour for morning service, and was not a fête day, she wondered, while she pushed and squeezed her way through the crowd, what was going on. When she succeeded in entering the temple she found that it was jammed with high court ladies and their maids, and a still greater crowd of slaves, who filled every inch of the vast hall down to the lowest steps. The excitement could not have been more intense if the occasion had been an execution.

  Anna continued to work her way toward her schoolroom table and finally reached the inner ring of women. There on the table lay the object that had produced both the crowd and the wild interest. Lying naked, surrounded by the grinning and ejaculating women, was an extraordinarily beautiful white child, a little girl perhaps eighteen months old. A mass of golden curls clustered around her head. Her skin was pearly soft. There was a slight flush on her cheeks. She was smiling at the crowd of women. If she had had wings sprouting from her shoulders she would have looked like a cherub plucked from one of Raphael’s pictures.

  A dark, rather handsome woman was perched on the table near the child. She was calling: “My ladies, she is worth a great deal more than ten ticals. She is worth her weight in gold. I would not sell her for less than two hundred ticals, and I do so only because I am very poor and cannot afford to keep her myself. Look at her skin! Look at her hair! Look at her lovely hands and feet!” As she talked she pointed to the various features with her index finger. Immediately a dozen or more voices shouted:

  “Fifteen ticals!”

  “Seventeen!”

  “Twenty!”

  “Twenty-five!”

  “Thirty!”

  “Thirty-five ticals!”

  Then came another pause. The auctioneer did not cry, “Going, going, gone!” as in an Occidental auction, but again described enticingly the charms of the little girl, ending with, “You cannot have her for thirty-five ticals. I’ll keep her myself, even if I have to starve!”

  Then came another rush of bids for the child, who was still smiling, as though she were half asleep. Her fists dug into her eyes and she yawned, showing tiny white teeth as perfect as everything else about her. The bidding shot up to fifty-five ticals.

  “No one shall have her for that price,” shouted the woman. “Look at her hair, like sunbeams, or like the gold that you wear around your necks, my ladies. Look at her skin, like the inside of a conch shell for satin. See, she is plump and well! See, she is happy and laughing all day long! What a jewel of a child! And you offer me only fifty-five ticals. Wa! It is nothing!”

  “Sixty!”

  “Sixty-five!”

  “Seventy!”

  “Seventy-five ticals!”

  The final bidder was Lady Piam, not the Kralahome’s sister, who had first brought Anna to the Palace, but one of the royal consorts. She was not among Anna’s personal friends in the harem, although she had two sons in the school. She belonged to the small coterie of powerful court ladies who dominated the Inside, and was the only woman who ever managed the King with acknowledged success. She was not pretty, but she had a good figure. She was totally uneducated and of barely respectable birth, being Chinese on her father’s side, but she had succeeded where others had failed because she had tact and a nice intuitive appreciation of character. Once she had sensed her growing influence over the King, she had contrived to foster it with only a slight rebuff now and then. She had been in the Palace eight years, and during that time had amassed a considerable fortune, procured goo
d places at court for members of her family, and had introduced many merchants from the Chinese community to the King in a business way, much to her own profit. Such a swift rise to power would ordinarily have left behind a trail of enemies, but Khun Chom Piam was a diplomat. She seemed to live in continual fear. She retained in her pay most of the female executive force in the Palace. She was warily humble and conciliating toward her rivals, with the result that they pitied her rather than envied her. This pity would probably have come to an abrupt end if they could have foreseen that her three little daughters—two toddlers and a new baby—would some day be the three queens of King Chulalongkorn; and that Lady Piam’s artful politics were to ensure her family’s position, make her the grandmother of two kings and one queen, and the great-grandmother of a third king.

  Suddenly as the auctioneer paused Anna heard her own voice. “One hundred ticals,” she said in a faltering tone.

  A loud burst of laughter hailed her bid. It was well known that Anna looked upon the traffic in human beings as wrong.

  “What do you want with her?” asked Lady Piam. “You have a white child of your own.”

  When Anna made no reply, she turned and bid one hundred and ten ticals.

  At once Anna cried vehemently, “One hundred and twenty ticals!”