The Stone Dragon

by Peter Watt

  Liza was too tired to challenge John any further. ‘I think the way I feel right now your dream has a very slight appeal,’ she sighed.

  ‘I would not hold you to any promise,’ he said softly, a bullet cracking overhead to remind them where they were. ‘I truly think that you are a lady worth a man’s life.’

  As they reached a deserted, shady verandah, Liza turned to face John. ‘Mr Wong … John, that is the nicest thing a man has said to me,’ she said, taking his hand in her own. ‘But you would think differently of me if we were not trapped in this terrible place.’

  ‘No,’ John said quietly. ‘When my wife died I devoted all my time to raising my son and daughter in the best possible way I could. I allowed no woman to come into my life, but now that they are both adults, it is time to think about myself.’

  Liza withdrew her hand and gazed at the courtyard strewn with the debris of war: spent cartridge cases, scattered balls of metal the size of grapes and chunks of masonry from buildings hit by high explosive artillery shells. ‘You know nothing about me,’ Liza said. ‘We are strangers to each other.’

  ‘I admit that I know very little about you,’ John conceded. ‘But what I know, and will never fully understand, is that I find you beautiful and desirable to the point that makes me want to learn more about you.’

  ‘If God grants us that chance, John, we may do so.’

  In the distance they could hear a bell tolling with an irritating clang, disturbing the precious moment they shared.

  ‘Another attack,’ John said wearily. ‘I have to return to the barricades.’

  Liza took a deep breath and sighed. ‘I must return to the hospital,’ she said. ‘I am to help boil up rice water for our patients with dysentery.’

  As they stood John reached out to touch her on the cheek. ‘I meant what I said.’

  ‘I know,’ Liza replied, reaching up to touch his hand. ‘I will admit that I do have some feelings for you as well but I am afraid.’

  John did not ask Liza what she feared. He already knew that they would be lucky if they saw one more sunrise before they were killed. Without another word he turned and walked away.

  For a day Liling had lain in a lather of sweat on the straw mattress. Andrew had known that it would be inevitable. Considering the crowded conditions and lack of hygiene in the Fu, there was bound to be an outbreak of virulent disease. He had ensured that he and Liling took precautions to avoid having the deadly fingers of disease grip them, but somehow Liling had taken sick. She had attempted to hide her growing illness as she tended to the mothers with children who were packed into the once spotless former palace. But eventually Andrew had noticed how ill she really was and forced her to lie down on their mattress in the privacy of their tiny room. It did not take long for the young woman to slip into a fever-induced state verging on a coma. Kneeling over her, Andrew held her wrist and felt her pulse beating weakly. Now and then she tossed her head, muttering incoherently, and Andrew forced back the tears. ‘Dear God, please do not take this young woman,’ he whispered.

  Already he had seen the over-crowded mass of refugees coming down with smallpox, a disease that most often proved fatal.

  Liling was at the edge of death and given the lack of medical supplies there was little Andrew could do for her but pray that she had not contracted the deadly sickness. Maybe she had scarlet fever, he tried to reassure himself. As dangerous as that disease was it was preferable to contracting smallpox.

  ‘Take some water,’ Andrew said soothingly, lifting a bowl to Liling’s lips.

  The water dribbled away and Andrew sat back on his legs in his despair. The stench all around was appalling but he had grown used to it. In the former palace the conditions were beyond insanitary but the besieged European community did not seem to care, preoccupied as they were with making sandbags, rationing food and meeting the random attacks from the Chinese.

  Shaking the ground with its explosive power, the blast of an artillery shell nearby shook dust down on Liling’s face. Andrew threw his body over her to protect the seriously ill girl from possible shrapnel while terrified men, women and children huddled together, crying for deliverance from the Christian God they had accepted, forsaking the worship of their old gods and ancestors.

  Andrew cringed when a second round burst even closer, hugging Liling to him.

  Amid the screams and sobs of shrapnel victims, Andrew recognised the desperate cry for medical assistance and rose unsteadily to his feet. For the moment there was nothing else he could do for Liling. He stumbled into a wide hallway where refugees were huddled, gripping what little they owned. A man was crying for help. He lay on his stomach, attempting to crawl down the hallway on his elbows while trailing his pulverised legs behind him. Just beyond the dying man Andrew could see a woman holding what was left of her child’s body, blood soaking the woman from her own wounds, and those of her headless baby. Andrew intercepted the woman stumbling in a daze towards him. Gently, he removed the lifeless body of the baby from the woman’s arms and placed it on the ground. With soothing words he asked her to sit down and slid her blouse above her head to reveal the ugly black entry wounds of shrapnel balls in her breast. Even as he examined her, blood spewed from her mouth and she fell sideways.

  Andrew squatted to examine the severely wounded man but knew that it was only a matter of time before he also died. The man looked at him with pleading eyes.

  ‘I am sorry, old chap,’ Andrew said in English. ‘We do not have the means to amputate, and I doubt that would help anyway.’

  As if understanding the foreign language the man lay face down on the dusty, tiled floor and cried softly.

  Andrew rose to his feet just as another shell exploded somewhere in the maze of the palace corridors. People shrieked and Andrew felt the nervous tic at the corner of his eye. His world had already come apart and he wondered why he should continue to live.

  Naomi had been isolated for half a day before Tung came to visit her. He brought a bowl of steaming noodles and vegetables as well as lychees and seasoned pork pieces and placed them on a solid timber table at the centre of the room.

  ‘It was the best I could do,’ he apologised. ‘I wish it could be more.’

  But to Naomi it was a rare feast. She accepted the food with an expression of gratitude and ate gingerly to ensure it went a long way to sating her hunger. While in Han’s control she’d had very little to eat and had lost much weight. Her clothes hung loose on her thin frame and she often found herself remembering the large steaks her father loved to serve up. At the time, the slabs of meat had seemed to her almost obscene in their size and bloody texture. Now she would have given anything to be devouring one of those steaks with its accompanying fried potatoes and garden peas.

  ‘I thank you for your kindness,’ she said between mouthfuls of the delicious spicy food.

  ‘I am going to attempt to get a message to your father,’ Tung said, taking a seat on the single chair in the room as Naomi ate, sitting on her low bed of a timber frame and straw mattress. ‘We have spies inside the legation.’

  Naomi was not surprised to learn this. She knew there were many refugees and it only took one well-placed person to provide intelligence. She glanced up at Tung and noticed that the bandage he had been wearing around his head when she first met him was gone, revealing a large scab where his left ear should have been.

  ‘You have been injured,’ she said sympathetically.

  ‘It is nothing,’ Tung grimaced, ‘I was luckier than the man beside me.’

  Naomi did not question him further but resumed eating her meal. When she had finished the noodles she placed the empty bowl on the table. ‘Will you tell me of events in the legation?’ she asked.

  ‘The foreign devils hold out with great tenacity,’ Tung answered. ‘Our leaders seem to be disorganised in their assessment of the tactical situation, launching probing attacks instead of an all-out assault.’

  Good, Naomi thought. Not that she was not partia
lly sympathetic to the rebel cause to free China but her Western upbringing had instilled in her a fierce pride for the might of the British Empire. ‘You do not seem to be like the other Boxers I have met,’ Naomi said.

  ‘How do you mean?’ Tung countered.

  ‘I sense a wise and even gentle side to you,’ Naomi responded, without having to think of the appropriate reply. ‘You appear to be a very intelligent man.’

  Tung shifted and Naomi could see that her words had touched a nerve. ‘I am a man whose life has been dedicated to seeing China become a free and progressive nation. To that end who you may perceive me to be is of little matter.’

  ‘Have you always been a revolutionary?’ Naomi asked, finding that she had a genuine interest in her captor for more reasons than that he had shown only kindness and courtesy towards her.

  ‘I was once a Shaolin priest,’ Tung said, finding it easy to talk to this pretty young woman. ‘I had a desire to learn and from my travels in the country I saw that we are a people who deserve to regain our past glory. To that end I learned English along with practising my martial skills. Eventually I fell in with people who followed the Son of Heaven. They shared our dream of a non-violent means to modernising China and eventually freeing us of the destructive foreigners. Sadly, my lord is now a prisoner of the Empress and the only option left to me was to take a command with the Boxer movement.’

  ‘As a former man of religion how can you justify the terrible things the Boxers do to Christian converts?’ Naomi asked.

  ‘I do not agree with all that my comrades do,’ Tung sighed. ‘But they are uneducated and ignorant men steeped in superstition. I pray that when we win our war things will change under a good leader. But who that will be I do not know. For the moment it is the Empress. I pray that she will see that the people of China, who are sacrificing so much in the war against the foreign powers, need benign leadership.’

  ‘Do you believe she will?’ Naomi asked pointedly.

  Tung did not answer but rose to his feet. ‘I will return to my duties,’ he said. ‘But I will visit you as often as I can. After all, I am using the most vigorous means at my disposal to extract any information you may still have of use to our cause.’

  Naomi thought that she saw a shadow of a smile on Tung’s face and knew she would be looking forward to seeing this enigmatic man again – if only for the fact that in his presence she felt safe.

  • • •

  Twenty-eight-year-old Captain Jack Myers, USMC, had been on the Tartar Wall for a week and the lack of sleep and constant danger were taking their toll on his mental and physical stamina. As commander of the crucial defensive position he had guessed that the Chinese opponents were placing their best sharpshooters up against his positions and the well-aimed, deadly fire was proving to him that this was true. Other national legation forces defending the compound were certainly not on the receiving end of such attacks.

  In his growing despair he had sent a note to Edwin Conger, the overall senior American representative in the city. It is slow death to remain here … The men all feel that they are in a trap and simply await the hour of execution.

  The response from the senior commanders of the defence was a simple answer from non-military men. Myers was to lead a sortie along the wall to capture a position held by the enemy, relieving the pressure on his own defences.

  ‘You have seen it,’ Captain Myers said to Lieutenant Simpson, huddled beside his commander. Both peered cautiously through a narrow slit in the sandbags. ‘The little yellow bastards have pushed the construction of their wall to reach the left-hand flank of our breastworks.’

  Even as they sat back from their observation post they could hear the cheerful laughter of the enemy at work, carefully piling up more bricks to reinforce what was becoming a fort from which they could eventually look down into the US marines’ position.

  ‘I hear that you have a man who speaks their language,’ Myers said.

  ‘A civilian, Mr Wong, he is part Chinese,’ Simpson replied. ‘Kind of attached himself to us and we kind of made him an honorary marine on account of his shooting prowess. He is an Aussie.’

  ‘Maybe he could come up here and tell us what the hell those little Celestial friends of his are jabbering about,’ Myers suggested.

  Simpson turned to a marine crouching nearby and gave orders to fetch the Australian civilian and a short time later John joined the American officers. Simpson introduced them.

  ‘You understand what they are saying over there?’ Myers asked bluntly.

  John strained forward and listened to the words. ‘You don’t really want to know, Captain Myers,’ he said with a frown.

  ‘Spit it out, Mr Wong,’ Myers said.

  ‘They are saying it won’t be long before they are in a position to overrun us, and that they will take their time torturing to death each and every defender who falls into their hands alive. They are even suggesting the best ways of keeping a man alive in prolonged agony. One idea is to …’

  ‘I’ve heard enough,’ Myers cut John short. ‘Simpson has informed me that you have been doing commendable work alongside his boys, Mr Wong.’

  ‘Just what I can do,’ John shrugged modestly. ‘As has Private Larry Gilles.’

  ‘Gilles?’ Myers asked, looking to Simpson.

  ‘One of my men,’ Simpson answered. ‘Currently laid up with a wound.’

  ‘He should get a medal,’ John added. ‘I am sure that a few days back he took out that marksman who was causing your boys a bit of grief.’

  Myers grinned. ‘I will look into writing up something,’ he said, taking John’s hint. ‘Thank you, Mr Wong. You can return to your position.’

  John slipped away, staying in a low crouch to ensure none of his big frame was exposed at any point on his way back to his position on the line.

  ‘We have no choice,’ Myers said. ‘Or tomorrow those Chinks will be putting into practice what Mr Wong has said they are planning for us. Organise a force of whatever you can get together of our allies, Mr Simpson. We are to assemble at 3 am at the bell tower. These are my orders for an assault on the enemy positions to our front.’

  He passed Simpson a sheet of paper on which he had pencilled a sketch of their location marking the enemy defences as well as instructions as to how he envisaged the attack to be carried out.

  ‘Can I attach Mr Wong to our contribution, sir?’ Simpson asked, causing Myers to frown.

  ‘Mr Wong is a foreign national and a civilian,’ Myers answered.

  ‘But my men feel he is lucky,’ Simpson countered.

  ‘I suppose,’ Myers accepted.

  Simpson slipped away to liaise with his Russian and British opposites, and to inform John that he would be joining the group selected for the early morning attack.

  The single candle flickered in the room. Andrew’s whole being was racked with his grief. Sobbing, he kneeled by Liling’s lifeless body, holding her in his arms and spilling tears down her now strangely serene face. Her death had come with a convulsion and there had been nothing he could do to save the courageous girl to whom he had sworn his love only hours earlier. When she had a brief moment of lucid recognition before slipping back into her fevered coma, he had promised her that when she finally got well they would always be together. Liling had smiled, hearing his words.

  Now she was dead. Andrew’s tears were bitter when he remembered how he had gone to the European hospital to ask for medicines but had been refused the precious supplies when the doctor had learned the young Australian wanted the medicine for a Chinese patient. ‘Sorry, old chap,’ the doctor had dismissed Andrew. ‘But I must keep our supplies for the European sick.’

  An old Chinese man whose back was bent with age shuffled over to Andrew. ‘She is with her ancestors,’ he said, gently touching the young man on the shoulder. ‘She has flown from this terrible place to one far better.’

  Andrew looked up at the old man. ‘She was not a Christian,’ he said.

  ‘She wa
s an angel,’ the old man replied. ‘Liling helped so many of us as an angel from God would. Now she flies with the other angels the missionaries have told us about.’

  Andrew gripped Liling’s slight body to his own as if to never let it go.

  ‘Thank you, honourable uncle, for your words,’ Andrew said, seeing the sad pain of loss on the old man’s face. ‘You are right in what you have said. Liling is now with God and His angels.’

  Andrew lowered Liling’s body onto the dusty floor and rose unsteadily to his feet. All he could do for her now was ensure that she be buried rather than disposed of over the wall like unwanted refuse.

  ‘Please watch over Liling,’ Andrew asked the old man. ‘I will return to have her buried.’

  The old man nodded. ‘It is she who now watches over us,’ he said. ‘But I will stay by her side until you return.’

  Andrew turned and walked away, wiping the remaining traces of tears from his face.

  • • •

  John had left the line to get some sleep in Robert’s quarters before the planned night assault on the Chinese barricades. Sitting with his back against the wall, he stared up through the hole in the roof at a cluster of stars, thinking about many things. His mind drifted over the fate of his two children, the feelings he had for Liza and the fear he felt for the ominously close hour of the dangerous attack on the enemy. As weary as he was, John decided to write a letter. He groped around until he found the stub of a candle which he lit. Its weak light provided just enough illumination for him to locate the desk drawer where he knew Robert kept his stationery.

  On top of the desk, which was splintered in places from the impact of shrapnel balls, was the little stone dragon encased in its protective shell. John paused in his search to gaze at the object. It bore the recent scar of a shrapnel ball that had glanced off it, chipping away a very small fragment from the outer shell of the rock. John took the stone in his hand and drew it close to his face to examine the tiny traces of the long extinct creature’s feet. He did not know why but he found himself quietly swearing an oath. ‘I swear to the spirit of this rock and its dragon that I will protect my son, Andrew, my daughter, Naomi, and also Liza and Liling from all harm that may attempt to come upon them.’