There was ash on his sleeves, ash on the hem of his gown and on his hands. Ash in his hair.
Li Chao Ch’in groaned.
‘Father?’
He looked up. Li Chang So was looking to him, concern in his eyes.
‘It’s hard, neh?’
Li Chao Ch’in looked away, grimacing with pain. In that instance of his son’s concern, all of his doubts had been blown away. Yet that moment had also exposed him. Made him vulnerable again. And now he sat there, tears coursing down his face, his fists clenched against what he was being forced to feel.
‘I abandoned them… I abandoned them, Chang So…’
The young prince looked back at him, tears running down his own face now. ‘No, Father. You are not to blame. It was that man. You could have not have acted any other way. You gave us all a chance. If you had stayed…’
His voice caught, gave way. His head went down again.
But Li Chao Ch’in shook his head, inconsolable.
He had abandoned them.
Half a world away, in a makeshift office on the edge of what had once been Bremen, Wolfgang Ebert and his team were finalizing the agreement with the Ministry of Contracts.
Amidst the chaos they had resurrected the deal. Just as it had seemed to have slipped from their grasp, Reed had brought them all together once more, labouring day and night to make it work. They went through the agreement clause by clause, all the while knowing that in a day or less they might be dead, or worse, prisoners in Tsao Ch’un’s cells.
It had been a gamble, but as it had turned out, it had paid off spectacularly. The Ministry of Contracts had reported directly back to the Seven and, in gratitude for GenSyn’s declaration of support, their order had been increased fivefold, to a cool fifteen billion yuan.
For Reed, standing there as they raised their wine bowls in noisy celebration, it was a day he would never forget – the day he had become First Level, a member of Chung Kuo’s elite.
That very afternoon, knowing that the deal was imminent, he had taken an hour off to go and see the mansion he would purchase with his share. Had signed the contract there and then. Tonight, after work, he would take Meg and his parents there.
And between times the war had ended and the Seven had triumphed and…
Reed laughed at the thought and sipped from his bowl, then lifted it high, toasting his fellows.
A change of sky, he thought, remembering what his father had said about the old days, when they had first come to the City. There’s been a change of sky.
Yet even as he thought it, the smile he’d been wearing faded. For a moment he’d forgotten.
Alison…
‘Are you all right, old friend?’
Reed looked up, meeting Buck’s eyes. Buck was still Head of Development at Contracts. They had worked so closely these past few months.
‘I was just thinking… of Alison.’
‘Ah, right. A sad business. How’s her son?’
‘He took it badly. Very badly. He’ll be looked after. Only…’
Buck nodded. ‘From what I’ve heard, she wasn’t the only one. A lot of people were undone by the last few days. Pushed over the edge. The uncertainty of it… not a lot of people can live with that.’
‘You can say that again.’
‘In the light of which, what you did, Peter…’ Buck smiled. ‘Well, let’s say we’re not ungrateful. I’m sure GenSyn paid you well, but if you’re ever looking to change your occupation…’
‘The Ministry?’ He laughed. ‘Are you serious?’
‘Absolutely. Chen So I loves you. He’d double your salary at a stroke.’
Reed grinned. ‘Really?’
‘Really. Now finish that off. I fancy a real drink.’
At that very moment, three thousand miles away, Jiang Lei lay in his bed, at rest after his life’s strange journey. It was quiet in the house, the curtains drawn against the afternoon’s sunlight.
Downstairs, the Jiang family was in mourning, grieving the old man’s passing. Every now and then the comset in the study would chime and someone would go to answer it. They would accept the sympathies of old friends who had just heard from other old friends, or from the newscasts which, in the last half hour, had taken up the story.
Young Lo Wen, who had known her grandfather only in his latter days, was amazed by just how famous he was. A great poet? She never even knew he wrote! And not only that but a marshal too, in charge of fifteen million men! He was a man who seemed to have a thousand friends.
Among those messages of condolence was one from an elderly Hung Mao, who, head bared, bowed low and thanked Lo Wen’s mother for her father’s generosity in sparing himself and his family. A man named Jake Reed. Lo Wen asked her mother what he meant by that, only her mother wasn’t going to say. It was Jiang Lei’s ‘private business’. Even so, it made her curious. There was so much she didn’t know about Jiang Lei. But she liked the idea of him having another name – a poetic name – and wanted to do the same. Maybe she could become a poet.
Later, when no one was watching her, she sneaked up to look at him again. He looked so peaceful up there in his big bed, his arms folded across his chest, his light blue ceremonial silks replacing the old satin pyjamas he used to wear. She wanted to touch him, to kiss his brow the way he’d so often kissed hers, but she had been told not to. He was an ancestor now, and to be revered accordingly.
And so there in that cool and silent room she revered him, bowing low to him before saying goodbye, remembering as she did how kind he’d been, how soft and pleasant his voice. A man whom she knew would never have hurt a fly.
‘Goodbye, Jiang Lei,’ she said one final time. And then, because it had been him too, ‘Goodbye, Nai Liu.’
And blew a kiss. A tiny kiss. For her yeh-yeh, her granddad.
‘Ah, Peter, darling… come in… I thought…’
‘We had a little drink,’ he said, stepping past Mary into the hallway. ‘We just signed a big contract, so we had a little celebration. I called Meg on the way back… she’s coming here direct from work.’
‘Peter?’ His father’s voice called from the living room. ‘Is that you, lad?’
He kissed Mary, then went through, stopping dead when he saw what was on the big screen he had bought them last year for their anniversary. ‘Aiya… is that who I think it is?’
Jake came over and gave his boy a hug, then stood next to him, whisky tumbler in hand, saluting the image.
‘Never thought you’d ever see that, eh, lad?’
On the screen was the image of a dead man. And not just any dead man, for this was once a Son of Heaven. Now he was nothing but a naked corpse, lying at the bottom of a well, his pale skin laced with his own blood.
Jake poured his son a tumbler of the old malt, then clinked glasses.
‘It’s over then, thank God!’
Peter winced at that last word. His father knew it was proscribed. ‘Dad…’
‘Ah, fuck it, lad… Do you still think it matters in the light of what’s happened?’
Peter shrugged. He didn’t want to get into an argument again. He wanted tonight to be a good night, a memorable night. But he knew that it did still matter. For this was Chung Kuo, and though their rulers may have changed, the world itself had not. If anything it would get far stricter. For a time.
The world his father had grown up in – that same world he had experienced as a child – was dead and buried. And rightly so. If it had been worth keeping it would have been kept. People would have fought to keep it.
Yeah. There were a dozen arguments to be had on the subject, only tonight he didn’t want one. Dismissing it from mind, he smiled.
‘Mum, Dad… I’ve something I want to show you.’
Shepherd watched the screen, nodding to himself and humming an old, forgotten tune. Something by Beethoven. One of the piano concertos.
He was in the same suite he’d always stayed in when he’d come to visit Tsao Ch’un at the Black Tower, wit
h a view from the wall-length window of the sea. In that sense nothing had changed. But in all others…
On the screen, the camera moved in slowly, giving a close-up on the corpse. Now that it was much closer, you could see that the infestation had begun. Bugs crawled and bit and burrowed, they flew and hummed and laid their eggs. Only Tsao Ch’un, who had hated insects more than he’d hated anything, was unaware. His eyes, once as ferocious as a tiger’s, were now opaque and dull. Whatever demon had once occupied him had now departed. The insects had moved in.
The camera dwelt on them a while, as if making some moral point about the fate of emperors. Or maybe it was just strange, what with the rareness of insects these days.
More than a few would be having nightmares tonight.
From all accounts, an accident had befallen Tsao Ch’un; he had stumbled upon the ancient well in the darkness and, not knowing that the thick wooden lid was rotten, had made to cross it.
And had fallen through.
Shepherd smiled. Poor bastard. Just when he thought he’d got away.
The camera eye drew back, showing the splintered lid, the slope down to the path behind it. Thus he had come, last night as the sun was setting. The Son of Heaven, half naked and undone. On the slopes of T’ieh Shan, Iron Mountain.
It rose further, showing the hill and, beyond it, the site of the crash. In the light of day it seemed an inauspicious place to die. Had so many not been looking for him, he would have lain there for eternity at the bottom of that well, unvisited, the flesh rotting on his bones, the insects burrowing, his rictus smile of death ironic.
But then, Shepherd thought, the Han have little grasp of irony. Fate, yes, but not irony…
‘Mei fa tsu,’ he said, lifting an imaginary glass to his one-time friend and Master. It is fate.
There was a knock at the outer door.
‘Amos?’
It was Li Chao Ch’in. He went across and opened it.
‘Have you seen it?’
The T’ang nodded, then moved past Shepherd, into the room. He was quiet for a moment, then he turned, looking to the other.
‘You know… I thought I’d feel good about it, once I knew he was dead. I thought…’ Li Chao Ch’in took a long breath, then shook his head. ‘Well… it is done with, neh? We can move on. Let the insects have him now.’
Shepherd frowned. ‘What d’you mean?’
‘I mean that we’re leaving him there. Where he fell. Leaving him to rot. There’ll be no honouring of the dead, no ceremonials, not for him. Not after what he did. No, he can lie there till the sun grows cold.’
Surprised by the bitterness in his voice, Shepherd stepped closer, touched his arm.
‘Are you all right, Chao Ch’in?’
Li Chao Ch’in shook his head. ‘I thought I would be, but…’ He swallowed, then, ‘We’ll place a cordon of iron around the site and guard it day and night.’
‘You think that will stop them coming?’
‘No. There will still be those who revere him. To whom he was a great man.’
‘He was a great man.’
Li Chao Ch’in glanced at him, then shrugged. ‘Anyway… are you ready?’
Shepherd nodded. ‘Strange, neh, how both men died on the same day?’
He was talking about Jiang Lei now.
‘Now he was a great man.’
Shepherd smiled. ‘There are those who would argue with you, Li Chao Ch’in.’
‘But not you?’
‘No. Not me. I admired his qualities. He was a true man. And, rarest of all things, an honest man.’
‘Then come… let’s celebrate his life.’
As the last rays of the sun settled over the edge of the City, Li Chao Ch’in’s cruiser set down on the pad above where Jiang Lei rested, in his bed, in the First Level mansion that had been his home these past twenty years.
Stepping down from his craft, the new T’ang of Europe looked about him. It was silent up here on the roof of the City. A silence broken now and then by gusts of wind which blew the gathered dust about in swirls.
He turned as Shepherd stepped out of the craft.
Shepherd looked about him a while, then grinned. ‘I should have built it with more character, neh? A few more minarets and the odd bridge and decorative fountain. As it is…’
‘It works,’ Li Chao Ch’in said. ‘It may not be beautiful, but beauty generally comes at a price, neh? Some rich man’s folly paid for by a thousand poor men’s graft.’
Shepherd stared at him, taken aback. ‘You surprise me, Li Chao Ch’in. Such sentiments…’
‘Can be expressed but once, between you and I, and never again.’
They fell silent. Across the way from them a welcoming committee was forming up, near the airlock.
‘Come,’ Li Chao Ch’in said. ‘Let us do our duty.’
Li Chao Ch’in knelt at the bedside, Shepherd stood directly behind him, both of them bending their heads in respect to the man who lay there, serene in death.
Across from them, on the other side of the massive bed, Jiang Lei’s family waited silently, knelt with their heads lowered, as the T’ang and his advisor paid respect to their Head of Family.
All, that is, except for young Lo Wen. As if she knew she would never witness such an event again, she had raised her head, looking across at the two great men who had come to pay their respects to her yeh-yeh. And they did indeed look like great men, the one – Li Chao Ch’in – for his impressive silks, the other – Shepherd was his name – for his great shock of hair, his beard and his fierce eagle eyes.
As the T’ang stood once more, she saw how his eyes went to her and, despite the solemn nature of the moment, he smiled.
Lo Wen liked that. Liked that he wasn’t like the others, cold and haughty.
‘My dear friends,’ Li Chao Ch’in began, addressing them all. ‘I heard with great sorrow of Jiang Lei’s death, and have to come to celebrate the man. Tomorrow, it has been decided, will be a holiday, to celebrate his life. And to give universal thanks to a man who helped this great world of ours through its birthing pains. A great man. A truly great man.’
There was a great murmur of satisfaction from the family at that. Satisfaction and surprise at the great honour being done their family.
‘Chieh Hsia…’ they answered, bowing low once more, the word hissing out from every mouth, uncoordinated, so that it sounded echoey and strange.
‘And you,’ Li Chao Ch’in said, gesturing to Lo Wen. ‘You must be Jiang Lei’s granddaughter… Lo Wen, is that right?’
She grinned, delighted that he knew her, and bowed her head.
‘Come here, child.’
Li Chao Ch’in picked her up and held her a moment, pleased with how pretty she was.
‘I had two daughters once like you,’ he said, and there was the faintest wistfulness as he said it. Only as he set her down again, he was smiling.
‘You must come and visit me,’ he said. ‘At Tongjiang, once it is rebuilt. You and your family, of course.’
‘Chieh Hsia…’ the older members of the family uttered, honoured even further by this invitation, which spawned yet another spate of bowing and murmuring.
Li Chao Ch’in’s eyes had returned to the figure laid out on the bed.
When he had first worked for Tsao Ch’un as advisor, Jiang Lei had been a figure of awe to him – someone not merely to admire, but to aspire to. It was Tsao Ch’un who had made their world, certainly. But it was the spirit of Jiang Lei, and his alter ego, Nai Liu, who had transformed it. Without Jiang Lei this world of theirs would have been a different, darker place.
Again he bowed his head. ‘Master Jiang… go in peace…’
He would have a great marble edifice built for Jiang Lei. A place where his descendants could come and give honour to their illustrious ancestor; where they could sweep his grave and burn incense as of old. Counterpoint to the well where Tsao Ch’un’s bones lay rotting and untended.
He looked to Shepherd. ‘
Do you wish to say anything?’
Amos stepped forward. He stood still a moment, looking down at the old man. Then, leaning over him, he kissed his brow and taking a single black stone from his pocket, placed it in Jiang Lei’s right hand.
‘For old times’ sake,’ he said, and stepped away.
Later, flying back in the craft, on their way to Bremen, where repairs had already begun, the two men looked across the cabin at each other.
‘Why no cameras?’ Shepherd asked.
‘Because he deserved better than that from us. Deserved not to be used for some cynical act of propaganda.’
‘Yet you meant what you said.’
‘I did.’
‘Then…?’ But Shepherd was confused now. It had seemed, to him, the perfect opportunity to make an impression – to make a firm statement to all the citizens of Chung Kuo that they were starting anew, and that the figure of Jiang Lei was to be their template now.
‘Leave it,’ Li Chao Ch’in said, knowing that Shepherd would not understand. Not that he really understood it himself. Only that it had not seemed right to make that private moment public.
And the girl. Lo Wen. Such a pretty thing she’d been. So like his darling Kuei.
He looked down, a cold shadow falling over him at the thought. For a moment he had forgotten. For the briefest instance the pain had gone away. Looking up, he met Shepherd’s eyes once more – saw how Amos watched him closely, intensely, but for once with an unfeigned sympathy.
‘It will get better, Chieh Hsia.’
‘Will it?’
‘You must take a new wife. Replace the children that you lost.’
Li Chao Ch’in stared at him aghast. ‘Replace?’
‘You cannot live in a void, Chao Ch’in. You survived, and that must be made to mean something. Li Chang So can take your place in Council, once he’s old enough, but for now you need to go forward not back. However much you hurt, you can’t afford to dwell on it. If you were any other man, maybe… only you are T’ang now. One of the Seven. It was not fated for you to be a common man and suffer common miseries.’
There seemed some truth in that. Even so, his heart rebelled against it. Shepherd had not lost what he had lost. Shepherd had not paid the price he had.
Daylight on Iron Mountain Page 37