A movement below the terraces caught his eye, but it was only three monkeys sidling with waving tails to and fro along an invisible boundary, peering at the changed scene with inquisitive wariness; having looked that way Theodore now saw that the pipe-line was gone – the cunning structure of giant bamboo-stems, raised on stilts, that carried water from the spring to the terraces. It was not just pulled down; it was gone. He could see no sign of the pieces. Somewhere among the smoking heaps lay the ashes of those pipes, which Father had been so proud of. Their disappearance seemed final proof that the Settlement was wiped out, burnt, or looted, or slaughtered and thrown into the ravine.
All gone! It was as if a child had been playing in the sand, building its toy village with detailed passion, when the wheel of a passing cart had rolled across and demolished it into mere sand.
He couldn’t tell how long he stood there, staring, trembling, gasping as if he had a fever, shaking his head to and fro. It was no use praying. Even God, the strong, unchanging presence who had filled every second of sleep and waking in the life of the Settlement; creator, judge, friend – he too had been driven away by that heedless wheel.
A fresh downpour from the uncaring clouds broke the trance, and because there was nothing else to do Theodore picked his way back towards the road, careless of whether he was seen. His mind was numb, but his body had decided it was going back to explore the ruins of the Settlement.
2
OUT ON THE open road the rain was a fine drizzle. Theodore’s feet walked his body along the grassy edge, still obeying Fu T’iao’s advice to be wary – in this case to leave no tracks on the slithery bare clay at the road’s centre. When he reached the ravine he halted. The bridge was gone.
His mind, which seemed for a while to have been wandering somewhere outside his body, came back and stared at the wreckage, unsurprised. He remembered the hammer of the axe-strokes in the night. He remembered Father fondling the hand-rail and saying, ‘With God’s will, that’ll stay put for a hundred years.’ The bridge was somehow part of Father, of his belief that man must worship with his hands as much as his mind, of his ingenuity in combining Chinese techniques with American knowledge to produce structures which were both light and strong and always managed to look as though they belonged where he put them, of his seeing that if he built the bridge then the road would take the short-cut and bring trade to nourish the Settlement. And now, for the very reasons that Father had built it, the people who had come in the night had smashed it down. Sure. But the old path would still be there – they wouldn’t trouble to destroy that because it was not Father’s work.
Theodore turned heavily, and felt his eyes widen at the sight of the people who had appeared behind him in the road, their coming muffled by the swish and whisper of rain. He gazed at them, too exhausted and uncaring to bolt for the cover of the trees. About ten people, and four horses. A slim young man, bedraggled despite the brown umbrella he carried, walked in front. His clothes were those of a peasant but he wore a neat little embroidered cap and moved in a manner which declared that he was not accustomed to trudging along sodden upland tracks. Behind him came the first of the horses, a creature so strikingly noble in its bearing – its coat a glossy brown, with a white blaze, its neck arched and ears pricked despite the drenching morning – that it took Theodore a moment to observe that its rider was almost equally out of place in this setting. The rider, who carried a dark green umbrella and sat sideways in the saddle, was clearly a woman and not Chinese, though her long reddy-brown cloak concealed her figure and her face was hidden by a veil which hung from the brim of her hat and was knotted under her chin.
The others were nothing unusual, ponies and peasants, hired to carry burdens – in the ponies’ case a pair of long wicker baskets slung on either side of their saddles and covered with green canvas, and in the men’s case a pair of smaller baskets slung fore and aft on a coolie-pole, which each man carried on his shoulder. All, except the noble horse and its veiled rider, trudged with a sullen and despairing air, as if they could hope for no end to their journey or to the rain. None paid any attention to Theodore, who was also a normal enough sight, a sodden peasant boy carrying a blanket and a satchel. The woman rode to the edge of the ravine and stared at the wreckage of Father’s bridge.
‘Oh, Jesus!’ she said. ‘Why did I ever leave Battersea?’
She spoke good English but with a curious, clipped whine. Theodore winced at the blasphemy but couldn’t stop staring. The men put down their loads and muttered.
‘Ah, for Christ’s sake!’ she said. ‘There’s got to be another way across. Ask the men, Lung. Ask them how far it is to this here mission.’
The young man with the cap and brown umbrella turned to the porters.
‘How far is to foreign village?’ he said in bad Miao.
The men shrugged and looked away. One muttered something inaudible. The young man turned back to the woman.
‘No way cross,’ he said in English as bad as his Miao. ‘Mission place very far.’
‘Come off it,’ said the woman. ‘That bloke don’t know nothing and what’s more he didn’t tell you nothing. Ask that kid there.’
The young man turned to Theodore.
‘Do you speak Mandarin?’ he asked despairingly.
Theodore nodded.
‘Why is there no bridge?’ said the young man. ‘This foreign princess is hideously dishonoured by the inadequacy of these roads. Can this appalling chasm be crossed elsewhere? How far is it to the Christian village? Is the missionary rich and charitable?’
‘Mission is burnt,’ said Theodore, wary now with human contact and trying to speak as though Mandarin didn’t come naturally to him and also as though the news meant nothing to him. ‘Men came in night. Break bridge. Burn mission. Is another path cross river.’
‘Men burnt the mission?’ said Lung, disappointment shading into alarm. He took a couple of paces to the woman’s side and began to whisper to her in English, voluble and frightened. Theodore, as he had turned to point the way to the path, had noticed some of the porters listening and had guessed that they spoke more Mandarin than they’d admitted. Now they drew back behind the horses in a close group, the Mandarin-speakers clearly explaining to the others what had happened.
‘It is begun,’ said one of them in Miao.
Lung and the woman were at the edge of the ravine now, peering across the gorge and no doubt seeing for the first time the wisps of smoke that still drifted above the blossoming orchard. The group of porters opened out and came forward in a stealthy line, one with a stubby knife in his hand and two others with clubs.
‘Miss! Watch out! Behind you!’ shouted Theodore.
His yell made the men hesitate, but the woman moved with extraordinary speed, dropping her umbrella, kicking her horse round and reining him back as he half-reared, and at the same time snatching a stocky-barrelled rifle from the holster by her saddle. She dropped the reins but remained steady in the saddle as the horse fidgeted back into stillness, and the gun swung along the line of porters, who fell back a pace, glancing at each other out of the corner of their eyes, waiting for someone else to start the attack.
‘Slimy bunch of bastards,’ she said. ‘Knew it the minute we hired them. Where’ve you skived off to, Lung, you yellow bleeder?’
There was no answer. The young man had vanished.
‘Show your face or I’ll leave you here,’ she said calmly. ‘And you won’t get no wages, neither.’
Lung emerged creepingly from behind a tree on the other side of the road.
‘Jesus, what a cock-up!’ said the woman. ‘Have we hired a bunch of bleeding Boxers, then?’
‘Not honourable Boxers, Missy. This men robbers, pirates. Think rob Missy, kill Missy, say they honourable Boxers.’
‘’Spect you’re right,’ she muttered. ‘Don’t make no odds. Tell ’em this gun here’s a twelve-shot repeater – that’s one bullet each and a few to spare. Tell ’em to drop their knives and turn rou
nd. I’ll count three and then I’ll shoot – I’ll start with that beggar with the club.’
Tremblingly Lung managed to put the sentences together. Nobody moved. The woman raised the gun to her shoulder, aiming at a squat, angry-looking man near the centre of the line.
‘One,’ she said. ‘Two.’
The club fell and the man turned. She swung the gun along the line, pivoting the others by force of will. Three knives and another club fell.
‘Fair enough,’ she said. ‘Now tell ’em to put their hands over their heads. Right. Now, Lung, pick up a knife and slit the back of each man’s trousers, from his belt to arse. Ah, get on with it, you yellow bleeder. I want ’em so they can walk, but not without holding their breeches up, see? Keep yourself bent low, so as I got a good sight of the bloke you’re doing.’
Still Lung stood twitching by his tree. The woman began to swear, without raising her voice but somehow flooding it with energy. Theodore had heard people swearing before – donkey-drivers and such, using the Settlement road because of the new bridge – but never in English. Some of the words he knew from the Bible, others were strange; but he knew that only a soul, man or woman, hopelessly lost to Christ could have spoken them in this manner.
Lung’s nerve broke. He darted forward, grabbed up a knife and bent behind the right-hand man, then moved down the line like a gardener performing some rapid piece of pruning on a row of fruit-trees. As he left each man a dramatic change took place, the shabby but serviceable pantaloons tumbling down to ankle-level, leaving some with bare buttocks and some with a twist of loin-cloth.
‘Fair enough,’ said the woman. ‘Now tell the bleeders to grab their trousies and march. Straight along the road, see? First feller to stop, I’ll shoot him dead, right? Same if he tries to scarper for the woods.’
Lung, strutting now with a sort of confidence, strung the order into his smattered Miao. The men clutched their trousers by the waist-bands and shambled off down the road. One or two glanced over their shoulders and saw the gun levelled steady as ever. The woman clicked her tongue and her horse, with no further command, walked forward behind the retreating porters. Half-hypnotized Theodore followed the procession to the first bend in the road, where she stopped the horse with another muttered order. Beyond the bend the road lay straight for more than a hundred yards, so when the men began to glance over their shoulders again they saw her still sitting there, motionless and ready. Slowly the group lost cohesion. Heads turned in argument, free hands gesticulated; another few seconds and they would break for the cover of the trees. Sensing that instant, the woman raised her gun to her shoulder and fired two shots above their heads. Yelling like parakeets they broke into a run, straight on down the road. Two of them tripped – over their trousers, perhaps, or each other – but picked themselves out of the mud and raced on round the further bend. Theodore heard the woman chuckle and turned to see the gun now pointing at him.
‘’Scuse the liberty, young man,’ she said. ‘Just I can’t afford to lose you. You speak English?’
‘Velly little English,’ said Theodore.
‘Fair enough. I shan’t hurt you. I want you to show me this here path. You’re from the mission, I expect? Poor little bleeder. What’s your name?’
Theodore hesitated. Father despised all liars, godly or pagan. ‘Christian name Theodore,’ he said.
Her face was a shadowed vagueness behind her veil, but from the way she cocked her head he had the impression that she was looking at him with sudden sharpness.
‘That’ll have to do,’ she said. ‘Hullo, Theo. I’m Mrs Jones. This here’s Lung. Hi! Grab that pony, one of you!’
She had slid the gun into its holster while she was speaking and was turning back towards the bridge when one of the pack-ponies came round the bend at a nervous tittup, almost knocking Theodore over. More by luck than skill he caught its halter and led it back to where Mrs Jones and Lung were gazing at the baskets which the porters had left behind. She slid from her horse and handed its reins to Lung while she went to catch another of the ponies which was wandering off between the trees. Her skirt was so long that she had to hold it clear of the ground with her left hand, but she seemed to find this no impediment and cornered and caught the pony with no fuss at all. The third pony, a grey, was grazing placidly by the edge of the ravine, so Theodore handed his halter to Lung and caught it and led it back.
‘There’s a young man what’s got his head screwed on,’ said Mrs Jones. ‘Tie her to that there branch, and we’ll see what we can chuck out. Heave my bath off Rollo for a start, Lung, and all that lot of empty specimen boxes – that’s the ticket . . .’
Mrs Jones and Theodore did most of the sorting, because Lung was fastidious, even in this mud and danger, about handling objects or carrying weights, so in the end he took the gun and stood sentry. Mrs Jones was quick and decisive, knowing what every basket held and making up her mind at once what she could spare and what there would be room for. Theodore piled the discarded stuff at the edge of the road.
‘Leave ’em good and obvious,’ she said, ‘so as if any of them bastards come back after us they’ll stop here and see what they can nick.’
Everything seemed very well made, though most of it had seen a lot of wear. A spare tent bore the label ‘Army & Navy Stores, London. Invincible Weatherproof Size 3.’ The collecting boxes were of dark oiled wood with brass corners. There seemed to be a surprising number of stoves.
‘That’ll have to do,’ she said at last. ‘We’re not a bleeding Chinese charity – it’ll cost me a couple of hundred quid to replace that lot, I daresay. You take Bessie and lead the way, Theo. She’s lazy but she’s quiet. Then you, Lung, with Rollo. I’ll take Albert, who’s a right bastard, and Sir Nigel can tag along behind. I better take me rifle, Lung, if you’ve finished playing soldiers.’
Lung, who had indeed been acting out the role of sentry in a slightly exaggerated way, handed over the weapon and Theodore started between the trees, heading left-handed until he reached the footpath. Looking back over his shoulder he saw the line of horses winding between the trunks, with the one which the woman had been riding coming steadily along in the rear. Drenched and mud-spattered though it was it moved in a quite different style from the dispirited trudge of the pack-ponies, with its head held in a manner that seemed aware and interested as it followed Mrs Jones. She strode along, holding her skirt in a graceful fashion with her left hand and Albert’s bridle with her right. She was short – no taller than the Chinese women in the Congregation, many of whom stood barely as high as Father’s elbow – and under her shape-muffling cloak she looked decidedly plump; but she moved with a sway and ease that made it seem as if she weighed very little, and though Albert – a lean-headed, liver-coloured brute – tugged and wrestled at the bridle she controlled him without apparent effort. She saw Theodore looking round and raised the hand that held the skirt a little further, at the same time cocking her wrist, a gesture no doubt meant only to tell him that he was doing well, but somehow full of liveliness and also vaguely teasing.
The effect was sharp enough to pierce through the trance of shock in which Theodore was once more moving, and to make him wonder what sort of person she was. English, he thought, though she spoke differently from the few English missionaries he had met, with her tinny vowels and lack of aitches. She seemed to be rich. She was wicked – a blasphemer, who had also laughed at the exposed buttocks of her porters. Shameless. But the few words she had spoken to Theodore, like the gesture he had just observed, gave him a sense of somebody full of life and intelligence and friendliness.
Pack-ponies in hill country are used to awkward tracks, and Bessie followed Theodore down into the ravine easily enough, without interrupting his confused musings. He reached the flat rock by the stepping-stones and waited till Lung reached the rock and stood beside him, staring at the stepping-stones where they stood black amid the white rush of foam.
‘Horses cannot cross here,’ Lung said angrily in Mandarin.
‘Why have you brought us here? What have I done that I must perish in this place of uncivilized demons?’
‘Horses used to cross here before the bridge was built,’ said Theodore, ‘provided the river was low.’
‘Where is the Princess? Why does she take so long? If she falls in the river, who will pay my wages? Did I join the robbers when they attacked her? No, I fought for her with my bare hands!’
A loose stone clattered on the rock beside them, and they turned and saw that Mrs Jones had managed to blindfold Albert and was forcing him to feel his way down. Her voice, swearing steadily, rose above the river-noise.
‘No cross here, Missy,’ called Lung. ‘Water very bad.’
‘Oh, go and fry your face,’ she shouted, as with a furious heave she managed to rush the pony the last few yards down to the rock.
‘Jesus!’ she said, ‘I wouldn’t do that again for a thousand quid. What are you on about, Lung? I’ve taken horses through worse than that. Theo, you nip across them stones and get ready to hold them. I’ll ride Sir Nigel through and lead the others, one at a time. I’ll take Albert first and get him done with. Right?’
She managed it, though twice she nearly lost her seat when a horse missed its footing in the tearing waters. Lung crossed last of all, teetering on each stone as he nerved himself for the next leap.
‘Don’t you look so smug, young man,’ muttered Mrs Jones as she and Theodore stood watching him. ‘It takes a lot more nerve to do things what you don’t fancy than it does with things what you do. You could start taking Bessie up that path now.’
The climb was easier than the descent had been; the path was better and in any case the horses found it more natural to pick their way uphill. Theodore had time to look about. Further down the ravine, held by the river against a jut of rock, was a bundle of green-blue cloth half-hidden by foam. Mrs Teng had an overshirt of just that colour. Theodore peered at it until he realized that he would rather not know for sure whether it was Mrs Teng’s body or just some bundle dropped in flight, and as he looked away his eye was caught by a movement on the further cliff. Three men were beginning to scramble down the path on the further cliff.
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