Killigrew and the Golden Dragon

by Jonathan Lunn

  Killigrew backed away from the terrified brave. ‘Do not be alarmed,’ he said in Cantonese. ‘I mean you no harm. I will try to help you, if I can. See, I am going to put my sword away.’ He slotted his cutlass into its scabbard. The brave regarded him with suspicion, but lowered his sword after a moment.

  ‘What have you got?’ demanded Hayes, coming through the door behind him.

  The brave immediately brought up his sword once more. His grimy face was streaked with tears, but his expression was grimly determined.

  ‘Tartar brave,’ Killigrew said in English, and switched back to Cantonese for the soldier’s benefit. ‘It is all right, he is a friend. We are not going to harm you. What is your name?’

  The brave cuffed the tears from his cheeks. ‘Yan.’

  ‘All right, Yan. My name is Kit Killigrew; I’m an officer of the British navy. You understand British navy?’

  Yan nodded. ‘High-nose barbarians enemies of Celestial Kingdom.’

  Killigrew shook his head. ‘Not enemies. Friends. Britain and China are at peace now. We’re going to help you. But you must come with us. This junk is adrift and being carried towards a reef. In a few minutes, the rocks will tear out her keel. Then she will either sink or be pounded on the reef. Understand?’

  Yan nodded, and sheathed his sword.

  The boarding party made a cursory search of the rest of the junk but found no one else. They put Yan in the boat and rowed back to where Verran awaited them on the deck of the Golden Dragon. Yan had never been on a barbarian devil-ship before and was apprehensive, but Killigrew managed to reassure him. He took Yan down to the saloon, gave him a towel to dry himself and a shot of brandy to steady his nerves. He poured himself a generous measure, too. He felt he needed it after the sights he had seen on the deck of the junk. There was still some laudanum in the bottle Verran had left in his cabin; he would need it to help him sleep tonight.

  Yan gasped as he swallowed the fiery liquor. ‘How-how-ah!’

  ‘Good?’

  ‘Very good!’

  Killigrew smiled and sat down facing the brave. ‘Yan, I need you to tell me what happened. Most importantly, I need you to tell me how much time passed between the pilongs leaving the junk and our arrival. Do you have any idea?’

  Yan shook his head. ‘I know they attacked at the Hour of the Snake. After that I lost track of the time.’

  Killigrew knew that the Hour of the Snake could mean any time between nine and eleven o’clock in the morning. He glanced at the chronometer on the sideboard. It was twenty-three minutes past one. ‘So there was not much time between the pilongs leaving and our arrival?’

  Yan grimaced. He seemed much more relaxed now. ‘It felt like much time.’

  ‘I know, Yan, I’m sure it did.’ Killigrew’s mind was racing. Even if the pilongs had attacked the junks at nine, they could not be more than a couple of hours away. ‘Did you see which direction they sailed in?’

  Yan shook his head. ‘No. I was hiding below decks. I stayed there until all was quiet, and then I waited longer. I thought it might be a trick, to make me come out of hiding.’ He hung his head. ‘I was very afraid.’

  ‘That’s only natural. Amongst my people I am considered very brave, but I am frightened sometimes too. I know if I had been through what you have endured today, I would have gone out of my mind with terror.’

  Yan looked morose. ‘I am a coward. I hid and left my comrades to die.’

  ‘Listen, Yan. You followed the only sensible course of action. If you had come out of hiding, you too would have been killed, and there would have been no benefit. But now you can help us catch the pilongs who attacked your junk, and avenge the deaths of your comrades.’

  Yan did not look much cheered by this prospect. Before Killigrew could urge him to try to remember some clue which might give them an indication as to which direction the pilongs had sailed in, there was a knock at the door. Still jumpy, Yan looked up in alarm.

  ‘It’s all right, Yan. You stay there.’ Killigrew stood up and opened the door a crack.

  It was Muda, the Golden Dragon’s Malay steward, with a tray of food for the prisoner. ‘Captainee wantchee savvy if Chinee man tellee alla yet?’

  ‘Not yet, Muda.’ Killigrew took the tray from the steward and closed the door behind him with his heel. He put the tray down in front of Yan. ‘Are you hungry?’

  Yan nodded. ‘Very.’

  ‘The ship’s cook prepared this for you.’ The tray bore a bowl of stewed pork, another of fried rice, and a pair of chopsticks: a reassuringly Oriental meal for their Chinese guest. Yan thanked Killigrew and tucked in eagerly.

  The lieutenant sat back in his chair and lit a cheroot. He was impatient to get in pursuit of the pilongs, but he knew that pressing the brave would only make him panic, and a man who was panicking could not think clearly.

  Yan was almost halfway through the meal when he looked up suddenly. ‘I heard! I heard the pilongs talking. They said something about “the brothers”.’

  For a moment Killigrew wondered if he was talking about the Brotherhood of Heaven, Earth and Man, and then it clicked. There were two islets off the coast of Lan-tao Island known as “the Brothers”. But that was in Cap-sing-mun anchorage, right beneath the noses of the barbarians, and seemed an unlikely rendezvous for pilongs. Dredging his memory he remembered there were two more islets, also named “the brothers”, off the coast of Hainan Island.

  ‘Did they mean the ones off the south coast of Hainan?’ he asked.

  ‘I do not know. I suppose that might be what they meant.’

  ‘All right, Yan. You stay here and finish your dinner. I’ll tell Captain Verran.’

  Even as Killigrew made his way from the saloon to Verran’s quarters, his initial elation was overhauled by suspicion. He did not doubt Yan was telling the truth, but it was all too easy. Could it be the pilongs had known that the Golden Dragon was coming, and they had deliberately let Yan overhear them talking about the Brothers as the bait to an elaborate trap?

  He knocked on the door to Verran’s day room.

  ‘Who is it?’

  ‘Killigrew.’

  ‘Come in, Kit.’ Verran’s day room was decorated like any English parlour, with chintz antimacassars over the easy chairs and lace curtains as delicate as cobwebs stretched over the stern window. Verran was sitting down to dinner. ‘Close the door behind you. Has your new pal told you anything yet?’

  ‘He overheard the pilongs say something about the Brothers.’

  ‘Off Hainan?’ Verran was on his feet in an instant. He crossed to the door and called up. ‘Mr Boggs!’

  ‘Sir?’

  ‘Set a course north by north-west for the Brothers, off Hainan Island. Tell Mr MacGillivray full speed ahead.’

  ‘Aye, aye, sir.’

  Verran closed the door and sat down again. ‘We can reach the Brothers in a day’s steaming,’ he told Killigrew enthusiastically. ‘If we’re only a few hours behind the pilongs there’s every chance we’ll overhaul them on the way.’

  ‘Perhaps that’s what they want.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘It’s all too convenient, Yan having overheard a vital clue like that.’

  ‘You think your new pal might be a plant?’

  ‘Even William Macready isn’t that good an actor. But it could be they deliberately let him escape detection, and then let him overhear their intentions.’

  Verran stared at him, and then laughed. ‘By God, Kit, you’re a suspicious son of a gun, aren’t you?’

  ‘Doctor’s orders. He says I’ll increase my life expectancy so long as I don’t accept anything at face value.’

  Verran chuckled. ‘I’m surprised your doctor didn’t recommend you swallow the anchor and take a job in the City, if he’s so worried about your life expectancy.’

  Killigrew grinned. ‘He did. I told him it was out of the question.’

  ‘He’s probably worried about whether or not you’ll live long eno
ugh to pay his bills. Don’t worry, Kit. If it is a trap, the pilongs are going to discover that this dragon has sharp claws.’

  * * *

  Killigrew almost choked when Yan told him that the three Imperial junks had sailed to the Paracels not to catch Zhai Jing-mu, but to parley with him. ‘Admiral Nie wanted to offer him an amnesty for all his crimes and a post in the Imperial Navy, in return for his helping to sweep the other pilongs from the seas,’ explained Yan.

  ‘Was Admiral Nie acting on Imperial authority? I mean, did the Imperial Grand Council know what Nie was doing?’

  ‘I do not know. I am only small fry; humble soldiers like me are told nothing. But I got the impression that negotiations had been going on between Admiral Nie and Zhai Jing-mu for many months. That is why the admiral thought it would be safe to meet Zhai at the rendezvous, why we let him and his men on board the flagship. We only allowed a few to board. We did not know that Zhai had other agents amongst our crew.’

  ‘What happened? Did the negotiations fall apart?’

  ‘I do not think so, Killigrew-qua. As soon as the pilongs had a foothold on board the flagship, the shooting began.’

  ‘So either something changed Zhai’s mind about accepting the amnesty, or he had been planning this for months, stringing Admiral Nie along with the attack in mind.’

  ‘I suppose so.’

  Killigrew wondered what Zhai Jing-mu hoped to achieve by attacking three Imperial men-o’-war, apart from annoying the Imperial authorities even further. ‘Was there any treasure on board any of the junks in the flotilla?’ he asked Yan.

  ‘I do not think so, but after the slaughter, I heard the pilongs taking armaments and ammunition from the junk: cannon, gunpowder, shot, gingalls, swords.’

  ‘A valuable haul to a man like Zhai Jing-mu, but at a devilish price: I can’t imagine anyone being foolish enough to offer him another chance at amnesty after this. He made the Imperial authorities lose “face”. They’ll go all out to catch him now. As long as the Ch’ing Dynasty rules in Peking, he’ll never be safe.’

  It was the morning of the day after they had found the three junks stricken off the Paracels. The monsoon was over, the rain had stopped abruptly and the heavy swells of the sea had given way to a light chop. The Golden Dragon steamed along the coast of Hainan Island, off the south coast of China, the sails close-hauled to give the steamer an extra few knots.

  Killigrew had taken Yan on a tour of the steamer, explaining to him as simply as possible how the steam from the boilers powered the pistons which drove the paddle-wheels, and showing him the thirty-six pounder in the forecastle and the eight-inch shell-gun in the stern to reassure him they had nothing to fear from the pilongs they were sailing to meet. ‘One hit from a shell can sometimes be enough to blow a junk clean out of the water,’ he had told Yan. ‘I know: I’ve seen it happen.’ Sensible to the fact that if these barbarians meant him harm they had already had every opportunity to kill him, Yan was much more calm than he had been the day before.

  ‘On deck there!’ cried the look-out at the masthead. ‘Sail ho!’

  ‘Where away?’ demanded Hayes.

  ‘Dead ahead!’

  Killigrew took the telescope from the binnacle and ascended to the top of the starboard paddle-box. Bracing his legs on the flat keel of the upturned paddle-box boat there, he extended the telescope and peered through the rain. Almost at once he picked out the mat-and-rattan sails of two three-masted junks sailing abreast before the wind. He descended to the quarterdeck once more.

  ‘What’s their heading?’ asked Verran.

  ‘West by north.’

  ‘Coming straight towards us, you mean.’

  Killigrew nodded. ‘Or sailing along the coast in the opposite direction to us, depending on which way you look at it. You think it could be Zhai Jing-mu?’

  ‘I doubt it. He’s supposed to be sailing away from us, not towards us, remember?’ He took the telescope from Killigrew and lifted it to his eye. ‘It’s probably just a pair of fishing junks.’

  ‘All the same, if he was only a couple of hours ahead of us we should have caught him by now. You don’t suppose we passed them in the night, do you?’

  ‘It’s possible. My people would have kept a pretty sharp look-out for them, but we could have passed them as they tacked miles to one side of our course.’ He snapped the telescope shut and handed it to Hassan to replace in the binnacle. ‘Still, at least we know where they’re going. And if it’s a trap, I’m sure they’ll make certain we find them.’

  ‘I still don’t like it.’ Killigrew lowered his voice. ‘The most powerful shell-gun in the world can only shoot one junk at a time, and you know how these pilongs rely on force of numbers. If we find ourselves heavily outnumbered…’

  Verran stared at him in astonishment. ‘Kit! Surely you’re not suggesting we turn tail and run back to Hong Kong?’

  ‘Christ, no! But I want to make sure we give ourselves every possible advantage. If it is a trap, the pilongs will be expecting us to sail for the Brothers, correct?’ Verran nodded. ‘Why make it easy for them? The Brothers could be where their ambush is laid. I say we heave-to in Galong Bay, a couple of miles to westward. We’ll stop the engines so the smoke from our funnel doesn’t give them advance warning of our approach, anchor in the bay and send a boat ashore. A landing party can approach the Brothers from landward, and see what the pilongs have got in store for us.’

  ‘Sounds like a first-rate plan to me. Let’s go below and work out the details.’

  ‘Later.’ Killigrew nodded to where they were fast coming up on the two junks. ‘These may not be Zhai Jing-mu’s junks, but there’s no reason why we should limit ourselves to him. There are plenty of other pilongs in these waters. We’ll stop these two and search them. If they’re not pilongs, they may be able to give us some information about where the pilongs are.’

  ‘All right,’ Verran said cautiously. ‘We’ll hail them as they pass us, then come about and overhaul them from astern. Hassan, call all hands to quarters.’

  As the Golden Dragon’s crew scuttled to their action stations, Killigrew took out his pepperbox and checked each of the barrels was primed and loaded. He had cleaned it out after the soaking it had got the previous day; as long as he stayed under the awning which kept the worst of the rain off the steamer’s deck, it should be all right.

  He glanced up at the two junks again, so close now that all but their masts and sails were hidden beneath the Golden Dragon’s prow from where Killigrew stood on the quarter-deck. Both junks were less than half the size of Admiral Nie’s flagship and if they were not careful they were going to be run-down by the steamer.

  ‘Hadn’t you better put the helm over?’ asked Killigrew.

  Verran grinned. ‘The hell with them. They can move for us.’

  For a moment it looked as though the two junks would sail under the steamer’s prow, but when they were less than two cables away they suddenly parted so that they would pass on either side of the Golden Dragon. Killigrew relaxed.

  When the two junks were a hundred feet apart, a cable suddenly rose up out of the water between them, running between the sterns of the two junks.

  It came to Killigrew in a flash: this was how they were able to catch and board faster vessels, meeting them head on; the cable would catch across the Golden Dragon’s prow, and the two junks would be swung in towards the steamer’s sides, coming against her bulwarks fifty feet abaft of the prow. The pilongs would be perfectly placed to throw grappling irons over the steamer’s bulwarks.

  They meant to board the Golden Dragon!

  Killigrew crossed the deck to where Dando, Firebrace, Gadsby and O’Connor stood on the forecastle with the rest of the bow-chaser’s gun crew. ‘Push her over to the aftermost port-side gun port! We’ll knock out the one to port first as she comes under our prow; then we’ll have only one left to worry about…’

  Dando and O’Connor put their shoulders to the thirty-six-pounder and tried to slide
it on its brass racers, but it was too heavy for just the two of them.

  Killigrew rounded furiously on the two landsmen, Firebrace and Gadsby. ‘Don’t just stand there, you horse-marines! Bear a hand!’ Swearing, Killigrew joined Dando and O’Connor at trying to move the bow-chaser.

  A couple of pistol shots sounded and O’Connor gasped. Next to him, Dando slumped over the gun. Killigrew stared at them both in astonishment. O’Connor slid to the deck, dead, and Killigrew saw a bloody wound in Dando’s back. He realised the shots had come not from the junks, but from behind him. As the two junks sailed past the prow on either side, he glanced over his shoulder and saw Firebrace with a pair of smoking pistols in his hands.

  ‘Are you insane?’ he spluttered.

  Gadsby also had a pistol in one hand and he levelled it at Killigrew. ‘Never saner, you sonuvabitch. Hand over the pepperbox.’

  Killigrew stared at him for a moment. The two junks bumped against the steamer on either side, just ahead of the paddle-boxes. The rest of the Golden Dragon’s crew, far from preparing to repel boarders, were making fast the ropes which the pilongs threw up to them. A moment later the paddle-wheels stopped turning and Hassan ordered the sails boxed.

  Realising that he had been betrayed on all sides, Killigrew put his hand on the grip of his pepperbox.

  ‘Uh-hunh!’ growled Gadsby. ‘Handsomely does it, Mr Killigrew. Cap’n Verran says he wants you taken alive, but I’ll put a bullet in your skull before I risk my own skin.’