“Can’t we use it?” Mary suggested. “If our competitors are struck, and we …”
“No one’s immune, Mary,” the Old Gentleman replied. “A general strike’s like the plague, sparing no one. When they close down Hong Kong’s commerce, we’ll all suffer. And God knows how bad the rioting will become or when it’ll end. That’s why I called you back. I need you both here.”
Sir Jonathan’s admission that he needed Charles and her was the gravest portent to Mary. Granted he was getting older. But, for the first time since Charles had roused the wrath of the Green Band in 1905, the Old Gentleman had acknowledged that he was neither omniscient nor self-sufficient. Both China and the world were changing so fast that even the supremely self-confident Sir Jonathan was deeply perturbed. He spoke of his anxieties only once more before they drove under the great winged-dragon arch toward The Castle to review the reports from his network of informants.
“We’ve passed through many changes,” he mused. “China, Asia, and the West—all are totally different from what they were a quarter of a century ago. This time the coming changes—political, economic, and social—will not simply mean the end of one era and the beginning of a new one. It will be a completely new epoch we won’t recognize. Tien Kai, Ti Chen! ‘The heavens are opening, and the earth is splitting!’”
Nothing could have revealed Sir Jonathan’s profound sense of loss and apprehension more than his invoking the old Chinese warning of disaster.
The depression induced by Sir Jonathan’s forebodings was, for that evening at least, dispelled by the joy of homecoming. Charlotte and her husband Manfei Way joined them for dinner, and Mary dandled her first grandchild. To Charles’s delight, it was a boy. The furry-haired, two-month-old bundle called Mokhing looked like a Chinese doll with chubby red cheeks and glowing dark eyes. When Mary cradled him in her arms, she was reconciled to becoming a grandmother at forty-five. Her scapegrace eldest son heightened her pleasure. His dark hair slicked down, he was a new Jonnie in a tight-waisted jacket and flaring trousers called “Oxford bags.” During her seven-month absence he had been transformed from a sober-sided young English gentleman into that new creature the Americans called a “sheik.” She almost expected him to produce a ukulele and croon “The Japanese Sandman.” Instead, he drew her into the chintz-bright morning-room overlooking the garden, which was hung with firefly lanterns.
“I wish to speak with Mother alone,” he declared, firmly closing the door on the rest of the family.
“Now, Jonnie, what’s the mystery?” Mary asked, seating herself in the familiar easy-chair and tugging at her short skirt.
“No mystery, Mother.” The blarney fell easily from his lips, and his voice took on the Sekloong lilt. “Just that I’m in love with the most smashing, beautiful, charming girl in the world—next to you, of course!”
“May I ask who she is, this paragon?”
“She’s Sarah, Sarah Haleevie.”
“Little Sarah? Who would’ve suspected?”
“You’re twitting me. Don’t tell me you knew?”
“Let us say I suspected.”
The glow in Jonnie’s hazel eyes faded. Like a small boy, he was crestfallen at being deprived of his surprise. But his smile soon flashed again, and he whooped in joy.
“If you guessed, I imagine there’ll be no trouble. Uncle Judah says he’s all for it.”
“Does he? And your grandfather? Is he delighted, too?”
“Not quite. Mumbled the same line. What about a nice Chinese girl? But his heart wasn’t in it. Later, he conceded Sarah was kuo-te-chü, ‘can pass okay,’ and Judah Haleevie’s a great man. So, if you and Father …”
“Not so fast, Jonnie. You know she’s Jewish, don’t you?”
“I never thought you were prejudiced, Mother?” he said defensively.
“I am, you know. I’ve got many prejudices you don’t know about. But anti-Semitism’s not one of them. I was thinking about the children.”
“Oh, Sarah’s agreed. They’ll be baptized Catholics, though she won’t think of converting herself. And I’d never press her.”
“I’m not concerned about that, Jonnie. I didn’t convert either, though my religious feelings aren’t as strong as the Haleevies’. But there’s bound to be tension over the children.”
“There won’t be, Mother, I assure you. When two people love each other …”
“I rejoice at the wisdom of your youth, but please don’t read me a lecture on love. Life doesn’t always work out as we plan. I don’t want Sarah to be resentful later.”
“Oh, we’ve thought of that. Discussed it. She makes only two conditions. Any children must be given instruction in their Jewish heritage, and, she says, learn about their Chinese heritage as well.”
“A sensible girl,” Mary said. “So all is arranged except for your parents’ blessing, is it?”
“You do approve, Mother,” he pressed, “don’t you?”
“Yes, I suppose so. We’re getting to be a very mixed lot, aren’t we, Jonnie?”
“Bless you, Mother, bless you!” He dropped a kiss on her cheek. “I knew you’d understand.”
“All right. Now go and tell your father. And apologize for telling me first.”
Jonnie bounded out of the morning-room. When the door slammed behind him, Mary leaned back against the flowered slipcover. She had known from the beginning that she was “mixed up with a damned strange lot,” as her father had said. Recalling her affection for Judah Haleevie and Two-Gun Cohen, she reflected somewhat guiltily that she much preferred the vivacious Sarah as a daughter-in-law to the dull Manfei Way as a son-in-law, and she wondered idly how Jonnie would tell Charles.
The encounter between father and son was initially smoother than Jonnie’s talk with his mother. Tolerant and relaxed, Charles Sekloong heard the news with pleasure. His dynastic sense had been troubled by the single state of the heir-presumptive to the House of Sekloong.
“Told your mother first, did you?” he remarked without rancor. “Well, I suppose marriage is women’s business.”
“But what do you think, Father?” Jonnie pressed.
“It’s a good match, good for business, too. She won’t get much, though. Not with seven brothers. But making the Haleevie connection closer won’t do us any harm. Like the girl, do you?”
“Father, she’s super. Lovely, a good sport, and smart as a whip. We talk the same language, too.”
“’Twould be surprising if you didn’t. She’s not a Hottentot or an Eskimo, after all. But what about your children? They’ll be Catholics, of course.”
“It’s all right, Father. We’ve agreed on that. And Grandfather finally said he’d talk to the Bishop, work out any problems with the Church.”
“I’m surprised at old Judah,” Charles mused. “I wouldn’t expect him to take kindly to …”
“There was some discussion, a fair amount of palaver,” Jonnie admitted. “But he says it’ll be all right. Uncle Judah says the children can be Catholics, but they’ll still be Jewish too. Says a Jewish mother makes them Jewish.”
“Well that’s his business, just as long as they’re brought up as Catholics. So everything’s settled, is it?”
“Actually, Father, not quite.” Jonnie studiously regarded the dark paneling of the study. “Not everything. There is one slight complication.”
“What’s that? Old Judah making conditions? Money? He’s an old fox, you know.”
“It’s nothing to do with Uncle Judah, Father. Neither he nor Sarah knows about the … ah … complication. If they did, it would ruin everything.”
“A girl, is it?” Charles understood instantly.
“You’re right, Father. A girl, a Russian girl I met in Shanghai.”
“You haven’t told your mother, have you?”
“Lord no!”
“Don’t. She won’t like it. But what’s the trouble?”
“Actually, Father, the Russian girl … Tanya. Well, I’m afraid. That is …”
“I’m afraid so, Father.”
“You’re a damned young fool.” Charles suppressed a smile. “But what’s to be done?”
“She’s poor, desperately poor, though she comes of a good family. Earns her living as a dancer, but very soon now she won’t be able to.”
“They all come of ‘good families.’ You’ll find that out. Never met one who didn’t.”
“Yes, Father.”
“What’s the problem then, money?” Charles resumed. “She’s not demanding you make her an honest woman?”
“She hasn’t yet, although I did think about it. But it’s impossible. It would be impossible even if it weren’t for Sarah. She’d never fit in, and she knows it. But she wants to keep the baby.”
“All right, my boy. Something can be arranged. She’ll have to leave the China Coast, of course, and she’ll need enough to see her through. A settlement, maybe.”
“Whatever you think. I just don’t want Tanya and the child to be in want.”
“That’s fairly simple. It won’t be the first Sekloong love-child. You know the money’ll come out of your account?”
“Fair enough, Father. I’m very grateful.”
Charles motioned his son to fill their brandy snifters.
“As I said, it’s not the first time. Maybe it won’t be the last …”
“Actually, Father, I assure you. That’s all behind me now that I’ve found Sarah.”
“I hope so, though we’ll see. Better not to, though. Checkbooks can’t solve all problems. Be careful and, whatever else, never, never tell your mother or Sarah.”
Sir Jonathan still resented the restraint his granddaughter Guinevere’s wedding had imposed on his penchant for lavish hospitality. Guinevere was his favorite granddaughter, not only because of her gentleness, but because she personified the traditional Chinese feminine virtues. She was soft-spoken, self-effacing, devoted to domesticity, and attentive to her elders. Her doting grandfather had, however, never quite forgiven her for insisting upon a family wedding followed by a reception for no more than two hundred guests when she married Dr. George Chapman Parker in September 1924. Unassuming modesty might suit Guinevere, but it was not the Sekloong way. He still complained, only half jesting, that his business associates had suspected the fortunes of the House were declining when Sir Jonathan Sekloong married off his eldest granddaughter under “drably middle-class circumstances.”
Sekloong weddings, like Sekloong hospitality, were legendary. Charlotte’s marriage to Manfei Way had been nicely calculated to be only slightly less pretentious than her mother and father’s. More than a thousand guests had been invited, and the flood of wedding presents had provided Hong Kong with material for gossip that lasted for months. Feeling himself belittled by Guinevere’s subsequent modesty, Sir Jonathan was determined to recoup when Jonnie, the heir-presumptive, married Sarah Haleevie.
Three thousand were to attend Jonnie’s reception, and fifteen hundred were asked to the banquet afterward. The Old Gentleman was confident that the volume and splendor of the wedding presents would make the largesse showered upon Charlotte seem no more than a provincial viceroy’s hoard compared to the Imperial Treasury. His own chief gift was the Second Small House, the replica of Mary and Charles’s mansion originally built for Harry, who had never occupied it. Sir Jonathan furnished it with a selection from his choicest treasures, and matched Bentley sports coupés for the bride and groom stood in the garages. His confidence was justified. All his associates rendered fitting tribute to the House of Sekloong’s joy, though they ranged from great European financiers through China Coast merchants who had made new fortunes in the post-war boom to Secret Society chieftains who preferred not to discuss the gambling, gold-smuggling, prostitution, drug traffic, and strongarm men that provided their wealth. Like the new breed of thrusting populist politicians, with whom they were allied, the presence of the Secret Society chieftains might be distasteful. But it was necessary.
The marriage of Sarah Rebecca Haleevie to Jonathan Osgood Sekloong on the afternoon of November 16, 1924, was the most memorable wedding Hong Kong had seen. For all the wrong reasons. Though the gifts had exceeded Sir Jonathan’s expectations, none of their donors from abroad was present. The bride glowed like a star ruby in her Alençon lace gown, but the expected phalanxes of her relations and friends from Shanghai were absent.
The formations of riot police outside the Roman Catholic Cathedral on Caine Road outnumbered the guests at the ceremony. When they emerged from the Cathedral, those guests were assailed by jeering. Banner-waving demonstrators pressed against the police cordon, shouting slogans in Cantonese and broken English.
“British murderers, quit Hong Kong! China for the Chinese! Death to the Chinese running-dogs! Death to the dog-legs who serve the British!”
The newly married couple’s Rolls-Royce was driven by a young English clerk of Derwent, Hayes. The colored streamers flying from the fenders and radiator-emblems of the motorcade fluttered through streets empty except for screaming demonstrators. Larger crowds besieged the long, ocher Repulse Bay Hotel to which the reception had been shifted because access for guests and provisions to Sekloong Manor was difficult. The waiters nervously handing round the champagne and caviar were the Hotel’s senior staff, supplemented by Sekloong servants, since the junior staff had vanished. Misled by his pride, Sir Jonathan Sekloong had badly misjudged the temper of Hong Kong.
A scant half-dozen bandsmen of the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders, flaunting their scarlet and green kilts, played in the Repulse Bay Hotel’s Ballroom to honor the gallant knight who was the groom’s grandfather and the groom’s father, whom the two subalterns the Regiment could spare to attend the reception punctiliously called “Colonel.” Like the police, the soldiers were heavily engaged elsewhere on more pressing, nonceremonial duties.
Though sporadic clashes had afrighted Hong Kong for several months, the chief threat the security forces fought was not violence, but paralysis. The general strike ordered by the Communist-led and Nationalist-supported All-China Federation of Trade Unions was alarmingly effective. When Charles and Mary returned in June, most employees were still at their posts. By September, most had yielded to either indignant propaganda or direct threats. Factories, shops, offices, and warehouses were virtually deserted. As it had during 1909, the plague year, the city’s pulse dwindled to a slow, irregular beat. European volunteer and “loyal” Chinese, supported by the military, maintained essential services like water, electricity, and transport to prevent the pulse’s stopping.
The Sekloongs were no more immune than they had been in 1909, perhaps less immune. The political scourge, while almost as virulent as the Black Death, was less discriminating. In early June, Sir Jonathan’s erratic driver, Ah Wai, had vanished to visit his “dying mother” in distant Kweichow Province, and by October only a few stubborn retainers remained in Sekloong Manor. Some were just too old to care; others were more frightened of leaving the only secure home they knew than the radicals’ retaliation; a few, like Mary’s amah Ah Fung, consciously chose to maintain decade-long loyalties. The caretaker staff in the Sekloong offices and godowns dwindled under increasing pressure. Those who defied the agitators’ verbal persuasion were offered more convincing arguments. A single beating usually sufficed.
The most powerful force was renascent patriotism. For the first time, the Chinese workingman felt that his own actions could directly affect his country’s fate—and his own. For the first time, instinctive subservience to authority, British or Chinese, was gravely shaken. For the first time, a larger cause than their families’ well-being moved the masses of Kwangtung Province and Hong Kong.
The workers deserted the Colony as much because it had become a place of ill omen as because of the agitators’ exhortations. Women with infants nodding on their backs in scarlet-cotton slings fought to climb the gangplanks of steamers to Canton, where the strike affected only British and
French firms. Some found it even less pleasant to starve for one’s country than to fight for it and returned to their jobs by bribing the vigilantes at the Canton docks and railway station. A number of those renegades were captured by the Strike Committees. The driver Ah Wai, who sought to return after finding his mountain village intolerably frugal and dull, was among those summarily condemned. Alongside three other “pro-British traitors” he was tied to a stake in the hot sun on the Canton Wharves. After two days without food or water, the wiry old man died.
The Sekloongs had drawn up a comprehensive plan to limit the strike’s effect on their interests. Based on the assumptions of another era, that strategy failed. It was like fighting a noxious, incorporeal cloud. For the first time, the Sekloongs were moving against great historical tides, not with them. The systematic mass agitation carried out by Liu Shao-chi under the direction of Mikhail Borodin and Chou En-lai had ignited a true popular rising for the first time in twentieth-century China. For the first time, Sir Jonathan’s instinctive understanding of the hidden sources of power misled him. He was confronted with a phenomenon beyond his experience: not a spontaneous, superstitious uprising crudely encouraged, as had been the Boxers, by political dilettantes, but a mass movement orchestrated by trained professionals. The Communists had learned not merely to fan smoldering popular resentment into flame, but to sustain—and direct—the conflagration.
The Sekloongs could, however, survive almost unscathed if the strike were not prolonged indefinitely—or they could withdraw. Even after six months, their vast resources still provided a virtually impregnable defense in depth. Since political upheaval was the single constant on the China Coast, Sir Jonathan had invested substantially in land and enterprises in Europe and the United States. But retreat to another continent was unthinkable. The Hong Kong–Shanghai sector was the bastion of his fortunes, and his heart was given to China. Besides, the House of Sekloong was more successful than its British competitors in channeling a trickle of necessities through its godowns. Ocean-going shipping bypassed Hong Kong after longshoremen refused to handle cargo. But the junks that carried the Colony’s meager exports to other ports for transshipment to foreign vessels returned with imported goods. All South China was not united against the British, and the independent junk-masters took their profits where they found them.
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