“Are you afraid without your Mr. Scant?” Miss Gaunt asked.
“I’m excited,” I shouted back. “I feel free. But Mr. Scant isn’t far away.”
“There’s Adams!” cried Mr. Jackdaw. I craned my neck to see but I could not spot the wagon. Still, I could feel Mr. Jackdaw pedal harder, and reflected that if he was doing this much for us, he must have been on our side.
“If you get close, I’ll jump across,” said Miss Gaunt.
“I’ll do my best, ma’am,” said Mr. Jackdaw.
Finally, I recognized the wagon, square and solid and entirely stationary in the road. Able to pass between the lines of festival traffic, we were gaining on Mr. Adams fast. Miss Gaunt stood up and began to position herself with one foot braced against the seat of the rickshaw. Though there were dozens of vehicles around us, along with innumerable pedestrians and an assortment of animals too, the wagon began to swell larger and larger in my vision, like a balloon being slowly inflated. Then we were almost upon the banker. I could feel Miss Gaunt begin to coil next to me like a spring.
And then all three of us nearly tumbled out of the rickshaw altogether, as someone led their donkey in front of us and Mr. Jackdaw was forced to brake. “Hurry, confound you!” he yelled at the peasant, who looked back at us with little interest. Unsurprisingly, the moment the way became clear, the traffic began to move again and the wagon went beyond our reach. Worse, Mr. Adams turned away down a side road, his destination apparently not the same as that of the crowds.
“I think he’s going to the North Station,” said Mr. Jackdaw.
“They said something about the station earlier,” I called back.
“I can’t keep up!”
Mr. Jackdaw’s cycling prowess was not to be understated, but the motorcar was faster than any cyclist, even while towing a wagon, and Mr. Adams soon got away from us once again. But Mr. Jackdaw pedaled on manfully, until finally we reached a kind of bridge with a steep slope downward, leading us toward train tracks and various large buildings.
“This is where they went,” said Mr. Jackdaw, breathing heavily after his exertions. “But if I cycle down that way, the rickshaw you’re in will get ahead of me, and we’ll be in a terrible state. So this is where I’ll take my leave of you.”
“Take your leave?” I repeated. “Surely you’ll come with us?”
“Afraid not, old chap,” said Mr. Jackdaw. “I have to go to the river to be sure of a plan B. The emperor’s barge will already be in the city, and I mean to see it comes to no harm. The road leads to the railway warehouses, and it should be clear which one they’re using. So for now, bon chance!”
We stepped down from the rickshaw, and Mr. Jackdaw disentangled himself from it, doffed his cap, and was gone. The rickshaw lay crookedly where it had been left behind, as though a little befuddled by being abandoned—just as I was. “I suppose we’re on foot from here,” said Miss Gaunt. I took Victor’s hand, and we began our descent. The warehouses were in a kind of sunken area, crisscrossed by train tracks. Held above the rest was the immaculate new station building.
I made sure Victor stayed close, but he set a fearsome pace. Perhaps he sensed his brother was near or he had understood enough of what had been said to know what awaited us. Somehow, his bicorn hat seemed to give him a greater sense of purpose, and his long hair gave him the look of a child from one of those revolutionary paintings. He peered up at me, then gave me a nod and a wide grin.
We saw Mr. Adams’s motorcar outside a warehouse marked with the letter D. It was a large structure, with its only windows placed very high up and no apparent way in other than through the large doors through which the motorcar was passing. There was no chance of slipping in that way unseen, so we set about looking for any other points of entry, finally discovering a rudimentary ladder up to the roof.
Having climbed the ladder, we first checked if any guards were waiting for us on the rooftop. Satisfied that they were not, Miss Gaunt and I took a moment to sort out our plan. This included telling Victor to go back down the ladder alone, which Miss Gaunt conveyed to him in French. He seemed unsure but agreed after some dithering and began to climb down. Miss Gaunt and I then turned our attentions to a locked doorway, horizontal along the flat rooftop.
“How do we deal with the lock?” she asked.
“Leave it to me,” I said, and set to work. It was a lock of a newer sort, with a number of bolts to align before the barrel would turn, but I could feel when each was in place, so finding the alignment was not so difficult. Once the key turned and the door came open, Miss Gaunt peered inside the space cautiously, but I said, “No need for stealth.”
“True enough,” said Miss Gaunt.
“Is anybody there?” I called down the stairs, which might have seemed like a foolish thing to do, but our plan required we get the attention of anyone who might be guarding the building. When no one below responded, we stepped into the doorway and made our way down the iron steps. At the bottom of the stairwell, there was a kind of office with a view out over the main floor of Warehouse D. Through this office window, I saw the French soldier boys for the first time. They were lined up along the warehouse floor, standing in front of horse-drawn wagons. A member of the Viridian Clan distributed rifles to them, and then each boy boarded the wagon nearest to him.
The door of the office shut behind me and Elspeth, and a figure stepped out of the darkness behind it. “An impressive sight, no? And all the better for the guns you helped supply.” The younger Mr. Song seemed very pleased with himself as he raised a revolver.
“Yu-Sheng?” said Miss Gaunt. “You’re part of this too? You’re . . . putting the Tri-Loom above the Viridian Clan or the police project? You said an international police was your dream.”
“A dream, yes,” Mr. Song said, as more men came up the stairs behind us, armed with swords or staffs. “But I must be sure China is still a nation when it happens. The rest of the world wants to tear us to pieces. This part goes to the English, this part to the French, the Germans, the Dutch, the Japanese. And then, when there’s nothing left of China but the Forbidden City, then where is our place in an international police? First, we must preserve China. And to do that, we must expel the foreigners. The only way to do it is to turn my countrymen, united, against them. And what better way to begin than have one of Europe’s countries attack the emperor?”
“So you try to use these French boys you’ve kidnapped? They’ll never help you.”
“Oh, but they will,” the younger Song replied. “Each of these boys has someone he’ll do anything to protect, someone who means far more to them than anything they will see here. And they know firsthand we have agents in France. With that threat over their heads, it only takes a little to motivate them.”
“The French government will denounce the attack,” Miss Gaunt said. “They’ll say it wasn’t their command.”
“And we’ll be here to call them liars. Who do you think my countrymen will believe? China will regain the strength our ancestors had. Strength enough to defeat any of the other nations of the world. That is when an international police can come into being, underpinned by the strength, intelligence, and influence of the true hongmen, the men of the Tri-Loom. Only through them can this dream become reality. And the only people with a chance to stop this are your friends, who Father will deal with, and the two of you. But here you are.”
“What about Deng?” said Miss Gaunt. “Did he know about this?”
“Deng’s a fool who knows nothing. He’ll be clawing through the pieces of our home, out of the way. If only you two were there with him, things would have been so much easier.”
“You’re forgetting someone,” I said. “Three of us came here.”
Mr. Song’s eyes widened. “The boy.” He gave his gun to the man next to him. “Take them alive,” he said. “We need to make an example of them later. But if they give you trouble, shoot the girl.”
Mr. Song swept past us, hurrying down the stairs to the warehouse
floor. The man who had been given the gun leveled it, so Miss Gaunt and I slowly raised our hands. Another man in the office put down his staff and produced a rope, obviously meaning to tie us up, and said something in Chinese to Miss Gaunt. She frowned at him, and he repeated it, more angrily, clearly telling her to lower her hands and put them behind her back. She kept pretending she didn’t know what he meant—that was when he went to grab her wrist.
Faster than a scorpion’s sting, she clutched the man’s wrist first, twisting it up behind his back and stepping behind him so that the group’s gunman would shoot his comrade if he fired the rifle. But Miss Gaunt did not want a standoff and instead shoved her captive at the man with the gun, wrong-footing him. I used the moment of surprise to snatch the discarded staff and swing it around at the man with the gun, hitting him hard on the elbow and making him drop the rifle.
The other men gave cries of alarm, and the one with the fastest reaction swung a sword down at Miss Gaunt. She stepped into the attack and tackled the man to the ground. I heard a gunshot and winced, but by then, Miss Gaunt was the one with a revolver in her hand.
Having fired her warning shot, Miss Gaunt pointed the gun at each of the men in sequence. They backed off, the tables turned. I went to her side. “Down the steps,” she said.
I did as Miss Gaunt had told me, and she followed behind me, closing the office door behind her. No sooner had we done this than we heard the roar of a motorcycle engine. The younger Mr. Song disappeared out of the main entrance, followed by all the wagons full of false French soldiers. We made our way down to the warehouse floor, Miss Gaunt careful to cover us with her revolver.
“They’ll come down the ladder, to cut us off from the outside,” I said. Miss Gaunt nodded, looking to the open exit. Around us were the traces of the people who had been living here, most likely for some time—vats of rice gruel, discarded cups and bowls, blankets, and, of course, buckets I didn’t want to go anywhere near. Following on foot would be meaningless now, so our only chance was to pursue Mr. Song in a vehicle. There was only one remaining—the motorcar Mr. Adams had used to haul the weapons here.
“Can you drive it?” I asked Miss Gaunt.
“I’ve never tried. You?”
“Only in Father’s engines outside his factory,” I said. “Never on any real roads.” Miss Gaunt didn’t have anything more to say at that. “It has to be me, doesn’t it?” I continued. “Bother.”
Miss Gaunt cranked the engine as I prepared myself for the hardest part, which was getting the thing in motion at all. I had never understood well how a motorcar’s gears worked, but I could at least identify the one gear for starting the thing, so I shifted the big stick into place. After several bumpy starts, I got the thing moving, and Miss Gaunt climbed in beside me. The men from the Viridian Clan formed a blockade across the front entrance, but Miss Gaunt shot at them, and they dived for cover.
“Where am I going?” I said, as the motorcar shuddered into life.
“Follow the tracks.”
Thankfully, this motorcar was heavier and slower than Father’s engines, so it wasn’t as terrifying to drive. Until, of course, we reached the road itself. I couldn’t help myself from a few “crikeys” and even a “Gordon Bennett” as I narrowly avoided crushing smaller vehicles or ramming into horses. Luckily, traffic continued to move slowly because of the festival, and I knew that the French youths in their soldiers’ uniforms couldn’t have gotten far either. On the other hand, Mr. Song could have easily sped past the slow-moving traffic in his motorcycle. As I drove, I hoped Victor had done his part in the plan and had hidden himself well afterward.
Miss Gaunt directed me to the riverfront, and once we saw the crowds, we knew it was time to disembark. “There they are!” she cried, pointing into the distance, and I saw the tops of the wagons.
Now on foot, we began to push our way through the crowds. There were so many people around that Miss Gaunt and I struggled to stay together. She grabbed my hand and pulled me on, yelling at the citizens to get out of our way. We barged past Asian and European and American strangers, protests and curses in a dozen or more languages ringing in our ears.
As we drew close, someone stepped out into our path, yelling, “Stop!”
I ran into Miss Gaunt’s back and very nearly fell. As I regained my composure, I saw the younger Mr. Song ahead of us, holding up one hand. His other hand was conspicuously hidden behind the small, quavering figure of Victor. I didn’t have to see behind my young friend to know Mr. Song had a gun pointed at his back.
“Honestly,” said Mr. Song. “This is why the Viridian Clan will never be enough. I ask them to do one simple thing, keep you busy, and they couldn’t even manage that. Hand over your gun, please. Hand it over. Good. Fortunately for you, I found your little friend before he could get to his brother.”
He held Victor by the collar, his other hand still pointed at the little boy’s back, and led us to a where Mr. Adams was waiting, up on a small platform that on an ordinary day might have been a bandstand. Mr. Song nodded, and Mr. Adams waved a red flag. Beyond the platform’s edge, I could see the scale of the miniature French army. There must have been two hundred young men there, or very nearly, and they had begun to march.
The Frenchmen had no true military training, so they did not keep ranks well, nor march in unison. But—advancing unstoppably—they still looked formidable. Onlookers began to notice them and many cleared a path, but at a certain point, the crowd became too thick, and none of the festivalgoers could move. As the young men approached this cluster, a series of loud bangs sounded off, one after another, like a bonfire collapsing in on itself. Somebody screamed.
“Yes,” said Mr. Song. He began to look for the onslaught’s first victims but frowned when it became clear there were none. “A warning shot?” he said. Mr. Adams was frowning too. However, the crowd had taken notice of the gunfire, and panic was beginning to spread. The false army advanced.
After a few dozen paces, the Frenchmen stopped again, and this time their action was clear. Almost in unison, the men aimed their guns into the sky and fired. Plumes of smoke rose upward, ghosts of little dragons ascending together.
“What are they doing?” demanded Mr. Song. Victor looked back to me and grinned.
The young Frenchmen reached the riverbank, where I now saw many boats had amassed, including a huge golden barge that must have belonged to the emperor. One man stepped forward, and though I could only see him from the back, I knew he would have a face that was bruised and bloodied, following a recent beating.
“Julien!” Victor cried out.
We could not hear what Julien said, and I doubt I could have understood his French at any rate, but his gestures and tone made his meaning clear—France was paying tribute to China and wished the emperor eternal happiness. Or something along those lines. The men shot in the air one more time and then kneeled, heads bowed, like the knights of old.
“Julien!” Victor yelled again, but Mr. Song tossed him aside.
“Prepare the bomb,” said Mr. Song. Mr. Adams nodded and slipped away.
The younger Mr. Song kept us pressed to the handrail of the little platform but moved around us so that he could see the river. His eyes were fixed on the royal barge. A moment later, we heard a whistling sound. A large firework exploded far above our heads, like a huge green flower, and although it was still daytime—and the effect would have been far more impressive at night—the firework was powerful enough to light up the sky. A brief series of secondary fireworks went off around it, and laughter and applause erupted from the crowd. I looked at the golden barge, and while I saw no movement on it, I did spot a smaller barge beside the boat. A short figure dressed in finery danced excitedly on the smaller craft, before a rotund adult urged the child back out of sight.
“What is this?” Mr. Song roared, but there was nobody to listen to him. Mr. Adams had disappeared. And so he turned to us in his fury. “What did you do?”
“You may have stopped
Victor from reaching his brother,” I said, “but he still reached the other French boys and spread a message. It doesn’t matter if you beat them, starved them, locked them away—now they’ve seen the threat to their families and loved ones wasn’t real. I’m sure that set a lot of them thinking. Victor even suggested this little tribute himself.”
Mr. Song rubbed a hand over his mouth. Then he pulled out the revolver he had taken from Miss Gaunt. “You’re so clever, you’ve gotten yourselves killed,” he said.
He didn’t see the shape rise up behind him, the shape that swung a wooden beam at his head so hard it splintered upon contact. Mr. Song was knocked to the ground and didn’t move.
“Thank you, Mr. . . .” I began, and then blinked. “Mr. Deng.”
“You’re welcome,” said Mr. Deng. “Sorry to disappoint you—I suppose you were expecting your butler.”
“No, I’m very happy to see you.”
“Did you hear all of that?” said Miss Gaunt, looking from Mr. Song to Mr. Deng.
“Enough,” Mr. Deng said. “And to think I trusted him. The whole clan must have known about this, apart from me and Zhao-Ji.”
“Where is Miss Cai?” I asked. “And Mr. Scant?”
As it had transpired, Mr. Scant was at the riverside with Julien. “Ah, there you are,” he said as we arrived. With a loud cry, Victor ran to embrace his older brother, running around him and chattering away like a pet ferret happy to see its owner. All around us, the young Frenchmen were dancing and celebrating with the locals as though the whole thing were an arranged party.
“I was about to come and make sure you were alright,” Mr. Scant added.
“Thanks to Mr. Deng,” I said. “Were you worried about me?”
The Shanghai Incident Page 14