The Cloud Leopard's Daughter

by Deborah Challinor

  She kept walking and finally, as she rounded a two-storey building, she saw dozens of bare masts in the near distance and the long finger of a pier. She dashed across the street, dodging ox carts, sedan chairs and the occasional rider on horseback, and down towards the shore, the smell of fish, smoke and something rotten filling her nostrils. Her hair fell out of its arrangement as she leapt across a pothole, its accumulation of water filmed with rainbow-coloured oil.

  It made sense to her that Pedder’s Wharf might be at the end of Pedder Street, so she walked along the edge of the waterfront, hoping she’d chosen the right direction. Here the ground was paved and, as she approached two very grand, three-storey stone buildings with archways and open verandahs on each floor, one on either side of a sort of open plaza, she encountered an actual street sign declaring Pedder Street. Extending from directly in front of one building was a lovely big wharf. She almost laughed out loud.

  She stepped onto the wooden boards, her bare feet making no noise at all, and hurried along, peering at the names painted onto forward bows. She’d read plenty about the Katipo III in Amber’s letters but never seen the ship. Then she spotted her, a beautiful craft painted black below the high-water mark with a red stripe above. She stood for a delicious moment, contemplating her means of returning to New Zealand and her father, and happily looking forward to seeing her friends, then ran across the gangway.

  ‘Hello!’ she called. ‘Is anyone home?’

  Mick Doyle popped up from behind the cabin, blanched and looked about to faint.

  ‘Mr Doyle?’ Bao rushed over to him. ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Holy Mary!’ Mick exclaimed, clutching his chest.

  ‘It’s me, Mr Doyle, Bao.’

  ‘Jesus God, I thought you were a ghost, so I did.’

  Gideon thumped down onto the deck from the mizzen mast, grinning hugely. ‘Miss Bao?’

  ‘Mr Gideon, how lovely to see you.’

  ‘You escaped! We knew you would.’

  ‘Did you?’

  ‘Pierre read the bones.’ Gideon cast an eye along the wharf. ‘Does Yip know you have absconded?’

  ‘He will soon.’

  ‘And he will expect you to come here?’

  ‘He must know that I know you are here for me.’

  Gideon looked thoughtful, but not unduly worried. ‘Mmm. I will set a watch. Come below. Rian and Simon have gone to see the governor about you and Amber being abducted, but Kitty and most of the others are here.’

  ‘Well, there is no—’ Bao stopped, staring at him. ‘Did you say that Amber has been abducted?’

  ‘Yes, it is a long story. Come below. Kitty will tell you.’

  Bao followed Gideon down the companion way, her skirts gathered in one hand, the most awful sense of dread and guilt filling her belly. In the mess room she greeted the crew, who were, to her embarrassment, delighted to see her, then Kitty appeared from her cabin, holding a piece of embroidery.

  ‘Bao?’

  Bao ran to her, to be embraced in a hug of such ferocity that she knew Kitty was also hugging her missing daughter. Bao quite understood.

  ‘Oh, my love,’ Kitty said, ‘I’m so pleased to see you. Did you escape? Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes, yes, I am unharmed. What has happened to Amber?’

  Kitty sank onto the bench before the mess table. Bao sat beside her.

  ‘Are you sure you’re all right? Do you need food or anything to drink? Pierre, some tea perhaps?’ Kitty looked around. ‘Where’s Pierre?’

  He was already in the galley putting together a tray in between mopping his eyes. He was very fond of Bao and she looked tired and thin, and he hadn’t liked the state of her dear, scratched, dirty bare feet.

  ‘Please tell me about Amber,’ Bao said again.

  ‘Oh God,’ Kitty said. ‘We went to see Kai in Sydney, about you. He warned us off and told us not to come after you, but we took no notice. So-Yee told us on the quiet you were here in Hong Kong.’

  ‘Oh, good old So-Yee,’ Bao exclaimed.

  ‘I know,’ Kitty agreed. ‘A ship followed us and we had to stop in Cebu after a storm and our sails ripped, we think thanks to Kai, and Amber was taken from our hotel there. She and Tahi were drugged. They’re married now, you know.’

  For a moment, Bao was delighted. She’d always known the two would marry one day. They were perfect for each other. She shot Tahi a huge, beaming grin, but his answering look of misery wiped the smile off her face. He was in awful pain, and she immediately felt it, too. ‘Who stole her?’ she demanded.

  ‘The captain of the ship following us, Lo Fang,’ Tahi said. ‘It was my fault.’

  ‘It was not,’ Kitty insisted.

  Bao nodded. ‘He works for Kai. He took me from our camp. Swine. And they are here, in Hong Kong?’

  ‘They were.’

  ‘Well, I will get her back. I know how to manage a man like Fang.’

  Hawk, Tahi and several of the other men exchanged doubtful looks. Bao saw but wasn’t offended. They didn’t really know her now, as a woman.

  ‘That’s not the end of it,’ Kitty said, her voice wobbling on the last words.

  Bao braced herself for more bad news.

  ‘Fang’s ship was raided by pirates before it reached Hong Kong and Amber was taken by them. Their captain is Lee Longwei, also known as the Dragon.’

  The hairs on Bao’s neck and arms prickled. She had heard of Lee Longwei: stories of his barbarous and bloody conduct had reached as far as the Chinese working the Australian and New Zealand goldfields.

  Kitty burst into tears, flapped a hand at Bao when she reached for her, blew her nose on the piece of embroidery and struggled mightily to compose herself. ‘I’m sorry. It’s all been a bit much, really. We’ve just felt so . . . useless. We were sure you were at that frog person’s house but couldn’t get to you, and some strange relative of So-Yee’s implied to us that Longwei would probably try and ransom Amber but possibly not for money – but what for, though? – and Pierre’s bones said something bizarre about the British swallowing all the opium in China, and we haven’t got a clue where Longwei is despite asking everywhere. Rian’s even gone to speak to Sir Hercules Robinson. You’re safe now, which is wonderful, but it seems our only hope is the British government. Amber’s a British citizen, being a New Zealander, so, in theory anyway, the governor here should be able to help us.’

  ‘What strange relative?’ Bao asked. ‘What bones?’

  As Kitty started to explain Pierre appeared, first with a tray bearing tea and several plates of cake and biscuits, and again with a large bowl filled with hot water and a pile of clean, soft cloths.

  ‘Cloths for the face, then for the feets,’ he explained. ‘And maybe Bao she borrow some of Amber’s clothes?’ he added, indicating Bao’s beautiful but impractical costume.

  ‘If you do not mind,’ Bao said, looking first at Kitty, then Tahi for permission. ‘I am more accustomed to wearing shirts and trousers than this sort of thing.’

  ‘So’s Amber,’ Tahi said. ‘She won’t mind. I’ll sort something out for you.’

  While Bao scrubbed at her face and then her feet, Kitty explained about the visit from Lo Fang’s crewman, and the reading Pierre did for both Amber and Bao. After a short interruption during which Gideon sent Mick and Ropata back on deck to keep an eye out for any sign of Yip Chun Kit or his men, Bao, in turn, described her escape from Chun’s compound, not neglecting to mention that she’d offered the Katipo as a haven should things go wrong for Wing and Ka. ‘I hope that is all right with you. But I do not think that anything will go wrong. Wing is very duplicitous. I expect she can lie her way out of anything.’

  Footsteps on the deck above alerted them to Rian and Simon’s return. A second later they clattered down the companionway.

  ‘Bao!’ Simon exclaimed.

  ‘Hello, Mr Simon. As you can see I have escaped Yip Chun Kit’s clutches.’

  ‘Christ, that’s a relief,’ Rian said, gi
ving Bao a quick, slightly uncomfortable hug. ‘Pierre said you would.’

  ‘What did the governor say?’ Kitty asked.

  Rian threw his hat at the table before he sat down: it skidded off and landed on the floor. ‘Pompous arsehole. He said Bao being held against her will by Yip Chun Kit was a Chinese matter, not a British one, but that’s irrelevant now, isn’t it, given she’s managed to escape. This ship sails under an Irish flag, and Ireland, though it always pains me to say it, is part of the United Kingdom. If Chun comes aboard to try and take Bao back, we will have the protection of the authorities. Won’t stop him causing trouble, though, will it?’

  ‘And Amber?’

  ‘Robinson said her abduction is a British matter, but he doesn’t have the military resources to go hunting down pirates, of which there are thousands in Chinese waters, looking for one missing girl.’

  A resounding silence filled the cabin.

  ‘What?’ Israel said, his face suffused with angry blood. ‘But she’s a British citizen! He’s the bloody governor. What the hell’s he doing here if it’s not to help British citizens?’

  Haunui said cheerfully, ‘You lot should make up your minds.’

  ‘What?’ Israel demanded again, even more sharply.

  ‘One minute you don’t want to be English, next minute you do, when you think it’ll work in your favour. What a pack of Hippolytes.’

  Rian smiled. ‘You mean hypocrites.’

  ‘Ae, them.’

  Simon said, ‘Hippolyte, I believe, was the queen of the Amazons in Greek mythology.’

  ‘Yes, it is hypocritical,’ Rian said, ‘but this is Amber we’re talking about. Bugger principles. In any case he said he couldn’t, or wouldn’t, help.’

  ‘Chatte,’ Pierre muttered.

  ‘Possibly a good thing,’ Hawk remarked. ‘If he sent soldiers chasing after Longwei there would very likely be a skirmish and Amber could be hurt, or worse. We do not want that.’

  Rian said, ‘He did say that the Tongzhi Emperor and Empress Dowager Cixi are visiting Hong Kong very soon, and suggested I try and get an audience with the empress dowager. Well, there’s no point speaking to the emperor, is there? What sense would I get out of a seven-year-old? Robinson seems to think Cixi may possibly have the pirates’ ear.’

  ‘Why would she?’ Bao asked. ‘The pirates do not abide by Chinese law.’

  ‘It’s worth a try.’

  ‘Also I do not think you will get an audience,’ Bao said. ‘Chinese protocol is extremely strict – the emperor and the empress dowager are godly, and, please do not be offended, but I do not think they or their advisors will consider an Irish sea captain worthy of an interview.’

  Rian laughed outright this time. ‘You’re probably right, especially when you put it like that. But I’ve got contacts here, compradors who owe me a few favours. I’ll have a word.’

  Bao knew how powerful the compradors – very wealthy Chinese merchants who acted as intermediaries between other Chinese vendors and European traders to facilitate commerce – were in Hong Kong society, so he very well might succeed.

  ‘Now,’ he said as he helped himself to a biscuit, ‘tell me how you got away from the Frog.’

  So everyone’s stories had to be told again, then Bao ducked into Tahi and Amber’s cabin to change clothes. Kitty followed her.

  ‘Do you mind if I come in?’

  ‘Of course not.’ Bao opened the fastenings over her right breast and beneath her arm and slipped off her robe, revealing a short, soft undergarment with shoulder straps like a chemise. She wriggled into Amber’s shirt and closed the buttons.

  ‘Are you really all right?’

  ‘Yes, I am fine.’

  ‘I don’t wish to pry, and you can tell me to mind my own business, but—’

  Bao managed a smile. ‘No, I was not forced to lie with him, if that is what you are worried about. I would have broken his arms, scratched out his eyes and bitten off his tongue had he tried.’

  Kitty looked taken aback. ‘Oh. Well, that’s all right then. I must say, you seem very . . . competent these days.’

  Bao undid her skirt and let it pool at her feet. She deliberated for a moment over her bamboo fabric drawers, then stepped out of those as well. They’d only bunch inside the trousers. Though she might keep them – they were lovely and warm. ‘You do not like the way I am now?’

  ‘Oh, no, I didn’t mean that. It’s just that you used to be so—’

  ‘Well, I have grown up now. And I have learnt many things.’ Bao pulled on the trousers, closed the buttons and faced Kitty. ‘But I am the same Bao. I still love my father, I still love my friends, I am still loyal, and I know right from wrong. My father has taught me that.’

  ‘Yes, I know. Your father is a lovely man.’

  ‘It will sadden me enormously if I do not spend time with him before he dies. But it will break my heart if I never see Amber again.’

  Kitty embraced her again. ‘You’re a good girl, Bao.’

  ‘Thank you. And please, do not worry. We will find her.’

  *

  As it happened, they did not need to find Longwei – he found them. Or, his emissary did. Two days after Bao arrived at the Katipo, a Chinese man appeared on Pedder’s Wharf asking to speak to Captain Rian Farrell. He was directed to the Katipo, and received on deck. The day was coolish and overcast, the crisp winds of autumn driving scudding clouds overhead.

  The man was tall, well built and apparently lacking an eye. Over the socket he wore a black silk eye patch onto which had been embroidered a blazing red eyeball, with an indigo blue iris and a gold pupil. It was most disconcerting. In Cantonese, he announced himself as Ip To, Longwei’s second-in-command. Rian, who could only pick out a few words, studied him warily.

  Bao translated.

  ‘Longwei wishes to meet with you,’ he said. ‘You must come to him, and you may speak with your daughter.’

  ‘I want her back.’

  ‘You may have her in exchange for executing a task specified by Longwei.’

  Rian didn’t like the word ‘executing’: it stank of the gallows. So they’d been right, the strange fellow with the hat and Pierre and his bones.

  ‘Ask him what task,’ he said to Bao, though he suspected he already had a vague idea, and it was absurd.

  Bao spoke, listened, then reported: ‘He will not say. He says that is for Longwei to discuss with you. We are to go to Hung Shing Yeh Bay at Lamma Island tonight to meet him.’

  ‘Who’s to go? All of us? Won’t that worry them?’

  Bao said something to Ip To.

  ‘He says it does not matter. They number in the hundreds.’

  ‘And where’s this Hung Shing Yeh Bay?’

  Bao spoke again, listened. ‘He says to get a map.’

  Ip To bowed, then strode down the gangway and off along the wharf.

  ‘Surly bastard,’ Mick said.

  Rian did have a map of Hong Kong and its surrounding waters – no sea captain would be without maps of the ports he regularly entered – so he fetched it and opened it out across the mess table.

  Hung Shing Yeh Bay was a remote area on the western side of Lamma Island, which itself was to the south-west of Hong Kong. The bay was well away from prying eyes and no doubt an ideal place to lie low. Rian didn’t know the waters around the island, however, and they would have to be careful, especially at night.

  They left within the hour, estimating it would take approximately four hours to sail around to Hung Shing Yeh Bay, depending on the wind. If they were lucky they would arrive before full dark.

  They weren’t lucky. The wind picked up once they left Victoria Harbour and, despite tacking aggressively, they were carried slightly off course towards the northern reaches of Lantau Island to the west. By the time they’d managed to regain their bearings the sun was already sliding down the sky, and a velvety, star-studded darkness had fallen when they rounded a headland and crept into the bay, Rian worried that they would hit s
ome submerged hazard. On the far side bobbed a collection of huge lanterns, or so it seemed. As they neared, it became clear that the lanterns were in fact fires burning on the decks of junks, the flames illuminating the furled orange sails.

  ‘They’ll go up like a box of matches if they’re not careful,’ Haunui said.

  Rian shook his head. ‘I expect they know what they’re doing. Furl the sails!’

  The crew ran to gather in the sails and secure them. The Katipo slowed and the anchor was lowered. Rian peered through his spyglass, though it wasn’t much use in the dark.

  ‘Will we lower the boat?’ Hawk asked.

  ‘Both of them.’

  The chains began their painful clanking as both ship’s boats went out then over the side, landing with identical flat splashes in the sea. Hawk threw down the rope ladders, then hesitated. ‘Weapons?’

  Rian scratched his nose. Arriving armed to the teeth might not be a good way to open negotiations, but he didn’t want to appear an easy mark, either. ‘Knives, and don’t bother concealing them. And I’ll have my revolver.’

  Hawk went down the ladder, a thump signalling that he’d reached the boat below. Kitty was next; as she turned to climb down she caught Rian’s eye and dared him to say something. He didn’t: he desperately didn’t want her to go but he wasn’t going to tell her she couldn’t this time. Bao went down after her, then he joined them. Israel, Gideon, Pierre, Ropata and Tahi climbed into the other boat. Mick and Simon were staying behind. It wouldn’t do to come back and find the Katipo overrun by pirates.

  As they rowed towards the fires, the flames got more distinct, and it became clear that about a dozen junks were harboured in the bay. The sound of music reached them – drumming and some sort of reed instrument? – and also the smell of roasting meat.

  From the darkness a small sampan appeared on their right and a voice challenged them in Cantonese. Bao replied, then said, ‘That is one of Longwei’s men, checking who we are.’

  ‘Did you say we’re expected?’

  ‘Yes. He said to look for the junk with the dragon flag.’

  As they drew closer Rian realised how big the junks were. They were ocean-going ships, not the usual smaller coastal vessels, with towering prows, massive sterns and masts that soared above their decks and cabins. He could see now that the fires had been lit in great iron braziers the size of washing coppers, though he certainly wouldn’t risk lighting one on the Katipo.