Everything marvelous and terrible, most of her mind on her new dilemma: how to get cash. What am I going to do? I have to have cash to pay for the medicine, that swine André Poncin won’t advance it for me, I know he won’t. Damn him and damn my father for stealing my money! And damn him of the Tokaidō into eternal Hell forever!
Stop that and think. Remember you are on your own and you must solve your problems!
My only possession of value is my engagement ring and I can’t sell that, I just can’t. Oh God, everything was going so well, I’m officially engaged, Malcolm is getting better, André is helping me but the medicine’s so expensive and I’ve no money, real money, oh God, oh God what am I going to do?
Tears spilled out of her eyes.
“Good God, Angelique, what is it?”
“Just that … just that I’m so unhappy.” She sobbed and buried her head in the bedclothes. “So unhappy that—that the Tokaidō happened and you’re hurt and I … I’m hurt too—it’s not fair.”
Sir William’s ten-oared cutter sped through the swell in double-quick time aimed at the flagship anchored in the roads off Yokohama, her bow wave heavy. He was alone in the cabin and he stood, riding easily, in frock coat, cutaway and top hat. Sea fair, light fading in the west, the clouds already grey but with no apparent threat of storm. As she swung alongside the ship, all oars went to the vertical, he jumped onto the gangway and hurried up to the main deck to be piped aboard.
“Afternoon, sir.” Lieutenant Marlowe saluted smartly. “This way, please.” Past gleaming rows of cannon to the quarterdeck—the main deck and shrouds a hive of activity, cannons being secured, hawsers coiled, sails checked, smoke from the funnel—up a gangway then down another to the second gun deck, past sailors battening down and stowing gear, to the Admiral’s cabin aft. The marine sentry saluted as Marlowe knocked. “Sir William, sir.”
“Well, open the door, Marlowe, for Christ’s sake.”
Marlowe held the door for Sir William and began to close it. “Marlowe, stay here!” the Admiral ordered.
The large cabin filled the stern of the ship—many small sea windows, big table and sea chairs anchored to the deck, small bunk and toilet, large sideboard with cut-glass decanters. The Admiral and General half got up with token politeness, and sat again. Marlowe stayed at the door.
“Thank you for arriving so expeditiously, Sir William. Brandy? Sherry?”
“Brandy, thank you, Admiral Ketterer. Trouble?”
The florid-faced man glared at Marlowe. “Would you oblige, Mr. Marlowe, brandy for Sir William.” He tossed a sheet of paper on the table. “Dispatch from Hong Kong.”
With the usual flowery greetings, the dispatch read:
You will proceed at once with the flagship and four or five warships to the port of Boh Chih Seh, north of Shanghai (coordinates overleaf) where the main pirate fleet of Wu Sung Choi is now harboring. A week ago a swarm of this pirate’s junks, arrogantly flying his flag—the White Lotus—intercepted and sank HM.’s mail ship Bonny Sailor in the waters off Mirs Bay, the pirate haven north of Hong Kong. The fleet here will deal with Mirs Bay—you will decimate Boh Chih Seh and sink all craft not fishing vessels if the leader, believed to be Chu Fang Choy, refuses to strike his colors and declines to surrender to Her Majesty’s justice.
When accomplished, send one ship with a report here and return to Yokohama, placing yourself as usual at the disposition of Her Majesty’s servants. Show this to Sir William and please give him the enclosed. yrs., Stanshope, KCB, Governor Far East.
PS: The Bonny Sailor was lost with all hands, 76 officers and men, ten passengers, one of whom was an Englishwoman, the wife of a trader here, a cargo of gold, opium and rice worth ten thousand guineas. Chu Fang Choy had the effrontery to have delivered to Government House a sack containing the ship’s log and forty-three pairs of ears with a letter apologizing that the others could not be recovered. The woman’s were not included and we fear the worst for her.
“Bastards,” Sir William muttered, with an added queasiness at the thought that, as pirates were endemic in all Asian waters, particularly from Singapore north to Peking, and the White Lotus fleets the most abundant and notorious of all, the woman could easily have been his wife who was due to arrive in Hong Kong any week from England with three of his children. “You leave on the tide?”
“Yes.” The Admiral slid an envelope across the table. Sir William broke the seals:
Dear Willie, The next mail ship will bring the specie for the Legation expenses. Between ourselves, sorry, Willie, but I cannot give you any further troops at the moment, or ships. In the spring possibly. I have been ordered to return troops and ships to India where the authorities fear repetition of the Mutiny of five years ago. Added to that, the Punjab is in ferment again, pirates plague the Persian Gulf, and damned nomads in Mesopotamia have again cut the telegraph—another expeditionary force is being organized to deal with them once and for all!
How is that poor fellow Struan? Questions are bound to be asked in Parliament about “failure to protect our nationals.” News of your Tokaidō disaster should reach London within two weeks, their answer not for two more months. I trust they will countenance stiff reprisals, and send us the money, troops and ships to carry out their orders. In the meantime weather the storm, if there is one, as best you can. Hong Kong is seething about this attack. Struan’s mother is hopping mad and all the riffraff China traders here (however rich from their foul opium trade) are up in arms, their misguided, slanted guttersnipe Press demanding your resignation. Was it ever different? as Disraeli would say! In haste, Godspeed, yrs. Stanshope, KCB, Governor.
Sir William took a large sip, hoping his face did not betray his anxiety. “Good brandy, Admiral.”
“Yes, it is, my very best private stock, in your honor,” the Admiral said, furious that Marlowe had given Sir William almost half a tumbler and had not used the ordinary, second grade he kept for visitors. Stupid berk, he thought, he should know better—he’ll never make flag rank.
“What about going to Osaka?” Sir William asked.
“Oh, Osaka? I regret you will have to delay until I return.” The smile was barely concealed.
“When will that be?” The sinking feeling became worse.
“To arrive at our destination, six or seven days depending on the winds, two or three days at Boh Chih Seh should be enough. I will have to recoal at Shanghai. Oh, I’d say I should be off Yokohama again unless fresh orders arrive in …” The Admiral quaffed his port and poured another. “I should be back in four or five weeks.”
Sir William finished his brandy and this helped to ease his nausea. “Lieutenant, would you be so kind? Thanks.”
Marlowe took his glass politely and refilled it with the Admiral’s best, hiding his disgust at being a flunky and totally fed up with this aide-decamp posting—wanting to be back on his own ship, his own quarterdeck to supervise the repairs the storm had caused. But at least I’ll see some action at long last, he thought with relish, imagining the attack on the pirate haven, all guns blazing.
“Well, Admiral,” Sir William was saying, “if we fail to make good our threat we will lose enormous face, the initiative, and put ourselves in great danger.”
“It was your threat, Sir William, not ours. As to face, you put too much value on it, as to danger—I presume you mean to the Settlement—damn, Sir, the natives of Japan would not dare to create any major problem. They didn’t really bother you at the Legation, they won’t really bother Yokohama.”
“With the fleet gone, we’re helpless.”
“Not exactly, Sir William,” the General said stiffly. “The army is here in some strength.”
“Quite right,” the Admiral agreed, “but Sir William is perfectly correct to say the Royal Navy keeps the peace. I plan to take four warships, sir, not five, and leave one frigate on station. That should be sufficient. The Pearl.”
Before Marlowe could stop himself, he had said, “Excuse me, sir, she’s still under
going major repairs.”
“I’m so glad to know you keep abreast of the state of my fleet, Mr. Marlowe, and that you keep your ears open,” the Admiral said witheringly. “Obviously Pearl can’t go on this expedition, so you’d best report back aboard and make sure she’s in first-class seagoing condition ready for any duty by sundown tomorrow or you won’t have a ship.”
“Yessir.” Marlowe gulped, saluted and rushed off.
The Admiral grunted and said to the General, “Good officer but not dry behind the ears yet—fine naval family, two brothers also officers and his father’s flag captain at Plymouth.” He looked at Sir William. “Don’t worry, his frigate will have stepped her mast by tomorrow and be in good order-he’s the best of my captains but, for God’s sake, don’t tell him I said so. He’ll guard you until I return. If there’s nothing else, gentlemen, I put to sea right smartly—so sorry I can’t join you for dinner.”
Sir William and the General finished their drinks and stood up. “Godspeed, Admiral Ketterer, may you come back safely with all hands,” Sir William said sincerely, the General echoing him. Then his face hardened. “If I don’t get any satisfaction from the Bakufu I will leave for Osaka as planned, in Pearl or not, at the head of the army or not—but by God, go to Osaka and Kyōto I will.”
“Best wait until I return, best be prudent, best not swear by God to undertake such an ill-advised action, Sir William,” the Admiral said curtly. “God might decide otherwise.”
That evening, just before midnight, Angelique, Phillip Tyrer and Pallidar left the British Legation and strolled down High Street, heading for the Struan Building. “La,” she said happily, “Sir William certainly has a modest chef!”
They were all in evening dress and they laughed, for the food had been abundant English fare and especially delicious—a side of roast beef, trays of pork sausages and fresh crabs brought in on ice from Shanghai in the mail ship’s ice room as part of the diplomatic pouch and therefore not subject to customs inspection or duty. These were served with boiled vegetables, roast potatoes, also imported from Shanghai, with Yorkshire pudding and followed by apple pies and mince pies with all the claret, Pouilly Fumé, port and champagne the twenty guests could drink.
“And when Madam Lunkchurch threw a crab at her husband I thought I would die,” she said to more laughter but Tyrer, embarrassed, said, “I’m afraid some of the so-called traders and their wives are inclined to be boisterous. Please don’t judge all Englishmen, or -women, by their behavior.”
“Quite right.” Pallidar was beaming, delighted that he also had been accepted as part of her escort and conscious that his evening dress uniform and plumed cap made Tyrer’s drab frock coat, his old-fashioned and abundant silk cravat and top hat seem even more funereal. “Dreadful people. Without your presence, the evening would have been awful, no doubt at all.”
High Street and its side streets were still busy with traders, clerks and others weaving their way home to their dwellings or strolling the promenade, the odd drunk lying by the oil lamps that lit the length of it. An occasional cluster of Japanese fishermen, carrying oars and nets, and paper lanterns to light their way, trudged up from the shore where their boats were beached, or headed down from the village for their night’s fishing.
At the front door of the Struan Building she stopped and held out her hand to be kissed. “Thank you and good night, dear friends, please don’t bother to wait, one of the servants can see me back to the Legation.”
“Wouldn’t dream of it,” Pallidar said at once, taking her hand and holding on for a moment.
“I—we’d be glad to wait,” Tyrer assured her.
“But I may be an hour or a few minutes, depending how my fiancé is.”
But they insisted and she thanked them, and she swept past the liveried, armed night watchman, up the stairs, crinoline billowing, trailing her shawl—still caught up in the excitement of the evening and the adoration that surrounded her. “Hello, darling, just wanted to say good night.”
Struan wore an elegant red silk dressing gown over a loose shirt and trousers with soft boots, cravat at his throat and he got up out of the chair, the pain deadened now by the elixir Ah Tok had given him half an hour ago. “I feel better than I have for days, my darling. A bit wobbly, but fine-how lovely you are.” The light from the oil lamp made his gaunt face more handsome than ever, and her more desirable than ever. He put his hands on her shoulders to steady himself, his head and body feeling strangely light, her skin creamy and warm to his touch. Her eyes were dancing and he looked down, loving her, and kissed her. Gently at first, then, as she responded, glorying further in her taste and welcome. “I love you,” he murmured between kisses.
“I love you,” she replied, believing it and weak with pleasure, so happy that he seemed truly better, his lips strong and seeking and hands strong and seeking but within bounds, bounds that suddenly, deliriously, she wanted to cast aside. “Je t’aime, chéri…je t’aime …”
For a moment they stood in their embrace and then with a strength he did not know he had, he lifted her and sat again in the big, high-backed chair and cradled her in his lap, lips touching, one arm around her tiny waist, a hand quietly on her breast, the silk seeming to enhance the half-cupped warmth beneath. Wonder filled him. Wonder that here where every part of her was covered and forbidden, in the night, all was open and offered and was young, but now he was more euphoric and stimulated than he had ever been, yet at the same time controlled, no longer frantic with lust.
“So strange,” he murmured, and thought, but not so strange, the pain’s masked by the medicine. The rest isn’t, my love for her.
“Chéri?”
“Strange that I need you so much yet I can wait. Not long but I can wait.”
“Please not long, please.” Again her lips sought his, nothing in her mind but him, heat welding her memory closed and worry closed and never a problem anymore. For both of them. Then the sudden sound of a nearby gunshot from outside.
Their mood shattered, she sat upright on his lap and before she knew it was hurrying for the half-open window. Below she could see Pallidar and Tyrer—damn, I’d forgotten them, she thought. The two men were looking inland, then they turned, their attention directed towards Drunk Town.
She craned out of the window but saw only a vague group of men at the far end, their bleary shouts wafted on the wind. “It seems to be nothing, just Drunk Town …” she said, guns and fights, even duels, not rare in that part of Yokohama. Then, feeling strange and chilled and at the same time flushed, she came back and looked at him. With a little sigh she knelt and took his hand and pressed it to her cheek, her head in his lap, but his gentleness and his fingers caressing her hair and the nape of her neck no longer drove the devils away. “I should go home, my love.”
“Yes.” His fingers continued their stroking.
“I want to stay.”
“I know.”
Struan saw himself, out of himself, the perfect gentleman, calm, quiet, helping her to her feet, waiting while she straightened her bodice and hair and draped her shawl around her. Then, hand in hand, walking slowly with her to the head of the stairs where he allowed himself to be persuaded to stay, permitting a servant to lead her below. At the door she turned once and waved a loving farewell and he waved and then she was gone.
It seemed to take him no effort to walk back and undress, letting his servant pull off his boots. Then into bed with no help at all, lying back at peace with himself and the world. Head fine, body fine, relaxed.
“How is my son?” Ah Tok whispered from the doorway.
“In the Land of the Poppy.”
“Good, good. No pain for my son there.”
The servant blew out the flame and then left him.
Down the High Street, the French soldier sentry, his uniform as sloppy as his manner, opened the Legation door for her. “Bonsoir, Mademoiselle.”
“Bonsoir, Monsieur. Good night, Phillip, good night, Settry.” The door closed and she
leaned against it a moment to collect herself. The delight of the evening had vanished. In its place, the spectres were crowding for attention. Deep in thought she walked across the hall towards her suite, saw a light under Seratard’s door. She stopped and, on a sudden impulse that this might be a perfect time to ask for a loan, she knocked and went in. “Oh! André! Hello, excuse me, I was expecting Monsieur Henri.”
“He’s still with Sir William. I’m just finishing a dispatch for him.” André was at Seratard’s desk, many papers spread around. The dispatch dealt with Struan’s, their possible arms deal with the Choshu, and the possible help that a possible French wife might render their fledgling arms industry. “Did you have a good time? How’s your fiancé?”
“He’s much better, thank you. The dinner was huge, if you like to eat heavily. Ah, to be in Paris, yes?”
“Yes.” My God, she’s beddable, he thought, and that reminded him of the infectious vileness eating him away.
“What is it?” she asked, startled by his sudden pallor.
“Nothing.” He cleared his throat and fought to control the horror. “Just out of sorts—nothing grave.”
He seemed so vulnerable, so helpless that abruptly she decided to trust him again and closed the door and sat near him, pouring out her story. “What am I going to do, dear André? I can’t get any cash … what can I do?”
“Dry your tears, Angelique, the answer is so simple. Tomorrow or the next day I will take you shopping,” he said, his mind quite clear for mundane matters. “You’ve asked me to go shopping with you, haven’t you, to help find an engagement present for Monsieur Struan. Gold cuff links with pearls, and pearl earrings for yourself.” His voice saddened. “But oh, so terrible, somewhere en route back from the jewelers you lose one pair—we look everywhere but to no avail. Terrible!” His pale brown eyes held hers. “Meanwhile the mama-san has her secret payment, I will make sure the pair you ‘lose’ more than covers the medicine, and all costs.”
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