Mandarin

by Elegant, Robert;

  “I’ve heard of him.” Saul was guarded. “I believe he has a reputation as a … what do you say … cad, isn’t it?”

  “I wouldn’t, sir. Not my kind of word, though the Limeys might. To me he’s just an adolescent lecher. Well, a very funny thing happened to Iain Matthews last night.”

  David set his features impassively, while Saul checked a disquieting suspicion.

  “They found him on the Bund early this morning,” Gabriel Hyde continued. “Trussed so tight he couldn’t move a finger—could hardly bat an eyelash.”

  “That’s not so funny.”

  “I assure you it was. He was stripped, absolutely bare-ass … ah … not a stitch on him. Only a dunce cap on his head. And his face was painted bright red.”

  “A peculiar sense of humor these young English have. Some prank of the griffins, was it?”

  “Anything but.” Hyde shook his head emphatically. “A sign in Chinese and English was pinned to his chest. That wasn’t funny. Must’ve hurt like the devil.”

  “And this sign?” Saul was losing interest. “What did it say?”

  “Just this: All red-haired devils play with our Chinese women thus be punished! There he lay, buck-naked and shivering in the heat. Some Chinese father’s had a grand revenge.”

  David permitted himself a small smile. He had not been certain the carpenter was speaking the truth when he swore he could carry a proposal to the remnants of the Small Sword Secret Society. He’d now have to pay the additional ten taels promised on fulfillment of their contract. But he’d gladly pay ten times as much to humiliate the barbarian.

  “That’s not all, Mr. Haleevie, not at all.” Gabriel Hyde hesitated. “But I don’t want to offend you.”

  “Try me, Commander, so I can get back to work.”

  “Well, you’ll pardon the language, but his penis and testicles were painted red, too. A little sign was tied around it. The message said: Next time, blood is real. Next time him eunuch. His mates laughed so hard they couldn’t untie him for minutes.”

  “As you said, somebody’s had his revenge.” Saul was relieved that the culprits were patently Chinese. “And I suppose it is funny, though unpleasant.”

  “There’ll be a great to-do now.” Hyde chortled again. “Pardon me, but I can’t help laughing.”

  Lionel Henriques wafted through the open door on a wave of indignation. His beautifully cut double-breasted nankeen jacket hung open, the high lapels skewed around his butterfly collar and maroon cravat. His pale-blue eyes glittered as he passed his slender hand through his blond hair.

  “Haleevie, my dear fellow, have you heard of the outrage?” he demanded. “What next, I ask you?”

  Henriques nodded to the American officer. David he ignored.

  “This young chap Matthews, have you heard?” he resumed. “It’s an outrage. The quack thinks he has a concussion, perhaps a fractured skull.”

  David Lee felt a twinge of guilt. His instructions had been clear: the rascal was to be shamed, but not injured. That decision was not influenced by compassion. The humiliation would be all the more galling, he’d reasoned coolly, if Matthews were unhurt. He wanted to make the griffin a laughing-stock, not a martyr. His smile faded.

  “It was not well done,” Saul said, pondering. “Whatever these Chinese had against this Matthews, they should have gone to law. Or left him to his conscience. Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord!”

  “A fat lot of good that would’ve done them.” Gabriel glanced sharply at David. “Chinese law can’t touch him—and English law won’t. Anyway, what makes you think he has a conscience?”

  “We live among barbarians,” Lionel Henriques muttered. “You haven’t heard the rest. When they turned him over, his … ah … bottom and thighs were seamed with cuts. And another sign was stuck into … ah … between his buttocks. Next time the jewels! it said. Absolutely barbaric.”

  “Somebody’s pretty annoyed at that young fellow.” Gabriel Hyde laughed again.

  David was puzzled, since the American was normally humane. If anything, he was too concerned with the well-being of others, almost quixotic. David savored the word he had learned only the preceding week. Gabriel Hyde had demonstrated that weakness by refusing any reward for returning the runaways captured on the smuggling junk.

  Why, David wondered, should the American feel such enormous delight at Iain Matthews’s humiliation? Had he guessed the identity of the lady who was thus revenged? Did he feel more for Fronah than fondness mingled with amusement? But his attitude toward her had always been avuncular, another treasured new word.

  “Well, gentlemen, I must be going,” the American said. “My rascals will sell the engine out of the Mencius if I leave them alone too long.”

  “Commander, can you drop by next week?” Saul invited. “I may have something to offer you. It’s only a thought just yet. But it could be interesting.”

  “I’ll do that, Mr. Haleevie. Goodbye for now.”

  Gabriel Hyde nodded to Lionel Henriques and waved cheerfully at the young Chinese in the corner. What, David wondered, did his knowing smile imply?

  “There’s also a matter I’d like to talk over with you, Mr. Henriques.” Saul was again briskly businesslike. “I promise I won’t keep you too long.”

  “Do call me Lionel,” the Englishman suggested. “And, if I may, Saul. We are, after all, brethren in this iniquitous place.”

  “Tell me, then, Lionel. Your responsibilities to Samuelson and Company, your duties at Derwents, do they keep you very busy?”

  “No, Saul, I’m not much occupied. Mine’s a watching brief.”

  Saul nodded. He had wondered why Lionel Henriques was virtually the only man in bustling Shanghai who seemed to have almost unlimited time at his disposal.

  “Much leisure for curio hunting,” Henriques went on. “Have you, by the way, seen the blue-and-gray lotus saucers Old Curiosity Soo’s offering? Tang, actually, he claims, and I believe he’s right.”

  “I look forward to seeing them.” Saul resented the capacity of his own passion for Chinese ceramics to distract him from business. “And soon, I hope. But now, I’d like to explore an idea with you.”

  Unnoticed in his corner, David grew tense. Foreigners, he knew, did not employ professional go-betweens to propose marriage as Chinese did to prevent either party’s being shamed by rejection. He also knew that his adoptive father regretted the disregard of that old Chinese—and Jewish—custom. Saul Haleevie was, he told himself, too civilized to offer his daughter’s hand in the presence of a third person. Yet it appeared that he was on the point of “exploring” the prospect of a marriage between Fronah and the Englishman while his adopted son sat by.

  “I’ve often thought of setting up entirely on my own, you know, Lionel,” Saul began tentatively. “The Khartoons are the best employers a man could have, and I already do a pretty fair trade on my own account. But you understand, for a man of spirit it can sometimes be galling.”

  “Saul, no one thinks of you as an employee,” Henriques interposed tactfully. “They call you the taipan of Haleevies, not the manager of Khartoons.”

  “Still, it’s galling when I see a good opportunity and can’t take advantage,” Saul continued meditatively. “Besides, a man who’s independent can do the best for his family. Someday, Fronah will be very comfortable—a wealthy young lady.”

  David tried to conceal his dismay at Saul’s lack of finesse. His adoptive father was actually offering Fronah’s hand to the languid Englishman before a witness, while disregarding the preliminaries essential to that—or any other—transaction.

  “I’m sure she will, Saul,” Henriques replied neutrally.

  “And that’s where you come in—or might come in.”

  David closed his eyes and wished he could cover his ears. Though forced to listen to the demeaning negotiation, he did not have to watch Saul barter away his daughter so barbarously and so unskillfully.

  “… need someone to work with me,” Saul continu
ed. “When I strike out on my own, I’ll have some need for additional capital as well. From what my brother Solomon wrote, you’re just the man for …”

  David realized that his adoptive father was as civilized and as subtle as he had thought. The merchant was not offering Fronah’s hand, but a commercial arrangement. Whether he ever discussed marriage would depend on the Englishman’s response—and his subsequent performance.

  Saul Haleevie was very canny. He was not only making his proposal before a witness who could, if the need ever arose, testify to the terms. He was also drawing his adopted son deeper into his business affairs, while showing that unworthy son that a partner could be found outside the family circle if necessary. Though David’s admiration for Saul’s sagacity was confirmed, he felt the broad hint regarding Fronah would better have been left unsaid.

  “Tell me, Saul, what do you have in mind?” the Englishman asked. “How can I serve you?”

  “You understand, I’m only trying ideas.”

  “Try me, Saul.” Lionel Henriques was irritated by the merchant’s Levantine circuitousness. “I’ve lots of time, as I said.”

  “Well, Lionel, I was thinking. The Taiping troubles aren’t good for business. But they could also be a big opportunity. If I could be sure of enough silver, there are some wonderful buys in the Taiping areas.”

  “Samuelsons won’t play, Saul,” Henriques interposed defensively. “It’s not even worth asking. Otherwise, I could commit quite substantial sums on my own say-so. But the bank is too heavily subscribed to Derwents to venture further sums on the China coast at this time.”

  “That’s not what I had in mind. I don’t want to borrow in London, not even from Samuelsons. There’s loose silver in Hong Kong and Canton, too. With trade disrupted, they don’t seem to know what to do with their silver. But I do. Also, I need a representative not directly connected with me—a man with an irreproachable reputation among the Gentiles.”

  “I’m your man, Saul.” The Englishman did not hesitate, and David again deplored foreigners’ undignified haste in business. “What precisely do you have in mind?”

  “It’s not all that urgent, of course,” Saul equivocated. “Take some time to think it over.”

  “I assure you, my dear chap, I’m quite prepared to undertake your commission,” Henriques pressed. “And without any talk of the consideration. I know I can depend on your fairness.”

  “Fairness, Lionel my friend, looks different depending on where you sit. When the time comes, we’ve got to understand each other right down to the ground. But I don’t want to rush you.”

  “You’re not rushing me, I’m quite certain that …”

  “No, Lionel, better take a few weeks. But if it works out, I’ll be forever in your debt.”

  “I don’t see the need to delay.” Henriques laughed. “However, as you wish. Now tell me, Saul, is this incident with Iain Matthews the beginning of a wave of lawlessness?”

  David nodded approval of his adoptive father’s tactics. Saul Haleevie was so subtle he might almost be Chinese. He had thrown out lures to both the American and the Englishman without committing himself to either.

  What complex scheme, David wondered, was his father spinning? He was delighted that Saul had followed the old Chinese maxim: The intelligent fisherman does not jerk the line, but lets the lure dance in the current until the pike eagerly hooks itself. Not one but two fish were darting around the lure.

  The evening meal was sacrosanct in the Haleevie household. Saul insisted that his daughter Fronah and his sons Aaron and David join their parents in the somber dining room of the house on Szechwan Road. But he was tolerant of his Chinese sons’ wish to eat Chinese food at lunchtime, and he did not require them to obey the laws of kashruth. Fronah was often permitted to join her adopted brothers for lunch in the new conservatory. Sarah shook her head in disapproval, since she could not believe her daughter would eat only fish, vegetables, or eggs. Besides, the cooking pans, the serving platters, and the fragile rice bowls were contaminated by the pork and shellfish indispensable to the Shanghai cuisine.

  Sarah did not agree with her husband that their daughter must be allowed some latitude if she were to live comfortably in the cosmopolitan treaty port. Even the tolerant Saul would have been shocked to learn that Fronah liked to eat shrimp dumplings and braised crab on her excursions with Maylu into the South City. Urged by the concubine, Fronah had twice nibbled crisp morsels of roast pork. The first time, she had vomited; the second time, she had only felt queasy. But revulsion—and guilt—ensured that she did not again taste the flesh of swine.

  After a light lunch with her parents on the sultry afternoon of July 17, 1856, Fronah pushed aside the feathery ferns trailing across the doorway of the conservatory to demand a bite of her brothers’ bream steamed with scallions and ginger. Tendrils of damp hair curled about her high forehead, and her rounded cheeks were flushed. She plied her scarlet silk fan so vigorously that the gilt ribs creaked. She had reverted to a cotton kaftan over only a flimsy linen shift, but the pervasive damp heat drained her energy. Fish, Maylu said, was cooling.

  The brothers leaned back in their cane chairs as Fronah entered. She wondered what secrets they had been discussing in rapid Shanghainese with their heads close together. The earnest Aaron rarely confided in her. At twenty, he considered himself mature, and Chinese gentlemen did not discuss serious matters with women. The scapegrace David never kept anything from her. Despite his brother’s admonitions, she could always winkle out his innermost thoughts. Today both looked sheepish, and neither spoke—neither Aaron in his gentleman’s cotton long-gown nor David in his raffish open jacket and baggy workman’s trousers.

  “I want some fish.” She settled in a vacant chair. “What were you whispering about?”

  “Mei shen-mo …” David assured her. “Nothing of importance, Fronah. Believe me.”

  “I don’t believe you,” she replied equably, attacking the fish with her chopsticks. “But it’s too hot to argue. You’ll tell me after a while, I’m sure.”

  Sprays of brown-and-yellow slipper orchids curled around David’s round face, while his lean brother sat in a bower of giant purple cattleyas. The conservatory had been built to accommodate Sarah Haleevie’s new passion for both orchids and the flamboyant orange bird-of-paradise flowers that seemed to flit amid the greenery.

  “All right, Little Sister, though it may disturb you.” Surprisingly, Aaron broke the long silence. “There’s been an outrage. Someone you know well. Actually Iain Matthews.”

  Fronah’s chopsticks clattered onto the serving platter. When her left hand dropped to her side, her fan furled its scarlet panels.

  “What’s happened to Iain?” she demanded. “Tell me what’s happened. Is he hurt?”

  “Not badly, Fronah,” David replied soothingly. “Dr. MacGregor thinks he may have a slight concussion, but not likely.”

  “It’s not fit for her ears,” Aaron interjected. “You can’t tell her the whole story.”

  Since Saul’s delicacy had obviously kept him from mentioning the incident to the ladies, the brothers were reluctant to relate the lurid circumstances. They hesitated, stuttered, and backtracked. David stared into his teacup, feeling truly guilty for the first time, though he felt that Fronah had encouraged him. But she demanded every detail of Iain Matthews’s humiliation. Did he only imagine that satisfaction momentarily quirked the corners of her mouth upward because Iain Matthews had suffered retribution for his offense?

  “I must go to him.” Fronah’s face was pale. “I’m going to him right now.”

  “Fronah, you can’t,” David expostulated. “Think of the scandal. Besides, Father doesn’t know about you.”

  “Thank God, I told Papa. He knows I was seeing Iain, but that’s all. Don’t you two say another word.”

  She paused among the ferns in the doorway, and David hoped she was regretting her impulsiveness. Instead she asked accusingly: “David, you didn’t have anything to do with
this terrible business, did you? I know your tricks.”

  “Of course not, Fronah,” he lied uneasily, wondering if he had actually mistaken her wish when she earlier agreed that the English youth should be punished “a little.”

  “That’s just as well,” she said flatly. “Otherwise I’d report you to the magistrates.”

  The ferns trembled in the doorway after her departure. David knew that Saul would be angry at her rushing off, and he had only recently forgiven them for their escapade with the smugglers.

  No Chinese lady would behave like Fronah. How could she retain either respect or affection for a man who had been so basely exposed to public ridicule? No matter how much she might have thought she loved such a luckless scamp, no Chinese lady would expose herself in turn to ridicule.

  David shook his head in perplexity. He would never understand how foreigners behaved, despite his love for Fronah and his Western education. Regretting his sister’s unhappiness, he was distressed by his stratagem’s failure. Instead of rejecting Iain Matthews, Fronah had rushed to the lout’s bedside.

  David did not regret the twenty silver taels the assault had cost. Revenge was worth more than £7, and the family’s honor was redeemed. But he would never understand foreigners, not even his own foreign sister.

  CHAPTER 29

  August 1, 1856

  SHANGHAI

  The atmosphere in the house on Szechwan Road had been strained for two weeks. Saul Haleevie knew it was no fault of Sarah or himself, for their rapport had not altered. Intense as always, it had, as always, been roiled by spats over trifles and exalted by moments of profound emotional and physical communion. Nor, after their first shocked anger, had they protested at Fronah’s visits to that unfortunate lad from Jardines. But the children had been irritable and withdrawn since the attack on Iain Matthews.

  Fronah’s distress was understandable, though dramatized. She was, after all, a good friend of the lad. What stronger tie might once have joined them he preferred not to inquire. She had assured him again: “All that was over long ago!” Whatever that meant.