The Unexpected Wife

by Warfield, Caroline

  Her lips twitched. She probably wants to tell me not to lay it on so thick.

  “Duke is a high official?” the translator asked.

  This time she was ahead of him. “Second only to the Queen, my lord,” she said in English and then went on in Cantonese.

  Lin wrinkled his brow and conferred with his translator, puzzling Charles. “Official proceedings take place in Mandarin as is proper. The High Commissioner orders that we speak English or Mandarin. The lady’s common Cantonese will not do,” the translator said smugly.

  Zambak bowed her head.

  Lin spoke again. “Does this English duke know barbarians are forbidden inside the city walls?” He glared at Charles while his minion translated.

  Charles breathed in. “I have been informed of that belatedly. I apologize that my curiosity and desire to learn about your ways drove me to break the rules. I understand that the commissioner, a man of great learning, often wishes to gather information about our ways as well.” He looked directly at Lin, whose eyes glittered, though whether with amusement or anger, Charles could not say.

  “The commissioner asks if there are no books in your country.”

  Charles smiled at that. “My private library has ten thousand volumes. What few I have about China were written by Englishmen. How accurate can they possibly be?”

  The translator earnestly murmured in the great man’s ear. Amused this time, no question. Charles felt like he had successfully negotiated through trial by ordeal.

  “Why does a big-footed western woman dare pollute Canton?” the translator demanded.

  Zambak waited until Lin indicated with a gesture that she should answer for herself. “My beloved brother became a slave of the opium poppy. My desire was merely to find him and free him. In doing so, I was caught up in activity that brought me here. Intruding on Canton was never my intent.”

  Again, a flurry of talk on the dais. Lin sat upright and made a pronouncement. “The High Commissioner has been told that the lady assisted in the clinic of Doctor Peters with the poor souls who wish to free themselves from opium. Is this true?”

  “Yes, my lord,” Zambak said, head high now.

  “The Commissioner says further that your presence is an insult and against the law.”

  “I regret—”

  The interpreter cut her off. “You will not speak! You have broken our law, but the Mandate of Heaven can be merciful in its justice. Commissioner Lin permits the merchant Daniel Oliver to expel you from Canton and transport you to Macao where you belong.”

  Zambak bowed murmuring thanks.

  “As to the duke,” he went on speaking only to Zambak. “We are merciful to fools as well. He may go with you.” She bowed again, and this time Charles did as well.

  “Thank God,” he breathed. He took a step backward, assuming they were dismissed and prepared to back out of the room as they might in the queen’s presence.

  “One more thing. The commissioner wishes to know how it is the lady speaks Cantonese.”

  “I listen, my lord,” she replied. “I listen, watch, and learn. It is a gift I share with my esteemed mother.”

  Good point. It never hurts to invoke one’s honored parents.

  The commissioner spoke directly to the translator who said something to their escort in rapid Chinese, Lin made a dismissive gesture, and they did indeed back out. When they got to the outer courtyard, however, the escort pulled Zambak aside, separating her from Charles. When he tried to follow, the guards pulled him back. “What is it?” he called.

  “The commissioner wishes to speak with me,” she said over her shoulder, looking bemused. She disappeared into a side door, leaving him in the sunny courtyard, alone except for a guard brandishing a vicious-looking sword.

  “What do we do now? Wait?” The guard responded with a fierce glare. “Wait. Right.” He stared helplessly at the door through which she disappeared.

  Chapter 30

  Lin at his ease gave a very different impression than Lin in command. He rested on a divan in a sunny room filled with flowers and the odor of cinnamon and nutmeg. He had not changed his robes, yet his appearance shifted subtly from stiff to comfortable. As Zambak entered the room, servants brought tea and almond cakes and bowed to the commissioner. Here, in what Zambak could only guess were private quarters, there was no kowtow. No translator appeared, and her escort withdrew to a far corner.

  No theater then.

  “Sit, lady, and try the tea. It is my personal blend. Very fine,” Lin said in perfect Cantonese.

  Zambak followed the lead of his servants and bowed at the waist before accepting a porcelain cup, so thin as to be translucent and without handles in the Chinese style. She sniffed scents of jasmine and undercurrents she could not identify. He had not lied. The exquisite taste teased her palette gently, lingered, and satisfied.

  “My mother would be delighted with this blend, my lord,” she said.

  He nodded, obviously pleased but, she thought, not so easily flattered. “Tell me about your mother,” he requested. She did, relating the Duchess of Sudbury’s childhood as an ambassador’s daughter and wife of a powerful force in the Foreign Ministry. She did not exaggerate in her description of diplomatic dinners at Sudbury House in London.

  “The Duchess, your mother—she is a member of the court?” he asked.

  How does his idea of court differ from ours? she wondered. She answered him truthfully in spite of qualms he might not understand the impact of politics on the queen.

  “She served our previous queen, my lord, but Queen Victoria prefers to have ladies of the Whig party serve her.” Much to Mama’s relief. She respected Queen Adelaide but has no desire to pamper Victoria nor cater to her whims.

  Lin frowned, but nodded sagely. “There are always factions. Your father is not in power?”

  Papa claims he belongs to the Party of Good Sense but can’t escape nominal identification with the Conservatives. It doesn’t stop him from sticking his spoon in when the Whigs are in power. How to explain all that to Lin? Better not to. “I believe my father prefers to exercise his influence behind the scenes.”

  “Wise man.” She thought his respect might be sincere.

  The breadth of Lin’s conversation astonished her. His questions ranged from cotton manufactories to the government in Calcutta to the state of English roads and railroad development, confirming the rumors he read European books and newspapers.

  Zambak sat as she had been trained to do, upright, back not touching the chair back, and nibbled almond biscuits with well-learned ladylike manners while replying with the force of a mind some considered unfeminine. Lin didn’t object. His questions became more pointed, and her responses and opinions sharpened.

  They came at last to what Zambak suspected was his true goal in this meeting. “What is the power of your superintendent of trade?” he asked.

  She answered as truthfully as she could. Elliot had been appointed by Palmerston, the foreign minister, to insure the free flow of tea back to England. She explained, patiently, the chain of command from Elliot to the foreign minister to the prime minister. She hesitated. In Lin’s world, the prime minister then reported to the queen who held all power. The letter to Victoria made it painfully clear the high commissioner didn’t and couldn’t understand the differences.

  “And so he has command over these opium smugglers?”

  Less than he would like. Lin must know he had been able to order the gunboats from the river, but his power to do so was tenuous. “Not directly,” she answered, “But somewhat.”

  He shook his head back and forth. “Poor policy,” he said. “What do you think of this man?”

  For a moment, being asked for such opinion by the great man left her stunned. He deserved an honest answer.

  “He is a man of consc
ience, my lord. A former naval officer who knows his duty. He was sent to supervise the tea trade but has no sympathy with the opium smugglers. He urges the government to stop them.”

  “Urges, but has no power to act.” He held her eyes, this man of action, his opinion of a man who could not act in the face of evil all too clear without speaking. She made no reply.

  “You may return to the Oliver factory now. Do not leave it, even to visit the other westerners. We will send documents of safe passage to Macao for you, this duke of yours, and your brother.”

  Zambak stood and bowed, hands at her waist, as she had seen others do. “Thank you for your kindness, my lord,” she said, and then she looked up at him again. “If I may be so bold, one other thing about Charles Elliot.”

  He waited patiently for her to speak.

  “He considers it his primary duty to protect English interests here. If he thinks England or the trade in tea is threatened, he will act.”

  Black eyes met ice blue. He understood. She bowed again and withdrew.

  And God help us if Elliot does act, she thought, backing to the door.

  ~ ~ ~

  Lin’s promised safe passage did not arrive the next day or the one after that. Trapped in Oliver and Company’s premises and anxious to get back to Macao to deal with Julia, Charles prowled the upper floors until Oliver told him to stay out of the offices so he could get work done.

  Thorn’s presence didn’t help. When the lack of servants and embargo on incoming supplies made life in any of the factories uncomfortable, he had been lured back by the promise of safe passage to Macao. He sat in the dining area as bored and frustrated as Charles. He considered learning to make his own tea, there being no Chinese servants, but had not yet done so.

  Even Thorn’s presence couldn’t banish the visions of Zambak—some real, some imagined, some wildly erotic—that haunted him in his enforced inactivity. The two of them hadn’t spoken since they returned to the factory and she gave him a summary of her odd interview before disappearing downstairs and leaving him to record it in their journal. She had moved back into a cubbyhole near the clinic, far from the guest corridor, avoiding him as much as she could. Pacing failed to banish his unruly thoughts, and he eventually gave in to the need to check on her. He thought perhaps reality would push the worst erotic images aside.

  When Charles went below stairs, he found Zambak covered in a stained apron assisting an opium patient in the throws of cramps and upset. That put period to romantic imagery but filled him with respect and warmth, which were in their own way worse.

  She looked up from where she held a basin over which the man heaved. “Charles! Make yourself useful. There is clean water over there. Dampen a rag for me.” She indicated the dresser with her head. “Have we heard from the high commissioner?”

  “No, I just came to check on you,” he replied, doing as she asked.

  She wiped her patient’s face and laid him back on his cot shaking uncontrollably. “Bored, Charles? We could use your help. You’re the one with sickroom experience.”

  “Not like this,” he sighed. “So much human misery.”

  “Better to alleviate what I can than to sit and wait,” she told him.

  “True enough. Work might help your irritable brother as well,” he added, taking the basin from her. “Where do I empty this?”

  She told him, but he paused in the doorway. “Do you think Lin really intends to give us passage documents?”

  “He’s a man of his word, so yes. He will use the timing to his advantage, however,” she replied.

  “While punishing a felon who trespassed,” he muttered as he wandered off with the foul-smelling basin.

  Charles worked in the clinic for almost four hours after Zambak left to speak to her brother. When asked, Peters had plenty of tasks to assign to a willing duke; they became increasingly unpleasant as the good doctor came to believe in that willingness. Charles had a particular affinity for the children, even fretful ones, and Peters seemed happy to turn them over to him to free up orderlies to deal with the flood of opium patients who continued to beg for help.

  A clock ticking toward execution is a great motivator, Charles thought, watching another fall weeping through the door.

  One small girl burned with fever, the result of an operation to remove a tooth abscess. The clinic deemed her unready to return home, and her mother, burdened with six other children, left her in their care. Charles worked steadily with cool, wet cloths to keep the fever down. Checking his watch, he prepared another tisane of willow bark, slid an arm behind the child, and began the tedious task of coaxing, cajoling, and convincing her to down it all. Ignorance of Cantonese words posed a difficulty, but he found tone of voice—augmented by funny faces—to be a universal language for children.

  He laid her back, leaned over, and bumped his nose to hers, eliciting enough of a giggle to warm his heart. When he reached over to put the empty cup on a table, he sucked in a breath. Zambak, standing primly in the doorway, her apron over her arm, studied him gravely. Her eyes hazy with moisture gave his heart a pang.

  “What is it?” he asked.

  “Oliver has called for us.”

  He stood and pulled down the sleeves of his shirt. “Safe passage at last?”

  She shook her head. Her eyes followed his hands when he fastened the neck. “Something else I think. It doesn’t sound good.”

  He buttoned his waistcoat and slipped into his coat. “Whatever it is, let us face it together.” The flare of something in her eyes warmed him, though he couldn’t be certain what he saw.

  ~ ~ ~

  I ogled him like a common trollop. The thought echoed all the way up the stairs to the door to Oliver’s office. The sight of the duke’s gentleness with the child squeezed her heart until warmth spread through her body and robbed her of speech. When he rose, she couldn’t take her eyes off his hands and the expanse of skin revealed by his rolled-up shirtsleeves or the place where his shirt opened at the neck. The memory sent the heat soaring. Now she felt one of those hands against the small of her back urging her forward.

  How will I concentrate on what Oliver has to say? She needn’t have worried. What he had to say drove all other concerns aside. The trader didn’t mince words. He sat back in his captain’s chair behind the worn wooden desk and spat it out. “Lin wants Dean. No promise of safety. In fact, a request for a guarantee of his safety has been summarily refused.”

  “I beg your pardon? Why?” she demanded. “He treated us well enough.” They took seats across from him.

  “Your crimes didn’t rise to the level of opium smuggling. They’ve all had a week to turn over their opium stores, and they have either ignored the edict or, as in the case of Dean, outright refused.”

  “He means to execute him,” she whispered. Memory of the summary execution of the men in the audience hall for opium related offences distressed her. If Lin executes an Englishman . . .

  “What response has been made?” Charles asked.

  “Dean’s company sent back an insulting message,” Oliver told them, disgust filling his words. He waved his ever-present pipe when he gestured.

  “That won’t help!” Zambak said.

  “No, it will not. The East India Company has sent a request to negotiate.” Oliver shrugged. “Lin doesn’t seem to be in a conciliatory mood.”

  “He wants to make an example of one of them. It was bound to come to down to Dean or Jarratt.” She rubbed her middle finger with her left thumb, staring down at the desk. The silence that met her comment alerted her. She glanced up. “What?” she demanded at the looks on their faces.

  “Why do you say that?” Oliver appeared genuinely interested.

  “Jarratt or Dean? They are the worst of the lot.” She looked from face to face finding no disagreement, though she doubted
the Americans would have given voice to it.

  “What did you mean about Lin?” Bradshaw asked.

  “Lin does not act according to ‘mood.’ His commission is to eradicate the opium and the trade in it. He takes action, yes, but not impulsively. He lays out a strategy and follows it inexorably forward. He wants the opium stores. He will get them one way or the other. At least he believes so. He would execute Dean and then ask for another.”

  Oliver sank back in his well-worn desk chair and sighed deeply. “Two more American firms have publicly renounced the trade and turned over their stores. The Scots and English are relying on your navy to protect their ‘assets’ and force opium down the Chinese throats.”

  Shame washed through her, shame for her country. She caught Charles’s eyes.

  “Have you no influence, Your Grace?” Bradshaw asked.

  “Some, but in England, not here. There the lady’s father has even more. The anti-opium forces need ammunition, however, and we’re no help here. We need to get our reports to London before it’s too late.”

  The bleak cloud in his eyes told Zambak he believed it was already too late. He’s probably right, but we have to try.

  “What of you, Dan? Are you still in danger of his wrath?” she asked.

  “I think not. Turning you over apparently put us back in his good graces.” Oliver colored up at that. They all knew the decision to comply had been Zambak’s. Not one of the men would have turned her over.

  “That and the clinic,” she replied. “He knows the value of what Alexander Peters does.”

  “Still no word about safe passage, though, and it grows more urgent every day.” Burdened with misery, Charles’s voice sounded harsh.

  “I suspect he will wait until the matter with Dean is settled before he lets even one ship out,” Oliver said.

  The weight growing in Zambak’s chest threatened to flatten her. She reached out a hand toward Charles for strength, caught herself, and pulled it back.