“Random killing of civilians. Casual murder of prisoners. That was the least of the beastliness that occurred. I much doubt that a woman or girl escaped the hands of the troops in either town.”
“You mean…”
“Exactly. I am sorry to mention such a thing to you, Ellen. Horrifying!”
“But not British sailors and soldiers, Magnus!”
“I fear so. And not confined wholly to the other ranks, shocking though it is to impute such conduct to officers. The Generals and admirals knew of it and turned the blind eye, except for the Germans and Russians who would seem to have cheered their people on. I am told as well that some missionaries preached justification of the acts of the men – ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’.”
She was not wholly amazed at that, presumed that it would be the Catholics, Romanism being far removed, in her opinion, from true Christianity. Magnus did not attempt to correct her delusions.
“Will the Chinese ever forget these actions, Magnus?”
“Some will. Those of the south who were untouched by the Boxers will have no concern for the tribulations of the northerners. Many of the dwellers of the larger towns will have seen almost nothing of the fighting – they will care little enough for the whole business. The peasants of the north will remember – they have suffered so greatly in the decade. The Yellow River flooded and changed its course, and millions died. Then there was the drought, in which more millions died. On top of everything, the Boxers and their defeat, and how many that killed, the Good Lord alone knows. I doubt the poor men of the soil will ever forgive the foreigners who they believe bear responsibility for the whole business.”
She could see that to be so.
“Will the British remain, Magnus?”
“For many years yet, my love. But we will go eventually - there will be a war with Germany and that will weaken us and strengthen the Chinese in their bitterness if we fight each other over their territory. I do not know. I suspect that in time the Japanese will take over from us and become the most hated nation in China once again – how that will affect us, I know not. I do not have a crystal ball, but I am sure that we are safe while the Qing survive, for the empire cannot ever exercise power again and yet can prevent any other government achieving legitimacy. After the empress, who is to say what will happen?”
“This is our last posting in China, Magnus?”
“Three years, my love. At most. Then it is Home for us, unless I resign my commission.”
She shook her head, he should not do that.
“Better to have a reason to go away, Magnus. If you are ordered off, then you must go – there can be no question of you betraying your friends in China if you are obeying your lawful master. I much suspect that we will be better off living in England.”
“Scotland, perhaps? I cannot imagine my father will make old bones, not if he is locked away for his own safety, which I fear to be the case. I must talk with Captain Hawkins – he hears every rumour and all of the unpublished facts of London existence. He has been our friend since this business with my brother started and my father became weakened in his constitution.”
“I know, Magnus, and am ashamed that I cannot like him. There is a degree of hardness to him that grates with me.”
“I will not work in his department because of that. He will employ any means to achieve what he considers a good end. He cannot accept that to dirty one’s hands is to betray our great cause. We cannot claim moral superiority over our enemies if we use their methods.”
Captain Hawkins passed through Shanghai later in the week, dropping into his offices there on his way from Peking to Hong Kong, or so he said.
“Good to see you, Eskdale. Heard you were here, of course. How’s the little boy?”
“Well and growing fast, sir. A source of great joy to us both.”
“Should be, too. Congratulations. Now, this business in London – the blackmailing letter you received and were so wise as to pass to me. Never fails to amaze me, the victims of blackmail who don’t ask for immediate help. Whatever happens, the victim is always worse off if he pays up. It never ends with a single payment, you see. Time after time I have seen the blackmailed in a suicide’s grave!”
Magnus agreed, very solemnly.
“I have the advantage of possessing no reputation to lose, sir. No man will blackmail me by threatening exposure of my brother or father – and since I met Ellen, I have nothing discreditable about me.”
“I know.”
This was a little disconcerting, suggesting that Magnus was under a degree of surveillance.
“I keep an eye on you, Eskdale. Of course I do! Be stupid not to with the contacts you have in China. All I expect to find out is which triad is on top at the moment. Now then, this little man in London. Nasty business, as the fellow wrote his letter under duress – his throat was to be cut if he did not. What he said was perfectly true and was known to one or two others who had been digging in the mire of your brother’s background. It seems that German intelligencers from one of their departments had got a whiff of his habits and had been closing in on him, expecting him to become a minister, a member of the government and vulnerable to them, in a few years. Your brother died – I’ll come to that in a minute – and they hoped to draw you in to replace him. They did not imagine that you would have money or that you would go straight to the authorities. It led us to them, of course, enabled us to identify their active men and discover their financial sources – which we managed to pinch! We found three other victims of blackmail as well – foolish men with boyfriends and well-placed in politics and in the civil service. Two of them were much relieved to be rescued from their servitude; the third had unpleasant tastes that were too criminal to ignore and we provided him with a few pounds and a ticket out of the country. Lets the message go round that one is better off talking to us than paying them.”
It seemed wise to Magnus.
“Adding to the fun, we have turned one of the Germans – he now works for us. As a result we have access to their files on the German General Staff – you wouldn’t believe some of the things those generals get up to!”
Magnus thought that he might.
“Now, your brother. The body we found was definitely his and we know how it got into the Thames. He tried to sell his German blackmailers to the French and was on his way by small motorboat down the Thames to Deal in Kent where he was to meet up with his new handlers and collect his first payment in cash. They thought it was a very clever way of avoiding watchers. Sadly for them, it was not, and the boat was intercepted by a steam tug with a group of Germans aboard. They made a mess of it and ran the boat down and drowned all those aboard it. The corpses came into messy contact with the paddle-wheels, whether prior or subsequent to death is unknown.”
“He couldn’t even manage a betrayal efficiently. Typical, sir!”
Captain Hawkins tried to turn a laugh into a sympathetic smile, unsuccessfully.
“Your father, by the way, is in rapid decline. He still cannot come to terms with you as his heir. In his more rational moments, he calls for his lawyers to disown you.”
“What does he do in his less, sir?”
“Calls for his bankers to lend him enough to put a price on your head.”
Magnus spluttered with laughter – it seemed somehow typical of the old man.
“Has he long to live, do you know, sir?”
“Months rather than years. He has periods of extreme restlessness, shouting and throwing himself about in his room, and the doctors are forced to inject to calm him down. They are very go-ahead – your lawyers have been able to pick up one of the best in the field as a consultant. Not expensive – he is an Austrian gentleman who wishes to become established in England. He made himself odious in Vienna through a social gaffe and was forced to leave the country and is vulnerable in England for not wishing to be deported. The implication that we might send him back has left him willing to treat an earl gratis, in exchange for i
t being known that he has him as a patient.”
Magnus found himself wanting to know exactly what the good doctor had done. Vienna was generally regarded as one of the more tolerant – or lax – cities.
“He was called to treat the daughter of a graf – the poor girl experiencing certain delusions on occasion, sufficient that she was an embarrassment in society and had to be confined on a country estate. He evidently reduced her insanity, but he increased her belly, which led him in his wisdom to flee the country while he was still whole. The count wished to set his horse doctor to work on him and save him from any such future errors.”
“Ouch!”
“Just so, Eskdale. He does not wish to be returned to Austria.”
“He might well not, sir. What is he injecting into my poor father?”
“Heroin. It is a derivative of opium lately discovered to give the irrational and the restless a degree of tranquillity – sometimes very marked – and to render them calmer and happier in their everyday existence.”
“Then my father is a lucky man to have the good doctor as his physician. Few are so fortunate.”
“Exactly, Eskdale. He is in physical decline, eating less and sleeping more, and the heroin seems to be ameliorating all of the pangs he might suffer.”
Magnus returned home to acquaint Ellen with all Captain Hawkins had told him.
“We may well succeed to the title within the twelvemonth, my love. Our son may become Lord Eskdale while still in his cradle.”
She wondered if that would be good for a little boy.
“It is unavoidable. There is nothing we can do about it – the law of inheritance and succession to titles is inexorable.”
“What will you do, Magnus? Can you remain as a captain and earl?”
“Lord knows, my dear. The Admiralty will make that decision for me, or so I suspect.”
Mr Sia evidently was as well informed as Captain Hawkins, possibly sharing the same sources. He sent a note begging the honour of a visit by the lord captain. Magnus returned an immediate acceptance, would pay him a call on the following day, if that was convenient.
“He cannot come here without arousing comment. I must go to him. A visit to his jewellery store will be unexceptionable.”
“In uniform or civilian clothing, Magnus?”
“In working dress my love. Part of my ordinary day’s engagements. Changing clothes might draw the attention of those who might notice me. I cannot ever be invisible in Shanghai, but I can seem to be ordinary.”
Mr Sia was delighted, as always, to welcome Magnus to his office – all of his business rivals would know that he had done so and would be enraged and anxious to discover what advantage he had gained on them.
“The new gunboat flotilla, my lord, is under your command. There is a rumour that some of them, perhaps all, will seek to penetrate the Gorges and reach Chungking.”
Magnus smiled his best, was pleased to say that was true.
“Two of the newest, Woodcock and Woodlark, have been built in England for no other purpose than to do so, Mr Sia. They will breast the river when it is at its lowest and then base themselves at the bund in Chungking, there to stay for many years. I hear – with what accuracy, I know not – that the Americans are also to send a boat to Chungking. There will in effect be a military base in the treaty port there. It may be thought wise to send soldiers as well, with their guns.”
Mr Sia was so pleased to hear that the town was to come under the protection of naval forces.
“There are many pirates thereabouts, my lord. No doubt your ships will seek to extirpate them, to send them to Shanghai for trial.”
“No, Mr Sia. Pirates are the enemies of humanity and require no trial. They will hang where and when they are caught, as will their masters in the towns.”
“So… were I you, my lord, to be informed of the names of the pirate kings, as one might call them, then…”
Magnus smiled and finished the sentence.
“Provided they were discovered in possession of pirated cargo, then they would be subjected to summary justice – hanged at the yardarm. In the absence of a yardarm, the nearest tree will do.”
Both accepted that Magnus was promising to kill off the leaders of lesser triads in the vicinity of Chungking. In return for mastery there, Sia would keep the peace and would ensure that British merchants were subjected to no annoyance.
“There are a number of godmen in the Upper Yangtse, my lord.”
“They are to be discovered all over China, Mr Sia. They proliferate like ants, or cockroaches.”
“Elegantly expressed, my lord. Cockroaches are sometimes trodden upon…”
“Occasionally, Mr Sia. When they become particularly objectionable in their infestations it may be the case that their nests must be eradicated. But, very often, the effort is not worth the return – destroying one may lead to two more in its place.”
“Wise words, my lord. They may sometimes be very irritating – when, for example, they are discovered near to mines and become a nuisance among the workers.”
Magnus knew, vaguely, that the conditions in Chinese mines were appalling, worse even than those in England, where miners died by the hundred every year.
“Workers must be permitted to produce for their employers without the interference of ignorant gwailos who know nothing of what is right in China.”
“They must indeed, my lord! The Middle Kingdom has its ways which have grown up over two thousand years and they must not lightly be interfered with by ignorant foreigners who offer alien habits to our people. I am glad – no, delighted – to hear your words of wisdom, my lord. As so often, you display a subtlety of understanding of our country.”
Tea was brought to them and they discussed the events in Peking, regretting the barbarity of the Germans and Russians and Japanese.
“Do you think, my lord, that Russia and Japan will go to war?”
“They must, Mr Sia, and before too many years have passed. Was I a gambling man, Mr Sia, I would not bet on a Russian victory. I have seen the Japanese at war, and they are fearsome fighting men. The Russians may be brave, some of them, but they cannot put an army together, or, I suspect, a fleet.”
Sia was surprised at this and questioned Magnus for some time on the topic.
“You would say, my lord,” he concluded, “that a wise man would not build relationships with Russia but might rather prefer to offer cooperation to the Japanese. One cannot offer them friendship, for they have no more than contempt for Chinese, but one may find occasions when a mutual profit is possible.”
Magnus nodded, searched for the most precise words.
“Japan is close to Chinese shores. Britain is half the world distant. Russia is a neighbouring state in Mongolia. Either Russia or Japan must in time play a greater part in China than Britain can. I know that the British are seeking alliance with Japan – it is no secret, I believe. I much suspect that Japan will become the important partner in the Orient, while Britain will act as a counterbalance, if you will, to America in the West. Britain will not, cannot, favour Chinese interests over Japanese, Mr Sia.”
“Clear indeed, my lord. It is more than ever the case that the wise man will place some part of his wealth in London, safe from both Japan and Russia.”
“I believe so, Mr Sia. The next few decades will see much change, but I think that the City of London will remain a safe haven for the rich. I am sure that Blantyres will retain influence there.”
Their alliance was thus agreed to be for the long term.
“You are a wise man and a good friend, my lord. My own master, Lord Ping, wishes to offer his congratulations on the birth of your heir. He has sent a small gift.”
“Lord Ping is kindness itself to me, Mr Sia. You know that I do not forget all that is due to such a fine gentleman.”
A few pleasantries and Magnus left, entering the Blantyre carriage to find a silk-wrapped package on the seat. It was heavy for its size, a foot or more tall and of much t
he same width and breadth.
He wondered what it might contain – it was unlikely to be gold coinage, that would be shockingly, insultingly, unsubtle. He kept his hands off the package until the carriage reached the courtyard of his house and then took it inside personally, preferring that the servants should not speculate about its weight.
“What is it, Magnus?”
“A gift from Lord Ping to celebrate the birth of the son and heir to the noble family, my love. Undoubtedly an addition to our riches. I do not know what he will have considered appropriate.”
They untied the silken cords that bound the parcel, unwrapping it with care in case it might be fragile.
“That, Magnus, is vulgar!”
“It is indeed, but, by God, it’s rich!”
She regretted his taking the Lord’s name in vain - as was incumbent upon her as protector of the virtue of the family - but was forced to agree.
The gift, contained and protected in a bamboo basket, was a mountain, delicately chiselled from a block of rose quartz of a deep and even colour. It had groves of tiny trees in jade and little houses made of gold with windows of precious stones. There were, for some reason, elephants, themselves worked of ivory. A dragon sat on the topmost peak, its body a massive emerald. Tiny figures cast in silver and gold worked improbable fields on the mountain slopes.
“I wonder what the symbolism is, Ellen?”
“I am rich - look at me?”
“It may well be that simple. I am the master of mountains and can give them to the gwailo lord. Unsubtle but effective. Ping is now closely involved with Blantyres and must feel the need to remind us that though we have mastery in London, here in China, he is king. At some stage, we must educate him in the ways of the City. The magnates there are no less arrogant in their power; they express themselves in a different fashion. It could be entertaining, Ellen.”
“Perhaps. He will be invisible in London - he must be made to realise that. A Chinaman may be worth many millions, but he will still be a Chink in the City and in the eyes of Westminster. It will be many years – generations - before his family can achieve acceptance.”
04 Peking Nightmares (The Earl’s Other Son Series, #4) Page 19