China Seas

by John Harris

  ‘How did he die?’ he demanded.

  ‘He was drunk.’

  ‘Then there’s no place for him here!’

  ‘Don’t talk bloody silly,’ Willie snapped. ‘He’s a European and he has to be buried. What do you suggest we do? Stick him on the bund and let him fade away?’

  In the end McEwan agreed on a modified service. Emmeline seemed indifferent and Willie even suspected that she was probably glad to be rid of her troublesome husband. There were plenty of other men who could fill her bed or occupy her counting house.

  McEwan was waiting for them by the church, which was built in a style that was half Glasgow-Presbyterian and half Chinese. The graves behind carried a similar mixture of names, varying from that of the Rev. Archibald Munro, who had died in 1894, to that of Lee Chen-Si, a child who had been knocked down by a horse.

  They had to wait until he had conducted the service for one of his converts and had to stand in the cold while the family sang a hymn and recited the Lord’s prayer.

  ‘Arthur, which art in Heaven,

  Harold be thy name,

  Thy kin done come,

  Thee Willie Dunn…’

  Listening, Willie wondered how much it meant to them.

  In the Chinese part of the cemetery with its strange cupola-like headstones, they could see paper streamers fluttering in the wind on the burial mounds to keep away evil spirits. A student, the son of a wealthy merchant, who had been killed in the rioting, was being buried there and a vast procession was snaking in from the road, with lanterns, gongs and a band discordantly playing ‘Colonel Bogey’. There were dragon kites, bouquets of flowers, models of favourite pets, a solemn portrait of the dead boy and a notice announcing his virtues printed on it in Chinese characters in gilt paint.

  Paid mourners in grubby white clothes, moving in traditional attitudes of grief, were clearing their throats and spitting ready to give tongue as they edged to the grave, followed by musicians blowing throaty sighs from instruments like hand pumps. Pigeons with reeds in bamboo tubes attached to their backs were released in a cloud of drifting feathers to add the wailing sounds of the lutes to the din. Solemn Taoist monks, in mitre hats and carrying horse-hair fly swats and prayer scrolls, brought money, lacquer boxes, songbirds and effigies of dragons to accompany the dead boy to paradise.

  Pastor McEwan stared coldly at them as they moved among the burial mounds with their yellowing skeletons in rotting coffins where the rain had washed away the soil, and refused to proceed until the noise had died down. ‘Pagan music,’ he said. ‘I can’t bury a Christian soul with that going on.’

  Eventually the gonging, blaring and wailing died and, as the Chinese peasant spectators turned round, their heads along the dividing wall like coconuts at a fairground shy, he sniffed and proceeded with the service.

  ‘For as much as it hath pleased Almighty God and His great mercy…’ The high-pitched voice, scraping at the nerves, seemed totally lacking in emotion. Stiff in his best suit with his high starched collar, Willie stood alongside a silent Emmeline, who was dressed in a black alpaca coat run up in a couple of hours by a Chinese tailor and worn over a grey dress. He was wondering if Gummer had ever been to church; if he believed; if, in fact, the ceremony really mattered any more to him than the one for the converts.

  He had not been back to the hotel long when he was called to the door of his room. The old Chinese who had led him into the city was waiting there for him with the reception clerk. He held an envelope and a large wrapped parcel.

  ‘Missee send this for Mastah,’ he announced.

  Willie nodded and tipped him, wondering what Emmeline was up to.

  The envelope contained money and a note saying it was to repay what he had handed over to bribe the Chinese. The wrapped object was a lacquered bowl which he recognised at once as Ming.

  He sat with it in his hands, staring at it, knowing it was worth a small fortune. The note with it said simply, ‘In gratitude. Always my love. Emmeline.’

  He jumped up at once, guessing what she was up to. Having got rid of Gummer, she was taking advantage of the absence of Abigail to get her claws in him again.

  Rewrapping the bowl, he marched out of the hotel, called a rickshaw and had himself driven to Emmeline’s new house. As the rickshaw stopped in front, he saw a curtain move upstairs and knew she was waiting for him.

  The servant who let him in bent low in a kow-tow. ‘Missee upstairs. Massah follow.’

  Stamping upstairs behind the Chinese, Willie found himself let into a bright sunny room furnished with a carpet from North China in blue, white and pink. Since getting her hands on her father’s money, Emmeline had never stinted herself and there was a chaise-longue, an armchair and a dressing table. The curtains were of gauze and moved slightly in the breeze. Through the door, Willie could see into the bedroom, where there was a huge bed, with a canopy where the big mosquito net was furled.

  Emmeline appeared almost at once. She was in white lace, with a flowing kimono-like garment over her shoulders, and her pale face was touched with colour. He guessed she had taken trouble with her appearance.

  He got down to brass tacks at once and placed the Ming bowl on the dressing table among the flowers. ‘That thing’s worth a fortune, Emmeline,’ he said.

  ‘I know. I couldn’t think how to repay you for what you did.’

  ‘I didn’t do much. Your husband died.’

  ‘It wasn’t your fault.’

  ‘It might have been. Though, at the time, I couldn’t think of any other way of doing it. Perhaps we ought to have brought him out face-down. But then he’d probably have died of suffocation.’

  ‘You did what you had to. You were wonderful, Willie. I’ll be eternally grateful.’

  ‘I still can’t accept that thing.’

  ‘I must reward you for what you did.’

  ‘Tried to do. I didn’t succeed. You can put business my way instead.’

  ‘Of course. We’re old friends, Willie. I can always do that. In fact–’ she hesitated, ‘–there’s something you can have straight away. There’s a collier, the Lady Roberts, full of best Welsh coal, at Port Arthur. He–’ the contempt she felt for Gummer showed in the word ‘–he sent it. I bought it for the naval squadron at Shanghai, but, with the trouble growing between the Russians and the Japanese, he thought he could get more for it up there. But the Russians wouldn’t touch it. They bring their own, they said, on the railway from as far away as St Petersburg. Make me a reasonable offer, Willie, and it’s yours. All you have to do is collect it.’

  ‘Port Arthur’s no place to visit just now,’ Willie pointed out. ‘Not with the trouble between the Russians and the Japanese boiling up.’

  ‘You can have it cheaply, Willie. I’ll be glad to get it off my hands. Obviously now that he’s dead, I’ve got to give all my attention to Wishart’s and I’ve got to make sure he hasn’t done anything else stupid. Give me a cheque now and it’s yours.’

  ‘You don’t buy ships and cargoes like that,’ he protested. ‘You need papers.’

  ‘I’ve got them, Willie. They’re all here. He brought them with him. Proud as can be of what he’d done.’ She snorted. ‘He was useless! You’d make a profit if you got it down to Shanghai for the Navy.’

  ‘If fighting starts, I might not.’

  ‘I talked to the consul before I came up here. He assured me fighting won’t start before the spring. Wars never start before the spring, he said. He said I had plenty of time. But now I haven’t. I’m needed here, and then down in Shanghai. For all I know, he’s bankrupted Wishart’s.’

  Willie paused, he liked the sea and was fascinated by ships. He always had been. Even at Wainwright and Halliday’s he had always spent more time than he ought in London Docks, trying to catch the whiff of the river, inhaling the smell of rope and tar and tallow. He’d always fancied being a shipping magnate and, while owning one ship hardly put him in that category, at least it was a start. But he still couldn’t believe
she was offering him such a bargain. It was unlike Emmeline and he found it hard to understand.

  ‘How much do you want for her?’

  ‘Morgan’s sold five steamers earlier in the year, 30,000 tons altogether, at cost price, subject to annual depreciation at five per cent for every year in service, making a total price of £200,000, with another £200,000 for good will and trade. You could have the Lady Roberts for eight thousand all in, coal and good will included. Just the thing for operating out here, Willie.’

  The figure she suggested was not high, but it would use every bit of his spare capital. It was also important, it was clear, to get up to Port Arthur and take the ship over at once before the trouble that had been threatening between Japan and Russia broke, or he’d find himself in trouble with the amount of capital it tied up.

  He weighed up the pros and cons for a while, not certain that he wasn’t making a fool of himself. But the appeal of being in shipping was great and he found it hard to resist. His mind was racing, as he did quick sums in his head while trying to present Emmeline with an unperturbed front.

  ‘I’ll take her,’ he said. ‘When do you want your money?’

  ‘Now,’ she said. ‘I’m in need of it.’

  ‘Not doing so well?’ he asked, alert for rumours of a fading business. Fading businesses meant cheap goods for sale and he was not one to miss an opportunity.

  Emmeline gave him a sideways look. ‘You mind your own business,’ she said.

  ‘My cheque good enough?’

  ‘I’ll cash it straightaway. If it comes back at me, the sale’s cancelled.’

  ‘It won’t come back,’ Willie said. ‘There’s enough to cover it.’

  Only just, though, he realised.

  The following day as he climbed from his bed, a vivid streamer of sun swept the sky, then it deepened to red and another streamer ended in the flaring flashpoint of the sun as it raced up in a blinding glare from the river. It looked a good omen.

  He had spent half the night doing sums and had come to the conclusion that he could just manage the sale that had been proposed, so long as he got up to Port Arthur at once to claim the ship before the Russians or the Japanese did. Emmeline gave him the papers and he insisted on studying them carefully before he handed over the cheque. They seemed straightforward. Two thousand tons dead weight, modern triple expansion engine and apparently sound. He’d heard that P & O had bought up a line recently to act as feeders for their European trade, so perhaps they might like to use his ship to feed their China Seas trade. Based at Shanghai, he could move between the East Indies, India, Indo-China, Japan, the Philippines, even down the Pacific to Australia and New Zealand. He had been exporting and importing long enough already to know the possibilities.

  ‘I’m grateful, Willie,’ Emmeline said as he handed over the cheque.

  She was standing in front of him, close enough for him to smell the perfume she was wearing, the lace over her bosom brushing his jacket. She paused. ‘It’s such a pity we parted all that time ago, Willie.’

  Willie frowned. ‘Lay off, Emmeline. We’re doing business not hopping into bed.’

  ‘We were lovers once.’

  ‘Emmeline, I’ve got a kid and another on the way.’

  She gave a romantic sigh. ‘To think it might have been mine, Willie.’

  ‘Emmeline, cut it out! I’m off.’

  She put a hand on his arm and, as he swung back to her, she pushed close against him. ‘I’ve always loved you, Willie. I’ve never forgotten what we were to each other.’

  ‘You didn’t give a damn!’ he snapped. ‘You just wanted me in your bed!’

  Her voice dropped a couple of octaves. ‘You were very good in bed, Willie.’

  He began to grow angry. ‘Christ, Em, we’ve only just stuck Gummer under the sod.’

  ‘He was never any good. It was the greatest mistake of my life marrying him. He wasn’t a gentleman like you, Willie.’

  Gentleman, Willie thought. That was something he’d never claimed for himself, though, judging by some of the white men making fortunes out of China, he supposed he’d as much right to the title as any of them.

  ‘Don’t go, Willie.’

  ‘I have to.’

  ‘Stay and have tea. Have a drink.’

  ‘Emmeline, for Christ’s sake–!’

  She had her arms round him now, her large firm bosom resting against his chest. He felt the chaise-longue behind his knees and collapsed on to it, Emmeline on top of him. Her fingers were already trying to unfasten buttons.

  ‘Jesus Christ on a tightrope!’

  With a heave, he jerked himself free and she landed with a bump on the floor, knocking over a table and a vase of flowers. She glared up at him, her bosom heaving. She had undone the buttons of her blouse and he had a bird’s-eye view of a pair of splendid breasts.

  ‘It’s all right, Willie. It’s all right. I want to. I want you to.’

  ‘Well, I don’t!’

  As he headed for the door, she scrambled to her feet and stood with her back to it. ‘I’m yours, Willie!’

  ‘Don’t be so bloody melodramatic!’

  ‘Take me!’

  He wrenched her out of the way, spinning her round so that she lost her balance and fell on to the chaise-longue.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, Emmeline,’ he snarled. ‘Grow up! I’m a married man and you’ve just become a widow.’

  As he slammed the door behind him she was just reaching for the overturned vase and he heard it crash against the other side of the panelling. As he clattered down the stairs, the Chinese manservant was waiting at the bottom, a look of bewilderment on his face. As Willie shot through the front door, he heard Emmeline scream. It was a scream of rage and frustration and she was still screaming as he told the rickshaw coolie to take him back to his office.

  Three

  By the time Willie reached Shanghai and booked his passage north in the coaster Shu Chi, he had been warned more than once that the deteriorating relations between Japan and Russia might make things difficult. There was even talk now of war, and any ship heading for Taku and the railway to Peking would have to round the Shantung promontory and pass through the narrows between Chefoo and the Russianheld Port Arthur. If fighting occurred, it would inevitably be there. It seemed he needed to hurry.

  By this time he was beginning to suspect that Emmeline had cheated him. She must have known of the increasingly strained relations between Japan and Russia and was guessing that her ship, the Lady Roberts, would be holed up in Port Arthur by a Japanese fleet, or that the Russians, cut off from their supplies, might commandeer her. He even began to wonder if she’d offered him the coal at a giveaway price to get him into her bed. The price had been so low she’d almost been throwing it at him.

  It was going to be a bloody funny war, he decided, fought between Japan and Russia on neutral Chinese territory, and it looked as if it might start at any moment because the news was that the Japanese were already threatening Chemulpo in Korea. Coasters were still running north, however, and according to the booking clerk at the shipping office, if Willie was prepared to take a chance on being caught in a naval battle, which was more than likely because the Russians had a fleet at Port Arthur and the Japanese had a fleet prowling round the Yellow Sea, then he could be carried. The clerk smiled. Would Mr Sarth care to take a chance? Mr Sarth would? Fine!

  Calling at his office, Willie informed Lun Foo and George Kee what was in the wind, told Lun he trusted him, winked quietly at Kee to indicate that he didn’t, arranged for a telegram to be sent to Abigail to tell her what he was up to, and headed for the docks.

  There was a heavy mist as he boarded the Shu Chi and as he reached the deck he was surprised to see Yuhitsu Shaiba, the man whose life he’d saved at Peking, waiting on deck, half-submerged in a heavy grey coat.

  ‘Yuhitsu! Are you travelling too?’

  Shaiba smiled. ‘I am going home to Japan,’ he said. ‘But first I must go to Tientsin. This is
a bad time, Mr Sarth, with the trouble with Russia. It was my intention to go via Vladivostok, but I have received a message from Tokyo which warns me that the war might start, so when we reach Tientsin I shall take passage on a British ship.’

  The ship left in the afternoon, and they were just south of the German-occupied port of Tsingtao when a German gunboat appeared on the port quarter. As it rushed past them, a shallow-draught vessel with a high bridge, a tall stack and a small popgun on the bow, a light began to wink.

  ‘“War is likely between Japan and Russia”,’ Willie heard the mate reading out. ‘“Do not put into Port Arthur.”’

  There was a discussion on the bridge, then the first class passengers were requested to assemble in the saloon, where the captain dispensed the news and informed them he would be unable to put into the Russian port.

  ‘I hope no one has business there.’

  ‘I have,’ Willie said at once. ‘Several thousand pounds’ worth of coal and a collier that’s worth saving. I’ve got to get in there.’

  ‘There’s a danger fighting might start.’

  ‘It won’t concern me.’

  There were two other businessmen, an American and a German, who also had business in the Russian port, and it was agreed that, provided there was no activity in the area, the Shu Chi would go as close to Port Arthur as she dared and summon a junk to take them in.

  ‘After that, it’s your own affair,’ the captain said.

  Four hours later, with Weihaiwei, the Royal Naval base, on their port side and the wind coming like a knife from the north, they rounded the islands east of Chefoo. Edging further northwards, they spotted a destroyer flying the rising sun flag of Japan, but there was no other activity and it was decided to go ahead.

  ‘He’s just scouting around,’ Willie said nervously, remembering Shaiba’s warning.