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China Seas Page 43

by John Harris


  As Da Braga-Kee and Co. began to take shape and Willie gave more and more of his attention to the Sarth Shipping Line, the Nationalists arrived outside the city. They were a very different kettle of fish from the northern armies. They were without the habitual kow-tow the Chinese had always given to Europeans, and as they stopped with their sun banners near the British lines, they looked confident, fit and well equipped. Watching them, Willie tried to decide what they were after. There had been no incidents because the city was an armed camp, with infantry and even artillery stationed on the high buildings and armoured cars making regular patrols along the outlying roads where the foreigners had their homes. On the only occasion the Nationalists had attempted to enter the Settlement, they had been firmly turned back by grim-faced British soldiers determined not to give an inch, and the municipal council had arranged for armed sentries to guard foreign properties beyond the settlement boundaries.

  The change brought about by their arrival was clear at once, but not quite in the way they’d expected. It was the night life of the city that changed. The Cantonese troops had been on the march for a long time through a succession of empty spaces, and they were looking for excitement, and, with the owners of the nightclubs largely opportunistic young Chinese who were totally in sympathy with them, they were soon crowding the foreigners off what they had always considered their own dance floors. And, being Chinese, they wanted Chinese girls to dance with, so that the White Russians and French began to disappear. More girls were rushed up from the south to supply the demand and sing-song girls hurriedly changed to taxi-dancers as everybody opted for the new drug, jazz. The only concession that was made was to import musicians from Manila because the Chinese still seemed totally unable to master waltzes, fox trots and tangos, and a Chinese singer trying to handle Shepherd of the Hills sounded like a cat with its head caught in the railings. Driven from their playgrounds, the Europeans fell back on those establishments that operated a colour bar and used only Russian and Eurasian hostesses. Yip Hsao-Li, Willie felt, would have loved it.

  ‘The bloody country’s being won for the Chinese in the nightclubs,’ he laughed.

  But there was another side to it, too, because the gangsters, friends of the late Yip Hsao-Li, also moved in and, with a rash of new night spots, began to take over. There was no shortage of experts in criminality and no shortage of weapons. As the warlords had disappeared, their soldiers had sold their weapons to buy food and there were now so many firearms in Shanghai it was no longer worth smuggling them in, and any small operator not prepared to pay for protection had his club closed – either by his own sudden demise, a riot, or by having a box of snakes let loose on the dance floor while the dancers were smooching in the half-light to a waltz.

  They hadn’t heard of Zychov for some time, but Thomas had heard he’d been seen at the headquarters of Chiang K’Ai-Shek, who was still waiting in the wings to make a triumphal entry into the city. Not for him the scuffling and exchange of shots, and he remained out of sight until the Nationalists were properly masters of the Chinese quarter and a revolutionary administration was in being to welcome him as a liberator.

  Willie was upriver at a place called Wanchu near Sinkiang when he arrived. A steamer, the Po-Li, which had run aground, contained a cargo of rice he was very much in need of and, with the new firm taking shape, money was short and he was eager to get his hands on the rice for which he already had a customer prepared to pay cash on delivery.

  When he reached the Sarth launch to take him along to the Po-Li however, his coxswain warned him to wait.

  ‘Best, Mastah,’ he said.

  ‘Why? What’s wrong?’

  The coxswain gestured at the gunboat lying out in the river flying the Kuomintang flag. ‘General Chiang go aboard gunboat, to go to Shanghai. All told to wait.’

  Looking up, Willie saw a big launch at the next jetty, its coxswain standing nervously on the quay, his deckhand busily polishing the brasswork.

  ‘How long’s the bugger going to be?’

  ‘No savvee, Mastah. But no boats move. Orders, mastah.’

  For an hour Willie waited frustratedly, then, just as he was about to get in the launch and order it away in a fury, several large American Packards arrived. They contained senior officers of the Kuomintang and, as they climbed out, he recognised among them Chiang K’Ai-Shek himself, small, thin, impassive faced, and looking incredibly young in a neat high-collared uniform with breeches, lace-up boots and a Sam Browne belt.

  ‘Dogleg himself,’ he muttered.

  He had no love for Chiang K’Ai-Shek. Thanks to him, Willie and Da Braga had suffered a considerable loss, because their property in Yangpo had been valuable, and he couldn’t imagine anybody buying it or paying rent for it now. And above all there was Abigail.

  He stared with narrowed eyes as a dozen officers climbed into the waiting launch. There was a great deal of saluting then the Nationalist coxswain bent over the engine. It fired once then promptly died, but after a few struggles, started again. Willie leaned over and shouted.

  ‘There’s no water coming through,’ he yelled.

  The coxswain looked up in alarm and moved aft, nervously pushing through the waiting officers. Returning to the engine, he switched off and removed the engine cover. A lot of shrill chatter broke out among the uniformed men, then one of them slashed at the cringing coxswain with his stick and a second climbed back to the quay and strode to where Willie was waiting.

  ‘We are commandeering your launch,’ he announced in English.

  ‘Oh, no, you’re not!’ Willie snapped back.

  ‘General Chiang wishes to go to the gunboat out there.’

  ‘Then let him take a sampan.’

  The officer gave Willie a sour look. By this time, Chiang, still surrounded by his officers, had arrived on the jetty alongside Willie’s launch.

  ‘You’re not having this launch,’ Willie told him bluntly. ‘It’s mine. I need it. Business is waiting.’

  Chiang’s eyebrows rose. ‘You speak our language,’ he observed.

  ‘Have done for years.’

  ‘We need your launch.’

  Willie glared. ‘Your troops have just ruined my business in Yangpo. And your supporters killed my wife. Why should I back off?’

  ‘Because,’ the officer who had first spoken said, ‘it isn’t fitting for a general of the Kuomintang Army of Liberation to travel by sampan. We are Chinese soldiers winning back China for the Chinese people.’

  ‘And a lot of affection you’ll win if you just take over things. You’re not having my launch.’

  One of the men alongside Chiang unclipped the flap of his revolver holster, but Chiang laid a hand on his arm and turned to Willie.

  ‘What do you say,’ he asked, ‘if we arrange to pay you for the use of the launch? Would that satisfy you?’

  It was an unexpected offer and Willie saw that Chiang was actually smiling. So far, though he’d seen dozens of photographs of the KMT leader, he’d never seen one of him smiling. It was impossible to refuse.

  ‘Very well,’ he said. ‘Payment on the dot when we arrive.’

  Chiang smiled again and started to climb into the launch. The other officers followed and Willie gestured to his coxswain to start the engine. Casting off the lines, they began to chug out into midstream. Alongside the gunboat, Chiang smiled, thanked Willie, and climbed aboard for his trip downriver in the direction of Shanghai. Willie smiled back, but his smile died as the other officers climbed after the general.

  ‘Hey,’ he yelled at the English-speaking officer. ‘Who pays me?’

  The officer ignored him and vanished after Chiang into the wardroom of the gunboat. Willie was about to climb after him, but the Chinese sailor on gangway duty pointed a rifle at him and flicked off the safety catch.

  ‘I hope the bastard’s right leg drops off,’ Willie said sourly to the grinning coxswain as he pushed off and turned the boat back to the Po-Li.

  Despite the arrival of Chian
g close to the city, there were only occasional clashes, one to the north of the settlement, another at Chapei, but the Nationalist leaders seemed to be well in control and trouble seemed chiefly to be stirred up by Communists in an attempt to embroil Chiang with the Western powers. Willie had heard that Thomas’ friend, Chou, was busy among the workers and certainly the timing of the strikes seemed to indicate the touch of a man with brains and organising ability. But still nothing of great gravity occurred beyond an occasional murder – never regarded as serious in Shanghai where violence always existed in the shadows – and the sporadic sniping by Communist gunmen. The European leadership was torn two ways, because one group of advisers was all for setting about the Chinese in the good old Victorian gunboat way, while the other, terrified of losing lives and property, advocated care and a softly-softly approach.

  Even when several foreigners were killed as the Nationalists entered Nanking and foreign gunboats shelled the city in retaliation, still the Nationalists held their hand. By now, however, Shanghai was living in a state of virtual siege.

  ‘Bloody Chinks,’ Honeyford snarled from behind a whisky and Apollinaris at the Long Bar of the Club as he swung on Willie. ‘It’s people like you, Sarth, that cause the trouble, pandering to ’em, treating ’em as if they knew what they were talking about.’

  Willie said nothing, but he didn’t hesitate to take it out on his son, whom he regarded in much the same way as Honeyford regarded him.

  Thomas was unrepentant. ‘If the Europeans in China had ever been strong enough to hold their position,’ he said, ‘it would have been different. But they never were and the Chinese are just beginning to realise it.’

  Certainly the vast undisciplined anarchy of strikes, protests and riots had jelled at last into a great campaign of detestation for the Western powers who had preyed on the country for a hundred years. The whole of South China was on the march, each uprising starting another in a chain reaction, and millions of pounds’ worth of property upriver was being abandoned without even a thought to its value.

  The Chinese had seen the Westerners humbled, struggling to safety between shouting, spitting mobs, and it was an earth-shaking experience. For generations, the Chinese had accepted their inferiority without question, but now, with the subtle propaganda of the Communists backing the blunter success of the Nationalist armies, they had become a nation – simply by joining hands and marching together. It seemed obvious to Willie – despite his own indignant complaints and the defiance of people like old Honeyford – that the days of the treaty powers were numbered and it was going to be even more difficult in the future with the growing dissent between the Communists and the Kuomintang, which he could already see adding to the problems.

  His first trip to Australia produced immediate results. Tough, uncompromising and ignored for years, the Australians were more than willing to do business. They always had grain to sell and were anxious to buy Hong Kong produce. Another ship, the Fuku Maru was bought in Japan and the Sarth Line merged with a small Australian line consisting of two small ships, the Keverne and the Dunnose Grange. They were both old but they were enough to send Willie hurriedly to Hong Kong to drum up cargoes. Nadya allowed him to stay with her, but it wasn’t the same and he decided that next time he’d stay at a hotel. It brought back too many memories of Abigail and all the old sorrows, all the old guilt. But the pain, the resentment, the bitterness, were wearing off now and he had come to the conclusion that a man in his right mind could overcome any disaster if he set his mind to it.

  He arrived back in Shanghai to find that the trouble he had expected was already brewing. The Communists were stirring up trouble again and the blame was being put on the Nationalists. British aircraft arrived to make reconnaissance flights over the areas where fighting was taking place and the railway lines to Hankow and Nanking were cut, but it was like trying to plug a leak as hundreds of other breaks appeared. Another demonstration in the Chapei area resulted in native police stations being attacked, the police murdered and their armouries seized. Dozens of large fires were burning at once and rumour had it that the Communists were itching to rush the International Settlement in the confusion they had caused. At his headquarters outside the city, however, Chiang informed the newspapers that he had no intention of causing trouble and gave a laconic interview to the press, posed with them for pictures, and offered tea and cakes.

  Two days later, gunfire seemed to be coming from a different quarter and the presence of armoured cars and Indian soldiers on the streets was noticeable. The firing continued, but no one knew very much beyond the fact that there was trouble again in the Chinese City. Shots could he heard all the way from Chapei and Hongkew, sometimes single shots, sometimes ragged fusillades. At the Club it was believed it was the Communist attempt to wrench control from the Europeans at last, but then they heard it was something else entirely.

  Thomas knew exactly what.

  ‘It’s the gangs attacking the Communists,’ he said.

  Da Braga looked startled. ‘Why, for God’s sake?’

  ‘An arrangement made by Chiang,’ Thomas said dryly. ‘He wants them cleared out before he takes possession, but he also wants to keep his hands clean. So he’s come to an agreement with Yip Hsao-Li’s friends. If they do his dirty work for him, he’ll allow them to operate.’

  As more information came in, Thomas’ estimate proved correct. The headquarters of the Workers’ General Union had been surrounded and most of those active in the movement had been shot out of hand. Gunmen belonging to the secret societies were now raiding the lodgings of known Communists and carrying them off for execution, while a Communist-led crowd which tried to demonstrate outside Chiang’s headquarters was dispersed with a great deal of bloodshed. Within a few hours all anti-Chiang opposition had been wiped out in a series of bloody reprisals which did little harm to Westerners and left Chiang basking in their good wishes. As they learned the whole story of how Chiang’s private army of gunmen had put the Communists to flight in one of the grimmest, bloodiest no-quarter fights ever, they learned that the same thing had also started at Canton.

  As the firing died down, the radio station announced that the disturbances in the Chinese suburbs were now under control. Only an occasional shot like a fire cracker came over the night air and, staring from the window towards the lights of the river, Willie was miles away, thinking of Abigail, when he heard the door open.

  It was Thomas and he looked young, pale and scared.

  ‘Hello, Tom,’ Willie said. ‘I hope you haven’t been trying to interfere in what’s going on.’

  ‘No, Father,’ Thomas said. ‘Not me. Not this time.’

  ‘How’s Fanny?’

  ‘She’s fine.’

  ‘You ought to bring her here more often. It becomes lonely with Polly in the States, Edward down in Hong Kong and your mother–’

  He stopped and, making an effort to smile, looked up. ‘What brings you here anywhere, anyway?’

  ‘Father,’ Thomas said, ‘I need a little help.’

  Willie’s eyes narrowed. ‘What have you been up to?’

  ‘Nothing, Father. I’ve not been up to anything.’

  ‘What is it then?’

  ‘Have you one of your ships due to move out? To Hong Kong? Or north?’

  Willie’s eyes narrowed. ‘Go on, boy.’

  ‘I have a couple of Chinese friends the police are looking for.’

  ‘Communists?’

  ‘You could call them that. You’ve met them.’

  ‘Chou?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘What’s in your mind, son?’

  ‘You’re in the shipping business and I was approached to see if you’d do him a favour.’

  ‘Who by?’

  ‘Another friend of mine. An Englishman.’

  ‘Is he a Communist?’

  ‘No, sir. He’s not. Just a man with a little compassion. You probably know him, but I won’t mention his name then you’re not involved.’
r />   ‘It sounds as if I’m going to be very much involved,’ Willie snapped. ‘What’s Chou been up to?’

  ‘Nothing more than he was always up to. He was working for the Chinese Communist Party. Chiang’s gangsters were well organised.’

  ‘By Chiang?’

  ‘No. But they’ve been organised. I heard someone picked up a lot of money to get them organised. Some Russian, they say.’

  Willie turned quickly. ‘Chap called Zychov?’

  ‘I think that was the name. Chou was arrested but managed to escape. He has to leave before they find him again.’

  Willie stared at the lights in the river again. The request didn’t present a great problem. Many coastal steamers took human freight if the money was right and the right man was approached. There was always deck space for another individual among the crowded passengers and he was more than willing to thwart Zychov and Yip’s gangster friends.

  ‘The Lady Roberts is due out,’ he said slowly. ‘Cargo and passengers. It won’t be a comfortable trip.’

  ‘I don’t think he’ll quibble, Father.’

  ‘Where is he now?’

  ‘Outside.’

  ‘You’d better bring him in. Don’t let the servants see him, though.’

  As Thomas disappeared, Willie reached for the telephone. By the time his son returned, it had been arranged. The men with him looked thin and tired but they smiled at Willie.

  ‘I’m grateful, Mr Sarth,’ Chou said.

  Willie nodded. ‘I’ll get things organised. You’d better try to find some food for your friends, Tom. They look as though they need some.’

  When he returned, the Chinese had finished eating.

  ‘Ready?’

  ‘Of course.’

  They went to the door where the car was waiting. Pushing the Chinese down behind the front seat, Thomas tossed a blanket over them, then climbed in alongside his father.

 

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