“You’re crazy,” says I, “but since they are too, you’ll fit right in, I dare say.”
“Fred T. Ward fits in anywhere, mister!” cries he, and then he was away along the deck again, chivvying the boatmen to trim the great mainsail, yelling his bastard pigeon and laughing as he tailed on to the rope.
Not only China-struck, but a well-fledged lunatic, I could see. Of course he wasn’t alone in having a bee in his bonnet about the Taipings; even the European Powers were keeping an anxious eye on them, wondering how far they might go. In case you haven’t heard of them, I must tell you that they were another of those incredible phenomena that made China the topsy-turvey mess it was, like some fantastic land from Gulliver, where everything was upside down and out of kilter. Talk about moonbeams from cucumbers; the Taipings were even dafter than that.
They began back in the ’40s, when a Cantonese clerk failed his examinations and fell into a trance, from which he emerged proclaiming that he was Christ’s younger brother – a ploy which, I’m thankful to say, I never tried on old Arnold after making a hash of my Greek construes at Rugby. Anyway, this clerk decided he had a God-given mission to overthrow the Manchoos and establish “the Tai’ping” – the Kingdom of Eternal Peace or Heavenly Harmony or what you will. He went about preaching a sort of bastard Christianity which he’d picked up from missionary tracts, and in any normal country he’d either have been knocked on the head or given a University Chair. But this being China, his crusade had caught on, against all sense and reason, and within a few years he’d built up an enormous army, devastated several provinces, thrashed various Imperial generals, captured dozens of cities including the old capital, Nanking, and come within an ace of Pekin itself. Getting madder by the minute, mark you, but among the millions of peasants who’d rallied to him and swallowed his religious moonshine, there were some likely lads who plotted the campaigns, fought the battles, and imposed his amazing notions of worship and discipline on a sizeable slice of the population.
This was the famous Taiping Rebellionb, the bloodiest war ever fought on earth, and it was still going great guns in ’60. Countless millions had already died in it, but neither the Imperials nor the rebels looked like winning just yet; the Imps were besieging Nanking, but not making much of it, while various Taiping armies were rampaging elsewhere, spreading the gospel and piling up the corpses, as not infrequently happens.
There was some sympathy for the Taipings among those Europeans (missionaries mostly) who mistakenly thought they were real Christians, and a few enthusiasts, as well as rascals and booty-hunters, had enlisted with them. Meanwhile our government, and the other foreign states who had some trade interest in China (and hoped to have a lot more) were watching uneasily, afraid to intervene, but devilish concerned about the outcome.
So there you are: a Manchoo government with an idiot Emperor who thought the world was square, fighting a lethargic war against rebels led by a lunatic, and preparing to resist a Franco-British invasion which wasn’t to be a war, exactly, but rather a great armed procession to escort our Ambassador to Pekin and persuade the Chinks to keep their treaty obligations – which included legalising the opium traffic at that moment personified by H. Flashman and his band of yellow brothers3. And in case you think I was incautious, heading up-river at such a time, take a squint at the map, and be aware that all the bloodshed and beastliness was a long way from Canton; you’d not have caught me near the place otherwise.
We were into the Bocca Tigris, where the estuary narrows to a broad river among islands, before I started to earn my corn. Out from Chuenpee Fort comes an Imperial patrol boat with some minor official riff-raff aboard, hollering to us to heave to; Ward cocked an eye at me, but I shook my head, and we swept past them without so much as “good day”; they clamoured in our wake for a while, beating gongs and waving wildly, but gave up when they saw we’d no intention of stopping. Ward, who’d been anxiously scanning the big forts on the high bluffs overlooking the channel, shook his head with relief and grinned at me.
“Is it always so easy?” cries he, and I told him, not quite, we’d meet more determined inquiry farther on, but I would talk our way past. Sure enough, in late afternoon, when we were clearing Tiger Island, up popped a splendid galley, all gold and scarlet, with dragon banners and long ribbons fluttering from her upper works, her twenty oars going like clockwork as she steered to intercept us. She had three or four jingalsc in her bows, and fifty men on her deck if there was one; under a little canopy on her poop there was a Mandarin in full fig of button-hat and silk robe, seated in state – and flying a kite, with a little lad to help him with the string. Even the most elderly and dignified Chinese delight in kites, you know, and no city park is complete without a score of sober old buffers pottering about like contented Buddhas with their airy toys fluttering and swooping overhead. This was a fine bird-kite, a great silver stork so lifelike you expected it to spread its wings as it hovered hundreds of feet above us.
To complete this idyllic scene, the galley carried on its bows a huge wooden cage, crammed with about twenty wretched coolies so close-packed they could hardly stir – criminals being carried to their place of punishment, probably. Their wailing carried across the water as the galley feathered her oars and an officer bawled across, demanding our business.
“Ruth and Naomi, lorchas from Hong Kong, carrying opium to the factories,” shouts I in my best Mandarin, and he said he must come aboard and examine us. I told Ward to keep way on the lorchas, and on no account to heave to. “If those thieving bastards once get on our deck, they’ll have the stoppings out of our teeth,” I told him. “But if we keep going, there’s nothing they can do about it.”
“Suppose they fire on us?” says he, eyeing the jingals.
“And start another war?” I nodded at the Union Jack at our stern, and hollered across the water:
“Our licence is in order, your excellency, and we are in great haste, and must proceed to Canton without delay. So you can bugger off, see?”
This provoked a great screaming of instructions to heave to immediately, but no one moved to the jingals, so I jumped on the rail and pointed to our flag.
“This is a British vessel, and I am a close friend of Pahsia-li, who’ll have your yellow hide if you get gay with us, d’ye hear?” In fact, I’d never met Harry Parkes, who was our man at Canton – and pretty well lord and master of the place – but I guessed the mention of his name might cause ’em to think. “Sheer off, damn you, or we’ll have half the oars out of you!” She was gliding in to head us off, not thirty feet away, and in a moment her oars would be crumpled against our hull; it was a question of who gave way. Suddenly she veered on to a parallel course, with the officer shrieking to us to heave to; I made a rude gesture, and he ran to the Mandarin for instructions.
I was half-expecting what came next. There was a barked order, and a dozen of the galley’s crew ran forward and seized on the wooden cage in which the criminals were packed like so many herring. On the order they heaved, sliding the cage until it was poised on the lip of the bow platform; her oars took the water again, keeping her level with us – and then they just looked across at us, and the officer repeated his demand to us to heave to. I turned away and told Ward to keep her going. He was gaping, white-faced; the poor devils in the cage were squealing like things demented and struggling helplessly.
“My God!” cries he. “Are they going to drown them?”
“Undoubtedly,” says I. “Unless we heave to and allow ourselves to be boarded and plundered on some trumped-up excuse. In which case they’ll certainly drown ’em later, just the same. But they’re hoping we don’t know that – and that being soft-hearted foreign devils we’ll spill our wind and come to. It’s a special kind of Chinese blackmail, you see. So just hold your course and pay ’em no heed.”
He gulped, once, but he was a cool hand; he turned his back as I had done, and yelled to the helmsman to hold her steady. There was dead silence on our deck; only the creaki
ng of the timbers and the swish of water along our side. Another yell to heave to from the galley … silence … a shrieked order … an awful, heart-rending chorus of wails and screams, and an almighty splash.
“Fine people, with a prime country, as you were saying,” says I, and strolled over to the rail again. The galley was still abreast, but in her wake there was a great bubbling and boiling to mark where the cage was sinking to the bottom of the Pearl. Ward came up beside me; his teeth were gritted and there was great beads of sweat on his brow.
“Old China or New China,” says I, “it’s all the same, young Fred.”
“The goddam swine!” cries he. “The cold-blooded yellow bastard – look at him there, with his goddam kite! He hasn’t even moved a muscle!” His face was working with rage. “Goddam him! Goddam him to hell!”
“Amen,” says I, and watched the galley slowly falling astern before turning back towards the shore, the silver stork-kite hanging in the air far above her. Suddenly a brightly-coloured object went whirling up the string, and then another – gaily-painted paper butterflies which were brought to a sudden halt by a twitch on the kite-string, so that they fluttered in the breeze, glinting and turning, just below the stork.
“Would you have heaved to when they made to drown those poor beggars, Fred?” I asked.
He hesitated. “I guess,” says he, and looked at me. “That’s why you’re aboard, huh?”
I nodded. “You see, they daren’t offer us violence – not after the Arrow affair. And they’ve no real right to stop an opium boat – but they’ll use every trick they know to bluff you, and once they’re aboard, and you don’t speak Chinese, and they outnumber you ten to one – well, they can sort of confiscate your cargo – oh, and release it later, no doubt, with apologies … and lo and behold, your chests of first-rate chandoo have been replaced, hey presto! by a ton of opium dross. See?”
“Bastards!” was all he said. “Him an’ his goddam kite!”
“Speaking of which – see those butterflies? Somewhere up near the Second Bar an active little Chink with a spy-glass is taking note of ’em – which means that round about the Six Flats we’ll meet another deputation, with a much more important Mandarin on board. It may be politic to present him with a couple of chests, rather than risk any embarrassment.”
“How’s that?” His voice was sharp. “Give him some of our opium?”
“What’s sixteen quid out of sixteen thousand?” I wondered.
He was silent for a moment. “I guess,” says he, and then: “Six Flats is up beyond the First Bar, isn’t it?”
I said it was, and that we ought to be there tomorrow noon, and after a little more talk he said he’d better take post on the second lorcha for the night, as we had agreed, so that both vessels were under proper control.
“Remember – keep close up, and don’t stop for anything,” says I, and he swore he wouldn’t. He didn’t bother with a small boat, but just dropped over the side and trod water until the second lorcha came by, and he scrambled aboard. A good boy that, thinks I; green, but steady. By Gad, I didn’t know the half of him, did I?
The boatmen were cooking their evening meal forward, but I’d brought cold fowl and beef, and after a capital meal and a bottle of Moselle while the sun went down I was in splendid trim for my Hong Kong girl, who was sitting by the stern-rail, singing high-pitched and combing her long hair. We went down to the tiny cabin, and were buckled to in no time; a fine, fat little romp she was, too, taking a great pleasure in her work and giggling and squealing as we thrashed about, but no great practitioner of the gentle art. But you don’t expect Montez or Lily Langtry for sixpence, which was what I was paying her; she was a crude, healthy animal, and when I’d played myself out with her she retired with a flask of the promised samshu and I settled down to my well-earned repose.
She was back at first light, though, crawling in beside me and grunting as she rubbed her boobies across my face, which is better than an alarm clock any day. I laid hold, and was preparing to set about her when I realised that she was trembling violently, and the pretty pug face was working with a strange, ugly tic.
“What the devil’s the matter?” says I, still half-asleep, and she twitched and sniffed at me.
“Wantee piecee pipe!” says she, whimpering. “Mass’ gimme! Piecee pipe!”
“Oh, lord!” says I. “Get one from the boatmen, can’t you?” She wanted her opium, and I could see she’d be no fun until she’d had it. But the boatmen hadn’t any, or wouldn’t give it, apparently, and she began to blubber and twitch worse than ever, sobbing “Piecee pipe!” and pulling the pipe from her loin-cloth and shoving it at me. I slapped her across the cabin, and she lay there crying and shivering; I’d have let her lie, but her first awakening of me had put me in the mood for a gallop, and it occurred to me that with a few puffs of black smoke inside her she might be stimulated to a more interesting performance than she’d given the previous night. It was only a step under the companion to where half a ton of the best chandoo was to be had; Josiah would never grudge a skewerful in such a good cause, I was sure.
So I growled at her to get her lamp going and bring her pin, and she came panting as I pushed through the chick-screen to the long main hold which ran the full length of the lorcha under its flush deck. There were the chests, and while she twitched and whined at my elbow I rummaged for a handspike and stuck it under the nearest lid. She had her little lamp lit, and was holding out the skewer in a trembling paw – as I said before, she was a most unlikely-looking guardian angel.
I levered the lid up with a splintering of cheap timber, and pulled back the corner of the oilskin cover beneath. And then, as I recall, I said “Holy God!” and came all over thoughtful as I contemplated the contents of the chest. For if I hadn’t had Mrs Phoebe Carpenter’s word for it that those contents were high-grade prepared Patna opium, I’d have sworn that they were Sharps carbines. All neatly packed in grease, too.
* * *
a Fast crabs and scrambling dragons were opium-running craft.
b See Appendix I.
c Heavy muskets mounted on tripods and worked by two men.
Chapter 2
There was a time, in my callow youth, when the discovery that I was running not opium but guns would have had me bolting frantically for the nearest patch of timber, protesting that it was nothing to do with me, constable, and the chap in charge would be along in a moment. For opium, into China, was a commonplace if not entirely respectable commodity, whereas firearms, into anywhere, are usually highly contraband, and smuggling ’em is as often as not a capital offence. But if twenty years of highly active service had taught me anything, it was that there is a time to flee in blind panic, and a time to stand fast and think. Given the leisure, I daresay I’d have replaced that chest lid, slapped the slut who was staring wildly at me, and taken a turn on deck to reflect, thus:
Had Mrs Carpenter spun me a web of yarn, and were she and dear Josiah aware that their cargo consisted of the very latest repeating weapons? Undoubtedly; Josiah had supervised the loading of the chests, and what he knew his wife knew, too. Very good, to whom should a God-fearing British clergyman and his wife be smuggling guns in China? Not to any British recipient, and certainly not to the Manchoo Imperials – which left the Taiping rebels. Utterly incredible – until one reflected that there were Taiping enthusiasts among our people, and none warmer than those clergy who believed that the “long-haired devils” were devout Christians fighting the good fight against the Imperial heathen. Were Carpenter and his wife sufficiently demented for that? Presumably; if you’re religious you can believe anything. Well, then, if they wanted to supply Sharps carbines to the Taipings, why not ship ’em up the Yangtse to Nanking, where the Taipings were in force, instead of to Canton, where there wasn’t a Taiping within a hundred miles? Simple: Nanking was under siege, the Yangtse was a damned dangerous river, and they’d have had to run the stuff through Shanghai, where there’d have been a far greater risk of det
ection.
But, dammit, how could they hope to smuggle guns into Canton, where our garrison and gunboats were thick as fleas, and the chests would have to be opened at the factories? That was plainly impossible – so they didn’t intend the lorchas ever to reach Canton. No, if their skipper turned eastward into the web of tributaries and creeks short of the First Bar, to some predetermined rendezvous … a Taiping mule-train waiting on a deserted river-bank … off-load and away up-country … why, it could be done as safe as sleep. And poor old Flashy; whom they’d needed to keep meddling and acquisitive Chinese officials at bay during the run past the forts, and who had performed that service to admiration – why, he’d be no trouble. Could he, Her Majesty’s loyal servant, go running to Parkes at Canton to confess that he’d been instrumental in providing the Taipings with enough small arms to keep ’em going until doomsday? Not half.
And that little snake Ward must be up to the neck in it! Hadn’t he announced himself a Taiping-worshipper only yesterday? Wait, though – he’d also admitted that he would have hove to for the Imperial galley, which would have been fatal to him … By gum, had that been acting for my benefit? Yes, because later when I’d remarked that we might have to part with a chest or two as “squeeze” to the Mandarins, he’d been taken suddenly aback, until he’d reflected that the lorchas would never get that close to Canton. The lying, dissimulating, Yankee snake …
That, I say, is how I would have reasoned, given the leisure – and I’d have been dead right, too. As it was, no leisure was afforded me; some of it went through my mind in a flash – the bit about Ward, for instance – but I hadn’t had time to slam the chest cover down when I felt the lorcha swing violently off course, her mainsail cracked like a cannon, there was a yelling and scampering of bare feet overhead, and I had flung the wench aside, dived into the cabin, grabbed my Adams from beneath my pillow, and was up the companion like a jack-rabbit.
Flashman Papers Omnibus Page 338
