The Blue Dress Girl

by E. V. Thompson

  One of Shalonga’s soldiers had obtained the keys to the prisoners’ shackles. As they were unfastened, Kernow asked, ‘What’s happening in the war? Has there been any more fighting between our armies?’

  Shalonga looked at Kernow pityingly. Battered, bruised and dirty, he looked as though he might drop dead any moment.

  ‘We have much to talk about, Englishman, but it will wait until morning. Come, I will show you and your men your new prison quarters.’

  The next morning, bathed, fed and more confident of the future, Kernow repeated his question of the previous night.

  This time Shalonga gave him a reply. ‘There has been a great deal of fighting, as I knew there would be. Your General Grant and the French General de Montauban are now at the gates of Peking, threatening to bombard the city and take it by storm if you are not released.’

  ‘What of the other prisoners? Have you been able to help them all?’

  ‘I am a fighting soldier, not a nursemaid, Englishman. I heard Lord Elgin’s soldier-interpreter had been taken prisoner. I thought it must be you and made enquiries. I have found you.’

  ‘I am glad you have, Shalonga. We all are but I thought you had been brought from your home to fight the Taiping rebels, not us.’

  ‘That is so. My father is still fighting them. I would be too, but the Emperor asked for part of my father’s army to come and defend Peking.’

  ‘You were a long way from the Taipings and Peking when I saw you dressed as a peasant on the bank of the Pei-ho river.’

  Shalonga suddenly looked serious. ‘Landing in such mud to try to take the forts was madness. My men would have turned upon me had I given them such an order. I saw you fall during the battle. I feared you were dead.’

  ‘I thought so too, but here I am.’

  ‘Yes, here you are, a prisoner – but I doubt if it will be for very much longer.’

  ‘I would have been a dead prisoner had you not found me. I will always be in your debt, Shalonga.’

  ‘Soon this foolish war between our countries will be over and you will be free, but I fear China will never be the same again. Missionaries and the long-robed men of the French will be everywhere.’

  ‘China couldn’t go on for ever pretending the rest of the world doesn’t exist. It does, Shalonga, and you’re a part of it.’

  ‘Perhaps. What will you do when the fighting is over?’

  Kernow thought of She-she and the uncertainty of their future together. ‘I don’t know.’

  As though he had been reading Kernow’s mind, Shalonga said, ‘What of your Hakka girl?’

  Kernow started as though someone had fired a shot beside him. Then he remembered speaking of her to this man when they had first met close to the Canton river.

  ‘You have a good memory. She is in Shanghai.’

  ‘You still see her?’

  ‘Yes.’

  The single word explained nothing, yet Shalonga seemed to find it sufficient.

  ‘You will soon see her again, my friend. This war will be over within a week.’

  Chapter 33

  HOSTILITIES BETWEEN ENGLAND and France on the one side, and China on the other, ceased only three days after the conversation on the subject between Kernow and Shalonga.

  The Allied armies had fought their way to the north walls of the capital and were now making preparations to launch an attack on Peking itself.

  Grant had his men bring up batteries of guns and he set them up in positions from which they could lob shells over the walls of Peking. Around and between the guns his infantrymen were established in a maze of trenches.

  The British commander-in-chief’s clear intention of attacking the city reaped its reward. The watchers on the city walls were thoroughly alarmed. A high government official was sent to negotiate a cease-fire. He returned to the city empty-handed. Neither Grant nor Elgin was in a mood for negotiation.

  Grant set out their views bluntly to the unhappy official. ‘Return the prisoners you have taken and surrender the great Anting Gate, or the Allied armies will take Peking by storm.’

  The next day Kernow rode into Grant’s camp accompanied by one of the captured Indian soldiers. The welcoming roar of the army’s cheers brought Grant from his tent.

  ‘Captain Keats! You don’t know how delighted I am to welcome you back.’ The commander-in-chief grasped Kernow’s hand and winced as he caught sight of the rope burns still angrily encircling Kernow’s wrists. His glance moved to the Indian who was surrounded by cheering men of his own regiment.

  ‘Have the others been sent back with you?’

  Kernow shook his head, ‘A trooper and a sowar are being brought in by litter. They are unable either to walk or ride. There were other prisoners, but I fear many will have died as a result of the treatment meted out to us by the Chinese.’

  Grant’s chin came up angrily. ‘You’d better come inside my tent, Captain Keats, I want to hear all about your experiences.’

  Over the course of the next two days nineteen more prisoners were returned to their armies. The Chinese declared they held no more. When General Grant declared this to be unacceptable, the Chinese returned coffins containing the remains of twenty-one others. Most were unrecognisable.

  The mood of the soldiers of the British and French armies was one of simmering anger. There could be no excuse for the brutality of the Chinese towards prisoners they had taken by treachery.

  In a bid to take the edge off their anger, Grant decided the dead men should be buried with full military honours. There was a Russian cemetery close to the Anting Gate and the British prisoners were buried here. Conveyed to the cemetery on gun carriages and escorted by infantry and mounted men, they were buried with full military honours.

  Kernow had told General Grant about his conversation with the dying bugler. He was deeply moved when he learned that Grant had ordered the inscription on the cross marking the young soldier’s grave to read ‘Corporal Bugler Cummins’.

  Later that evening, Kernow was called to General Grant’s tent. He found Lord Elgin there and it was the British ambassador who spoke to him first.

  ‘You know the Chinese thinking better than either of us, Keats. Do you think the impressive funerals we held for the prisoners they killed will prevent them doing it again?’

  ‘I doubt it, my Lord. They will shrug their shoulders and put it all down to the peculiar customs of the Fan Qui. They can’t understand why we’re making such a fuss about a few men whose lives meant little to anyone except perhaps themselves.’

  ‘That’s rather the way I see it and General Grant agrees. I’m determined to punish them for what they’ve done, so we’ve decided to burn down the Emperor’s Summer Palace. After all, that’s where they took you and the others and kept you for three ghastly days. It would be an appropriate gesture. One that I feel might have a real impact upon the Chinese authorities.’

  The decision startled Kernow. The Summer Palace was a wonderful building. One of the wonders of the Eastern world. Burning it would be almost sacrilegious. And yet …

  ‘I think burning the palace would certainly leave them in no doubt about the depth of our revulsion, my Lord.’

  ‘Good. I want you to go and take charge of the burning, Captain Keats. There’ll be an Engineer officer to help you. A Captain Gordon.’

  The Summer Palace was in the French army’s line of march and it had already been thoroughly looted by Britain’s allies. However, such was the vast quantity of treasure within the palace, there were still many items of considerable value lying about the pavilions and grounds.

  ‘It seems a criminal act to put a torch to such a wonderful place.’ Captain Gordon made the comment as he and Kernow gazed up at the golden roof of a pagoda, glinting in the sun.

  ‘It is a criminal act. Unfortunately, only something on such a scale will impress the Chinese enough to make them think twice before ill-treating and murdering prisoners.’

  ‘You were one of their prisoners, and I appreciate
how you must have suffered, but don’t you think the experience has biased you against the Chinese?’

  The Royal Engineer officer who was to carry out the destruction of the Summer Palace had earned a reputation among his fellow officers as something of an eccentric. Some said he would have been happier had he come to China as a missionary and not a soldier.

  ‘You can have no appreciation of how I and the others suffered, and I am not biased against the Chinese. I would risk my life for the Chinese officer who saved me … and for others.’

  Kernow’s thoughts turned to She-she. She had been on his mind a great deal since his return to the army. The news from Shanghai was that there had been fierce fighting in the vicinity of the city. It was also reported that the suburbs had been destroyed, although there was some confusion about which side was responsible for this.

  She-she should have been safe enough in the house of the Strachans, but he could not help worrying about her.

  The destruction of the Emperor’s Summer Palace did all that Elgin and Grant hoped it would. Only days later the ambassador rode through Peking streets lined by British and French soldiers, in a procession that had all the pomp and colour that Elgin could have wished.

  At the Hall of Audience, the long-delayed ratification of the treaty between Britain and China was finally signed by Lord Elgin and Prince Kung. Neither man exactly oozed bonhomie, but Elgin firmly believed that time would heal the bitterness between the two countries. Meanwhile trade would bring great benefits to both nations.

  The following day it was the turn of the French ambassador to sign a similar treaty on behalf of his own country. That night a celebration was held in the British camp with toasts to all three countries and to a brighter and harmonious future.

  As the party broke up in the early hours of the morning a very cold wind blew through the tents of the sleeping soldiers.

  Standing at the entrance to his own tent, General Grant looked about him. The hills about Peking were silhouetted against the skyline in the bright light of a full moon.

  ‘Back in England there’d be a hard frost on a night like this, Keats.’

  ‘There’s probably one tonight, sir. After all, it’s late October.’

  ‘True. Hopefully, we’ll all be home in time to see the last frosts of the winter, at least. You’ll be looking forward to that, I’ve no doubt?’

  Fortunately, after calling out ‘Good night’, General Grant turned and entered his tent without waiting for an answer.

  The question troubled Kernow. He was not ready to return to England yet. He would need to convince She-she that he really wanted her to go to England with him. It would not be easy. He could not make up his mind which problem was likely to be more difficult: convincing She-she he really wanted to marry her, or persuading her to go to England as his wife.

  Walking back to his tent he was comforted by the thought that in only a few weeks’ time he should be with She-she once more. They could tackle the problem in the privacy of a shared bed. Thinking about it left him with a warm feeling that chased away the chill of an approaching Chinese winter.

  Chapter 34

  ON 8 NOVEMBER 1860 the British and French armies began their withdrawal from Peking. Winter had set in with a vengeance now. It was bitterly cold and there had been snow-flurries on the hills beyond Peking. General Grant and Lord Elgin had been right not to allow the Chinese commissioners to delay the advance upon Peking. Another couple of weeks and the weather would have provided the Imperial army with an unbeatable ally.

  The treaty had been signed, China, France and Britain were at peace with each other, but there was still an absence of trust between East and West. As the Allied armies marched alongside the Pei-ho river, a flotilla of British gunboats kept pace with them, ready to take a hand should there be any last-minute treachery on the part of the Chinese.

  Nothing happened to break the peace. Leaving strong garrisons behind at the town of Tientsin, and at the Taku forts, the victorious armies set sail. Some would go to garrisons in Hong Kong and India, others were returning home to Britain and France.

  Kernow arrived at Shanghai with General Grant on 4 December. Lord Elgin had gone ahead, bound for London, where he would receive the warm gratitude of his Queen and country.

  When General Grant went ashore to be fêted by the British community, Kernow lost no time in heading for the Strachan home. On the way he saw that rebuilding work was already well under way in the suburbs destroyed by the defenders of Shanghai.

  He was relieved to see that the Strachan house had suffered no harm. Nan Strachan was in the garden, hanging out clothes on a bamboo frame. When she saw Kernow the expression that came to her face told him his relief had been premature.

  ‘Where’s She-she? Is she inside?’

  ‘She’s all right, Kernow, but … don’t you know?’

  ‘Know? Know what?’

  Kernow was confused. Nan had said She-she was all right, but the statement was at odds with her evasive attitude.

  ‘You’d better come inside and talk to Colin.’

  ‘Where’s She-she? What is it you’re trying so hard not to tell me?’

  ‘Come, in … please.’

  Inside the small house, Colin was working at the kitchen table, fashioning a small wooden horse for one of the children for Christmas. He rose immediately and extended his hand.

  ‘Kernow! It’s good to see you. We heard about your capture and release. You must have had a bad time. Have you seen She-she yet?’

  ‘I thought she was here. I’ve been asking Nan where she is, but apparently there’s something I should know before I see her.’

  ‘That’s right. Sit down, Kernow. Nan, fetch something for Kernow to drink.’

  ‘I’d rather stand, if you don’t mind – and don’t you start prevaricating now, or I really shall start worrying. What’s happened to She-she?’

  ‘She was kidnapped from this house by Chang’s men, and taken to his camp. I tried to stop them and was knocked unconscious as a result.’

  ‘Where is she now? Does Chang still have her?’

  ‘No. Caleb Shumaker negotiated her release. Esme and I went with him. But she never came back to this house. Sally Merrill took her to the United States consulate. She’s been there ever since.’

  ‘God! What a terrifying experience for her. Was she harmed?’

  When neither Nan nor Colin Strachan replied to his question immediately, Kernow said, ‘There’s something more, isn’t there? I’ll go to the U.S. consulate now and see her.’

  ‘Wait, Kernow! Yes, there is more. I wish there was some easy way to tell you, but there isn’t. Chang doped her with opium. Then he beat and raped her. She hasn’t fully recovered yet. She doesn’t want to see Nan or me, and Sally Merrill says she hardly speaks to her. She-she must dread the thought of having to face you after everything that’s happened to her.’

  All the way to the United States consulate Kernow’s thoughts and emotions were in a turmoil. The knowledge of what Chang had done to She-she sickened him. The thought of how she must have suffered, mentally and physically, caused him to alternate between anger and anguish. Much of his anger was directed against the French authorities. The Strachan home was on the fringes of the French area, but it was part of the Concession. They had a duty to protect it.

  He was angry with General Grant for not releasing him to return to Shanghai; with the Chinese for keeping him a prisoner, unaware of what was happening at Shanghai, even though he could have done nothing to help. Most of all he was filled with a deep burning anger that encompassed the Taiping movement and centred upon Chang.

  His anguish was for She-she and the effect her experiences at the hands of Chang would have had. He would need to be both patient and understanding with her. It would not be easy in the emotion of a reunion.

  The first person Kernow met at the United States consulate was Caleb Shumaker. The American appeared to have far more confidence in himself than when they had last met. As
the two men shook hands warmly, Caleb said, ‘I saw the ships were in and went down to the anchorage to find you. They told me you were already ashore. I knew you’d make your way here eventually.’

  ‘I’ve come to speak to She-she, but I’m glad I’ve met up with you. I want to thank you for rescuing her from the Taiping rebels. It was a very courageous thing to do and could have landed you in serious trouble with your own government. Thank you.’

  ‘I brought her back here, yes. As for thanking me … I’m not so sure you’ll be ready to do that when you meet her again. I never knew her before. I wish I had. She’s a beautiful girl, but mentally she’s in a mess. She’s told Sally more than once that I shouldn’t have brought her back. That I should have left her so that she could one day have killed Chang for what he did to her.’

  Aware that he might have said more than was wise, Caleb said hesitantly, ‘You do know … what happened out there in the Taiping camp?’

  Kernow nodded grimly. ‘Colin Strachan and his wife told me. I can only imagine the torture She-she has suffered.’

  Accompanied by Caleb, Kernow entered the consulate. Before he was reunited with She-she, Sally intercepted him in the hallway. She too was aware of the return of the fleet from the Pei-ho river and had been expecting him.

  Close to tears, Sally gave Kernow a warm and sympathetic hug. Such a demonstration of affection towards him would have angered Caleb Shumaker a few months before, but the rescue of She-she from Chang had given him a new maturity. He had more confidence in himself. As a result his relationship with Sally had strengthened.

  ‘You’re a lot thinner, Kernow. We heard about your horrific experiences at the hands of the Chinese. It’s wonderful to have you safely back with us.’ The tears were still in evidence as she added, ‘Only you know how much you suffered, but Esme and I prayed for you every night. So did She-she. It’s the only thing she’s put her whole heart into.’