It seemed too that both Selectmen started as Harper loomed over them and Kite, aware that Harper’s quixotic motive had momentarily thrown the two Commissioners, quickly seized the initiative.
‘As you see gentlemen,’ he said indicating the pile of silk brocades laid on a rush mat in the corner of the cabin, I am quite unable to prevent the ladies from purchasing such seductive material but I fail to see how you can accuse us of illegal trade. We have brought a small and speculative quantity of Malwa opium hither, and might therefore be said to be partaking in the Country trade in a trivial way, but as for taking a cargo for London why, where would be the sense of it?’
The two Selectmen looked confused and Harrison bent to Blackstone’s ear while Kite smiled benignly at Harper and Nisha.
After a moment Harrison, who though he might have been the junior was indisputably the more aggressive, handed back the Spitfire’s documents. ‘You can affirm that you are not intending to load a cargo for London?’
‘Absolutely not, Mr Harrison, nor Ostend, nor Amsterdam, if it please you.’
‘Shame on you gentlemen, to suspect us,’ Sarah put in, flashing a radiant smile at Blackstone who flushed darkly.
‘I cannot see you on deck in action, Mistress Kite,’ snapped Harrison, rising to his feet.
‘Would you care to match me on deck with a foil, Mr Harrison?’ Sarah flashed back. ‘I am more than a match for my husband, am I not William?’
‘I think you would find my wife more than competent, Mr Harrison, nor is she a bad shot.’
But Harrison ignored the remarks and had swung round to confront Harper. ‘So you are the notorious Hooker,’ he said before clapping his hat upon his head, summoning Blackstone to follow and clumping up the companionway steps. For a moment the four of them stood stock-still, then Kite, putting his finger to his lips, followed the Selectmen on deck.
The watch stood about idly observing the strangers depart. McClusky was handing the manropes to Blackstone, Harrison having already descended into his gig when Kite caught up with them. Blackstone was about to throw his leg over the rail when he caught Kite’s eye and said, ‘sorry to disturb you, Captain. We had information that you were loading for London.’
‘Information? What information?’ Kite made a deprecating gesture round the deck. ‘We are a small schooner, what in heaven’s name could we carry in sufficient quantity to threaten the Honourable Company?’
‘Silver, Captain, silver.’
Kite stood and watched the gig pull away. Something more than the mere commercial defence of a monopoly had motivated the Selectmen’s visit and he lingered a moment, reviewing the events of the last hour. An uncomfortable apprehension was forming in his mind. How could he prove anything, though? He was a gambler, a man willing to risk all without the slightest ability to predict the outcome and with no appreciation of the part others had to play in his wager. It had all seemed so very straight-forward in London and Bombay.
‘William… William, please come below.’ It was Sarah calling him from the companionway.
‘What is it?’ he asked, walking aft after exchanging a word with McClusky.
‘Nisha is in a terrible state. What is all this about?’
‘Why don’t you ask her,’ he said with laboured sarcasm. ‘After all my dear, you are very close to her.’
Sarah blushed at Kite’s implication and bit off a reply, bobbing angrily below. Kite followed. In the cabin Nisha sobbed in Harper’s arms and Kite was moved to ask the mate to leave, but he had himself unwittingly embroiled himself in this bizarre affair and Kite could not afford to alienate him now. Kite closed the door to the companionway and the second door which led to the pantry in which Maggie was washing the glasses. Then he went aft to his desk and tucked the letter-of-marque away. ‘Please let us all sit down, we have a few matters to discuss.’
They sat as bid, only Nisha’s uncontrollable sobs breaking the silence until she looked up, aware that Kite’s eyes were upon her.
‘What is it, William?’
‘I think you know, Nisha, better than any of us. What exactly was you late husband up to?’
‘Hey, steady Cap’n.’
Kite held up his hand. ‘Zachariah, you may have acted in too precipitate a fashion for your own good. Those gentlemen came down from Canton. Now we have had no contact with Canton, nor with East India House at Macao. It is my guess that they were alerted to our presence by Lee. Lee had an interest in you, Nisha, and the name Hooker.’ Kite looked at Sarah and Harper. ‘Neither of you can pretend that that nasty little man Harrison did not have an interest in a man named Hooker…’
‘But Hooker is dead, William,’ Sarah put in.
‘We know that, but they may well not know that in Canton.’ Kite paused. ‘Indeed it strikes me that they have never met Hooker… Until this afternoon, that is, when they met you, Zachariah. You cheerfully admitted you were Mr Hooker.’
‘That’s not true, Cap’n,’ Harper protested.
‘It’s true enough for those two,’ Kite said. ‘It is what they wanted to believe and you wanted to believe it too, just as Sarah and I did, for we four here all had our private reasons for pretending that you were indeed Mister Josiah Hooker.’ Kite was silent for a moment, then he added, ‘oddly I think the two Selectmen anticipated finding Mr Hooker aboard, so that even if you had explained you were Zachariah Harper and not Josiah Hooker, they would not have believed you. Your assumed name, whatever way you cast the dice, is too similar to the other.’
‘But, hell, Cap’n…’
‘Moreover,’ Kite went on remorselessly, ‘I think that somehow when Nisha wrote her initials yesterday, Lee may have reported them as yours. N.H. looks a little like Z.H. when written askew and read by a Chinaman.’
‘But the other, I mean Hooker’s name, was Josiah, so where does…?’
‘William is right, Zachariah,’ Nisha interrupted in a low tone. ‘Josiah’s second name was Zebulon and he used to use it in matters of trade.’
‘A conceit, no doubt,’ murmured Kite, thinking of the three pen scratches of the initial.
‘Well, all right,’ Harper went on, ‘so all this is true. But what is all this about Josiah, or Zebulon Hooker, or whatever he called his God-damned name, eh?’
‘Do you wish to confess, Nisha, or shall I reveal your husband’s secret?’ There was no reply from Nisha. ‘Very well then. It was silver. Hooker carried silver clandestinely to London, a quantity of it if I am any judge…’
‘But so what?’ Harper asked. ‘London is grown rich upon the wealth of the Orient.’
Kite held up his hand. ‘I am not making moral judgements, Zachariah, I am only elucidating mysteries. You see the East India Company can sell very little in China. British manufactures are greeted by the Celstials with disdain. They must purchase tea, silk and porcelain with money and this drains their capital, so they welcome the Country trade from Bombay and Calcutta in Indian cotton chiefly, but also in other commodities such as our lucrative lading, Malwa opium. This generates a money flow in the contrary direction, cash as they call it hereabouts, out of China.
‘The so-called Country traders of Scots or English origin wish to remit their profits to London both for investment return, and for the removal of their capital to their home countries where, in due season, they can enjoy the benefits of their speculations in India and China. To do this and to circumvent the Company’s monopolistic regulation, they deposit their cash with the Company’s treasury in Canton, whither our late visitors have undoubtedly come.
‘The depositors receive bills of exchange on the Company in London and thus their money is remitted as desired, while the outflow of silver from China is stemmed and available at interest from the Company, to the Chinese for further trade.’
‘But that is monstrous,’ Sarah began, but Kite cut his wife short.
‘Monstrous or not, Sarah, that is what happens, I believe. Now we are suspected of being here to repeat the process, complete with our offen
ding Mr Hooker, hence the animus against us from those two gentlemen. I received a scarcely veiled threat from Blackstone which I fear he would not have delivered had he not fallen under your spell, Sarah. Perhaps he has designs upon you after disposing of me.
‘Not that, William, though it is a cynical matter to be sure, what is monstrous is that you are suggesting that Josiah was murdered by agents of the Company… Do I take that to be your implication?’
‘So it would seem.’ Kite looked at Nisha. She seemed stunned as she sat, clasping Harper’s large hand. ‘Those dacoits were suborned in some way,’ he explained, ‘certainly there was not much regret shown at the Castle, who played upon my gullibility and inexperience of Oriental ways…’
What sounded like a scuffling outside the door to the companionway lobby intruded. ‘Excuse me,’ Kite said, strode to the door and flung it open. Outside Maggie was remonstrating with Rahman.
‘I tried to tell him you was having a private meeting, Cap’n Kite, but he insists…’
‘It is important, Kite Sahib,’ Rahman pleaded and Kite realised that he had omitted his Indian mentor from the process: perhaps he had had a more sinister and complicit role to play. Kite motioned him into the cabin and Rahman immediately began to voice his suspicions.
‘I was sleeping off watch, Kite Sahib, but Mr McClusky has just told me you have been visited by the Selectmen…’
Kite outlined what had transpired, voicing his suspicions as to Lee’s hand in the affair. Rahman concurred, his face anxious. ‘But I knew nothing of this transfer of silver, Kite Sahib. It was not something I would be made a party to…’
‘That is true, William,’ Nisha put in, sniffing back the last of her tears and Kite sensed rather than understood the gulf that divided the two Indians.
‘This will affect the sale of our opium?’ Kite asked, a cold certainty clamping itself around his heart.
Rahman nodded. ‘Lee will try and drive the price down. Tomorrow Chang will say there are problems in Canton and that if we wish to sail soon we must accept a lower price… perhaps a much lower price…’
‘So what are we to do?’ Kite mused, anxiously rubbing his jaw.
‘Mind if I say something, Cap’n?’
‘Of course not, Zachariah. What is it?’
‘If they’re capable of murdering once, mayn’t they not do it again? And seein’ as how I’m now believed to be Mr Hooker… Well, I ain’t much inclined to lay my bones down here in junk creek.’
‘Oh…’ Nisha began another bout of sobbing and Harper bent and kissed her on her veiled head.
‘Hushabye, hushabye, I ain’t planning on letting anything happen to old Zachariah yet awhiles.’
‘We are on the horns of a dilemma, it seems,’ he said, looking from one to another of them. He was now the gambler who had staked and lost everything.
‘There is no question, William,’ Sarah said drawing herself up, ‘we should not put Zachariah’s life at risk. It would be better to sail at once and be damned to them all.’
‘And what do we pay the hands off with, my dear, even supposing the keel bolts hold until we reach Bombay?’
‘It ain’t for me to say, Cap’n, but we could make for Calcutta instead. Maybe we will encounter a Country ship willing to tranship our opium, or maybe we could dispose of it elsewhere.’
‘Of course!’ Rahman smote his forehead, his eyes shining with triumph. ‘It will fetch a good price in Malacca, we can sell it direct without transhipment, Kite Sahib! It is true it will not yield so high a profit but,’ Rahman shrugged philosophically, ‘it is better than to wait here and be butchered.’
Kite smiled. ‘I do not think they will butcher you, Mister Rahman,’ he began but Rahman interjected.
‘Oh, Kite Sahib, you do not understand. It is I who will disappear first, let me assure you of that.’
Kite pondered Rahman’s proposition. It was clear that if Lee had indeed compromised them he would offer them only a derisory price and Kite did not like being outwitted.
‘But we have our hostage!’ Kite exclaimed, suddenly recollecting Chang, but Harper shook his head. Chang was not aboard. He had disappeared an hour or two before the arrival of the Selectmen, promising McClusky that they would be discharging on the morrow and he must arrange for the sampans to come down from Whampoa.
‘Unfortunately McClusky believed him, Cap’n,’ Hooker added.
Kite swore under his breath. It was his own fault, he should have kept a better eye upon Chang, or better briefed McClusky. It was too late anyway, and at least rahman’s contingency plan might work.
‘No matter,’ he said with sudden resolution, ‘we cannot cry over spilt milk.’
They would weigh anchor immediately after dark, pass north of Keow Island and slip to seawards between it and Lintin to the east, he explained.
‘I am unwilling to submit to coercion, but we will cheat Lee of his profit and see what we can achieve at Malacca.’
As they filed out of the cabin, Rahman asked the mate, ‘what is the meaning of this spilt milk, Harper Sahib?’
‘It’s a saying, Rahman. You cannot drink what is on the deck, d’you see?’
Rahman smiled his gratitude. ‘Of course, of course.’
And so it was that when Chang’s sampan came in sight of the anchorage on the north coast of Keow next morning, there was no sign of the Spitfire, nor any report of where she had gone. With a heavy heart he returned to Canton to tell his master.
Chapter Twenty-One
A Bone of Consolation
The following day they stood to the southwards with a light north east wind behind them which, Rahman assured Kite, was the first of the favourable monsoon.
‘All the Indiamen and Country ships will be leaving the China coast within the next few weeks, Kite Sahib. The Indiamen bound for England will stand on through the Selat Sunda, others, with the Country ships will follow us into the Selat Malacca for the Bay of Bengal, Calcutta, Madras and Bombay.’
Kite listened to Rahman’s chatter, his eye on half a dozen native craft strewn about the sea ahead, his mind wandering. He was bitterly disappointed that his venture to China had collapsed in so complete and humiliating a manner and he wondered if the Company’s smug officials at Bombay had some inkling of this likely conclusion to so ignorant an interloper as himself. If they had connived at Hooker’s murder they were capable of anything, However, it was inconceivable that any other craft could have arrived on the China coast from Bombay sooner than Spitfire, despite her few days’ delay off Hainan. On the other hand it was quite likely that Lee had been warned off dealing with the foreign devil who had been in action with imperial war junks. Kite discarded the thought; it was an irrelevance. What did he really know of the ramifications of the affair? He was simply speculating, and speculating wildly. Better still to curse himself for a foolish optimist in his dealings with Hooker. Why else had Hooker hidden in a London tenement, absenting himself from the society he claimed that he desired to become a part of, but from fear of the Company’s spies and informers? It was where he kept his treasure. Doubtless time and the return home of his principals, the men who had conspired with him to ship silver directly to London, would have purchased him immunity.
It was increasingly clear to Kite that Hooker had been playing a complex, dangerous and double game, for despite the concealment of his party, he had gone brazenly to East India House in Leadenhall Street. Were Woolnough and Drysdale part of the private conspiracy, despite their high office? And had they been frightened off that day when the board had sat, so that they repudiated Hooker at the moment he expected triumph? Dismissed or not, Hooker had been cast adrift, explaining his need to return to India much more convincingly than his muttered explanation of an enemy and a romantic past.
Then in Bombay, Hooker’s presence became a greater embarrassment than in London. Kite guessed several highly placed officials were implicated and the last thing they wanted was Hooker back on the Malabar coast. His odd behaviour in re
spect of Kite, what seemed some sort of an alliance with the reptilian Grindley, all done in haste and shrouded behind the bombast of his social round, carried out in suspicious solitude, seemed to indicate a further muddying of the waters. Had Hooker not, after all, banked his co-conspirators’ money? Had he had it with him the whole time, thereby implicating Kite? And what risks consequently attached to Kite and the company of the Spitfire?
Kite concluded that he had been subjected to a clever, concealed interrogation by President Cranbrooke. His ignorance must have been as obvious as the nose on his face. He was a Liverpool man with a loyalist American as his mate, a man with no experience of the Indian trade and clearly a dupe of the cunning Hooker. The President’s lack of concern over Hooker’s murder, his persuasive advice to treat the matter as suicide, all pointed to the fact that he at the very least knew who was behind the suborning of Hooker’s dacoits. Whether Hooker’s assassination was engineered under the clandestine auspicies of the East India Company, or a secret cabal of its officials who were hand-in-glove with others in the China trade did not matter. Hooker had either run foul of the former or betrayed the trust of the latter so that either party had had a motive for disposing of him.
Kite now recalled Nisha’s muttered remark about paying ‘it’ back, a remark he, in his own selfish preoccupation, he had attributed to Hooker’s shameful ditching of himself. It seemed he could see now a hundred little hints that pointed to the gravity and extent of Hooker’s foolish crime. Why, having encountered the gullible and disappointed captain Kite in Leadenhall Street, had not Hooker even borne off his messenger, the even more hapless Jack Bow? The extent of Hooker’s malfeasance was truly astonishing.
Not that it mattered now. It was too late to fret over having been made a dupe, though he would dearly like to know how much of her late husband’s conspiracy was known to Nisha. Kite could swallow his own pride. There would be those in Liverpool who might have found it all most amusing, but by now his name would mean nothing, for he would have been forgotten as another failed shipowner, ruined by war with the American rebels. No, he would simply ship out as a common master again, as he had long ago intended to do. Nor need he return to Liverpool to do that. If he could get Spitfire back to Bombay, perhaps he could seek a berth in one of Bomanjee’s Country ships. He was growing old now and he could establish Sarah in a suitable house in Bombay, he felt certain. As for the schooner, he would have to sell her, for he could not afford her docking, even in Bombay and the state of the keel-bolts troubled him deeply.
The East Indiaman Page 26
