Party in Peking

by Margaret Pemberton

  ‘I have gone to the Anglican Mission,’ she wrote hastily. ‘I shall join you later at the British Legation. Love, Olivia.’

  From the bottom of a wardrobe she retrieved a capacious straw bag and hurriedly stuffed it with a change of clothing, then she paused, her heart beating light and fast.

  There had been no sound of a door opening and closing. The wind bells were silent. Lewis was still in the house. She tiptoed back out on to the landing and then, as the hall remained deserted, hurried swiftly towards the back staircase. Five minutes later, panting for breath, her straw bag clutched beneath her arm, she was pushing her way through the crowds of the Tartar City.

  Chapter Nine

  ‘Marry Olivia?’ Letitia Harland gasped incredulously. ‘Whatever can you mean, Doctor Sinclair? You cannot possibly marry Olivia.’

  Lewis looked down into her plump, agitated face and suppressed a flicker of impatience. He should have waited until Sir William had returned before declaring his intentions. It was only natural that Lady Harland had other, more grandiose plans for Olivia’s future.

  ‘I can, and I am going to,’ he said with a certainty that terrified her.

  She stumbled backwards, jarring a small table and sending a jade figurine toppling. The man was a monster. Did he think, because his wife was Chinese, that his wedding vows were not binding? She remembered the talk that had swept the Legations at the time of his marriage. The head-shaking and the condemnation. The prediction that no good would come of it. And now… Now he wanted to put the past behind him and marry suitably. Marry Olivia. Letitia grasped the back of William’s high-winged chair, determined that he would not do so. She had never been brave but now she was filled with primitive courage. It was her cub that was being threatened. Her fledgling.

  ‘No!’ she declared vehemently. ‘Never!’

  Lewis’s brows shot upwards. He had not expected to meet with such violent opposition from so mild a source.

  ‘I think,’ he said gently, ‘that it would be best if I spoke to Olivia, don’t you?’

  Letitia held on firmly to the chair. ‘Olivia is not at home,’ she said, crossing her fingers so that the lie should not stain her immortal soul. ‘She is visiting with her fiancé.’

  She heard him take in his breath sharply and was suffused with a sense of triumph. It was not really so terrible a lie. Phillippe was Olivia’s fiancé. The little tiff of yesterday morning would soon be made up and she was sure that William would applaud her for her ingenuity.

  ‘Then I shall wait,’ he said, and this time there was a new edge to his voice. A steely determination that sent fresh flutters of apprehension down her spine.

  ‘The wedding is to take place very soon, Doctor Sinclair. A proposal of marriage to my niece at such a time could only cause embarrassment.’

  Disbelief flared in the dark depths of his eyes and the muscles along his jawline tensed and hardened.

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ he said tightly.

  ‘I spoke to Monsieur Casanaeve in this very room only yesterday morning,’ Letitia said, glad that at least that much was true. ‘There can be no prospect of you marrying my niece. None at all.’

  ‘You will forgive me if I prefer to hear that statement from Olivia herself,’ he said, his eyes holding hers so unrelentingly that she began to tremble.

  ‘You forget yourself, Doctor Sinclair,’ she retorted, holding on gallantly to the last remnants of her courage. ‘There is one insuperable obstacle to you even talking to my niece on such a subject.’

  ‘And that is?’ His voice was cold and hard and his eyes had narrowed as if he knew very well what it was she was about to say.

  Letitia wished vainly that William would come. That Dr Sinclair would apologize for his unforgivable behaviour and leave. He did not do so. Instead he waited, his eyes never leaving hers until she said at last, her voice quivering with outrage, ‘Your wife, Doctor Sinclair!’

  The silence that followed was the most dreadful that Letitia had ever experienced. At the cold contempt in his eyes she shrank back against the chair, no longer brave but extremely frightened. A nerve had begun to tic at the corner of his jaw and his mouth was etched by thin, white lines.

  ‘I am sorry you think so,’ he said chillingly. ‘It is not a view that I had expected to meet in this house. Good day, Lady Harland.’

  He strode past her, not trusting himself to remain another minute in the room. Dear Lord. Would it never end? Was Pearl Moon not to be forgiven her nationality even in death? If he married Olivia, would she, too, have to endure ostracism because her predecessor had been Chinese? He slammed out into Legation Street, his fists clenched, his face ashen. It was a future he could never subject her to. She would be better off marrying Casanaeve.

  ‘William? William, is that you?’ Letitia Harland called, running from the drawing-room and into the hall as her husband returned from his meeting with Sir Claude. ‘Oh, William!’ She threw herself into his arms, the tears coursing down her cheeks. ‘That dreadful man came while you were out! I do not think that he can be very well, William, for he said that he wanted to marry Olivia!’

  ‘Marry Olivia? Young Casanaeve? Of course he does. I told you not to worry about the tiff they had,’ Sir William said, disentangling himself gently from his wife’s unexpected embrace.

  ‘Not Phillippe,’ Letitia said, clinging to his arm. ‘Doctor Sinclair!’

  Sir William stared down at her, a curious expression in his eyes. ‘Did he, indeed?’

  ‘Yes he did, William, and I told him that he could not do so. I told him that Olivia was to marry Monsieur Casanaeve and he looked most terribly angry and said that he didn’t believe me!’

  ‘But Olivia is no longer engaged to Monsieur Casanaeve,’ Sir William said, a frown marring his brow.

  ‘I know, but what else was I to say to deter him? He was so very, very determined. Do you think that he did not marry his wife in a Christian church, William? Perhaps he is allowed to take more than one wife.’

  ‘Where is Olivia now?’

  ‘Upstairs, packing clothes ready for our removal to the Legation. I was so frightened that she would hear him. Just imagine how offended she would have been.’

  Sir William was silent. He did not think that Olivia would have been offended at all.

  ‘Are you not proud of me, William? I told Doctor Sinclair that Olivia was not in the house, but with Monsieur Casanaeve! Why are you frowning so? It was only a little lie and cannot possibly cause harm.’

  Sir William’s face was grave. ‘I think, my dear, that it might very well cause harm.’

  Letitia stared at him uncomprehendingly. ‘But how could it? Olivia cannot marry Doctor Sinclair. He already has a wife.’

  Sir William passed his hand over his eyes and then said sombrely, ‘Mrs Sinclair was murdered in a Boxer attack five months ago, Lewis Sinclair is a widower.’

  Letitia was momentarily robbed of speech. At last she said with difficulty, ‘But…how dreadful. I did not know.’

  ‘It is apparently a well-established fact. Sir Claude was most surprised that I was not aware of it.’

  ‘Oh dear. And do you think that…would Olivia have wanted…’ she faltered. The expression on her husband’s face told her only too well what the answer to her unspoken question was. ‘I only acted for the best, William. Truly I did.’

  He patted her hand. ‘ I know, my dear,’ he said reassuringly. ‘And now let us speak to Olivia.’

  As he climbed the stairs he felt weary. Sir Claude’s news had not been optimistic. There was now no doubt that the Empress Dowager was in league with the Boxers and that the Boxers had the support of Imperial troops. Railway and telegraphic communications had been disrupted and even the most optimistic believed that a Boxer attack on the city was inevitable. The situation was grave and he had worries enough without Letitia well-meaningly making things worse. He knocked on Olivia’s door and then, when there was no reply, entered with a deep feeling of foreboding.

 
; The note was placed prominently on the dressing-table. He crossed the room swiftly, his hand shaking slightly as he picked it up.

  ‘What is the matter, William? Where is Olivia? Oh, what is happening?’ his wife cried, pressing her hands against her chest, wondering how many more shocks she could sustain.

  ‘Olivia has gone to the Mission to help the nuns,’ her husband said briefly, tucking the note in a pocket of his waistcoat and striding past her and out of the room.

  ‘But she cannot!’ Letitia shrieked in anguish. ‘ We are not safe here! She must come with us to the British Legation!’ She ran after him, along the landing and down the stairs. ‘We must get her back, William.’

  ‘I intend to,’ he retorted, seizing his walking cane, cramming his homburg on his head, ‘But it’s useless my trying to cross the city to the Mission. The streets are in chaos.’

  ‘Then where are you going?’ she asked, clinging on to his arm, her face ashen.

  ‘The Hôtel de Pekin. Lewis will know what to do. He’ll get her back.’

  Without any of his usual aplomb he hurried outside, calling impatiently for his sedan. Great heavens, what a mess it all was. He should have known that Olivia would not remain idly in the house once arrangements for the move to the Legation had been completed. He should have guessed her intentions. He mopped his brow in a fever of agitation. There would be no protection for the Mission when the Boxers attacked and he knew with dreadful certainty that they would attack soon. Very soon.

  At the hotel Madame Chamot greeted him, her face pale, her eyes heavily shadowed. ‘Lewis is not here,’ she said, her voice taut with strain. ‘He went out this morning, against Doctor Poole’s orders. When he returned he was like a man possessed. He ordered that his horse be saddled and he has ridden out of the city, intent on another rescue mission.’

  ‘But he is injured!’ Sir William protested, aghast.

  Madame Chamot shrugged wearily. ‘I know, but he would listen to no-one. Not even my husband.’

  Sir William leaned heavily on his cane. ‘The countryside is alive with Boxers,’ he said defeatedly. ‘ He will not return alive,’ and with stooping shoulders he turned and made his way slowly back to his sedan.

  In the west of Tartar City the noise and clamour was deafening. Shopkeepers were boarding up their shops, hastily throwing their goods into handcarts. No one was walking. Even the Chinese women with their bound feet were scurrying through the streets in undisguised agitation. Olivia clutched her straw bag closer to her chest and tried not to be swamped by the panic stricken crowd around her. She was nearly at the Mission. Once there, surely she would be far too busy to think about Lewis? She dodged between a string of dirty camels and a shabby and overloaded donkey, a pain seizing her chest as if a dagger had been driven between her shoulder blades. Would she still hear of him at the Mission? Would she know where he was? What he was doing? If he was safe? Despite all her good intentions, the tears ran freely down her face.

  ‘Oh Lewis,’ she whispered, standing suddenly still amid the tumult around her. ‘I love you so much!’

  A small, wiry Chinese with a heavy pannier bumped into her and a Peking cart rattled past. She began to move again, wiping away her tears, knowing they were a luxury she dare not indulge in.

  The sisters at the Mission greeted her with open arms. Every inch of space was taken up by the paliasses of refugees. Children cried, weary and hungry. The sick lay, hollow-eyed, exhausted by their long trek to what they hoped was safety.

  ‘What is happening?’ Sister Angelique asked her as they stepped over a pile of meagre possessions. A pot and a pan and a few precious bags of rice. ‘We have heard nothing for two days now.’

  ‘Some troops have arrived, but not enough.’

  ‘How many?’ The skin was tight over her bones, so translucent that Olivia could see the blue of her veins clearly.

  ‘A little over three hundred.’

  The small, bird-like figure at her side shook her head in consternation. ‘You are right. It is not enough. Will there be more?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Olivia said truthfully. ‘The Boxers are severing all our communications with the outside world. Telegraph lines have been cut down. Railway tracks torn up.’

  ‘And now they are at the city gates.’ Sister Angelique finished for her. ‘Well, so be it. We must simply put our trust in God.’ She led Olivia into a small, windowless room that had once been a pantry. ‘I’m afraid that this is all I can offer you,’ she said, indicating a small mattress. ‘Lan Kuei sleeps next to you. She will be pleased to see you again.’

  Olivia put her straw bag down. ‘What would you like me to do first. Sister Angelique?’

  ‘Help with the children. Most of them are sick and all of them are frightened.’ She put a frail hand on Olivia’s arm. ‘And thank you for coming, dear child. We need all the help that we can get.’

  In the days that followed, Olivia marvelled at the sisters’ strength. They were nearly all elderly. All were tired. Yet they carried on stoically accepting everyone who came in search of shelter, rationing and re-rationing their small supply of food.

  She was cutting up sheets and rolling them into bandages when one of the Chinese converts brought news that the grandstand on the European racecourse had been burned to the ground.

  ‘It cannot be long now before the Boxers flood through the gates,’ Sister Angelique said, regarding the huddled refugees, with troubled eyes. ‘I had hoped that by now we would have been sent some protection. A handful of guards, however small.’

  Olivia put another bandage to one side. ‘If they have not come now, I doubt they will come at all,’ she said quietly. ‘The troops who arrived were detailed to guard the legations.’

  ‘Then if they will not come to us we must go to them,’ Sister Angelique said calmly. ‘The children must be escorted across the city before it is too late.’

  ‘It may already be too late,’ Lan Kuei said, joining them and speaking low so that she should not be overheard and create even more alarm. ‘It is not only the grandstand that is burning. There are fires in the commercial quarter. All shops selling foreign goods have been pillaged and many people have been killed.’

  Sister Angelique, who had worked till two in the morning, had slept late. ‘ I did not know,’ she said, her softly wrinkled face grave. She turned to Olivia. ‘There is no time to be lost, Olivia. The protection we have waited for has not come. We must try and take as many of the children as possible to the British Legation.’

  As she spoke a panic-stricken ripple ran round the crowded rooms and corridors and they could hear, quite distinctly, the roar of flames and the crash of rafters and masonry.

  ‘We’ll take them in groups of twenty,’ Olivia said swiftly. ‘ Sister Agatha and Sister Louise are fit enough to help. Hurry, Lan Kuei, tell the sisters that they are needed and organize the children.’

  Lan Kuei’s skin had taken on a waxen tinge and her eyes were large and frightened. ‘But if the Boxers are in the streets we shall all be killed!’

  ‘We shall all be killed if we remain here,’ Sister Angelique said succinctly. ‘Hurry, child. Do as Olivia says.’

  Olivia was already pressing through the crush, Sister Angelique at her side. ‘The legations may already be barricaded,’ she said as she hastily began to assemble a group of bewildered children around her.

  ‘I pray not. If only they had sent soldiers to protect us! If only Doctor Sinclair was here.’

  Olivia grasped the hands of two of the children. If Lewis had been there she would not have been afraid. Lewis would have seen that she and all the refugees were safe.

  ‘Don’t cry,’ she said to the children with outward calm. ‘ Keep close to me.’

  Inwardly she felt as if a bucket of iced water had been poured down her spine. At any moment the legations would be under full-scale attack and Phillippe had boasted to her that when they were, Lewis would be the first to fall.

  ‘He couldn’t have meant it,’ she
whispered feverishly as she herded the children towards the door, but as she remembered the crazed exultation on Phillippe’s face her fear increased. She had not warned Lewis. He had no idea that danger lay within the legation compound as well as without. If he died, she would be partly to blame.

  ‘Lan Kuei will follow you,’ Sister Angelique was saying, a small island of calm amid a crowd of consternation. ‘ When you reach the legation do not attempt to come back. There is nothing further that can be done here.’

  ‘And you?’ Olivia asked, suppressing the urge to grip the frail wrists and drag Sister Angelique bodily in her wake.

  ‘I will stay,’ Sister Angelique said. ‘Goodbye, my child. God go with you.’

  Olivia held her tightly and then turned, ushering her small charges out of the Mission and into the dust-filled street. Determination overcame fear. She had to reach the legation in safety because she had to get a message to Lewis. She had to tell him of Phillippe’s threats.

  The street was choked with fleeing Chinese. Peking carts thundered over the parched earth. Cries of fear merged with the ever-nearing orgiastic howls of ‘ Sha! Sha!’

  ‘Keep together!’ she shouted over the din. ‘And hurry! Don’t stop for anything!’

  The pig-tailed child gripping her hand screamed in terror as a huge tongue of fire surged skywards only yards away from them. ‘Run!’ Olivia shouted. ‘ Run!’

  She stayed in the rear, terrified that a child should fall and be left behind. Her heart was slamming violently against her breastbone as she urged them onwards, hardly able to keep upright as the panic-stricken Chinese swept past her. She could not see the Boxers but she could hear them and hear the screams of those who got in their way as they rampaged the nearby streets. A child fell and Olivia breathlessly hauled it to its feet, running, running as the roar of flames grew louder and rafters and masonry crashed into the heart of the burning buildings.