Tai-Pan

by James Clavell

  “Well, there are certainly forty or fifty in Canton,” Struan said.

  “And if there are two thousand?” Cooper asked.

  “We’d better get ready to leave the Settlement.”

  “Bannermen are a bad sign,” Mauss said. He did not want to leave the Settlement; he wished to stay with his Chinese converts and to continue the preaching to the heathen that took all of his time when he was not interpreting for Struan. “Schrecklich bad.”

  Struan considered possibilities, then rang for a servant. “Big chow quick-quick. Coffee—tea—eggs—meat—quick-quick!”

  “Bannermen are in the square, and all you think of is having breakfast?” Cooper asked.

  “No point in worrying on an empty stomach,” Struan said. “I’m hungry this morning.”

  Mauss laughed. He had heard the whispered rumor among the servants that the Tai-Pan’s legendary mistress had arrived in secret. At Struan’s suggestion, two years ago he had secretly taught May-may Christianity and had converted her. Yes, he thought proudly, the Tai-Pan trusts me. Because of him, oh Lord, one at least has been saved. Because of him, others are being saved for Thy divine mercy. “Breakfast is a good idea.”

  Standing beside the window, Cooper could see the traders scurrying through the garden and into their factories. The bannermen were grouped in an untidy mass, squatting and chattering. “Maybe it’ll be like the last time. The mandarins’ll hold us for ransom,” Cooper said.

  “Na this time, laddie. If they start anything, they’ll try to cut us up first.”

  “Why?”

  “Why send bannermen to Canton? They’re fighting men—na like the local Chinese army.”

  Servants came in and began to lay the huge table. Later the food was brought. There were cold chickens and boiled eggs and loaves of bread and hot stew and dumplings and hot meat pies and butter, marmalade and jam.

  Struan ate heartily and so did Mauss. But Cooper had no relish for his food.

  “Mass’er?” a servant said.

  “Aye?”

  “One-Eye Mass’er dooa here. Can?”

  “Can.”

  Brock stalked into the room. His son Gorth was with him. “Morning, gentlemen. Morning, Dirk lad.”

  “Breakfast?”

  “Thank you kindly.”

  “You had a good voyage, Gorth?”

  “Yes, thank you, Mr. Struan.” Gorth was of a size with his father, a hard man, scarred and broken-nosed, with grizzled hair and beard. “Next time I be beating Thunder Cloud.”

  “Next time, lad,” Brock said with a laugh, “you be captaining her.” He sat and began to gorge himself. “Will thee pass the stew, Mr. Cooper?” He jerked a bent thumb at the window. “Them bastards doan mean no good.”

  “Aye. What do you think, Brock?” Struan asked.

  “The Co-hong be tearing their pigtails out. So trade be finished for the time. First time I seed poxy bannermen.”

  “Evacuate the Settlement?”

  “I baint bein’ chased out by Chinee or by bannermen.” Brock helped himself to more stew. “Course I may retreat a little. In me own time. Most of us’n be starting back tomorrer for the land sale. But we’d do good to call a council right smartly. You’ve arms here?”

  “Na enough.”

  “We’ve plenty for a siege. Gorth bringed ’em. This place be the best to defend. It be almost ourn anyway,” he added.

  “How many bullyboys have you?”

  “Twenty. Gorth’s lads. They’ll take on a hundred Chinese apiece.”

  “I’ve thirty, counting the Portuguese.”

  “Forget the Portuguese. Better us’n alone.” Brock wiped his mouth and broke a small loaf in two and smeared it with butter and marmalade.

  “You can’t defend the Settlement, Brock,” Cooper said.

  “We can defend this factory, lad. Doan thee worry about us’n. You and the rest of the Americans hole up in yorn. They won’t touch thee—it’s us’n they want after.”

  “Aye,” Struan said. “And we’ll need you to watch our trade if we have to leave.”

  “That be another reason I come here, Dirk. Wanted to talk open about trade and Cooper-Tillman. I made a proposal which were accepted.”

  “The proposal was accepted subject to Struan and Company’s not being able to fulfill prior arrangements,” Cooper said. “We’re giving you thirty days, Dirk. On top of the thirty days.”

  “Thank you, Jeff. That’s generous.”

  “That be stupid, lad. But I doan mind the time, I be generous too with yor time. Eight more days, Dirk, eh?”

  Struan turned to Mauss. “Go back to the Co-hong and find out what you can. Be careful and take one of my men.”

  “I don’t need a man with me.” Mauss heaved his girth out of the chair and left.

  “We’ll hold the council downstairs,” Struan said. “Good. Perhaps we should all move in here. There be space enough.”

  “That would give us away. Better to prepare and wait. It may just be a trick.”

  “Right thee are, lad. We be safe enough till servants disappear. Come on, Gorth. Conference in an hour? Downstairs?”

  “Aye.”

  Brock and Gorth left. Cooper broke a silence. “What does it all mean?”

  “I think it’s a ploy by Ti-sen to make us nervous. To prepare for some concessions he wants.” Struan laid a hand on Cooper’s shoulder. “Thanks for the thirty days. I will na forget.”

  “Moses had forty days. I thought thirty’d be adequate for you.”

  The conference was noisy and angry, but Brock and Struan dominated it.

  All the traders—with the exception of the Americans—were in the huge state room that Struan used as his private office. Kegs of cognac, whisky, rum, and beer lined one wall. Tiers of books and ledgers lined another. Quance paintings hung on the walls—landscapes of Macao, portraits, and ships. Glass-fronted chests with pewter mugs and silver tankards. And racks of cutlasses, and muskets; powder and shot.

  “It’s nothing, I tell you,” Masterson snorted. He was a red-faced, dewlapped man in his early thirties, head of the firm of Masterson, Roach and Roach. He was dressed like the other men—dark wool broadcloth frock coat, resplendent waistcoat and felt top hat. “The Chinese have never molested the Settlement ever since there was one here, by God.”

  “Aye. But that was before we went to war with them and won it.” Struan wished they would all agree and go. He held a perfumed handkerchief over his nose against the rancid stench of their bodies.

  “I say toss the bloody bannermen out of the square right now,” Gorth said, refilling his tankard with beer.

  “We be doing that if it be necessary.” Brock spat into the pewter spittoon. “I be tired of all this talkin’. Now be we agreeing with Dirk’s plan or baint we?”

  He glared around the room.

  Most of the traders glared back. There were forty of them—English and Scots, except for Eliksen the Dane, who factored for a London firm, and a corpulent Parsee dressed in flowing robes, Rumajee, from India. MacDonald, Kerney, Maltby from Glasgow and Messer, Vivien, Tobe, Smith of London were the chief traders, all tough, oakhard men in their thirties.

  “I sniff troubles, sir,” Rumajee said and pulled at his vast mustache. “I counsel immediate retreat.”

  “For God’s sake, the whole point of the plan, Rumajee, is not to retreat,” Roach said caustically. “To retreat only if necessary. I vote for the plan. And I agree with Mr. Brock. Too much bloody talking and I’m tired.” Struan’s plan was simple. They would all wait in their own factories; if trouble began, on a signal from Struan, they would converge on his factory under covering fire from his men if necessary. “Retreat before the heathen? Never, by God!”

  “May I suggest something, Mr. Struan?” Eliksen asked.

  Struan nodded at the tall, fair-haired, taciturn man. “Of course.”

  “Perhaps one of us should volunteer to take word to Whampoa. From there a fast lorcha could hare for the fleet at Ho
ng Kong. Just in case they surround us and cut us off as before.”

  “Good idea.” Vivien said. He was tall, pallid and very drunk. “Let’s all volunteer. Can I have another whisky? There’s a good chap.”

  Then all at once they were talking again and quarreling about who should volunteer, and at length Struan pacified them. “It was Mr. Eliksen’s suggestion. If he’s a mind to, why na let him have the honor?”

  They trooped into the garden and watched as Struan and Brock escorted Eliksen across the square to the lorcha Struan had put at his disposal. The bannermen paid no attention to them, other than to point and jeer.

  The lorcha headed downstream.

  “Mayhaps we be never seeing him again,” Brock said.

  “I dinna think they’ll touch him or I’d never’ve let him go.”

  Brock grunted. “For a foreigner, he baint a bad ’un.” He went back with Gorth to his own factory. The other traders streamed to theirs.

  When Struan was satisfied with the arrangement of the armed watch in the garden, and at the back door that let onto Hog Street, he returned to his suite.

  May-may was gone. And Ah Gip.

  “Where Missee?”

  “Doan knowa, Mass’er. Cow chillo no see my.”

  He searched the whole building, but they had vanished. It was almost as though they had never been there.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  Struan was in the garden. It was just before midnight. There was an uneasy stillness in the air. He knew that most of the traders would be sleeping in their clothes, weapons beside them. He peered through the gate at the bannermen. Some were sleeping; others were jabbering over a fire that they had built in the square. The night was chill. There was scant movement on the river.

  Struan left the gate and sauntered pensively around the garden. Where the devil was May-may? He knew that she would not casually leave the Settlement. Perhaps she had been enticed away. Perhaps—God’s blood, that was nae way to think. But he knew that the richest warlord in China would not hesitate to take her—by force if necessary—once he had seen her.

  A shadow jumped over the side wall and Struan’s knife was instantly in his hand.

  It was a Chinese who tremulously held out a piece of paper. He was a short, lithe man with broken teeth, his face stretched and opium-yellowed. Imprinted on the paper was Jin-qua’s chop, a private seal used only on contracts and special documents.

  “Mass’er,” the Chinese said softly. “Dooa follow. Alone.”

  Struan hesitated. It was dangerous to leave the protection of the Settlement and his men. Foolhardy. “No can. Jin-qua here can.”

  “No can. Dooa follow.” The Chinese pointed at the chop. “Jin-qua wantshee, quick-quick.”

  “Tomollow,” Struan said.

  The Chinese shook his head. “Now. Quick-quick, savvy?”

  Struan realized that possibly Jin-qua’s chop had fallen into other hands and that this could easily be a trap. But he dared not take Mauss or any of his men because the meeting must be very secret. And the sooner the better.

  He studied the paper under the lantern and made absolutely sure that the chop was correct.

  He nodded. “Can.”

  The Chinese led the way to the side wall and clambered over it. Struan followed, ready for treachery. The Chinese hurried along the side wall of the factory and turned into Hog Street. Incredibly, the street was deserted. But Struan could feel eyes watching him.

  At the end of Hog Street the Chinese turned east. There were two curtained sedan chairs waiting. The sedan-chair coolies were terrified. Their fear intensified when they saw Struan.

  Struan got into one sedan chair, the Chinese into the other. Immediately the coolies picked up the chairs and loped along Thirteen Factory Street. They turned south into narrow, deserted alleyways unfamiliar to Struan. Soon he had lost all sense of direction. He settled back and cursed his stupidity, at the same time exulting in the expectation of danger. At length the coolies stopped in a filthy, high-walled alley strewn with rotting offal. A festering dog was foraging.

  The Chinese gave the coolies some money and when they had evaporated into the darkness, he knocked on a door. It opened, and he stepped aside for Struan to enter. Struan motioned him to go first, then warily followed him into a rancid stable where another Chinese was waiting with a lantern. This man turned and walked silently across the stable through another door and did not look behind him. Now they picked their way through a huge warehouse and up rickety steps and down more steps into another warehouse. Rats scurried in the darkness.

  Struan knew they were somewhere near the river for he could hear water lapping and hawsers creeking. He was ready for an instant fight, the haft of his knife in his cupped hand, the blade concealed up his sleeve.

  The man with the lantern ducked under a bridge of packing cases and led the way to another half-hidden door. He knocked and then opened the door.

  “Halloa, Tai-Pan,” Jin-qua said. “All same no seea longa time.”

  Struan came into the room. It was another filth-strewn warehouse dimly lit with candles and cluttered with packing cases and mildewed fishing nets. “Halloa, Jin-qua,” he said, relieved. “No seea longa time.”

  Jin-qua was ancient, fragile, tiny. His skin was like parchment. Thin wisps of graying beard fell to his chest. His robes were richly brocaded, and his hat jeweled. He wore thick-soled embroidered shoes and his queue was long and shiny. The nails of his little fingers were protected by jeweled sheaths.

  Jin-qua nodded happily and shuffled to a corner of the warehouse and sat at a table set with food and tea.

  Struan sat opposite him, his back to the wall. Jin-qua smiled. He had only three teeth. They were gold-capped. Jin-qua said something in Chinese to the man who had brought Struan, and the man left by another door.

  “Tea-ah?” Jin-qua asked.

  “Can.”

  Jin-qua nodded to the servant who had carried the lantern, and he poured the tea and helped Jin-qua and Struan to some food. Then he moved to one side and watched Jin-qua. Struan noticed that the man was muscular and armed with a knife at his belt.

  “Plees,” Jin-qua said, motioning Struan to eat.

  “Thank you.”

  Struan nibbled at his food and drank some tea and waited. It was necessary to let Jin-qua make the first opening.

  After they had eaten in silence, Jin-qua said, “You want see my?”

  “Jin-qua dooa good trade out of Canton?”

  “Bis’ness good bad all same, never mind.”

  “Trade stoppee now?”

  “Stoppee now. Hoppo very bad mandarin. Sodjers many, many. My payee big squeezze for sodjers. Ayee yah!”

  “Bad.” Struan sipped his tea. Now or never, he told himself. And now that the right moment had at last arrived, he knew that he could never sell out Hong Kong. A pox on the mandarin! While I’m alive there’ll be nae godrotting mandarin on Hong Kong. It’ll have to be Brock. But murder’s nae way to solve bankruptcy. So Brock’s safe, because everyone expects me to remedy the problem that way. Or is he safe? Where the hell’s May-may?

  “Hear One-Eye Devil Brock have Tai-Pan by troat.”

  “Hear Devil Hoppo have Co-hong by troat,” Struan said. Now that he had decided not to make a deal, he felt much better. “Ayee yah!”

  “All same. Mandarin Ti-sen anger-anger have got.”

  “Why so?”

  “Mass’er ‘Odious Penis’ writee werry bad-bad letter.”

  “Tea-ah werry number-one good-ah,” Struan said.

  “Mass’er ‘Odious Penis’ dooa what Tai-Pan say, heya?”

  “Sometimes can.”

  “Bad when Ti-sen anger have got.”

  “Bad when Mass’er Longstaff anger have got.”

  “Ayee yah.” Jin-qua fastidiously picked some food and ate it, his eyes narrowing even more. “Savvy Kung Hay Fat Choy?”

  “Chinese New Year? Savvy.”

  “New year begin soon. Co-hong have got bad debts from old y
ears. Good joss start new year when no debts. Tai-Pan have got plenty Co-hong paper.”

  “Never mind. Can wait.” Jin-qua and the other Co-hong merchants owed Struan six hundred thousand.

  “One-Eye Devil can wait?”

  “Jin-qua paper can wait. Finish. Chow werry number-one good-ah.”

  “Werry bad.” Jin-qua sipped his tea. “Hear Tai-Pan Supreme Lady and chillo dead. Bad joss, solly.”

  “Bad joss, plenty,” Struan said.

  “Never mind. You plenty young, plenty new cow chillo. Your one piece cow chillo May-may. Why Tai-Pan have got ony one bull chillo? Tai-Pan wantshee med’cine maybe. Have got.”

  “When wantshee, I ask,” Struan said affably. “Hear Jin-qua have got new bull chillo. What number son this?”

  “Ten and seven,” Jin-qua said, beaming.

  Great God, Struan thought. Seventeen sons—and probably the same number of daughters, which Jin-qua does na count. He bowed his head and whistled in appreciation.

  Jin-qua laughed. “How muchee tea-ah wantshee this season?”

  “Trade stop. How can trade?”

  Jin-qua winked. “Can.”

  “Doan knowa. You sell Brock. When I wantshee tea-ah I tell you, heya?”

  “Must knowa two days.”

  “No can.”

  Jin-qua said something sharply to his servant, who went to one of the mildewed packing cases and removed the lid. It was full of silver bullion. Jin-qua motioned at the other packing cases. “Here forty lac dolla.”

  A lac was approximately twenty-five thousand pounds sterling. Forty lacs was a million sterling.

  Jin-qua’s eyes slitted even more. “I borrow. Werry hard. Werry expensee. You want? Jin-qua lend, maybe.”

  Struan tried to conceal his shock. He knew there would be a hard deal attached to any loan. He knew that Jin-qua must have gambled his life and his soul and his house and his future and that of his friends and his sons to amass so much bullion secretly. The bullion had to be secret or the Hoppo would have stolen it and Jin-qua simply would have disappeared. If news leaked into the pirate and bandit nests that abounded in or near Canton that there was even a hundredth part of so much treasure close at hand, Jin-qua would have been obliterated.