Tai-Pan

by James Clavell

  “Oh, yes, very,” she said. “But we watch from top of you. Down level perhaps no one saw. Wat for did Brock hit his son, heya?”

  “I did na know he did.”

  “Yes. Two times. Wat for such blows! We laughed till we choke. The son almost hit back. I hope they fight—kill each other—then no money to pay back. I still think you fantastical crazy na just to pay pirate to assassination him.” She sat on the cushion, then knelt again with an oath.

  “What’s the matter?”

  “My bum, she is still sore.”

  “It is still sore,” he said.

  “She. That was joke. Ayee yah, this time I beat you to hell and make back all my dolla.” She added innocently, “How much I owe? Fourteen tousand?”

  “You remember very well.”

  He sat down and picked up the dice cup. “Four games. Then sleep. We’ve a long night ahead.” He threw the dice and she cursed.

  “What joss you have! Double six, double six, a pox on double six!” She threw the dice and equaled him and slammed the cup down and whooped, “Good dear sweet double six!”

  “Keep your voice down, or we will na play.”

  “We’re safe, Tai-Pan. Throw. My joss is good today!”

  “Let’s hope it’s very good,” he said. “And tomorrow.”

  “Ayee yah tomorrow, Tai-Pan! Today. Today is what counts.” She threw again. Another double six. “Dear sweet dice, I adore you.” Then she frowned. “What for does ‘adore’ mean?”

  “Love.”

  “And ‘love’?”

  Struan’s eyes crinkled and he shook a finger at her. “I’m na going to get into that argument again.” Once he had tried to explain what love meant. But there was no Chinese word for the European concept of love.

  The grandfather clock began to sound eleven. Struan shifted wearily at his post beside the wall skylight. May-may was curled up asleep, Ah Gip slumped against a mildewed packing case. A few hours ago he had dropped off to sleep for a moment, but his dreams were bizarre and mixed with reality. He had been aboard China Cloud, lying crushed under a weight of bullion. Jin-qua had come into the room and eased the bullion off him, and had taken it all in exchange for a coffin and twenty golden guineas, and then he was no longer on his ship but ashore in the Great House on the knoll. Winifred brought him three eggs and he was eating breakfast and May-may had said, behind him, “God’s blood, how can you eat the unborn children of a hen?” He had turned around and seen that she was wearing no clothes and she was achingly beautiful. Winifred had said, “Was Mother as beautiful without clothes on?” and he had replied, “Yes, but in a different way,” and he had awakened suddenly.

  Dreaming of his family had saddened him. I’ll have to go home soon, he had thought. I dinna ken even where they’re buried.

  He stretched and watched the movement on the river, and thought about Ronalda and May-may. They’re different, very different—were different. I loved them both equally. Ronalda would have enjoyed London and a fine mansion there and taking the waters in the season at Brighton or Bath. She’d have been a perfect hostess for all the dinners and balls. But now I’m alone.

  Will I take May-may home with me? Perhaps. As Tai-tai? Impossible. Because that would cast me out from those I must use.

  He stopped musing and concentrated on the square. It was deserted. Just before nightfall the bannermen had left. Now there was only the dull moonlight and blurred shadows, and this emptiness felt eerie and cruel to Struan.

  He wanted to sleep. You canna sleep now, he told himself. Aye, but I’m tired.

  He stood and stretched, and settled himself once more. The chimes rang the quarter-hour and then the half, and he decided to wake May-may and Ah Gip in a quarter of an hour. There’s nae hurry, he thought. He did not allow himself to speculate about what would happen if the lorcha from Jin-qua did not arrive. His fingers were touching the four half coins in his pocket and he wondered again about Jin-qua. What favors and when?

  He partially understood Jin-qua’s motives now. Ti-sen’s disgrace had clarified them. Obviously there would be war. Obviously the British would win it. Obviously trade would begin again. But never under the Eight Regulations. So the Co-hong would lose its monopoly and it would be every man for himself. Hence the thirty-year trade span: Jin-qua simply had been cementing his business relationship for the next three decades. That was the Chinese way, he thought: na to worry about immediate profit, but profit over years and years.

  Aye, but what’s really in Jin-qua’s mind? Why buy land in Hong Kong? Why train a son in “barbarian” ways and to what calculated end? And what will the four favors be? And now that you’ve agreed and promised, how are you going to implement them? How can you ensure that Robb and Culum fulfill the bargain?

  Struan began to contemplate that. He mulled a dozen possibilities before arriving at an answer. He hated what he knew he had to do. Then, having decided, he turned his thoughts to other problems.

  What to do about Brock? And Gorth? For a moment on the wharf he had been ready to go after Gorth. One more word, and he would have had to challenge him openly. Honor would have forced—and allowed—him to humble Gorth. By a knife in the gut. Or by the lash.

  And Culum. What’s he been up to? Why hasn’t he written? Aye, and Robb, too. And what mischief’s Longstaff done?

  The chimes sounded eleven o’clock. Struan awakened May-may. She yawned and stretched luxuriously, like a cat. Ah Gip had been up the instant Struan had moved, and she was already collecting the bundles.

  “The lorcha is come?” May-may asked.

  “Nay. But we can move downstairs and be ready.”

  May-may whispered to Ah Gip, who unpinned May-may’s hair and brushed it vigorously. May-may closed her eyes and enjoyed it. Then Ah Gip braided the hair as a Hoklo would, and bound it with a piece of red ribbon and let it fall down her back.

  May-may rubbed her hands in the dust and dirtied her face. “Wat I do for you, Tai-Pan. This filth dirt will destroy the perfection of beauty skin. I will need much bullion to repair. How much, heya?”

  “Get along with you!”

  He led the way carefully downstairs into the dining room and, motioning them to sit patiently, went to the window. The square was still deserted. There were oil lights in the massed sampans of the floating villages. Dogs barked from time to time and firecrackers sounded and quarreling voices were raised and hushed, and sometimes there were happy voices—and the ever-present clack-clack of mah-jongg tiles being banged onto a deck or a table and the chattering singsong. Smoke rose from cooking fires. Junks and lorchas and sampans filled the estuary. Everything—the sounds and the smells and sights—seemed normal to Struan. Except the emptiness of the square—he had presumed that the square would be populated. Now they had to cross a deserted expanse, and in the moonlight they could be seen for hundreds of yards.

  The clock chimed midnight.

  He waited and watched and waited.

  The minutes became longer and after an eternity the chimes sounded the quarter-hour. Then the half-hour.

  “Maybe the lorcha is south,” May-may said, stifling a yawn.

  “Aye. We’ll wait another half an hour, then we’ll look.”

  Almost at the hour he saw the two lanterns on a lorcha coming downstream. The boat was too far away for him to see the red-painted eye and he held his breath and waited. The lorcha was sailing gently but was sluggish and slow in the water. This was a favorable sign to him because the bullion would weigh many tons. After the boat passed the north end of the Settlement, it changed course and crept into the wharf. Two of the Chinese crew jumped ashore with hawsers and tied up. To his relief, another Chinese went to the lantern on the prow, blew it out and lit it again according to the prearranged signal.

  Struan searched the half-darkness for peril. He sensed none. He checked the priming of his pistols and stuck them in his belt. “Follow me, quickly now!”

  Silently he went to the front door and unlocked it and guided them
cautiously through the garden. He opened the gate and they hastened across the square. Struan felt as though all Canton was watching them. Reaching the lorcha, he saw the red-painted eye and recognized on the poop the man who had led him to Jin-qua. He helped May-may aboard. Ah Gip leaped aboard easily.

  “Wat for two cow chillo, heya? No can!” the man said.

  “Your name wat can?” Struan asked.

  “Wung, heya!”

  “Cow chillo my. Cast off, Wung!”

  Wung noticed May-may’s tiny feet and his eyes narrowed. He could not see May-may’s face, for she kept the sampan hat low over her forehead. Struan did not like the way Wung hesitated or the way he looked at May-may. “Cast off!” he said curtly, and bunched a fist. Wung rapped an order. The hawsers were cast off and the lorcha slipped away from the wharf. Struan took May-may and Ah Gip down the gangway to the lower deck. He turned aft where the main cabin would be and opened the door. Inside were five Chinese. He motioned them out. Reluctantly they got up and left, looking May-may up and down. They, too, noticed her feet.

  The cabin was tiny with four bunks and a crude table and benches. It smelled of hemp and rotting fish. Wung was standing at the door of the cabin, scrutinizing May-may.

  “Wat for cow chillo? No can.”

  Struan paid no attention to him. “May-may—you locka dorra, heya? Only open dorra my knock, savvy?”

  “Savvy, Mass’er.”

  Struan went to the door and beckoned Wung outside. He heard the bolt lock behind them, then he said, “Go hold!”

  Wung took him into the hold. The forty crates were stacked in two neat rows against the sides of the ship, with a wide passageway between them.

  “Wat in box, heya?” Struan asked.

  Wung seemed perplexed. “Wat for you saya, heya? All same Mass’er Jin-qua say.”

  “How muchee men knowa?”

  “My only! All knowa, ayee, yah!” Wung said, drawing his finger across his throat.

  Struan grunted. “Guard dorra.” He selected a crate at random and opened it with a crowbar. He stared down at the bullion, then lifted one of the silver bricks from the top layer. He sensed Wung’s tension and it heightened his own. He replaced the brick and the top of the crate.

  “Wat for cow chillo, heya?” Wung said.

  “Cow chillo my. Finish.” Struan made sure the lid was tight again.

  Wung stuck his thumbs in the belt of his ragged pants. “Chow? Can?”

  “Can.”

  Struan went on deck and checked the rigging and the sails. A four-pound cannon was in the bow and another in the stern. He made sure that both were loaded and primed, and that the powder keg was full and the powder dry. Grape and shot were ready at hand. He ordered Wung to assemble the crew and picked up a belaying pin. There were eight men aboard.

  “You saya,” he said to Wung, “all knives, all boom-boom, on deck plenty quick-quick.”

  “Ayee yah, no can,” Wung protested. “Plenty pirate in river. Plenty—”

  Struan’s fist caught him in the throat and slammed him against the gunnel. The crew chattered angrily and prepared to rush Struan, but the raised belaying pin discouraged them.

  “All knives, all boom-boom on deck, plenty quick,” Struan repeated, his voice steely.

  Wung hauled himself up weakly and muttered something in Cantonese. After an ominous silence he threw his knife on the deck, and, grudgingly, the others followed suit. Struan told him to gather up the knives and tie them in a piece of sacking that was on the deck. Next he made the crew turn around and he began to search them. He found a small pistol on the third man, and with the butt end smashed the man across the side of the head. Four more knives clattered to the deck from other men, and out of the corner of his eye Struan saw Wung drop a small fighting hatchet overboard.

  After he had searched the men, he ordered them to stay on deck and taking the weapons with him, he carefully searched the rest of the ship. There was no one concealed belowdecks. He found a cache of four muskets, six swords, four bows and arrows and three fighting irons, behind some crates, and carried them into the cabin.

  “Heya, May-may, youa hear what topside can?” he whispered.

  “Yes,” she said, as softly. “You say we can talk English in front of Ah Gip safely. You dinna want to now?”

  “I forgot. Habit. Nay, lass, it’s all right.”

  “Why hit Wung? He’s Jin-qua’s trusted, no?”

  “The cargo’s the lodestone of this voyage.”

  “‘Lodestone’?”

  “Magnet. Compass needle.”

  “Oh, I understand.” May-may sat on the bunk, her nostrils quivering from the stench of rotting fish. “I be very sick if I stay here. Can I be on deck?”

  “Wait till we’re clear of Canton. You’re safer here. Much safer.”

  “How long before we meet China Cloud?”

  “A little after first light—if Wolfgang makes no mistake on the rendezvous.”

  “Is that possible?”

  “With this cargo, anything’s possible.” Struan picked up one of the muskets. “Do you know how to use this?”

  “Wat for should I shoot gunses? Me, I am a civilizationed fright-filled old woman—of great beauty I agree, but na gunses.”

  He showed her. “If anyone but me comes into the cabin, kill him.” He went back on deck, carrying another musket.

  The lorcha was in mid-channel now, under a soaring moon, ponderous and low in the water and making about four knots. They were still passing the suburbs of Canton, and both sides of the river were thickly lined with floating villages. From time to time they passed boats and sampans and junks beating upstream. The river here was half a mile wide, and there were boats of all sizes ahead and astern going downstream.

  The sky told Struan that the weather would be fair, but the tang on the wind felt smooth and dry and dewless, without body. He knew that this wind would lessen and further reduce their speed. But he was not worried; he had made the journey so many times that he knew the shoals and the rivers and tributaries and checkpoints intimately.

  The approach to Canton was a maze of waterways and islands, large and small, covering an area five miles by twenty miles. There were many different ways to come upstream. And to go downstream.

  Struan was happy to be afloat again. And happy that their journey to the Marble Pagoda had begun. He swayed easily to the motion of the lorcha. Wung was near the helmsman, and the crew was scattered around the deck, malevolent and sullen. Struan saw that the prow lookout was in place.

  Ahead, half a mile, the river forked around an island. At the approaches to the fork was a shoal to be avoided. Struan said nothing and waited. He heard Wung speak to the helmsman, who put his tiller over and swerved the lorcha safely away from the shoal. Good, Struan thought. At least Wung knew part of the waterways. He was anxious to see what route Wung would take around the island. Both routes were good but the north was better than the south. The lorcha held its course and headed into the north channel. Struan turned and shook his head and pointed to the south channel just in case Wung had arranged an ambush.

  The helmsman glanced at Wung for confirmation. Struan made only the slightest movement toward the helmsman. The helm was swung over quickly and the sails flapped momentarily and the lorcha came about onto the new course.

  “Wat for go that way, heya? Wat for hit my? Plenty bad. Plenty.” Wung moved over to the gunnel and glared into the night.

  The wind freshened slightly, and the lorcha increased speed as they moved into the south channel. At the limit of their tack, Struan motioned the helmsman to put his tiller over. The boat came about slowly, and then, on the new tack, the wind caught the flapping sails. The booms creaked across the deck and the boat lurched slightly and began to gain way once more.

  He ordered the sails trimmed and they sailed smoothly for half an hour, part of the river traffic. Then out of the corner of his eye Struan saw a big lorcha bearing down on them swiftly from the windward. Brock was standing
in the bow. Struan crouched and scurried over to the tiller and shoved the man aside. Wung and the helmsman were startled and began chattering excitedly, and all the crew watched Struan.

  He swung the tiller hard to starboard and prayed that the lorcha would answer the helm quickly. He heard Brock’s voice faintly—“Starboard yor helm, right smartly!”—and he felt the wind scud from his sails. Struan slammed the tiller over to jibe and reverse direction; but the lorcha did not respond, and Brock’s lorcha drew alongside. He saw the grappling hooks catch and hold fast. He leveled a musket.

  “Oh, it’s thee, Dirk, by God!” Brock called out, feigning astonishment. He was leaning on the gunnel, a broad smile on his face.

  “Grapples are an act of piracy, Brock!” Struan tossed his knife, haft first, to Wung. “Chop grapples quick-quick!”

  “Right you are, lad. Beg pardon for the grapples,” Brock said. “I thort you be lorcha in need of a tow. Doan see thy flag aloft. Thee be ashamed of it maybe?”

  Struan saw that Brock’s crew was armed and at action stations. Gorth was on the poop deck beside a small swivel gun, and although the gun was not pointing at him, he knew it would be primed and ready to fire. “Next time you grapple a ship of mine, I’ll presume you’re pirates and blow your head off.”

  “Permission to come aboard, Dirk?”

  “Aye.”

  Brock slipped through the rigging of his ship and leaped aboard. Three men jumped up on the gunnel to follow him, but Struan leveled the musket and shouted, “Hold there! Any of you come aboard without permission, I’ll blow you to hell.”

  The men stopped in their tracks.

  “Quite right,” Brock said sardonically. “That be the law of the sea. A captain invites who he likes and who he doan. Stay where thee be!”

  Struan shoved Wung forward. “Chop grapples!”

  The frightened Chinese rushed forward and began to hack the ropes. Gorth swung the swivel gun and Struan aimed at him.

  “Stand off, Gorth!” Brock said sharply.

  The law of the sea was on Struan’s side: grappling was an act of piracy. And coming aboard armed, without permission, was piracy, and of all the laws of England none were so zealously guarded or enforced as the laws of ships at sea and the powers of a captain afloat. For piracy there was only one punishment: hanging.