“That’s very nice of you, George. I would indeed. And I imagine Mary would be delighted. She’s never been on a frigate before.”
Perhaps tonight, Glessing told himself, there’ll be an opportunity to determine how Mary feels about me. “I’ll send a longboat for you. Would three bells—the last dogwatch—be all right?”
“Better make it eight bells,” Horatio said nonchalantly, just to show that he knew that three bells in this watch would be seven-thirty, but eight o’clock would be eight bells.
“Very well,” Glessing said. “Miss Sinclair will be the first lady I’ve entertained aboard.”
Good God, Horatio thought, could Glessing have more than a fleeting interest in Mary? Of course! The invitation was really for her, not me. What a nerve! Pompous ass! To think that Mary would even consider such a match. Or that I would allow her to marry yet!
A musket clattered to the stones and they glanced around. One of the marines had fainted and was lying on the beach.
“What the devil’s the matter with him?” Glessing said.
The master-at-arms turned the young marine over. “Don’t know, sorr. It’s Norden, sorr. He’s been acting strange like, for weeks. Perhaps he’s the fever.”
“Well, leave him where he is. Round up the sailors, marines to the boats! When everyone’s aboard, come back and fetch him.”
“Yes, sorr.” The master-at-arms picked up Norden’s musket and threw it to another marine and marched the men away.
When it was safe to move, Norden—who had only pretended to faint—slipped into the lee of some rocks and hid. Oh Lord Jesus, protect me till I can get to the Tai-Pan, he prayed desperately. I’ll never get an opportunity like this again. Protect me, oh Blessed Jesus and help me get to him afore they come back for me.
Brock was standing on the quarterdeck of his ship, his telescope trained on the flags. He had broken Struan’s code six months ago and understood the first message. Now, wot about ‘Zenith’? Wot do that mean? he asked himself. And wot be so important about Ottoman treaty that Struan’s’d risk telling about, open like, even in code, ’stead of in secret when they be aboard? Maybe they knowed I broke the code. Maybe they want me t’understand it and ‘Zenith’ means, private to them, the message be false. Crisis and war means price of tea and silk be going up. And cotton. Better buy heavily. If it be true. And perhaps put my head in Struan’s trap. Where the hell be Gray Witch? Not right for her to be beat. Damn that Gorth! He costed me a thousand guineas.
Gorth was his eldest son and the Gray Witch’s captain. A son to be proud of. As big as he, as rough, as strong, as fine a seaman as ever sailed the seas. Yes, a son to follow you an’ worthy to be Tai-Pan in a year or two. Brock said a silent prayer for Gorth’s safety, then damned him again for being second to Thunder Cloud.
He focused his telescope on the shore where Struan was meeting Robb, and wished that he could hear what they were saying.
“Excuse me, Mr. Brock.” Nagrek Thumb was captain of the White Witch, a large, thickset Manxman with huge hands and a face the color of pickled oak.
“Yes, Nagrek?”
“There’s a rumor going around the fleet. I don’t put much stock in it, but you never know. Rumor says that the navy’s getting powers to stop us smuggling opium. That we can be took like pirates.”
Brock scoffed. “That be a rare one.”
“I laughed too, Mr. Brock. Until I heard that the order’s to be give out at four bells. And until I heard that Struan said to Longstaff we should all have six days’ grace to sell what stocks we have.”
“Be you sure?” Brock hardly had time to absorb the jolting news when he was distracted by a bustling on the gangway. Eliza Brock strode ponderously onto the deck. She was a big woman with thick arms and the power of a man; her iron-gray hair was worn in a loose bun. With her were their two daughters, Elizabeth and Tess.
“Morning, Mr. Brock,” Liza said, setting her feet squarely on the deck, her arms crossed over the hugeness of her bosom. “’Tis a nice day, by gum!”
“Where you beed, luv? Morning, Tess. Hello, Lillibet luv,” Brock said, his adoration of his daughters overwhelming him.
Elizabeth Brock was six and brown-haired. She ran over to Brock and curtsied and almost fell down, then jumped into his arms and hugged him, and he laughed.
“We were over t’ Mrs. Blair,” Liza said. “She be proper poorly.”
“Will she lose the baby?”
“No, the Lord willing,” Liza said. “Morning, Nagrek.”
“Morning, ma’am,” Thumb said, taking his eyes off Tess who was standing at the gunnel looking toward the island. Tess Brock was sixteen, tall and curved, her waist fashionably narrow. Her features were sharp and she was not pretty. But her face was strong and the life in it made her attractive. And very desirable.
“I’ll get some grub.” Liza made a note of the way Nagrek had looked at Tess. It’s time she were wed, she thought. But not to Nagrek Thumb, by God. “Come below, Tess. Get on with you, Lillibet,” she said as Elizabeth held out her arms to be carried.
“Please, please, please, Mumma. Please, please.”
“Use thy own legs, girl.” Even so, Liza swept her into her huge embrace and carried her below. Tess followed, and smiled at her father and self-consciously nodded to Nagrek.
“Are thee sure about Struan and Longstaff?” Brock asked again.
“Yes.” Nagrek turned to Brock, forcing his heated mind off the girl. “A golden guinea in a man’s hand makes his ears long. I’ve a bullyboy in the flagship.”
“Struan baint never agreeing to that. He couldn’t. It’d wreck him with the rest of us.”
“Well, it were said right enough. This morning.”
“Wot else were said, Nagrek?”
“That’s all the bullyboy heard.”
“Then it be trickery—more of his sodding devilment.”
“Yes. But what?”
Brock began churning possibilities. “Send word to the lorchas. Get every case of opium up the coast. Meantime send a purse with twenty guineas to our bullyboy aboard China Cloud. Tell him there’s twenty more if he finds out wot be aback of it. Be careful, now. We baint wantin’ to lose him.”
“If Struan ever catched him he’d send us his tongue.”
“Along with his head. Fifty guineas says Struan’s got a man aboard us’n.”
“A hundred says you’re wrong,” Thumb said. “Every man aboard’s a trusty!”
“Better I never catched him alive afore thee, Nagrek.”
“But why should he fly ‘Zenith’?” Robb was saying. “Of course we’d come aboard at once.”
“I dinna ken,” Struan said. Zenith meant “Owner to come aboard—urgent.” He frowned at Thunder Cloud. Bosun McKay was out of earshot down the beach, waiting patiently.
“You go aboard, Robb. Give Isaac my compliments and tell him to come ashore at once. Bring him to the valley.”
“Why?”
“Too many ears aboard. It might be very important.” Then he called out, “Bosun McKay!”
“Aye, aye, sorr.” McKay hurried up to him.
“Take Mr. Struan to Thunder Cloud. Then go over to my ship. Get a tent and a bed and my things. I’ll be staying ashore tonight.”
“Aye, aye, sorr! Beggin’ your pardon, sorr,” Bosun McKay said awkwardly. “There’s a young lad. Ramsey. In H.M.S. Mermaid, Glessing’s ship. The Ramseys’re kin to the McKays. The first mate’s got it in for the poor lad. Thirty lashes yesterday and more t’morrer. He were press-ganged out o’ Glasgow.”
“So?” Struan asked impatiently.
“I heard, sorr,” the bosun said carefully, “he’d like a berth somewheres.”
“God’s blood, are you simple in the head? We take no deserters aboard our ships. If we take one knowingly, we could lose our ship—and rightly!”
“S’truth! I thought you might buy him out,” McKay said quickly, “seeing as how Capt’n Glessing’s a friend o’ yorn. My prize money’ll g
o to help, sorr. He’s a gud lad and he’ll jump ship if he’s nothing ahead.”
“I’ll think about it.”
“Thank you, sorr.” The bosun touched his forelock and scuttled away. “Robb, if you were Tai-Pan, what would you do?”
“Pressed men are always dangerous and never to be trusted,” Robb said instantly. “So I’d never buy him out. And now I’d watch McKay. Perhaps McKay’s now Brock’s man and put up to it. I’d put McKay to the test. I’d get intermediaries—probably McKay as part of the test, and also an enemy of McKay’s—and string Ramsey along and never trust his information.”
“You’ve told me what I’d do,” Struan said with a glint of humor. “I asked what you’d do.”
“I’m not Tai-Pan, so it’s not my problem. If I was, I probably wouldn’t tell you anyway. Or I might tell you and then do the opposite. To test you.” Robb was glad that he could hate his brother from time to time. That made liking him so much greater.
“Why’re you afraid, Robb?”
“I’ll tell you in a year.” Robb walked after the bosun.
For a time Struan mused about his brother and the future of The Noble House; then he picked up a bottle of brandy and began to walk along the cleft of rocks toward the valley.
The ranks of the merchants were thinning and some were already leaving in their longboats. Others were still eating and drinking, and there were gusts of laughter at some who were dancing a drunken eightsome reel.
“Sir!”
Struan stopped and stared at the young marine. “Aye?”
“I need your help, sir. Desperate,” Norden said, his eyes strange, his face gray.
“What help?” Struan was grimly conscious of the marine’s side arm, a bayonet.
“I’ve the pox—woman sickness. You can help. Give me the cure, sir. Anything, I’ll do anything.”
“I’m no doctor, lad,” Struan said, the hairs on his neck rising. “Should you na be at your boat?”
“You’ve had the same, sir. But you had the cure. All I wants is the cure. I’ll do anything.” Norden’s voice was a croak, and his lips were flecked with foam.
“I’ve never had it, lad.” Struan noticed the master-at-arms starting toward them, calling out something that sounded like a name.
“You’d better get to your boat, lad. They’re waiting for you.”
“The cure. Tell me how. I’ve me savings, sir.” Norden pulled out a filthy, knotted rag and offered it proudly, sweat streaking his face. “I’m thrifty and there be—there be five whole shillin’ an’ fourpence, sir, and it be all I have in the world, sir, and then there’s me pay, twenty shillin’ a month you can have. You can have it all, sir, I swear by the blessed Lord Jesus, sir!”
“I’ve never had the woman sickness, lad. Never,” Struan said again, his heart grinding at the memory of his childhood when wealth was pennies and shillings and half shillings and not bullion in tens of thousands of taels. And living again the never-to-be-forgotten horror of all his youth—of no-money and no-hope and no-food and no-warmth and no-roof and the bloated heaving stomachs of the children. Good sweet, Jesus, I can forget my own hunger, but never the children, never their cries on a starving wind in a cesspool of a street.
“I’ll do anything, anything, sir. Here. I can pay. I don’t want nuffink for nuffink. Here, sir.”
The master-at-arms was striding up the beach. “Norden!” he shouted angrily. “You’ll get fifty lashes for breaking ranks, by God!”
“Is your name Norden?”
“Yes, sir. Bert Norden. Please. I only want the cure. Help me, sir. Here. Take the money. It’s all yorn and there’ll be more. In Jesus Christ’s name, help me!”
“Norden!” the master-at-arms shouted from a hundred yards away, red with rage. “God’s blood, come here, you godrotting bastard!”
“Please, sir,” Norden said with growing desperation. “I heard you got cured by the heathen. You bought the cure from the heathen!”
“Then you heard a lie. There’s no Chinese cure that I know of. No cure. None. You’d better get back to your boat.”
“Course there’s a cure!” Norden shrieked. He jerked out his bayonet. “You tell me where to get it or I’ll cut your sodding gizzard open!”
The master-at-arms broke into a horrified run. “Norden!”
A few on the beach turned around, startled: Cooper and Horatio and another. They began to run toward them.
Then Norden’s brain snapped, and gibbering and foaming, he hurled himself at Struan and slashed at him viciously, but Struan sidestepped and waited without fear, knowing that he could kill Norden at will.
It seemed to Norden that he was surrounded by devil-giants all with the same face, but he could never touch one of them. He felt the air explode from his lungs and the beach smash into his face, and he seemed to be suspended in painless agony. Then there was blackness.
The master-at-arms rolled off Norden’s back and hacked down with his fist again. He grabbed Norden and shook him like a rag doll and threw him down again. “What the devil happened to him?” he said, getting up, his face mottled with rage. “You all right, Mr. Struan?”
“Yes.”
Cooper and Horatio and some of the merchants hurried up. “What’s the matter?”
Struan carefully turned Norden over with his foot. “The poor fool’s got woman sickness.”
“Christ!” the master-at-arms said, nauseated.
“Better get away from him, Tai-Pan,” Cooper said. “If you breathe his flux you could catch it.”
“The poor fool thought I’d had the disease and got cured. By the Cross, if I knew the cure for that I’d be the richest man on the earth.”
“I’ll have the bugger put in irons, Mr. Struan,” the master-at-arms said. “Cap’n Glessing’ll make him wisht he never been born.”
“Just get a spade,” Struan said. “He’s dead.”
Cooper broke the silence. “First day, first blood. Bad joss.”
“Not according to Chinese custom,” Horatio said absently, sickened. “Now his ghost will watch over this place.”
“Good omen or bad,” Struan said, “the poor lad’s dead.”
No one answered him.
“The Lord have mercy on his soul,” Struan said. Then he turned west along the foreshore toward the crest that came down from the mountain ridge and almost touched the sea. He was full of foreboding as he drank in the good clean air and smelled the tang of the spray. That’s bad joss, he told himself. Very bad.
As he neared the crest, his premonition intensified, and when at last he stood in the floor of the valley where he had decided the town would be built, he felt for the third time a vastness of hate surround him.
“Good sweet Christ,” he said aloud. “What’s the matter with me?” He had never known such terror before. Trying to hold it in check, he squinted up at the knoll where the Great House would be, and, abruptly, he realized why the island was hostile. He laughed aloud.
“If I were you, Island, I’d hate me too. You hate the plan! Well, I tell you, Island, the plan’s good, by God. Good, you hear? China needs the world and the world needs China. And you’re the key to unlock the gates of China, and you know it and I know it, and that’s what I’m going to do, and you’re going to help!”
Stop it, he said to himself. You’re acting like a madman. Aye, and they’d all think you mad if you told them that your secret purpose was not just to get rich on trade and to leave. But to use riches and power to open up China to the world and particularly to British culture and British law so that each could learn from the other and grow to the benefit of both. Aye. It’s a dream of a madman.
But he was certain that China had something special to offer the world. What it was, he did not know. One day perhaps he would find out.
“And we’ve something special to offer as well,” Struan continued aloud, “if you’ll take it. And if it’s na defiled in the giving. You’re British soil for better or worse. We’ll cherish you and make
you the center of Asia—which is the world. I commit The Noble House to the plan. If you turn your back on us you’ll be what you are now—a nothing barren flyspeck of a stinking barren rock—and you’ll die. And last, if The Noble House ever turns its back on you—destroy it with my blessing.”
He hiked up the knoll and, unsheathing his dirk, cut two long branches. He cleaved one and thrust it into the ground and with the other formed a crude cross. He doused the cross with brandy and lit it.
Those in the fleet who could see into the valley, and who noticed the smoke and the flame, found their telescopes and saw the burning cross and the Tai-Pan beside it, and they shuddered to themselves superstitiously and wondered what devilment he was up to. The Scots knew that the burning of a cross was a summons to the clan, and to all the kinsmen of all kindred clans: a summons to rally to the cross for battle.
And the burning cross was raised only by the chief of the clan. By ancient law, once raised, the burning cross committed the clan to defend the land unto the end of the clan.
CHAPTER TWO
“Welcome aboard, Robb,” Captain Isaac Perry said. “Tea?”
“Thank you, Isaac.” Robb sat back gratefully in the deep leather sea chair, smelling its tangy perfume, and waited. No one could hurry Perry, not even the Tai-Pan.
Perry poured the tea into porcelain cups.
He was thin but incredibly strong. His hair was the color of old hemp, brown with threads of silver and black. His beard was grizzled and his face scarred, and he smelled of tarred hemp and salt spray.
“Good voyage?” Robb asked.
“Excellent.”
Robb was happy as always to be in the main cabin. It was large and luxurious like all the quarters. The fittings throughout the ship were brass and copper and mahogany, and the sails the finest canvas and the ropes always new. Cannon perfect. Best powder. It was the Tai-Pan’s policy throughout his fleet to give his officers—and men—the finest quarters and the best food and a share of the profits, and there was always a doctor aboard. And flogging was outlawed. There was only one punishment for cowardice or disobedience, officer or seaman: to be put ashore at the first port and never given a second chance. So seamen and officers fought to be part of the fleet and there was never a berth empty.