“Well, Moorcock, it’s about Bastable’s manuscript. A lot of people—mainly in publishing, of course, but quite a few of them are members of the club—well, they think you’ve been duped by the chap who told you that story.”
“Duped?” I raised my eyebrows.
He looked miserably at the carpet. “Or worse,” he murmured.
“I think you’d better tell me what they’re saying.” I frowned. “I’m sure you mean well and I assure you that I’ll take anything you have to say in good part. I’ve known you too long to be offended.”
He was plainly relieved and came and sat down in the next chair. “Well,” he began, “most people think that you’re the victim of a hoax. But a few are beginning to believe that you’ve turned a bit—a bit eccentric. Like those chaps who predict the end of the world all the time, or communicate with the astral plane, and so on. You know what I mean, I suppose.”
My answering smile must have seemed to him a bit grim. “I know exactly what you mean. I had even considered it. It must seem a very rum go to someone who never met Bastable. Now you mention it, I’m not surprised if I’m the gossip of half London. Why shouldn’t people think such things about me? I’d be tempted to think them myself about you if you came to me with a story like Bastable’s. As it is, you’ve been extremely tolerant of me!”
His smile was weak as he tried to acknowledge my joke. I went on:
“So they think I’m a candidate for Colney Hatch, do they? Well, of course, I’ve absolutely no proof to the contrary. If only I could produce Bastable himself. Then people could make up their own minds about the business.”
“It has become something of an obsession,” suggested my friend gently. “Perhaps it would be better to drop the whole thing?”
“You’re right—it is an obsession. I happen to believe that Bastable was telling the truth.”
“That’s as may be...”
“You mean I should stop my efforts to get the account into print.”
There was a hint of sorrow in his eyes. “There isn’t a publisher in London, old man, who would touch it now. They have their reputations to think of. Anyone who took it would be a laughingstock. That’s why you’ve had so much trouble in placing it. Drop it, Moorcock, for your sake and everyone else’s.”
“You could be right.” I sighed. “Yet, if I could come up with some sort of proof, possibly then they would stop laughing.”
“How could you find the proof which would convince them?”
“I could go and look for Bastable in China and tell him the trouble he’s caused me. I could hope that he would come back to London with me—talk to people himself. I could put the matter into his hands and let him deal with his own manuscript. What would you say to that?”
He shrugged and made a gesture with his right hand. “I agree it would be better than nothing.”
“But your own opinion is that I should forget all about it. You think I should burn the manuscript and have done with it, once and for all?”
“That’s my opinion, yes. For your own sake, Moorcock— and your family’s. You’re wasting so much of your time—not to mention your capital.”
“I know that you have my interests at heart,” I told him, “but I made a promise to Bastable (although he never heard me make it) and I intend to keep it, if I can. However, I’m glad that you spoke to me. It took courage to do that and I appreciate that it was done with the best of intentions. I’ll think the whole thing over, at any rate.”
“Yes,” he said eagerly, “do think it over. No point in fighting a losing battle, eh? You took this very decently, Moorcock. I was afraid you’d chuck me out on my ear. You had every right to do so.”
Again I laughed. “I’m not that much of a lunatic, as you can see. I haven’t lost all my common sense. But doubtless anyone with common sense would listen to me and become convinced that I was a lunatic! Whether, however, I have enough common sense to put the whole obsession behind me is quite another matter!”
He got up. “Let’s stop talking about it. Can I buy you a drink?”
For the moment it was obviously politic to accept his offer so that he should not think I had, after all, taken offense. “I’d be glad of one,” I said. “I hope the other members aren’t afraid that I’m about to run riot with a meat-axe or something!”
As we left the library he clapped me on the shoulder, speaking with some relief. “I don’t think so. Though there was some talk of chaining down the soda siphon a week or two ago.”
I only went back to the club once more during that period and it was noticeable how much better the atmosphere had become. I determined, there and then, to give up all immediate attempts to get Bastable’s story published and I began to make concrete plans for a trip to China.
And so, one bright autumn morning, I arrived at the offices of the Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company and booked the earliest possible passage on a ship called the Mother Gangá, which, I gathered, was not the proudest ship of that particular line, but would be the first to call at Weihaiwei, a city lying on the coast of that part of Shantung leased to Britain in 1898. I thought it only sense to begin my journey in relatively friendly country where I could seek detailed advice and help before pressing on into the interior.
Mother Gangá took her time. She was an old ship and she had evidently come to the conclusion that nothing in the world was urgent enough to require her to hurry. She called at every possible port to unload one cargo and to load another, for she was not primarily a passenger ship at all. It was easy to see why she rid herself of some of her cargoes (which seemed completely worthless), but hard to understand why the traders in those small, obscure ports should be prepared to exchange something of relative value for them!
I was prepared for the slowness of the journey, however, and spent much of my time working out the details of my plans and poring over my original shorthand notes to see if Bastable had told me anything more which might offer a clue to his whereabouts. I found little, but by the time I disembarked I was fit (thanks to my habit of taking plenty of exercise every day on board) and rested and ready for the discomforts which must surely lie ahead of me.
The discomfort I had expected, but what I had not anticipated was the extraordinary beauty and variety of even this relatively insignificant part of China. It struck me as I went up on deck to supervise the unloading of my trunks and I believe I must have gasped.
A huge pale blue sky hung over a city which was predominantly white and red and gold—a collection of ancient Chinese pagodas and archways mixed with more recent European building. Even these later buildings had a certain magic to them in that light, for they had been built of local stone and much of the stone contained fragments of quartz which glittered when the sun struck them. The European buildings were prominent on the waterfront where many trading companies had built their offices and warehouses and the flags of a score of different Western nations fluttered on masts extended into the streets, while the names of the various companies were emblazoned in their native alphabets and often translated into the beautiful Chinese characters, in black, silver or scarlet.
Chinese officials in flowing robes moved with considerable difficulty through throngs of sweating, near-naked coolies, British and Chinese policemen, soldiers and white-suited Europeans, sailors from a dozen different countries—all mingled casually and with few outward signs of discomfort in what seemed to me, the newcomer, like some huge, dream-like rugger scrum.
A young Chinese boy in a pigtail took me in charge as I left the ship and shepherded me through the throng, finding me a rickshaw and piling me and my luggage aboard until the wickerwork groaned. I put what I hoped was an adequate tip into his outstretched hand and he seemed delighted, for he grinned and bowed many times, uttering the words “God bless, God bless” over and over again before he told the celestial between the rickshaw’s shafts that I wanted to go to the Hotel Grasmere, recommended by P. & O. as about the best British hotel in Weihaiwei.
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With a lurch the rickshaw set off, and it was with some astonishment that I realized a moment or two later that I was being pulled by a slip of a girl who could not have been much older than sixteen. She made good speed through the crowded, narrow streets of the city and had deposited me outside the Grasmere within twenty minutes.
Again my donation was received with near ecstasy, and it occurred to me that I was probably being over-generous, that a little money would go a very long way for the average Chinese living in Shantung!
The hotel was better than I had expected, with excellent service and pretty modern facilities. The rooms were pleasant and comfortable overlooking an exotic Chinese garden full of small, delicate sculptures, huge, richly coloured blooms and foliage of a score of different shades of green so that the whole thing looked like a jungle fancifully painted by some symbolist aesthete. The scents of the flowers, particularly during the morning and the evening, were overpowering. Electric fans (drawing their energy from the hotel’s own up-to-date generator) cooled the rooms, and there were screens at the windows to keep the largest of the insects at bay. I rather regretted I would only be staying a short time in the hotel.
The morning after my arrival, I paid a visit on the British Consul, a youngish chap connected, I gathered, to one of our best families. A little on the languid, foppish side, he gave the impression of being infinitely bored with China and all things Chinese, but his advice seemed sound and he put me in touch with a local man who made regular trading visits into the hinterland of the province and who agreed, for a sum of money, to escort me all the way to the Valley of the Morning.
This chap was a tall, slightly stooped Chinese of early middle age, who carried himself with the utmost dignity and, while wearing plain cotton garments of the simplest sort, managed to convey the feeling (in me, at least) that he had not always been a mere merchant. I could not help but be reminded of the aristocratic merchant-adventurers of earlier European times and, indeed, it was soon revealed to me that Mr. Lu Kan-fon betrayed a singularly fine command of English and French, knew German and Spanish pretty well and could communicate adequately in Dutch. I also gathered that he had a good knowledge of Japanese. Moreover, he had read a great deal in all of these languages, and, English aside, had a far better familiarity with the literature of those countries than had I. He had been educated, he said, by a European missionary who had taught him much of what he now knew, but I found the explanation inadequate, though I was too polite, of course, to tax him on it. I suspected him of being either a dishonoured aristocrat (perhaps from Peking) or the younger son of an impoverished family. The court intrigues of the Manchus and their followers were notorious and it was quite probable that he had, at some time, played a game of politics in Peking which he had lost. However, it was none of my business if he wished to disguise his past or his origins, and I was relieved for my part to know that I would be traveling in the company of a cultured companion whose English was almost as fluent as my own (I had privately dreaded the difficulties of communicating with a guide in the wilds of China, for my knowledge of Mandarin and Cantonese has never been particularly good).
Mr. Lu told me that his little caravan would not be leaving Weihaiwei for several days, so, accordingly, I spent the rest of the week in the city and did not waste it (as I saw it!) but assiduously enquired of anyone named Bastable, or answering Bastable’s description, who might have been there. I received no information of any obvious value, but at least felt content that I had not made the ironic mistake of going off to look for a man who could, by the laws of coincidence, be found living in the next room to mine in the hotel!
At the end of the week I took a rickshaw to Mr. Lu’s large and rambling emporium near the centre of the Old Town, bringing with me the bare necessities I would need on the long journey. The rest of the party had already assembled by the time I arrived. They awaited me in a spacious stableyard which reminded me somewhat of a medieval English inn yard. Riding horses and pack animals were being loaded and harnessed, their hoofs churning the ground to mud. Chinese, dressed in stout traveling-garments of heavy cotton, wool and leather, shouted to one another as they worked, and I noted that there was not a man, save for Lu Kan-fon himself, who did not have a serviceable modern rifle over his shoulders and at least one bandolier of cartridges strapped about him.
Lu saw me and came over to instruct his servants in the distribution of my luggage on the pack horses, apologizing for the confusion and the condition of the horse I was to ride (it was a perfectly good beast). I indicated the arms which his men bore.
“I see that you are expecting trouble, Mr. Lu.”
He shrugged slightly. “One has to expect trouble in these times, Mr. Moorcock. Those guns, however, should ensure that we see little of it!”
I was relieved that the horsemen were to ride with us. Outside the city I might well have mistaken them for the very bandits we feared. I reflected that if we were to meet any bandits who looked half as fierce as our own men, I would be more than a little perturbed!
At last we set off, Mr. Lu at the head of the caravan. Through the crowded, bustling streets we rode, moving very slowly, for there seemed to be no established right of way—one took one’s chances. I was expecting that we would head for the gates of the Old City, but instead we turned towards the more modern sections of the city and eventually arrived at the railway station (which might have been transported stone by stone from London, save for the Chinese words decorating it) and I found that we were riding directly through an archway and on to one of the main platforms where a train was waiting.
Mr. Lu plainly enjoyed my surprise, for he smiled quietly and said: “This first lap will be by train—but in case the train should meet obstacles, we take our horses with us. You call it insurance?”
I smiled back. “I suppose we do.”
Horses and riders went directly into waiting goods trucks. I learned from Mr. Lu that our entourage would travel with their animals, while we walked a little further along the train to where a first-class compartment had been prepared for us (Mr. Lu seemed to have considerable influence with the railway company and I gathered that he traveled this route fairly frequently).
We settled into a carriage which would have put most British carriages to shame and were immediately served with tea and light refreshments.
It was then that Mr. Lu, taking mild and humorous pleasure in mystifying me slightly, revealed the destination of the train.
“With luck, we should get as far as Nanking,” he told me. “Under ordinary circumstances the journey would not take us more than three days, but we must be prepared for some delays.”
“What would be the cause of such delays?” I sipped the delicious tea.
“Oh, there are many causes.” He shrugged. “Bandits blow up the lines. Peasants use the sleepers and the sections of rail for their own purposes. Then again there is the general incompetence of the company employees—and that’s probably the greatest problem of them all!”
This incompetence was demonstrated very quickly. Our train was due to leave at noon, but in fact did not leave the station until just after four. However, any impatience I might have felt was soon dissipated by the sights of the interior which greeted me after the city was behind us. Immense stretches of flat paddy-fields, interrupted by the occasional low hill around which a village was invariably built, shimmered in the soft light of the Chinese sun. Here was revealed the real, immutable wealth of China— her rice. The value of silver might fluctuate; industries would fail or prosper at the whim of the rest of the world; cities and states could rise and fall; conquerors would come and go, but China’s rice and China’s hardy peasantry were eternal. That, at any rate, is how it seemed to me then. I had never seen farming of any kind of such a scale as this. For miles and miles in all directions the fields stretched, predominantly green or yellow, intersected with low earthen dykes and somewhat broader ribbons of silver which were the irrigation canals, and above all this was the wide,
hazy blue sky in which hung a few wisps of pale, lonely cloud.
The train chugged on, and while the landscape changed hardly at all it did not become boring. There was always something to see—a little group of scantily dressed peasants in their wide-brimmed straw hats and their pigtails, waving cheerfully to the train (I always waved back!)—a sampan making its way slowly up a canal—an ancient bridge which looked like a perfect work of art to me and yet which was plainly just a bridge built for an ordinary road between one tiny township and another. Sometimes, too, I saw pagodas, small walled cities (some virtually in ruins) with those highly ornate many-tiered gates typical of Chinese architecture, houses decorated with red and green tiles, with ceramic statuary, with bronzework and with mirror glass which made some of them seem as if they burned with a strange silver fire. When the train came, as it frequently did, to a sudden jerking stop, I had plenty of opportunities to study these sights in detail. It was on the third day, when we had made something over half of our journey to Nanking, that I began to notice significant changes in the demeanour of the people in the towns and villages we passed. The peasants rarely waved to the trains and were inclined to look upon us with a certain amount of apprehension and even downright suspicion. Moreover, it soon became obvious that there were a great many people about who were not local to the areas. I saw several detachments of cavalry on the roads we passed, and once thought I saw an infantry division moving through the paddy-fields. Elsewhere there was evidence of, at very least, some sort of martial law in operation—more than once I saw peasants being stopped, questioned and searched by men in uniforms of a variety of descriptions. There was no question in my mind that this part of China was being disputed over, probably by at least three factions, amongst them the central authority. I had heard tales of the petty warlords who had sprung up in the last few years, claiming all sorts of honours, titles and rights— each one claimed to represent the forces of law and order, none would admit to being little more than a rapacious bandit—now it looked as if I was witnessing the truth of the tales for myself. The long journey to Nanking passed without incident, however, and we disembarked from the train with some relief.