The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure (67 page)

Altogether things had gone better than expected, thought Airton. The general situation remained uncertain, but at least there was order, and even a degree of cheerfulness, in their little world.

Things had seemed black on the morning after the ‘Day of Catastrophe' as Fischer had described it, in his curiously pompous English. Airton had risen early and hurried through his rounds in the hospital. He had been relieved to see that the appendix patient was in good condition and he was pleased by Tom's fast recovery. Tom was already itching to be allowed out of bed and frantic with curiosity about the noise and commotion he had heard the day before. The doctor had taken the decision there and then to tell him the truth about everything that had happened. He was bound to find out sooner or later. He had even told Tom about Helen Frances, keeping none of the facts from him. Tom had taken it like a man. When he heard that Frank had been murdered he bowed his head. Otherwise he showed no sign of emotion. He listened with a stony face as the doctor described Helen Frances's affair with Manners, her pregnancy and her drug addiction. It did not seem to surprise him. He merely nodded at each unpleasant detail. There had been no way to sugar the pill so the doctor's own telling had been precise, even cold, and Tom had seemed to respond in the same vein. He only asked two questions after the doctor had finished.

‘And how is HF? Will she recover?'

The doctor had told him that it was too early to say. She was still undergoing treatment for withdrawal. She had suffered, but she was strong, and he saw no reason why she should not conquer her addiction, given time and care. She was still weak and he would not allow her to be disturbed. The baby was growing healthily inside her.

‘I'm pleased to hear it,' Tom said shortly. ‘She's lucky to be in the care of a good doctor.' Then came his second question, in a voice so calm it had almost scared Airton: ‘And the father? Manners? He is dead, you say?'

‘He was beaten to death, Tom.'

‘You know that for a fact?'

‘That's what Herr Fischer told us. He and Bowers saw it happen.'

‘Thank you, Doctor. I would like to rest now. I'll join you in the house in a while.'

‘Tom, I don't think you should move from the ward until you have…'

But something in the young man's expression caused the doctor quietly to withdraw. And, of course, Nellie had been angry when he told her that Tom was now in possession of all the facts. She had accused him of being a man with no common sense or sensibility, and he had surprised himself by rounding on her: ‘Hold your tongue, woman. Do you not yet understand the situation we are in? Tom, like all of us, must come to terms with this emergency, and he won't do so if we continue to mollycoddle him.' And he had ordered her to get on with her house chores while the men held a council. He had felt a glow of satisfaction when she had surrendered to him with ‘Well, you know best.' He could not remember when he had stood up to his wife in this way before. It was therefore with an unfamiliar sense of authority and resolve that he stepped into the dining room, where Fischer, Fielding and Bowers were finishing their breakfast, and, in as objective terms as he could, laid out the situation as he saw it.

‘Gentlemen,' he told them, ‘you all know what happened yesterday, and we are naturally alarmed, but there is even more that we don't know. Obviously there is something seriously amiss in the city of Shishan. Delamere's death proves that the Boxers are here and powerful enough for the Mandarin to want to gather all of us together for our protection. Yes, protection. That's what the officials who brought you here told us. As you pointed out to me last night, Fielding, I know the Mandarin and I have no reason to believe that he is not the friend to us that he has always been. I believe him when he says he wants to protect us. I also believe that the sensible course is not to do anything rash, like trying to escape from here, as some of us may have been thinking.'

At this point he looked at Fielding, who smiled and waved his pipe for him to continue.

‘How can we escape anyway? The railway line's closed to us and we don't have the wherewithal to set up a mule train. No, escape is impractical and not even desirable. We've all been in China for a long time and we've all had experience of these flare-ups. They blow over when authority reasserts control. In the meantime it's important for us to keep our heads.'

‘Excuse me, Doctor,' Fielding interrupted, his features still humorous, ‘in the circumstances that's a rather loaded phrase. It's keeping our heads that's of most concern to us all. Are we really just going to sit here and take what comes?'

‘No, Fielding, I'm not proposing that we do nothing. I intend to write a letter to the Mandarin, a memorial as it were, expressing not only our dismay at the events that have taken place but also our willingness to support him in this crisis, assuring him that he need expect nothing but cooperation from us. Believe me, gentlemen, the Mandarin, and only the Mandarin, has our interests at heart and he will be in a position to help us. This I firmly believe, as I believe that Providence will not forsake those who put their trust in her.'

‘You're going to write a letter?' Fielding smiled. ‘That's it?'

‘Well, Fielding, have you a better suggestion?'

‘It's not my mission,' said Fielding. ‘All I can say is, if I see a chance of getting out of here I'll take it, Mandarin or no Mandarin.'

They were startled to hear a sound from the door. Tom, leaning on a crutch, his arm in a sling, made his way painfully to a chair and sighed as he slumped into it. ‘Excuse me, gentlemen,' he said, ‘I heard most of what's just been said. I believe the doctor told us, Mr Fielding, that there is no way out of here at the moment. In the circumstances I agree with what he proposes.'

‘That we rely on a letter, and Providence?'

‘You're an ordained minister, Mr Fielding, you know more about Providence than I do—but the doctor was talking about finding ways to persuade the civil authorities to come in on our side. And, yes, perhaps a few prayers might help in getting them to do so—but I have some other suggestions, Doctor, with your permission.'

‘Yes, Tom?' said the doctor uncertainly.

‘A letter to the Mandarin is a wise move, as you suggest, and I agree with you that, at the end of the day, order will probably be restored. But it does no harm to prepare for the worst—and it may be that it will take some time for the Mandarin to settle his problems with the Boxers. He has Major Lin and trained troops who are loyal to him…'

‘The men who murdered Henry Manners,' said Fielding.

‘Yes,' said Tom, ‘but Manners was a man who made his own enemies. I don't know what personal quarrel may have existed between him and Major Lin. I know they had dealings, probably of a dubious kind. Some of us know what a man like Manners was capable of.'

‘Even so, Tom.'

‘All I'm saying is that there are no grounds to believe that Major Lin, whatever his shortcomings or personal enmities, will not remain loyal to the Mandarin—but even that in the short-term may not be enough for us. We must conceive of the possibility that the Boxers may attack us before civil order is restored.'

‘Go on,' said Fielding.

‘Well, I believe that if we're well prepared we should be able to hold them off. We've a good position on a hill. We have hunting rifles and ammunition. And plenty of stores. There's even a well in the garden for water.'

‘Yes, but … this is a mission, Tom. A hospital.'

‘It's a building, sir, and a building can be protected. It's brick, with a corrugated-iron roof so it's difficult to set afire. We can put bars over the windows and strengthen the doors. We can make firing-holes. Look, sir, I'm not saying anything like this will happen, but it does no harm to be prepared.'

‘So it's to be Fort Laramie, after all!' laughed Fielding. ‘What did I tell you?'

‘I think the idea is preposterous,' said Airton. ‘How can we turn our hospital into a fort? It's far too large.'

‘We may have to abandon the hospital,' said Tom quietly. ‘We can defend this house, however.'

‘No, a thousand times no,' said Airton. ‘I will never abandon my patients. And what will the women think, and the children, if they saw us preparing for a—for a war?'

‘They'll think that you were a good shepherd defending his flock in the best way he can,' said Nellie, who, unnoticed, had also come into the room. ‘And a brave man, my dear, as I've always known.'

‘I'm for it,' said Bowers, breaking his silence for the first time. Herr Fischer, still in the depths of remorse for Charlie, nodded also.

‘It may only be a precaution, sir,' said Tom. ‘I also believe that the Mandarin will come to our aid long before we need to pick up a gun. You still need to write that letter, sir.'

‘Guess it'll give us something to do to while away the time,' said Fielding. ‘I haven't barricaded a cabin since the last Apache uprising in 'eighty-six.'

‘Then you'll be able to instruct us on what to do, sir,' said Tom. ‘Doctor, will you not consider the idea?'

And, of course, the doctor had agreed—and now he did not regret the decision. The preparations, as Fielding had said, had provided occupation and done much for morale. He could not believe that there was any need for them but he was used already to the bars on the windows that strengthened the shutters. It made little difference to their lives. In summer they had to keep the shutters closed anyway. In the meanwhile he had worked hard on his letter to the Mandarin, consulting his dictionaries to produce the most exact words, and racking his memory of the classics to turn out the perfect phrase.

He was content that the hospital functioned nearly as normal. Sister Caterina had insisted on staying on in her room there so that she could be close to the patients. Elena's disappearance still troubled her but he had to admit that she was coping marvellously, bustling through the wards with her usual cheeriness. If she felt any alarm for her friend she did not show it in public, although she spent most of her free time now in the chapel, praying.

Of course, the patients had become aware of the tensions. Some had made excuses and discharged themselves before they should have done so, and there were no new patients or outpatients—but that was only to be expected. He had been disappointed when his major-domo, Zhang Erhao, had failed to turn up for duty, but again he did not blame the man. He would certainly not be one to cast the first stone. On the other hand the good spirits of the patients who had stayed—many were Christian converts—had cheered them all. He had never seen Ah Lee or Ah Sun cope with their heavy duties with more enthusiasm. ‘We are Christians and marching in the same army of Jesus,' Ah Lee had told him proudly, and he had clapped him on the back. The doctor was moved as much as he was amused. One of the droller episodes in the civil-defence preparations had been when Tom attempted to teach Ah Lee how to use a gun. After a while they had mutually decided that in Ah Lee's hands a kitchen chopper would be more effective.

It had taken the small community remarkably little time to adjust to their new conditions and to treat the firing-holes, the bales of grain packed against the doors and the barricades at every opening of the building as normal fixtures of the household.

There was a moment of sadness during the second afternoon when the doctor had conducted a simple burial service for Frank Delamere in the small plot in the garden where the Airtons had laid their own stillborn child shortly after their arrival in Shishan. A rough wooden cross now stood next to Teddie's carved stone. Everyone had attended, except the one person who mattered: Frank's daughter, Helen Frances, did not know yet that that her father was dead. She was still in too precarious a state to be told. The children threw a wreath of wild flowers on to the grave with her name on it, and at one point in the service the doctor saw Nellie looking up at Helen Frances's boarded window with tears running down her cheeks—but there was no help for it. These were terrible times.

They had done their best in the circumstances. That was his only comfort. Airton was sure that Frank would have liked something grander than this furtive gathering round a grave in the hot Manchurian sun. Frank would have considered his brief address pedestrian, and probably pompous to boot. He conceded that Tom's remarks had been much more moving because of their simplicity. Frank was an old rogue, Tom had said, and he would have been a difficult father-in-law, but no man had been more generous and Tom loved him, as his daughter did. Tom would miss him, as a friend. That was all, but it was enough to cause wet eyes all round. Well, Frank and Airton had had their differences but underneath his disapproval he had had a genuine liking for the man too and he would also miss him. His eyes misted. Perhaps when this emergency was over, and Helen Frances was herself again, they might think of a more suitable memorial. A service in the cathedral in Tientsin, perhaps, with choirs and Ave Marias and a sung Nunc Dimittis or whatever else the papists preferred. That would be for happier days. Happier times.

Now all he could do was work on his own memorial for the Mandarin and soon he had lost himself in the task. When it was finished to his satisfaction he folded the closely written sheets and carefully placed them in a red envelope. The only problem he faced now was how to get it to the
yamen,
but that could be resolved tomorrow. One of the patients could take it, perhaps, for a bribe. In the meanwhile he was looking forward to this evening's entertainment. As in old times, Nellie and Herr Fischer had promised a concert with piano and violin, after dinner.

*   *   *

Nellie had given a competent rendition of one of Chopin's nocturnes, and afterwards Herr Fischer had surprised them with an impassioned playing of Brahms' Concerto for Violin. There had been tears in his eyes as he moved his bow over the ‘Allegro non troppo,' Nellie struggling slightly to follow the score. All could feel the intensity of his feelings as he mourned his Charlie. The doctor had tears in his own eyes by the time it came to the ‘Adagio,' and he noticed that Bowers was sitting upright on the sofa, the cup of tea in his hands untouched. It had been something of a relief when the heartrending music was over, and Nellie and Fischer started on a rousing medley from
Carmen
to finish the evening. It was halfway through ‘The Smugglers' Dance' that they heard the drums. So lost were they in the music that, for a moment, it seemed to be an unlooked-for accompaniment to the gypsy strains, but Nellie and Fischer froze, and then they all froze as the alien noise from outside seemed to thunder inside the very room.