Breaking Bamboo (13 page)

He had a reputation for inelegant bluntness – a failing Guang shared.

‘Our stock of crossbow bolts is insufficient,’ said General Zheng Shun. ‘As for the other necessities for a siege, we gather them too slowly. If the Army of the Right Hand is driven back, we can expect the enemy on our doorstep within a few weeks.

We must redouble our efforts. The authority can only come from yourself.’

Guang was amazed at the general’s boldness. Wang Ting-bo listened patiently.

‘I agree,’ he said. ‘The requisition of supplies must take precedence.’

Yet he did not state how this would happen.

Then Zheng Shun’s cousin, Admiral Zheng Qi-Qi, broke in:

‘Your Excellency, our river fleet is sadly weakened by ill-repair and a shortage of supplies.’

Admiral Qi-Qi was a less daunting personage than his cousin. Whereas Zheng Shun was naturally irascible, a courteous smile played round the corners of Admiral Qi-Qi’s mouth. ‘Should the enemy fall upon us,’ he continued, ‘my boats will be the mouth through which the Twin Cities are fed.

I fear we will go hungry.’

Again Wang Ting-bo pursed his lips in agreement.

‘No one would deny the validity of your opinion,’ he said.

The Pacification Commissioner’s nephew, Prefect Wang Bai, spoke up: ‘Your Excellency, I can report happier news. Due to my great efforts, the city’s underground granaries could with-stand a siege of several years. It is true the peasants in the surrounding districts have been taxed hard to achieve this. I make no apologies. Whatever malicious tongues say, none of the impounded grain has been used to force up prices in the market. At least as far as I know.’

The Zheng cousins exchanged mocking glances.

‘I commend your diligent work,’ said Wang Ting-bo.

Then he noticed Guang and peered at him in surprise.

‘Have I not met you before?’ he asked, wonderingly. ‘Only then you were a doctor. Now you wear a Captain of Artillery’s uniform.’

Chen Song coughed apologetically.

‘Your Excellency,’ he said, bowing deeply. ‘Forgive me for speaking. May I humbly inform you, Captain Yun Guang here is the twin brother of the doctor who cured your son. No wonder you mistake one for the other!’

Still Wang Ting-bo gazed at Guang in amazement.

‘I have every reason to thank the good doctor,’ he said. ‘He did me a great service. Now my son is healthier than ever before. Are you the one they call Captain Xiao?’

Guang advanced and knelt before the great man, his mouth dry as salt. He could not think how to justify his presence.

Luckily, Chen Song spoke for him.

‘Your Excellency,’ he said. ‘I beg your permission to tell this exalted company how Yun Guang earned the title
Captain
Xiao
.’

He spoke eloquently, outlining his own mission and what he had learned concerning the Mongols’ dispositions. How he had chanced upon Guang in Chunming, after the latter gentleman had valiantly killed the despoilers of his ancestral tomb and liberated his father. It was a story deserving the utmost attention.

‘All this is true?’ asked Wang Ting-bo.

‘As I kneel here, sir,’ replied Chen Song, solemnly. ‘May I add, the heroic Yun Guang, though too modest to proclaim his own virtues, is a notable commander of artillery, a master of the latest weapons. By a lucky chance he has no commission at present.’

Chen Song subsided. His glance flickered round the circle of notables. Wang Bai was smiling thinly, as though appreciating a private joke.

‘Ah!’ said the Pacification Commissioner. ‘I shall send a memorandum concerning this to the Son of Heaven’s First Minister! Let the clerks take note that Captain Xiao shall also be awarded five thousand
cash
from public funds.’ He looked at Guang curiously. ‘There is something strange here. Your twin brother saves my heir when all other doctors despair. Now you appear, just when I lack a Commander of Artillery. How do you explain that?’

The Pacification Commissioner addressed Guang directly.

He sensed his whole future depended on his reply. The other officers were watching. Guang lifted his eyes so they boldly met Wang Ting-bo’s.

‘Your Excellency,’ he said. ‘Perhaps it was meant to be so. If the enemy besieges the Twin Cities we will need every weapon at our disposal – thunderclap bomb, whirling tiger catapult, fire lance and naphtha. Our traditional weapons will not suffice. We must construct tactics they cannot anticipate. If I were your Commander of Artillery, I would ensure our siege equipment outmatches their own. That way, they could not even approach the walls – except to perish.’

Wang Ting-bo stared at him thoughtfully.

‘First your brother saves my son,’ he said. ‘Now you promise to save the city. Can Heaven’s hand be in this?’

The Zheng cousins stirred. Admiral Qi-Qi laid a restraining hand on his cousin’s arm.

‘Your Excellency,’ broke in General Zheng Shun, his cheeks flushing. ‘Perhaps we should learn more about this valiant captain before he is promoted to Commander of Artillery.’

Wang Bai had been silent for some time. Now he spoke so courteously that General Zheng Shun seemed a coarse, dis-agreeable, unsubtle fellow in comparison.

‘I, for one, have heard Yun Guang’s name mentioned with honour,’ he said, ‘as a man of courage and filial piety. One might add that in rescuing his father he used our latest weapons to startling effect. So he clearly knows his trade.’

Wang Bai had everyone’s close attention, especially his uncle’s.

‘In addition,’ he said, ‘I fear that reinforcing our defences will involve hardship for many in the city – I refer to the confiscation of valuable property, forced labour, the levelling of homes. Yun Guang’s deeds seem to have gripped the people’s imagination. Very good. If
Captain Xiao
oversees this work, grumblers will find it harder to argue. Yet I agree with General Zheng Shun to this extent. . . any appointment should be temporary and I myself will direct all his actions.’

‘As an administrator you should not oversee military matters!’ burst in General Zheng Shun.

‘What do you say, Honoured Uncle?’ asked Wang Bai, ignoring the interruption.

‘I would beg His Excellency not to make a decision without further enquiries,’ urged Admiral Qi-Qi. His voice held little hope. He knew Wang Ting-bo all too well.

‘First, my son, now this,’ mused the Pacification Commissioner.

‘Let it be as both Wang Bai and Zheng Shun suggest. I hereby appoint Yun Guang as
temporary
Commander of Artillery. He shall receive half the normal salary until he proves competent.

With regard to strengthening the city’s defences, he shall report directly to my nephew, Prefect Wang Bai. Today’s audience is over.

Good day, gentlemen.’

One by one the assembled officers and high officials left the pavilion, the Zheng cousins and their supporters muttering angrily amongst themselves. Guang followed until he heard Wang Bai calling his name. He bowed deeply to his new benefactor.

‘You spoke for me, sir,’ he said, fiercely. ‘I shall never forget your faith in me.’

Wang Bai smiled.

‘One should not forget one’s debts,’ he said. ‘Remember also how the Zheng cousins opposed your promotion! Yun Guang, you must justify my faith in you. As soon as you are settled in your new quarters – I have rather a fine house in mind – inspect our defences carefully and report what might be improved.

Remember, I am your patron now.’

‘I will do as you say,’ said Guang, fervently.

Wang Bai examined him for a moment without speaking.

‘Outwardly you resemble your brother, but the inner is quite different,’ he said. ‘Only inferior minds look no further than appearances. Now I shall order an official to conduct you to your new residence. I think you will find it rather splendid.’

Love for Wang Ting-bo and his nephew filled the new Commander of Artillery. He noticed Chen Song hovering to one side and felt a brief guilt. Perhaps he should argue for his friend’s promotion. But Guang adopted a haughty expression and followed Wang Bai into the Pacification Commissioner’s private mansion. Chen Song was left alone in the garden where small birds twittered.

*

Guang spent the next two days in ceaseless activity, inspecting every inch of the ramparts, too busy to visit Apricot Corner Court. A team of clerks noted the potential location of catapults and giant crossbows, muster-points and arsenals for thunderclap bombs. It was an absorbing study. His new patron, Wang Bai, read the completed report in Guang’s presence.

‘Did you have any help in this work?’ he asked, suspiciously.

‘No, sir.’

‘You are energetic, unexpectedly so. I shall give you a list of properties we need to confiscate. Make sure you add it to your memorandum. And next time, submit your reports directly to me alone, rather than ordering your scribes to prepare a copy for the Pacification Commissioner.’ Wang Bai smiled thinly.

‘That way we can ensure there are no errors.’

Convinced he had made a good start, Guang rode his new horse to Dr Shih’s modest shop. As usual the attention he attracted was gratifying. People called out
Captain Xiao
as he passed. Mothers instructed their children to stare at him. For all his fine horse and uniform, Guang felt oddly alone as he trotted through the streets. He realised it was not Yun Guang from humble Wei Valley these people admired, but a giant they had created as an antidote to their fear. He felt these things but could not articulate them. Chen Song would have known how to express the thought. Yet Guang was ashamed that his conduct towards his friend had been ungrateful, and so avoided him.

He led his horse into Apricot Corner Court, a place he knew intimately from the winter he had spent there as his twin brother’s guest.

Widow Mu’s children and Old Hsu’s grandchildren ceased their game and stared in wonder at his painted armour and tasselled sword. Flies buzzed around the horse’s eyes and it snorted impatiently. A distant rumble of thunder echoed from the mountains west of Nancheng.

‘Hey, Little Melon,’ he called to a boy too thin for such a round name. He was bolder than the other children and crept curiously towards the horse. ‘Not afraid he might bite?’

‘I’m not afraid!’ came the shrill reply.

‘Ask your mother if you are allowed to earn a string of
cash
for tending my horse.’

Little Melon gasped.

‘A whole string!’

It was a week’s income for a poor family. The boy ran into Widow Mu’s dumpling shop and emerged with his mother, who at once bowed very low.

‘You are too noble to visit us, sir!’ said the widow, sweetly.

Old Hsu stuck his head through his workshop window and glowered at Guang’s armour and sword.

‘There would be no more war if men did not wage war!’ he called out. ‘No more murderers if men reformed their vicious ways!’

His head disappeared back into the house. Widow Mu waved her eldest daughter forward to present Guang with some dumplings wrapped in a banana leaf.

‘Take no notice of Old Hsu,’ she whispered, confidentially.

‘Since his son was conscripted he can’t abide the sight of a soldier.’

Guang had always considered the old man to be a madman or, at best, a buffoon. He was half tempted to report him to the Ward Constable for possessing unorthodox opinions. Even so, the exchange dampened his mood.

He was still eating his dumplings when he entered Shih’s shop by a side door. He found no sign of his brother or apprentice. Madam Cao sat on a low stool by the counter, drinking tea and examining a ledger of accounts. At the sight of him filling her doorway, she gasped with pleasure.

‘You have come at last!’ she said, bowing with exaggerated respect.

His sister-in-law’s elaborate courtesy contained a veiled reproach.

‘I could not visit earlier. I have been engaged on official business, following my promotion.’

‘So we have heard.’

Cao poured him a fresh cup of tea and offered her seat to him with another deep bow.

‘We never stood on ceremony before,’ he said, finding a stool lower than her own. ‘Let us not do so now.’

Her troubled expression cleared a little.

‘Well then I won’t, even if everyone is calling you Captain Xiao. Oh,
Captain Xiao
!’ She chuckled but stopped suddenly to check whether he was offended. Reassured, she continued: ‘I won’t pretend we didn’t weep with relief to see you return.

While you were away, Shih could hardly sleep for fear of the dangers you faced. Yet it seems everything you asked for in your letter has been granted.’

Guang sipped his tea and glanced at the closed door leading to the family apartments.

‘Father is within?’ he asked.

‘Why yes,’ said Cao, as though more might be said.

‘How is he?’

Her eyes widened.

‘Lord Yun keeps to his room and mutters. We have provided him with a basin of golden carp and they suffice for company.

Shih has discovered a strange thing. Honoured Father-in-law believes favourable demons are acting through the fish, that their circling of the bowl somehow protects him. Shih says curing such a malady is like unpicking a tangle of invisible threads.’

Guang sipped his tea morosely.

‘I tried my best,’ he said. ‘There was such danger in the Mongol lands, Cao! We were lucky. Or our ancestors helped us.’

Her eyes descended to his fine chest and shoulders.

‘You are what you are, Brother-in-law,’ she said. ‘You saved Lord Yun from one danger. Now Shih must protect him from another.’ She hesitated, adding: ‘I never met Honoured Father until you brought him here. I suspect that if the Mongols had not seized Three-Step-House, we would never have seen him at all.’

‘Misunderstandings,’ muttered Guang. ‘Foolish errors.

Father was always demanding. I mean, if he felt – rightly or wrongly – that he had not been shown filial respect. . .’

‘Is that why Shih was sent away?’ asked Cao, doubtfully.

‘Did Shih not show him sufficient respect? He was just a little boy when Lord Yun. . . Oh, I shall say no more! It all happened long ago. But I must tell you, Brother-in-law, my own father always found Shih a respectful apprentice.’