Gunpowder Alchemy (13 page)

I was given two instructions upon disembarking in Shanghai. The first was to stay close.

“And don't trust anyone,” Chang-wei warned.

The perils must have been real. He actually held a hand to the small of my back as we moved through the market area near the docks.

“We must go to the administrative yamen,” Chang-wei said. “They'll help me relay my message to Peking.”

The streets of Shanghai swallowed us, and I was shoved against Chang-wei by the swell of the crowd. From the sheer number of shops and teahouses, Shanghai had to be unaccountably wealthy. Anything could be bought here among these lanes. The market vendors spied the insignia on Chang-wei's uniform and immediately pressed close, holding out various trinkets.

Though I had heard the city was overrun with foreigners, I found myself surrounded by my own countrymen, through their style of dress was markedly different from Hunan province or even what I recalled from Peking. The colors were blinding, the designs ornate and the fabrics combined in a way I had never imagined: silk beneath leather, brocades and fastenings and buttons that looked like a puzzle in and of themselves.

A man crossed our path wearing a sash of imperial yellow, though it was obvious he was no more than a merchant. I looked to Chang-wei, but he registered neither surprise nor outrage even though the color was supposed to be worn only by those closest to the Emperor. This truly was a lawless place.

Chang-wei found the administrative compound and installed me just inside the gates after a quick word with the sentry stationed there. The building had the look of a fortress with so many armed guards patrolling the gates.

Whatever official business Chang-wei had to attend to took much longer than I expected. There was a long line of petitioners waiting to see the magistrate when we arrived. The line dwindled down by half, but Chang-wei still had not returned.

When he finally did reappear, I could see by his frown that something was wrong. Worry lines cut deep into his forehead, and he pulled me into the far corner of the courtyard before speaking.

“Rebels,” he said in a low voice as if the word itself were a curse.

This was nothing new to me. “There are always reports of rebels and bandits on the road.”

“This is something different. Something worse.”

“Where?”

Chang-wei ran a hand roughly over his face, and I knew the answer then. My pulse jumped.

“Is Linhua village safe? Mother? What about Tian?”

“We don't know. Nothing is certain.”

“What's happened? How many rebels could there possibly be?”

I knew I was demanding answers he couldn't possibly have, but I was not going to back down. I would walk the entire way home if I had to.

“Miss Jin, you can't go to your village. The rebels have taken over entire cities in the southern region of Hunan province. The reports say they've gathered an army.”

“I can't just remain here and do nothing. I told Nan I would only be away for two days,” I protested helplessly. How many days had it been now? Almost a month.

My eyes stung with tears, and I knew I wasn't making any sense. I didn't fear rebellion. I feared not knowing whether my family was dead or alive.

“We'll go to Peking first,” Chang-wei reasoned. “I've sent a copy of Yang Hanzhu's notes to the Ministry, and the crown prince will be more than grateful for your contribution. You'll be protected in the capital while the Emperor raises an army to defeat the rebels. Once he has regained control of the south, we'll send out messengers to find your family.”

I shook my head even before he finished. “My family needs me now. Our village could still be untouched.”

Chang-wei's jaw hardened stubbornly, but I could be stubborn, too.

I wasn't going to hide in the capital while Mother and Tian were in danger. No one in Peking cared about people like us.

“If I lose them now, I may never find them.” When we'd been forced to flee the capital eight years ago, there was so much fear and confusion. You went where you were told, hoping that fate would be kind.

“I can't let you go alone.”

“There must be someone going south. A merchant caravan.”

“No one is going blindly into rebel territory, Soling.” In his agitation, Chang-wei abandoned polite address completely. He rubbed a hand over the back of his neck. “I can find out if the governor of Shanghai will raise a militia to provide support.”

“I don't want to be dragged into the middle of a war. I just want to find my family.”

I broke away from Chang-wei. I didn't want him to see me so shaken. For the last years, I had been making decisions for all of us, but I didn't know what to do anymore.

“Miss Jin.”

Chang-wei hovered just beyond my shoulder, not touching me. I didn't turn to him. I would not allow myself to face him until I had some plan to show him I wasn't giving up.

“There is someone who will go into Hunan,” I murmured finally.

The thought made me sick to my stomach, but I swallowed my tears as well as my pride. I turned to face Chang-wei. Behind him, the official business of the yamen continued without interruption. For these citizens, the threat of rebellion was far, far away.

“Opium runners,” I declared, forcing the words out. “Smugglers have routes throughout the empire.”

Runners were able to travel along rivers and secret routes to deliver the opium to every corner of the empire. Like ghosts, they managed to evade the most diligent of enforcers. The opium trade had to be alive and rampant in a city like Shanghai.

“I won't put you into the hands of such vermin,” he insisted.

I started to argue, but Chang-wei silenced me with a tiny motion of his fingers. “I said I would not allow you to go alone.”

Could he possibly mean . . . that this wouldn't be farewell?

“Let us go together,” Chang-wei said, answering my silent question “There's no time to waste.”

***

Chang-wei disappeared once more into the inner offices of the yamen, and when he emerged this time, he was no longer dressed in official robes of state. Instead, he'd traded his uniform for an unremarkable dust brown robe, suitable for a clerk or a tradesman. It was a wise decision. Bureaucrats were not looked favorably upon in the countryside where we'd be traveling.

He managed to procure transportation from the yamen. The gears of the carriage whirred as the driver brought it to a stop before us. He extended a hand to help me up.

“Will you be punished for abandoning your duty to come with me?” I asked Chang-wei as he extended a hand to help me onto the transport.

“It can't be helped.”

The calm, almost dismissive manner with which he defied the crown prince's order made me see him with entirely new eyes.

Chang-wei took command of the levers that controlled the carriage. I'd seen them in the streets of Peking, but had no experience operating such a machine. Our village still relied on mules and rickshaws for transport.

He directed the carriage toward the east section of the city wall. A large gate guarded what appeared to be another section of the city. Beyond that gate was the foreign concession.

I held my breath as we approached, certain the city guards would have us immediately imprisoned. On the contrary, the sentry hardly made note of us as we passed through the boundary. They sent us on our way with a solid tap against the side of the wagon.

Chang-wei drove the machine forward. “It's much harder for foreigners to come the other way into the walled city.”

I glanced back over my shoulder, and my final view of the gate told another story. A guardsman was tucking a string of coins into his belt. I'd failed to even notice Chang-wei sneaking the bribe to him.

“Attached on the outside of the carriage, no need to ask questions,” Chang-wei explained.

The moment we were through the gates, I sensed immediately that we had left our homeland behind. The buildings rose two or three stories in shapes that weren't ugly, yet struck me as alien and forced upon this place. The lines and planes were too sharp, too abrupt. Neat rows of windows and doors. The writing on the signboards was also unintelligible to me.

The foreigners were dressed in stiff and heavy clothing. I was stunned to see not only white-skinned people but also our own among them. In these streets, we were invariably the ones pulling the rickshaws, holding open the doors. Standing meekly in corners. Bowing.

“Have you been here before?” I asked.

Chang-wei maneuvered through the streets as if they were familiar to him. “I have. Not too long ago.”

We veered away from the riverfront filled with Western steamships and clippers. As the wagon rolled deeper into the settlement, the sense of being disoriented, being ripped out of place, became even keener. This was China and it wasn't.

I could hear the Canton dialect, which, according to Chang-wei, had been adopted in all the port cities as a trade language. Those familiar words were drowned out by the harsh sounds of the
Yangguizi
tongue.

Among the boxlike buildings, there were a few familiar sights, but their features were exaggerated to the point of ridiculousness. We stopped in front of a building that resembled an ancient temple. Red columns graced the front along with a pagoda-like architecture that rose three tiers high. There were dragons painted everywhere, dragons on the walls, the columns, the steps. Is that how our country looked to them?

As I stepped down, Chinese attendants came to take control of the carriage. Chang-wei guided me into the pagoda. The main room featured an altar upon which a many-handed bodhisattva stood balanced in a dancer's pose. That was where the resemblance to a temple ended.

We had entered some sort of drinking house. Tables were arranged throughout the parlor, though at this time in the afternoon, only a few were occupied. I followed Chang-wei to a table in the corner near one of the long windows.

The hostess came to greet us, dressed in an enviable green silk that fit her figure as if it had been poured onto her skin.

“The Phoenix Pagoda welcomes you, sir.”

I raised my eyebrows at the ostentatious name, to which the hostess arched an eyebrow right back at me. Her eyebrow was decidedly shapelier than mine. Like a moth's wing, as the poems described. Her entire face was painted to perfection: red lips, darkly lined cat's eyes, skin as smooth as porcelain.

“I do apologize, but women are not permitted here,” she continued.

“And what are you?”

I meant the question honestly, but her lips pressed into a thin, hard line.

“She is my assistant,” Chang-wei interjected, slipping something surreptitiously to the hostess. It might have been identification papers. It could have been money. Whatever it was, the woman's look of irritation was immediately replaced by the cool mask we had seen upon first arriving.

Chang-wei ordered wine and then asked for someone with a name I didn't recognize. I waited until the hostess was halfway across the parlor before speaking.

“This place has a brothel's name,” I complained. “And if the name is ‘Phoenix,' then why dragons everywhere?”

He hushed me, his brow knitting in annoyance. “I hope to find someone here who can help escort us to Linhua.”

“Then we
are
seeking an opium dealer.”

“Not every foreigner is a smuggler,” he chided. “The associate I'm meeting here is a well-respected businessman in Shanghai.”

I shot him a look. Perhaps Yang's views had tainted me. “What lucrative business does a foreigner have in Shanghai besides opium?”

The hostess returned with two glasses set upon a tray. She leaned in closer than necessary to serve Chang-wei his drink. Mine was set down with a heavy thud.

“Mister Burton will be here shortly,” she announced in a syrupy-sweet tone.

Another single, pointed glance at me and she was gone again.

Chang-wei took a drink from his glass. The liquor was a dark honeyed color, yet the vapors from it were reminiscent of kerosene and chloroform. I left my glass untouched.

“Will the crown prince's associates be able to pursue you here?” I asked.

“The imperial government has little say in the treaty ports,” he replied, not looking entirely pleased with it. “The crown prince will soon be informed of our success. This”—he paused to consider the word—“
excursion
is only a temporary detour. His Highness will have to reconcile the triumph of reclaiming the formula with my less than utter obedience afterward.”

I looked down at my hands. “Why are you risking yourself to help me? You're under no obligation to do so.”

“I am,” he said quietly. “For many reasons.”

When I looked up, he was watching me so intently I could feel my face warming. Had he at one time asked my father for me? Or had Father initiated the arrangement? I would always wonder why this man, out of all possible suitors. I would always be searching for what it was that had set Chang-wei apart.

And I would never know the answer.

“You took all the danger upon yourself by seeking out Yang and then being held captive on his ship,” Chang-wei added hastily. “I couldn't let you face this danger alone.”

“Thank you, Mister Chen.”

He played with the rim of his glass. My fingers drew a restless pattern on the tabletop. The moment had become too personal for both of us. I inspected the surroundings as a distraction.

Despite the decor, which favored painted scrolls and silk screens, the place had a distinctly different feel from a native drinking house. The other patrons were all
Yangguizi.
They sat in strange garb, also a mix of Western and native clothing. Cigars filled the air with a cloying haze.

The discomfort of being pulled out of place and time persisted. I couldn't sit still. In contrast, Chang-wei was remarkably composed. He was at ease, wholly accepting of the surroundings, which, by their very appearance, refused to accept him. Chang-wei lifted the glass to his lips, sparing only a casual glance in either direction.