The China Bride (26 page)

When her tears finally ran out and she drew away, she saw that Elliott's eyes were damp. He'd lost not only a partner, but a friend.

Turning practical, he said, "I'll order refreshments—you look as if you haven't eaten for a week. Tea, or something stronger? "

"Tea. And any kind of food." Wearily she sank into a deep chair as he rang for a servant and ordered a quick meal for his guest.

He took the chair opposite. "Forgive me for the impertinence, but might you be carrying a child that could be Maxwell's heir?"

"No." She closed her eyes. The night she'd discovered that, she'd curled up in an anguished ball and wept until dawn. "Unfortunately."

"I'm sorry—but it makes your situation easier," he said pragmatically.

"Maxwell's family is unlikely to challenge the marriage if you aren't a threat to them. Even if they do prove difficult… well, I'm willing to accept you as his heir, which means you own a quarter of Elliott House." Her eyes snapped open. "I… I never thought of that."

"You've had more important things on your mind. Even if the Renbournes refuse to acknowledge you as Lady Maxwell, your share of Elliott House should provide you with enough income to live comfortably. More than comfortably, if I have my way."

"It…it seems too much when we were married for less than a day."

"Maxwell married you to insure your future. Don't feel that it's wrong to accept what he wanted to give." Elliott eyed her speculatively. "I'm planning on opening a London office. If you're a partner and living in England, you can have a strong voice in running it. You know things about China no
Fan-qui
ever will."

She covered her eyes with her hands, not prepared for this new world opening in front of her. It was hard to grasp that she, who had been a minor hong employee, was now a partner in a powerful American trading company.

Guessing her thoughts, Elliott said, "This must all be a shock, but you'll have five or six months to prepare yourself for the role of the widowed Lady Maxwell. Just take everything one step at a time."

One step at a time. "I… I must have European clothing made. All I have is what I'm wearing."

"And the sooner that's burned, the better. I know a seamstress who specializes in clothing for European women. She'll take care of you." A servant arrived with a tray of food and a pot of tea. Elliott sipped a cup while Troth ate. She hadn't realized how hungry she was. When she finished, she said, "Peng mentioned that you're off for Singapore in two days."

Elliott frowned. "I'm afraid so. I can delay perhaps another day, but no longer."

"There's no need for you to change your plans on my account." She gave a wintry smile. "I'm used to managing for myself."

"But you don't have to now. That's why Kyle married you." Close to tears again, she poured more tea. "The most important thing for you is to arrange for his body to be retrieved so he can be buried in England. I think it's best to go to Mr. Boynton, since he's head of the East India Company's Chinese operations."

"A good idea—he has more influence with the viceroy in Canton than any other European. I'll go this afternoon and tell him the whole story. Since Maxwell was a British nobleman, the Company will cooperate fully." Elliott frowned. "Does Chenqua know what happened?" When she shook her head, he said, "You'll have to tell him."

He was right, of course. She'd mentally tried to compose a letter during the long walk from Feng-tang. Though she hadn't liked the role Chenqua chose for her, he'd acted honorably as head of his household and her guardian. She owed him gratitude for all he'd done. And, though she'd always feared him a little, she also felt respect and affection. "I will write him before I leave Macao."

"You'll stay here, of course, even after I'm gone." Elliott frowned thoughtfully. "There's an English ship in port now. It will be sailing for London early next week. Just long enough for you to take care of necessary business and acquire a wardrobe."

The sooner, the better. She yearned to escape China and its ghosts. Rising, she asked, "Is there a guest room ready? I'm very tired."

"Of course." He rang for the comprador, who ran the household, then escorted her to the drawing room door. "Anything you want, you have only to ask."

She gave him an uneven smile. "You're very kind. Kyle provided for me well when he married me out of pity."

Elliott raised her chin with one hand and studied her face, surprising warmth in his eyes. "He didn't marry you from pity, Troth Montgomery." After that cryptic remark, he turned her over to the comprador, then left for the Company's headquarters. Grateful that Kyle's death was no longer her burden alone, Troth went to her room and fell onto the bed without stripping off her filthy garments.

She slept for twenty hours.

Though Troth had lived in the household of a powerful man for fifteen years, she'd never had that power exercised on her behalf. Over the next days, Elliott organized her life with dizzying speed and efficiency. By the time he left for Singapore, a day later than planned, her voyage to London had been booked and her wardrobe was well under way. He also arranged a letter of credit on his London bank, explaining that the money was simply profits due to Kyle. She felt well cared for indeed.

The seamstress clucked disapprovingly when Troth insisted on dark colors and sober styles for her
Fan-qui
wardrobe. Though she was a bastard who had lived a highly irregular life, she would look respectable when she visited Kyle's family.

Her private obligations were the hardest. The first was to compose a letter to Chenqua in which she explained her actions and Lord Maxwell's death. Though she begged his forgiveness for her disobedience, she did not suggest returning to Canton and her old life. She'd paid too high a price for freedom to relinquish it now.

Then she visited the Protestant cemetery where her parents were buried side by side. A peaceful, walled enclave, it was as much garden as burial ground. Her father had helped buy the land and establish the cemetery, which had been badly needed since the only other Christian burial ground was Catholic, and neither the Catholics nor the Chinese had wanted to accept Protestant bodies.

Hugh Montgomery hadn't expected to be buried here himself, though. He'd spoken sometimes of the lowland kirk his family attended, and the fine view it had of the Scottish hills. Nonetheless, she sensed that he was content to lie in the exotic land where he'd spent most of his adult life. "Good-bye, Papa," she whispered as she laid flowers on his grave. "In your honor, I swear to visit Scotland. I… I wish you were going with me." Her beautiful mother had been nominally a Christian, but in true Chinese fashion she'd also worshiped the gods she'd been raised with. To her, Troth said, "I've had a tablet inscribed with your name and Papa's, and I shall honor it all my days. Your spirit will not hunger or thirst in the afterlife." She lit sandalwood incense sticks and left them to burn down by the headstones, along with an offering of oranges. Then she left the cemetery, knowing she would never see it again.

Last of all, she walked along Macao's small peninsula until it narrowed to a hundred-yard width called the Stalk of the Lotus. There she was stopped by the wall into China. Called the Barrier, it had been built to prevent Europeans from setting foot on Chinese soil. By her own choice, she was irrevocably cutting herself off from the land of her birth. She gazed at the wall for a long time before turning away.

So be it.

«
^
»

Feng-tang, China

Summer 1832

Today Kyle would be executed… again. He prayed that this time it would be real.

He'd been prepared to die under the prefect's guns, and it had been a shock to find himself still standing as the smoke drifted away. Numbly he wondered if he'd been mortally wounded, but was too injured to feel pain. Then he looked at Wu Chong and saw the cruel satisfaction in the old man's face. Damnation, the matchlocks hadn't been loaded with bullets, only powder and wadding! The execution had been Wu Chong's vicious, sophisticated form of mental torture.

Kyle was still standing by the wall, rigid, when the plump merchant, Wang, came up to him and bobbed his head apologetically.

"Wu Chong consult soothsayer. Inauspicious time for execution of
Fan-qui
. After new moon, sentence will be carried out Chinese-style."

"A beheading?"

"Very swift, painless," Wang assured him.

Kyle would rather have been shot.

Hanging on grimly to the shreds of his dignity, he stalked back to prison surrounded by guards. Outside his cell, several of them took the opportunity to work him over with expert punches before shoving him into the damp straw.

Three weeks until the new moon.

To keep himself from going mad, he devised exercises to maintain his body. For his mind, he methodically worked his way through his Cambridge courses, starting with the Michaelmas term of his first year. Philosophy, mathematics, the classics in Latin and Greek. Surprising how much a man could remember when he had nothing better to do.

He tried to avoid memories of Troth and home, for they were far more painful than reciting bits of the
Odyssey
. But he couldn't control his dreams. At night Constancia lay beside him, warm and loving, or Troth, sweet and true and passionate. Or he was fishing with Dominic, or riding the hills of Dornleigh with his sister and father.

Waking up was a return to hell.

He was sure the second execution would be real. Beheading, after all, was the preferred Chinese method, and their executioners were said to be very expert.

The prospect of decapitation was peculiarly unpleasant, despite Wang's assurances that it would be painless. This time it was harder to keep his face impassive when he was taken into the courtyard. His bristling, untamed beard helped conceal any failures of control.

When forced to kneel in front of the headsman, he thought of Hoshan and the serenity he'd experienced there. His hammering heart almost drowned out the beating of the drums that marked the raising of the sword. Cool air brushed his face as the blade sliced by to bury itself in the ground a scant inch in front of him. He half expected a second blow to fall just when he would begin to believe he'd been spared, but Wu Chong was subtler than that.

Once more Kyle was marched back to his stinking cell. It was wretchedly hot. The monsoon season had begun and water trickled down the walls constantly as the rains alternated with suffocating humidity. Every night Kyle made another scratch on the wall and wondered how long it would be until the prefect tired of his game, and ended it once and for all.

The third execution was scheduled as a hanging in another one of Wu Chong's bows to Western custom. Kyle no longer cared, for malaria had struck. As he'd guessed at the beginning, the prison was a breeding place for pestilence, and the rude health that had protected him throughout his travels was no longer enough.

He recognized his ailment when chills started in his lower back, radiating throughout his body until he shook with cold despite the tropical heat. Dispassionately he watched his fingers turn dead white and his nails take on a bluish cast. Even milder forms of malaria could be lethal without treatment.

Chills were followed by burning fever. Desperately he rubbed his face against the wet walls, frantic for cooling as muscle tremors brought on pain so deep his bones ached. The guard who delivered his meals prodded him with a boot before leaving him to his fate.

Twelve hours after the first symptoms, the fever ebbed and he had a short period of mere misery. Having seen malaria in others, he took advantage of the time to eat his rice and drink as much water as possible. Often malaria struck in daily attacks as regular as clockwork, and he needed to maintain his strength for the next bout.

The chills returned at noon and the ghastly cycle began again: chills, dry fever, sweating, over and over. He lost count of the days because he was too ill to scratch the wall. Sometimes when shaking with cold he imagined Troth beside him, warming him with her body. Or when he panted with fever he thought he felt her cool hands on his face, until he returned to the horror of the cell.

He had to be carried out to the crude scaffold, though he managed to stand upright as the rope was put around his neck. Three times was the charm; a few miserable minutes and his suffering would be over.
Sorry,
Dom, for breaking my promise to come home
.

But the hangman was an amateur and the execution a sham. Instead of dropping him far enough to break his neck, as a decent British hangman would have done, Kyle was left strangling at the end of the rope until he blacked out. Then they cut him down.

It was hard to be arrogant when lying on the ground spewing one's guts out, but Kyle did his best. Wrexham would have been proud. Looking disappointed that his prey wouldn't last much longer, Wu Chong waved him back to the prison.

As his daily bout of fever claimed him, the only damned thing Kyle could manage to be glad about was that Troth and his family would think he'd died quickly.