Halfhyde on the Yangtze Read online

“Oh, I say, sir!”

  “However, I got the gist as well as the gerunds, my dear fellow. Well, Halfhyde, what’s the situation with your men below? I mean, it doesn’t look too good to me.”

  “It isn’t, sir. I fear my Captain is being removed, and there’s no knowing where.” Halfhyde looked sardonic as he went on, “I fear something else: Captain Watkiss will consider Cole, and I have deserted him in his hour of need, but such was not my intention, I assure you.” He paused. “You spoke a moment ago of an attack. I’m here to get you out before the attack comes, and that means there’s no time to lose.”

  Carstairs shook his head. “It’s a brave thought, Halfhyde, but two can’t possibly make an escort!”

  “Well, as to that, sir, we shall see.” Halfhyde rubbed his hands together briskly, the light of battle in his eyes. “There are things I shall need to know. First, how many persons have you here, men, women and children?”

  “Forty-three men, twenty-four women, fifteen children of varying ages, most of them American—the children, that is.”

  “I see. And rifles and revolvers?”

  “Enough for all the adults. Foreigners in China need to be armed, and all of them brought their arms.”

  “Then we shall have a fighting chance, sir. Next, I would be obliged if you would inform me fully of the diplomatic situation in Chungking, and of where a certain Count von Furstenberg fits into the picture, and as to why a Mr Bloementhal from Peking was to contact a person inside your Consulate. And I would be most grateful for brevity.”

  CAPTAIN WATKISS bounced balefully along the sodden Chungking streets under the continuing downpour, in the tight clutches of two large Chinese bearing curved swords the edges of which, he felt, might at any moment cleave his neck. That they were razor-sharp he knew, for that had been demonstrated: his monocle had been ripped away and cast into the air with its black silk toggle dangling. As the toggle streamed down and fell, one of the swords had flashed in the air and cut it in half, cleanly and instantly, despite the almost total lack of bite that it offered. Yes, the swords were sharp…not that Watkiss was afraid of death, of course: Post Captains of the fleet were never cowards. Watkiss felt obliged to make this stiffening point to Beauchamp, who was being herded along beside him.

  “We are of the Navy, Mr Beauchamp. Remember that.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “We are not to be scared from our duty by dagoes.”

  “What’s our duty now, sir?” Beauchamp asked.

  “Yes, Mr Beauchamp, it would take you to ask that, would it not?” Watkiss said disparagingly. “Our duty is to Her Majesty, Mr Beauchamp, and it will be resumed the moment we are back aboard my flotilla!”

  “I see, sir.” Beauchamp paused. “What do you intend to do, sir, after that?”

  “Why, bombard the port, of course! Blow blasted Chungking to smithereens with my three-pounders! What else?”

  “Yes, I see, sir,” Beauchamp said politely, “but Count von Furstenberg will have that in mind, will he not?”

  “Possibly,” Watkiss snapped. “But do you suggest that I should refuse my duty because a blasted Hun may have my intentions in mind, Mr Beauchamp?”

  “Oh no, sir—”

  “Good. Now hold your tongue and save your breath for the future. Since Halfhyde has seen fit to desert me,” he added with extreme bitterness, “you’ll have to become my First Lieutenant again and much will depend upon you. Do well, Mr Beauchamp, and possibly the past can be forgotten.”

  “Oh, thank you, sir!”

  “Don’t congratulate yourself too soon, Mr Beauchamp.”

  They slogged on, back along the streets towards the wharf in abject defeat. The taste of it was horrid but Watkiss considered he had had no option. Count von Furstenberg had with him a strong detachment of cavalry and a piece of horse artillery, while the Chinese hordes were nothing short of legion. Von Furstenberg had been all too precise: refusal to retreat would mean slaughter. It would have been hard, no doubt, to explain away to his blasted Kaiser, but in fact, he had carte blanche and could probably have come up with excuses, lying ones of course, but still.

  Watkiss glowered about himself, feeling half drowned. There was one thing about the rain, it held the smell of Chungking down a little. He looked ahead at his marching men; the damn Hun was being correct, certainly, they had not been deprived of their arms—yet was that a good thing after all? Von Furstenberg would say in Berlin that he had received Captain Watkiss’ surrender and had been magnanimous enough to take the British word that the rifles would not be used. Captain Watkiss was damned if he regarded himself as having surrendered; he had merely agreed to relinquish his ground under duress and that was quite different. But the Admiralty would have to see his point, or he, Watkiss, could face much trouble for retreating whilst still armed. There was only one ray of sunshine: Hackenticker and Bloementhal were also in retreat, though they could scarcely, of course, be said to have surrendered since they had no armed force of their own with them. A momentary regret struck Captain Watkiss as he seethed along: why the devil hadn’t he allowed Hackenticker to take command?

  “Mr Beauchamp!”

  “Yes, sir?”

  “The dagoes are crowding the seamen and marines.”

  “Yes, sir.” It was true: the retreat was being extremely well shepherded, and the naval force was being pushed tight together to the detriment of their marching.

  “I don’t like it, Mr Beauchamp, but I suppose there is nothing I can do about it.”

  Beauchamp almost wept with relief: he had visualized a direct order for him to keep the Chinese clear and knew that his total inability to do so would not be considered an adequate excuse for failure. The retreat continued, as did the terrible rain. Mangy dogs cowered in the lee of broken buildings and one or two of them barked at the British as they went by. There was less smoke now, since the rain had largely put out the fires, or had at least stopped them spreading. As they came down in clearer air towards the wharf, Beauchamp saw the Yangtze and the three remaining gunboats of the flotilla: the water-level, he noticed, had already risen an appreciable amount. Then something unexpected happened. As the armed Chinese soldiers, assisted by the pressure of the mob, turned the head of the marching column of seamen and marines directly for the wharf, Watkiss and Beauchamp, together with Mr Bodmin, Rear Admiral Hackenticker and Mr Bloementhal, were brought to a halt in the rear by their individual escorts and held fast. As his men marched away, leaving him behind, Captain Watkiss protested vigorously until he was given a blow on the forehead that tilted his white helmet, now grey from the rain, backwards. As he gasped with pain and shock, he became aware that one of the dagoes, the dago Lim Puk-Fo, was speaking to Bodmin; and a few moments later Captain Watkiss was himself addressed somewhat sheepishly by the Customs man.

  “Zur, zur—they do say they want ee to remain.”

  “Do they? What for?”

  “An ’ostage like, zur, I reckon. All of you gentlemen, zurs. And they say, zur, that if the gunboats open fire on the town, then they’ll chop off your ’ead, zur.”

  Watkiss stared. “Mine?”

  “Ar, zur, that’s what they do say, zur.” Mr Bodmin stood as though awaiting orders. They came like a torrent. Mr Bodmin was to reason with the blasted dagoes and point out that both Her Majesty and the Emperor of Germany would be displeased and that vengeance would strike Chungking like a typhoon. Mr Bodmin was further to point out, in case his plea should fail, that the seamen and marines and the junior officers had all marched away and that Captain Watkiss had been given no opportunity to pass orders that they were not to open fire. When they discovered that their Senior Officer was being held ashore, they might very well open fire, and the dagoes would be hoist with their own petard. Mr Bodmin did his best, but the plea was not accepted in its first part, only in its second: the British head serang could send one of his fellow hostages aboard with the ships’ companies to take charge and ensure that no hostile act was committed.

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p; Watkiss breathed hard down his nose. “It’ll have to be you, I suppose, Mr Beauchamp.”

  Beauchamp tried not to look too happy. “Yes, sir. You may rely on me, sir, I assure you.”

  “I hope so, Mr Beauchamp, I hope so indeed. Bear in mind constantly what is at stake.”

  “I will, sir!”

  “Why not,” Hackenticker asked, “let me go, Captain? I—”

  “My dear sir, you shall never take command of my flotilla! Off you go, Mr Beauchamp. Do your duty.”

  “I shall, sir.” Released, Beauchamp saluted and turned away for the wharf, holding himself back with some difficulty from going fast. Captain Watkiss’ final words rang in his ears like a knell: do your duty. There had been a hint of pathos; Beauchamp’s duty was also to his threatened Captain, and his threatened Captain had sounded much as though he were reminding him of it. Beauchamp, however glad he was to hasten his feet from Chinese soil, was a conscientious man and knew he could face a conflict of duties: presumably, Her Majesty’s interests had to come before those of Captain Watkiss. Indeed, Captain Watkiss would have been the first to say so himself…wouldn’t he? Mr Beauchamp’s thoughts, as he caught up with the seamen and marines, became tinged with bitterness: Captain Watkiss would be quite likely to place him in arrest for saving his life if he failed to do it in accordance with Queen’s Regulations and Admiralty Instructions.

  IN THE Consulate, the preparations were in hand for a break-out and the flight to the gunboat flotilla; and Carstairs had spelled out the overall situation to Halfhyde as requested. As Watkiss had been advised by Bloementhal, the Russian and German Empires were competing for treaty rights in the great land mass of China and along her coasts, and at the present time the Germans appeared to be in the ascendant thanks to the nefarious efforts of Count Hermann von Furstenberg who was well accredited to, and well received by, the ancient Empress-Dowager of China in Peking. Both Germany and Russia were, Carstairs said, taking advantage of the current situation in Chungking and Szechwan province.

  “The rising, sir?”

  “Yes. They’re hoping to extend it from Szechwan throughout China to the detriment of British trading interests—then they, or rather one of them, will step into the vacuum. Meanwhile, we’re the hostages.”

  “For what purpose?”

  Carstairs shrugged. “Partly to put the wind up our nationals, both British and American, in the rest of China. Partly to show the world that the Chinese have no more time for us, and that we’re henceforward unwelcome. We’re to be the pawns, is what it comes down to—bargaining pieces. If Britain and America back out of China, we’ll be released unharmed.”

  “Yes, I follow. Are you all, in fact, unharmed?”

  “Yes. There have been no attacks beyond simple harassment designed to keep our heads down, as it were. Mind you, we’re not all too healthy…the food’s been short, so has the water, and the strain’s been pretty immense on the women and children.”

  “Quite. And Bloementhal, sir?”

  Carstairs said, “Bloementhal was under orders to make contact with one of my protégés, as you know—”

  “May I now ask which one, sir?”

  “Of course, and if I knew, I’d tell you—but I don’t. I was advised by cable that Bloementhal was on his way, but no mention was made of whom he was to contact.”

  Halfhyde nodded. “Then may I suggest the time has come to find out? There’s a need of speed in case attack should come before we leave—”

  “I doubt if it’ll come as fast as you fear, Halfhyde. As I said, we’re the pawns. Our use is not finished yet.”

  “Perhaps, but the sooner the better nevertheless, then they’ve lost their pawns—and I for one wouldn’t trust the mob not to take the bit between its teeth and jump the gun.” Halfhyde paused; in point of fact, and most oddly, the mob sounds had died away. He moved to the window and looked down. The roadway was relatively empty now. Shrugging, he turned back to the Consul. “I suggest questioning, sir. Questioning of all in the Consulate, to find out who is Mr Bloementhal’s contact, and why. I think we must have the answers before we move out.”

  MR BODMIN was marched away with the other captives, protesting about being treated thus when he was married to a Chinese woman and therefore part of the family, as it were, of China.

  “It be uncivilized, zur.”

  “They’re an uncivilized people,” Watkiss snapped. Amongst other indignities, they had snatched away his sword.

  “Ar, zur, they’re not—not really. Their civilization’s as old as the ’ills, zur—”

  “Kindly don’t argue with me, Mr Bodmin, I detest argument, detest it. The Chinese are uncivilized.”

  “Well, zur,” Bodmin said doubtfully, “if you says so. I’m an uneddicated man, zur, not like the gentry—”

  “Yes, yes.”

  “O’ course, the old woman, zur, the wife that be, she’ll be all right, she ’as ninety-seven relatives livin’ in Chungking alone, zur—”

  “Good heavens! As I once remarked to Mr Halfhyde, the Chinese have little else to do…but never mind. Ninety-seven in-laws, it’s unbelievable. Don’t keep lurching into me, Mr Bodmin, I don’t like it.”

  “Sorry, I’m sure, zur.”

  The downpour was not slackening one iota, it was quite appalling, and Watkiss hoped without much conviction that Beauchamp would handle his flotilla in a seamanlike way if the Yangtze should rise to unacceptable limits. With this in mind, he enquired from Bodmin what the maximum rise and fall had been in his experience: the charts and Sailing Directions were not always, in Watkiss’ view, to be wholly trusted.

  “Ar, it be bad, zur, bad.” Mr Bodmin shook his head.

  “Yes, but how bad?”

  “Why, zur, last year ’twere, zur, the river rose ninety-seven feet above low-water mark, zur.”

  Watkiss was aghast. “Goodness gracious, Mr Bodmin, you’re confusing your navigation with your in-laws, surely!”

  “No, zur. ’Twere a whacking great coincidence I’ll not deny, zur, as I remarked to the old woman at the time, but the figures be dead correct, zur, in both instances, I’ll take my solemn Bible oath on it.”

  Captain Watkiss blew out his cheeks and sent up a prayer for his gunboats, only too certainly to be hazarded by that fool Beauchamp if the worst should happen. Beauchamp, poised ninety-seven feet above low water, would be lethal. They trudged on surrounded by the Chinese guns; behind them, Rear Admiral Hackenticker and Bloementhal maintained a morose silence. Not long after Watkiss’ chat with Bodmin, the awful march ended and they moved thankfully out of the rain into shelter of a sort. Extremely dirty and smelly shelter, but relatively dry and clearly very secure: shelter was the city gaol, a foetid place which they were evidently to share with criminals, and Watkiss protested at such treatment.

  “I am a Post Captain of Her Majesty’s, Her Britannic Majesty’s, Fleet. Mr Bodmin is an officer of Chinese Customs. There is also a Rear Admiral of the United States Navy I should add. Mr Bodmin?”

  “Ar, zur?”

  “Tell the buggers.”

  “They do know already, zur.”

  “Tell them again.”

  It was of no avail. Each of the three, plus Bloementhal whom Watkiss had not felt worth mentioning, were pushed unceremoniously into a kind of cage, a filthy place with iron bars around it. There were other similar cages, with other occupants, common criminals, thieves and murderers no doubt…Watkiss was aghast. There appeared to be no lavatories: the evidence of this lack was only too apparent. Some of the prisoners were lying flat on plank bunks, on their backs, with eyes staring upwards. Opium, no doubt—disgusting! Watkiss believed he could smell opium, which the wretched dagoes took like afternoon tea. He seized the bars in a rage and shook them, and once again reminded his gaolers of his rank and authority, but it was quite useless, and when Hackenticker had the blasted cheek to murmur something about a monkey in a zoo, he let go of the bars and sat down on a plank bed and sulked. His mortification was complete. Th
ere was just one consolation: a gaol was an official place, therefore he was being treated officially and was not in the hands of, for example, pirates. That was something, if not much. Watkiss groaned aloud and put his head in his hands. Somebody, only God knew who, must get a despatch through to Commodore Marriot-Lee, who would soon be lying with his first-class cruisers off Shanghai…or to the Commodore-in-Charge in Hong Kong, who would alert the Empire by means of the underwater cable…

  THE OCCUPANTS of the Consulate were questioned separately, one by one, in the Consul’s office. Carstairs did the questioning, with Halfhyde and Cole present but not taking part. All but the children were questioned, although it was thought unlikely that a woman would be Bloementhal’s contact; and in the end it was the last person to be interrogated who turned out to be the one: perhaps the most unlikely of them all, the bald man with the eyeglasses whom Mr Bodmin had earlier pointed out to Captain Watkiss as “parson,” the Reverend Marchwood Erskine, missionary to the heathen, a citizen of Great Britain from Worthing in Sussex, member, as he said in a curiously hoarse voice, of a breakaway group from the established Church of England known as Jacob’s Tabernacle. This, Halfhyde gathered, was a sect much concerned with propagation of the gospel; in a word, evangelists.

  Carstairs, who knew Erskine well enough, was greatly surprised and said as much. “What’s the connection with Bloementhal?” he asked. “I’d not associate you with diplomatic activities, Mr Erskine, nor with Americans come to that.”

  The Reverend Marchwood Erskine, wrapped in dignity and black clothing that must have been as hot as Hackenticker’s blues, cleared his throat. “Bibles,” he announced in his hoarse tones.

  “Bibles?” Carstairs seemed more surprised than ever.

  “Not an unnatural commodity for my cloth, I think?” The eyeglasses were removed and polished and replaced before Erskine went on again. “Bibles spread the word, Mr Carstairs, and the good Lord knows the Chinese people need the word. I do His work.”

  “Yes, of course, I’m sorry.” Carstairs paused, tapping his desk and looking baffled. Halfhyde felt the grip of impatience: time could be all too short. “That doesn’t quite explain the connection, Mr Erskine, does it?”