Tai-Pan (77 page)

“Blore’s a nice young man,” Shevaun said, glad to be alone with Struan at last. “Where did you find him?”

“He found me,” Struan said. “And I’m glad he did.”

His attention was distracted by an altercation near one of the tents. A group of soldier-guards was hustling a Chinese out of the enclosure. The coolie’s hat fell off—and with it the long queue. The man was Aristotle Quance.

“Excuse me a second,” Struan said. He hurried over and stood in front of the little man, shielding him with his bulk. “That’s all right, lads, he’s a friend of mine!” he said.

The soldiers shrugged and moved off.

“Great thundering cannon balls, Tai-Pan,” Quance choked out, adjusting his filthy clothes. “Saved in the nick. Bless you!”

Struan shoved the coolie hat back on Quance’s head and pulled him behind a flap of the tent. “What the devil are you doing here?” he whispered.

“Had to see the races, by God,” Quance said, settling the hat so that the queue fell down his back, “and wanted to talk to you.”

“This is nae time! Maureen’s in the crowd somewhere.”

Quance blanched. “God protect me!”

“Aye, though why He should, I’ve nae idea. Be off with you while you’re safe. I heard she’s booked passage for home next week. If she suspects—well, be it on your own head!”

“Just the first race, Tai-Pan?” Quance begged. “Please. And I’ve information for you.”

“What?”

To Struan’s shock, Quance told him what Gorth had done to the prostitute. “Ghastly! Poor girl’s near death. Gorth’s mad, Tai-Pan. Mad.”

“Send me word if the girl dies. Then we’ll—well, I’ll have to think about what to do. Thank you, Aristotle. Best you vanish while you can.”

“Just the first race? Please, for the love of God! You don’t know what it means to a poor old man.”

Struan looked around. Shevaun was studiously ignoring them. Then he noticed Glessing walking by. “Captain!”

When Glessing recognized Quance, his eyes soared to heaven. “By Jove! I thought you were on the high seas!”

“Do me a favor, would you?” Struan said quickly. “Mrs. Quance is over by the post. Would you keep Aristotle out of trouble and out of her way? Better, take him over there.” Struan pointed to where the Chinese were milling about. “Let him watch the first race, then take him home.”

“Certainly. Good God, Aristotle, I’m glad to see you,” Glessing said, then to Struan, “Have you heard from Culum? I’m terribly worried about Miss Sinclair.”

“No. But I told Culum to see her as soon as he arrived. We should hear any moment. I’m sure she’s all right.”

“I hope so. Oh, where should I take Aristotle after the race?”

“Mrs. Fortheringill’s.”

“By Jove! What’s it like, Aristotle?” Glessing asked, his curiosity getting the better of him.

“Terrifying, my boy, mortal terrifying.” Quance grasped his arm and his voice hoarsened. “Can’t get a wink of sleep and the food’s hideous. Nothing but quent for breakfast, lunch, tea, dinner and supper. Can you lend me a few guineas, Tai-Pan?”

Struan grunted and walked off.

“What’s quent, Aristotle?”

“It’s, er, a kind of gruel.”

Struan rejoined Shevaun.

“A friend of yours, Tai-Pan?”

“It’s na politic to notice some friends, Shevaun.”

She tapped him lightly on the arm with her fan. “There’s never a need to remind me about politics, Dirk. I’ve missed you,” she added gently.

“Aye,” he said, realizing that it would be easy and wise to marry Shevaun. But na possible. Because of May-may. “Why do you want to be painted in the nude?” he asked suddenly, and he knew from the flash in her eyes that his hunch was correct.

“Aristotle said that?” Her voice was level.

“Great God, no. He’d never do that. But some months ago he was teasing us. Said he had a new commission. For a nude. Why?”

She blushed and fanned herself, and laughed. “Goya painted the Duchess of Alba. Twice, I believe. She became the toast of the world.”

His eyes crinkled with amusement. “You’re a devil, Shevaun. Did you really let him—well, see the subject?”

“That was poetic license on his part. We discussed the idea of two portraits. You don’t approve?”

“I’d say your uncle—and your father—would hit the sky if they heard about it, or if the portraits fell into the wrong hands.”

“Would you buy them, Tai-Pan?”

“To hide?”

“To enjoy.”

“You’re a strange girl, Shevaun.”

“Perhaps I despise hypocrisy.” She looked at him searchingly. “Like you.”

“Aye. But you’re a girl in a man’s world, and certain things you canna do.”

“There’s a lot of ‘certain’ things I would like to do.” There were cheers and the horses began to parade. Shevaun made a final decision. “I think I will leave Asia. Within two months.”

“That sounds like a threat.”

“No, Tai-Pan. It’s just that I’m in love—and in love with life as well. And I agree with you. That the time to choose the winner is when they’re at the starting gate.” She fanned herself, praying that her gamble would justify the risk. “Who do you pick?”

He did not look at the horses. “The filly, Shevaun,” he said quietly.

“What’s her name?” she asked.

“May-may,” he said, the light in his eyes gentle.

Her fan hesitated and then continued as before. “A race is never lost until the winner’s judged and garlanded.”

She smiled and walked away, head high, more beautiful than she had ever been. The filly lost the race. Only by a nose. But she lost.

“Back so soon, Tai-Pan?” May-may said thinly.

“Aye. I tired of the meet, and I was worried over you.”

“Did I win?”

He shook his head.

She smiled and sighed. “Oh well, never mind.” The whites of her eyes were pink, and her face was gray under the gold.

“Has the doctor been?” Struan asked.

“Na yet.” May-may curled on her side, but that did not ease her discomfort. She moved the pillow away, but that did not help either, so she replaced it again. “Your poor old mother’s just old,” she said with a forlorn grin.

“Where does it hurt?”

“Nowhere, everywhere. A good sleep will cure everything, never mind.”

He massaged her neck and her back and would not allow himself to think the unthinkable. He ordered fresh tea and light food and tried to persuade her to eat, but she had no appetite.

At sunset Ah Sam entered and spoke briefly to May-may.

“The doctor is come. And Gordon Chen,” May-may said to Struan.

“Good!” Struan got up and stretched.

Ah Sam walked over to a jewel cabinet and took out a small ivory statue of a nude woman lying on her side. To Struan’s astonishment, May-may pointed to parts of the tiny statue and spoke at length to Ah Sam. Ah Sam nodded and went out, Struan followed, bewildered.

The doctor was an elderly man, his queue long and well oiled, his ancient black robes threadbare. His eyes were clear and a few long hairs grew from a wart in his cheek. He had long thin fingers and the backs of his slender hands were blue-veined.

“So sorry, Tai-Pan,” Gordon said, and he bowed with the doctor. “This is Kee Fa Tan, the best doctor in Tai Ping Shan. We came as fast as we could.”

“Thank you. You’d better come this—” He stopped. Ah Sam had gone over to the doctor and had bowed deeply and shown him the statue, indicating parts of it in the same manner as May-may. And now she was answering questions volubly.

“What the devil’s he doing?”

“Making a diagnosis,” Gordon Chen said, listening attentively to Ah Sam and to the doctor.

“With the statue?”

“Yes. It would be unseemly for him to see the Lady if it was not necessary, Tai-Pan. Ah Sam is explaining where the pains are. Please be patient, I’m sure it’s not serious.”

The doctor contemplated the statue in silence. Finally he looked up at Gordon and said something softly.

“He says it is not an easy diagnosis. With your permission, he would like to examine the Lady.”

Seething with impatience, Struan led the way into the bedroom. May-may had dropped the curtains surrounding the bed. She was only a discreet shadow behind them.

The doctor went to May-may’s bedside and again fell silent. After a few minutes he spoke quietly. Obediently May-may’s left hand came from under the curtains. The doctor picked up her hand and examined it intently. Then he put his fingers on her pulse and closed his eyes. His fingers began tapping the skin gently.

The minutes passed. The fingers were tapping slowly as though seeking something impossible to find.

“What’s he doing now?” Struan asked.

“Listening to her pulse, sir,” Gordon whispered. “We must be very quiet. There are nine pulses in each wrist. Three on the surface and three a little lower and three deep down. These tell him the cause of the sickness. Please, Tai-Pan, be patient. It is most hard to listen with fingers.”

The finger tapping continued. It was the only sound in the cabin. Ah Sam and Gordon Chen watched spellbound. Struan shifted uneasily but made no sound. The doctor seemed to be in a mystical reverie. Then suddenly—as if falling on an elusive prey—the tapping ceased and the doctor pressed hard. For a minute he was like a statue. Then he let the wrist lie on the coverlet, and May-may silently gave him her right wrist and he repeated the procedure.

And again after many minutes the tapping abruptly ceased.

The doctor opened his eyes and sighed and put May-may’s wrist on the coverlet. He beckoned to Gordon Chen and to Struan.

Gordon Chen closed the door behind them. The doctor laughed softly and nervously and began speaking quietly and rapidly.

Gordon’s eyes widened.

“What’s the matter?” Struan said sharply.

“I didn’t know Mother was with child, Tai-Pan.” Gordon turned back to the doctor and asked a question and the doctor answered at length. Then silence.

“Well, what the devil did he say?”

Gordon looked at him and tried unsuccessfully to appear calm. “He says Mother’s very sick, Tai-Pan. That a poison has entered her bloodstream through her lower limbs. This poison has centered in her liver, and the liver is now”—he sought for the word—“maladjusted. Soon there will be fever, bad fever. Very bad fever. Then three or four days of time and again fever. And again.”

“Malaria? Happy Valley fever?”

Gordon turned back and asked the question.

“He says yes.”

“Everyone knows it’s the night gases—na poison through the skin, by God,” he slammed at Gordon. “She’s na been there for weeks!”

Gordon shrugged. “I only tell you what he says, Tai-Pan. I’m no doctor. But this doctor I would trust—I think you should trust.”

“What’s his cure?”

Gordon queried the doctor.

“He says, Tai-Pan: ‘I have treated some of those who suffered the Happy Valley poison. The successful recoveries were all strong men who took a certain medicine before the third fever attack. But this patient is a woman, and though in her twenty-first year and strong with a fire spirit, all her strength is going into the child that is four months in her womb.’” Gordon stopped, uneasily. “He fears for the Lady and the child.”

“Tell him to get the medicine and treat her now. Na after any attack.”

“That’s the trouble. He can’t, sir. He has none of the medicine left.”

“Then tell him to get some, by God!”

“There’s none on Hong Kong, Tai-Pan. He’s sure.”

Struan’s face darkened. “There must be some. Tell him to get it—whatever it costs.”

“But, Tai-Pan, he—”

“God’s blood, tell him!”

Again there was chatter back and forth.

“He says there is none in Hong Kong. That there will be none in Macao, or in Canton. That the medicine is made from the bark of a very rare tree that grows somewhere in the South Seas, or in lands across the seas. The tiny quantity he had came from his father who was also a doctor, who got it from his father.” Gordon added helplessly, “He says he’s completely sure that there’s no more.”

“Twenty thousand taels of silver if she’s cured.”

Gordon’s eyes widened. He thought a moment, then he spoke rapidly to the doctor. They both bowed and hurried away.

Struan took out his handkerchief, wiped the sweat off his face, and walked back into the bedroom.

“Heya, Tai-Pan,” May-may said, her voice even thinner. “Wat for is my joss?”

“They’ve gone to get a special medicine which’ll cure you. Nae anything to worry about.”

He settled her as best he could, his mind tormented. Then he hurried to the flagship and asked the chief naval doctor about the bark.

“Sorry, my dear Mr. Struan, but that’s an old wives’ tale. There’s a legend about Countess Cinchon, wife of the Spanish viceroy of Peru, who introduced a bark from South America into Europe in the seventeenth century. It was known as ‘Jesuits’ bark,’ and sometimes as ‘cinchona bark.’ Powdered and taken with water, it was supposed to cure the fever. But when it was tried in India it failed completely. Worthless! Damned Papists would say anything to get converts.”

“Where the devil can I get some?”

“I really don’t know, my dear sir, Peru, I suppose. But why your anxiety? Queen’s Town is abandoned now. No need to be concerned if you don’t breathe the night gas.”

“A friend’s just come down with malaria.”

“Ah! Then heroic purging with calomel. As soon as possible. Can’t promise anything, of course. We’ll leech him immediately.”

Struan tried the chief army doctor next, and then, in the course of time, all the lesser doctors—both service and civilian—and they all told him the same thing.

Then Struan remembered that Wilf Tillman was alive. He hastened to the Cooper-Tillman opium hulk.

And all the while Struan was questioning the doctors, Gordon Chen had returned to Tai Ping Shan and had sent for the ten Triad leaders under him. Then they had gone to their own headquarters and had sent for the ten leaders under them. Word spread with incredible speed that a certain bark of a certain tree was to be found. By sampan, by junk, word filtered out across the harbor to Wowloon, soon to reach hamlets and villages and towns and cities. Up the coast, down the coast, inland. Soon all the Chinese of Hong Kong—Triads and non-Triads—knew that a rare bark was being sought. They did not know by whom or for what reason: only that a great reward had been offered. And this knowledge fell into the ears of the anti-Triad agents of the mandarins. They too began to seek the bark, and not only for the reward; they knew that a portion of bark might perhaps be used as a lure to unmask the leaders of the Triad.