The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure (108 page)

‘Don't mind him,' said Brown confidentially. ‘He's talking about a chap called Manners. Friend of the Airtons. He came here once, about three months ago, on a hunting trip. Stayed a couple of days. Odd, supercilious sort of character. Didn't like him, to tell the truth. He was also here before and during the Boxer madness. There were—how does one put it?—rumours that he and Mrs Cabot … It's all nonsense, of course, but the Chinese believe there was something going on between them. You'll find that these people, lovable though they are, are the most dreadful gossipmongers. Always getting the wrong end of the stick. I wouldn't think very much of it, if I were you. Don't, for Heaven's sake, raise this topic with the Airtons. They get very upset. My goodness, they do.'

‘No, no, I certainly won't,' said Arthur, looking a little alarmed.

They drove on for a while in silence. The willows on either side of the road rustled in clouds of fresh green leaves.

‘How long have you been in Shishan, Mr Brown?' he asked.

‘Dr Brown, actually. I'm a medical missionary and a minister, but just call me Brown. I'm sure we'll be friends. I've been here just under a year. Arrived in June of 1901, a couple of months before the Airtons returned from home leave. The society thought they could do with a bit of help in rebuilding the mission. A pair of younger hands, you know. They'd had quite a terrible ordeal one way and another.'

‘Was there—was there much to rebuild?' asked Arthur.

‘I'll say. Place was a shambles. For a start the mission and the hospital had been burned to the ground. Pretty tense, too, with all the Russian soldiery about. There were executions, and the poor Chinese, most of whom had nothing to do with any Boxers, were scared for their lives. What do you expect with brute Cossacks allowed to run amok? Everyone was a Boxer in their eyes, and most of the time all they wanted to do was plunder. It was all rather shameful. One of those occasions when we white men did
not
set a good example.' He switched to Chinese. ‘Mr Lu, we're talking about the period after the Boxers, when I first arrived in Shishan. Didn't the Russians give you some trouble too?'

‘They were not happy times,' said Lu. ‘It is better not to think about those days.'

‘Cossacks went into Lu's home,' said Brown, in English again. ‘He doesn't like to talk about what they did. They executed—well, murdered, actually—one of his best friends, another merchant called Jin. The man was entirely innocent. Oh, yes, you'll hear plenty of stories of that kind round here.'

‘But what the Boxers did here was unforgivable,' said Arthur. ‘Surely some justice was in order after the massacre?'

‘Of course you're right,' said Brown. ‘But who do you punish? Apparently they got some ringleaders. A few days after I arrived, they executed one notorious brute in the public square, some bandit with the rather quaint name of Iron Man Wang, whom they'd just captured after a big battle in the hills. They hung his body on the city gates in a cage where it rotted for months. Apparently he really had had something to do with all the atrocities. Even the Chinese say so—but the others? Well, who was a Boxer? Nobody will ever admit to being party to all of that, you know. Most of them, anyway, were just peasant boys. They emerged out of the fields, and now they've disappeared back into them. These days, it's fashionable to be a Christian, of course.' He laughed.

‘Really?' said Arthur in surprise.

‘No, I'm exaggerating,' smiled Brown. ‘But it has been heart-warming to see the steady increase in conversions in recent months. Tell you the truth, I'm kept rather busy, though I'm helped by some very good Chinese lay pastors who I've trained. You must come to our next service—we have a proper church now on the site where the Airtons' old house used to be. The Catholics are here in force, of course. They're becoming a bit of a threat, to tell the truth, with quite a following. They've taken over an orphanage that used to be run by some Americans who were killed in the massacre. Dr Airton goes there quite often to help out on the medical side.'

‘I heard a little about Dr Airton when I was in Peking,' said Arthur carefully.

‘You probably heard a whole lot of rot,' laughed Brown. ‘Oh, yes, I know the stories—but it's all malicious tripe. I've got to know him over the last year, and I can tell you there's nobody more courageous or downright decent on this earth. He's something of a saint, in his way. It's all one to him what denomination anyone is. He doesn't get too much involved in the missionary side of the work at all any more. As a matter of fact, he leaves that to me. He concentrates on what he's good at, which is healing people—but I'll tell you, more people have come to my door to ask about Jesus after being healed by him, or just having met him and been impressed by him, than any I could convert on my own account. He's exceptionally modest, selfless, unsparing of his time, doesn't live for anything except his healing work, and some of the cures he's made, why, if I didn't have the scientific basis to understand what he's doing, well, actually, I might think they were miraculous.'

‘He sounds a marvellous man,' said Arthur.

‘Oh, he is, he is,' said Brown. ‘He's a saint, a living saint, as I've said. Not an ounce of bitterness in him, which you might have expected considering he was here right through the madness, and saw many of his friends put to death. In fact, you'd think it might never have happened the way he treats everyone—anyone—just the same. There's one man in our hospital, Zhang Erhao, who helps with the administration. He really was a Boxer, and by all accounts betrayed the Airtons. Well, this man came on bended knees shortly after the Airtons arrived back here, weeping and saying he was a Christian now, and Airton just raised him up, tears running down his own cheeks, and gave him his old job back. Oh, yes, Airton's a saint all right. The local people think so too. That's good for us. The Catholics haven't got anyone like him, you see. I say,' he said, a look of concern on his face, ‘you're not Roman Catholic by any chance, are you?'

‘No, I'm Church of England,' said Arthur.

‘Well, that's a relief,' laughed Brown. ‘Thought I might have put my foot in it, for a moment. Not that I've anything against the Catholics, of course, but it's good to have another member of the home team on board.'

‘I'll—I'd be delighted to come to your service,' said Arthur, thinking that that was what was expected of him.

‘Excellent. Excellent,' said Brown, puffing on his pipe.

‘Are the Russian soldiers still here?' asked Arthur.

‘Not in such numbers as before,' said Brown. ‘There's a troop of cavalry in the barracks—not Cossacks any more, thank goodness. Their colonel, Tubaichev, sometimes comes round to dine with Dr Airton. Officially the Chinese are back in power. A new mandarin arrived at the end of last year and is ensconced in the
yamen,
but I don't know what he does. It's Tubaichev who calls the shots. Effectively he rules the place. He's not a bad sort—unlike his officers.'

‘What's wrong with them?'

‘Bunch of godless reprobates,' said Brown. ‘Spend their time whoring and carousing in the Palace of Heavenly Pleasure.'

‘What's that?' asked Arthur.

‘The Palace of Heavenly Pleasure?' He laughed. ‘You'd better ask old Lu here. It's not a place I've been near, I can tell you. Den of sin, run by a fearsome madam who might have stepped out of the pages of a penny dreadful. But Lu loves the place, the old rogue. He's probably itching to take you there. Mr Lu,' he said, switching to Chinese, ‘do you plan to corrupt the morals of Mr Topps by taking him to the Palace of Heavenly Pleasure?'

Lu Jincai laughed politely. ‘If Tuopasi Xiansheng wishes,' he said. ‘The baked crab is excellent, and it is a place where we merchants gather from time to time.'

‘Well, you make sure you stick to the baked crab, is my advice,' said Brown. ‘Leave the after-dinner entertainments to the Russian officers.'

Arthur looked from one smiling face to another. He was not sure how to respond. ‘Well, it sounds as if an interesting experience is in store for me,' he said.

Brown laughed. ‘Well done, Topps,' he said. ‘You experience everything. It's the only way. And remember, our church is always open to you if you find yourself tempted to stray off the straight and narrow. Seriously,' he added, ‘you have to be broad-minded to get on here. China is still seething with every sin under the sun. We're doing our bit, quite a lot now, as I've said, to introduce these pagans to the True Path, but Airton—yes, it was actually Airton, one of the only times that I recall he spoke about the Boxer episode—said something to me that I've never forgotten. “We brought the madness down on our own heads,” he told me, “because we had forgotten how to be humble.” I spent a long time racking my brains to understand what he meant. And I think it's this. You're not going to change anyone by trying to make them into you. We know that the Christian path is the right one, but a Chinaman has his own way of looking at the world. We've got to find a means to cut our cloth to fit his. You won't get anywhere by judging too harshly, or forcing our superior knowledge down his throat. Best way to convert someone in fact is by not converting them at all. There's a conundrum for you, isn't it? Airton used a Chinese expression, which he said he'd got from the old Mandarin who lived here:
“wu wei
.
”
'

‘Yes, it's from Lao Tse. The
Tao Te Ching,
' murmured Arthur.

‘Oh, you know it, then?' said Brown, looking slightly disgruntled. ‘Well, you probably understand what Airton was on about, then. Confess it's a bit deep for me, but I think it means something like “Everything good will happen in its own good time if you let it, and don't worry yourself in the meanwhile.”'

‘Yes, it's something like that,' said Arthur, blushing in case Brown felt he had been showing off.

The pony-cart trundled on in silence. Brown puffed on his pipe, his chatter interrupted—perhaps because Topps's knowledge of the Chinese classics had taken the wind out of his sails—but his was not a temperament to remain abashed for long. ‘Well, Topps, what's the news from the big wide world?' he asked cheerily. ‘What are they saying in Peking?'

‘About politics, you mean?' asked Arthur. ‘The Empress Dowager returned from exile in January. Most of the foreign troops are returning home. The Chinese government is working out how they are ever to pay the enormous indemnity that has been agreed. I—I think it's going to be difficult for them.'

‘Serves them right,' muttered Brown, chewing his pipe. ‘Hope some of the money comes our way. We've done well out of donations, and have rebuilt the hospital and put up a church, but there's a lot more we could be doing. Airton's set his heart on building a medical training school here. What else is going on?'

‘There was a lot of talk about the deteriorating situation between Russia and Japan over this part of the world, Manchuria,' said Arthur. ‘Rumours that one day there might be war between them.'

‘Stuff and nonsense,' snorted Brown.

‘I hope you're right. I had a conversation with a strange man in the British Legation who wanted to see me when he heard I was coming up here. A Mr Pritchett. Have you heard of him?'

‘Can't say I have.'

‘Well, he was anxious for me to write and tell him if I should ever come across any signs of the Japanese doing anything suspicious up here.'

‘That's the trouble with diplomats,' said Brown. ‘They live in a fantasy world. See conspiracies in the most innocent things. I'd forget about them if I were you.'

‘There—there aren't any signs of Japanese here, then?' asked Arthur.

‘Japanese? No, I've not heard of anything they're doing here. Well, there's a Japanese barber's shop in the high street. Funny little fellow who gives a good haircut. The Russian officers use him. And there was a Japanese officer who came through here on his way to a hunting trip in the Black Hills some while ago. Most sophisticated sort of cove for an Oriental. Dressed in tweeds. It was about the same time as that Manners fellow I was telling you about was here. In fact, I'm not sure if they didn't know each other. Yes, I think they did know each other, come to think of it. They both went to dinner with Colonel Tubaichev. Might have arranged to hunt together too. But that just goes to show you, doesn't it? Your Pritchard, or whatever you said his name was, would have woven a fantastic piece of skulduggery out of all that. And what could be more innocent than an officer taking his leave and hunting in the Black Hills? There are bears and even tigers up there. Some of the best hunting in Asia. And if Tubaichev thought there was anything odd in it, he wouldn't have invited them to supper, would he?'

‘I daresay you're right,' said Arthur.

‘No, it's not the Japanese,' continued Brown. ‘It's the homegrown brew of bandits we have to worry about. There's one particular gang of disaffected Chinese army officers who were giving the garrison some bother in the Black Hills last Christmas. Preyed on the merchant caravans going up to Tsitsihar. Very well armed by all accounts, with modern rifles and howitzers and field guns and you name it. Tubaichev had to call for reinforcements and he himself led an expedition into the Black Hills. But they didn't find them. They'd dribbled off through the woods and are probably in Mongolia now. It's been quieter lately.'

As he was speaking he was peering ahead of him. He turned to Arthur with a happy smile on his face. ‘There, ahead of us. Do you see it?'

Through the trees, Arthur saw a small hill, and on top of it green-tiled roofs gleaming in the sunshine. There was a square steeple on the crest, which looked as out of place in the Chinese countryside as a pagoda in an English village.