Shanghai must be the one place in the world where one never tired of the view. He could see people on the Bund of virtually every race on Earth: Chinese from all parts of China, from beautifully elegant businessmen in well-tailored Europeans suits, mandarins in flowing silks, singing girls in slit skirts, flashily dressed gangster types, sailors and soldiers to the poorest coolies in smocks or loin-cloths. As well as the Chinese, there were Indian merchants and clerks, French industrialists with their wives, German ship-brokers, Dutch, Swedish, English and American factory-owners or their employees, all moving along in the twin tides that swept back and forth along the Bund. As well as the babble of a hundred languages, there was the rich, satisfying smell of Shanghai, a mixture of human sweat and machine oil, of spices and drugs and stimulants, of cooking food and exhaust fumes. Horns barked, beggars whined, street-sellers shouted their wares. Shanghai.
Karl smiled. If it were not for the present trouble the Japanese were having in their sector of the International District, Shanghai would offer a young man the best of all possible worlds. For entertainment there were the cinemas, theatres and clubs, the brothels and dance-halls along the Szechwan Road. You could buy anything you wanted—a piece of jade, a bale of silk, embroideries, fine porcelain, imports from Paris, New York and London, a child of any age or sex, a pipe of opium, a limousine with bulletproof glass, the most exotic meal in the world, the latest books in any language, instruction in any religion or aspect of mysticism. Admittedly there was poverty (he had heard than an average of 29,000 people starved to death on the streets of Shanghai every year) but it was a price that had to be paid for so much color and beauty and experience. In the two years that he had been here he had managed to sample only a few of Shanghai's delights and, as he neared manhood, the possibilities of what he could do became wider and wider. No one could have a better education than to be brought up in Shanghai.
He saw the Rolls pull in to the curb and he waved. His mother, wearing one of her least extravagant hats, leaned out of the window and waved back. He sprang down the steps and pushed his way through the crowd until he got to the car. The Chinese chauffeur, whose name Karl could never remember and whom he always called "Hank", got out and opened the door, saluting him. Karl gave him a friendly grin. He stepped into the car and stretched out beside his mother, kissing her lightly on the cheek. "Lovely perfume," he said. He nattered her as a matter of habit, but she was always pleased. It hardly occurred to him to dislike anything she chose to do, wear or say. She was his mother, after all. He was her son.
"Oh, Karl, it's been terrible today." Frau Glogauer was Hungarian and spoke German, as she spoke French and English, with a soft, pretty accent. She was very popular with the gentlemen in all the best European circles of the city. "I meant to do much more shopping, but there wasn't time. The traffic! That's why I was late, darling."
"Only five minutes, Mama." Karl looked at his Swiss watch. "I always give you at least half-an-hour, you know that. Do you want to finish your shopping before we go home?" They lived in the fashionable Frenchtown area to the west, not too far from the Race Course, in a large Victorian Gothic house which Karl's father had purchased very reasonably from the American who had previously owned it.
His mother shook her head. "No. No. I get irritable if I can't do everything at my own pace and it's impossible this afternoon. I wish those Japanese would hurry up and restore order. A handful of bandits can't cause that much trouble, surely? I'm sure if the Japanese had a free hand, the whole city would be better run. We ought to put them in charge."
"There'd be fewer people to manage," said Karl dryly. "I'm afraid I don't like them awfully. They're a bit too heavy-handed in their methods, if you ask me."
"Do the Chinese understand any other methods?" His mother hated being contradicted. She shrugged and pouted out of the window.
"But perhaps you're right," he conceded.
"Well, see for yourself," she said, gesturing into the street. It was true that the usual dense mass of traffic was if anything denser, was moving more slowly, with less order, hampered by even more pedestrians than was normal at this hour. Karl didn't like the look of a lot of them. Really villainous wretches in their grubby smocks and head-rags. "It's chaos!" his mother continued. "We're having to go half-way round the city to get home."
"I suppose it's the refugees from the Japanese quarters," said Karl. "You could blame the Japs for the delays, too, mother."
"I blame the Chinese," she said firmly. "In the end, it always comes down to them. They are the most inefficient people on the face of the Earth. And lazy!"
Karl laughed. "And devious. They're terrible scamps, I'll agree. But don't you love them, really? What would Shanghai be without them?"
"Orderly," she said, but she was forced to smile back at him, making fun at herself for her outburst, "and clean. They run all the vice-rings, you know. The opium-dens, the dance-halls..."
"That's what I meant!"
They laughed together.
The car moved forward a few more inches. The chauffeur sounded the horn.
Frau Glogauer hissed in despair and flung herself back against the upholstery, her gloved fingers tapping the arm of the seat.
Karl pulled the speaking tube towards him. "Could you try another way, Hank? This seems impassable."
The Chinese, in his neat grey uniform, nodded but did nothing. There were carts and rickshaws packing the street in front of him and a large truck blocking his way back. "We could walk," said Karl.
His mother ignored him, her lips pursed. A moment later she took out her handbag and opened the flap so that she could look into the mirror set inside it. She brushed with her little finger at her right eyelid. It was a gesture of withdrawal. Karl stared out of the window. He could see the skyscrapers of the Bund looming close behind them still. They had not gone far. He studied the shops on both sides. For all that the street was crowded, nobody seemed to be doing much business. He watched a fat Indian in a linen suit and a white turban pause outside a shop selling the newspapers of a dozen countries. The Indian picked his nose as he studied the papers, then he selected an American pulp magazine from another rack and paid the proprietor. Rolling the magazine up, the Indian walked rapidly away. It seemed to Karl that some more mysterious transaction must have taken place. But then every transaction seemed like that in Shanghai.
The Rolls rolled a few more feet. Then the chauffeur saw an opening in a side street and turned down it. He managed to get half-way before a night-soil cart—the "honey-carts" as the Chinese called them—got in his way and he was forced to brake quite sharply. The driver of the cart pretended not to notice the car. One wheel of his cart mounted the sidewalk as he squeezed past. Then they were able to drive into the side street which was barely wide enough to accommodate the big Phantom.
"At least we're moving," said Frau Glogauer, putting her compact back into her bag and closing the clasp with a snap. "Where are we?"
"We're going all round the world," said Karl. "The river's just ahead, I think. Is that a bridge?" He craned forward, trying to get his bearings. "Now that must be north... My God!"
"What?"
"Chapei. They must have set fire to it. The smoke. I thought it was clouds."