Once a year Jin-qua and her father would send someone to her to learn her progress and to bring news of the family.
Very strange, May-may thought. Certainly I wasn’t sent as spy, but to be Struan’s concubine. And certainly neither Father nor Grandfather would do such a thing lightly—not with their own bloodline. Was I not Jin-qua’s favorite granddaughter?
“So much bullion,” she said, avoiding his question. “So much is terrifical big temptation. Huge. All in one place—just one risk, attack, or theft, and twenty, forty generations would be safe.” How foolish I was to be afraid of the Tai-Pan. He is a man like any other and my lord. Very much man. And I will be Tai-tai soon. At long last. And I will have face at long last.
She bowed deeply. “I’m honored you trust me. I will bless your joss, Tai-Pan, forever. You do me huge honor and give me so much face. For anyone would consider how to steal it. Anyone.”
“How would you go about that?”
“Send Ah Gip to the Hoppo,” she said at once and went back to stirring the pot. “For a guarantee fifty percent he disregard even the emperor. He would allow you to stay, secretly if you wish, until lorcha arrived. When he made sure it was right lorcha, he would let you go abroad secretly and intercept downriver. And cut your throat. But then he would cheat me out of my share and I’d have to be his woman. Dirty turtledung! Na for all the tea in China, na that pig fornicator. He has dirty tricks. You know that he’s almost impotent?”
“What?” Struan said, not really listening to her.
“It’s common knowledge,” she said. She tasted the stew daintily and added a little soya sauce. “He has to have two girls at same time. One has to play with him while the other works. Then, too, he’s so small that he fits things on himself, enormous things. Then, too, he likes to sleep with ducks.”
“Will you na talk such drivel!”
“What’s ‘drivel’ mean?” May-may asked.
“ ‘Nonsense.’ ”
“Huh, that’s na nonsense. Everyone knows.” She tossed her head prettily and the long plume of hair danced. “I dinna understand you at all, Tai-Pan. You are shock when I tell you about ordinary things. Many people use things to improve sex. Very important to improve if you can. Eat right foods, use right medicines. If you’re small, ayee yah, not bad to improve your joss and give your girl more pleasure. But na like that dirty pig! He does it just to hurt.”
“Will you na stop it, woman!”
She stopped stirring and looked at him. A tiny frown crossed her face. “Are all European like you, Tai-Pan? Na like to talk open about man-woman things, heya?”
“Certain things you dinna talk about, and that’s the end of it.”
She shook her head. “That’s wrong. It’s good to talk. How else can one improve? Man is man and woman woman. You dinna get shock about food! Why so crazy, eh? Sex is food, never mind.” Her eyes crinkled mischievously, and she looked him up and down. “Heya, all Mass’er dooa jig-jig like youa all same can, heya?”
“Are all Chinese girls like you, heya?”
“Yes,” she said calmly. “Most. Like me but na so good. I hope.” She laughed. “I think you must be very special. I’m special too.”
“And modest.”
“A pox on that sort of modest. I’m honest, Tai-Pan. Chinese are honest. Why for should I not appreciate me? And you. I enjoy you, like you me. Stupid to pretend na.” She peered into the pot, and took a piece of meat with the chopsticks and tasted it. Then she took the pot off the fire and put it near enough to the flames to keep it warm. She opened the door and whispered to Ah Gip. Ah Gip plodded away. May-may went back to the fire.
“Where’s she gone?”
“To find us place to hide.”
“I’ll do that.”
“In this she would be better. First we eat, then you decide about Brock.”
“What about him?”
“He will na let you hide and stay easily, heya?”
“I’ve already decided what to do about him.” Struan’s face crinkled with the breadth of his smile. “You’re very, very special, May-may.”
“Special enough for you to make me Tai-tai? Your Supreme Lady, according to your custom?”
“I’ll decide about that after I’ve accomplished three things.”
“Wat three things?”
“The first is to get the bullion safe into
China Cloud.”
“Next?”
“The second is to make Hong Kong absolutely safe.”
“The last?”
“I’m na sure. You’ll have to be patient on that one.”
“I will help you with the first two. The last I dinna ken. I am Chinese. The Chinese are very patient. But I am also a woman.”
“Aye,” he said, after a long moment.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Struan was in his private office on the ground floor, writing a dispatch to Robb. It was almost two o’clock. Outside the traders and their clerks and coolies and servants were carrying possessions from their factories to their lorchas. The Hoppo had relaxed the order withdrawing all the servants. Servants and coolies were to be allowed until the Hour of the Monkey—three o’clock—the time by which the Settlement was to be abandoned. Bannermen were still in the square preventing access to the American factory.
Struan finished the letter, affixed his special chop and sealed it with wax and signet ring. He had told Robb not to worry, that he would bring good news to Hong Kong, and that if he was late Robb should go to the land sale and buy all the land they had long ago decided upon. And buy the knoll, whatever the cost. Whatever Brock bid, Robb was to bid one dollar more.
Now Struan sat back and rubbed the fatigue out of his eyes and began to recheck his plan, trying to find the holes in it. Like all plans that involved the reactions of others, there always had to be a measure of joss. But he felt that the weathervane of his joss had backed to the old quarter, where he was always guarded and things happened as he wanted them to happen.
The tall grandfather clock chimed twice. Struan got up from the carved teak desk and joined the servants, who were streaming in and out of the factory under the supervision of the Portuguese clerks.
“We’re almost finished, Mr. Struan,” Manoel de Vargas said. He was an elderly, gray-haired, sallow Portuguese of great dignity. He had been with The Noble House for eleven years and was chief clerk. Before this he had had his own company with its headquarters in Macao, but he had been unable to compete with the British and American traders. He bore them no grudge. It is the will of God, he had said without rancor, and had gathered his wife and his children around him and had gone to Mass and had thanked the Madonna for all their blessings. He was like the vast majority of Portuguese—faithful, calm, content and unhurried. “We can go as soon as you say,” he said tiredly.
“Are you feeling all right, Vargas?”
“A little agued, senhor. But once we get settled, I will be well once more.” Vargas shook his head. “Bad to move and to move and to move.” He spoke sharply in Cantonese to a coolie staggering past under the weight of ledgers and pointed to a lorcha.
“That’s the last of the books, Mr. Struan.”
“Good.”