Struan helped Jin-qua and himself to some dim sum.
“Chow plenty werry good,” Jin-qua said, sitting very straight in his chair.
“Chow werry bad,” Struan said apologetically, knowing it was the best in Canton. A servant came in with coal and put it on the fire, adding a few sticks of fragrant wood. The delectable perfume of the wood filled the small room.
Jin-qua ate the dim sum fastidiously and sipped the Chinese wine, which was heated—as were all Chinese wines—to just the correct temperature. He was warmed by the wine and even more by the knowledge that his protégé Struan was behaving perfectly, as a subtle Chinese adversary would. By serving dim sum at night, when tradition dictated that it be eaten only in the early afternoon, Struan was not only further indicating his displeasure, but was testing him to see how much he knew about Struan’s encounter with Wu Kwok.
And though Jin-qua was delighted that his training—or rather the training performed by his granddaughter, T’chung May-may—was bearing such delicate fruit, he was beset with vague misgivings. That’s the infinite risk you take, he told himself, when you train a barbarian into civilized ways. The student may learn too well, and before you know it, the student will rule the teacher. Be cautious.
So Jin-qua did not do what he had intended to do: select the smallest of the shrimp-filled steamed doughs and offer it in midair, repeating what Struan had done on the ship of Wu Kwok, which would have indicated with exquisite sublety that he knew all that had happened in Wu Kwok’s cabin. Instead, he picked one of the deep-fried doughs and put it on his own plate and ate it placidly. He knew that it was much wiser, for the present, to hide the knowledge. Later, if he wished, he could help the Tai-Pan avoid the danger he was in and show him how he could extricate himself from disaster.
And as he munched the dim sum he reflected on the utter stupidity of the mandarins and the Manchus. Fools! Contemptible, dung-eating, motherless fools! May their penises shrivel and their bowels fill with worms!
Everything had been planned and executed so ingeniously, he thought. We maneuvered the barbarians into a war—at a time and place of our own choosing—which solved their economic problems, but in defeat we conceded nothing of importance. Trade continued as before, through Canton only, and thus the Middle Kingdom was still protected from the encroaching European barbarians. And we yielded only a flyblown malodorous island which, with the first coolie to set foot on shore, we had already begun to retrieve.
And Jin-qua considered the perfection of the scheme which had exploited the emperor’s greed and his fear that Ti-sen was a threat to the throne, and had made the emperor himself destroy his own kinsman. A divine jest! Ti-sen had been so beautifully trapped, and so cleverly selected so far in advance. The ideal tool to save the emperor’s and China’s face. But after years of planning and patience and a complete victory over the enemies of the Middle Kingdom, that greed-infected, harlot-sniffing lump of dogmeat—the emperor—had had the fantastic and incredible stupidity to repudiate the perfect treaty!
Now the barbarian British are angry, rightly so. They have lost face before their devil queen and her besotted intimates. And now we’ll have to begin all over again, and the ancient purpose of the Middle Kingdom—to civilize the barbarian earth, to bring it out of the Darkness into the Light, one world under one government and one emperor—is delayed.
Jin-qua did not mind beginning again, for he knew that time was centuries. He was only a little irritated that the time had been put back unnecessarily, and a superb opportunity wasted.
First Canton, he told himself. First our beloved Canton must be ransomed. How little can I settle for? How little? . . .
Struan was seething. He had expected Jin-qua to pick one of the shrimp-filled doughs and offer it to him in midair. Does that mean he does na yet know that Wu Kwok passed the first coin? Surely he realizes the significance of the dim sum? Watch your step, laddie.
“Plenty boom-boom ship, heya?” Jin-qua said at length.
“Plenty more Longstaff hav, never mind. Werry bad when mandarin mad hav.”
“Ayee yah,” Jin-qua said. “Mandarin Ching-so werry mad hav. Emperor say all same Ti-sen.” He drew his finger across his throat and laughed, “
Phftt! Wen L’ngst’ff no go way, hav war—no hav trade.”
“Hav war, take trade. Longstaff plenty mad hav.”
“How muchee tael help plenty mad, heya?” Jin-qua put his hands into the sleeves of his green silk coat, leaned back and waited patiently.
“Doan knowa. Maybe hundred lac.”
Jin-qua knew that a hundred could be settled amicably at fifty. And fifty lacs for Canton was not unreasonable when she was helpless. Even so he feigned horror. Then he heard Struan say, “Add hundred lac. Tax.”
“Add hundred wat?” he said, his horror real.
“Tax my,” Struan said bluntly. “No like tax on head cow chillo slave my, chillo little my. Mandarin Ching-so werry plenty bad.”
“Tax on head chillo? Ayee yah! Plenty werry bad god-rottee mandarin, werry!” Jin-qua said, pretending astonishment. He thanked his joss that he had heard about the reward and had already settled that matter quickly and adroitly, and had sent word through an intermediary to the English whore—and thus to Struan—just in case someone had attempted to collect the reward for May-may and the children before they were in safety.
“Jin-qua fix! Doan worry, heya? Jin-qua fix for frien’ in few days. Werry godrottee mandarin Ching-so. Bad, bad, bad.”
“Plenty bad,” Struan said. “Hard fix maybe, cost many lac. So no add one hundred lac. Add two hundred!”
“Jin-qua fix for frien’,” Jin-qua said soothingly. “No add one, no add two! Fix plenty quick-quick.” He smiled happily at the perfect solution he had already instigated. “Werry easy. Put other name on Ching-so list. One-Eye Mass’er cow chillo, and two cow chillo little.”
“What?” Struan exploded.
“Wat bad, heya?” What in the world is the matter? Jin-qua wondered. He had arranged a simple exchange—a worthless barbarian woman and two worthless girl children belonging to the man committed to Struan’s destruction in return for the safety of his own family. What’s wrong with that? How is it possible to understand the barbarian mind?
In God’s name, Struan was thinking, how can you understand these heathen devils? “No like list,” he said. “Na chillo my na chillo One-Eye Devil, na chillo any. Werry godrottee bad.”
Kidnaping certainly is very, very terrible, Jin-qua thought in agreement, for he was in constant fear that he or his children or his children’s children would be kidnaped and held for ransom. But some names have to go on the list in replacement. Whose? “Jin-qua not put cow chillo on list, never mind. I fix. No worry, heya?”
Struan said, “Add two hundred tax my, never mind.”
Jin-qua sipped his tea. “Tomollow Co-hong talkee L’ngs’ff, can?”
“Ching-so can.”
“Ching-so add Co-hong, heya?”
“Tomollow Ching-so can. Next day Co-hong can. Talkee how muchee tael. While talkee, we buy sell tea all same.”
“Finish talkee, trade can.”
“Talkee trade all same.”