Struan glanced at Wu Pak. The boy lowered his eyes and scuffed at the earth.
“He does na speak English?”
“No. But Bert here speaks his tongue. An’ Fred some words. Bert’s ma be Fukienese.” Scragger’s discomfort worsened.
“Where’s your mother, Fred?”
“Dead, Yor Worship,” the urchin choked out. “She be dead, sirr.”
“She be deaded two year back. Scurvy got her,” Scragger said.
“You’ve Englishwomen with your fleet?”
“Some has. Back over there, lads,” he said, and his sons fled to where he was pointing and stood rock-still, out of hearing. Wu Pak hesitated, then ran back and stood close beside them.
Scragger dropped his voice. “Fred’s ma were convict. Transported ten year for stealing coal in the depth of winter. We was married by a priest in Australia but he were renegade so maybe it weren’t proper. We was married anyways. I give her me oath afore she deaded to do right by the lad.”
Struan took out more papers. “These give me guardianship of the boys. Until they’re twenty-one. You can sign for your sons but what about Wu Pak? Should be a relation.”
“I’ll put me mark on all. You got one for me to show Wu Fang? Wot I signeded?”
“Aye. You can take one.”
Struan began to fill in the names, but Scragger stopped him. “Tai-Pan, doan put Scragger on the boys. Put another name. Any you likes—no, doan tell me wot,” he added quickly. “Any name. You think of a good one.” The sweat was beading his forehead. His fingers trembled as he took the pencil and made his mark. “Fred’s to forget me. An’ his ma. Do yor best with Bert, eh? His ma’s still me woman and she bain’t bad, for a heathen. Do yor best for ’em and you’ve a friend for life. Me oath on’t. They both beed taught to say their prayers proper.” He blew his nose in his fingers and wiped them on his trousers. “Wu Pak’s got to write once a month to Jin-qua. Oh yus, and yor t’bill Jin-qua for the schooling and wot. Once a year. They’s all to go to the same school and vittle together.”
He beckoned to the Chinese boy. Wu Pak came forward reluctantly. Scragger jerked a thumb toward the boats and the boy left obediently. Then he beckoned his sons.
“I be off now, lads.”
The boys ran to him and clung to him and begged him not to send them away, their tears streaming and terror overwhelming them. But he pushed them off and forced his voice hard. “Be off with you now. Obey the Tai-Pan here. He’s t’be like a dad to yer.”
“Doan send us’n off, Dad,” Fred said piteously. “I beed a good boy. Bert’n me be good boys, Dad, doan send us’n off.”
They stood in the enormousness of their grief, their shoulders heaving.
Scragger cleared his throat noisily and spat. After a second’s hesitation, he jerked out his knife and seized Bert’s queue. The Eurasian squealed with horror and tried to fight free. But Scragger chopped off the queue and cuffed the hysterical boy hard enough to bring him out of shock, but no harder.
“Oh, Dad,” Fred said tremulously in his little piping voice, “you knowed Bert promised his mum to keep his hair proper.”
“Better I do’s it, Fred, afore another,” Scragger said, his voice breaking. “Bert doan need it now. He’s t’be toff like you.”
“I doan want to be toff, I want t’ stay home.”
Scragger tousled Bert’s head a last time. And Fred’s.
“ ’Bye, my sons,” he said. He rushed away and the night swallowed him.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
“Why go so early, Tai-Pan?” May-may asked, stifling a yawn. “Two hours’ sleep last night for you is na enough. You will lose your vigor.”
“Get on with you, lass! And I told you na to wait up.” Struan pushed his breakfast plate away and May-may poured him more tea. It was a glorious morning. The sun beamed through the latticed windows and cast delicate patterns on the floor.
May-may tried to close her ears to the pounding and sawing from the building that was going on all over the foreshore of Happy Valley, but she could not. The noise had been permanent and overpowering day and night since they had arrived three days ago.
“There’s a lot to be done, and I want to be sure all’s well for the ball,” Struan said. “It’s to start an hour after sundown.”
May-may shivered with delight as she remembered her secret gown and the beauty of it. “Breakfast at dawn is barbarisms.”
“ ’Barbaric,’” he said. “And it’s not dawn. It’s nine o’clock.”
“It feels like dawn.” She arranged her pale yellow silk robe more comfortably, feeling her nipples hard against its texture. “How long are horriblitious noises going on?”
“It’ll settle down in a month or so. No work on Sundays of course,” he said, half listening to her, thinking about all he had to accomplish today.
“It’s too much noises,” she said. “And something’s bad with this house.”
“What?” he said absently, not listening.
“It feels bad, terrifical bad. Are you sure the
feng shui is correct, heya?”
“Feng what?” He looked up, startled, and gave her his full attention.
May-may was appalled. “You did not have a feng-shui gentlemans?”
“Who’s he?”
“God’s blood, Tai-Pan!” she said, exasperated. “You build house and dinna consult feng shui! How crazy mad! Ayee yah! I deal with that today.”
“What does the feng-shui gentleman do,” Struan asked sourly, “apart from costing money?”
“He makes sure that the feng shui is correct, of course.”
“And what, for the love of God, is feng shui?”
“If the feng shui is bad, the devil spirits come into the house and you’ll have terrifical bad joss and terrible sickness. If the feng shui is good, then no devil spirits come in. Everyone knows about feng shui.”
“You’re a good Christian and you dinna believe in evil spirits and mumbo jumbo.”
“I absolute agree, Tai-Pan, but in houses feng shui is fantastical vital. Dinna forget this is China and in China there’s—”
“All right, May-may,” he said resignedly. “Get a feng-shui gentleman to cast a spell if you must.”
“He does na cast spells,” she said importantly. “He makes sure the house is positioned right for the Heaven-Earth-Air currents. And that it’s na built on a dragon’s neck.”
“Eh?”
“Good sweet God, as you say sometimes! That’d be horrifical, for then the dragon that sleeps in the earth would no longer be able to sleep peaceful. God’s blood, I hope we’re na on his neck! Or head! Could you sleep with a house on your neck, or head? Of course na! If the dragon’s sleep is disturbed, of course fantastical worst things happen. We’d have to move instantaneous!”
“Ridiculous!”
“Fantastical ridiculous, but we still move. Me, I protect us. Oh yes. It’s very important that one protects her man and her family. If we’re builded on a dragon, we move.”
“Then you’d better tell the feng-shui gentleman that he’d better not find any dragons around here, by God!”