He held her hand briefly and studied it as it lay in his own, as if he would discover its secrets.
Lydia withdrew it.
His green eyes, lazy and half-closed once more, settled on hers in a speculative way. ‘My mother, Countess Natalia Serova, is holding a party next week. Maybe you would like to join us? Monday at eight. Do come.’ He laughed, a light teasing sound. ‘We can sit and talk about troop movements.’
Behind him in his car on the gravel drive a Chinese chauffeur in military uniform sat patiently behind the steering wheel, and a small Kuomintang flag fluttered on the bonnet in the icy breeze.
‘I’ll think about it,’ Lydia said and shut the door.
She ran up the stairs two at a time. The bedroom door was closed, but she opened it in a rush and was already speaking as she entered the room.
‘Chang, it’s all right, I…’
She stopped. The bed was empty. The sheet thrown back and the quilt gone.
‘Chang?’
The air was cold. She felt a chill wind brush her cheek. The window was wide open and the curtains billowing.
‘No,’ she breathed and rushed over to the sill. Outside there was no sign of his broken body on the terrace beneath. Her room looked out onto the back garden, which appeared bleak and bare, no movement except a foraging magpie. Empty. A tight pain gripped her chest.
‘Chang,’ she called, but softly.
Something made a noise behind her. She swivelled around and watched the door swing shut. Behind it, tight against the wall where he had been hidden by the open door, stood Chang An Lo. His face was white. But his body was wrapped in the peach quilt and from his right wrist dangled the unraveled twists of a bandage. In his swollen fingers were the scissors she used on the bandages, the long blades held like a dagger.
40
Theo felt like death. But he looked very much alive. He was wearing his finest suit, the charcoal with the narrow pinstripe, a starched white shirt, and his favourite striped silk tie. A real Foreign Devil. Stiff and upright. Today Feng Tu Hong would see an enemy, but an enemy in control.
He parked the Morris Cowley in a back street in the Chinese part of town, tossed a grubby urchin a couple of coins to watch it, and joined the crush of bodies heading uphill to the square. A sharp wind snatched at hair and jackets and made people duck their heads under their woven bamboo hats. Theo lifted his face to it and felt it numb the sickening ache behind his eyes. He needed his eyes to be clear. He elbowed his way through the chattering crowd and could see no other fanqui as he passed under the writhing dragon archway into the wide open square. He paid no attention to the hostile looks. Feng Tu Hong was the only one he had eyes for.
‘Excuse me, honourable sir, but it is unwise for you to be here today.’
It was a small elegant man speaking at his shoulder. He was wearing the saffron robe of a monk, and his shaven head gleamed as if freshly oiled. He smelled strongly of juniper and his smile was as peaceful as a sunflower’s.
Theo bowed. ‘I am here to speak with the president of the council. At his command.’
‘Ah, then you are in safe hands.’
‘That is debatable.’
‘All things are debatable. But those who have faith in truth and are determined on the path, they will find awakening.’
‘Thank you, holy one. I will hold that thought.’
Qing Qui Guang Chang. Open Hand Square. It was the wrong name for it, Theo decided. The hands that were soon to be in front of him would be closed. In fear.
The square was cobbled and surrounded by teahouses and shops with vivid red banners waving in the wind. A startling gold-painted elephant’s tusk arched over the doorway of the colourful theatre that dominated one side. Everything was bright and decorated and seemed to sway with movement under the curling eaves of the roofs, flicking up strange carved talismans to the gods. The usual market of caged birds and sacks of spices from the southern provinces was banished today and in its place a small wooden platform, six feet square and two feet high, had been erected in front of the grand theatre entrance. On it stood a large ebony chair. On the chair sat Feng Tu Hong.
At his side stood Theo.
Eager faces full of anticipation lined the square, leaving the central area empty. They had trekked in from the fields and over from their offices or kitchens to be entertained, to have their daily drudgery relieved for one brief and dramatic moment. It was the display of power that drew them. It reassured them. In this changing and slippery world, some things remained the same. The good old ways. Theo could see it in their faces, and his heart sickened for them.
Feng raised one finger. Immediately the far corner of the crowd parted and a long column of grey uniforms and badly polished boots marched into the square. The Kuomintang. They acknowledged the president of the council, then formed an inner square and faced outward into the crowd. Their rifles bristled in their hands. Theo studied their blank young faces because it was preferable to thinking about why they were there, and he focused on one very upright soldier in particular who was having difficulty hiding his sense of pride. He looked all shiny and new, as if he had come fresh from Chiang Kai-shek’s military academy in Whampoa.
Soldiering was traditionally regarded as a lowly occupation in China, unlike in the West, but Theo had noticed a great change in Chiang Kai-shek’s latest recruits. These had their minds trained and indoctrinated, as well as their bodies, so that they believed in the task they were doing. And they were paid a decent wage for the job. Chiang Kai-shek was no fool. Theo admired him. But he feared that development for China would be slow. Chiang was fundamentally a conservative. He liked things the way they were, despite his posturing and promises of revolution. Yet this young soldier’s face burned with his blind faith in his leader, and that had to be good for China.
‘Tiyo Willbee.’
Reluctantly Theo turned his gaze to Feng. The big man was wearing his presidential ceremonial robes, embroidered blue satin over a quilted gold undertunic that made him look squarer and heavier than ever. A tall and elaborate black hat was perched incongruously on his bull-sized head and reminded Theo of the black cap of a hanging judge.
‘Watch for the first man.’
For a moment Theo did not grasp his meaning, but when a slow drumroll started up and from each corner a monk in saffron robes stepped forward and blew his long pipe in a loud wailing cry that alerted the restless crowd, he realised what Feng was saying. A string of eight prisoners was being led into the centre of the square. Their hands were fastened behind their backs with leather thongs, their shirts stripped from their bodies so that they were naked from the waist up, despite the winter temperatures. Except for one. A woman. She was second in the string and Theo recognised her at once. The plain submissive face that had buried itself in the cat’s mangy fur with such devotion. It was the woman on the boat, the one who had given him Yeewai. In front of her stood the master of the junk, the man who had made too free with his knife blade, and behind them stood six others, all from the same vessel.
‘You see?’ Feng demanded.
‘I see.’
Theo knew what was coming. He’d seen it before but it never grew easier to watch. The prisoners were made to kneel by the captain in the grey uniform and then kowtow to the president.
Feng sat stone-faced.
When a big man with a long curved sword stepped out into the middle of the square with slow dignity, the crowd roared its approval. He whirled the sword once around his head in a display of speed and skill and the action triggered two of the prisoners, no more than boys, to cry and plead for mercy. Theo wanted to shout to them that it was a waste of their last precious breaths. The sword rose and fell in turn on three necks. Gasps of awe flowed from the onlookers as the lifeblood spurted out. Suddenly a young woman rushed from the packed crowd of dark heads and hurled herself at Feng Tu Hong’s slippered feet. She clutched them and kissed his ankles with a passion.