China Jewel (30 page)
Authors: Thomas Hollyday
Tags: #Fiction, #Mystery, #Retail, #Suspense, #Thriller
Cutter said, “I get it too. I’m not risking any more lives to make money.”
Madeline spoke in her French-accented English, “Jim, you are still a gambler. You’re going to be my father-in-law. I got a right to know what you are going to gamble on next.”
He took her hands in his and looked at her, “Like your father, who was my friend, I’m gambling on you and Jamie.”
She smiled, “Jamie told me you only took on the big gambles, kept your luck for what really counted. We’re pretty safe. Not a major risk.”
“Well, I guess you could say the rest of my life is the real next gamble and you guys are part of it.”
Jamie asked, “Will you come to our wedding at Mother’s house in Buenos Aires? We’re stopping there on the cruise home with the Peregrine.”
“So there’s going to be a wedding in Buenos Aires after all?” Katy asked.
“You wanted to see Jamie get married.”
“Yes. I did. Madeline will be a beautiful bride,” she said, holding Madeline’s arm.
Cutter said, “I saw a flower shop and nursery for sale in River Sunday.”
“Yes I did too. Maybe you should buy it.” She looked into his eyes. “Jamie told me a long time ago about your nickname.”
“Flower?”
“Yes, and your mother.”
“What would you think of being with a man who grows flowers for a living? Not a very good match for a famous historian.”
“Let me be the judge of that. Is that a proposal?”
He nodded. “I’d like to settle in River Sunday with you. That town has been good to me.”
“You’ve been good to it. Jamie and Madeline would like it too.”
“You think he’ll visit?”
“He wants to spend time with you. He’s always talking to me about his childhood and your friend, the old African chief, who taught him to sail. He wants to relive those good memories with you.”
Cutter looked at her with questions in his eyes, “I’d plant crocus bulbs and grow a lot of peony bushes.” He grinned, “So will you do it?”
“Yes,” she said. “One condition. I want to see the Temple of the Six Banyan Trees.”
“That’s the Chinese temple drawn on the old caddie box in New York.”
“Yes.”
Cutter looked at his son. “We’ll all go.”
“Funny,” she said. “I was just thinking about an old legend.”
“What?” he asked. They began walking and he held her close.
“In the old days it was considered unlucky by the crew if they sailed on a ship which had it name changed.”
“So Captain Tolchester was unlucky?”
“I’m just not sure,” she said, as she moved against him.
They walked out of the exhibit, passing by the throngs of Chinese business men and women. Cutter smiled about their new life to come in River Sunday. His mind pictured the square sails of the Peregrine coming over the Chesapeake pine trees as the clipper brig returned home. He could hear the crew singing.
My Tommy’s gone on the Eastern Shore,
My Tommy’s gone and I’ll go too;
Hurrah, you high low,
For without Tommy I can’t do.
My Tommy’s gone a high low.
My Tommy’s gone to Baltimore,
My Tommy’s gone and I’ll go too;
Hurrah, you high low,
For without Tommy I can’t do.
My Tommy’s gone a high low.
Acknowledgements
The book,
China Jewel
, as books do, began many years ago in Maryland with my learning of the old clipper ship races of the Nineteenth Century. I read from A.B.C. Whipple,
The Clipper Ships:
“Every clipper carried with her on every voyage the hopes and often the wagers of builder and merchant, captain and crew, and countless fans among the public that she would outpace all her rivals.” Then, I enjoyed the description in Dana, Chapter 25 of
Two Years Before the Mast
: “This affair led a dispute as the sailing of our ship and the Ayacucho. Bets were made between the captains, and the crews took it up in their own way; but as she was bound to leeward and we to windward, and merchant captains cannot deviate, a trial never took place; and perhaps it was well for us that it did not, for the Ayacucho had been eight years in the Pacific, in every part of it-Valparaiso, Sandwich Islands, Canton, California, and all-and was called the fastest merchantman that traded in the Pacific, unless it was the brig John Gilpin, and perhaps the ship Ann McKim of Baltimore.” I found in Wikipedia 2010 that a formal race was held in 1866 called the Great Tea Race. The following account was in the London Daily Telegraph of 12 September: “…leaving China at the same time, (the two clipper ships) sailed almost neck and neck the whole way and finally arrived in the London docks within two minutes of each other.”
I would be amiss not to thank the Boston Athenaeum for their energetic research services. I am especially indebted to insights gained from the original log in my possession of the famous Baltimore clipper brig John Gilpin on its voyages to China in the 1830s. Thanks to the excellent blue water data from
Cruising Routes
by Cornwell, including handling storms at sea, from Hiscock’s
Around the World in Wanderer III
, from
Greyhounds of the Sea
by Cutler, 1930, and from the memoirs in
Flying Cloud
by Shaw, 2000. I consulted two other classics for excellent first hand data on sailing and handling square-rigged ships:
Two Years before the Mast
by Dana, 1840, and
On Board the Rocket
by Adams, 1879. Certainly much gratitude is due to the wonderful
Icebergs, Port and Starboard
,
by John Jourdane, 1992, and his notes on the modern day Whitebread-Volvo Round the World Race. Thanks to Mark Weber of the US Brig Niagara of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission for providing a copy of the crew handbook for sailing that historic replica brig.
The China Trade
by Crossman and
The Tea Clippers
by McGregor aided my research. Thanks for research by Claudia Jew, museum photographer, and permission of the Mariner’s Museum in Virginia to use the portrait of the Chesapeake built Baltimore clipper brig Golden Age of 1840 for the cover of
China Jewel
.
Pan American’s Ocean Clippers
by Tahow and other sources on the early history of Pan American Airways aided my study of the great ocean flying boats. Turner Classic Movies kindly provided a special research copy of the movie, “China Clipper.” Thanks to Dan Berg’s notes on the “Inshore Schooner Shipwreck” at aquaexplorers.com. Quoted songs are “Tommy” from
On Board the Rocket
, Adams, 1879, “Flying Down to Rio” from RKO Studios, 1933, by Gus Kahn, “Valparaiso” 1996, by Sting, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” 1941, by Don Raye and Hughie Prince, “The Yankee Doodle Boy,” 1904, by George M. Cohan,” and “Candyman” 2007, by Christina Aquilera, which includes cadence attributed to the United States Marine Corps.
I’m especially grateful also to C. Michael Curtis of the
Atlantic Monthly
and the former Elliott Coleman of the Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars for their kind encouragement. I extend special appreciation for their time to all those who read and commented on draft copies of the manuscript. Thanks again to hard working editors, and last, but not least, much gratitude to my family for its patience.
Thomas Hollyday, Boston, July 5, 2013
Acknowledgements
The book,
China Jewel
, as books do, began many years ago in Maryland with my learning of the old clipper ship races of the Nineteenth Century. I read from A.B.C. Whipple,
The Clipper Ships:
“Every clipper carried with her on every voyage the hopes and often the wagers of builder and merchant, captain and crew, and countless fans among the public that she would outpace all her rivals.” Then, I enjoyed the description in Dana, Chapter 25 of
Two Years Before the Mast
: “This affair led a dispute as the sailing of our ship and the Ayacucho. Bets were made between the captains, and the crews took it up in their own way; but as she was bound to leeward and we to windward, and merchant captains cannot deviate, a trial never took place; and perhaps it was well for us that it did not, for the Ayacucho had been eight years in the Pacific, in every part of it-Valparaiso, Sandwich Islands, Canton, California, and all-and was called the fastest merchantman that traded in the Pacific, unless it was the brig John Gilpin, and perhaps the ship Ann McKim of Baltimore.” I found in Wikipedia 2010 that a formal race was held in 1866 called the Great Tea Race. The following account was in the London Daily Telegraph of 12 September: “…leaving China at the same time, (the two clipper ships) sailed almost neck and neck the whole way and finally arrived in the London docks within two minutes of each other.”
I would be amiss not to thank the Boston Athenaeum for their energetic research services. I am especially indebted to insights gained from the original log in my possession of the famous Baltimore clipper brig John Gilpin on its voyages to China in the 1830s. Thanks to the excellent blue water data from
Cruising Routes
by Cornwell, including handling storms at sea, from Hiscock’s
Around the World in Wanderer III
, from
Greyhounds of the Sea
by Cutler, 1930, and from the memoirs in
Flying Cloud
by Shaw, 2000. I consulted two other classics for excellent first hand data on sailing and handling square-rigged ships:
Two Years before the Mast
by Dana, 1840, and
On Board the Rocket
by Adams, 1879. Certainly much gratitude is due to the wonderful
Icebergs, Port and Starboard
,
by John Jourdane, 1992, and his notes on the modern day Whitebread-Volvo Round the World Race. Thanks to Mark Weber of the US Brig Niagara of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission for providing a copy of the crew handbook for sailing that historic replica brig.
The China Trade
by Crossman and
The Tea Clippers
by McGregor aided my research. Thanks for research by Claudia Jew, museum photographer, and permission of the Mariner’s Museum in Virginia to use the portrait of the Chesapeake built Baltimore clipper brig Golden Age of 1840 for the cover of
China Jewel
.
Pan American’s Ocean Clippers
by Tahow and other sources on the early history of Pan American Airways aided my study of the great ocean flying boats. Turner Classic Movies kindly provided a special research copy of the movie, “China Clipper.” Thanks to Dan Berg’s notes on the “Inshore Schooner Shipwreck” at aquaexplorers.com. Quoted songs are “Tommy” from
On Board the Rocket
, Adams, 1879, “Flying Down to Rio” from RKO Studios, 1933, by Gus Kahn, “Valparaiso” 1996, by Sting, “Boogie Woogie Bugle Boy,” 1941, by Don Raye and Hughie Prince, “The Yankee Doodle Boy,” 1904, by George M. Cohan,” and “Candyman” 2007, by Christina Aquilera, which includes cadence attributed to the United States Marine Corps.
I’m especially grateful also to C. Michael Curtis of the
Atlantic Monthly
and the former Elliott Coleman of the Johns Hopkins University Writing Seminars for their kind encouragement. I extend special appreciation for their time to all those who read and commented on draft copies of the manuscript. Thanks again to hard working editors, and last, but not least, much gratitude to my family for its patience.
Thomas Hollyday, Boston, July 5, 2013
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