The Empire Trilogy (112 page)

Matthew and Joan … they might almost had been designed for each other. What a shame! As it happened, neither Walter nor the rest of his family, except for his younger daughter, Kate, had set eyes on Matthew although they, too, had made occasional visits to England. Matthew and Walter's son, Monty, were roughly the same age, yet when Monty had been at school in England Matthew had not joined him … he had been sent to school in Switzerland, or in Sweden, or in some other country. For, Walter recalled, gazing sadly at the portrait of his former partner, in the smooth and otherwise flawless edifice which Mr Webb had constructed around himself in preparation for a dignified and comfortable old age, a single nasty crack had appeared.

Old Mr Webb, although his faculties had remained unimpaired in most respects, had been assailed by certain progressive ideas about diet and education and Matthew had been brought up in accordance with them. This was surely a tragedy worthy of that… what was his name? … that French blighter … yes, Balzac, that was it. The most progressive of all the schools Matthew had been sent to, so Walter had heard, had taken co-education to the limit of allowing no distinction whatsoever to be made between the sexes. Children were known simply by the title ‘Citizen' and a surname. Boys and girls alike wore the same baggy, flowing pantaloons and bullfighter jackets. They swam naked together in the swimming pool, had their hair cropped to a similar length, played the same noncompetitive games, and were allowed to unroll their sleeping mats in whichever dormitory they pleased provided it was not in the same one two nights running.

This was undoubtedly the most extreme of several private schools which Matthew had attended. The others had probably specialized in nothing more extreme than vegetarianism and some form of non-coercive teaching. Yet the thought of these schools still haunted Walter to this day. He had done his best to remonstrate, mind you, but the old man was obstinate and had shown himself ready to take offence. The matter had had to be dropped. But what all these schools had done to young Matthew, Walter could only wonder. It seemed to him pathetic beyond words that this old gentleman, whose own life had been an example of rectitude, hard work and self-discipline, should have succumbed to such an array of peculiar and debilitating theories, the very opposite of everything that he himself had stood for.

Only too glad would Walter have been if events had proved him wrong, if the fatal vegetarian flaw had not brought about the tragedy he feared. But this was not to be. One of Mr Webb's visits to England had coincided with the General Strike of 1926. Matthew had been a student at Oxford at the time. While his fellow undergraduates had poured cheerfully out of their colleges to lend a hand in breaking the strike Matthew had skulked in his room ‘sporting his oak' (Walter understood this to be university jargon for ‘keeping his door shut'). Despite the shut door Mr Webb had argued with his son. Very likely the word ‘patriotism' had been mentioned.

Walter had received no first-hand account of the meeting but somehow he pictured Mr Webb standing on the lawn of Brasenose College holding up fistfuls of white hair to the icy wind that howled through the quad, while dismal dons, looking up from their books, surveyed this representative of suffering humanity with distaste from leaded casements. He understood that after wandering about for a day or two the old chap had offered his own services as a tram-conductor. They had been refused, of course. No matter how enthusiastic he might be, for the serious business of collecting fares and clubbing trouble-makers off the rear platform he was much too frail. He had retired to Singapore then, having watched the strike collapse without his son's assistance.

At one time it had been understood that Matthew would take his place in the firm one day. But after 1926 this was no longer discussed. Matthew's mother had died suddenly in 1930 and Matthew himself had seldom been mentioned after that. He was known to be living in Geneva where he had some job connected with the League of Nations. And that, reflected Walter, given the poor boy's peculiar education, is about what one might have expected! Old Mr Webb was still alive, by the way, and on certain social occasions he could still be seen in Walter's garden or drawing-room, looking no less upright and dignified than the old gentleman in the portrait which Walter had just been contemplating. ‘Matthew and Joan … what a shame indeed. It would have suited the firm nicely.' And with a sigh Walter went to look for his wife who had retired to her room with a pencil and a piece of paper, determined to break the code in which Joan had taken to writing her diary.

Never in her life had Mrs Blackett subjected herself to such mental effort as she did during the next few days in her attempt to make sense of those mysteriously jumbled letters. She tried everything she could think of, she pummelled her brain with one theory after another, she covered the floor of her bedroom with crumpled pieces of paper, she grew thin and haggard, but still without result. At last, however, as she sat defeated in front of her dressing-table gazing at her hollow-eyed reflection and still with a line of Joan's fiendish code gripped in her fingers, chance came to her rescue: she dropped her eyes to the reflection of the paper and found that she could read it without difficulty! It was the simplest of all codes used by children: mirror-writing. She searched feverishly for the other coded sentences she had copied from Joan's diary and held them to the mirror, her lips working … There was a knock on the door and Walter came in, looking sombre.

‘He's not a Hungarian!' cried Mrs Blackett. ‘He's a …'

‘A Brazilian, I know. It's even worse.'

‘Walter, how do you know?'

‘I just asked Joan. What's more, I have a feeling that this time it may be more serious.'

Walter was beginning to think that although difficulties of this sort were in the natural order of things and were such as any family with growing daughters has to expect, a Brazilian was going a tiny bit too far. Weary of his wife's efforts to break Joan's code he had decided to approach his daughter directly. Joan had replied without hesitation that the object of her affections was a secretary at the Brazilian Legation in Peking who had come to visit Singapore for an extended holiday. They would probably be married in a year or two in Rio de Janeiro, once she had had time to become a Catholic. Although his family did not have much money (they were rather hard up, actually), they were direct descendents of King Alfonso or someone of Spain, or was it Portugal? She was glad that Walter had brought the matter up because she had been on the point of asking whether she could invite Carlos to tea. Oh yes, and if Walter did not mind, it might be best not to show him all the paintings of Rangoon, at least to begin with, until they all knew each other better.

This was serious, undoubtedly. But Walter did not lose his nerve. He knew Joan to have an obstinate streak in her and had quickly decided, in spite of the danger, that the best policy would be to continue as before, counting on her good sense. He believed that given time she would perceive that an impoverished Brazilian was out of the question. Still, this talk of marriage was disquieting. He replied guardedly that he saw no reason why Carlos should not come to tea. In return Joan gave him a kiss.

Carlos, it turned out, wore a monocle, affecting to be a British gentleman. Over tea (this time it was Mrs Blackett's turn to remain tight-lipped and sullen) Carlos explained to Walter that in the Brazilian Legation in Peking there had been nothing whatsoever to do … nobody there did any work, not a bit, not an ounce, not a scrap! And he uttered a high, bleating laugh, also modelled on that of a British gentleman. One reason nobody did any work in Peking was because the Chinese Government was not there, nowhere near! The blessed thing was miles away in Nanking! In any case, the Chinese and Brazilian governments had nothing whatever to say to each other, not a blessed word! No Brazilian had been near China for centuries! So what could a chap do? he enquired, failing to notice the unfortunate impression he was producing on Walter. What could a chap do but spend his entire day in riding-breeches or tennis flannels and his evenings dancing on the roof of the Grand Hôtel de Pékin? ‘A poor show, actually,' he added regretfully, somewhat to Walter's surprise. After a long silence he dropped his monocle glumly into his handkerchief and began to polish. Walter had agreed with his last remark. He glanced quickly at Joan but her face was impassive and he could not tell what she was thinking.

Carlos cleared his throat. Sometimes, when they needed a change from Peking, they would go on leave to Shanghai. He brightened a little. Did Walter know that the Lambeth Walk was now all the rage in Shanghai's nightclubs?

Once he had met Carlos, Walter was reassured. Joan, a sensible girl who knew how important her eventual marriage would be both to herself and to her father's business, could not fail to see how thoroughly impossible he was. Walter was amazed, indeed, that she should have been able to put up with him for a day, let alone a week. But somehow she seemed able to manage it and, presently, the week became several weeks. As time went on, Walter's confidence diminished. He had almost decided to use his parental authority to put a stop to the liaison when he happened to mention the matter to a French friend, a certain François Dupigny, who was passing through Singapore at the time. Dupigny, to whom he had applied for information about the young man's background in the hope of uncovering something discreditable, exercised some important function in the Indo-Chinese Government on behalf of the French Colonial Ministry; he was unusually well-connected in the Far East and had an ear for gossip.

Although, as it turned out, Dupigny knew nothing at all about Carlos he threw up his hands in dismay at Walter's idea that the two young people should be prevented from seeing each other. On the contrary, he declared, nothing could be worse for Walter's cause! The lovers should be not only permitted but
obliged
to spend as much time in each other's company as decorum and chastity allowed. In such circumstances nothing could be better guaranteed to pour icy water over the passion of one young person than intimate acquaintance with the other!

Walter was taken aback by this cynical view, though there might be a grain of truth in it, he had to admit. In all probability, however, he would not have adopted such an unconventional approach to his difficulty had not Joan, at that very moment, asked for permission to visit Shanghai for a holiday in the company of Carlos … and, of course, of her mother who would have to be persuaded to act as chaperon. Joan naturally expected a refusal and, seeing him hesitate, began to show signs of indignation and rebellion. But Walter's hesitation was less concerned with Carlos than with the political situation in Shanghai and in China generally. He recalled the trouble there had been there in 1932, of which he had been given a vivid description by the manager of Blackett and Webb's Shanghai branch. The curious scene which he had evoked had for some reason remained in Walter's mind: a chilly night in January, the booming chimes of the Custom House clock dying away into silence over the rainswept city, and then the sudden rattle of rifle and machine gun fire.

As was usually the case with these China ‘incidents' the rights and wrongs of the affair had been thickly cloaked in ambiguity. All that one could say for certain was that soon after eleven p.m. an armed contingent of the Japanese Naval Landing Party led by men carrying flaming torches had crossed the border from the International Settlement into Chapei. They had been greeted with a hail of bullets by the bitterly anti-Japanese, anti-foreign, pro-revolutionary Nineteenth Route Army: in no time the streets around the North Station had been littered with dead Japanese Marines. The Japanese had not thought to switch out the streetlights and, with the brilliantly lit International Settlement behind them, had made an easy target for the Chinese in the darkness of Chapei. And since the North Szechuan Road between the Post Office and North Honan Road had remained illuminated and the sound of gunfire could be heard all over the Foreign Concession area, presently taxis and private motor-cars began to arrive loaded with Europeans and Americans in evening-dress who had stopped by on their way from theatres, restaurants and dinner-parties to see the fun. In a few minutes a cheerful, chattering crowd had gathered, champagne was being sipped and neighbouring cafe proprietors had been roused to supply hot coffee and sandwiches. The general view of this good-humoured, after-theatre audience was that the good old Japs were saving Britain, France and America the trouble of teaching the Chinese a lesson. For undoubtedly the Chinese, with their growing ‘anti-foreign' and nationalistic feeling, had been getting too big for their boots. Allow them to continue in this direction and it would not be too long before the various commercial and legal privileges enjoyed by the Great Powers in China would be at an end.

Walter, still hesitating, reflected that the ‘anti-foreign' feeling in China had not diminished and could still be a source of trouble. On the other hand, it was now mainly concentrated on the Japanese, who thus acted as a lightning-conductor for Europeans and Americans. This spring (of 1937) had been relatively quiet, apart from reports of increased Japanese troop movements in Manchuria. Besides, the various garrisons of the Foreign Concessions had been greatly strengthened and the Chinese were so busy fighting among themselves that the threat to Shanghai appeared negligible.

‘I see no reason why you shouldn't go,' Walter said calmly, ‘provided you don't do anything foolish.' And then, though not without misgivings, he settled down to await developments. He was beginning to realize that the marriage of a daughter to the right sort of young man is a matter to which a great deal of attention must be given, whether you like it or not.

‘But don't you see, Papa dear,' said Joan, reclining on her bed in her underwear and luxuriating in the draught of the fan directly above her, ‘how it could come as a shock to a nicely brought-up girl like me who has always been either at home or at school. It was
absolutely
shocking, I mean, and Mama was quite as taken aback as I was, at least she turned as white as milk and I thought she was going to faint. Her eyes got a funny look in them and even Carlos, in his absurd British clothes, looked a bit shaken. Actually, it was a good job Carlos was there because although I don't think he'd seen much of the rougher side of life either, at least his presence was reassuring. He was a
man
, at any rate, even though I know you think he's a bit ridiculous, and his clothes, a tweed suit I think it was, did tremendously inspire confidence. Anyway, without him and his tweeds and his monocle I'm quite sure that Mama would have fainted and think what problems that might have caused in the middle of I think it was called Hongkew and Mama already complaining that she was worn out because we had spent most of the afternoon trailing around the Japanese part looking for this wretched silk shop and being sent on one wild-goose chase after another and it would soon be getting dark and she wanted to get back to Bubbling Well Road where she felt safer and, anyway, I should have felt distinctly uncomfortable, particularly as all the rickshaw coolies vanished the moment they saw there was going to be trouble with Japanese soldiers arriving and, trust him! Carlos had told his chauffeur to pick us up not there, but two or three streets away. By the way, have I shown you the remains of my blisters?