The Indigo Pheasant: Volume Two of Longing for Yount: 2 (35 page)

The Cook, her niece, and Mei-Hua sorted through the great fruit and vegetable market at Spitalfields, and the specialty food shops in Soho and around Covent Garden, to uncover rough equivalents for at least some of the many items a proper Chinese feast required. Winstanley had East India Company officers supply seldom-seen spices from their personal stores. He also procured from the EIC’s warehouses the very best, hill-grown, carefully cured and tatched teas:
campoi congou
and the single-culled
lap tay souchong
, fragrant
tien hung hyson
and
khee kee hyson
, the
chulan hyson
so rarely found in Great Britain or anywhere in Europe. Noodles—a necessity for the Spring Festival—were particularly problematic. After much persuasion, Mei-Hua accepted as a plausible substitute the vermicelli used by the Italians who ran the restaurant at La Sablonière in Leicester Square. Likewise, they were forced to borrow bowls and pans for deep-frying from the Hindostanee Coffee House in Portman Square.

So it came to pass that two dozen people sat down together, packed very cozily into the house on Mincing Lane, on Chinese New Year’s Eve. Sanford and Tang Guozhi found they had much in common: an interest in strategic budget-making and in military history, a stringent code for living that still allowed for fine dining and feasts. Barnabas wanted to know from Shaozu how and where smilax was grown in China. Mr. Fletcher and Billy Sea-Hen were there (along with male and female members of the variegated Sea-Hen congregation), seated with the Cook and her niece. Dorentius and Mr. Gandy sat next to Sally and Maggie. Winstanley brought his fiancee, a Miss Bascombe from Sussex—who took an instant, and quickly reciprocated, liking to Mei-Hua. Red bunting hung from walls and adorned window-frames. Wine flowed freely. (Tang Guozhi, missing the fiery fortified wines of his homeland, after several rounds of toasts nonetheless pronounced the Burgundies quite good, agreeing with Barnabas’s assertion that these were “nourishing, theological, and able to hold death at bay,” and soon became just as enamoured of the Cahors as Barnabas was). Everyone praised the inventive, hardy and delicious meal, all the more so for its hybrid origins. Much gaiety ensued over multilateral mistranslations and meanings construed awry. Everyone fed Isaak scraps under the table, and to Yikes by the fireplace. Songs were sung (some accompanied by Charicules), toasts exchanged, ancestors and missing friends remembered (Barnabas broke down in tears when he led a toast for Tom and Afsana, provoking a round of explanations for the Chinese), the concept of Family held up to honour by all.

Mei-Hua felt at home for the first time since arriving in the West. The evening’s conviviality appeased momentarily her direction-less yearning. She wanted Maggie to reassure her that the warmth she felt was not illusory or fleeting. She was relieved to see that Sally seemed happy, or at least a little less sad. Yet Mei-Hua too felt sadness gnawing at the edges of her new-found mirth, a snake’s venom curdling the sap in the roots of a new-flowered tree.

“This good moment is marred by my knowledge that everyone here must leave all too soon for far-distant lands,” Mei-Hua thought, paraphrasing a famous poem by Li Qingzhao, who had also hailed from Tsinan Fu more than seven centuries earlier. “Will the blossoming pear-tree entice us to stay, now that the raspberries have all withered?”

She remembered that Li Qingzhao, bereft of her dear husband and exiled by an invading army, had spent the last decades of her life alone and wandering. With effort, Mei-Hua pushed all melancholy thoughts from her mind and re-joined the feast.

The evening ended well past midnight. Maggie pulled a sleepy Mei-Hua aside as the Chinese made ready to return to Devereux Court. Maggie hugged her.

“Little sister,” said Maggie. “Little eagle. I wish you all good fortune, and am glad you have come to us.”

Mei-Hua hugged Maggie in return.

“Me too,” said Mei-Hua, tears in her eyes.

“Good night then,” said Maggie. “Oh, and one final thing before I forget. Your monthly visitor? You know what I mean, yes I see you do. You can always talk to me about that. The Cook and her niece are good ears as well. We will help you with the necessaries for it, ‘just never you worry,’ as Cook says. Good night again, little one.”

Mei-Hua felt at home for the first time since coming to London.

“Would you make a slave of me again?” said Maggie to Sir John on the Tuesday morning two weeks after the feast of the Chinese New Year. Sir John had called her to this meeting, and sent a marine sergeant to Mincing Lane to force her attendance.

They sat in the small conference room (the so-called Green Baize Room) just off the Old Sales Room at East India Company House on Leadenhall Street. On the walls hung colourful prints of the EIC forts at Tellicherry, Bombay and Madras, along with portraits of Clive, Cornwallis and Sir Eyre Coote, besides a random selection of sextants and other nautical instruments. Over the mantlepiece a clock stood on very curious brackets.

Two EIC clerks sat to one side of Sir John, his personal secretary on the other.

“Do not bait me, girl. I stood with Wilberforce and am committed to abolition,” said Sir John, in tones laminated with exasperation. “You know yourself to be a subject of His Majesty—no more, no less than I am—and thus no slave, but free.”

Maggie crossed her arms, as she sat alone on the other side of the table, and raised one eyebrow. Sir John glared back. He dismissed the two clerks and his secretary.

“As we are alone now, I shall speak as frankly as nature and my spirit can possibly allow,” he said. “You are, Miss Collins, the most vexatious, captious, and irritating person I have met in a very long time. You are also the most intriguing, unique, and arresting individual that Fortune has cast into my path. No, do not respond—I do not wish to hear your insights, insinuations, or imprecations just now. You will listen . . .”

He proceeded to tell Maggie that she must and would follow all his instructions regarding the outfitting, governance and command of the
Indigo Pheasant
—now that His Majesty’s government effectively owned the ship and fully controlled its mission.

“The Crown has seen fit to preclude and preempt any further claims for extrinsic ownership over either the ship or any part of its equipment and machinery, and has vested all rights unto itself in essence, kind, and usufruct,” said Sir John, in a judge’s tone. “As a point of commercial and contractual law, the Crown is the majority owner. The Crown has also invoked its ancient allodial rights of purveyance, requisition for the benefit of the commonwealth, and enprisement. One consequence of these actions is that the Lord-Chancellor has refused the petitions for patent put forth by Sarah McLeish. Of course we are not surprised to learn that the lawyer Sedgewick—admittedly once an agent of ours, now becoming a minor irritant—has filed a suit of protest and counter-claim at Chancery. We have no qualms in asserting that this suit will never succeed, going the way of a
Jarndyce
case at best.”

Maggie shrugged slightly and blinked. Not having been party to the patent application, she was little inconvenienced or perplexed. She was instead amazed at how quickly and mechanically Sir John could speak when he discussed judicial matters. She wondered if the Law itself had descended from whatever high throne it sat upon and had at that moment made of Sir John an automaton for its pronouncements.

Maggie was relieved when Sir John’s voice resumed its more human timbre—but she became alarmed at the content of his speech as it became clear that his next declarations concerned her directly. His voice rose and his eyes shone as he described the power of the steam engine and the sleekness of the hull.

“Forgive me,” said Maggie (having to remind herself to add “Sir John”). “I embrace the mission the vessel represents but I cannot share your unbridled enthusiasm for the instrument itself. Ships may be your pride and the King’s glory, but they have a rather different meaning for my people. Seeing them arrive off the coast at Whydah or Elmina or the French Goree, well sir, they arouse very different emotions there than the ones you express here.”

Sir John saw her for the first time.

“Your candour deserves mine, sir,” Maggie continued. “At times I fail to subscribe to the particulars of the mission I myself have helped to instigate and that I will lead. Meaning only that I am pledged to sail thousands of miles—clear into another world (yes, Sir John, let us speak plainly)—to cure an ill that rages still unchecked in this, our own world. Why should I do this, when the evil is unabated in the very land of my birth?”

Sir John had no answer for Maggie.

“Would that His Majesty sent a fleet of
Indigo Pheasants
to Jamaica or to South Carolina,” said Maggie.

The clock on its bizarre brackets ticked and tocked in the ensuing silence.

“I cannot disagree with you, Miss Collins,” said Sir John at last. “Despite what you may think, and all appearances notwithstanding, my own power in this matter has its limits. I can share your wishes, but lack the influence to effect them. Perhaps the
Indigo Pheasant
’s immediate objective is but the first sally in this much wider struggle. There are deep and abiding interests working against the
Pheasant
, as well you know.”

They talked for another hour. They shared what they knew about Yount and the Owl; Sir John stressed that knowledge of these matters was a Secret of State, and commanded her to maintaining the secrecy. Maggie, while understanding the need for the utmost discretion about Yount and Strix (and having neither a history of nor a propensity to casual conversation about such things), resisted most mightily the concept of being commanded to do anything. They each tried to bend the other to his or her will, neither able to secure the advantage. If the clock had been able to, it could have written an epic based on the battle between Sir John and Maggie Collins: Apollo versus Diana, hoary Jupiter trying to out-debate Minerva, the old tortoise versus the yam-queen.

“You tax me out of all countenance, Miss Collins,” said Sir John. “Cannot you see that I am under the very injunction that I place upon you, that the canopy of constraint covers us both for mutual benefit?”

Eventually, the two declared a truce of sorts. Sir John tried to impress upon Maggie the importance of the United Kingdom acquiring Yount as a protectate or trusteeship, if not an outright colony, to eradicate the very evil she spoke of and to protect the Yountians from further encroachments upon their liberty. Maggie remained unconvinced, saying that she would not be party to such machinations and that her willingness to continue depended on Sir John guaranteeing Yountians their own voice in deciding their future. Sir John agreed, while hedging his agreement in a thicket of conditions and caveats.

They spoke of the strategems necessary to defeat the Owl, their common enemy. Sir John listened with ever-expanding interest to the intricacies of the mathematics involved in fulgination, requesting (he was careful not to command) a memorandum on that topic. He wanted to know whatever Maggie could tell him about Dorentius Bunce, and especially about Xie Mei-Hua. Maggie said a little about Dorentius and protected Mei-Hua from Sir John’s investigation. Sir John skirted the issue of the McDoons’ near-bankruptcy and told Maggie nothing about the Admiralty’s dealings with James Kidlington and the lawyer Sedgewick.

Another hour passed.

“What can you tell me about the itinerant preacher who associates with the McDoons, this Billy Sea-Hen who has stirred up so much controversy?” asked Sir John.

“Not much,” said Maggie, instantly wary. “And, if I could, I doubt that you would expect me to spy for you.”

“No, no,” said Sir John, repressing a snort of anger. “I only mean that I get the strangest reports about the Sea-Henners or whatever this canaille calls itself. Tied up with the Yount business, I am sure of it.”

“This much I will say,” replied Maggie. “Billy Sea-Hen is as staunch a foe of the Owl and the Others as any man alive. You can have no concern in that quarter.”

“Perhaps,” said Sir John. “But he is affiliated in our files with a most peculiar person who once resided in London, now seemingly vanished. A sort of mountebank they called The Cretched Man. Who in turn had some sort of ties to the Owl itself, though our records are scanty on these points.”

Another half-hour passed. Sir John’s secretary knocked on the door and, in response to a barked “enter,” timidly said that they were already late for another meeting at the Admiralty.

“Before you go, Sir John, I must ask you: are you a musical man?” said Maggie.

Sir John said, “Beruthiel’s cats, that is the most eccentric question you have asked in a conversation filled with eccentric themes. Not that it can have much bearing on anything we have discussed but, yes, as it happens, I have some modest talent in the musical way. A little scraping on the viola da gamba: Telemann, Lully, though the youngsters find them old-fashioned and silly these days. Why, I even played once with Lucky Jack and Stephen Maturin, in Portsmouth.”