The Mandate of Heaven (56 page)

Pleased by his own generosity, the Noble Count went so far as to mutter: ‘Who’d have imagined it.’ Though the exact nature of
it
was not explained.

After the presents, Hsiung insisted on taking Teng for a drive in his carriage ‘to see something worth seeing’. During the journey through the small town of Chenglingji neither was sure what to say. Their past, shared and brutally severed, both connected and forced them apart. Perhaps, thought Teng, the Noble Count could not forgive the fact he had once played the role of inferior. When Teng considered the matter, perhaps
he
could not forgive it either, though for opposite – and quite justified – reasons. He asked Hsiung about the capture of Chenglingji and received a glowing account that avoided any reference to a massacre of innocent townsfolk.

Their destination turned out to be the harbour. They stepped onto the wharf and the Noble Count gestured at long lines of shipyards. A large fleet was being constructed by thousands of scurrying labourers, paid for by revenue from the Salt Pans.

‘You will be surprised by my plans,’ he said, ‘perhaps even amazed.’

Teng waited for more. A calculating look crossed Hsiung’s face.

‘I cannot share those plans, even with you.’ His tone suggested pleasure in being the guardian of so important a secret. ‘After the trap that nearly destroyed us in the Salt Pans, only a tiny number share my intentions. It is better that way.’ Hsiung laughed bitterly. ‘I do not mind telling you, Liu Shui even wants me to say nothing to my own concubine! She will be joining us soon, along with two of my spymasters. Then you shall see a fine woman!’

Teng sensed Hsiung had more boasting in mind.

‘From your tone, I divine she is a notable beauty,’ he said, helpfully.

‘Ha! Some might call her divine.’

‘She, at least, cannot be a secret. Surely I have heard of her?’

‘Perhaps,’ chuckled Hsiung, ‘she is an actress from Hou-ming. When she arrives I shall order her to perform for both our pleasures. Ah Teng, how she can sing! When I thought you had died she sang a song all about grief that won my heart.’

Teng had rarely seen Hsiung so voluble, even as a boy, and smiled at the softening of his old companion’s character.

‘That would be an honour,’ he said, bowing. ‘What is her name?’

‘Ying-ge.’

Teng’s expression froze. He struggled to maintain his smile.

‘Ying-ge? An actress, you say?’

‘Yes,’ said Hsiung. ‘Have you heard of her?’

‘No … no …’ said Teng, plucking at his chin. Habits of pride made him a poor liar; fortunately his host was too busy explaining the merits of his new navy to notice.

On the drive back, Hsiung was disappointed when Teng pleaded exhaustion and closed his eyes. The Noble Count even muttered: ‘If I had undergone the same trials as you, Teng, I would have recovered weeks ago!’ Still the feeble scholar did not stir.

Shielded by frailty, Teng’s mind swirled. Ying-ge had betrayed him to Salt Minister Gui, no doubt for a substantial reward. Given Hsiung’s infatuation with her, there were few limits to the mischief she might deploy. His one hope was that Ying-ge did not know the Salt Minister had revealed her treacherous actions. A hope as slender as her waist – and insinuating tongue.

‘That whore, coming here?’ exclaimed Shensi.

‘Speak more quietly,’ urged Teng, ‘I do not wish to join those poor wretches.’

They were on a bench beside the pond, their eyes drawn irresistibly to the bloated, maggot-infested and fly-bound corpses still dangling a little distance away. When the wind changed direction, Teng smelt them in his room and thought the sickly odour a warning to be cautious.

‘The Noble Count serves a noble cause,’ he muttered, ‘but we must take care, Shensi, great care.’

The tomb-finder grunted.

‘I’ll pack everything necessary for a quick escape,’ he said. ‘A man with
cash
and supplies could hide in the hill country behind Chenglingji until his beard turned grey.’

With that he left, looking round to check he was not followed.

Later that day, Teng found himself picnicking with the Noble Count at a beauty spot inland from Chenglingji, where waterfalls converged to form a deep pool in a rocky valley. Blessed by every kind of natural beauty, it was the kind of place gentleman-scholars painted and praised in verse.

Their picnic consisted of forty separate dishes, many heated on charcoal braziers: spiced fish, shreds of peppered beef and snow peas, frogs legs sautéed in copper pans and served with sesame seed biscuits. A small orchestra provided fitting harmonies to complement the ceaseless, eternal music of the waterfalls. Though Teng’s fingers were still stiff from labouring in the Salt Pans, he was persuaded by Liu Shui to play a patriotic tune from the former dynasty on the lute. Though unexceptional, his performance was applauded loudly by all present, especially the Noble Count.

‘Ah,’ he said, ‘how I remember the hours you spent practising that damned instrument when we were boys! You did not know it, but I often slipped into the city to see what fun could be had for far less effort!’

His Highness was drunk enough for a little indiscretion. Chancellor Liu Shui bowed. ‘I believe Honourable Deng Teng has a deep wish for you to show him the waterfalls,’ he murmured.

Teng looked up in surprise. He had expressed no such wish.

‘Why not!’ declared Hsiung. ‘I need to walk off that dinner. Follow me, Teng!’

They climbed into a grove of pines and followed a winding path littered with ancient, worked flints – proof that men long vanished had used this place. Summer’s small birds were plentiful and inclined to sing. Trills and warbles echoed round the wood. Soon they reached the very brink of a waterfall where it fell to join the pond below, flowing between two breast-shaped boulders.

In the distance lay the rooftops and smoke plumes of Chenglingji, framed by the sparkling blue waters of the lake. Teng tried to stare beyond the horizon all the way to Hou-ming.

Reviving strength left him eager to return. Firstly to discover if his ailing father was still alive. If so, arrangements for his care must be set in motion without delay.

Just as urgently, he longed to meet Yun Shu and renew their last, lost conversation. Teng could no longer evade his desires. Yet returning to Hou-ming without knowledge of the situation in the city would most likely end in his arrest.

Thus it was uncanny when Hsiung answered his thoughts: ‘I’m glad we have a chance to speak alone,’ he said, ‘I have firm news concerning your father.’

Teng stirred from his reveries.

‘It is good news,’ added Hsiung.

Agents had witnessed the old scholar being maintained as an invalid in Cloud Abode Monastery and treated with great honour. ‘You can thank our old playmate, Yun Shu, for that,’ he said. ‘Doesn’t that seem strange? When I told Liu Shui he said that I was pine, you were bamboo, and she was the plum tree. Does that make sense to you?’

Teng nodded. ‘I often think of those years when we three played together. Do you remember our old home fondly? I cannot believe it has been reduced to ashes.’

Was that a flicker of annoyance he detected in Hsiung’s face? Or some other emotion? Perhaps now was the time to address the past with integrity. The alternative was endless evasion.

‘Hsiung,’ he said, ‘you have grown into a great man who does much good for the people he rules. Maybe my father’s influence helped in that. Despite the awkwardness of our previous stations in life, I hope you remember Deng Mansions fondly.’

Hsiung cast a sideways glance at Teng. ‘You have no idea how fondly.’ Tears started to his eyes. ‘I remember Deng Nan-shi as the model of a learned gentleman.’

Teng, too, found himself weeping. As long held-back tears often will, they led to laughter and recollections of hilarious scrapes in the ruins of Monkey Hat Hill. By the time the two men returned to the pond for more wine, they were side by side, shoulders close together, a detail Liu Shui acknowledged with his broadest smile.

Later, as they rode back through the twilit countryside in a large carriage, accompanied by dozens of cavalry, Liu Shui spoke of the relics of Yueh Fei that had been stolen when the library of the Dengs was looted by Salt Minister Gui.

‘How I regret not punishing that man when I had him in my power,’ mused Hsiung. ‘He should have burned alive, just as he burned Deng Mansions.’

‘Not all the relics of my ancestor were lost,’ said Teng from his corner of the carriage. ‘Although it is a trifle, I gave a scroll written by my great ancestor to Abbess Yun Shu of Cloud Abode Monastery. It granted the ownership of a valley in the distant west to her own ancestors, the Yun clan. So something remains.’

Liu Shui grew thoughtful. ‘The fact that it alone was preserved is surely significant.’

Near Chenglingji he resumed the topic. ‘The cause of Yueh Fei would be strengthened if we recovered those documents and relics. Perhaps it is a duty for you, Honourable Deng Teng, as the great man’s only youthful descendent. Besides, I am sure you are anxious to return to Hou-ming to help your father.’

‘You read my wishes exactly,’ said Teng.

He dared not add that part of his eagerness stemmed from Ying-ge’s imminent arrival.

‘I can offer you a bodyguard,’ said Hsiung. ‘Perhaps even the protection of my two Spymasters who are in and out of Hou-ming on my business.’

‘Noble Count, I ask only for my friend Shensi,’ said Teng.

The carriage passed through the town gates and as the gentlemen parted for the night, Hsiung said in a puzzled, wine-softened voice: ‘Do you know, Teng, for years I feared you would grow into a foolish prig. You’ve proved me wrong. And I’m glad.’

With that he strode to his wing of the mansion.

For the next two weeks Teng often found himself in the Noble Count’s company. Not a day passed without a meeting over dinner or visit to a pleasure spot or merely to drink tea and wine in the cool of evening. Though long silences were common between them, they were of the companionable sort.

Teng grew accustomed to Hsiung’s brooding and often wondered what was passing through his mind. He sensed dark thoughts, if the contraction of the Noble Count’s brow and disturbingly intense expression were clues. Sometimes Hsiung would squeeze his bunched fists until the knuckles whitened, prompted by inner tensions he never shared with Teng. The latter gentleman was glad to be spared.

One hot, long afternoon in early summer while Hsiung was drilling his army before the walls of Chenglingji and practising attacks by siege towers, ladders, covered ramps-on-wheels, Teng sat in the garden of the Noble Count’s residence. Only the Zhongs’ skin and bones remained, still dangling, still objects of interest to flies. He found himself composing a song in his head and sent a servant for ink, paper and brush. Instead the boy returned with a rotund, huffing figure.

Teng’s respectful bow to Chancellor Liu Shui was matched equally.

‘Honourable Deng Teng,’ said Liu Shui, ‘may I claim an interview?’

Again Teng bowed. ‘That would be an honour beyond my expectation.’

The fat man took a seat beside him on the stone bench. Both examined the floating water lilies for a while.

‘We have been greatly pleased to note your companionship with His Highness,’ remarked Liu Shui.

‘The pleasure has been entirely my own,’ said Teng, ‘as has the honour.’

The Chancellor nodded gravely.

‘As a scholarly gentleman you will realise, of course,’ he said, ‘that the Mandate of Heaven has already been lost by the Mongol Yuan Dynasty – assuming they ever really gained it.’

‘Of course,’ said Teng.

‘This is the hour for righteous men, however humble, to be chosen by Heaven as saviours of the people.’

‘There are countless examples,’ agreed Teng. He went on to mention several from numerous dynasties.

‘Yet no ruler, however strong in battle,’ said the Chancellor, ‘prospers without benign government for the people. Otherwise he is little better than a bandit.’

‘Yes,’ said Teng, more warily. The wily old scholar-official was clearly preparing for something.

‘That is why,’ said Liu Shui, ‘we are greatly pleased by your influence on His Highness. My agents report that other influences – I may say, less favourable ones – are drawing near. For the sake of your noble father and the cause your entire family perished to defend, perhaps you might be persuaded to stay in Chenglingji until the autumn?’