The Red Thread (2 page)

‘The dragon is chasing the flaming pearl. It is a good sign. One of the special sights of the Nanyang, the southern seas. Here are the Vermillion Hills, where the red phoenix, bird of peace and wisdom, guards the quadrant. She has brought this ship through its perils.'

The men were reassured; the captain was the man who had saved them from the deadly storm. They were alive; the flaming pearl was the jewel of good luck, the magic granter of all wishes. It meant hope, potential for the new life they were beginning in the fabled Nanyang, a place where their fortunes would be made, the coolie agents at home had assured them. They would be guarded by the gentle phoenix, sovereign of the feathered world, the bird that never dies. The towering ring of fire surrounding the ship told them it was true.

‘Nuts.'

Zhen turned and murmured to his friend. Qian looked at him quizzically.

‘A pretty speech from our admiral, eh? He is a sage.'

Qian shook his head, not understanding. Sometimes Zhen could be infuriatingly cryptic. Zhen smiled.

‘Once there was a monkey keeper handing out nuts. He said to the monkeys, “Three every morning and four every evening.” The monkeys were all in a rage. “All right,” said the keeper. “Four every morning and three every evening.” The monkeys were all delighted. The captain, doubtless unawares, had harmonised with the monkeys' perspective. You see? These coolies are the monkeys. Say the right words, and they will believe anything. Tell 'em we're floating on the elixir of immortality, and they'd all jump overboard.'

Qian smiled, but in his heart he was like the monkey coolies. He wanted to believe that they were secure in the bosom of a benevolent power, not merely drifting like so much flotsam and jetsam on the surface of this ruby sea.

The colours began to change as they pursued the setting sun. The persimmon moon gradually became a saffron moon. Even the captain, with his long experience in the South Seas, had not seen such light. The flying fish that dashed along beside them flashed coral, apricot, peach. When the sun had fallen below the horizon, the sky and sea turned slowly from pale rose to purple; the rising amber moon was now their sole companion, before and aft, lighting both the way back to China and the way forward, to their new home.

Not until the moon was high in the darkened sky did it turn a pearl white and throw its silver light over the sea, bathing the waters around the hull in a pale, translucent glow. The junk slid its two great anchors into the depths. The men from the east had arrived in Si Lat Po.

Zhen and Qian leaned over the rail and gazed at the harbour. All around lay the paper-cut silhouettes of ships. A forest of masts bathed in moonlight spread to the shore. On each craft, the lights of the night watch flickered like fireflies, the dark sea glittering like a starry mirror of the Milky Way. Zhen whispered the words of a long-dead, homesick poet:

‘Athwart the bed

I watch the moonbeams cast a trail,

So bright, so cold, so frail,

That for a space it gleams

Like hoar-frost on the margin of my dreams.

I raise my head

The splendid moon I see,

Then drop my head

And sink to dreams of thee

My homeland, of thee.'

Qian felt tears caught in his throat. Despite his relief at this safe arrival and the flickering beauty of the scene before his eyes, thoughts of his family filled his mind. He said the poem again in his head. This same moon hung like a bright eye over his village, casting its hard, white gaze on a place of walking dead, of decayed and rotten fields, a wasteland where parents abandoned their babies and sold their daughters into slavery for a pittance. He had seen things he could not speak about, monstrous hunger turning men into fiends. He thought of his wasted mother, his desperate brothers, his young, sickly sisters (at least they had not yet been given up) and his father's grave. He thought of how all of them had placed their hope in him, the scholar, and sorrow overwhelmed him.

His reverie was interrupted abruptly by Zhen, who nudged him and pointed to the west.

The billowed white sails of a schooner leapt from the curtain of darkness like a fox spirit from a wood. The burnished prow cut through the dark waters of the roads. His thoughts of home disappeared as they watched this fairy craft approach, drop anchor and lower sails. The watch was set. Between the junk and the schooner a glittering ribbon of silver formed a watery path.

A small figure moved forward to the bowsprit. She had watched as the schooner neared. She had never before seen such a monumental vessel. The heavy carved wood and the thick trunks of the masts made the schooner look plain and puny.

In the glow of the moon it looked unreal, like a dream of wizard's invention, too huge for mortal men. Charlotte raised a finger and traced the outline of the moon with its misty white halo.

A thunderclap of voices erupted from across the water, and she started, becoming suddenly aware of hundreds of eyes turned upon her.

For a brief moment Charlotte froze, then shrank back into the shadows.

From the high deck of the junk, Zhen and Qian stood looking down on the foreign ship. The men pushed and shoved to get a glimpse of this woman who stood so brazenly in the open night. Was she a ghost? A loud murmur went round the ship.

Qian, the smaller of the two men, turned to his companion. ‘Ma Chu, the Sea Goddess; she is like Ma Chu, no? She has appeared at the moment of our safe arrival. She's greeting Ch'ang O, the Moon Goddess.'

Zhen shook his head. ‘No, blockhead, she
is
the Moon Goddess and I am Yi, her husband. She wants to hold me in her tender embrace.'

He stepped up higher onto the ship's rail and, leaning precariously over the edge, threw out his arms. ‘Ch'ang O, my little lady of the moon. I'll come soon darling.'

The words were rough, slang and full of innuendo. The ship erupted in laughter.

From the shadows Charlotte saw the man step into a pool of pale light and hold out his arms towards the schooner. Strange sounds fell on her ear, and she heard the roar of laughter roll over the water. She could just make out his silhouette, and she guessed that this laughter and his gesture were aimed at her. Astonished, she remained in the shadows, watching, until Mr Dawson came suddenly to her side.

Mr Dawson had paid her the most exquisite and pointed attentions since he had come aboard at the Cape. She had learned that he was taking up an appointment with the British and Foreign Bible Society. During his many years in Asia he had tried a handful of professions, but none had served him well. His employers had been difficult and overbearing, his capacities unappreciated. He reckoned that God could not be more difficult than the directors of the East India Company.

Now, Charlotte was much more intensely curious about the junk.

‘Where does it come from, this ship?'

‘China.'

He was from Bristol and pronounced it ‘chainarr'. He waved vaguely to the East. ‘The cargo is human mostly. They are called coolies.'

China? Charlotte knew little about China. It was a mystical land of silk and tea. Her aunt possessed a Chinese bowl covered in designs of charming pagodas, pretty gardens and crooked bridges, exotic birds and graceful ladies with parasols. What did he mean, human cargo?

‘Are they slaves?' she asked.

‘No, but as good as. They are labour for the plantations and tin mines or in the town. For at least a year they must work to pay back their passage. Then they are free, so it is said, but by then most of the wretches are indebted from gambling or addicted to the opium which the bosses sell them. The Chinaman loves these pursuits, you see, and cannot give them up.'

He shrugged. ‘Some make good, I suppose. They say there are merchants richer than royalty who came here with nothing.'

She detected a note of bitterness in his voice.

He looked down at Charlotte. ‘Never fear, you will have little to do with this kind of rabble. We all stay well apart. In Singapore each race has its own living place.'

She feared he might put a comforting hand upon her shoulder. She was, on this occasion, glad of his loquaciousness and interested in the information he had imparted, but she knew he was as addicted to the sound of his own voice as, apparently, Chinamen were to gambling. This fact, added to the sourness of his breath, made conversation with him more a trial than a pleasure. As he was about to continue, she quickly curtsied, thanked him and, wishing him good night, went below.

Charlotte turned uncomfortably in the narrow bunk. The proximity of the Chinese ship seemed to have a physical effect on her; the air was stifling and now, so close, she was anxious to see Robert, who she knew would be waiting for her. Abandoning rest, she found her box of lucifers, lit the candle and took out Robbie's last letter.

Dearest Kitt
,

I have extraordinary but good news. I have been promoted from my position at Johnstone & Co in a most unexpected manner. Actually promotion is hardly a word for what has happened, as I am no longer employed by Mr Johnstone at all. In the absence of a proper police force, the state of affairs in the settlement has been worsening over the past several months, with gang attacks and robberies becoming so frequent that people dare not sleep at night. So much so that the strongest remonstrance was made to the East India Company's officials in Calcutta. The government there has been forced to pay attention to this matter, which they'd much rather ignore. They have grudgingly agreed to the permanent appointment of a head of the police force.

Now, my dearest sister, you must sit down, for have you not guessed it? It is I, your brother, who has been asked to take up this post, to my surprise and, I must say, delight. I had so tired of clerking. I have been told that this unusual step was taken because of the good terms I am on with the mercantile community here, both European and native, and equally because I am not a military man, clanking about in uniform and spurs. Of course, I am also affable and charming, etc., etc
.

The better news is that, while this post is not so well remunerated as I would wish, it comes with a good-sized residence. You are almost nineteen, and your education finished, and so you must come at once to live with me here in Singapore. I have written also to Aunt Jeannie that she is to arrange your passage, to be paid for from father's inheritance. As you know, I will come into this only when I turn twenty-two, but I cannot think there will be any objection. Grandmère will most assuredly be glad to see the back of both of us, though Aunt Jeannie may be saddened. She has been as much a mother to us as she has been allowed, and I am sorry to grieve her. But there is nothing else for it. I fear to wait. Grandmère has been casting around to marry you off to some oaf or other almost since I left. Out here your prospects will be considerably better, for while your looks, as you are aware, are wanting, women of your age are as rare as hens' teeth, and there are plenty of up-and-coming and much better oafs to choose from!

I do not mean to alarm you with talk of gangs and robberies. We shall be entirely safe. Where safer than with the head of the police force! Singapore is a warm and healthy place and now has such elegant buildings, thanks to Mr Coleman's splendid architecture. From the governor's mansion on the hill to the streets of the Chinese town, everything here will delight you. Although our group of
orang putih
(white people) is small, yet we are a jolly band
.

Voyage safely chère soeur
.

Your loving brother, Robert.

A steward had brought some tea. She opened the box with the robe she had kept for this reunion. After the months of this voyage, her other clothes were now practically in tatters. Everything was so difficult on board a ship, in particular
la toilette
. She brushed her hair and began to arrange the yellow ribbons.

Charlotte and her brother had been raised in Madagascar, where her father ran the school and orphanage of the London Missionary Society. When the violence against white men began there, he had sent his children to his mother and sister in Scotland, his homeland. They travelled under the protection of one of the young missionaries, Father Michael, who was carrying reports back to London. He and their mother would follow soon, he had told them. She remembered her parents' faces as she and Robert left those childhood shores: her father stoic, her mother's face streaming with tears, too filled with misery even to wave as their tiny figures became mere specks. They had never seen either parent again. On that journey to Scotland, she and Robbie had at first cried but Robbie, bold young boy that he was, soon came to think of this as an adventure, dogging the crew and climbing about in the rigging. He grew tired of her tears. She thought her heart might shatter. Only the presence of Father Michael, endlessly patient and kind, saved her and gave her some peace.

For a very long time she had been angry at her parents, resentful of her forced exile in this town of granite, her obligatory presence in the cold stone church where she silently cursed the god who had so indifferently robbed her of mother, father, love. Gradually, as she grew up, this feeling had been replaced with sadness and longing for what she and Robbie had missed. She no longer cursed God, for she felt that this meant that she was also cursing her mother and father, and even Michael, who had been her saviour. Though she could not find Him in her heart, she had learned a grudging appreciation for those good souls who did.

Charlotte put down her brush and took a deep breath. Though perilous, this voyage had been happier than that childhood one so long ago. She smiled. Soon she would be with Robbie.

The moon was still dropping from the night sky and the sun sitting below the horizon when Charlotte stepped warily onto the deck and opened her parasol. This, she felt, might accord her some measure of privacy from the eyes on the junk, but it seemed the men were still asleep, as there was no movement. She lowered the parasol. Now she could see what a mighty thing this Chinese ship was. The wood glowed red, redder as the dawn crept up the sky. The bow was a little lower than the stern, which stood fifty feet above the sea. The sails were lowered, but she could see they were a faded vermillion. The stern was square and carved with images she did not understand. Two great eyes adorned either side of the bow. An enormous rectangular keel, honeycombed with holes, hung massively in the smooth water, little eddies forming as the ship swung gently. Two anchors, fixed to the sea floor, kept the ship stationary. Pennants with strange symbols fluttered on its masts. Viewed from such close quarters, the ship was overwhelming, dwarfing the schooner on which she stood.