"Mine come from the north of England, Northumberland, for generations," Sir William said absently, his eyes on the approaching headland, his mind on the Bakufu. "My father died when I was young--he was a Member of Parliament, with business interests in Sunderland and London, and dealt in the Baltic trade and Russian furs. My mother was Russian so I grew up bilingual and that got me on the first rung of the F.o. She was..." He caught himself just in time, astonished that he had volunteered so much.
He had been going to add that she, his mother, was born the Countess Sveva, a cousin to the Romanovs, that she was still alive and once had been a lady-in-waiting to Queen Victoria. I must really concentrate--as if my family and background was any of their business. "Er, what about you, Tyrer?"
"London, sir. Father's a solicitor, like his father." Phillip Tyrer laughed. "After I got my degree at London University and told him I wanted to join the Foreign Office he almost had a fit! And when I applied to become an interpreter in Japan he told me I'd gone mad."
"Perhaps he was right, you're damned lucky to be alive and you're hardly here a week. Don't you agree, Marlowe?"
"Yes sir. That's true." Marlowe thought the time apt. "Phillip. By the way, how is Mr.Struan?"
"Neither good nor bad was how George Babcott put it."
"I certainly hope he recovers," Sir William said, a sudden ache in his bowels.
When he had gone to Kanagawa three days ago, Marlowe had met his cutter and told him what he knew about Struan and Tyrer, about losing the soldier, the suicide of the assassin, and chasing the other one.
"We charged after the bugger, Sir William, Pallidar and I, but the man had just vanished.
We combed the surrounding houses but nothing. Tyrer thinks they might be the two Tokaido attackers, sir, the murderers. But he's not sure, most of them look alike, don't they?"' "But if they were the two, why should they risk going to the Legation?"' "The best we could come up with was perhaps to prevent identification and to finish the job, sir."
They had left the wharf and hurried through the ominously deserted streets. "What about the girl, Mr. Marlowe?"' "Seems to be fine, sir. Just shaken."
"Good, thank God for that, the French Minister is wound up as tight as a gnat's bum about the "vile insult to honor of France and one of his nationals who is also his ward." The sooner she's back in Yokohama the better--oh by the way, the Admiral asked me to tell you to return to Yokohama at once. There's a lot to do.
We, er, we've decided to pay Yedo a formal visit in three days, by flagship..."
Marlowe had felt his excitement explode.
Sea or land engagements were the only real way to quick promotion and to the Admiral's bars he would have at all costs. I'll make the Old Man proud of me, and get Flag Rank long before Charles and Percy, his two younger brothers, both Lieutenants.
And now on the deck of the flagship, the sun good, the deck throbbing with the power of the engines, his excitement welled up again. "We'll be off Yedo before you know it, sir, your entrance will be the biggest that's ever been, you'll get the murderers, indemnity and anything else you want."
Both Tyrer and Sir William had heard the excitement, but Sir William only felt chilled. "Yes, well, I think I'll go below for a minute, no thank you, Mr. Marlowe, I know the way."
With great relief, the two young men watched him go. Marlowe checked that the Admiral was within sight. "What happened at Kanagawa after I left, Phillip?"
"It was, well, extraordinary, she was extraordinary, if that's what you were asking."
"How so?"
"About five o'clock she came down and went straight to see Malcolm Struan and stayed with him until dinner--that's when I saw her. She seemed... seemed older, no, that's not quite right either, not older but more serious than before, mechanical. George says she's still in some form of shock. During dinner Sir William said he'd take her back with him to Yokohama but she just thanked him and refused, said she'd first have to make sure Malcolm was all right, and neither he nor George nor any of us could persuade her otherwise. She hardly ate anything and went back to his sickroom, stayed with him and even insisted on having a cot made up there so she could be within call if need be. In fact, for the next two days, until yesterday when I went back to Yokohama, she hardly left his side and we barely spoke a dozen words to her."
Marlowe covered a sigh. "She must love him."
"That's the strange part. Neither Pallidar or I think that's the reason. It's almost as though she's... well disembodied is too strong a word. It's more like she's partially in a dream and that being with him is safe."
"Christ! What did Sawbones say?"
"He just shrugged and said to be patient, not to worry, and that she was the best tonic Malcolm Struan could have."
"I can imagine. How is he, really?"
"Drugged most of the time, lot of pain, lot of vomit and loose bowels--don't know how she stands the smell though the window's open all the time." Fear washed over both of them at the thought of being so wounded and so helpless. Tyrer glanced ahead, to hide, still deeply conscious that his own wound had not yet healed, knowing it could still rot, and that his sleep had been nightmared with samurai and bleeding swords and her.
"Every time I popped by to see Malcolm--and to be honest to see her," he continued, "she just answered me with "yes, no or I don't know," so after a while I gave up. She's, she's still as attractive as ever."
Marlowe wondered: if Struan wasn't around was she truly out of reach? How serious a rival could Tyrer be? Pallidar he dismissed as not in the same league--she couldn't like that pompous bugger.
"My word, look!" Tyrer said.
They were rounding the headland and they saw the vast Bay of Yedo before them, open sea to starboard, smoke from cooking fires of the sprawling city shrouding it, the landscape and overlording castle.
Astonishingly the bay was almost empty of the multitude of ferries and sampans and fishing boats that normally abounded, with the few there scurrying for shore.
Tyrer was very uneasy. "Is it going to be war?"
After a pause, Marlowe said, "They had their warning. Most of us think, no, not a full-scale war, not yet, not this time. There'll be incidents ..." Then, because he liked Tyrer and admired his courage, he opened his mind to him. "There'll be incidents and skirmishes of various sizes, some of our people will get killed, some will discover they are cowards, some will become heroes, most will be petrified from time to time, some will be decorated but of course we will win."
Tyrer thought about that, remembering how frightened he had already been but how Babcott had convinced him that the first time was the worst time, how brave Marlowe had been rushing after the assassin, how ravishing Angelique was--and how good it was to be alive, young, with one foot on the ladder to "Minister."
He smiled. Its warmth lit up Marlowe as well. "All's fair in love and war, isn't it?" he said.
Angelique was sitting in the window of the sickroom at Kanagawa, staring into space, the sun breaking through the powder-puff clouds from time to time, her heavily perfumed handkerchief to her nose. Behind her Struan was half awake half asleep. In the garden soldiers patrolled constantly. Since the attack security had been redoubled, more troops sent from the Yokohama encampment, with Pallidar temporarily in command.
A tap on the door pulled her from her reverie. "Yes?" she said, hiding the kerchief in her hand.
It was Lim. Beside him was a Chinese orderly with a tray. "Food for Master. Missee wantchee eat, heya?"
"Put there!" she ordered, and pointed at the beside table. She was about to ask for her tray to be brought as usual, then changed her mind, thinking it safe. "Tonight, tonight Missee food dining room. Unn'erstan, heya?"
"Unn'erstan." Lim laughed to himself, knowing that when she thought she was alone she used the kerchief.
Ayeeyah, is her nose as small and delicate as her other part? Smell? What's the smell they complain of? There's no smell of death here yet. Should I tell the tai-pan's son that news is bad from Hong Kong? Ayeeyah, better he finds out for himself. "Unn'erstan."
He beamed and left.
"Cheri?" Automatically she offered the chicken soup.
"Later, thank you, darling," Malcolm Struan said as expected, his voice very weak.
"Try to take some," she said as usual, again he refused.
Back once more to her seat in the window and her daydreams--about being safe at home in Paris again, in the great house of her uncle Michel and her darling Emma, the highborn English aunt who had mothered her and brought her and her brother up when her father had left so many years ago for Hong Kong, all of them surrounded in luxury, Emma planning luncheons and riding in the Bois on her prize stallion, the envy of everyone, charming the massed aristocracy and being fawned on in return, then bowing so gracefully to Emperor Louis Napoleon--Napoleon Bonaparte's nephew--and his Empress, Eugenie, and their smiling recognition.
Boxes at theatres, La Comedie francaise, choice tables at Trois Freres Provencaux, her coming of age, seventeen, the talk of the season, Uncle Michel recounting his adventures at the gambling tables and the races, whispering naughty stories about his aristocratic friends, his mistress, the Countess Beaufois, so beautiful and seductive and devoted.
All daydreams of course for he was only a junior Deputy in the War Ministry, and Emma, English yes but an actress from a travelling group of Shakespearean players, daughter of a clerk, but neither with enough money for the outward display so necessary for Angelique in the capital of the world, for the spectacular horse, or two-in-hand and carriage that she needed so desperately to break into real society, the real upper echelon, to meet those who would marry and not just bed and flaunt and soon to pass on to a younger flower.