In Red and Gold

Doane felt a little hand steal for a moment into his with a nervous pressure. His own relief was great.

For this smiling gentleman could hardly be regarded as one about to die. They placed him in the steamer chair of woven rushes from Canton. And pleasantly, then, their last evening together passed in quiet talk.

His excellency was in reminiscent mood. He had been a young officer, it transpired, in the T’aiping Rebellion, and had fought during the last three years of that frightful thirteen-year struggle up and down the great river, taking part in the final assault on Su-chau as a captain in the “Ever Victorious” army of General Gordon. Regarding that brilliant English officer he spoke freely; Doane translating a sentence, here and there, for young Kane.

“Gordon never forgave Li Hung Chang,” he said, “for the murder of the T’ai-ping Wangs, during the peace banquet. It was on Prince Li’s own barge, in the canal by the Eastern Gate of the city. Gordon claimed that Li procured the murder. He was a hot-blooded man, Gordon, often too quick and rough in speech. Li told me, years later, that the attack was directed as much against himself as against the Wangs, and regarded himself as fortunate to escape. He never forgave Gordon for his insulting speech. But Gordon was a vigorous brave man. It was a privilege to observe him tirelessly at work, planning by night, fighting by day – organizing, demanding money, money, money – with great energy moving troops and supplies. He could not be beaten. He was indeed the ‘Ever Victorious.’”

It was, later, his excellency who asked Hui Fei and young Kane to sing the American songs that had floated on one or two occasions through his window below. They complied; and Dixie Carmichael, in an agreeable light voice, joined in. At the last Duane was singing bass.

The party was breaking up – his excellency had already gone below – when Rocky, moved to the point of exquisite pain, caught the hand of Hui Fei.

“Please!” he whispered. “Just a word!”

“Not now. I mus’ go.”

“But – it’s our last evening – I’ve tried to be patient – it’ll be all different at Shanghai – I can’t let you.”

But she slipped away, leaving the youth whispering brokenly after her. He leaned for a long time on the rail then, looking heavily at the winking lights of the cruisers. It was a relief to see Mr. Doane coming over the deck. Certainly he couldn’t sleep. Not now. His heart was full to breaking… The fighting impulse rose. During this past day or so he had seemed to be losing ground in his struggle with self. The startling incident in Miss Carmichael’s room had turned out, he felt, still confusedly, as a defeat. It had left him unhappy. This night, out there in the blossom-scented gallery, he had sensed the strange girl, close at hand, cool as a child, singing the old college songs with apparent quiet enjoyment, as an uncanny thing, a sinister force. Even when speaking to Hui Fei, her influence had enveloped him… This would be just one more little battle. And it must be won.

Accordingly he told Mr. Doane the story. The older man considered it, slowly nodding.

“It is probably the fact,” he said, at length, “that she stole the pearls at Huang Chau. She was with Connor and Watson. But it is also a fact that she might have pearls of her own. And in traveling alone through a revolution it would be her right to conceal them as she chose. It is true, too, that unset pearls couldn’t be identified easily, if at all. And she is clever – she wouldn’t weaken under charges… No, I don’t see what we can do, beyond watching the thing closely. As for her threats against you, they are partly rubbish.”

But Rocky cared little, now, what they might be. Once again he had cleaned the black slate of his youth. His head was high again. He could speak to Hui Fei convincingly in the morning.

His excellency, alone in his cabin, took from his hand-bag the book of precepts of Chuang Tzü; and seated on his pallet, by the small table on which burned a floating wick in its vessel of oil, read thoughtfully as follows:

“Chuang Tzü one day saw an empty skull, bleached but intact, lying on the ground. Striking it with his riding whip, he cried, ‘Wert thou once some ambitious citizen whose inordinate yearnings brought him to this pass? – some statesman who plunged his country into ruin and perished in the fray? – some wretch who left behind him a legacy of shame? – some beggar who died in the pangs of hunger and cold? Or didst thou reach this state by the natural course of old age?’

“When he had finished speaking, he took the skull and, placing it under his head as a pillow, went to sleep. In the night he dreamt that the skull appeared to him and said: ‘You speak well, sir; but all you say has reference to the life of mortals and to mortal troubles. In death there are none of these… In death there is no sovereign above, and no subject below. The workings of the four seasons are unknown. Our existences are bounded only by eternity. The happiness of a king among men can not exceed that which we enjoy.’

“Chuang Tzü, however, was not convinced, and said: ‘Were I to prevail upon God to allow your body to be bom again, and your bones and flesh to be renewed, so that you could return to your parents, to your wife and to the friends of your youth, would you be willing?’

“At this the skull opened its eyes wide and knitted its brows and said: ‘How should I cast aside happiness greater than that of a king, and mingle once again in the toils and troubles of mortality?’”

He closed the book; laid on the table his European watch; and sat for a long time in meditation. As the hands of the watch neared the hour of three in the morning, he took from the bag a box of writing materials, a small red book and a bottle of white pills.

The leaves of the book were the thinnest gold. On one of these he inscribed, with delicate brush, the Chinese characters meaning “Everlasting happiness.” Tearing out the leaf, then, he wrapped loosely in it one of the pills – these were morphine, of the familiar sort manufactured in Japan and sold extensively in China since the decline of the opium traffic – and swallowed them together. He inscribed and took another, and another, and another.

Gradually a sense of drowsy comfort, of utter physical well-being, came over him. The pupils of his eyes shrunk down to the merest pin-points. His head drooped forward. His frail old body fell on the bed and lay peacefully there as his spirit sought its destiny in the unchanging, everlasting Tao.

CHAPTER XIII – HIS EXCELLENCY SPEAKS

IT was daybreak. Doane, standing in his cabin by the opened window, looked out with melancholy in his deep-set eyes over the muddy low reaches that border the Wusung. It was a familiar scene; indeed he knew it better than any spot in his native land – the railroad along the bank, the brick warehouses, the native village of Wusung, the inevitable humble families in the fields gathering in the last crops of the season.

Overhead the laopan was shouting, tackle creaked, the crew half sang, half grunted their chanties. From the cruisers, one after another, floating musically on the still air, came the call of bugles – the reveille of the American navy. So these were ships from home. The stars and stripes would soon, at “colors,” be rippling from each gray stem… There was an ache in his heart.

Then other noises came – a little confusion of them, somewhere here on the junk – excited whispers, a sound that might have been sobbing, and then – yes! – the low wailing of women.

He turned; listened closely. Light feet came running along the corridor. A familiar, lovely voice called his name, brokenly. Then Hui Fei drew aside his curtain. Her cheeks were stained with tears.

Quickly, his arm about her shoulders as she swayed unsteadily, but without a word, he walked beside her along the corridor to the cabin of his excellency… There were the few servants, kneeling by the inert body and bowing their heads to the floor as they mourned. Doane straightened the body and closed the eyes… It was Hui Fei who found the roll of documents on the table and placed them in Doane’s hands. He saw then, through the mist that clouded his own eyes, that they were addressed to himself: “To my dear friend, Griggsby Doane, I entrust these my last papers.” The name alone was in English; written in a clear hand, not unlike that of a painstaking schoolboy, each letter carefully and roundly formed.

Hui Fei sent the servants to another cabin, but remained herself, seated on the floor by the side of the huge strong man who was now without question the head of the strangely assorted family. She was calmer. Doane did not again hear her sob; he did not even see tears. During that difficult moment when Rocky Kane appeared in the doorway and asked huskily, sadly, if he could help, she even smiled, very faintly, very gently, as she moved her head in the negative. And the youth, after a hesitant moment, left them.

Doane spread out the documents on the floor. The first, addressed directly to himself, he laid aside for the moment. To the second, addressed to the throne – “by the hand of His Imperial Highness, Prince Ch’un, Regent, as soon as it may be possible to convey to him in this hour of China’s sorrow this inadequate expression of my last thoughts” – was attached a paper requesting that “my closest friend, Griggsby Doane” read it thoughtfully, “in order that he may understand fully the circumstances in which I find myself at this the end of my long life.

“I, your unworthy servant,” – it read – “have learned with sorrow and tears of the decree permitting me to withdraw from this troubled life in solitude and peace without the painful consequences of a death by the headsman’s sword. And in bowing humbly to your will I, your unworthy servant, recognize that my life lies wholly in your hands to be disposed of as seems best to the imperial wisdom. But in thus proving my never weakening loyalty to the imperial will I also must express the sober thoughts of one who has pondered long over the evils that beset our land and who has ventured at times, weakly, to hope that China might pay heed to certain lessons of recent history and find a way to oppose successfully the pressure of other powerful nations upon us. For it has been my privilege, as a long-time servant of the throne, to observe certain of these other nations at first hand and to learn a little of their power, which is very great.

“On another occasion I, your unworthy servant, wittingly incurred danger of death or imprisonment, because, in the eagerness of my convictions, I dared to suggest certain reforms to the throne. There is a saying that the tree which bends before the gale will never be broken off but will grow to a ripe old age, and my hope has always been for a great and growing China. At that time princes and ministers about the throne asked permission to subject me to a criminal investigation, but his late majesty was pleased to spare me. Therefore my last years have been a boon at the hand of his late majesty.”

There followed a clear, dignified statement of the urgent need for vast reforms. His excellency recalled in detail his long years of service and his decorations and honors. Quietly he called attention to the fact that all, or nearly all, China was in revolt, that the throne tottered, that to permit the government longer to be dominated by corrupt eunuchs was an affront to modern as to ancient thought and morality. It was clear to himself, he stated, that without a skilfully organized system of gradual, perhaps rapid, modernization, China would soon crumble to pieces under the heel of the greedy foreigners. And there was profound pathos in the passing remark that perhaps his suicide, far from home, his vast estate seized by government agents or despoiled by robbers, his person, alone, beyond the reach of harm – safe, in fact, with the hated foreigners – might stand as a final proof of his loyalty to the throne in serving which his long life had been spent.

“But at the moment of leaving this world I feel that my mind is not so clear as I could wish. The text of this my memorial is ill-written and lacking in clarity of thought. I am no such scholar as the men of olden times; how, then, could I face the end with the calm which they showed? But there is a saying, ‘The words of a dying man are good.’ Though I am about to die, it is possible that my words are not good. I can only hope that the empress and the emperor will pity my last sad utterance, regarding it neither as wanton babbling nor the careless complaint of a trifling mind. Thus shall I die without regret. I wish, indeed, that my words may prove overwrought, in order that those who come after, perhaps more happily, may laugh at my foolishness.

“I pray the empress and the emperor to remember the example of our great rulers of the past in tempering peace with mercy; that they may choose only the worthy for public service; that they may refrain from striving for those things desired by the foreigners, which would only plunge China into deeper woe, but that by a careful study of what is good in foreign lands they may help China to hold up her head among the nations and bring us finally to prosperity and happiness. This is my last prayer, the end and crown of my life.”

The junk was moving up the river as Doane finished reading, passing one of the war-ships. The bugles were blowing again. A beam of warm sunlight slanted in through the window of stained glass and threw a kaleidoscope of color on the wall.

Hui Fei sat motionless, her hands folded humbly in her lap, gazing at the floor. Her face was expressionless. She seemed wholly Oriental.

With a sigh, Deane rolled the memorial and tied it with the ribbon. The one beneath it, he saw now, was addressed to Hui Fei. Without a word he handed it to her and then settled to read his own. Hers was the shorter. When she had finished she lowered it to her lap and sat motionless, as before.

Doane now took up the paper addressed to himself and read as follows:

“My friend, Griggsby Doane, grieve not for me, and be sure that in the manner of my end I have had no wish to bring evil upon you. It is in a measure sad that this end should come upon a hired junk instead of on a plot of hallowed ground, as I would have chosen. But there was no choice. I have waited until assured of my daughter’s safety.

“Inform the magistrate at Shanghai of my death, and see that my Memorial to the Throne is forwarded promptly. Give to my daughter Hui Fei the letter addressed to her. It my wish that you also should read that letter, and I have so instructed her. It is also my wish that she should read this letter to you. Buy for me a cheap coffin, and have it painted black inside. The poor clothes I wear must serve, but I wish that the soiled soles of my shoes be cut off. Twenty or thirty taels will be ample for the coffin.

“I do not believe it will be necessary for the magistrate to hold an inquest. Please have a coating of lacquer put on the coffin, to fill up any cracks, and have the cover nailed down pending the throne’s decision as to my remains. Then buy a small plot of ground near the Taoist temple outside of Shanghai and have me buried as soon as possible. There is no need to consider waiting for an opportunity to bury me at my ancestral home; any place is good enough for a loyal and honest man.

“You will find about a thousand taels in my bag, also the few jewels we found at my home. Sell the jewels and keep for yourself the balance that will remain after my burial expenses are paid. The laopan of this junk has his money. This he will deny, and will cry for more; but do not heed him.

“Remember there is nothing strange or abnormal in my passing; death has become my duty. It may be true that the historic throne of the Manchus is rocking, is falling, but despite the understanding that has been given to me of what is good in Western civilization I have never swayed in my heart from loyalty to that throne and steadfast devotion to its best interests as I can see them, and I do no less than obey the mandate of my empress and my emperor.

“Do not grieve unduly for me. It is my wish that all of you, my friends and family, should live happily in the life that lies before you. To you, Griggsby Doane, out of the gratitude and admiration of my proud heart, I give and bequeath all the little that may be left of my worldly goods, including the money, the pitiful handful of jewels, the historic paintings and my daughter Hui Fei. It is my wish that you will marry her at once, and that in your best judgment you sell any or all of the paintings to provide what money you and she may need, and also that you and she care lovingly for the younger child. It may be better to educate her in the Western manner, but that will be as you may decide. In the matter of this marriage with my daughter, Hui Fei, I have sought the opinion of each of you regarding the other. I have your assurance that it has been your own wish. And Hui Fei informs me that she respects and admires no man more than yourself. You will see, therefore, that I have approached this matter in the Western spirit, and as a result I see no reason why the marriage should be delayed or that my beloved daughter should be left alone at the mercy of an unscrupulous world. I have informed her, also, of my decision. My gifts to you make a most inadequate dowry, but they are all I have. I wish for you both great happiness and many descendants.

“And now, Griggsby Doane, my dear friend, I take my leave of you. I, at seventy-four years of age, can claim an unsullied record. My family tree goes back more than seven hundred years; for three centuries there have been members of my clan in the Imperial Household or in the Government Bureaus, and for four hundred years we have devoted ourselves to husbandry and scholarship. For twenty-four generations my family has borne a good name. I die now in order that a lifetime of devotion to duty and loyalty to the throne may be consummated.”

Slowly Doane lowered the document. He could not speak; he could hardly think. There beside him, still motionless, sat the young woman who was now, by all the traditions of her people, abruptly his.

Dutifully, observing that he had finished reading, she gave him her own letter; and he, in exchange, handed her his. Thus they read on. And then, again quietly exchanging the documents, they sat without a word by the peaceful body.

Little by little Doane’s brain cleared. It was a time, he felt —the time, indeed – when all his experience, all his character and skill, must come into use. Now, it ever, he must be wise and steady and kind. Very gently he took her hand; it lay softly in his; she did not lift her eyes.

“We will not think of this matter now,” he said. “Our only thought must be to carry out his plans regarding the funeral. If it shouldn’t seem best, later, to fulfill quite all his last wishes, perhaps he, from the other side of the barrier, will understand what he couldn’t wholly understand while on this earth. But this I must say now – whatever direction your life may take, try to think of me as filling, the best I can, your father’s place. I shall hope to be your dearest friend. Lean on me. Use me. And be sure I will understand.”

Her slim fingers tightened once again about his.

“He was a won’erful father,” she began, and choked a little.

He left her there; sent in her maid to her; himself mounted to the deck.

The sun was well up. Other junks sailed up and down the tide. A bluff-bowed freighter, flying the Dutch flag, lay at anchor near one of the Chinese torpedo boats that had gone over to the chaotic new republic. The American steamers were far astern, but a motor launch flying an officer’s flag and with blue uniforms visible under the awning, plowed by on her way up to the city. In the distance, up ahead, beyond the crowding masts and funnels of the steamers that came from all the world, could be seen the buildings and spires and the smoke-haze of European Shanghai… The bund there, within a few hours now, would be crowded with pony-carriages and motor-cars and over-fed tourists riding in rickshaws drawn by ragged coolies. The hotels would be thronging with talkative young women and drink-flushed men, all eagerly retailing confused and inaccurate news of “the revolution”; out at the British country club on Bubbling Well Road blond men would be playing tennis in flannels: and the gambling houses would be brightly illuminated until late at night, and the Chinese shopkeepers in Nanking Road would be selling their souvenir trinkets, their useless little boxes of coinsilver and cloisonne and damascene work and their painted snuff-bottles and green soapstone necklaces and blue-and-white pottery quite as if no troubles could ever arise to disturb the destiny of nations.

Doane sighed again. The last letter of his excellency was in his hand, held tightly; though he was not at this time aware of it. He glanced aft, and saw Rocky Kane standing on the gallery, among the flowers, gazing not forward toward the jangling, money-seeking, pleasure-mad city that is the principal point of contact between the culture of the West and that of the East, but off astern, as if endeavoring to see again the lost Yangtze Kiang of his glowing romance.

Doane went to him; aware, then, of the paper rolled so tightly in his hand, said – a huge figure, towering over the boy, his face sad and more than ever deeply lined, but with a grave kindliness about the eyes:

“My boy, it is important that you and I have a talk. Suppose we sit down.” He indicated the steamer chair; but Rocky insisted that he take it, himself dropping heavily down on the step of the deck.

“How – how is she standing it?” he asked, his troubled eyes searching that strong face before him.

“As well as we could ask. It is bound to be very hard for her – especially during these next few days. But she has courage. And she knows he would wish her not to mourn… A matter has come up that concerns you, Rocky” – it was the first time he had used that familiar name; the boy’s moody eyes brightened momentarily, and a touch of color rose in his cheeks – “and I don’t feel I can delay telling you about it. First, you had better let me read you this.”

He had not thought, before this moment, of the necessity that he himself make the translation for the boy. It had to be difficult; he would have given much if the thing could have been managed in some less directly personal way; but for that matter, difficulties lay so thickly about him now that there was no good in so much as giving them a thought. And so – deliberately, with great care to find the nearly precise English equivalent of every obscure phrase – he read the letter through.

He dared not look at the boy’s face, but could not but become aware of the hands that twitched, clasping and unclasping, in his lap, and of the feet that at times nervously tapped the deck. When the task was done he quietly folded the paper and slipped it into a pocket.

The silence grew long and trying. Doane searched and searched his own still confused mind for the right, the clear word; but could not, during these earlier moments, find it. The boy, plainly, was crushed; but behind the clouded eyes and the knit brows an emotional storm was gathering. Doane felt that. It had to come, of course. And it would have to be handled.

But the first words were almost calm.

“So that” – thus the brooding youth – “so that’s how it is!”

Doane waited. After a little the boy sprang up. “But in God’s name, why didn’t you tell me!” he cried. “You’ve let me come and talk to you! You – This isn’t fair! You’ve made a fool of me! You – ” Doane rose too. They stood side by side among the heavily scented blossoms. Doane felt moved to put a kindly hand on the slender shoulder beside him; but a following thought cautioned him that even a touch would be resented at this moment.

“I didn’t tell you,” he said, “because until I read this paper I didn’t know.”

“But you must have known! You told – him. Told him you loved her! Probably you’ve been telling her, too – here under my eyes. Oh, God, what a fool I’ve been… If you’d only been square with me!”

“This is not fair,” said Doane, still very quiet. “We must talk this out, but not now – not while you are angry.”

“Angry! What in heaven’s name is the sense of talking it out! It’s settled, isn’t it?”

“I’m not sure.”

“That’s not so!” The boy seemed to be recovering somewhat now from the first shock of unreason. He turned away to hide the tears in his eyes. “You’ve admitted to her father, if not to her, that you love her… Oh, why didn’t I see it! Why did I have to be such an awful fool!.. She knows it now. And you know as well as I what she’ll do. She’ll never go against her father’s last wish – never. You know that!”