Flashman Papers 3-Book Collection 4: Flashman and the Dragon, Flashman on the March, Flashman and the Tiger. George Fraser MacDonald

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      “Good-night … fan-qui,” says she, pretty hoarse, and then she turned and disappeared into the staring rabble behind her. Truth to tell, I didn’t much mind; I was bruised and exhausted, and another bout would have carried me off; if that was what she was like merely fighting for her life, God knew how she’d behave in amorous ecstasy. I straightened my coat and pushed through the crowd, marvelling at the minds (and bodies) of women – treat ’em civilised, and they swing you round their heads; strangle ’em, and suddenly they’re all for you. Because there was no doubt about it, now; she fancied me. It’s all a matter of the proper approach.

      I knew better than to seek her out next day, as we steamed up the sluggish Yangtse; the consummation of our wooing would be all the better for keeping. I saw her once, as I paced the upper walk after tiffin; she was standing in the steerage, gazing up, and raised a hand and gave her lazy smile at sight of me. I smiled back, surveying her carefully like a farmer at the stock-ring, then nodded as one satisfied for the moment, and turned away to resume my stroll. Aye, let her wait. I had other matters to occupy me, during the day at least; I chewed the fat with Ward, boned up on my Taiping notebook, wondered when the devil Bruce’s agent would turn up, and was first in quest of news at every village landing-place.

      The crisis was plainly at hand up-river. Off Tungchow, a downriver boat informed us that the great battle about Nanking had become a rout, with the Taipings everywhere victorious; Chen’s Celestial Singers were driving through to relieve the capital, while General Lee was driving the Imps like sheep and breaking their blockade on the river.

      “And ye ken what that’ll mean,” declares Skipper Witherspoon ominously. “Every scoondrel in an Imp uniform’ll be castin’ awa’ his coat and turnin’ bandit. It’ll be worse than Flodden. Goad help the country! We’ll no’ see Nanking this trip, I’m thinkin’; we’ll dae well if we get the boat’s neb twenty miles past Kiangyin.”

      This was serious, for it meant that the last fifty miles of my journey would be through lawless country scourged by Imp deserters and Taiping fanatics. Well, they could count me out; if there was no sign of Bruce’s man, I’d turn back with Yangtse when Witherspoon decided he’d reached the safety limit; I couldn’t be blamed, if the country was impassable. But I knew Bruce wouldn’t care for that, and I was still studying to find a good excuse when we pulled in at Kiangyin late in the afternoon. It was the usual miserable hole of mud buildings and rickety bamboo wharves, with the usual peasants gaping apathetically, and stinking to wake the dead – the peasants and Kiangyin both. Beyond the town, stale paddy stretched away to the misty distance, with a few woods here and there, and the inevitable agriculturists and bullocks standing ankle-deep. A depressing spectacle, in no way redeemed by the appearance of the Rev. Matthew Prosser, B.A., God rest him.

      He came aboard like a vessel of wrath, stamping up the gangway and roaring, a small, round, red-faced cleric with corks hanging from his hat like an Australian swagman, a green veil streaming behind, an enormous dust-coat, and a fly-whisk which he used as a flail on hindering Orientals. Behind him tottered an urchin with his valise, and Prosser was furiously demanding the cabin steward when his eye lit on me, and he started as though he’d been stung. He kept darting furtive glances at me while he hectored the steward, and was no sooner inside his cabin than the door opened again, and his crimson face appeared, crying: “Hist!”

      I went over, and he dragged me in and slammed the door.

      “Not a word!” cries he, and stood, listening intently with his corks bobbing. Then, in a thunderous whisper: “I’m Prosser. How-de-do. We shall be bearing each other company, I believe. Say nothing, sir. Remember Ehud: ‘I have a secret errand unto thee, oh King; who said, keep silence’.” And he gave an enormous wink, which in that furious red face was positively alarming. “Be seated, sir! There!” He pointed firmly to the bunk, and began rummaging like a terrier in his valise.

      As it happened, I remembered Ehud, the Biblical left-hander who was adept at sticking knives in folk, which was a portent if you like. As to Prosser, he seemed such an unlikely agent that I asked him if he knew Bruce in Shanghai, and he rounded on me with bared teeth. “Not another word! Discretion, sir! We must bind our faces in secret. Now where,” he snarled, rummaging again, “did I put it? Aha, I have it! The cup was found in Benjamin’s sack!” And he lugged out a rum bottle which must have held half a gallon. He beamed, peered at the level (which was marked in pencil), set it on the table, and caught my eye.

      “Well, Balshazzar drank wine, did he not?” cries he. “But only after sundown, sir. And then but a small measure, against the evening chill. Yes. Now, sir, attend to me if you please. I believe you speak Mandarin? Good.” He seemed vastly relieved. “Then when we have reached our destination, I shall make you known to a certain personage, and leave you to your business.” He nodded heavily, glanced at the bottle, and muttered something about the Lord being good to them that wait.

      “But you’ll be staying with me in … where we’re going?” says I. He might not be much, but he’d be better than nothing.

      He shook his head angrily. “No such thing, sir! I am known, you see, and they watch me, and send forth spies that they may take hold of my words. You will do better without me – indeed, the less we are seen together, the better, even now. And once I have made you known, discreetly, to one who, like Timothy, is faithful in the Lord … faithful, I say … then my task is done. Besides, I have my own work!” And he glared at the bottle again, while I concluded that the faithful one must be the Loyal Prince, General Lee Hsiu-chen of the Taipings. Why the devil couldn’t he say so, instead of acting like Guy Fawkes?

      This was disconcerting. I’d supposed I would be dry-nursed to Nanking by some capable thug who not only knew the Taipings backwards, but could give me all manner of useful tips, and do most of the work, with luck. Instead, here was this bottle-nosed parson, who didn’t want to be seen near me, couldn’t wait to get shot of me, and daren’t even say the simplest thing in plain language.

      I said I must have some information, and he said, quite short, that he hadn’t any. I pointed out that the boat might not go as far as Nanking, in which case he’d have to be seen in my company, probably trudging through bandit-infested country. He didn’t take this kindly, but growled that if the hosts of Midian were prowling, the Lord must see us through, and cheered me up no end by producing an ancient muzzle-loader revolver from his valise and jamming rounds into it, twitching towards his bottle the while.

      I gave up, and left him with a nasty reminder that sundown wasn’t for another half-hour. As soon as the door closed I heard the cork pop. Be not among wine-bibbers, thinks I, and recalling that that verse ended with reference to riotous eaters of flesh, went in search of dinner.

      Well, it was all sufficiently hellish. How, I asked myself for the thousandth time in my life, had I got into this? A couple of months earlier I’d been homeward bound, and now I was heading on a secret mission that made my flesh crawl, into the bloodiest civil war ever known, on a rickety steamboat in company with the likes of the Reverend Grogpickle and Frederick Townsend Ward who, between them, probably had as sure a touch for catastrophe as any pair I’d ever struck. Stay, though – there was my wrestling wench down on the steerage deck. A bout with her in my cabin might not disperse the blue-devils entirely, but God knows when I’d have another chance. I finished my dinner quickly, and went out on the upper deck.

      We were well up from Kiangyin by now, but what kind of country we were in it was impossible to tell. The sky overhead was clear enough, with a bright silver moon, but the river itself was shrouded with fog, and we were pushing into the fleecy blanket at slow ahead, the siren hooting dismally. Traces of it hung like wraiths on the narrow promenade outside the cabins, with a clammy touch on the skin; the sooner I was snug with my giantess, the better.

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