Samuel Merwin - In Red and Gold

Doane was silent. It was extraordinarily difficult, here by this calm old city, on a sunny afternoon, to believe that it was, as Sun had put it, war.

“We’re to tie up,” the captain went on, “until further orders. The foreign concessions at Hankow were safe enough this noon, but with an artillery battle just across the river, and an imperial army moving down from the north over the railway, they stand a lot of show, they do.”

“I wonder if they’ll send us on.”

“What difference will it make?” The captain’s voice was rising. “You know as well as I do that they’ll be fighting at Nanking before we could get back there. Here, too, for that matter. I tell you the whole river’ll be ablaze by to-morrow. This bloody old river! And us on a Manchu-owned boat! A lot o’ chance we stand.”

The sight-seers strolled across the shady bund, passed a stone residence or two and a warehouse, and made their way through the tunneled gateway in the massive city wall. Little Miss Andrews was escorted by young Mr. Braker. Miss Means walked with one of the customs men. Two or three others of the men wandered on ahead. Rocky Kane and the thin girl in the middy blouse brought up the rear.

As they entered the crowded city within the wall a babel of sound assailed their ears – the beating of drums and gongs, clanging cymbals, a musket shot or two, fire-crackers; and underlying these, rising even above them, never slackening, a continuous roar of voices. The teachers paused in alarm, but the customs man smilingly assured them that in a busy Chinese city the noise was to be taken for granted.

Nearly every shop along the way was open to the street, and at each opening men swarmed – bargaining, chaffering, quarreling. The only women to be seen were those in black trousers on a wheelbarrow that pushed briskly through the crowds, the barrow man shouting musically as he shuffled along. Beggars wailed from the niches between the buildings. Dogs snarled and barked – hundreds of dogs, fighting over scraps of offal among the hundreds of nearly naked children.

A mandarin came through in a chair of green lacquer and rich gold ornament, supercilious, fat, carried by four bearers and followed by imposing officials who wore robes of black and red and hats with red plumes. As the street was a scant ten feet in width and the crowds must flatten against the walls to make way the roar grew louder and higher in pitch.

There were shops with nothing but oils in huge jars of earthenware or in wicker baskets lined with stout paper. There were tea shops with high pyramids of the familiar red-and-gold parcels, and other pyramids of the brick tea that is carried on camel back to Russia. There were the shops of the idol makers, and others where were displayed the carven animals and the houses and carts and implements that are burned in ancestor worship, and the tinsel shoes. There were shops where remarkably large coffins were piled in square heaps, some of glistening lacquer with the ideograph characters carven or embossed in new gold. There were varnishers, lacquerers, tobacconists; open eating houses in which could be seen rows of pans set into brickwork. There were displays of bean cakes, melon seeds and curious drugs.

Two Manchu soldiers sauntered by, in uniforms of red and faded blue; fans stuck in their belts and painted paper umbrellas folded in their hands. One bore a hooded falcon on his wrist.

Miss Andrews sniffed the penetrating odor of all China, that was spiced just here with smells of garlic cooking and frying fish and pork and strong oil? and – like the perfume of a dainty lady amid the complex odors of a French theater – an unexpected whiff of burning incense. She looked up between the high walls, on which hung, close together, the long elaborate signs of the tradesmen, black and green and red with gold, always the gold. Across the narrow opening from roof to roof, extended a bamboo framework over which was drawn coarse yellow matting or blue cotton cloths; and through these the sunbeams, diffused, glowed in a warm twilight, with here and there a chance ray slanting down with dazzling brightness on a golden sign character.

“It’s all rather terrifying,” murmured Miss Andrews, at Braker’s ear, “but it’s beautiful – wonderful! I never dreamed of China being so human and real.”

“And to think,” said he eagerly, “that it has always been like this, and always will be. It was just so in the days of Abraham and Isaac. The one people in the world that doesn’t change. It’s their whole philosophy – passive non-resistance, peace. And-do you know, I’m beginning to wonder if they aren’t right about it. For here they are, you know. Greece is dead. Rome’s dead. And Assyria, and Egypt. But here they are. It’s their philosophy that’s done it, I suppose. Almost be worth while to come out here and live a while, when our part of the world gets too upset. Just for a sense of stability – somewhere.”

These two young persons, dreaming of stability while the earth prepared to rock beneath their feet!

Rocky Kane and the slim girl had dropped out of sight, lingering at this shop and that. The party later found them at a silversmith’s counter. They had bought a heap of the silver dragon-boxes and cigarette cases; and then devised a fresh little idea in gambling, weighing ten Chinese dollars against other ten in the balanced scales, the heavier lot winning.

Young Kane had got through his clothing, somehow, there in the street, to his money belt, for he held it now carelessly rolled in one hand. He was flushed, laughing softly. He and the thin girl were getting on.

“Come along, you two,” remarked the customs man. “We stop only two hours here.”

The young couple, gathering up their purchases and the heaps of silver dollars, slowly followed.

“That was great!” exclaimed Rocky Kane. The thin girl, he had decided, was a good fellow. She was always quiet, discreet, attractive. In her curiously unobtrusive way she seemed to know everything. The face was cold in appearance. Yet she was distinctly friendly. Made you feel that nothing you might say could disturb or shock her. He wondered what could be going on behind those pale quiet eyes, behind the thin lips. The men had remarked on the fact that she was traveling alone. She was a provocative person – the curiously youthful costume; the black hair gathered at the neck and tied, girlishly, with a bow – really an exciting person. The way she had taken that little scene out on deck with the gorgeous Chinese girl – Rocky knew nothing of the distinctions between the Asiatic peoples – who spoke English; quite as a matter of course. Though she took everything that way. This little gambling, for instance. She loved it – was quick at it.

“I’m wondering about you,” he said, as they wandered along. “Wondering – you know – why you’re traveling this way. Have you got folks up the river?”

“Oh, no,” she replied – never in his life had he known such self-control; there wasn’t even color in her voice, just that easy quiet way, that sense of giving out no vitality whatever. “Oh, no. I have some business at Hankow and Peking.”

That was all she said. The subject was closed. And yet, she hadn’t minded his asking. She was still friendly; he felt that. His feelings rose. He giggled softly.

“Lord!” he said, “if only the pater wasn’t along!”

“Does he hold you down?”

“Does he? Brought me out here to discipline me. Trying to make me go back to college – make a grind of me… I was just thinking – here’s a nice girl to play with, and plenty of fun around, and not a thing to drink. He gave me fits at Shanghai because I took a few drinks.”

“You have the other stuff,” said she. He turned nervously; stared at her. But she remained as calmly unresponsive as ever. Merely explained: “I smelt it, outside your cabin. You ought to be careful – shut your window tight when you smoke it.”