A Gryphon Year

© 2012 by Priscilla Thomson Jackson. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse 11/05/2012

ISBN: 978-1-4678-7313-0 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4678-7312-3 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4678-7311-6 (e)

Library of Congress Control Number: 2011960739

Photographs are from the Author’s Family Albums. A few from Antiquarian books.

Because of the dynamic nature of the Internet, any web addresses or links contained in this book may have changed since publication and may no longer be valid. The views expressed in this work are solely those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the publisher, and the publisher hereby disclaims any responsibility for them.

Dedication

To our father, J. Oscar Thomson, M.D., F.A.C.S., F.I.C.S.

The Canton Hospital was his (and others’) life work; we have its Records. He did attend the Tartar General, Lamp Chimney Lei, knew Sun Yat Sen. He was a friend to China from his birth in Macau, his return as M.D. in 1910, and (with 30,000 operations recorded) for the next thirty years.

However, a daughter does not know her dear father’s thoughts. Therefore James Galt is not my father, nor Nell my mother. They are Western idealists braving a mysterious Empire, dangerous to foreigners just after the Boxers, as seen through author’s memories, books written in the 1800-1900s, and a fiction writer’s imaginings.

Celebrating—also for Chinese-Americans, Chinese-Canadians—China’s history: Here, Oppositions rumbling before The Revolution.

Important Historical People, who are named, did do what they did. However, Apologies to Chinese historians as to details of the Battle of Seventy-Two Heroes. Young folk may doubt their ancestors’ belief in such superstitions. Nevertheless, in any Age before Science, thoughtful people always wondered, then often guessed.

NONE of the other characters are actual people. They represent kinds of people I knew or events I’d heard about, but their psyches, beliefs and stories are their own—and I grew to love most of them.

Acknowledgement

With gratitude to Dr. John Richardson M.D. of Coral Gables, Florida, who read this entire manuscript early on to check its medical correctness and also to consider whether James’ thoughts might be those that a doctor—in these trying circumstances—would actually think and feel.

Historical Scenes of Chinese Export Trade to America

New York Harbor 1830 Canton Port 1830

Center: Clipper-ship. Friendship of Salem and junk

Alfred Meakin Staffordshire, England. Original

copper engraving

Perfect and pastel she saw their leave-taking now, flat as a tinted postcard, romantic as a colored photograph, she remembered herself of a month ago—a blue-eyed Canadian college-girl in a gray Eton suit beside her American doctor husband, posed like dress-dummies on a railroad platform, bound for Vancouver, en route to the Orient. Proper, shy and newly married, they stood a little apart, right hands raised, smiles set over good teeth.

Aunts and cousins, Hartnells and Frews, stood with the Galt in-laws, Scotch Presbyterians all. Ostrich plumes and gentile good-byes wafted up, correct and kindly, unreal as the hands in the long chamois gloves. Transfixed in luminous time, stiff as Seurat figures, they were placed against the CPR’s monstrous iron wheels. Father in black cutaway and gleaming watch chain still braced himself against October’s chill, brushing at his walrus moustache, doubtful of headlong youth and life in foreign fields. Mother, her Queen Alexandra hat set straight across the curls along her forehead, dabbed at her eyes.

Such a handsome couple! Murmurs merged into the locomotive’s panting.

And so courageous!

To the ends of the earth!

And at a time like this!

Now, in the vivid, untrustworthy present, she saw them dry into bone. The long woolen skirts, russet, mauve and taupe, and the slim Edwardian trousers lost girth. She gazed at a family portrait, her life with them cut off. She had scarcely noticed it passing. Seeing it now, eyes bruised with loss, how innocent, how pure that life seemed to have been.

Wide-eyed, she stared about. It was a fine Canadian ship that carried herself and her love: fine furnishings in a tidy cabin where every fixture fitted, where silky percale tucked her in.

Sunday silk. Aunt Frew.

For Aunt Frew was right. She must not, must not let her imagination run away with her. She must not yield to the traitorous aching in her armpits, aching to reach up to James, to beg him to come down and comfort her. Aunt Frew had no patience with people who imposed on others, or worse, who cried, losing control—the final, undisciplined, irresponsible indulgence, resulting inevitably in self-pitying sobs and hysterics.

Darkness. She could not sleep. She dare not dream. Yet, though swept by the loss of all life she had lived so far, she could not cry. Tears weakened the will, enfeebled the character. For character was the embodiment of one’s moral fiber. Building character was one’s lifetime duty.

Tearless, then, Nell set to imagining the one person left to her in this alien present. His leg would be thrust out of his overhead nook, topside of their double-decker bunk, in strong wooden arms of British-Columbian lumber.

The varnished bed-rail had knocked her awake—a sudden lurch from a heaving billow far below. It had knocked her elbow through her rose-sprigged nightdress. It was a smooth, false rail; it pretended to save her from falling, but in the dream, it caught the girl of the tinted picture. White sheets held her flat on her helpless back while the ship hurtled through the monstrous sea. She heard the roar of fierce water. The round rung made her bed a birdcage; she hung tremulously over the fathomless deep. Should the waves submerge, wantonly as they had deigned to surface, this tendon of wood would hold her still. Slippery with laughter it would imprison her as the wild, black water rushed over and under. She jerked spasmodically, gasped a strangled scream and sat up.

Nightmares—she had had them as a child, waking crying in the night. Too much imagination, Aunt Frew had told Mother—‘Originality’ came from the Hartnell side. Nevertheless, Mother had insisted on marrying one although Aunt Frew had warned her. Aunt Frew had told Nell many times—since she might have inherited the tendency—not to let her imagination run away with her. Nell brought Aunt Frew’s smooth bun, unyielding posture, and plain Sunday silk to mind.

Face facts. China!—The day after tomorrow!

Nell sat erect in the shadow of the bunk above her head. Blocking the undefined future for now, James? James? she called tentatively. It was a fine, old, one-syllable Scottish name—originally spelled Jamys. Now one of her names—Mrs. James Galt. With shy relief, she saw a pale movement in the gloom. James flopped his surgeon’s hand down at her. How she loved that warm, strong hand encasing hers when they had courted, sauntering up and down the broad Dufferin Terrace in the protecting dusk, high above the mighty St. Lawrence.

James murmured sleepily from above, a disembodied bass resonance. What’s the matter, Nell? It’s rougher. Are you seasick?

Of course not, dear! Only the high pitch—however could you ask—betraying her. I love the ocean. I just wondered if you were awake.

Want anything?

She tightened her lips, holding in the talkative tongue, picturing the narrow upper bunk, which he, the gentleman, had taken. His leg would be thrust out of his flannel nightshirt, and hooked over the Hudson Bay blanket, in careless audacity, trying to cool off without wakening and removing it. Astoundingly, this limb would be covered with hair, almost fur! How it had startled her on that first night of their honeymoon in Banff. Like those other shocking things done in the dark. She had been ashamed to meet the knowing eyes of the waiters at breakfast. Even after the five days on the train and twenty-five in this cabin, modestly dressing and undressing beneath her robe and averting her eyes when he disrobed, her gaze still scampered away from the raw indelicacy of a man’s leg bare.

You don’t get seasick, do you, James? James? She cuddled up in a soft ball with his name.

Never have.

Maybe in a real storm? spinning fragile conversation out of sugar.

Don’t worry about a storm, my darling. He smothered a yawn. Typhoon season’s over. Big ship. Canadian officers—well-trained.

Oh, I wasn’t worrying, about storms, anyway.

He breathed deeply, then regularly. She sighed visualizing his breathing, following the air up the column of his muscled neck and out the nostrils of his beautifully shaped nose. It was high-bridged, generously defined, and proud. She had learned, in the year that they had known each other, his blue eyes cool, his straight eyebrows could frown and his loving lips tighten into an unyielding line. Even so, his nose remained patrician. She had tried to compliment it in the mirror, how perfectly modeled. He had laughed. It performs the function, he said, kissing the tip of her short one. Personally I prefer the piquant to the impressive.

But his name, his furry leg, and his remembered face did not quell the gathering menace of the unimaginable future.

James, wistfully, Where do you keep your pocket watch?

It’s… the middle of the night.

Men were so severe about objects, requiring them to be useful. His watch was a part of him. The slender wafer might still carry his warmth, resting as it did against his taut abdomen.

She tucked her hand under her cheek. A whiff of Mama’s handmade lotion—glycerin and rose water—pinched her heart. She settled down, in a hard ball, to be quiet.

It was quiet except for the tromp-tromp of the engines. It was too quiet and too dark. Oh, James, where are you taking me?

But of course, he wasn’t taking her. She had chosen to come. He had only invited her. How proud she had felt at the Commissioning Service, repeating the words of dedication, the vow of service, which James had taken. Before God and the Society’s officers. She had been accepted, although untrained, as a full and equal member of a vocation dedicated to helping other people. China had seemed so quaint and enchanting then. James’ off-hand coolness had drawn her, marveling and entranced. Although she thought of herself as self-reliant, he seemed to be unaware of his audaciousness. China!

Fools rush in, she had heard one of her father’s friends say to another. Do they know what they’re getting into?

Still one admires that young man. He’s first class.

But is he aware that it might be dangerous?

It takes a special breed, I suppose.

Grit and spunk, that’s what it takes.

It’s not for me, nor my wife. But if it heats up again, he’ll send her home, of course.

It’s not for me either—yet I envy them.

So do we all. In a time of dog-eat-dog, they act on what we all profess.

Bewildered in the lonely dark she shuddered.

James, she whispered. James… James?

Into what valley of what shadow had she strayed? Weakly, she wished that James, who was invulnerable, would swing down and hold her. Surely, he would know…

She held her breath for a long minute, and then let it blow away with the hoarse breathing of the motors. It was a fine, safe, modern ship, as new as the century, the pride of the Canadian Pacific Steamship Line; the floors were solid oak, the fixtures bright brass and nickel. She drew the satin ribbons around her throat, she settled down like a good girl. A wave rolled under the hull; it tipped up her bunk; the rail cracked her elbow. She shrank away. She fastened her eyes shut.

I will not think of dangerous things, I simply will not. She pulled her cold toes into her rosebud-sprigged nightdress. I will put them right out of my mind.

Instead, think of home. Think of the upstairs parlor with the curved black horsehair settee, picky, coarsely slick. Conjure up the family Bible on the piecrust table. See the blue brocade chairs by the tiled parlor grate. The stool with scroll legs inviting her to play the walnut parlor organ. Next to it stood the claw-foot, marble-topped table. The room rose in front of her tightly closed eyes. Something not usually there lay on that table, a familiar, yet forgotten rag-paper journal with a page of foreign news torn out. Puzzling. A long time ago in 1900 when she had been—thirteen? The remembered room but with a younger girl to be protected from history. Torn pages tantalized, a mystery. Where could they be? The forbidden pages she found crumpled in the wastebasket. She had scanned them, crumpled them back and run out of that room, forgetting them, dashing them out of her head. Now the old news crowded up into her throat like vomit. She lay trembling in the darkness, helpless to prevent it.

Far away in the Province of Shensi, into the wild hinterland of China’s northern plains, a nice American couple had journeyed, a minister and his young wife. They lived in a small house on a side street, studying the difficult language, giving first aid, adopting a skinny slave-girl, telling anyone who would bother to squat in the street outside their home about a certain Jesus who would be their Friend.

The Governor of Shensi was a tough old Mongol autocrat, living far from the excitements of the capital. His province was remote from the great rivers that bore the foreign gunboats, far beyond the shock waves of the cannon-shattered forts.

Dark forms with great splay feet, dirty shirts, wetted lips and black hair coarsely slick crowded into the corners of the cabin—evil shades. Nell sealed her blue eyes, knit her feathery brows, and rolled her head from side to side to shut them out.

The young man had been killed by the mob. Good riddance, the old Governor agreed. But there was a dove-grey suit like her own, fitted to show the trim waist, except for leg-of-mutton sleeves of that day, jutting out beyond the shoulders. The bosom was modestly flattened under the bone-buttoned jacket. Unseen brown hair was twisted into a high-placed bun.

The teahouse rumor had it that white women were strangely deformed. Snide glances had appraised this one for many months, curiosity whetted. Now was the time for knowing, there in the Governor’s Yamên before the agitated feet and the craning necks crowding within the red clay walls. Elbowing, jostling, spitting, the crowd heaved in upon itself. Eyes darted, shifted; lips drew back in hungry happiness.

They stripped her naked, she from the schoolroom and the quilting circle and married in decency in the steepled white church. They stripped her naked for the edification of the vacant mouths and burning, lascivious eyes.

When the learning was done, there he stood: naked to the waist and sweating like a pig, a red rag tied around his shaven head.

A fisted hand snatched and released her long brown hair, stretching her white neck like a chicken. He yanked it back until she screamed.

The great biceps clenched. The two-handed sword flashed sunlight, driven downward. Ah, how she shrieked. The sword flashed again. He had sliced off both breasts!

Nell barricaded her own breasts. She whimpered at the pain in her bosom.

It had happened. There were words on a printed page. They glared at her, bright black and unforgotten. Even Aunt Frew could not call it imagination.

In the hard sun of the harsh northern plain, they had set the American girl on the city wall for all to see.

The Governor had told the Empress Dowager about it when he visited her in Peking. The woman—you had to admire it, he had said, took several days to die.

Nell smothered her face in the pillow, her teeth in her lip tasting blood. Silently she began to cry

The Empress, they said, had chuckled.

共

The morning’s glorious sea-wind parted James’ sandy hair. It tingled his scalp and skewered his eardrums. It swept a merry whistle from between his lips. He bared his teeth to it. China tomorrow!

Good morning, Dr. Galt, a tanned, thirty-ish Englishman sporting a dapper moustache.

Good morning, Mr. Colocott.

May I join your morning constitutional once again?

Of course. In spite of the trig and jaunty moustache, this Colocott seemed sound, James thought. He was tightly knit, intact, like a well-joined chest of drawers.

They strode together purposefully, pitting their weight against the wind. Other passengers in turned-up collars and pulled-down caps followed them, also participating in the daily swing around the deck. One old goat shuffled along in bedroom slippers. Some sought to compete, crowding behind, squeezing by against the rail. James and Charles Colocott, with their good shoulders and sinewy legs, having taken the position at the front, kept it. They led the way on up-slant and down-slope. It exhilarated James, both the unspoken competition and the sweep of the sea, sky, and wind. The sense of accomplishment satisfied him. The ship, on his behalf, battled the waves. Together they conquered the breadth of the Pacific Ocean, lap after lap, mile after nautical mile.

I’ve asked to be put at your table for the Captain’s dinner, at the ship doctor’s table, Mr. Colocott said, if it is agreeable?

Good. Excellent. James answered. You joined the ship in Japan?

Yes. Business there. I’m with an importing firm in Hong Kong.

We’re going to Canton.

To Canton?

Yes, to the Canton Hospital. The only hospital in the two Kuang provinces.

Which is an area as large as Germany. There’ll be quite a demand for your services.

Yes. There is great need.

The two men, companionable in their youth, their energy and their compulsion to accomplish something even on an ocean voyage, followed the aft curve of the mahogany rail. The railing had become a friendly landmark to James during this idyllic honeymoon at sea. Now the wind was pushing them past the parallel legs outstretched in steamer chairs. Amused at the stiff bundles, swathed in steamer rugs, he smiled widely, for there was Nell, lovely Nell. Her head was inclined toward the harridan next to her. Her hat brim shaded her high, intelligent forehead; the delicate auto-duster secured it around her soft chin. The steamer rug around her slender waist not quite hiding the beautiful shape above and below. She appeared to be interested in what the woman was saying. She was gracious that way.

This is your gryphon year, then? Mr. Colocott was saying to him.

My—what year?

Your first year in a foreign assignment. When you’re unfamiliar with the customs, have no basis for judgment. When you’re neither, as they say, bird nor beast.

We are green, I admit.

Thus in the short term, of no value to the company. Count on making mistakes.

James shook his head. In medical school, mistakes were not tolerated, certainly never excused. Allowances led to sloppiness, to guesses, weakening the unrelenting drive for certainty. Some students had discussed it; admitting guilt for future mistakes might make one over-cautious. One might—even knowing so little and losing so often to death—give way to self-flagellation, even despair.

I don’t mean, of course, medical mistakes, Mr. Colocott was saying. You’re top-flight; the best school in the Commonwealth, I was told. I just mean to suggest, he laughed, don’t guarantee to cure the son of the chief magistrate.

We hardly guarantee to cure anyone.

Your Chinese competitors do.

They do?

You may be expected to.

That would be misrepresentation. Surely, things are different in China now. Half a century ago, they accused Catholic priests of stealing eyes for medicines. They saw them gesturing over dying folk, giving extreme unction. Our hospital was founded in 1830 in a centuries-old international port. They understand better what we can and cannot do.

They understand very little about what we do, old man. This is an old, self-satisfied, despotic regime, and up in Canton you’ll be far from the protection of His Majesty’s naval vessels. I don’t mean to alarm you, but there was a case reported in the South China Morning Post in which a foreign doctor was written up in the local newspaper for curing dead. It was simply not safe for him. My advice is, don’t be too active until you understand the lay of the land.

Pretty hard for me to do. I was to have a year of language study, but the staff at the hospital is so pressed, I may go right to work. The mortality rate of the hospital is, in fact, very high. Since it is usually the hospital of last resort.

Meaning that Sir Chinaman goes to his own doctors until he’s about to shuffle off?

When he loses hope, yes. This brings us, according to the annual reports, many terminal cases.

Mr. Colocott whistled. Not a promising occupation.

There are many we can save with the impressive developments in western sciences. Sorry about the gryphon year, but I’ll be having a post-graduate program of advanced cases never seen in the West.

Mr. Colocott raised his peaked eyebrows like a nervy boy, unconvinced. You’ve been warned.

James had received another warning this morning. Nell, leaving the breakfast salon had asked him, in a suppressed sort of way, You had heard about people killed by the Boxers?

Not recently?

During the Boxer Rebellion, I mean.

At the time, I was only a boy.

I hadn’t realized, she had said with difficulty, that things like that happened to good people, I mean, to people like us. Not just to their citizens. The Empress was so gracious to your President Taft’s daughter. Did you? she had added, oddly challenging.

Did I what?

Realize that?

I’ve seen plaques and monuments to the martyrs of the Boxer Rebellion, he had answered—perhaps impatiently. But that was a decade ago. The Empress Dowager is dead. They have a constitutional monarchy now.

I had a nightmare, she had said nervously, although disclaiming it with a shamed little laugh. You were so off-hand about coming. So I wondered if…

If what?

I dreamed about a woman’s execution, she said, as if in explanation.

You wondered, he said evenly, If I knew what I was doing?

Pink stained her satin cheeks as if she had been scolded. She raised her head and regarded him without backing down, with a kind of endearing dignity.

It has been ten years since the Boxer Rebellion, he told her, as he’d explained so often before they left home. She was usually so sensible and self-reliant. Would it have been dangerous to travel in our South in 1875, a decade after our Civil War?

I suppose not, she had murmured. Any fears she might have had been appeased, he thought. However, he had had to close his fists on the potency drying up in his body. How he yearned to seize her and carry her back to the cabin from which she had issued so primly this morning. After their wedding night, he had kept himself to a gentle and quick possession of her unseen body once a week. One must not take advantage of a virginal and reluctant bride. Seven times in his life, therefore, he had tasted ecstasy. Some day might she join in this astonishing expression of all that was deepest in love? Many ladies did not feel ardor, but Nell was so plucky a girl, riding, canoeing, reading history undiluted, and coming to China. Moreover, she was so loving a person—to her parents, to the children in her Sunday school class, and when her great blue eyes regarded his features with a wondering tenderness, he could hardly control himself.

Nell rested her beautiful brow against his shoulder, the high brow that brought true distinction to her lovely face. A fever coursed through him painfully unexpressed. If he were careful, his exuberance shuttered, might she want him to love her ardently in his way?

On deck for afternoon tea, James felt the constriction before he saw it. He accepted the duty before he knew what it was. He strode toward the knot of people before he heard the cry Is there a doctor in the house?

I am a doctor.

The group of passengers close to the fallen person turned toward James, assessed him, acknowledged him and moved apart. They re-clustered behind him, a solid stockade.

An old man lay on the tar-striped deck, his face like blanc-mange, a slack unwrinkled pudding; white sideburns extended along his jaw and curved inward. His eyes were closed. His trousers, shaken up at ankle, revealed leather bedroom slippers. James bent over him, felt his pulse, pulled up an eyelid. The passengers peered.

It’s Sir Gladwyn Waud, you know; the China authority.

The famous sinologist.

Coming back from England—too bad—almost made it.

Got his knighthood, though. Worth the trip to England. A real scholar.

Can we help, doctor? Someone asked respectfully.

A shock, I suppose?

Apoplexy.

Pretty bad, isn’t it?

You can see that it is, a voice whispered tartly. He’ll never make China alive.

James knelt on one knee. He slid his hand under Sir Gladwyn’s head, felt the ridges of tar between the planking against the back of his hand, the fine white hair against his palm.

The old man opened his eyes. He stared up into the huddle of faces looking down at him. He narrowed his eyes testily.

I am not dying. A man can slip on this dratted, heaving deck, he croaked with an indignant harrumph. Come on, young man, get on with it. Help me up.

James lifted. Sir Gladwyn stood shakily, rocked against James’ bent arm, but stood. He was very tall when straightened up. For a moment, the two men stood encircled, waiting for the passengers to let them through. For a moment, it looked as if they might not.

Should you get up, Sir Gladwyn? an English voice asked.

Sure you’re all right, Sir?

It might be serious, Sir. I can call your room steward. A lady on the edges, who had been crying, dried her eyes with a sniff at the wasted sympathy.

Just winded, James said. Let him sit down.

The circle parted reluctantly, like thwarted children forced to abandon the game because the teacher has come.

Vultures, Sir Gladwyn snorted.

They walked slowly across the deck, James holding Sir Gladwyn steady.

Glad you’re returning to China, Sir.

Fifty years in China. Sir Gladwyn panted. What was the good of knowing all that in Surrey?

James imagined the brilliant, obfuscating, fact-stuffed old man shuffling in bedroom slippers through the streets of a little English village. He would vacation in the Chinese Room of the British Museum, penning shaky notes for articles for the Chinese Repository.

Here’s my chair, number 67.

James stiffened his arm into a rigid banister so that the old man could drop into his chair with dignity. I’ll bring a tonic to your cabin.

The old man nodded, like one used to tonics. He breathed heavily, waiting, no doubt, for his heart’s pumping to subside. He raised his strong-featured face, squinting painfully against the bright sky behind James’ head.

Keep me alive till we get to Canton.

James started. I’ll try, Sir.

First trip? Sir Gladwyn pressed his liver-spotted hands against his knees.

Yes, James said. I’m looking forward to it.

Eager, he nodded to himself. Young.

James did not dispute it. He was glad to accept that ‘young’, glad to be at the beginning of his fifty years in China. He would accept all the additions; ‘young and eager’, ‘young and impetuous, ‘young and foolish’.

That’s the young doctor, a passenger, passing behind him, murmured. Didn’t do a thing. Just dragged the old man up.

James sat on the steamer chair next to Sir Gladwyn. He should have dragged over his own numbered chair. Usurpation of chair assignments violated the code of the deck.

If you feel up to talking… be the first to draw on your experience now you’re back.

Not the first, Sir Gladwyn chortled. His white sideburns moved backward, framing something that was almost a smile. Not the first. Look at this, young man. His hand fumbled into his pocket. It stumbled over the flap, trembled into the pocket’s far corners.

A heavy parchment clattered and squealed as he pried its folds apart and patted it flat against his knee. James was glad to wait through the pardonable boasting of the old, expecting some ancient memento. It was an official document, impressive with a golden crest, a seal embossed in red wax, and—James was startled—a famous signature black and bold across the sheaf:

Herbert Henry Asquith, Prime Minister of England

It was as modern as today, and powerful. James was astonished.

He needs to know, Sir Gladwyn rumbled. He needs to know.

James waited respectfully through the laborious re-folding of the parchment. Sir Gladwyn had won the privilege of being waited for. What was his mission in China? Was he far more than a visiting scholar? A diplomat of the first water? Hardly a clandestine spy.

The trembling document missed the top edge of the pocket, was set too far over, and caught at the corner of the rim. Finally, pushed down, he gave it a pleased pat. Without raising his watery eyes to the sea-bright sky he said to his hands, You wanted to ask me, young man?

The situation—China. We know so little,

There’s a great deal to know.

You must feel—anticipation at returning? James said. "They say that anyone who has lived China wants to return. After fifty years, you must have a love for the country?

Love, sir? Hate, rather.

James blinked. He remembered a story circulating the decks. A young wife died of cholera? A young son poisoned with river water?

Killed the two people I ever loved, sir.

The old could still appall the young. Fleetingly James thought of his own young wife and winced. James admired a person who saw life unprettied. To look at the truth straight on, without gush and twitter, was half way to managing it. James studied his hands, his short-cut nails; he flexed his fingers to strengthen them. If Sir Gladwyn hated China, why had he come back?

Sir Gladwyn seemed to be looking at him now through the squinted folds of skin, so he asked, So many things… Are they teachable, for example? Will they accept modern medicines, invasive surgery, and sanitary practices such as quarantine from family for contagious diseases?

Big country, Sir Gladwyn muttered. Sick and dying everywhere. Drop in the bucket.

We’ve made a start, James leaned forward speaking—so be it—eagerly. You may have heard of the Canton Hospital? Started in 1830. They’ve removed thousands of cataracts ‘making the blind to see’ as the Bible has it. You’d never believe the number of cases for an institution of small size until you read the annual reports. They’ve remained in operation through wars, epidemics, anti-foreign outbreaks. They’ve trained assistants, even some Chinese doctors in the past. Eventually—

Need. Sir Gladwyn reached ponderously backward into a long, long memory. Felt that way once. We started a newspaper, y’know. For the people who could read, of course, scholars, students. The Court was against news, you know—why should subjects know what was happening outside? Everything that mattered they could read in the Court Circulars.

A wonderful service, sir. News of science and inventions? Did they read it?

They read it, all right. The people did. The officials accused us of disaffecting the populace. The scholar in him looked at the other side, as it must so often have done. And so, perhaps, we were…

His voice had not fallen finally as if he had concluded, but had trembled off into a silence which settled between them, resting until either of them found something further to say.

The sun warmed James’ cheeks. It winked back from the toes of his new black boots. Is the newspaper still going?

Remember the printer we hired? A good boy, wasn’t he? He roused himself to speak to the present. They’d forbidden any Chinese to teach us the language in the old days, y’know. On pain of death. And to print it! Pain drew in his shaggy white eyebrows. Beat him forty strokes in the face, tears in his voice. Ignorant mandarins, he muttered. Fossils.

James pulled in the purifying salt air. But it’s different now.

Different, different? Sir Gladwyn’s head sank on his chest.

James leaned forward, anxious for his answer, but the silence settled again, like a gull on the water.

James stood up quietly, looking down on the great old head, a first class person, a living library of all he wanted to know. But the body with the bright white hair slept in the sun.

I’ll see you again, James murmured, moving away. Why was an old don going upcountry to Canton at the end of his life? Moreover, why was he carrying a letter from the Prime Minister of the greatest of the world’s Great Powers?

共

It was the last evening on board, to be celebrated with the Captain’s Dinner, an occasion for wearing one’s prettiest; in Nell’s case her apricot tulle, ruffles floating at neckline and wrists. ‘Savor the present’, she told herself, stamp out the embers of an undefined future. Tonight required only an aptitude for pleasure, her hand on the sleeve of James’ blue serge suit. You’re wearing the gold cufflinks—my wedding present, she said, surprised. I found out too late that you never wore jewelry.

He smiled down at her, a special glint. Barbaric ornamentation.

Her heart rose. The small ruby in each cufflink winked at her from his starched French cuffs. That he was willing to wear the cufflinks was a heady concession. An untrustworthy bear had allowed itself to be led, for the moment, by a jeweled, golden button.

What a marvelously attractive man he is, she thought, his bearing so confident, his chin firm, his eyes unafraid. Tripping along in her satin slippers, she felt him tame his stride to hers, and was touched. Mr. Colocott, the English importer with the trim moustache, James’ companion of the deck, joined them at the entrance. Good evening. May I? Tomorrow your first view of the Orient.

Nell sparkled back at him, over-charged, unknowingly flirtatious. So let’s eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow—who knows?

We’ll know soon enough. James said dryly, dampening her down. Why borrow trouble?

The dining salon bloomed, flowers of lustrous gowns against stems of dark-suited men. Skirts flowed to the floor like the trumpets of lilies. Golden beads and stickpins echoed the gold braid of the winter-uniformed Canadian officers. White throats offered themselves and shaven cheeks pretended to be civilized. Water goblets and ranks of silver glinted on gleaming white tablecloths made rosy in the light of tiny pleated lampshades. Six pairs of shiny eyes smiled up from the ship doctor’s table as the handsome young couple arrived. The gentlemen rose as James seated Nell.

You’ve met Dr. and Mrs. Galt? asked the ship’s doctor, their table’s host.

Good evening.

Good evening.

Good evening.

Good evening.

We’re going to enjoy every bite, Nell twinkled. Who knows whether in China we’ll get another?

The ship’s doctor seemed to drink in her charm and high color, as if dazed. James observed not displeased.

Odors, like invisible blessings, followed the great trays. Tidbits on silver salvers offered like homage by white-coated waiters. Soon warm dinner plates garlanded the round table, plates crowded with thick slices of pink ham positioned between fresh green peas and golden yams under a buttery sheen. The garnishes were varnished amber ovals called kumquats, Nell was told eagerly, fresh watercress. Potatoes Duchess squeezed out in cream rosettes.

How can they grow watercress at sea, Doctor? someone marveled.

You must go on deck after dark and see the Southern Cross. Gorgeous!

We’ve managed to make the crossing without a typhoon.

Nell leaned toward the tablemates, vividly aware of James beside her. They were a couple, a unit, both looking outward, yet counting on each other to smile, to comment, to project appropriately. James watched Nell sidelong, her blue eyes wide, pink lips parted, flawless rosy cheeks. She seemed to drink in and return the rays of friendliness from each spoke of this wheel of good fellowship and comforted stomachs.

But you’re not an American, I understand, Mrs. Galt, Mr. Colocott’s smart moustache twitching, frankly admiring her. You’re one of us.

No longer. James settled his hand on the back of Nell’s dining chair, answering for her. She became an American citizen on the occasion of her marriage to me.

Ah, on the basis of law, but surely not of loyalty, Mr. Colocott not backing down. I hope it turns out to be a fair exchange.

Why not? James dismissively.

I’ll have a foot in both worlds. Which was true, as Nell brought oil to the antagonism she felt rasping. So perhaps I have gained. She smiled mischievously at James, blue eyes brilliant. May I expect other benefits for the sacrifice of my Imperial citizenship?

James bent suddenly toward her, as if challenged; he would subdue her with a kiss… but a bell tinkled. The Head Steward rose. "We will be favored with a vocal selection from Carmen between courses. Miss Alicia from San Francisco. A treat of a sweet—before the sweet is served."

All eyes turned toward the contralto who clasped her hands by the grand piano, thus swelling her luxuriant bosom, necessary for volume. James leaned close to Nell. You’re beautiful, he murmured, So starry-eyed. But you can stop dazzling the men. His glance slid slowly from her intelligent forehead, her high color, to her chestnut hair softly drawn into a figure eight behind her white throat. Swallowing, Let’s leave all this bustle, and go out on deck where I can… He set his teeth.

Sssh. Her small moue warned of a rebuke from their tablemates, but her twinkle rewarded his sentiment. Primly, however, she directed her attention onto the soloist, herself modeling the behavior expected. She mimicked the clasped hands, set them before her on the tablecloth. Her tawny gold bracelet, with its heavy inch-long links, tumbled, clinking. Her lips could not but curve up. Somnolent eyelids fell, intensely aware of him. His aloof white shirt only masked animal hair. His elegantly striped silk necktie momentarily prettied the muscles of his neck.

The unseen accompanist was crashing arpeggios up and down. You have a noble brow, James murmured as if judiciously. Although I love your adorable nose and could drown in your beautiful eyes, at this moment I most admire the sweep of your brow.

Nell blushed. He was extravagant! She saw Mr. Colocott glance over—probably admonishing their whispering. Nevertheless, the memory scene of her bracelet… Her oval fore-fingernail tapped the gold. Remember this? Remember when…

James eyes crinkled up. He remembered it well.

Four friends had happened to meet behind McGill University by the hawthorn copse. Three were interns, and the fourth herself. Did you see my brother’s shot on goal at the hockey game? We’ll take the title. She’d been basking in their attention, heedless and headstrong perhaps, but protected from dangerous intimacy by their numbers. Suddenly, James, whom she had met only twice before, stepped ahead of the others, so close that she’d faltered into silence and stepped backward; the hawthorns scratched her fall coat.

James was dressed to go out, a navy blue suit and no topcoat, looking magnificent as he did tonight in starched white shirt and regimental tie. Good afternoon, Miss Hartnell, he looked down at her formally, very severe.

She had blinked. Why, good afternoon.

He had taken, almost captured her hand startling her again, for a man was supposed to wait for the lady to initiate the handshake. Her breath short, she had seen the other three men—disapproving, put out, excluded by his body.

Please! Caught in the too-intimate privacy he had created, she skipped backward to escape his silent regard. She flung her left hand above her head, I haven’t seen you recently, Dr. Galt. Have you been… Oh! Oh! My hand!

Her hand was impaled on a thorn! She could not move it! Impaled above her head! Oh… it hurts!

An inch-long thorn has pierced through a link in the bracelet, James had said judicially.

She twisted and moaned.

Don’t move, he said. The thorn is wedging itself under the tightening bracelet. The pain had been astonishing. Blood oozed over the back of her hand.

What shall I do? she cried. I’m caught!

The intern from Nova Scotia had reached up to grab the branch, pulling it downward, trying to break it off.

She had screamed at the pain. He had let go at once. His hand also bleeding, muttering.

You’re stuck! the younger one had exclaimed unhelpfully. Don’t move!

The blood was wiggling down her wrist. James bent toward her, his chest an inch from the tips of her unprotected breasts.

She had held her breath. He had pressed his warm thumbs on each side of the thorn, stopping the horrid bleeding. He had held the position for a moment and was silent, her heart beating, face to face. Her breath came shallow and shallower until only the wisp of air flowed between her open lips. Deliberately, yet quickly, he had slid the last two fingers of his left hand under the bracelet and raised it. At the same instant, the fingers of his right hand had forced up the branch, while the ball of his palm had weighed down on her wrist with controlled but enormous strength. The blood-tipped thorn had withdrawn itself without even breaking.

Why—why, thank you! She had stumbled against him, faint from the loss of breath. He had steadied her, holding her punctured hand.

Very neat, the boy from Nova Scotia had said reluctantly. James bound up her hand tightly with his white handkerchief. Speechless, she had slid into a state of sweet delight. The rescue by his strong and competent hands had exalted her, never forgotten.

Those same fingers touched the bracelet as the soloist climbed the scale gathering volume. I beat out three good men.

Were you competing?

Of course.

Were they?

Of course.

At what? She studied him from under her eyelashes.

At winning the princess—as you very well knew.

You did rather take over. She basked in the memory of his competence and power. Her eyelids fell at the wonder of being handled and saved.

It was good of you to allow it, he murmured.

Allow it?

When you selected me—with your eyes—I had one chance. I’m glad I made it.

She frowned. When did I select you? I was helpless. Any of them could have, friends longer than you, also doctors. The delicious helplessness of that special day remained.

It was you who had the power in that situation. A sardonic chuckle. Friends! We were enemies. You knew that I’m sure, in spite of all your chatter about hockey. Finally you threw yourself into that thorn bush, and action was required.

A knight in armor to the rescue?

If you will. I saw that you would accept my intervention.

How could you see that? I didn’t know it myself!

Your eyes met mine. Your body turned toward me. Your lips—your wonderfully soft lips—were begging for kisses.

Sssh. Sssh. she whispered hastily. Never!

He laughed softly.

An explosion of clapping startled her. The gazes of their tablemates returned, enforcing propriety. Nell glanced at James once more. His arrow-straight eyebrows shadowed his steady eyes. He should be predictable to her—they were married. But… no. He surprised her often. That male mastery tantalized her. Why did he laugh when she contradicted him?

You’re supposed to applaud, not stare, he murmured, clapping enthusiastically. Hastily, she patted her palms, caught his amused and mocking salute.

May I say, Mrs. Miller, a flowery little lady was speaking to Nell, as the clapping died away, that pretty sweethearts like yourselves fill our evening with charming sentiment.

Nell flushed, embarrassed, the others also taken aback at so personal a remark. Were they so transparent? But—oh, well. And James’ expression? Anything but pretty sentiment.

Will you be staying in the Orient long? asked the blond young American insurance executive, Roger Summerled.

Oh yes, Nell smiling brilliantly at him. Years and years. And you?

A career appointment.

James’ strong fingers drummed on the tablecloth. Mrs. Miller’s words might be banal, Nell recognizing his impatience, but the fun is in discovering new people. His cufflinks’ tiny rubies caught the light at each thump.

Well then, it’s good that we civilized nations got rid of those Boxers. Mrs. Miller spoke quite passionately, her white skin flushed into her faded red hair. Otherwise we’d hardly dare stay in Hong Kong. Never venture into China.

Nell froze, her desert spoon in mid-air.

Hong Kong is not China. Mr. Colocott’s moustache gave his truism status.

Eat up, James murmured. I’m tired of sharing you.

Nell placed her desert spoon between her lips.

But they thought themselves invincible! And to murder all those foreigners, even a convent of innocent nuns. If only our soldiers in the Legations had come to save them.

That affair was only a temporary aberration, James said almost brusquely. Don’t you agree, Mr. Colocott?

Probably so, Mr. Colocott did agree. The Boxer Rebellion possibly the last gasp of an outdated faction.

Nell did not swallow the sweet her spoon laid into her mouth. It sank off her tongue forgotten, her eyes fixed on the Englishman.

Encouraged, Mr. Colocott went on. Actually be grateful that their government is absolute. We relieved the Siege of the Legations with a comparatively small show of force, to teach the lesson to only one person, the Empress Dowager. Even autocrats have to respect the lives of diplomats. Even the savage Gauls did that. Once convinced, she simply removed her support from the ‘Righteous Fist’ mob and sly Prince Tu’an who paid them. She gave her support to sensible Commander-in-Chief Jung-lu who wants to develop a modern nation.

You make it sound intelligible. Mr. Summerled pursed his pink and mobile lips. But the country’s notably unpredictable.

Everyone says a foreigner can never understand the Chinese mind. Mrs. Miller nodded, expecting agreement.

Did they have a grievance? Nell asked. Forgive my ignorance, but we hadn’t met anyone who knows China at first hand. Weren’t they opposed to foreigners because we were ‘eating up their land,’ and calling down the wrath of Heaven?

But ‘Exterminate the Foreigner’ Mrs. Miller protested. That was uncalled for whatever we did!

You’re very well informed, Mrs. Galt, Mr. Colocott bowed. Yes, ostensible grievances. However, any excuse can whip up a mob. The Manchu used us as scapegoats for their own mismanagement.

Yes, James interposed. She reads up on China each evening. But we Americans—which includes you now, Nell—need feel no shame, he raised an eyebrow at her. We do not occupy territory, ‘spheres of influence’ being the nicer phrase. A decision made by our Secretary of State, John Hay, in 1901.

That’s right! Roger Summerled also stood for America. The Open Door Policy.

The Boxers were eliminated more than a decade ago. James continued briskly. The policy changed under the Old Empress, as you pointed out, Mr. Colocott. There’s now strong movement for reform.

Maybe so, Mrs. Miller admitted breathlessly. But it’s still dangerous in there.

James frowned, but Mrs. Miller continued sturdily, faded blue eyes fixed on Nell. I know you’re a very educated and important man Dr. Galt, but be careful if you dare to beard China.

We will be, James answered evenly.

What is the name of the Emperor now? Nell asked.

P’u Yi, answered Mr. Colocott. A child emperor guided by the Regent, his father Prince Ch’un.

Nell nodded. I thought it was rather sweet that the Empress Dowager named him herself in a ‘Ceremony of Tribute’.

Not so sweet, Mr. Colocott contradicted her. This ‘Little Emperor’, the Huang Tung Emperor, was named presumptive heir when he was only two years old, on the very day before—with remarkable timing, the Young Emperor—whom the Empress had imprisoned—neatly died.

Oh, these English are used to that sort of palace intrigue, James said cheerfully. Princes murdered in the Tower and all that.

But that was years ago, Nell sniffed.

Yes. Years ago. James looked at her meaningfully. So… He rose, China is also coming into its future, the twentieth century. I daresay all of us here will help her. Before anyone could follow up, Shall we go, my dear? After such a fine dinner, a turn around the deck?

It was hardly a question. Nell drew in her eyebrows. She needed more news about China. She was stimulated by this social encounter, caressed by the charm of the dining salon. And these interesting and attractive people—

Don’t take her away, sir, Mr. Colocott exclaimed.

Don’t abandon me—the last American, said Roger Summerled.

There’s the demitasse, reminded Mrs. Miller

Fruit and cheese also, the ship’s doctor added.

Nell sat smiling at her court. Why leave this lovely group? So openly begged to stay! It amused her to be treated as one of a matched pair. They want us to stay, James, she smiled up at him, not moving.

We want to hear about your wedding in Montreal, Mrs. Miller said shyly. They’ve only been married a month, she told the table.

Six weeks. Nell blushed at their indulgent smiles.

James remained standing. He was not a member of their group. He placed his hand on the back of Nell’s chair. He did not appreciate their indulgence. His impassive face told her plainly he was waiting for her.

Vexed, she sat still. Why should she be commandeered? The male faces were not innocent. These men knew very well what he was waiting for. Might they even be visualizing the uttermost privacies in which James… !

Breathlessly, she rose at once, inwardly cringing. Well, since I vowed that we would live in perpetual harmony, I had better not disagree. She put a good face on it, but she passionately resented having to leave. Only at parties did she hear non-domestic stories, the world outside the home, or hear from that strange breed of being known as men. We have so enjoyed sharing this Captain’s dinner with you, she concluded pleasantly. We’ll see you on deck tomorrow.

Very smooth, James murmured, as he stepped back to allow her to precede him among the tables. And very prompt. You’ll make someone a wonderful wife after all.

What do you mean, after all?

After all, in spite of that feminine charm and exaggerated attention you lavished on the men. You certainly did dazzle them—as you intended. But a little too provocative for my comfort.

Provocative? You were provocative! Those mean things you said about England.

He laughed far down in his throat. So I’m going to take you up on it.

He was ostensibly following her like a gentleman, but actually, he was pressing her out of the salon, his implacable stride falling just behind her satin slippers.

On what? she, slightly breathless.

On the promise of your loveliness.

Nell and James passed out of the warm, safe, social light and into the primitive night. Sea gusts tweaked strands of long hair out of Nell’s smooth chignon. They flapped the apricot ruffles. They boosted her across the deck, an importunate wind.

James boomed at her back to compete with the thrusting whistle. And I’m counting on your pledge of ‘Perpetual Harmony’. I hadn’t been told about that. Suddenly he slid his arms around her waist, stopping her cold in the inky shadow of a man-sized ventilator.

I thought we were going to stroll, she protested, captured. The ventilator grew out of the deck like a monstrous jack-in-the pulpit.

He pivoted her around as if she were a doll, suddenly face-to-face. They were no longer a couple, a unit looking outward. They were a tingling he and she alone in the dark. Hurriedly she filled the ominous quiet with words.

Well, isn’t that what everyone wants in their marriage?

Loveliness? Of course.

No! Harmony.

Well, roughly, I suppose. He laughed like a throaty male lion waiting for the mouse to tire. But there may be spice in a little strife. She resented the nervous way James made her feel.

I don’t admit that, she frowned, Calm seas… Her frowns did not intimidate, for James, still gripping her waist, traced her eyebrows with an index finger. I’ll never think so, she said, piqued. I take it seriously, embarked on the most important, the most exciting, the final phase of her life, Married Life.

He drew her to him inexorably, winding his strong arms around her. I take you seriously, he said into her hair.

Not here! People can see!

Nell, you were so beautiful tonight. I couldn’t get you away from those drooling males fast enough.

Oh, I don’t think they…

You are honey to honey bears, my dear. Why did those medical students swarm?

Feeling foolish, I was never flirtatious! That hoarse hum at her ear was not the wind, she realized suddenly. It rumbled upward out of the mouth of the ventilator shaft, the saliva-moist mingling of many breaths, of hundreds of people breathing below decks, most of them drooling males. She shivered.

James drew her closer. If you say you draw men unintentionally, I believe you. But believe me. You were breathtakingly vivid tonight. Can it be, my own darling, you are feeling what I feel?

Feeling what? She stammered, agitated, I was only wondering—

Wondering what?

China, tomorrow!

That, too, of course. But tonight, the last night of our honeymoon, were you also thinking of me?

Yes… but I’m provoking you again?

Not provoking—provocative, a siren of the sea. His eyes were hidden in shadowy sockets, his teeth pale and slightly apart. A quiver coursed down her body, pressed as it was against his hard one. It quavered in her voice. Do you really understand the place where you are taking us?

His head was a silhouette above her, blocking the friendly stars. She could not see his face, but could feel him feeling. Breathless, because her lungs were smashed against his chest, she had to forestall… I mean, what you yourself said, she almost gasped, Not borrow trouble… but looking ahead. I do worry. I wonder… about—you know… trouble?

Of course I investigated. He said wearily as if disappointed.

But I mean… enough?

He straightened up, but he did not let her go. I’m sure the Society did. He spoke stiffly. Nell, are you questioning my judgment?

"Well, I—"

If so, he added sharply, it’s late in the day for that.

It’s just that I had a nightmare—

Oh, your nightmares. He turned on her savagely. I told you before! The Boxers are finished. Forget them! He pulled her so powerfully against him that her head fell back and her spine arched itself against his rigid arm. Nell in the starlight, his breath was drawing, deepening in a way she recognized. Nell, whose soft pink lips—whether she knows it or not—are begging for kisses.

Nell fended off his approaching lips, the roughness of his blue serge through the tulle. His passion alarmed her—these bear hugs without her consent or permission. Amusement mocking her resistance. He laughed like a boy, in mischievous glee. So you have nightmares. Your Aunt Frew told me. Childishness. In the daylight terrors evaporate.

He grasped the nape of her neck. Her hair slid away under his hold. He grasped her neck the tighter. He seemed to hurl himself over her, fierce… Fierce and gloating? Oh, God! Her hands pushed out convulsively in unreasoning terror. He pulled her backwards so her arms flew out like chicken wings. Her back arched! Her neck stretched. Her long hair slid out of the treacherous pins cascaded over her shoulders, taking all self-control. The hoarse breath above her she had heard in her dream, the hoarse breaths of the Shensi Yamên blew though the drooling breaths from the ventilator at her ear. Her vulnerable breasts exposed to the night’s implacable sky. Helpless to protect herself, the curtain between the present and the past, the real and the remembered, ripped. Looming above her in the dark, there he stood, naked to the waist, sweating like a pig, with a red rag bound around his shaven head. He raised his cruel hand! Something golden glittered on his wrist, red as blood. His great hand descended. One breast covered—Mutilation! She screamed.

The sky did not hear the thin, heart-broken cry. It was lost in the whistling of the importunate wind. But James heard it. He froze. Gently, gently, he raised her upright, still facing him, his hands still encasing her waist.

You’re cruel, she whispered, shrinking away. Who are you? she whispered to this dark and looming stranger. Did she know him so very well? He had deliberately mimicked her nightmare! Totally shaken, frightened. You did it on purpose! she cried wildly.

Nell, darling. The voice was James’. Don’t shrink away. It’s only me. I only said that nightmares are nothing but fantasy.

It was James, that sterling person to whom she’d entrusted her life. That made her furious. Her courage surged back. You are cruel! Callous and insensitive! How could he have used her own admission to mortify her so? I may be childish in your eyes, but—, trembling in her voice, trembling in her limbs, you just want to dominate me!

Nell, I’m sorry. He drew her against him. You’re trembling!

You staged it just as it happened! Deliberately!

How could I stage it? I don’t know what you dreamt.

I told you. It was the executioner!

There is no such man! You’re awake! It was imagination then. It was just now.

She shook her head fiercely. Her hand flew above her shoulders. She would not cry so she laughed a frantic abandon. "I didn’t imagine it! It was true! It happened!"

What happened? James said quietly, suppressively. Tell me what happened.

She would not be calmed. You don’t know. You never stopped to find out. You just wanted to see your advanced cases. And you knew I’d come along because—

Because why? he said too evenly.

Because I was—helpless.

You’re not helpless, Nell. Don’t play act. You made your own decision to come. I heard you tell your mother so.

It was true but it wasn’t his place to contradict her. She was angry because he was getting angry. He had no grievance. No one had outraged him. Even as she stoked her anger, she felt qualms, as if she were baiting a bear that might turn on her. She buried this new fear under more accusations.

What right have you to correct me when you frightened me so?

I won’t have you frightened at shadows.

Her hand flew to her lips, deeply insulted, I don’t get frightened—at shadows.

All right—something happened. Apparently, you’re not going to tell me. I’m sorry… but I was impatient with your swooning maidenhood. I had thought… I had hoped for a partner in… love.

Swooning maidenhood. Was that how he saw her? Shame flamed into her face, rage at his demands, humiliation at his criticism. You want to dominate me, she cried, bitterly ashamed now at her loss of self-control. She tore herself out of his hands. I hate you! she cried. Even as she flung the words into his unseen face, she regretted them. They were cheap and melodramatic, only said to hurt him. She knew they were false.

Her anger sent her headlong toward the heavy door to the light. Yanking open the door against the wind, she swayed forward, her hair streaming against her cheeks. Passengers sauntered out of the dining salon. Her hair down, she