Snake Bite (14 page)

Cameron hesitated, shrugged, and followed Sherlock in. ‘This is stupid,’ he said quietly. ‘This is
so
stupid. My mother would have kittens if she found out.’

The interior of the house was cool and shadowed. It smelt strange, like sweet smoke. The walls were made from rough plaster, and there were paintings hanging on them, not on canvas and framed as
they would have been in England, but on scrolls with wooden batons top and bottom to stop them from curling up. In the corners of the rooms, and set in niches in the walls, were small wooden
figurines – dragons and fat men with loincloths. There were no chairs, just cushions on the tiled floor, and the tables were set low to the ground so that people could kneel at them or sit
cross-legged.

‘You said you
know
my husband? We have never met, have we? You don’t live in Shanghai?’

‘I was on the ship with him,’ Sherlock replied. ‘The
Gloria Scott
. I said I would come and see him, once he had settled back at home.’

‘Ah – then you are Sherlock! He told us about you.’ She smiled briefly, before her face settled back into lines of concern. ‘He said that he hoped you would join us for a
meal, because he had some news for you – but then he suddenly collapsed.’

‘Yes, I am Sherlock – and this is my friend Cameron.’

She nodded: a little bob of the head that seemed to involve her shoulders as well. ‘I am Tsi Huen.’

She led them down a passageway to what was obviously a bedroom. The bed, like the tables in the first room, was set close to the floor. In contrast the windows were high up, well above the
height of a man’s head.

Wu Chung was lying on the bed. Sweat covered his pockmarked face, and he was shaking. As Sherlock got closer he could see that the cook’s eyes were bloodshot.

‘My friend Sherlock!’ he exclaimed. He was obviously trying to sound hearty, but his voice was thin and strained.

‘Wu Chung – what happened?’

He shook his head. ‘I do not know. I went to sleep last night. I woke with a start early this morning, before the sun came up. I don’t know what it was that woke me, but when I tried
to get out of bed I found that my legs would not hold me. I collapsed, and I started to shake. It feels like fire is running through my veins! And my mouth is drier than a desert!’

A boy came in through the doorway. He was about the same age as Sherlock and Cameron: Chinese, of course, thinner than Wu Chung but with similar features and hair. Wu Chung’s son, Sherlock
assumed. He was carrying a pitcher of water which he held out towards his father. The expression on his face was like his mother’s: panic, barely under control.

‘Here, drink this. I got it for you from the well.’

Wu Chung grabbed at the pitcher and drained it in three great gulps. He wiped his hand across his damp mouth. ‘That helps,’ he said. ‘Thank you.’ He glanced up at
Sherlock, and smiled. ‘I was hoping that I would see you,’ he said. He patted the bed beside him. ‘Come, Sherlock, sit. There was something I wanted to tell you, and there is a
message I need you to take for me.’

‘What is it?’ Sherlock asked.

‘The thing I wanted to tell you was that I won’t be on the
Gloria Scott
when she sails.’

‘I know you don’t feel like it,’ Sherlock said, trying to sound reassuring, ‘but you’re going to get through this. I promise.’

‘No, I mean I was offered another job.’

‘As a cook?’ Sherlock asked, surprised.

‘Yes. On board that big ship we saw in the harbour yesterday. The American one.’

‘The USS
Monocacy
?’ Sherlock shook his head, trying to imagine Wu Chung cooking for hundreds of American Navy personnel rather than a few tens of English sailors. ‘How
did that happen?’

Wu Chung glanced over at his wife, and smiled. ‘Talking to Tsi Huen yesterday, when I arrived home, she persuaded me not to go away for such a long time again. She told me that I needed to
be here for Wu Fung-Yi while he is growing up.’ Wu coughed, blocking his lips with the back of his hand. ‘I knew she was right, so while she cooked dinner I walked back to the harbour
to see if anyone else was looking for a cook. In a bar near the wharf I found that the American warship was seeking an assistant cook. I signed up straight away.’ He smiled. ‘They
desperately need a man who knows what he is doing. I have discovered that the new Head Cook has ordered far too many barrels of fresh water. Hundreds of them! The ship is heading up the Yangtze
River – they will have all the fresh water they want! I told him it was too much, but he wouldn’t listen to me.’

‘Did you tell Captain Tollaway that you wouldn’t be coming back?’

‘I sent a message to Mr Larchmont. I know he and the Captain will understand.’ He glanced up at his wife. ‘I have spent too long away already. I have missed so much of their
lives. The American ship is sailing up the Yangtze River for the next few weeks. I will be back before anyone misses me, and then I will look for other opportunities in Shanghai.’

‘But when does it sail?’ Sherlock asked. He felt saddened at the fact that he would not be sharing the voyage back to England with his friend.

‘Tomorrow,’ Wu said. His face was ashen. ‘But I will not be able to make it. Not the way I am feeling now. And a cook who is ill is a cook that nobody wants preparing their
food. I need you to take a message to the Captain of the
Monocacy
. Tell him that he will need to find another assistant cook.’

If he can, at such short notice, Sherlock thought, but he smiled reassuringly at Wu Chung. ‘I’ll take the message,’ he said. ‘I’m sure you can find another job
locally without much trouble.’

Wu shook his head. ‘Not the way I am feeling right now.’

‘Have you eaten anything that might have caused this?’ Sherlock asked.

‘Nothing that my family haven’t eaten as well.’ His face spasmed, and he suddenly twisted sideways and brought up the water that he had drunk moments before on to the floor.
Tsi Huen stepped forward to take his shoulders.

As he settled back into the bed, pale and shaking, Sherlock noticed something on his back. He only saw it for a moment, as Wu Chung’s cotton shirt shifted, but it caught his attention.

‘Lean forward,’ he said.

‘What?’

‘Lean forward!’

Tsi Huen and her son glanced at each other, puzzled. Wu Chung stared at Sherlock for a moment, then he nodded. His wife and son helped him as he sat up in the bed and leaned forward. Sherlock
peeled the damp cloth away from his shoulder.

There, below Wu Chung’s neck and above his right shoulder blade, were two red marks. One was small and neat while the other was larger and had ragged edges. The two marks were about an
inch apart, and the skin all around them was marked with a red rash.

Tsi Huen gasped. ‘Snake bite!’ she cried. She leaped back from the bed, staring horrified at the tiled floor. ‘Fung-Yi – get back! It might be under the bed.’

Sherlock’s body wanted to jump back as well, but his mind was fascinated by the idea that there might be a venomous reptile underneath the low bed. With body and mind fighting, he froze in
place. It took Cameron grabbing his shoulder and physically pulling him to make him move.

Wu Chung drew his knees up to his chest and glanced around nervously. ‘I didn’t feel any bite,’ he said.

Safely five feet away from the darkness underneath the bed, Sherlock dropped to his knees and peered into the shadows, ready in case something lashed out at him. But there was nothing. The space
beneath the bed was empty.

He stood up, shaking his head. ‘If there was a snake there then, it’s gone now.’

‘Of course there was a snake!’ Tsi Huen exclaimed. ‘You saw those marks!’ She wailed in anguish. ‘How could this happen to us?’

Looking around the room, Sherlock wondered the same thing. ‘The windows are so high that I can’t see how a snake could climb up there,’ he mused, ‘and this bedroom is at
the end of a corridor. The snake would have had to slither a long way to get here, and then slither a long way to get back. Why would it do something like that?’

‘Maybe it got in through a hole,’ Cameron suggested.

Sherlock looked around the room, at the line where the walls met the tiled floor. ‘Look at it,’ he said. ‘I can’t see any holes.’

‘There are no holes,’ Wu Chung’s son, Wu Fung-Yi, said proudly. ‘Mother made me fill them all up with clay so that rats and mice can’t get in. I check every week to
make sure that no more holes have appeared.’

‘Good boy,’ Wu Chung said weakly, lying back down in the bed. His face was grey and sallow.

‘When did you last check?’ Sherlock asked.

‘Yesterday,’ the boy said.

Cameron looked around. He hefted his stick. ‘I’ll check the other rooms, in case it’s still here.’ He looked at Tsi Huen. ‘If that’s all right with
you?’

She nodded. ‘Be careful.’

‘Look under all the furniture,’ Sherlock cautioned.

Wu Chung’s son stepped forward. ‘I will help,’ he announced. ‘Two sets of eyes are better than one.’ He nodded soberly at Cameron.

Tsi Huen seemed about to object, but a look from her husband made her close her mouth. ‘Let him go,’ Wu Chung said, voice weak. ‘He is a brave boy, and I am very proud of
him.’

Cameron and Wu Fung-Yi left the room, cautiously glancing around. Wu Chung gestured Sherlock and Tsi Huen closer to the bed.

‘Best that he is not here,’ he said. ‘I do not want him to see me like this.’ He coughed, and Sherlock was shocked to see blood on his lips. ‘Maybe it would have
been better if I was ill. With a snake bite, there is no recovery. Do not let him back in. No child should have to watch his father die.’

Tsi Huen cried out, then stifled the cry with the back of her hand. Her eyes were wide and scared.

‘You’re not going to die,’ Sherlock said with more firmness than he felt. Looking at Wu, he thought the man might be right, and he suddenly felt tears springing to his eyes.
‘We need to get you a healer,’ he said. ‘Where can we find one?’ He caught Tsi Huen’s eye. ‘Cameron and I will go and fetch the healer. We’ll take Wu
Fung-Yi with us.’

Tsi Huen nodded her gratitude, tears in her eyes. Sherlock could see that she knew what Sherlock was doing – giving her a chance to say goodbye to her husband, if indeed he was dying.

Cameron and Wu Fung-Yi came back into the bedroom. ‘No snakes,’ Wu’s son announced proudly. ‘We checked everywhere.’ He glanced over at his father, and his eyes
were suddenly sorrowful. He suspected what was happening as well.

‘We’re going for a healer,’ Sherlock announced.

Tsi Huen wrote a quick note on a scrap of paper with an inked brush. ‘Here,’ she said, giving it to Cameron. ‘This is the address, and a note for the healer. Be quick. Be as
quick as you can.’ She frowned at Cameron. ‘You can read
hanzi
?’

He nodded, and scanned the note. ‘I know where this is,’ he confirmed.

Sherlock gazed over at Wu Chung. He nodded a farewell. The cook nodded back, smiling weakly.

‘Come on,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

The daylight outside was blinding, and it took a moment for their eyes to adjust. Cameron led the way quickly down the street. Wu Fung-Yi brought up the rear, glancing back at the house where
his father lay ill. Possibly dying.

‘Are there a lot of poisonous snakes in China?’ Sherlock shouted to Cameron as they ran.

‘Some,’ Cameron called back over his shoulder. ‘Usually out in the countryside. I’ve not heard of any coming into the towns. Not without ending up in a cooking pot,
anyway.’

‘The Chinese eat
snakes
?’ Sherlock questioned.

Cameron nodded. ‘The Chinese eat anything.’

At first Cameron led the way through the crowded streets, but Wu Fung-Yi kept trying to overtake him. ‘I know where we are going!’ he shouted.

Cameron jostled his way back to the leading position a couple of times, but eventually Sherlock caught him by the shoulder. ‘Let him be at the front,’ he said. ‘He needs to
feel like he’s doing something to help his father.’

‘I suppose so,’ Cameron said, shrugging. ‘I’d probably feel the same.’

Eventually they arrived at a small shack that was set apart from the other buildings in the area. Charms and trinkets hung on strings from the roof, gently swinging in the breeze. Sherlock
noticed that the garden around it, front and back, contained plants that were different from the flowering shrubs that everyone else seemed to cultivate. These plants mostly didn’t have
flowers, or if they did then the flowers were dull and limp. They were thin, unimpressive things, more like weeds than anything that someone would want to keep around.

Wu Fung-Yi ran up to the doorway. There was no door:  just  a  thin  blanket  that  hung  down  over the opening. He banged on the door frame.

‘Please!’ he called. ‘Honourable sir – we need your help!’

As Sherlock and Cameron joined Wu  Fung-Yi,  an elderly man pulled back the blanket. He was, perhaps, the oldest human being that Sherlock had ever seen. His skin was the texture of
leather that had been crumpled up and left to dry out in the sun. His eyes were almost invisible behind a landscape of wrinkles that reminded Sherlock of cracks in the mud of a dried-up pond. He
had a thin, white moustache that hung down on either side of his mouth to his collarbones. His head was almost bald apart from a white ponytail, barely larger than the strands of his moustache,
which decorated the back of his head. When he opened his mouth to speak, Sherlock saw that he only had one tooth left, and his gums were black.

‘Who are you, to disturb my sleep?’ he grumbled in a high-pitched voice.

Wu Fung-Yi bowed quickly. ‘My apologies, venerable healer. My father is ill. My mother sent me to beg for your help.’

The old man stared at Wu Fung-Yi for a long moment, his eyes mere glints of light in the dark folds of his eyelids. Stepping out into the garden, he moved his head to stare at Sherlock and
Cameron. He was holding a wooden stick in his hand, and used it to support his weight. It was twisted, like a tree root. ‘So, foreign devils as well,’ he said casually.
‘Interesting days. Interesting days indeed.’