The Blue-Eyed Shan (29 page)

“They seem unaware of this,” Wan said.

“Out of season,” Kin-tan said. “The Wild Wa are even now preparing niches in their cursed oak trees.”

Greenwood sat cold and empty. He tightened his embrace; Lola snuggled. “May I go to him?”

“No.”

“May he—”

“Not yet. It must be thought on.”

“It is the Sawbwa who must decide,” Za-kho rebuked Naung.

Naung said bluntly, “I think not.”

The Sawbwa frothed only slightly. “To deny order in the morning is to invite chaos in the evening.”

“It is I who must fight, and Wan and Kin-tan and the men, and it is we who will say.” Naung's voice trembled; his anger pressed upon them all.

“Yet we owe the general much,” Wan said, “and it is true that Pawlu must pay it debts or face future afflictions.”

“We must learn his plans,” Kin-tan said, “and his men's, and we must discover the nature of this foreigner.”

“So much I concede,” Naung said.

“That is well,” said the Sawbwa. “To rage at a small flame is to fan a great fire. As lustful desire clouds the brain, so heedless hatred fogs the judgment.”

Naung said, “Bugger.”

“Let Pawlu betray its benefactors and we shall drink the wind,” the Sawbwa went on. “In a dissolute age the honest beggar is the gods' favorite.”

Naung said, “Bugger again.”

“The general may come here. And the foreigner if he is not an Englishman or a Frenchman.”

Naung pondered. “That too I concede. But I do not concede that these outlanders may call Pawlu home. Green Wood, I want the truth. Every man here and your own daughter will listen, so tell me the truth or make your peace with your gods. You came here to find your general and take him out?”

“No more and no less,” Greenwood said promptly. “With no evil intent. This I swear by the life of my daughter.” He rubbed Lola's head. “But thirty-two men! My heart shrinks.”

“So does mine,” said Naung, “but my guard triples. Well then. This I propose, o Sawbwa!” The mockery was lost; the Sawbwa thawed. Naung's glance was for Wan and Kin-tan. “Green Wood will not leave the village; this, as a bar to evil communications. He may send a message, and we can bring his general and his colonel under escort. They will concert plans immediately to leave Pawlu and take their rabble with them. These soldiers are not to cross the road and will be shot down like pye-dogs if they do so.”

“That is what I recommend,” the Sawbwa said.

Wan and Kin-tan agreed.

“Three days,” Naung said to Greenwood.

Greenwood kept his peace and contented himself with visits to old friends, Na-yuan the blind woman, Kung the one-armed veteran, Chung's daughters, whom he praised appropriately and warned of Jum-aw's citified wiles. He chatted with Chung, he chatted with Loi-mae and Lola. He slept badly, stimulated by Yang's arrival, tense at Naung's hostility, depressed by insistent forebodings, odd spurts and pricks of shame and guilt. All that night, it seemed, dusky Wild Wa slipped into his nightmare like personal demons to mock and menace.

Next morning he tramped heavy-eyed to Naung's house, where he drank tea and ate twice-cooked fish. His manner with Loi-mae, and hers with him, were the easy ways of old friends, and Greenwood felt that it would be possible after all to do no harm. Lola chattered, wore the Japanese officer's hat at a perky tilt, showed Greenwood how her breasts wer budding. When he left for the Sawbwa's house, Loi-mae hugged him tight. Always, he felt at that moment, there would be love and trust, and the rest, the panting and gymnastics, was perhaps not as important as he had once believed.

“I attend council with my father,” Lola announced. Her tone was peremptory. “And I wear my Japanese cap.”

Loi-mae pursed her lips, but said, “Why not?”

“She will be safe with me,” Greenwood said, scowling. “Just let that Weng-aw even smile at her!”

Lola pranced and preened.

The morning drifted by. Tension hung like mist. On the slopes and in the common field, men went armed, and some of the women carried daggers, or a dah slung through a waist sash. The high command—Naung, Wan, Kin-tan—was nowhere to be seen.

The Sawbwa sat before his house in ceremonial dress, his Pawnee headband natural and appropriate. Za-kho attended him like a body servant. Greenwood and Lola strolled not far from them, pausing once for a game of jack-straws with dry reed stems. All along the slopes, and in clumps or couples on the field, villagers consulted and smoked. The sun inched higher in a bright, wintry sky: January in the mountains, yet warm enough to strip away the blouse.

It was not a cry or a stir that warned them but an eddy in the tension, a ripple, hoofbeats sensed but not yet heard. Heads turned, and groups drew together. Greenwood said, “They come.”

Lola clutched his hand beside the Sawbwa and Za-kho. Far across the grass, just this side of Red Bullock Pass, a a procession emerged, a squad of horsemen, Naung leading, Wan and Kin-tan on the wings, and in the center, side by side, the general, oddly bulky, and a foreigner. The Shan wore blue, the guests—prisoners?—khaki. The ponies proceeded at a walk. Excitement grew among the villagers, and cries rose. Someone shouted, “Hey, Smiler! Welcome back!” and then they were all shouting, waving, crowding close to the line of march as if to fling blossoms. Yang did smile then, his best effort, and a cheer erupted.

Greenwood saw that the general had contrived a sling and was wearing footlockers. One jounced against the paunch, another hung behind. The hoofbeats were firm and sharp now on the winter turf.

Za-kho said, “General Yang is carrying chests.”

“Ah! Ah! Gifts!” The Sawbwa clapped hands.

Gifts indeed, Greenwood thought, and then the cavalcade was upon them and he was meeting Yang's lively gaze. Naung rode proudly and formally. Behind him the foreign colonel sat tall on a Yunnan pony. All dismounted at one time, General Yang sliding to the ground, steadying his footlockers. He reminded Greenwood of a street vendor, display case up front, spare stock hanging behind.

All observed the proprieties. General Yang stepped first to the Sawbwa, bowed and exchanged with him fraternal pats on the shoulder. The Sawbwa uttered chirps of joy, as did Za-kho. Naung and the Shan warriors, neutral, sat their ponies and waited. The other foreigner was a colonel in Chinese uniform, a cold man and pale. His presence enraged Greenwood. Another Occidental here! Greenwood was also alarmed. A capable colonel leading thirty-odd survivors …

General Yang came before Greenwood, extricated himself from looped ropes and let the footlockers slide gently to earth, an offering at Greenwood's feet. For a long moment the village was still while the two friends rejoiced in silence. Far away a peacock shrilled. For that moment all under a bright heaven stood well.

“By God, you did it,” Greenwood said.

“Hot dog,” said the general, and it set them off, broke the spell; they guffawed like schoolboys, shaking hands, embracing.

Yang broke away and glared down at Lola. “And who is this woman?” he asked fiercely in his primitive Shan. “Who is this beauty?”

Greenwood said, “It is no woman. It is merely my daughter, Lola.”

Yang said, “Nonsense! Your daughter, Lola, is a child. This is a lovely woman!” And he swept her up, tossing her high while she laughed and cried out, “O Yang! Welcome, old Smiler! What have you brought me?”

Even Naung laughed.

Warily Greenwood took stock of the bizarre foreigner, who was observing all this with a fixed smile and a flare of the nostrils, as if viewing a mirage, or a vision.

When everyone had said “Blessings and greetings!” a dozen times and all backs save he colonel's had been slapped, and Lola was riding on Yang's shoulders, and it had just struck Greenwood as ridiculous but also possibly sublime that his best friends in the world should be Yang, Wan, Kin-tan, Mong—at that instant Yang said quietly in English, “These footlockers must not leave the village. Find a way to ensure that I too remain. House arrest, hostage, honored guest, anything.”

Greenwood said, “Yes.” He was observing Mong, who had decided to cast an inquisitive glance upon the colonel.

The colonel's chin rose; distaste warped his features, as if Mong smelled bad.

Mong's chin rose; he mimicked the colonel perfectly.

“You must present me to your colonel,” Greenwood said quickly.

The colonel, a head taller than most, the officers' kepi lending him a rigid, posed appearance, snubbed Mong and said to Greenwood, “Colonel Prince Nikolai Andreevich Olevskoy. Your servant.” “Colonel,” he said, and he was obviously, icily, nobody's servant. He was taller than Greenwood and fairer, his hair almost platinum, his eyes blue-gray.

“I'm Greenwood.” Neither offered to shake hands.

Behind Greenwood the Sawbwa asked, “Is this an Englishman?”

Greenwood said, “No, a Russian.”

For another startled instant no one spoke. Then, even more startling, the Sawbwa burst into a flood of some language not Shan.

“What says the Sawbwa?”

Yang spoke: “That Russians are good, according to a certain Shang, who revealed this to him long ago. Odd that he should suddenly break into Yunnan Chinese. He is positively vehement at this grand conjunction—Green Wood! The Smiler! And a Russian!”

Greenwood asked, “Who is Shang?”

“His nat,” Naung said, “his demon and familiar spirit.”

Greenwood explained this to the visitors.

Meanwhile the Sawbwa made his way to Olevskoy, placed a trembling hand on his shoulder and spoke in Shan.

Naung snarled. They all heard it.

Olevskoy seemed to find the hand repellent, soiled or diseased. “What was all that?”

Greenwood answered. “He says that Pawlu is your home.”

“Good God,” said Olevskoy. “Thank him for me.”

Greenwood did so, with ceremony, and then said, “Let us sit upon the ground. Za-kho, will you will see to a fire and beer, and some pineapple? Mong, will you ask Jum-aw to tend the ponies?”

After the beer and pineapple Ang-ang the Woman-in-Common served sizzling strips of gingered goat, bowls of boiled rice, tea and rum. A ring of spectators gathered: half the village. Greenwood saw with amusement that the Russian prince was fretting.

“They're a friendly people. Only curious.”

“I am unarmed,” Olevskoy brooded, “on new ground.”

“You won't need arms. You have no enemies here.”

“On a frontier there is always an enemy.” The Russian sucked at his rum. “Even among the salt of the earth.”

“They are folk of good bones,” Yang said, “and much honor among them.”

“Savages. Tattoos.”

Greenwood let his jacket fall open.

“Good God,” Olevskoy said again. “A man of the people.”

“Exactly right. They call themselves ‘the people' and they have made me one of them.”

“How democratic. You Americans, treating all the world's ills with your clammy liberal poultices.”

Leebral pawltices. Probably this prince heard his own voice as that of an English gentleman. “Not quite,” Greenwood said. Hating America was an international pastime; he had learned that since the war. If you want a man to hate you, save his life. “We do ténd to meddle, but we pass along a little science and art and home rule. Not to mention money.”

“All commerce and gasconade,” Olevskoy said. “There is only fucking and dying.”

The shock of it, the searing flash of profound, appalling truth, stopped Greenwood's breath. He recovered: “The rest is so everybody can do both well.”

The Shan listened intently. The ring of them was denser. Greenwood stroked Lola's hair.

“Look at them!” Olevskoy was enraged. “Regardez-moi ces sauvages. Et ce sawbwa qui n'est pas sawbwa. C'est un
starosta
, un petit chef de village, et de plus imbecile.”

Naung was puffing at a cheroot, his face blank.

“English, Colonel. No secrets from Greenwood.”

“No French?”

“Sorry.” Greenwood was curt. “What was all that?”

“This sawbwa is no sawbwa, only a half-witted village headman.”

“The conversation has taken a low turn,” Yang complained. He smiled at the Sawbwa, who dithered happily.

“Avec mes trente hommes je vais prendre ce village,” Olevskoy muttered.

Yang said, “No more war, Colonel.”

The field was sunny and warm; children scampered and shouted. To the Sawbwa Greenwood said, “Yang and I would share a house. Can that be?”

Naung said, “The Russian does not sleep in Pawlu,” and the warriors stiffened at this rude disregard of the Sawbwa.

Olevskoy asked, “What was all that?”

“I asked if you could sleep here,” Greenwood lied. “I'm afraid they won't have it.”

“I sleep with my men,” Olevskoy said. “I don't require the company of savages.”

Yang said, “Poor Nicky. What a foul mood. How grumpy and unTolstoyan.”

“That one!” Olevskoy spat.

Greenwood, ever the diplomat, said, “One of the glories of Russia, isn't he?”

For an instant Olevskoy left them, and traveled far; melancholy crossed his face, and unmistakable anguish. Then he said, “A fool. In the greatest novel ever written about a woman he had Venus rising in the west!”

From the edge of the field Loi-mae called: “Lola! Lola!”

Lola glanced casually in other directions and settled back against Greenwood's shoulder.

Naung said, “Lola. Go to your mother.”

Lola pouted.

“Do as Naung says,” Greenwood told her.

Naung scowled.

Lola hopped up and made tiger faces, growling and clawing the air before Greenwood.

“There is no doing anything with the children these days,” Wan said. “Shall I beat her?”

Lola dashed at Wan, fell upon him with a hug and knocked him backward. She then sprang up, bowed to the Sawbwa and danced three romping steps, arms outflung, braids spinning and glinting rusty gold in the sunshine, eyes alight with youthful excitement, moist lips parting over perfect white teeth unstained by betel. She danced back to the crowd of warriors and, as they parted, down the lane they made to Loi-mae. The Shan warriors chuckled and murmured, “Good! Good!”