The Land Leviathan (A Nomad of the Time Streams Novel) (4 page)

It was on the third day of our journey upriver that the first serious incident took place. I was leaning on the rail of the ship, looking towards the west bank (which was closest) and enjoying my first pipe of the day when I suddenly heard a sharp report and, looking in the direction from which the sound had seemed to come, noticed a white puff of smoke. Peering more carefully, I made out several riders armed with rifles. More reports followed and I heard something whizz through the rigging over my head. I realized that we were being shot at and hastily ran along the deck to the wheelhouse with the intention of warning the Dutch skipper of the boat.

Old Cornelius, the skipper, smiled at me as I told him what was happening.

“Best stay inside, den,
Minheer
,” he said, puffing phlegmatically on his own pipe, his huge red face running with sweat, for it was all but airless in the wheelhouse.

“Should we not pull further out into midstream?” I enquired. “We are surely in some danger.”

“Oh, yes, in danger ve are, most certainly, but ve should be in much greater danger if ve vent further to midstream. De currents—dey are very strong, sir. Ve must just hope dat not’in’ serious is hit, eh? Dey are alvays shootin’ at us, dese days. Any powered vessel is suspected off bein’ a military ship.”

“Who are they? Can we not report them to the nearest authorities?”

“Dey could easily
be
de aut’orities,
Minheer
.” Cornelius laughed and patted me on the shoulder. “Do not vorry, eh?”

I took his advice. After all, there was little else I could do! And soon the danger was past.

Nothing of a similar nature happened to us in the course of the next couple of days. Once I saw a whole town on fire. Lurid red flames lit up the dusk and thick, heavy smoke drifted over the river to mingle with ours. I saw panic-stricken people trying to crowd into sampans, while others hailed us from the bank, trying to get us to help them, but the skipper would have none of it, claiming that it was suicide to stop and that we should be overrun. I saw his logic, but I felt a dreadful pang, for we sailed close enough to be able to see, with the aid of field-glasses, the fear-racked faces of the women and children. Many women stood up to their waists in water, holding their infants to them and screaming at us to help. The following morning I saw several detachments of cavalry in the uniforms of the central government, riding hell-for-leather along the bank, while behind them rode either irregulars attached to them, or pursuers, it was hard to tell. In the afternoon I saw field artillery being drawn by six-horse teams over a tall bridge spanning a particularly narrow section of the Yangtze Kiang. It had obviously been involved in a fierce engagement, for the soldiers were weary, wounded and scorched, while the wheels and barrels of the guns were thick with mud and there were signs that the guns had been fired almost to destruction (I saw only one ammunition tender and guessed that the others, empty, had been abandoned). Framed against the redness of the setting sun, the detachment looked as if it had returned from Hell itself.

I was glad to reach Wuchang, but somewhat nervous concerning the next stage of our journey, which would be overland by horse, backtracking to an extent, along the river and then in the general direction of Shancheng—unless we could get a train as far as Kwang Shui. It was what we had originally hoped to do, but we had heard rumours that the line to Kwang Shui had been blown up by bandits.

Wuchang faces the point where the Han Ho river merges with the Yangtze Kiang. It is one of three large towns lying close to each other, and of them Wuchang is the loveliest. Hanyang and Hankow are beginning to take on a distinctly European character, giving themselves over increasingly to industry and ship-building. But there was no real rest in Wuchang. Martial law had been declared and a mood of intense gloom hung over the whole city. Moreover, it had begun to rain—a thin drizzle which somehow managed to soak through almost any clothing one wore and chilled one to the very bone. The various officials who appeared at the dock as we came in were over-zealous in checking our papers and sorting through our baggage, suspecting us, doubtless, of being revolutionists or bandits. The better hotels had been taken over almost entirely by high-ranking officers and we were forced at last to put up at a none-too-clean inn near the quays, and even here there were a good many soldiers to keep us awake with their drunken carousing into the night. I pitied any town they might be called upon to defend!

Mr. Lu disappeared very early the next morning and returned while I was eating an unpalatable breakfast of rice and some kind of stew which had been served to me with genuine apologies on the part of our host. There was little else, he said. The soldiers had eaten everything—and no-one was paying him.

Mr. Lu looked pleased with himself and soon took the opportunity to let me know that he had managed to secure passage for us on the next train leaving Wuchang. The train was chiefly a troop transport, but would take a certain number of boxcars. If I did not mind the discomfort of traveling with the men and horses, we could leave almost immediately.

I was glad to agree and we gathered up our luggage and went to meet the rest of our party on the far side of town where they had been camped, sleeping in the open, curled up against their steeds. They looked red-eyed and angry and were cursing at each other as they saddled up and prepared the baggage for the pack animals.

We made our way to the station in something of a hurry, for there was precious little time. Mr. Lu said that a troop transport was more likely to leave on time—or even ahead of time if it was ready to go. The army could decide.

We got to the station and the train was still in—drawn by one of the largest locomotives I have ever seen. It belonged to no class I recognized, was painted a mixture of bright blue and orange, and was bellowing more fire and smoke than Siegfried’s dragon.

We crowded into the boxcars, the doors were shut on us, and off we jerked, hanging on for dear life as the train gathered speed.

Later we were able to get one of the sliding doors partly open and look out. We were in high mountain country, winding our way steadily upwards through some of the loveliest country I have ever seen in my life. Old, old mountains, clothed in verdant trees, the very image of those Chinese paintings which seem so formalized until you have seen the original of what the artist described. And then you realize that it is Nature herself who is formalized in China, that the country has been populated so long that there is scarcely a blade of grass, growing in no matter what remote spot, which has not in some way received the influence of Man. And here, as in other parts of China, the wilderness is not made any less impressive by this imprint. If anything, it is made more impressive. Mr. Lu shared my pleasure in the sight (though he took a somewhat condescending, proprietorial attitude towards me as I gasped and exclaimed and wondered).

“I expected to be delighted with China,” I told him. “But I am more than delighted. I am overawed—and my faith in the beauties of Nature is restored forever!”

Mr. Lu said nothing, but a little later he took out his cigarette case and, offering me a fine Turkish, remarked that even Nature at her most apparently invulnerable was still in danger from the works of mankind.

I had been thinking of Bastable and his description of the bomb which had blown him back into his own time, and I must admit that I gave Mr. Lu a hard look, wondering if perhaps he knew more of Bastable than he had said, but he added nothing to this remark and I decided to accept it for one of generalized philosophy.

Accepting the cigarette, I nodded. “That’s true. I sincerely hope this civil strife does not destroy too much of your country,” I said, leaning forward to give him a match. The train swayed as it took a bend and revealed to me a lush forest, full of the subtlest greens I had ever seen. “For I have fallen in love with China.”

“Unfortunately,” said Mr. Lu in a dry but good-humoured tone, “you are not the only European to be so smitten. But must one always take steps to
possess
that which one loves, Mr. Moorcock?”

I accepted his point. “I do not approve of my government’s Chinese policies,” I told him. “But you will admit that there is more law and order in the territories controlled by Britain than in other parts of China. After all, the Chinese Question remains a vexed one...”

“There would be no Chinese Question, Mr. Moorcock,” said Mr. Lu with a ghost of a smile, “without Europe and Japan. Who was it introduced massive importation of opium into our country? Who was responsible for the devaluation of our currency? These were not internally created problems.”

“Probably not. And yet...”

“And yet I could be wrong. Who is to tell?”

“The Manchus cannot be said to be incorruptible,” I told him, and I smiled a smile which echoed his.

His own smile became a broad grin and he sat back against the wall, waving the hand which held the cigarette, granting me, as it were, the match. I think the gesture was made graciously rather than from any real agreement with the point of view I had presented.

T
he train traveled steadily through the rest of the day and into the night. We slept as best we could on the shuddering floor of the wagon, ever in danger of a horse breaking free and trampling us. It was almost dawn when the train came to a sudden screaming halt, causing the horses to buck about in fear, stamping and snorting, causing our men to leap to their feet, hands on their rifles.

The noise of the stop gave way to a peculiar and uncanny silence. In the distance we heard a few voices shouting back along the train and cautiously we slid the doors right back, peering into the murk to try to see what was happening.

“At least there’s no gunfire,” said Mr. Lu calmly. “We are not under direct attack. Perhaps it is nothing more than a blockage on the line.”

But it was plain he was not convinced by his own suggestion. Together we clambered from the wagon and began to walk up the line towards the locomotive.

The big engine was still ejaculating huge clouds of white steam and through this steam moved dark figures. From the windows of the carriages there poked scores of heads as sleepy soldiers shouted enquiries or exchanged speculations about the reasons for our stopping.

Mr. Lu singled out one of the more competent-looking officers and addressed a few short questions to him. The man replied, shrugging frequently, making dismissive gestures, pointing towards the north and up at the jagged mountain peaks above our heads.

The sun made its first tentative appearance as Mr. Lu rejoined me.

“The line has been blown up,” he said. “We are lucky that the driver acted with alacrity in stopping the train. There is no chance of continuing. The train will have to go back to the nearest town. We have the choice of going with it and enjoying the dubious security of traveling with these soldiers, or we can continue our journey on horseback.”

I made up my mind immediately, for I was slowly becoming impatient with the delays and diversions we had so far experienced. “I should like to continue,” I told Mr. Lu. “It is time those horses were exercised!”

This was evidently the answer he had hoped for. With a quick smile he turned and began to stride back to our section of the train, calling out to his men to ready the horses and to load them, saying to me in an English aside:

“Personally I think we stand a much better chance on our own. This is territory at present controlled by the warlord General Liu Fang. His main interest is in wiping out the troops which have been sent against him. I do not think he will bother an ordinary caravan, particularly if we have a European gentleman traveling with us. Liu Fang hopes, I gather, to recruit allies from Europe. A plan which is almost certainly doomed to failure, but it will be of help to us.”

Accordingly, we were soon on horseback, heading down the long slope away from the stranded train. By noon we were deep into unpopulated country, following the course of a river along the floor of a valley. The valley was narrow and thickly wooded and at length we were forced to dismount and lead our horses through the moss-covered rocks. It had begun to rain quite heavily and the ground was slippery, slowing our progress even more. Moreover, it had become hard to see more than a few yards ahead of us. Owing to my lack of sleep and the hypnotic effect of the rain falling on the foliage above my head, I continued almost in a trance, hardly aware of my own tiredness. We exchanged few words and emerged from the forest and remounted when it was quite late in the afternoon, with only a few hours of daylight left. The river began to rise and we still followed it, from one valley into another, until we came upon some reasonably level ground where we decided to make camp and consult our maps to see what progress we had so far made.

It was as I watched the men erecting the tent which Lu and I would share that I glanced up into the hills and thought I saw a figure move behind a rock some distance away. I remarked on this to Mr. Lu. He accepted that I had probably seen someone, but he reassured me.

“It is not surprising. Probably only an observer—a scout sent to keep an eye on us and make sure that we are not a disguised military expedition. I doubt if we shall be bothered by him.”

I could not sleep well that night and I must admit that in my exhaustion I had begun to regret the impulse which had sent me on this adventure. I wondered if it would all end in some sordid massacre, if, by morning, my stripped corpse would lie amongst the remains of our camp. I would not be the first European foolish enough to embark upon such a journey and pay the ultimate price for his folly. When I did sleep, at last, my dreams were not pleasant. Indeed, they were the strangest and most terrifying dreams I have ever experienced. Yet, for some reason, I awoke from all this feeling completely refreshed and cleansed of my fears. I began to be optimistic about our chances of reaching the Valley of the Morning and ate the crude fare served us for breakfast with immense relish.

Mr. Lu was moved to comment on my demeanour. “We Chinese are famous for our stoicism,” he said, “but we could learn something from your British variety!”