The Mark of the Golden Dragon Page 9

  "C'mon, Chops, you've already done that. I've seen your storeroom. Hell, you could supply twenty museums with half that stuff."

  "True, I do have a rather nice collection of antiquities."

  His eyes take on a dreamy look and he softly says, "Sir Charles Chen, Order of the British Empire, Knight of the Garter. Oh, wouldn't that put some of those noses ... Well, never mind," he says, shaking those thoughts out of his head. "I shall think upon your proposal. Here's Sidrah. Now off with you both."

  "It is indeed a wondrous place, Sidrah. Thank you for bringing me. I wish we could have brought Ravi with us, though. I don't like the thought of his being chained up like that."

  "Do not worry, Jah-kee," says Sidrah, placing her hand upon my arm, as we sit at a low table in a lush garden outside of the temple, partaking of various sweetmeats and drinks. Blossoms hang over our heads, and heady perfumes linger in the air. "Father has taken a liking to the boy. He will be fine."

  Today, I have on a lovely pink silk top and a matching narrow straight-to-the-ankle skirt. I'm wearing a similar colored shawl over my head. I figure I blend in pretty well with the crowd.

  Ganju Thapa sometimes goes with us on these outings, but not today. I know the man finds escorting us a distasteful duty, and he gets out of it whenever he can. This day he sends two of his underlings, and they don't seem to like it much, either. They helped launch the Eastern Star, true, but did not show much joy in the outing. Perhaps they don't like being on the water. Sidrah, thoroughly enjoying herself when on the sea and marveling at my sailing skill, assigned them the task of holding parasols over our heads to guard our complexions from the sun. When we landed at the beach near the temple we were to visit, the two lugs stayed with the boat, while we proceeded through a small village to the temple grounds.

  "Why do you not wear your hair like mine, Sidrah?" I ask, popping yet another olive into the ever receptive Faber mouth. There are shrimp-flavored crackers to go with them, and I crunch these with great gusto. Although they took some getting used to, I now find them quite delicious. "Your father seems to like it."

  Sidrah wears her hair piled high on her head, held in place with many elaborate combs. She considers, then says, "My mother was Siamese, not Chinese. This is the way we wear our hair."

  Hmmm... I sense she is being ... diplomatic.

  "Besides ... ah ... Chinese women do not always wear their hair like you have yours," she says.

  "Oh...?"

  "No ... Only women of certain ... adventurous ways ... and men, of course."

  Oh-ho! I get it now! Thanks, Cheng Shih, for branding me a bad girl. Oh, well, it's been done before, and I shall live with the mark.

  "Come," she says, rising to her feet. "Let us go into the presence of Gautama Buddha."

  We get up and go into the quiet of the temple.

  Sidrah and I kneel before the statue of the Great Buddha that is enthroned within the place—him sitting all calm and serene, gentle smile in place, with a bowl of smoldering incense at his feet. We both had bought some sticks of the stuff from a saffron-clad monk, lit them, and had placed them in the bowl. We sat there quietly for a while—Sidrah, I'm sure, praying her Buddhist prayers, and me thinking my heathen thoughts about who I am and how I got to be here in this place. You are surely a long way from Cheapside, girl...

  There are other monks in the interior of this place and they sit in a circle and chant, and it is a most soothing sound. I close my eyes and let the sound and the smell of the incense take me, swaying, away.

  Am I having a religious experience? My head swims and the place seems to move under me... Me? Jacky Faber, the skeptic ... the mocker, the maker of Biblical jokes. Could it be?

  No, it couldn't.

  I open my eyes and look up. Among the wafts of incense smoke, I see strands of white powder, which looks like falling plaster ... and then a grinding noise...

  That doesn't sound very spiritual. That doesn't—

  "Jah-kee!" screams Sidrah, grabbing my arm and hauling me to my feet. "Run!"

  I'm mystified. Run? Why?

  She drags me toward the portal through which we had so recently entered. She sees me confused and screams yet again...

  "Earthquake!"

  Chapter 15

  My mind reeling from the feel of the earth moving in waves beneath me like some earthen sea, I struggle out of the temple. Looking down to the shore, I can see the Eastern Star resting quietly there despite all the pandemonium that swirls about us. Our two bodyguards begin pushing her out to sea and the cowards are manning the oars. They are probably regretting their lazy decision to let us go to the temple alone, because if anything happens to Sidrah, their lives won't be worth a farthing. Chopstick Charlie, mild though he might appear, would see to that, for sure.

  Sidrah listens, head up, watching the shore intently.

  "It was but a small earthquake," she says, her hand still on my arm.

  Small? I shudder. It felt pretty big to me! I look back to the temple, which is still standing, but there are some other buildings nearby that are not—they are now piles of rubble. Piteous screams rend the sudden, uneasy silence. Oh, Lord...

  "There may be aftershocks ... but that is not the only thing to fear. Come, let us run."

  All right. But she doesn't run toward the boat. She drags me in the opposite direction—inland. What...?

  "The boat's thataway, Sidrah. Why—?" I protest, stumbling along behind her.

  "After earthquake," she shouts, panting, "sometimes comes the tsunami, the Great Wave ... And look, Jah-kee, it is going to happen!"

  She points to the shore. The water is fast receding and there is a great sucking sound, like it's being drawn out by some giant whirlpool far out to sea. When first we had landed in our little boat, the beach was about twenty-five yards wide. Now it is a hundred ... now a hundred and fifty ... The Eastern Star is aground on the sand, her oars now useless to the two men who still sit within her ... Now two hundred ... and then we can see the shoreline no more. All manner of sealife lies exposed to view. Whelks, conchs, giant clams, lobsters, all kinds of fish—all just lying there. Oh, Lord, if we could just harvest some of these, even a few, I'm thinking.

  "Quickly, Jah-kee, as fast as you can! The wave will come fast!"

  I need no further encouragement. Lifting our sheathlike skirts, we race for higher ground.

  "To that tree there! It is our only chance!"

  She points to a large tree with low drooping branches that sits to the left, way beyond the temple, and we pound toward it. I get there first and vault up onto the first limb, lock my legs around it, and reach back for Sidrah, as she cannot have had the experience in climbing that I do.

  She goes to take my hand, but there is a cry of anguish and we both look down to see a baby, a girl, sitting naked upon a rock next to some washing her mother had been doing, the child now plainly alone in a suddenly very cruel world. Sidrah reaches down to scoop her up, then slings the child on her back, and the girl wraps her arms around Sidrah's neck as she runs to the tree. I reach under Sidrah's armpits and haul her, and the burden on her back, up to the first branch.

  "Higher!" gasps Sidrah. "We must get higher! Look!"

  I look and I see it. Good God!

  The Great Wave looms up ... and up ... and ever up ... out there on the horizon, and it is coming on like the Wall of Doom, and judging from the masts of the boats it is devouring, it's gotta be fifty feet high!

  The Wave from Hell roars ever onward, sucking up whatever is in its path—boats ... animals ... people—sucking into its belly whatever it does not grind to bits against the pitiless ground.

  "Higher! Higher!" shouts Sidrah, and we crawl further into the ever thinner branches.

  "But it is just a wave," I call out. "Surely it must crash and then wash away!"

  "No, Jah-kee! Look beyond the crest!" she cries, pointing with her free hand.

  There is the wave itself, yes, but behind it there is no trough like a regular wave
's—like those I have dealt with all my adult life ... No, no simple little trough there. No, the entire Bay of Bengal rides high behind it!

  Horrified, I climb higher as the water comes relentlessly on.

  Now it is at the edge of what was the beach, and from my perch, I am amazed to see that there, midway up the wall of water, rides the poor, doomed Eastern Star, its two terrified occupants still in it. And now it thunders below us, sweeping all before it.

  The Devil Wave hits the helpless land and its defenseless people and their flimsy homes. It smashes into the side of the temple, surging angrily all about. The temple holds, but my Star hits the side of the building and shatters into a hundred yellow shards and I see no more of it.

  The tree trembles, but it has seen this before, and it holds.

  "Higher! There is another wave!" implores Sidrah.

  I look out and see that, incredibly, there is yet another wave coming at us. This one sits on top of the first one! Lord!

  We scramble higher into the top of the tree as the second wave surges by us, wetting our feet but doing us no other harm. The water swirls below for an astonishingly long time, and then slowly recedes.

  It seems that angry Neptune is done with us ... for now.

  Disasters bring out the best in people...

  We climb down and find the surviving villagers already at work trying to help the victims less lucky than they. There is much wailing and crying, but there are shouts of joy as well. Sidrah is able to hand the child she saved back to the girl's weeping mother. We join a gang digging out a man trapped by wreckage and a boy pinned by a log, and look to help others as best we can.

  And disasters bring out the worst in people... as well as the worst people themselves...

  In the midst of yet another rescue attempt, Sidrah suddenly straightens up and looks toward the shore. She looks grim.

  "What is it? Another wave?"

  "No. Bad men come. Look."

  I follow her gaze and see that two big launches have pulled up on the beach and rough men are pouring out of them. Beyond them, out at sea, sits a ship, and from its masthead it flies the black colors.

  Pirates!

  "Out at sea they feel the sea surge below them and know that big wave will come up and strike shore. They come in to reap evil profits from unhappiness of others," explains Sidrah, the anger plain in her usually impassive face.

  The seagoing marauders swarm up the beach and rage through the stricken town, and the people of the village are helpless before them. Those the pirates cannot use are struck down without mercy, and the ones they can use—those to be held hostage for ransom or to be sold as slaves—are shoved into their boats and taken back to the big ship. It is as easy as plucking apples from a tree for the heartless bastards to capture the stunned victims of the tsunami. A gang of them rampages through the temple, stealing all they can lay their hands on. The monks cry out in protest, but it does them no good, for the pirates club them down, laughing at their anguish.

  "Run, Sidrah!" I shout, and run we do, but as we dash past the temple, we see with dismay that there is a high cliff to the rear of the temple, so we cannot run there. We are caught between that stone wall and the devils from the sea. Damn! We are trapped! They are on us in a moment.

  A particularly large and smelly rogue grabs me and twists my arm behind my back. From her cries, I suspect Sidrah has been similarly assaulted.

  "Let go of me, goddamn it!" I yell, twisting in his grip.

  My shiv, please, my shiv! Oh, where are you now when I need you?

  "You'll pay for this, you dogs!" I threaten, but I fear in vain, for no, it does not serve. Rough hands are put on us and we are taken, the pirates plainly delighted to have snatched two girls as well dressed as we are and surely worth something in the way of very sweet ransoms.

  We stand on the deck of the pirate ship, which has made sail, and we are headed south and are now out of sight of the plundered town. Most of the captives have been shoved below into what smells like the hold of a slaver, but Sidrah and I remain on deck, being examined by the grinning rogue of a captain. He is dressed in black pantaloons with a wide leather belt. His thick chest is covered with curly black hairs and crossed with two heavy straps. Above us flutters his flag, which I can now see has two crossed scimitars on a field of black, with a silver five-pointed star between the blades. Sidrah has her chin in the air, her haughtiest look on her face, and is speaking to the captain. I do not know the language, but I know what she is saying.

  I am Sidrat'ul Muntaha, Daughter of the House of Chen. You would do well to treat us kindly, if you mean to keep your head.

  The beast nods, happy at the news, and he replies.

  That is very good, Little Chicken. Charlie-san shall pay dearly to get you back. But what is this strange creature? He hooks his thumb at me.

  Being so addressed, I put on the Lawson Peabody School for Young Girls Look—chin up, eyes hooded, lips together, teeth apart, and gaze upon the captain as if I were looking at a toad, to which he most certainly seems to be related. I decide to speak up for myself.

  "Listen, you misbegotten son of a slime worm. I am Lieutenant Jacky Faber, Royal British Navy, also known as the dread Ju kau-jing yi, beloved by Cheng Shih, Admiral of the China Sea! I sail under her protection! Look upon this, lowly eater of cockroaches, and despair!"

  I whip my pigtail from off my neck and show him my Golden Dragon tattoo, my Safe Passage in these perilous waters, as it were. So, there, pig...

  He laughs and brings the back of his hand across my face. I cry out and take a step back. He brings his own grisly face up to mine and exposes his yellow teeth and spits out some surly words.

  "Be careful, Jah-kee!" hisses Sidrah, who had translated my bootless threat. "The arrogant fool says that he has no love for the whore Cheng Shih and he does not fear her! Especially since you, the bearer of her hated mark, will not survive this voyage if you do not curb your tongue!"

  The greasy cur of a captain issues orders and I am grabbed by two burly sailors and stood up on the rail. Teetering there and looking down, I see the water swirling darkly by the ship's hull. Looking across, I see that the land is about a quarter mile off to the west.

  "He says he will throw you in to drown, Jah-kee," says Sidrah, sounding very worried. "Please be careful what you say."

  I look at the water. I look at the land. I look at the captain snarling next to me, and strangely I think of Jemimah Moses and one of the animal tales she used to tell me and the kids back on the Nancy B. as we plowed through the Caribbean last year. It had to do with Brother Rabbit and a horrid briar patch into which Brother Fox and Brother Bear were threatening to toss him.

  I turn to this sleazy captain and work up a gob of spit and aim it at his eye.

  "Do what you will!" I shout. "You sorry sack of monkey shit."

  "Arrhhhhgash!" he roars, and I am thrown off the side, and as the water comes up to meet me, I hum...

  Born and bred in a briar patch...

  Chapter 16

  Great, just great...

  Here I am, sitting on yet another desolate beach, my prospects dim. The ocean lies in front of me, with the thick jungle behind, teeming with tigers, no doubt. Well, girl, be glad you're still alive, and you'd best get on with it. With a heavy sigh and a mighty groan, I get to my feet and stretch. I figure my best option is to walk north, to return to the devastated village to see if I can arrange some sort of passage back to Rangoon and Charlie's place.

  After that unwashed cur of a captain had me tossed into the drink, I had stayed below long enough to see the hull of the pirate slip out of sight. After allowing sufficient time to lapse so that all aboard would think me drowned, I kicked to the surface and started pulling for the shore... Please, Father Neptune, please hold back your toothy sharks, because I think you have handled me roughly enough this day.

  I settled into the rhythm of the strokes and soon set up a good pace, the slippery silk of my sarong not slowing me down at all
as I slid through the water, my mind churning. I knew Sidrah would be ransomed, she being the daughter of the House of Chen, after all. I certainly wasn't doing her any good back on that ship, but if I can at least get back to Charlie and tell him what happened to her, he might be able to take action. As for the other poor people on that pirate ship, it was certainly the slave pens for them, as no one would ransom poor fisher folk. Aye, Sidrah would certainly be ransomed, and the others enslaved, but another thing I knew for certain: After that bastard saw the dragon mark on my neck, there was no way I was gonna leave that ship alive. I probably would have spent some interesting time below-decks with the captain and his crew before having my neck wrung and my body tossed overboard.

  For me, it was the devil or the deep blue sea, and I chose the sea.

  As I trudge along, keeping close to the shoreline should a hungry tiger appear with dinner on his mind, I pull the ruins of my beautiful silk sarong away from my skin, the better to dry it out. Of course, the fine pink silk is a mess, all flimsy and smeared, but I gotta wear somethin'. Oh, well, the sun feels good on my muscles after that long swim, and for that I am grateful. Walk on, girl...

  I do keep walking, but I am getting hungry and thirsty and I do not have my shiv with which to dig clams or poke the eyes out of coconuts. There is a lot of ropey seaweed lying about on the beach and there are rocks around which the stuff is clustered, so I mess about in it, trying to find some luckless beast to devour, but find nothing. I do notice that the channel right here gets rather narrow and fishing craft out on the water have to come close in here. There is one rock in particular that sits a good distance out. Would have to watch out for that one, should I be sailing, says the mariner in me.