Hitchman’s merciless gaze and emphatic manner assured me that his threat was sincere. I went faint with the terror that he would discover my deception-or that Kuan would. Hitchman released me, but I felt the lingering ache from his grasp as I stumbled into the schoolroom. Overwhelmed by helplessness, I collapsed in the chair at my desk and cradled my head in my hands. What if I was never to escape the house? Would Mr. Slade rescue me?
Presently, T’ing-nan arrived. He mumbled a greeting and seated himself at his table. He seemed unnaturally subdued, perhaps because of the altercation with his father the night before. I set him a lesson in writing. He clenched the pen in his fist and produced an illegible scrawl.
“Hold your pen this way,” I said, demonstrating.
He tried, but seemed unable to follow my example. “You please show me?” he said humbly.
I should have known that he had mischief up his sleeve, but I was too addled by my encounter with Hitchman to be on my guard. I positioned myself beside T’ing-nan, took his hand in mine, and arranged his fingers around the pen.
He seized my wrists. “Hah!” he crowed. “I got you!”
“Let me go,” I ordered, angered by his trick and my own gullibility.
His eyes danced with malicious glee as I struggled to pull away. He rose and jerked me to and fro, twisting my arms.
“Stop that!” I cried, fearful that he meant me serious harm, perhaps because he wanted to vent on me his anger at his father. “Help! Help!” I screamed.
A loud voice commanded, “Stop!”
We both froze, then turned to see Kuan standing in the doorway. He spoke disapprovingly in Chinese to his son. T’ing-nan released me and glared at Kuan.
“Come with me, Miss Bronte,” said Kuan.
As he ushered me up the stairs, into his office, I felt as though I’d been plucked from a frying pan and cast into fire. He seated me in the chair I’d occupied yesterday, and himself at his helm behind the desk.
“I apologize for the crude behavior of my son,” Kuan said; yet he did not appear sorry. Rather, he seemed gratified, as if at an opportunity that T’ing-nan had furnished him. “But then he is not the first unruly young man you have ever had the misfortune to know.”
“What do you mean?” I said.
“I am referring to your brother.”
My defenses reared inside me as they always did upon mention of Branwell. “Branwell is nothing like your son.”
“I beg to disagree,” Kuan said, calmly folding his hands. “Your brother is, according to the people of your village, a constant trial to his family, as my son is to me.”
“Branwell would never attack a woman,” I protested.
Kuan gave me a pitying smile. “Would you like to hear what my spies have learned from your village folk?”
I didn’t want to learn more than I already knew about my brother’s misdeeds, and particularly not from Kuan. Goaded and indignant, I said, “What I would like is that you should honor your promise to let me inquire about you.” If I couldn’t yet deliver him into Mr. Slade’s hands, at least I might learn what he was and what were his intentions.
Again he seemed pleased, rather than annoyed, by my forwardness; perhaps he welcomed an audience. Contemplation narrowed his gaze. “Perhaps the time has come for me to answer the question you asked me last night: Why did I leave China?” His eyes took on that distant, musing look of recollection. “Why indeed, when Canton had everything to offer an ambitious civil servant such as I was.”
Once more, his mellifluous voice and the mention of foreign locales began weaving a spell around me. On the sea outside the window, a ship seemed a Chinese junk floating on eastern waters. I fell into the same languorous yet attentive state as yesterday.
“Wealth flowed into Canton from distant lands,” Kuan said. “Foreign merchants paid duties to the emperor and fees for lodging. Chinese merchants paid taxes and tributes. Much of this money found its way into the hands of officials like myself, the secretary to the governor. And the most profitable commerce was the trade in opium.”
I flinched at his mention of the drug that had ruined my brother and caused my family such woe. Kuan’s spies must have discovered Branwell’s habit. It seemed no coincidence that Kuan would speak of Branwell and opium in the same conversation.
“Opium is the fruit of the poppy and a substance of miraculous powers,” Kuan said. “When ingested-or smoked in a pipe, as is done in China-it eases pain and induces a feeling of tranquillity and euphoria. Worries fade; the senses grow keener. The world seems delightful.”
Often had I wondered why Branwell took opium, to his own detriment. Now I began to comprehend.
“Hence, the use of opium is widespread in Canton,” said Kuan. “The servants in my house indulged. So did clerks and officials in the governor’s service. But opium is not a pure boon to mankind. It induces a disinclination to do anything but lie dreaming amidst clouds of smoke. A habitual user abandons his duties, ceases to eat, and grows weak. Even should he wish to reverse his decline, he finds the habit most difficult to break. Cessation causes stomach cramps, pains, nightmares, and extreme nervous agitation.”
How well I knew, from observing Branwell.
“The poor wretch will do anything rather than give up his opium,” Kuan continued. “When he has spent all his funds on the drug, he will steal. Money has vanished from the government treasury, stolen by officials. Thieves roam the city. And the problems extend far beyond Canton. Across the kingdom, merchants, peasants, soldiers, priests, and the finest young men and ladies of society have taken up the habit. So have the emperor’s bodyguards and court eunuchs. It is estimated that China harbors some twelve million opium smokers.”
I was amazed to hear that what I’d thought a private problem was such a vast calamity in the faraway Orient.
“And the scourge continues,” Kuan said. “Every autumn, the ships arrive in Canton, laden with thousands of chests of opium from British poppy plantations in India. British merchants in the foreign settlements strike deals with Chinese opium brokers. Chinese silver pours into foreign hands, while the opium is carried inland along creeks and rivers, like poison flowing through the kingdom’s blood.”
Kuan suddenly addressed me: “What did you do when your brother fell under the evil spell of opium?”
Startled into frankness, I said, “I tried to stop him using it.” Indeed, I’d searched the house for bottles of laudanum, thrown them away, and remonstrated with Branwell.
“That is exactly what we in China attempted with our many opium smokers,” Kuan said. “Imperial edicts were issued, outlawing opium use and trade. Under orders to stem the scourge, I led raids on opium dens, arrested dealers. I seized Chinese opium boats and confiscated the cargo. Smokers were punished by beheading. Dealers and opium den operators were strangled. By discharging my duty, I made myself unpopular with the users whose opium I made scarce, the officials who profited by the trade, and the dealers whose property I destroyed.” Kuan’s expression turned dark with memory. “There was a price on my head.”
His crusade to save his people had earned him threats. I had experienced the same from Branwell by trying to save him. I began to see another piece of his intention in telling me his story: Kuan meant to forge our common experience into a bond between us-and in spite of my awareness, he was succeeding.
“But the profits from the opium trade were so great,” Kuan said, “that new dealers replaced those executed. The only solution was to attack the source of the opium: the British merchants. They who brought their foreign mud to poison our people must be banished from China.”
The hatred I saw in his eyes when he spoke of the British merchants surprised me. I had never thought to hate the people who supplied opium to Branwell; I had blamed him alone for his condition. Now I felt my perspective revolving, like a globe turning in Kuan’s hand to reveal new continents.