“Best get used to the uniform,” Amanda (Captain) Baines adds, gesturing to the case. “Try it on before you sleep, and wear it in the morning.”
“Yes,” Edie says. “Of course.”
In her cabin—Cuparah, of necessity, is big; in fact, it is huge for a submarine, like a Gothic destroyer sunk and overturned, with an Art Deco cruise ship inside, so cabins are like rooms in very expensive boutique hotels—Edie Banister stares at the photograph, and the face in it stares back at her in the light of her cabin’s curlicued reading lamp. All around her, there’s a whisper of water and air: the submarine has two hulls, one within the other. The inner walls are a honeycomb—for strength, flexibility, and lightness, the Ruskinites on board have told her, and to permit cabling and pipes. As the ship moves, it sighs and chuckles to itself, so that Edie fancies herself surrounded by a giant, generous, asthmatic dog.
The white shirt has trim sleeves and a severe cut which vanishes her already minimal bust. Over the top goes a jacket with broad shoulders, making a very male, very triangular torso dropping to her hips. Rummaging in her bags she finds her rank pins, and twists them through the thick collar. She also has a false moustache not entirely unlike Shem Shem Tsien’s, a brace of neat sparrow’s wings. Careful, she fixes them very firmly to her upper lip (in absolutely no sense does she wish to have a conversation with the Opium Khan which begins: “Commander Banister, your moustache has fallen in the gazpacho”) and turns to look in the mirror.
The effect is rather more than she had anticipated. A pale, severe face stares back at her, a young man’s only just out of boyhood—perhaps trying a little too hard—but definitely not a woman’s. How curious. She puts her cap on and looks again. Actually, that young man in the glass is quite attractive—not in a rugged way, but in the manner of a refined creature, inexperienced yet supple, in need of Edie’s skilled, frank schooling. An entirely different set of fantasies winds across her inner vision. My oh my … her hands trace the outline of his—her—uniform. Ho hum. It’s rather a shame she can’t go to bed with herself. She turns sideways … Delicious.
And distracting. Edie sneers at her reflection, hoping to produce a dangerous expression. Hm. That’s not a look which will stop an advancing foe. She tries again, going for confident disdain. It doesn’t work, but produces a strange, fey look of murderous intent instead.
Cuparah shudders and barks; it’s something called the thermocline. Edie doesn’t know what that may be, but hitting it and bouncing off it is like running the rapids, and every time it happens she abruptly remembers how far beneath the waves she is, and how very far from home. If only she could get some warmth into her bones. A hundred feet down in an iron cigar filled with working men, why the Hell is it so cold? She wonders if she can ask Amanda Baines for a heater.
Actually, she knows why it’s cold. Excess heat is a major problem in submarines, and Cuparah is worse than the average because she is bigger and contains all manner of clever doohickeys, including the coding machine, which gets so hot that in England it would be operated by girls wearing only their most sensible underwear. Because this is a Ruskinite submarine, it has an incredibly clever solution involving water being pumped around the vessel between the inner and outer hulls. This water is also—even more cunningly—used to assist in manoeuvring, and because it is not compressible, actually adds to the strength of the hull. Cuparah’s cooling system is the Keeper’s best work. Amanda Baines calls it Poseidon’s Net, and smiles a little when she does because she is the only submarine captain who has one. It is brilliant.
It also makes all the cabins in Edie’s section really cold.
Conscious of the weight above her, Edie slips out of her uniform. She steps carefully, feeling a ridiculous nervousness about leaning on the walls in case she punctures the armoured skin and drowns the boat. Ridiculous. Impossible. But she can’t shake the aching horror of the idea, shed the imagined feeling of an eggshell cracking.
She draws her blanket around her and falls asleep, wishing very devoutly for a friend in need, or actually, just the warm embrace of a friend in bed.
James Edward (Edie) Banister, sword on hip, walks along the gang of Cuparah. His boots are very black and very shiny, and his steps are the clipped, certain steps of a son of Empire. The playing fields of Eton have birthed him, and if they have not also been successful in teaching him classical Greek or mathematics, nor made any attempt to instil a sense of compassion, they have at least prepared him for his likely tasks with a sense of monstrous entitlement. Wherever he goes, in whatever ridiculous foreign court he walks, he walks in the warm shadow of Henry V and Queen Victoria, in the palm of the hand of Shakespeare, and let the heathen take heed.
“The gig is waiting, Commander Banister,” Amanda Baines says, without a shadow of humour. “I believe you already know these men?” And yes, he does—four of Mrs. Sekuni’s really very very not very good students, now grudgingly approved, in full rig and quite respectful.
“Yes, Captain,” Edie replies quietly.
“Carry on, then, James. Good luck.”
The long, maroon Rolls-Royce has grey leather seats and is driven by a respectful man called Tah. Tah assures his passenger that the journey will pass without incident. From behind James Banister’s whiskers, Edie wonders what sort of incident he is thinking of. She peers back along the road, comforted by her escort in their own car. A small squad of hard cases from the fighting parts of England, and very welcome, too.
The road is very straight and very flat, and lined with cherry trees. It is a perfect road through a barren place. Once, along the way, Commander Banister sees a grandmother plucking a stone from the track. Looking back as the car whooshes past, Edie sees the woman stoop again, and again, and realises that this is her task.
“The Khaygul-Khan is very progressive,” Tah says proudly. “He believes in full employment.”
“So I see.”
“And in civic works. This avenue is the work of the Khaygul-Khan’s modernising project. The cherry trees are brought from Japan. They are the most beautiful cherry trees in the world. Matched pairs.”
“The Khaygul-Khan believes his country should have the best,” James Banister agrees.
“Also, in engineering for the future. Our nation will not survive in the new world without infrastructure. We use modern construction techniques. No elephants.”
“What, none?”
“None at all. It is not modern.”
“That seems a shame.”
“The Khaygul-Khan does not greatly admire elephants. He says they are lazy by nature and prone to outbursts of temper. He was forced to have several of them impaled, because they would not serve in his army of peace. Elephants are of the past. In the future, there will be none in Addeh Sikkim.” Tah chokes a little on this last. James Banister makes haste to move the conversation along.
“I’m sure that’s very wise,” he says.
“Naturally, all our people wish to be part of the Khaygul-Khan’s great project,” Tah asserts stoutly.
“Naturally.”
“It is only the brigands from over the border who are against this. They foment rebellion and unrest. And the pirates from the Addeh.”
“I’m sure pirates are very wicked.”
“Yes. Pirates are wicked. Exactly.”
Tah nods emphatically.
In the gaps between the proud, imported trees, squalid houses and hopeless faces.
Edie hears Abel Jasmine, in her head: This is not the fight, Edie. No crusades. The fight is survival. We’ll do the good things, the right things, later. For now, the fight is the thing.
She doesn’t like it, but she knows it’s true. She settles herself, twirls her false moustache with one hand, and tries to think like a bold scion of Empire.
From the Door of Humility—where appellants enter the throne room of the Opium Khan—to the dais where Shem Shem Tsien sits, fanned by houris and waited on by eunuchs, is a distance of forty paces. The whole chamber is lit b
y row upon row of gas lamps, tiny globes burning very bright and hot, but interspersed between them are strange coils of actinic blue. Every so often they crackle and spit as a moth or fly blunders into them. A lavender silk carpet runs the length of the room and culminates in a shin-high bar of gold and rubies at which one is required to kneel. The Englishman, Banister, removes his cap and places it under his arm. He has already politely given up his sword and pistol to the flunkey on his left. He turns, leaving his personal guard of four at the back of the room, and walks the long carpet slowly but without ceremony. The Opium Khan watches him every step of the way, past the sturdy marble columns sheathed in mosaic to give the impression of being quarried whole, and the great gold sculptures depicting the achievements of the Khan (suitably edited) and the organist playing the Khan’s personal anthem, and finally—this is where most petitioners are finally overawed—over the small bridge which crosses a jagged chasm, the bottom of which cannot be detected, so deep it is, but from which emerges in strange, sudden flashes yet more blue light and a sound of seething geology, like a dragon turning in its sleep. Behind the Opium Khan is a huge spiderweb of blue coils, the radial arms like the limbs of a many-limbed god. Approaching the throne is like walking into a storm cloud; one’s hair stands slightly on end.
Commander Banister reaches the bar, and bows his head respectfully.
“From Her Britannic Majesty, greetings,” he says briefly. His voice is light, even high, but then the English nobility are often said to be an effeminate race.
The flunkey coughs.
“It is customary that visitors kneel before the Khaygul-Khan,” he says.
“I ain’t a customary visitor,” the young man replies smartly, with a condescending smile. “I’m an ambassador o’ the British Crown. Don’t kneel in Beijing, don’t kneel in Moscow. Never been done. Never will be. Might kneel for Don Bradman, mind you. Decent batter. Whaddaya say, Khan? Bradman any good?”
“Bradman is excellent, Commander Banister. Although I always feel that Larwood’s better nature precludes a proper confrontation.”
“How so?”
“Larwood declines to risk hurting him severely, Commander Banister. Even with the new bodyline. He holds back.”
“Nature of the game, Khan. In the end, victory ain’t the point.”
“A very English game, Commander. Which is why I do not play.”
“Dear me. But however do you spend the summer, athletic fellow like you?”
“Fencing, Commander Banister. Hunting. War, sometimes. And of course, I must tend to my flock.”
“Sheep? Curious notions you fellas have. Sheep, eh? No pastime for an aristocrat, I’d say, but you know your nation, I s’pose, Khan.”
The Khan’s eyes are very sharp upon Banister’s face.
“My people, Commander.”
“Oh, indeed. Metaphor. Well, to each his own. Need a lot of looking after, do they?”
“Constant.”
“Int’restin’ how that happens in warmer climates. Your Frenchman requires very little maintenance, your yeoman Wessexer none at all. The Scots and the Dutch are positively against it. But come down into the heat and everyone needs schooling and regulation. Inconvenient, I call it.”
“It is a solemn duty which affords me the chance to be closer to God. Do you feel close to God?”
“Course I do. Dieu et mon droit, you see. Bein’ an ambassador’s very nearly like bein’ a bishop.”
Shem Shem Tsien smiles. “Bishops cannot make love.”
“Ambassadors should avoid makin’ war and nuns ain’t supposed to drink; fishermen are silent, not to mention ministers are selfless and judges are incorruptible. Surprisin’ how often all of us slip up, though.” Commander Banister smiles a broad, idiotic smile, his eyes very sharp in his pale, girlish face. Shem Shem Tsien nods in appreciation. Yes, indeed. Here is a man worthy of his attention. A buffoonish mask offered without pretence of truthfulness, and just a hint of a dare: Shem Shem Tsien has been challenged to find the truth of James Banister and just perhaps his price as well.
“Nice decorations,” Banister says, indicating the great disc behind his host.
“You like them? The aesthetic aspect is secondary, of course. Still, a throne decked in storms is something of a statement, I feel.”
“Secondary, eh? So what’s primary?”
The Opium Khan’s smile thins a little. “I have a morbid fear of insects, Commander Banister.”
“Insects? Big fella like you?”
“Mm. I once caught a Japanese merchant wandering through my kingdom, Commander, with a selection of wine glasses. Amid some truly excellent English crystal and some lost wax pieces by Lalique, he had a small number of cylinders containing mosquitoes which had been fed upon dying men. The diseases they carried were extraordinarily virulent. Do you see? I believe the idea came from an American author—a man who had no love for Asia, as it happens. Of course, the Americans—by which I mean, I suppose, the white Americans—have some history with spreading disease among those who are in their way.”
“Charmin’.”
“Indeed. As a ruse of war, it is efficacious. As an act of man, despicable.” See me, Commander Banister. I say the word, but I do not feel it. Understand: I have no limits.
James Banister’s bland expression does not falter, and the Opium Khan snorts lightly through his nose. Is the man dense? Or brave? The Englishman goes on.
“I understand you’ve been havin’ a wee war of your own?”
“Rabble from the forests. Woodcutters and charcoal burners. There is a real conflict abroad in the world, and it is at my gates. What you refer to is but a local issue of authority, nothing more.”
“Unruly peasants?”
“Misled by the last remnants of an old conflict.”
“Dear me. Best to finish that sort of thing at the time.”
“Indeed. It’s rare that I have occasion to regret my mercy.”
Commander Banister nods. Yes, he has grasped the implication there. “I imagine that it is,” he says coolly, and snaps his heels together by way of punctuation. “If I may?”
Shem Shem Tsien nods magnanimously. “We will eat in an hour, Commander. My chef has been instructed to prepare some traditional dishes for your amusement.”
“Not goat, I hope.”
“Addeh swan with a pearl and vinegar sauce, gold-leafed potatoes and a confit of Sikkim Red Tiger.”
“Never had tiger. What’s it like?”
“I understand that depends very much on what the animal has been eating.”
“And this one?”
“I have been feeding it personally. I can assure you the flavour will be entirely appropriate.”
“Taste of steak, then?”
The Opium Khan smiles, and raises one thin eyebrow.
“Steak. Yes. And perhaps just a little of the woods, Commander Banister. One never knows what will come through.”
“ ’E’s a cauld bastid, an’ noo error,” Flagpole says in Edie Banister’s chamber, when Songbird has given the all-clear. “A total, un-mitigayt-ud bastid. World’ud be bettah off wi’oot ’un. Noo chance, I s’pose, Countess?”
“ ‘Commander,’ ” Songbird says, reprovingly, glancing at the humming coil in the corner of the room. Edie isn’t sure whether a coil like that might be made to work as a microphone as well as a bug-zapper, and has no desire to find out by being discovered as a spy. Well, all right, as a girl spy with an inimical mission: it’s pretty clear that Commander James is a spook of the first circle, but people in this world seem to take that sort of thing as natural. It’s like not minding that the other fellow has a gun so long as he points it at the floor.
“Aye, weel. Commander, then. Noo chance?” Flagpole looks down at her, rough countryman’s face hopeful, like a boy asking for a new bicycle.
Edie glances around the room; bordello chic, very much in the Soho style of accommodation for louche gentlemen wishing to try out the harem style. A subtle insult t
o the British soldier, or an assumption about his ignorance? Or … a warning that her disguise has been penetrated already, and here is a false room for a false fellow, as fake and obvious as her fake moustache. No way to tell. She fingers a length of orange satin, draws it across her face. Delicious. Focus.
“Not unless something goes very wrong,” she replies. Flagpole brightens.
“Whul, it usually does, ey?”
“ ’Ope not,” Songbird mutters. “Some other bugger can go aftah that ’un. ’E looked at me on the way oot a’ the room. Fair ’n’ I widdled meself. Go op agin that wi’oot orders? Buggeroff!”
A large number of Songbird’s pronouncements end in this one word, which is how he gets his name. Shortarse (who is predictably enough around six foot nine and scrawny) christened him after the first few days on Cuparah. “Fookin’ Nora, ’e’s too sophisticated fer the likes o’ me, Cap’n, I can’t sail wi’ no flutt’rin’ songbird!”
Shortarse was also the first to call Edie “Countess,” after Flagpole tried his luck getting her to share his bunk back before they made landfall. “Now then, wee lass, best we get it oot tha way, like. You’ll be wantin’ to hoist the colours fer Flagpole, sure enough, I says let’s do it reet off the bat, and mayhapp’n ye’ll be cured o’ yer infatcherashun ’fore we leave …” And so saying, he planted a wet smacker on her lips. Edie bethought herself of Mrs. Sekuni’s Second Method For Repelling Improper Advances From Bourgeois Intellectual Sex Maniacs (of which Mrs. Sekuni assured Edie there were an infinite number and they were not, absolutely not to be despised, because many of them were quite as interesting as they wished a lady to believe). She let the kiss linger and then she helped herself to a chunk of his meaty backside in each dainty hand, and locked herself against him. She drew the kiss out as the rest of the section whooped and growled, pressed her tongue between his amazed lips and squirmed in the most lewd way she knew. She roved her hands all over him, down, up, down, up … up. And as the roar subsided, she pressed her thumbs lightly against his neck at the sides, slowly and imperceptibly closing his carotid arteries. One, two, three … four.