China by Edward Rutherfurd (historical books to read TXT) 📕

slapped his thigh. “No moon,” he cried. “What a fool I’ve been!”

“Sir?”

“That’s what Li’s been up to. The cunning devil.”

“General Li?”

“This…” The Mongolian waved towards the activity in the yamen below. “It’s a bluff. He’s not trying to take the garrison at all. He doesn’t want Hangzhou. He’s just been waiting for our relief force to show up. That was his game. Draw troops away from Nanjing, split the Southern Grand Battalion.”

“And now they’re here, sir, what’ll he do?”

“Do? He’s already done it. Why would he wait? He’s gone. He must have sneaked his troops out by the western gate last night. Right under our noses, in the dark. Made a night march. They’re on their way back to Nanjing.”

“Where they’ll fall upon the remaining besiegers.”

“That’s right.”

“And the Taiping troops burrowing under the garrison wall, and the Taiping camp outside?”

“Decoys. Like those flags on the walls. To make us think he’s still there. Every day he can fool us, he puts more distance between himself and any troops we send after him.”

“What’ll you do, sir?”

“If I’m right, there’s probably no more than three hundred men in the yamen. We can take care of them and the Taiping camp ourselves, and send the Southern Grand Battalion troops straight back to Nanjing.” Genghis shook his head. “Trouble is, I can’t prove it. The only thing the war council will do is prepare for the possible enemy attack. Strictly defensive. That’s all.”

Guanji considered.

“If I can get into the yamen, I should be able to see at once. There’s either six thousand men in there, or a few hundred. Would the war council accept a report from me?”

“They might. How would you get in?”

“Maybe,” said Guanji, “the Manchu woman could guide me.”

—

She’d looked at him appraisingly. “If you want to get into the yamen, you’ll have to go dressed as a rebel. I have Taiping clothes that would fit you, at my house.”

“How did you get them?”

“Killed a Taiping.”

Even getting to her house, they had to be careful. He couldn’t go through the rebel-occupied city dressed as a Manchu officer and risk being arrested by a Taiping patrol. By the time they set out, he’d changed into poor man’s clothes. If anyone asked, he was her brother.

It was midafternoon by the time they got to her house, near the southern gate. Time to change again. Two of her children and an old woman he assumed was her mother-in-law watched as he tried on the loose smock with its red Taiping badge and the dead man’s leather belt.

“Do you want his sword?” she asked. “He had a sword.”

It was a typical Chinese soldier’s sword, straight and pointed, with sharpened sides, about the same length as his own, though not as good. Guanji tried it. “I may as well,” he said. “What about my hair?”

“Turn around.” She carefully undid his plaited Manchu pigtail, wet his hair, and spread it across his shoulders. She tried the dead man’s hat on Guanji’s head. It fitted, near enough.

“Could I pass for a rebel now?” he asked with a grin.

“Not in daylight,” she said. “Better wait for dusk.”

—

It was nearly two hours before they set off. Even going through the southern part of the city, they had to be careful. For now that he was dressed as a rebel, he had to watch out for the townsfolk. There were still plenty of local people, Han or Manchu, who’d willingly slit the throat of a lone Taiping rebel if they saw one. Hiding his Taiping clothing under an old Chinese coat, and with his hair loosely bound into a temporary pigtail with twine, Guanji shuffled along beside the Manchu woman as they made their way northward up quiet streets and alleys.

If the streets were strangely deserted, he soon realized that the houses were mostly occupied. Uncertain what was going to happen next, people were staying indoors for safety. When she did meet someone in the street, the Manchu woman would ask them, “Where are the Taiping?” And each time the answer was similar: Either that they had left the day before, or that a patrol had been seen an hour or two ago, but not since.

Once they came to a Buddhist temple. The door had been broken in, but someone, out of devotion presumably, had placed a lamp inside and lit a few candles. They paused for a moment to look in. The Taiping had smashed the tables, the statues, everything. As they continued working their way northward, the situation remained the same: people hiding, Taiping gone.

When they came to the square where he and his riflemen had ambushed the Taiping, however, the woman put her hand on his arm and told him to stop. “This is where you must be Taiping,” she whispered. She took his coat and quickly untied his hair, letting it fall loose to his shoulders. “Yesterday, all these houses were full of them.”

He surveyed the square. A wood fire had been lit in the center. It was still burning with a low flame, but there was no sign of anyone to tend it. A few remains of the barricade he’d thrown up could be seen in one corner of the square. They’d been using it for firewood. The houses stared blankly. He couldn’t see a lamp in any of them, or any indication of human presence. But looking northward up a street that must lead to the yamen, he could see lights a quarter mile ahead.

“I’ll go on alone,” he said quietly. “Wait for me.”

She nodded.

—

He was almost certain already. The Mongolian was right. The Taiping had fooled the defenders of Hangzhou, and they’d gone. But he had to be sure. Totally sure. Otherwise, if the Taiping breached the wall and came rushing into a garrison who believed the threat was over, thousands of his people were going to die. He walked slowly, the Taiping sword hanging from his belt. He was conscious of the beating of his heart.

He’d gone a couple hundred