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

The emperor considered for a moment. Then he sighed. “I still think they may join the Taiping,” he said gloomily. We all waited. “It’s always the same. A dynasty rules for centuries, then things start to go wrong. Barbarians trouble the borders. Provincial generals rebel…The peasants revolt. There are famines and floods as the gods show their disapproval…”

“Many emperors face challenges,” said Prince Gong. “But they can be overcome.”

“Everybody lies to me,” cried the emperor.

“I am not lying to you,” said Prince Gong quietly.

“My ancestors are looking down on me.”

“We must give them cause to be proud.”

There was a silence. We were all watching the emperor, but I’m not sure he cared.

“I am nothing to be proud of.” He sounded so sad. But it wasn’t the sadness of wisdom. More childish, really. Nobody said anything. Then he started weeping.

This was the emperor of China. I stole a glance at the face of the Noble Consort Yi. She didn’t even blink. Had she seen him cry before? I wondered if she felt pity for him. Perhaps she had at one time, but not by then, I suspect. She’d tried to make him more of a man and failed. Does a woman blame herself when her man ceases to be a man?

Not for long. She cannot. “Your Majesty has held firm on the most critical matter of all,” she suddenly declared. They all looked at her. “The kowtow! That is the most important thing.”

“Ah. Indeed.” Prince Gong was the first to react. She’d thrown them all a lifeline, to get out of their embarrassment. Prince Sushun and his brother saw it, too. “Indeed,” they echoed.

“At least I haven’t given way on that,” said the emperor, recovering himself.

Her timing was always wonderful. And taking advantage of the tide, so to speak, she rowed her boat forward. “Your Majesty has never wavered. The kowtow is the symbol of the emperor’s authority that not only your subjects but the envoys of all other kingdoms use in your presence. Abandon the kowtow, and we as good as say that our authority is at an end.”

“This cannot be denied.” The emperor nodded.

“Will Your Majesty allow me to say, then,” she gently pursued, “that one of the reasons I believe that the Western barbarians—even the American barbarians, who generally seem to be more courteous and less immoral than the others—want to undermine and destroy our empire is that they steadfastly refuse this sign of respect that has been given to emperors since time began. It is a deliberate insult that all the world will come to hear about. All the subject kingdoms. All our own people. It effectively says that the authority of the emperor is denied. That truly will be the beginning of the end. And these barbarians must know it. Therefore I say they have come here to destroy us.”

She has to be right, I thought. What else could it mean? I think everyone who heard her thought so, too, even Prince Gong.

“They must kowtow,” the emperor said firmly. “They must come peacefully, without arms, up to Beijing and be received in the usual way. If they refuse to behave, they will be stopped at the forts.”

The conference ended. I’m not sure any action had really been decided, but the emperor had made it sound as if it had. I noticed that above us, grey clouds were moving in, with shafts of yellow light falling between them. And I remember looking at the emperor. He’d turned his eyes up towards the sky, and the yellow light showed all the lines of strain on his pale face. He just kept staring upwards, for so long that I could even detect the movement of the minute hand on that stupid barbarian clock on the pagoda.

—

I didn’t see him again for almost a month. Some days he’d be closeted with officials in the Audience Hall. He’d also taken to visiting the islands alone. But I knew he was still spending time with the Noble Consort Yi, and that was all that mattered to me.

It was very quiet at the Summer Palace. Everyone was sleepy in the humid weather.

As for the barbarians, they didn’t seem to be making much progress. One morning, on my way to the Noble Consort, I met Mr. Liu. He was feeling so pleased with himself that he even smiled at me. “The barbarians are stuck in the mud,” he announced, “just as I predicted.”

“You were right, sir,” I said with a bow. “Your humble servant rejoices.”

But a day later, I heard that they were still advancing on the forts. Slowly and painfully, but they weren’t giving up.

Not long after this, I was with the Noble Consort Yi when Prince Gong looked in. “Two of the smaller coastal forts have fallen,” he said glumly.

“Our men ran away?” Her face was anxious.

“No, they fought like fiends. It wasn’t the men. It’s their guns. The barbarians’ rifles load so much faster, and they’re so much more accurate, that before our poor fellows can get off a volley, half of them have been mown down. I’m off to tell the emperor now.”

The next morning I asked the Noble Consort how the emperor had taken the news.

“With perfect calmness,” she said. But I didn’t really believe her.

And we had to wait only a few days before we heard: The barbarians had smashed all the forts, and the road to Beijing was open before them.

—

How could it have happened? That’s what everyone wanted to know. How had the barbarians been able to get through the miles of mud and bamboo spikes and walls and all the rest? Naturally, all eyes were on Mr. Liu. He’d told the emperor it couldn’t happen.

I almost felt sorry for him. But I must say, he knew how to fight with his back to the wall.

During the main battle, it seemed, a shot from the barbarian cannon had blown up one of our gunpowder magazines. The damage had been catastrophic. Mr. Liu seized on