Juan in China by Eric Linklater

Author:Eric Linklater
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
Published: 2013-02-26T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 12

Juan had decided to return to the New Celestial, for Min Cho-fu’s flat seemed overcrowded, though this was due rather to the emotional atmosphere than to the number of people there.

Peony had collapsed just before they arrived. Whether opium was the trouble, or delayed concussion, Juan did not know, but he suspected the latter and insisted that Miss Min should take her in and put her to bed. Miss Min was most unwilling to do this, and her brother did not help matters by succumbing to an emotion so extreme and complex that he had to shut himself in the bathroom, where he was very sick. But Juan carried his point by opportunely remembering that Peony was the only person who could find Hikohoki.

‘He left the hotel on Monday,’ he said, ‘and we don’t know where he went. But he told Peony to come and see him if she wanted a job, and presumably he gave her an address. So if you’re going to look for him, your easiest way is to nurse Peony, and when she gets better she may tell you where he lives.’

Kuo instantly perceived the force of this argument, and Peony was put to bed.

‘It’s funny,’ said Juan with a yawn. ‘I only missed him by a few minutes. After leaving that wretched monastery, I mean. I went back to the hotel, and they told me that Hikohoki had just gone. If I hadn’t got lost in the Chinese City I’d have seen him, and we might have saved ourselves a lot of bother.’

‘You got lost in the Chinese City, and because of that you failed to see Hikohoki?’

‘Yes. Didn’t I tell you?’

‘You got lost!’ Kuo repeated. ‘When you knew that every minute was valuable, you got lost! Oh, how stupid of you!’

‘My dear girl,’ said Juan, ‘I didn’t get lost on purpose, nor had I any reason to suppose that time was particularly valuable that morning. To lose one’s way is something that may happen to anyone.’

Not to a grown mm,’ said Kuo. ‘A grown man shouldn’t lose himself in Shanghai, It is too stupid, too paltry.’

Juan, who had anticipated praise and some display of affection from Kuo, in return for what he considered his creditable behaviour in Chapei, was very much taken aback by this unexpected rebuke. He saw no justice in it, and he felt very much inclined to answer hotly and at great length. But he controlled this foolish impulse, and merely said, ‘You must be tired, darling, you’d better get some sleep. I’ll go back to the New Celestial, I think.’

There were, he thought, too many conflicting emotions in Min’s dat for him to find, much comfort there. But in his over-heated room in the hotel he slept undisturbed till five o’clock; and when he woke he found on his table a letter that his room-boy must have brought in without waking him. It was from Mrs Fannay-Brown to remind him of his promise to drink some sherry with them that evening.

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