Killigrew and the Golden Dragon by Unknown

Author:Unknown
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781911591870
Publisher: Canelo Books
Published: 2019-11-27T00:00:00+00:00

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Killigrew found Sir Dadabhoy Framjee at Peri’s sepulchre in the cemetery in Happy Valley. The Parsi looked as if he had lost a great deal of weight in the past two months, his sorrowful eyes shrunk deep into his skull, his once rubicund cheeks now hanging slack from his face. Unlike Killigrew, he carried no umbrella against the slashing rain, yet he was heedless of the fact that he was getting soaked through.

This was the first time the two of them had spoken since Peri had been murdered. Killigrew had been in two minds as to whether he should speak to Framjee at all and he braced himself for an outburst of bitterness and recrimination, but at the sound of his footsteps on the gravel path the Parsi merely looked up and smiled wanly.

‘Mr Killigrew.’

‘Sir Dadabhoy.’ Killigrew held his umbrella to give the Parsi some shelter from the rain.

‘Every morning I go into the parlour for breakfast and expect to see her, waiting to read the papers to me as she always used to. Then I come down here, in the hope it will help me to understand she is never coming back.’ Framjee kneeled and laid the wreath he had brought before the sepulchre.

Killigrew laid his own wreath next to it. ‘I understood the coffin was sent back to Bombay?’

Framjee nodded. ‘For a traditional Zarathustrian funeral. She was always proud of her religious heritage, so much so that sometimes she made me feel ashamed…’

‘I suspect you’re a better Zarathustrian than I am a Christian, sir.’

‘You are very kind to say so.’ Framjee gestured to the sepulchre. ‘I wanted a memorial to her here on Hong Kong, to remind people at what cost this colony is maintained. Does that seem foolish to you, Mr Killigrew?’

Killigrew shook his head.

‘Walk with me, sir.’ Framjee gestured to the entrance gate, and the two of them wandered side by side down the path with their hands clasped behind their backs. ‘I am given to understand that you blame yourself for what happened to my daughter.’

Killigrew smiled sadly. ‘Wouldn’t you, sir? I led her right into that trap, I goaded Zhai Jing-mu into shooting her…’

‘You tried to bluff him, just as you did when you first saved her from him back in January. You did what you thought was right; you must not blame yourself. It was not your finger on the trigger.’

‘It might as well have been.’

‘No, Mr Killigrew. I have heard a great deal about you: the work you did against the pirates in Borneo, and against the slavers on the Guinea Coast. If anyone is to blame, it should be me. You advised me to send Peri back to Bombay back in January, and we pooh-poohed your advice. If we had listened to you, Peri would still be alive today.’

‘Or her ship might have been attacked by pilongs on the way, or it might have foundered and sunk in a typhoon.’

Framjee nodded. ‘So many ifs. Only one man had his finger on the trigger, and that was Zhai Jing-mu himself.

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