Send out chits with the lantern-wallah, tell them I’m…
‘Indisposed?’
Anything you like.
As the days dragged on, with no news being received from Vico, it became clear to everyone that the Seth’s nerves were fraying ever thinner under the strain. His fidgeting became increasingly agitated and he took to venting his impatience indiscriminately, on whoever happened to be at hand – which was, more often than not, his unfortunate munshi.
News of these eruptions would spread quickly through the Achha Hong, and for a while afterwards everyone would act as though they were performing a collective penance, walking on tiptoe and speaking in English.
The two shroffs were always the first to offer their condolences:
‘… what to do? Sethji is like that only…’
‘… in life agonies and sufferings are always there…’
‘… pray God and bear up the burden…’
One morning, while Bahram was toying with his breakfast, Neel began to read out an excerpt of an imperial edict, issued in Beijing: ‘ “The Controller of the Board has reported that the habit of smoking is on the increase even though the Viceroys and Governors of every Province have been authorized to conduct raids and make seizures of Opium. Alas the mandarins are careless and manage matters unskilfully. If they have seized any Opium it is only a miserably small quantity and I fear they are not all upright…” ’
What is this? snapped Bahram.
Sethji, it is a hookum-nama issued by the Son of Heaven, in the capital: a translation has been published in the last issue of the Register.
Pushing aside his unemptied plate, Bahram rose from the table: Go on, munshiji. Let me hear the rest.
‘ “After this the Viceroys and Governors of every province must sternly and distinctly demand that their people obey the commands; and they must also order their civilian and military officers to vigorously search all traitorous merchants who are engaged in the traffic of Opium. And all people who keep Opium shops in the Cities must be apprehended and brought before the Tribunals.” ’
Glancing up from his notes, Neel saw that on rising from the breakfast table Bahram had done something that was very rare for him – he had seated himself at his desk.
‘Why you have stopped?’ said Bahram. ‘Carry on: what else does Emperor say?’
‘ “The Viceroys and Governors of every Province must exert themselves to eradicate the evil by the very roots; a single person must not be allowed to slip through the net of the law; if they dare to wink at, or conceal, or lose opportunities of apprehending, or other evils of that sort, then they will be punished by a new law, and further their sons and grandsons will not be allowed to appear at the examinations. If, on the other hand, the district Mandarins show intelligence and ability in conducting this business they will be promoted according to the new law. Let this be promulgated through every Province for the information of all people. Respect this!” ’
Here Neel was interrupted by a curious grinding noise, like the gnashing of teeth. Looking up in surprise, he saw that the sound was emanating not from Bahram’s mouth, but rather from his hands – he had positioned his carved inkstone in front of him and was furiously kneading his long-neglected inkstick. Whether this was to give release to his agitation or to calm himself, Neel could not decide, and a moment later the inkstone, unsteadied by the increasing violence of Seth’s motions, went hurtling off the desk. A jet of black ink flew up, drenching the Seth’s immaculate choga and splashing all over his papers.
Bahram jumped to his feet, looking down at himself in horror. ‘What bloody nonsense! Who has told these Chinese fellows to make ink like it is masala? Crazy buggers!’ Turning a pair of angry, disordered eyes at Neel, he pointed to the inkstone: ‘Take it away! I never want to see it again.’
Ji, Sethji.
Neel was moving towards the door when it flew open of itself: a peon was outside, a sealed note in hand.
An urgent chit had just been delivered, the man said. The bearer was downstairs, waiting for a reply.
From Bahram’s response it was clear that he had long been awaiting this note. All thought of the inky mishap was instantly erased from his mind, and his voice turned brisk and businesslike: Munshiji, I need you to go down to the khazana. Kindly ask the shroffs to prepare a purse of ninety taels: tell them to pick out ‘number-one first-chop coins’. And tell them also: none of the coins must carry my mark.
Ji, Sethji. Bowing out of the daftar, Neel headed quickly down the stairs.
Like every other counting-room in Fanqui-town, the Seth’s khazana was on the ground floor. A small airless room with a massive door, it had only one heavily shuttered window, with thick steel bars. This was the exclusive domain of the firm’s two shroffs and no one else was allowed inside: here they would sit shroffing for hours, creating an unceasing metallic melody, with streams of coins tinkling through their hands.
Fanqui-town’s most commonly used coin was the one that had the widest currency in the world: it was the Spanish silver dollar, also called the ‘piece of eight’ because it was valued at eight reals. The dollar contained a little less than an ounce of fine silver and was embossed with the heads and arms of recent Spanish sovereigns. But among the pieces of eight that circulated in Canton, very few retained the designs that had been stamped on them at the time of their minting. In China, while passing from hand to hand, every coin was marked with the seals of its successive owners. This practice was considered a surely for buyers as well as sellers, for anyone who complained of a bad coin could be sure of having it replaced so long as it could be shown to be marked with the seal of its last owner.
When space ran short, more was created by flattening the coin with a hammer. In due time, the cracked and battered coins would be broken into bits, to be kept in bags and placed upon the scales when a transaction required silver of a certain weight. As coins aged, they became more and more difficult to pass off, even when their content of silver remained unchanged; new coins, on the other hand, were called ‘first-chop dollars’ and were so prized they were valued above their weight.
Although ubiquitous, the Spanish dollar was used principally for small everyday exchanges; commercially important transactions were usually conducted in Chinese coinage, of which the smallest was the ‘cash’ (or chen). Made of zinc and copper these coins had a square hole in the middle, and could be strung together in large numbers: a string of a hundred cash was known, in English, as a ‘mace’ and when people went shopping they usually carried one or two of these, wearing them like bangles on their wrists and arms.
The cash was a beautiful coin, to Neel’s eyes, but it was too heavy to be carried in bulk and counted for little, being worth even less than an Indian paisa. The tael was the Chinese coin that was of real value: it contained about a third more silver than the Spanish dollar and was the unit most often used for the purposes of large-scale commerce.
The fact that Bahram had asked for a purse containing taels rather than dollars was significant in some way, Neel knew, but he could not quite surmise what: the sum was not large enough to pay for a significant quantity of goods but was yet much too big for an everyday purchase.
To discuss the matter with others in the hong was unthinkable, of course, so Neel assumed that the answers to these questions would remain forever obscure to him. But a little while later, after he had delivered the ninety taels to the Seth’s bedroom, encased in a leather purse, he went to the daftar to fetch his papers and found an oddly encrypted message on his desk. A scribble had appeared on the sheet of paper that he used as an ink-blotter: a closer glance showed it to be in the Seth’s sloping hand.
Evidently, his own desk being splattered with ink, Bahram had decided to make use of Neel’s. After penning a reply to the note he had received, he had dried the ink on the blotting sheet. Now, peering at the sheet, Neel was able to decipher a few words:
… Innes…
… to confirm… will bring purse… Eho Hong at eleven…
Yrs Bahr…
*
Bahram knew exactly what he had to do that morning; Vico had coached him carefully on the details. He was to go over to James Innes’s apartment, which was in the Creek Factory. The money was to be handed over only after the delivery of the first set of crates: it wasn’t intended to be Innes’s fee – that would be paid later – it was meant for cumshaws, to be distributed to the local officials who had made the shipment possible. The first delivery was to be a trial run and Vico would not be accompanying it; he planned to stay back, in Whampoa, to make sure
