Part 41 (1/2)

For Walter, Shanghai was a constant reminder, a sort of memento mori memento mori, of the harsh world which lay outside the limits of British rule. The population of Shanghai's foreign areas had already been excessive before the war had broken over the city in August 1937. But within a few weeks the influx of refugees to this sanctuary had brought it to more than five million. Moreover, these were people who, even in peacetime, had been living on a level of bare subsistence that all too often dipped into total dest.i.tution: then a man's only means of supporting his family was to sift through rubbish bins or dredge the flotsam from the s.h.i.+ps along the wharves. 'You would think the Chinese here would be more grateful considering what their relatives in Shanghai have to put up with!' There existed, Walter was aware, a macabre thermometer to the state of health and well-being of the Shanghai population (of other cities in China, too): namely, the 'exposed corpse'. Even in relatively good times, such was the precarious level of life in China, vast numbers of 'exposed corpses' would be collected on the streets ... six-thousand-odd in the streets of Shanghai in 1935. In 1937 more than twenty thousand bodies had been found on the streets or on waste ground in the city. By 1938 with the help of the war the number of corpses collected had risen to more than a hundred thousand in the International Settlement alone in the International Settlement alone! 'The cremation of six hundred corpses,' the Health Department report for that year declared encouragingly, 'takes only four hours, though a greater number must have from six to eight hours for complete combustion.'

Well, no wonder that labour in Shanghai was so cheap and productive when the worker was accompanied everywhere by his grim doppelganger doppelganger the 'exposed corpse'! 'Our workers in Singapore may sometimes find it hard to make ends meet but at least they don't have that sort of thing to cope with. And why not? Because men like old Webb saw fit to devote their lives, not to a lot of political bilge about nationalism, welfare and equality, but to the building up of businesses which would actually produce some wealth! Perhaps one day we shall see what sort of fist our rabble-rousing friends the Communists make of feeding people but I only hope I don't have to depend on them for my next meal!' the 'exposed corpse'! 'Our workers in Singapore may sometimes find it hard to make ends meet but at least they don't have that sort of thing to cope with. And why not? Because men like old Webb saw fit to devote their lives, not to a lot of political bilge about nationalism, welfare and equality, but to the building up of businesses which would actually produce some wealth! Perhaps one day we shall see what sort of fist our rabble-rousing friends the Communists make of feeding people but I only hope I don't have to depend on them for my next meal!'

Righteous indignation welled up inside him at the prospect until he remembered that, for the moment at least, the Communists were dropping their anti-British campaign, so people said, in order to concentrate all their efforts against the j.a.panese.

'Well, Mohammed,' asked Walter leaning forward in the rush of air to speak into the syce syce's ear, 'are you happy living in Singapore?'

'Very happy, Tuan Tuan.' Walter could not see the man's features in the darkness beneath the black outline of the cap he wore, but he glimpsed the flash of white teeth as he smiled.

Presently, soothed by the vastness of the night sky, his thoughts turned to Mr Webb again and not, this time, with the lingering resentment of the old man's rigid ideas which he had felt earlier in the evening (those contemptuous marzipan smiles) but with sympathy and grat.i.tude. And for the first time he began to feel a real pang of sorrow, that painful sense of absence, of being deserted almost, when someone whose life has been closely intertwined with your own suddenly disappears. For in spite of his age, Mr Webb's collapse had come as a surprise: it was only when you had a hand in picking him up that you realized that there was nothing much to him any more but skin and bone and the undimmed presence of a powerful personality, what weight there was was consisted largely of his heavy English shoes. He had, after all, continued hale and hearty throughout the decade that followed his retirement. Only in the past year or two had he shown some signs of failing: at one time he had come to believe that his fellow directors of Blackett and Webb were trying to poison him, in the gruesome Malay fas.h.i.+on, with needle-like bamboo hairs coiled like watch-springs which then unwind to puncture the intestines or lodge undetected in the mucous membrane of the bladder. Fortunately, he had forgotten about it after a while. consisted largely of his heavy English shoes. He had, after all, continued hale and hearty throughout the decade that followed his retirement. Only in the past year or two had he shown some signs of failing: at one time he had come to believe that his fellow directors of Blackett and Webb were trying to poison him, in the gruesome Malay fas.h.i.+on, with needle-like bamboo hairs coiled like watch-springs which then unwind to puncture the intestines or lodge undetected in the mucous membrane of the bladder. Fortunately, he had forgotten about it after a while.

Next, there had come a final flaring-up of the entrepreneurial fires which had been banked up peacefully since his retirement. He had demanded that Walter should expand Blackett and Webb into a great vertical combine like Lever Brothers or Dunlop. A vast amount of rubber was already under their control and there was still time to get a foothold in the palm-oil business. Why should they not go into the production and marketing of motor-tyres and margarine in Europe and America? Walter, though he considered the idea ridiculous, had murmured soothingly that it was worth thinking about. But old Mr Webb had become querulous, demanding a proper response to his plan. Gently Walter had explained that the opportunity for such an expansion was long since past: the compet.i.tion was too powerful, capital and European executives too hard to come by, even if business had not been so sternly regulated by Britain's war economy. Mr Webb had been bitter and disbelieving, had denounced Walter as 'a mere tradesman' ... but presently the fires had died down again; in the last few months before today's fateful garden-party at which he had tumbled out of his chair and into the strange twilit ante-room to death, neither his dreams of a huge combine nor his fears of bamboo poisoning had caused him any distress. The question of palm-oil, though, had lodged in Walter's mind like a coiled bamboo hair: insignificant at first, it was coming imperceptibly to irritate him. Blackett and Webb should have become involved in palm-oil ten years ago. A businessman must move with the times. How often, recalling the fate of the fine-millers of rice in London ruined by the opening of the Suez Ca.n.a.l, had he not warned young men against thinking that a business could be maintained in a changing world without constant change!

The Bentley, having skirted the teeming, narrow streets of Chinatown, ill-lit and even at this hour apparently bubbling with sinister activity and subversion, had now almost reached Outram Road. The several buildings of the hospital were scattered on a small hill among trees; first-cla.s.s, second-cla.s.s and third-cla.s.s buildings respectively housed patients occupying corresponding positions on the social ladder. Mr Webb, naturally, had been taken to a building from which he would be able to leave the world in a suitable manner. The Bentley, therefore, drew up beside the half-dozen cream pillars which formed the entrance to the main building: Walter remained in the motorcar while the syce syce went to make enquiries about Mr Webb. The man was gone some time and, presently, Walter got out to take a stroll beneath half a dozen tall palms on the lawn opposite the building. Above, on the roof, he could see the silhouette of a clock tower but it was too dark to make out the time. He supposed it must be well after midnight by now. Through the open windows on the ground floor he could see into what was evidently a general ward, dimly lit. He stared into it for a moment, half fascinated, half repelled : he was just able to make out shadowy figures stretched motionless beneath the silently whirring fans. So, this was how it ended for a man who had once had the Rangoon rice trade by the throat: in essentials not very different, he thought sombrely, from the way it ended for one of Shanghai's 'exposed corpses'. went to make enquiries about Mr Webb. The man was gone some time and, presently, Walter got out to take a stroll beneath half a dozen tall palms on the lawn opposite the building. Above, on the roof, he could see the silhouette of a clock tower but it was too dark to make out the time. He supposed it must be well after midnight by now. Through the open windows on the ground floor he could see into what was evidently a general ward, dimly lit. He stared into it for a moment, half fascinated, half repelled : he was just able to make out shadowy figures stretched motionless beneath the silently whirring fans. So, this was how it ended for a man who had once had the Rangoon rice trade by the throat: in essentials not very different, he thought sombrely, from the way it ended for one of Shanghai's 'exposed corpses'.

A crunch of gravel. Walter turned away. The syce syce was approaching accompanied by Major Archer. The Major had come earlier on a similar mission to Walter's. Old Mr Webb was still in the same condition, unconscious and paralysed. Walter could no doubt look in on him for a moment if he wanted. was approaching accompanied by Major Archer. The Major had come earlier on a similar mission to Walter's. Old Mr Webb was still in the same condition, unconscious and paralysed. Walter could no doubt look in on him for a moment if he wanted.

'Perhaps tomorrow,' said Walter, moving back towards the Bentley, reprieved. 'I really just came to find out how he was getting on.' He lingered, however, for a moment with the Major, explaining that Mr Webb's collapse meant that a number of difficult decisions would have to be taken. What were they going to do now about the theme of 'Continuity' in the jubilee procession? That was just one of many new problems that were zigzagging their way to the surface like bubbles as Mr Webb drew nearer to death. And should he make arrangements for young Matthew Webb to come out to Singapore? 'After all, it seems a long way for him to come if he's not going to inherit.'

The Major showed surprise. But surely. Why, Mr Webb had happened to mention only the other day that Matthew would be his heir! He had even asked the Major some months earlier to witness his signature on the appropriate doc.u.ment and at the same time had spoken warmly of those who devoted themselves to the rehabilitation of native peoples.

'He said nothing to me about it,' muttered Walter, thankful for the darkness which helped to mask the shock which this news had caused him. Until this moment he had allowed himself to entertain some hopes that, in default of an heir, he himself might be left at least a substantial part of Mr Webb's holdings in the business.

'Surely he would have told me if he had changed his mind?' He stood for a moment with his hand on the door of the car looking up at the stars.

'Well, perhaps I will go and look in on him after all,' he said finally and with a nod to the Major made his way heavily towards where his former partner lay on his death-bed.

11.

The medical opinion had been that Mr Webb would not survive more than a few hours. But the hours and the days and presently the weeks went by and still the old fellow lingered on. An era had ended, Walter was right about that, and no doubt a new era had begun. But Mr Webb somehow managed to survive this jolting pa.s.sage over the switched points of history and live on into the spring of 1941. Most likely, if his feeble hold on life had been shaken loose and he had died then and there, which probably would have been best for everybody, Walter would not have thought it worth while to summon Matthew merely to attend a funeral. But Mr Webb continued to cling on stubbornly and, besides, if Matthew was to inherit his father's share of the business Walter preferred to have him in Singapore where a clear idea of the serious responsibilities attached to his inheritance could be the more easily printed on his mind. After all, they knew so little of Matthew. He would have to make up his own mind, of course, whether or not to come out. Was he even in Europe still? A number of the more affluent people in Britain, according to J. B. Priestley's wireless broadcasts, were prudently moving to Canada and the United States, leaving the lower cla.s.ses to defend their estates against the Germans. Walter knew nothing of Matthew's financial situation but a.s.sumed that he must be, at least, comfortably off.

As a child Matthew had once or twice written dutiful letters to 'Dear Uncle Walter', thanking him (his little fingers guided by his mother's hand) for some Christmas present or other. In the years that followed the General Strike one or two more letters had arrived. Their purpose was not stated but Walter had not found it hard to guess. The young man, filled with remorse by the estrangement from his father, was seeking some word of him. Naturally, Walter had replied with rea.s.suring descriptions of the old man's comfortable days at the Mayfair Rubber Company. Matthew had continued to write an occasional letter to the Blacketts throughout the thirties, though his letters had grown shorter and the information they contained somewhat random, as if he merely wrote down whatever caught his eye as he looked around his hotel room or out of the window (he never seemed to have a home of his own). These letters had come not only from Geneva but occasionally from other cities, too. There had once even been a picture postcard from Tokyo, showing what appeared to be a sheep standing up to its knees in a lake. 'What is supposed to be the purpose of this?' Walter had wondered, amazed, staring at the sheep and trying to penetrate its significance. It seemed that the boy had paid a visit to the Far East, after all.

One of Matthew's letters in 1939 had mentioned that he would soon be in London on some unspecified business. As it happened, Kate, then aged almost twelve, had been there at the time, staying with an aunt for a few days before returning from school to Singapore for the summer holidays, holidays destined to be prolonged by the outbreak of war. The Blacketts' curiosity about Matthew was considerable. Why should Kate not go and have a chat with him?

Walter had wasted no time in cabling his London office, instructing them to telephone every hotel in London until they found a Matthew Webb. In the meantime poor Kate, who had not been consulted and who naturally dreaded the meeting in prospect, had waited praying that he would not be found. The princ.i.p.al cause of her despair was the thought of being seen 'by a man' in her school uniform, a fate which she and her school-friends agreed was the ultimate humiliation. But in due course, after on or two false alarms, Matthew had been unearthed in a shabby boarding-house in Bloomsbury. The London manager of Blackett and Webb had packed Kate into a taxi and rushed her across London.

The meeting had not been a great success at first. Matthew had been lying on his bed in his underwear reading a book while his trousers, which had just been soaked in a cloudburst, were drying over a chair in the window. Without his trousers he was reluctant to let a young girl into his room although, as Walter later observed, one might have thought that this was one of the few contingencies in life that his progressive education had prepared him for. Moreover, at first he appeared never to have heard of any Kate Blackett and could not think what she wanted of him. Kate had had to shout explanations through the door, arousing the interest of the other lodgers. Meanwhile, the landlady's suspicions had been awakened by the telephone drag-net which had caught Matthew in her establishment and she had become convinced that he was a malefactor or prevert of some kind. So Kate's mortified explanations through the door had been punctuated by instructions from the landlady for him to leave her premises immediately. Finally, however, Matthew had dragged on his sodden trousers and opened the door.

Kate was later asked to describe the person who had confronted her as the door opened. Well, he was quite nice, she thought. She could not think of anything else to say. Oh yes she could, he wore spectacles. Chiefly what she remembered was that his shoes squelched when he walked: they had evidently been soaked, too. He had walked straight out of the boarding-house, ignoring the landlady and the London manager, who was rubbing his hands in consternation at the way things had turned out. Kate, dreadfully embarra.s.sed by the furore she had caused, had followed Matthew to a tea-shop round the corner. She had felt so self-conscious that almost the only thing she remembered about their conversation was that when, at the end of it, Matthew had risen from his seat there had been a wet patch where he had been sitting. And yet they had got on very well really, she a.s.sured her father. He was quite nice, she thought.

Why stay at such a wretched place? Why travel with only one pair of trousers and shoes? It could hardly be that he was short of money. He presumably had a salary of some kind and Walter was certain that despite their estrangement old Mr Webb had not ceased to provide a generous allowance for his son. 'I'm afraid,' Walter had said when discussing Kate's revelations with his wife, 'that all those half-baked schools have had their effect on the lad, whatever Jim Ehrendorf may say to the contrary.'

As it happened, the Blacketts had been unable to learn much more from Ehrendorf than they had from Kate. Ehrendorf was perfectly well able to tell them what Matthew thought thought about a number of matters, many of them abstract. He could tell them where Matthew stood on 'socialism in a single country', on J. W. Dunne's 'serial time' and suchlike. What he could not do was to give the Blacketts any real idea of what he was about a number of matters, many of them abstract. He could tell them where Matthew stood on 'socialism in a single country', on J. W. Dunne's 'serial time' and suchlike. What he could not do was to give the Blacketts any real idea of what he was like like. Was he married? How did he dress? Well, if he wasn't married where did he eat his meals? Smiling, Ehrendorf had to admit that they had been so busy talking that many of these questions had not crossed his mind. Now that he thought about it he had come across Matthew once or twice in restaurants in Geneva, eating by himself with a book propped against a jug of wine or beer. But there was not much else he could remember. He agreed with Kate that Matthew wore gla.s.ses, however. He was sure of this because once, while they were strolling under the plane trees on the Quai Wilson, he had broken them.

'How?'

'Sir?'

'How did he break them?'

But Ehrendorf could not remember. Perhaps he had dropped them. They had been discussing Locarno at the time. Matthew had strong feelings about such treaties and soon Ehrendorf was sharing them with the Blacketts: it seemed that as a good League man Matthew did not believe in the Big Powers settling things behind closed doors.

'And so,' smiled Walter, 'all you can tell us is that he wears gla.s.ses, which we knew already.'

'And that he's a wonderful human being,' added Ehrendorf with warmth.

Kate had taken to giggling whenever Ehrendorf spoke warmly of Matthew. This time, when she giggled, Ehrendorf suddenly sprang across the room and seized her before she could escape. He picked her up bodily, although she was getting to be quite a lump, and brought her back under one arm. This time he was going to find out why she was laughing. In the end Kate had to confess: it was because he was always calling Matthew a 'wonderful human being' and she kept thinking he was calling him a 'wonderful Human Bean'! Her parents exchanged exasperated glances at this: Kate had recently discovered that she had a sense of humour and they had suffered greatly in consequence. But Ehrendorf seemed to find it amusing. Thereafter Matthew became known to the younger Blacketts as 'the Human Bean'.

Well, since old Mr Webb continued to cling on stubbornly Matthew had to be sent for, whatever he was like, and influence used on his behalf to overcome the difficulties of war-time travel. Fortunately, rubber was a priority cargo these days and the Ministry of Supply listened sympathetically to Walter's request that Matthew should be sent out to take his father's place in the Mayfair Rubber Company. It took time before Matthew could be located through his solicitors (it turned out that he had not made a prudent bolt for it with the stampeding herd of well-to-do), and more time before the details could be arranged. The result was that not just weeks but months had pa.s.sed since the unlucky day the old gentleman had fallen out of his chair at the garden-party before word eventually reached Walter that Matthew had started out on his journey. But these days unless you were a bra.s.s hat or a Minister n.o.body knew when you would arrive, or even if you would arrive at all.

Mr Webb, though severely paralysed and still unable to communicate, had in due course been moved back to the Mayfair with a nurse in constant attendance. Walter, who himself had a secret dread of dying in hospital, had overborne medical advice to the contrary and had the old gentleman returned to his home. There he could more easily take a few minutes away from his business affairs to lift a corner of the mosquito net and give a comforting squeeze to the cold knuckles which lay on the sheet.

Once or twice Mr Webb had tried to say something. Something to do with the sun, apparently. It could hardly be that the light was bothering him because the blinds of split bamboo chicks had been unrolled and allowed only a muted glow to enter the room. Perhaps the old man had been thinking of agreeable evenings spent prowling with his secateurs and watching the sunlight gleam on the skins of his naked gymnasts as they swooped and swung and balanced, growing stronger every day. Walter found it disturbing, nevertheless, to see his friend lying there, breathing noisily in his tent of white muslin. Mr Webb's eyelids were half open but his expression was vacant for the most part and he showed little sign of being aware of his surroundings. 'This is how we all finish,' mused Walter grimly.

'It's the end of an era,' he said aloud to Major Archer who stood beside him in a respectful pose at his dying chairman's bedside.

Because presently Mr Webb again tried to say something about the sun Walter decided that Miss Chiang should be recalled.

Perhaps he would find her presence soothing. After Mr Webb's collapse the gymnasts and body-builders had been dispersed with a bonus added to their emoluments. Miss Chiang had declined indignantly when offered an additional reward for staying away from her former employer while he was in hospital. Now the Major was given the delicate task of running her to earth in some tenement in Chinatown and persuading her to return to visit the patient. She agreed without fuss and her presence did indeed seem to exert a soothing influence on the old man. She was still wearing one of Joan's cast-off dresses and Walter, glimpsing her one day as she was leaving the Mayfair was taken aback, as much by her good looks as by the thought of her dubious relations.h.i.+p with old Mr Webb. 'Who would have thought that Webb would end up like this with a half-caste holding his hand!'

Walter, these days, had little time to spare for visiting the sick. Business had never been more hectic and besides he was becoming increasingly preoccupied with the problem of finding a husband for Joan. Now that it had become clear that he was unlikely to inherit Mr Webb's share of the business it had become more important than ever that she should make a sensible match.

'What are your feelings for Jim Ehrendorf, if you don't mind me asking?' he enquired mildly one day, finding her alone.

'Oh, he'd put his hand in the fire for me,' she replied with a laugh.

Walter was silent for a moment, contemplating this reply which, though interesting, did not answer his question.

'Don't you believe me?'

'Of course I believe you,' said Walter, laughing in turn. 'What I wanted to know was what you feel for him? him?'

Joan shrugged, gazing out of the window, her eyes like green pebbles. 'He's all right. He gets on my nerves though, I'm thinking of chucking him one of these days ... in fact, the sooner the better.' Walter was satisfied with this reply.

Some days later, however, he thought of it again in a rather different light. For it happened that one day, in the course of a casual conversation while waiting for Joan to come downstairs, Ehrendorf said something which Walter, as a rubber producer, found unusually interesting, and which placed him in something of a predicament if he were to pursue his policy of replacing Ehrendorf in Joan's affections with someone who would make a more suitable husband.

Walter's predicament stemmed indirectly from the successful operation of the Restriction scheme's tap for controlling the flow of rubber on to the market, of which he had originally been one of the chief plumbers. As a result of the recession of 1938 and the fall in price to five pence a pound the Committee had given the tap a savage twist, shutting down the flow to forty-five per cent of capacity. Thereafter in the reservoir of rubber stocks the level began to sink and the price to creep up again. By the beginning of 1939 the level had fallen once more below the danger mark which had released the previous boom, but the Committee still showed no sign of opening the tap.

As it had turned out, it was neither the idleness of the native smallholders nor the lack of capacity of the producing countries which had now set the price of rubber on its long, steady climb, but the declaration of war in Europe. At the end of 1939 with the level in the reservoir very low (a mere two months' absorption) the price had been standing at a gratifying s.h.i.+lling a pound. This, patriotism apart, had been a tense period for Walter and his colleagues. What effect would war have on the use of rubber? Their experience during the Great War had been of little help: in those days the industry had hardly got under way. But they had not had long to wait. Despite a grudging increase in the amount released to the market the level continued to sink. Rubber was being used more than ever.

At this point the Committee began to come under heavy pressure, not just from the manufacturers but from the United States Government and the British Ministry of Supply. More rubber must be released! And it was, but still not enough. The German attack on France and the Low Countries the preceding spring (May 1940) had alarmed the Americans about their future supplies: they wanted to build up a reserve in case it should be needed for their defence programme. And so they had established the Rubber Reserve Company to buy the 150,000 tons they thought they would need at a decent price of up to twenty US cents a pound; the Committee had agreed to increase the flow so that there would be enough rubber on the market for them to buy. Presently the Americans had decided to make it 330,000 tons.

Alas, against all expectations the amount of rubber used by private manufacturers continued to rise and, despite the increased rate of release, there was still not enough to go round. The United States Government's twenty cents, which at one time would have been considered bountiful, was being resolutely outbid by private manufacturers who, often as not (Walter had to smile at the thought of it) were themselves the chaps who had been appointed as buying agents for the Government and who were now in the satisfactory position of bidding against (and naturally outbidding) their official selves! How poignant it was when the Reserve Company found that after six months of effort its cupboard was still almost as bare as it had been at the beginning! Even when the Committee had at last reluctantly agreed to raise the rate of release to one hundred per cent for the first quarter of 1941 there was still no sign of the market reaching saturation point. The spreading j.a.panese influence, moreover, was diverting rubber from Indo-China and Siam away from Britain and the United States. There could no longer be any serious doubt about it, in Walter's view: the producers' wildest dreams were being realized. This time they had a genuine genuine shortage of rubber, not just the wishful thinking of a fast-talking London broker. shortage of rubber, not just the wishful thinking of a fast-talking London broker.