Northern Exposure - 54. Chapter 54

May 10, 1801

Stroganov Palace

St. Petersburg, Russia

“Tell us how you found yourself in the Russian Bastille,” Daventry prompted Chartley.

“Let us let him enjoy his dinner,” said Granger, who watched a ravenously hungry Chartley devour food with what was almost indecency.

“I am sorry, for food this good has been absent in my life for as long as I can remember,” Chartley said, his eyes glazed with what was almost lust.

“I am glad you enjoy it,” Pavel said. While Chartley ate, the three of them regaled him with their various tales, including the changes in the British government.

Chartley dabbed his mouth with a napkin after he finished eating and leaned back a bit, taking a drink of his wine. He probably appeared dapper to Pavel and Daventry, but to Granger he seemed exhausted. “I don’t suppose you gentlemen are familiar with how our factory in Canton works?”

“Despite the extensive depths of my knowledge, I cannot say that is part of it,” Daventry replied, making them chuckle.

“Foreigners are only allowed to trade in the port of Canton,” Chartley began. “The Chinese have set up factories outside the suburbs of that city, and each trading delegation may rent one of those locations to conduct business. Foreigners are allowed into a few of the parts of the nearest suburb, but it is unwise to spend much time there.”

“Why?” Granger asked.

“Because many locals hate foreigners, and the antipathy has been growing, especially with the rise of a sect called White Lotus. If one goes into that area, one is wise to have a strong guard,” Chartley said.

“Does that violence get worse when one gets to Canton?” Daventry asked.

“Foreigners are not allowed to visit Canton,” Chartley said. “The gates of the city open in the morning and close at night, and guards will inspect anyone entering the main city area. If a foreigner enters, depending on his connections, at best he will be banished.” There was no need to expand on what would happen if they had no connections.

“Then where do foreigners stay?” Pavel asked.

“Foreigners stay in the factories, or if they are lucky, when their trading season is over and the fleet has sailed, they will spend time in Macao,” Chartley explained.

“That is a Portuguese colony,” Granger noted.

“In a sense. It is run by the Portuguese, but it is a Chinese possession,” Chartley said. “That gives the Chinese more control over it than one would expect if it were classified as a colony.”

“I daresay things would have been especially rough for me there, based on my luck with Portuguese governors,” Granger observed ruefully, making all of them chuckle.

“Indeed,” Daventry agreed.

“I do not understand. What do they manufacture in these factories?” Pavel asked, pulling them back onto the topic, and Chartley’s story.

“Ah, they are called factories, but there is no production there,” Chartley said. “Britain has the largest factory, complete with a fenced off area that extends down to the waterfront. On the ground floor, it is a buzzing hub of commerce, but on the floor above it, you would think you were in a club in London. It is quite nice, with good food and lots of drink. The walls of most of the rooms are paneled with fine wood, and the individual rooms are comfortable.”

“It does not sound as if you were roughing it too much,” Daventry observed.

“Living at the factory, you will feel pampered and housed in luxury,” Chartley said. “Unfortunately there is nowhere else for you to go.”

The thought of being all but locked up in a gilded cage seemed horrifying to Granger. “I would think one would feel as if one were in a nice prison,” Granger said.

“It is not quite that bad, but the analogy is not entirely wrong,” Chartley said. “All of the servants, the entire staff is Chinese, and that is how I got into trouble.”

“And what happened?” Granger prompted.

“First of all, you must understand that while the Chinese staff is attentive and truly do make life pleasant, they are also spies. Anything they see can and will be reported to the government,” Chartley said.

“Then it sounds as if you truly are living in a nice prison,” Pavel noted. “All of your needs are met, you are made comfortable, but you are watched constantly.”

“That is why a break in Macao is vital to one’s health, otherwise the pressure of being constantly under surveillance becomes crushing,” Chartley said.

“That life is not for me,” Daventry noted with scorn, then got playful. “So you got in trouble because the staff spied on you and caught you doing something wicked? Let us hope at least that is interesting.”

“Sadly, it was not. It had to do with speaking Chinese,” Chartley noted.

“I am not following you,” Granger said, unable to grasp what Chartley was saying.

“Communication with the Chinese is done in what is called Pidgin English, which is a bastardization of English with terms from other languages tossed in,” Chartley said. “It is a most ungentlemanly language, and I unwisely let annoyance with it guide me to learn Chinese, or to be more specific, Cantonese.”

“You can speak Cantonese?” Pavel asked, stunned. Chartley babbled off several sentences in that language that seemed unintelligible to the rest of them. “Impressive.” Granger failed to see what benefit there was to working to understand a language that was so different, and would be largely useless.

“Why was your ability to communicate in Cantonese a problem?” Granger asked.

“Evidently the Emperor of China is displeased when foreigners learn any Chinese dialect,” Chartley said. “I had heard that was so but did not really think it would be a problem.”

“They banished you from Canton for speaking Cantonese?” Daventry asked, stunned. That seemed incredibly illogical. It was like being banned from Paris for speaking French.

“There’s a bit more to it than that, but technically that is why,” Chartley said. “Canton is run by a Hoppo, and that man is usually corrupt. I was on exceptionally good terms with the Hoppo, but there are spies everywhere. Spies told of my knowledge of Cantonese, and spies told of the Hoppo’s corruption, and intriguers in Peking tied the two of those things together.”

“So you were tossed out along with the Hoppo, courtesy of a plot in Peking,” Pavel concluded.

“That is correct,” Chartley said with a smile. “It was a lightning attack. A strong body of Imperial troops arrested the Hoppo, while another brigade burst into the British factory and apprehended me.”

“What did they do with you?” Granger asked,

“I was directed to leave China immediately, and to never return,” Chartley said. “It is always dangerous to be removed in the middle of the trading season, because one risks enormous amounts of money, and to have the system frozen at that point could be financially devastating. So in one sense, I was fortunate that the season was over, and I did not have that to contend with.” Granger recalled Chartley talking about that before, when he’d run off to Amboyna to try and help Bertie save his investments.

“So you were able to keep all of your gains,” Daventry concluded, “much as if you settled your accounts and took your cash right before a gaming house became bankrupt.”

“Yes,” Chartley said. “The disadvantage, however, was that there was little shipping left. So when I was directed to leave the country, my choices were very limited.”

“Surely in a busy port such as Canton there were friendly ships?” Daventry asked.

“Not many, and in fact there was only one. There was a French ship, which was not an option for obvious reasons. There was also an American ship, but the captain was an Irishman, and he remembered that my family has estates in that country. He refused to allow me passage. That left one final option, a Russian trading vessel. My trunk was packed with indecent haste, and with no time to speak to anyone, I was hauled off and deposited on that ship.”

“There were no other ships, not even in Macao?” Granger asked. “Surely you could have transferred to another ship there.”

“I could not,” Chartley replied. “I was in a boat with my trunk, and the boat was surrounded by Chinese War Junks. Once I boarded the Russian vessel, the captain was ordered to sail at once, and the War Junks positioned themselves on either side of the ship and stayed with us until we passed Macao and headed into the open sea.”

“Once you’re away from the harbor, transferring to another vessel would have seemed feasible, was it not?” Pavel asked.

“It was the time of year when vessels were scarce, as I noted. The only option at that point was to try to get to a friendly port,” Chartley said. “I begged and tried to bribe the captain to take me to such a place where I could catch a ship to India, but there is nothing close.”

“It is hard to fault or blame your Russian captain,” Granger said, remembering his time traversing through those waters. “The closest location would have been Manila or one of the Spice Islands. Manila would be closest, and I would expect that to be close to 1000 mile away.”

“Yes, and eventually he made me realize that that was much too far for the captain to divert to,” Chartley said. “Even if he had wanted to, there were insufficient stores aboard for such a trip.” The others may not have fully grasped that problem, but Granger did.

“This Russian captain was not helpful?” Pavel asked.

“No, he was a good chap, and did his best to make things comfortable for me,” Chartley said. “Our destination was Okhotsk.”

“I have never heard of that place,” Daventry said.

“Neither have I, and it is Russian,” Pavel agreed, making them chuckle.

“It is a port on Russia’s Pacific coast. It is a poor harbor, and you will please pardon me for observing that it is little more than a dreary outpost. It does have the advantage of being the place where Siberian rivers converge,” Chartley noted.

“Was there not somewhere else they could have landed you along the way such that you could have returned to India?” Daventry asked.

“There was not,” Chartley said. “I was banned from China, and that meant that I was also not welcome in those areas largely dependent on the empire. That ruled out Korea and Taiwan. The only other option was Japan, and they have ferocious rules about banning foreigners.”

“Those are not pleasant options,” Pavel noted.

“Indeed,” Chartley agreed. “When I arrived at Okhotsk, I had a few more choices for my return to England, but they were none of them very attractive.” Granger noted that Chartley had said he was returning to England and not India, a topic to broach with him later.

“You had more options in Okhotsk?” Pavel asked.

“Yes. I could have tried to take a passage back to Canton and hopefully find a different ship to transfer to. The risk there was that if my presence was discovered aboard, I would most likely have been put to death for defying the Emperor,” Chartley said.

“That would seem to be a bit risky,” Daventry noted with a wry grin.

“Not only for me, but for the captain and crew of the ship,” Chartley noted.

“It sounds as if these Chinese are little better than barbarians!” Pavel exclaimed.

“In some ways, they are,” Chartley allowed.

“What were your other options?” Granger asked.

“Another choice was to travel with fur traders and the like to the Oregon territory. In that situation, I would most likely end up in the Spanish province of California, and would have to work my way down to Mexico and try to catch a ship to Jamaica or one of the other British Caribbean islands,” Chartley said.

“I can see that once you reached California, you would have multiple ways to return home, but all of them would be difficult, and this would not be helped by the fact that England and Spain are at war,” Granger observed.

“That was my read on it as well,” Chartley said. “It seemed then, that the best course was to hire a guide and a party of men to take me overland to St. Petersburg, and then to secure a berth on a British merchant vessel returning home.”

“That is a most arduous journey,” Pavel noted. “There are some roads, but much reliance is still on the rivers.”

“I think that what are called roads do not meet the definition of such structures as we know them, so as you noted, we relied on the rivers. Only since we were in essence sailing upstream, it was difficult to use boats, so rather we rode along their shores, following roughly their paths,” Chartley said ruefully. “It was indeed long and arduous, but it had its rewards. I had no sooner left Okhotsk than I encountered Batu.”

“I had assumed he was with you before that,” Granger said.

Chartley shook his head. “No. We passed through a small village and an older man was beating Batu with a cane in a most unpleasant way. It was disturbing, but also impressive, in that Batu, who could clearly have killed his tormenter, merely put up with the punishment. I intervened, which was not well received.”

“I shouldn’t wonder,” Granger said, visualizing the outrage at having a foreigner interfere in a domestic dispute. “Was he enslaved to the older man?” Granger asked, the only reason he could think of for such a scene to play out.

“In a sense,” Chartley said. “He was one of the man’s serfs. So instead of creating an incident where my party and I killed the tormentor, I bought Batu’s freedom from him.”

“That would explain why he is so loyal to you,” Granger said.

“Not entirely,” Chartley said. “Batu was raised to be loyal, and to stop at nothing to obey his benefactors. In a base way, such a loyalty is disturbing, but on a practical level, it is quite endearing.”

“Will you take him back to England with you?” Daventry asked.

“I will take him with me wherever I go,” Chartley replied firmly. “That is the bond between us that is both explicit and implicit.”

“He almost sounds a bit like Winkler,” Daventry joked.

“Or Boles,” Granger countered, neatly shutting Daventry up, then turned back to Chartley. “You are lucky to have found each other.”

“I agree,” Chartley said, then returned to his tale. “The journey across Siberia was long, dangerous, and unpleasant, but it turned out to be not as bad as I had originally anticipated. Things were going well enough until we got to Kazan.”

“That city was all but destroyed during the Pugachev rebellion, but I am told it has been rebuilt,” Pavel said.

“It has, and that explains why everything was quite new. It is lovely, especially as it sits on the Volga River,” Chartley noted.

“Then what happened?” Granger asked.

“The Governor of Kazan was at first quite polite and hospitable, and invited me to stay with him at his palace and recover from transiting Siberia,” Chartley said. “I did not realize he was, in fact, tricking me with his generous gesture.”

“Tricking you?” Pavel asked.

“I was not aware that the Tsar had taken a particular dislike to Britain, and certainly did not know that we were all but at war,” Chartley said. “I was also not aware that the Governor was of a mind to use me to ingratiate himself with His Imperial Majesty.”

“That is not unusual for Imperial Governors,” Pavel said with scorn.

“While I sat around enjoying the luxury of his palace, he had sent a messenger to St. Petersburg alerting the Tsar that he had captured a British spy,” Chartley said. “Thus when it came time to depart, instead of traveling with my own party, I was put into an uncomfortable carriage in chains, barred from contact with anyone, and sent directly to St. Petersburg as a prisoner. The only merciful thing that was done was for them to let Batu come with me, although in the end that was more of a curse.”

“It’s hard to see that, as he is so devoted to you,” Daventry said.

“Yes, and as I said, I am also devoted to him. But in order for him to go with me to the Secret House, he had to consent to have his tongue cut out. I protested vehemently against him allowing such a thing. He was taken from me and I had written him off, agonizing as that was, and told myself that he had been sent back to Mongolia, where he is originally from,” Chartley said. The anguish he experienced then was still clear in his voice today.

“But he did not go back,” Pavel said, stating the obvious.

“No,” Chartley said, shaking his head. A tear actually fell out of his eye, which he quickly wiped away. “He was returned to my company some two weeks later, still recovering from having his tongue removed.”

“I am sorry,” Granger said sympathetically, and the others murmured their assent to that statement.

“Our pleasant reunion was truncated, because no sooner did I arrive at the Secret House than that damned fever reappeared,” Chartley said bitterly. “It was a bad episode, one that laid me low for nigh on two months. To be honest, I have still not recovered.”

“I had always hoped that a recurrence would be milder,” Granger said hopefully.

“As had I,” Chartley said. “The only other recurrence I experienced was aboard your ship, and indeed, that was much milder. I suspect that the extreme stresses I put on myself with my journey weakened me to the point where the monster that is the fever was able to more fully take charge of my body.”

“I am glad you survived,” Granger said.

“It was a near thing,” Chartley said. “When I became coherent and was clearly recovering, one of the officers of the prison came to chat with me and told me that there was a British officer in St. Petersburg. I tried to get them to put me in contact with that person, but was robustly refused.”

“Prisoners sent to the Secret House are allowed no contact, so they were following their orders,” Pavel said a bit defensively.

“They followed them quite diligently,” Chartley said, with wry sarcasm. “When I discovered that the British officer was actually George, I asked again, hoping that the fact that we are friends would have some bearing on the situation.”

“I would think that would rather convince them that it was vital not to allow you contact,” Pavel said.

“Based on the fact that you are sent there by order of the Tsar and released only by his orders, their attitude makes sense to me,” Granger said, trying to truncate a conversation about whether these Russian officers acted correctly or not.

“You are perhaps correct, but that does not make me less bitter about it,” Chartley snapped, then calmed himself and continued. “In any event, there was to be no help from the official chain of command, so I opted for a less conventional approach.”

“You certainly did,” Daventry noted.

“Batu and I worked up a plan for him to escape and to try to get in touch with you,” Chartley said to Granger.

“Your plan succeeded,” Granger said with a smile. “I’m sure your planning was thorough, but you left a lot to luck.”

“I did?” Chartley asked in a challenging way.

“You assumed that Batu would be able to escape from the prison, and you assumed that he would be able to actually get to me and get me to listen to him, and you assumed that we would be able to decipher the carvings on his back,” Granger noted.

“A hare-brained scheme, to say the least,” Daventry added.

“I had confidence in Batu, and in you, George,” Chartley said. “I knew that he could escape, and I knew that you would listen to him.”

“So you say,” Granger said. He thought Chartley had taken an enormous risk, but as it was successful, it made him appear somewhat brilliant.

“I did not think I had other options other than to spend my days languishing in that cell,” Chartley countered. “So what you consider to be risky seemed less so, based on the situation I was in.”

“I am curious,” Pavel mused. “When Tsar Alexander gained the throne, he asked for an inventory of all those still in the Secret House. Why was your name not on that list? I am quite confident you would have been immediately freed, but for the fact that your presence was hidden.”

“Perhaps it is because of the money,” Chartley said.

“Money?” Pavel asked.

“When I left Canton, I had 10,000 golden guineas with me,” Chartley noted. “I had spent some of them on the trip, but there were at least 9,000 guineas left. I am assuming that those funds were forfeited to either the Governor of Kazan or the commandant of the prison, or perhaps both of them.”

“There is no shortage of corruption and graft in the Russian government,” Pavel said sadly. “I am sorry that this has cost you so dearly.” Granger noted that that was Pavel’s way of saying that despite what had happened, it was unlikely that he would be able to recover his lost guineas.

“I hope that will not discommode you when you get back to England,” Granger said. “If it does, you have only to contact me.”

“Thank you, George. Those are the words of a true friend,” Chartley said. “My funds are largely safe in India or Britain, but for the gold I was forced to carry with me. I will survive this, but it is frustrating nonetheless.”

“I recommend that you explain this to His Imperial Majesty when you meet with him,” Pavel said to Chartley. “I am unsure as to whether your guineas will ever be returned to you, but at least the Tsar will understand the motives behind hiding you there.”

“I wonder if there are others who are imprisoned for similar reasons,” Daventry mused.

“I think this will already go bad for the prison commandant, but in any event, the people who are held there will be ascertained, and then the Tsar may keep them imprisoned or free them,” Pavel said. That seemed to bring a close to Chartley’s recollections of his journey.

“What will you do now?” Granger asked.

“I must first meet with His Imperial Majesty on the day after tomorrow to make sure I am free to choose my destiny,” Chartley rightly observed.

“His Imperial Majesty is a wise enough man to want to evict you from his lands as soon as possible,” Daventry joked.

“That was my read on it as well,” Chartley said. “In that case, when I am well enough to travel, I will book a passage back to Britain.”

“You cannot travel now?” Granger asked.

“I am too weak, George,” Chartley said, and then yawned as if to emphasize his statement. “I have to fully kill the fever within me or a trip on the ocean will be my death.”

“We are to leave here within the next week or two,” Granger said. “We have already stayed longer than we probably should have.”

“George, this is not a problem,” Pavel said. “Lord Chartley will stay here with us. His company will ease the pain of missing you and Charles when you leave.”

“I would not want to impose,” Chartley began to object.

Pavel raised a hand to silence him. “My father is currently in Moscow. When he returns, he will ease your recovery by quizzing you about your travels. In fact, I would suggest that his company may accelerate your healing, if only to avoid those conversations.”

“That is an unfair portrayal of your father,” Granger objected strongly. “I have learned so much from him.”

“I fear he has not yet taught you to appreciate the sardonic Russian sense of humor,” Pavel said, smiling.

“I think that, like George, we have all grown quite attached to you and your family,” Daventry said.

“As we have become attached to you,” Pavel said.

Lest this moment become too maudlin, Granger directed the conversation to a more practical matter. “I am wondering if it would be possible to send a letter to India from here?”

“Why would you do that?” Chartley asked.

“Because I received a letter from Bertie, who was most worried about you,” Granger said. “He will want to know that you are alive and relatively well.”

“I suppose that is the courteous thing to do, to let others know that I have temporarily avoided an early demise,” Chartley agreed.

“Such a thing is possible, although it is not cheap,” Pavel noted.

“We will structure it so that half the money is due on delivery of the letter, just to force my brother to contribute to the cause,” Granger joked, getting a chuckle from the others.

“I am not sure when you planned to send this letter, but I am hoping that you can wait a few days so I can enclose a note as well,” Chartley said.

“I think it will take longer than that to arrange for a courier,” Pavel said.

“If you gentlemen do not mind, I would like to rest,” Chartley said.

“Of course,” Pavel said, which was his duty as the host. “We will take you first to the bath to get cleaned up, then we will ensure you are comfortable and can get your rest.”

“Thank you for your kindness, both now and for offering to allow me to recover here,” Chartley said.

“I am confident you will repay it with your charming company,” Pavel said. He summoned footmen, and with their help and Batu’s guidance, they were able to lug Chartley off to the bath and his bedroom.

Meanwhile, Granger went up to his room and pulled out his writing pad, then proceeded to jot down notes on what Chartley had told him of his travails, then used those notes to draft a letter to Bertie.