The procession of nine vehicles moved off in clouds of yellow dust and black diesel smoke to the accompaniment of cheers and waves from those gathered to see them go. Although it was late summer, the sun blazed down on the convoy of trucks, each bearing its cargo of crates, boxes, wooden frames, and packing cases, each numbered and listed with its contents.
Notwithstanding the many wonders discovered, the turtle shell which Weiskopf kept securely at his waist was to him, the season’s greatest treasure. As he drove, he began to compose in his mind the paper he would write announcing his find. To begin, he thought, there will be a full description of the site, its geographical coordinates, and a map, as well as several photographs of the excavation at various stages of the work. Then would come details of the recovery of the bone, its depth and location in the excavation — with a diagram, of course — and a list of its precise dimensions followed by an analysis of the provenance to establish its age and absolute authenticity. Martins’ in situ photograph, along with photographs of the bone both front and back, would have to be included, and, when all that was done, his translation — he thought of it now as his triumphant translation — of the inscription. And to conclude, he thought, a brief description of the historical placement of General Chang and the now-confirmed battle. He could envision the entire article in his mind already. It was simple, and, best of all, the evidence was indisputable. It was free of speculation. Other epigraphists would no doubt carefully scrutinize his translation, but he was entirely confident. The incised characters were clearly visible. There was neither illegibility nor gaps in the text. He had had, therefore, no need of interpretational guesswork of the kind scholars, including himself, love to poke holes in. He felt the pouch for the hundredth time and experienced the familiar surge of excitement.
The procession left the excavation site and turned towards Zhengzhou. To everyone’s relief, Schilling’s pessimistic prediction about the condition of the trucks, that they would not get ten kilometers, did not come to pass, and although their engines rasped and growled, coughing out dense billows of acrid smoke, they all kept grinding forward. Weiskopf had been told by a shipping agent in Tianjin that a German tramp steamer, the Sonne, was sailing for Bremerhaven in mid-September with a mixed cargo of hardwoods, furniture, silk, and silver. There would be room for the crates of artifacts, and after a little haggling and a lot of alcohol, cabins were also secured for himself and Schilling. A price was agreed, and all was done. He walked out of the office with the signed contracts in his hand, leaving the agent smiling, happy, and three parts intoxicated.
“I won’t be sorry to board that ship,” said Schilling, as they jolted and banged their way out onto the main road. “We haven’t been home for six months, and a lot has been happening in Germany since we left.”
“I’ll be relieved to get all these boxes and crates safely back to Leipzig,” said Weiskopf, “It won’t be an easy journey to Tianjin, and the Sonne didn’t sound like much of an ocean-going vessel to me.”
“Why do we have to take the train at all?” asked Schilling. “Can’t we drive to Tianjin?”
“We could,” said Weiskopf, with a nod, “except for the fact no one would rent me the trucks to go there. Mr. Wu did his best, but everyone told him the same thing.” He steered the truck around a farmer on the road carrying a long, flexible pole on his shoulder with a large basket of what looked like turnips suspended from each end. The man, barefoot and clad only in baggy brown trousers and a ragged shirt which might once have been white, matched his steps to the rhythmic upward spring of the pole and thus saved himself from some of the weight of his burden as he walked. Schilling waited.
“The trucks would never be returned to their owners,” Weiskopf resumed. “Once we got to Tianjin, the truck drivers would simply sell the vehicles and pocket the money. Wu said the only solution was for me to buy the trucks and sell them in Tianjin myself, but there’s no money left for that sort of thing. The good Herr Professor Bergdorf would have a seizure. And besides,” he added, with a sideways glance at Schilling, “the price quoted for the trucks was extortionate. I had enough trouble getting an agreement on hiring them even for this short time.”
At the Zhengzhou railway station Weiskopf edged the Ford into a narrow space outside the main terminus, and then, by dint of a lot of waving and shouting, he and Schilling managed to get the other eight vehicles positioned close to the platforms. As they prepared to enter the station building, they were accosted by a man wearing a rumpled gray suit, a battered fedora, and an ingratiating, gap-toothed smile.
“Excuse me,” he said in halting English, “but do you wish to sell your truck?”
In Weiskopf’s estimation the ancient Ford was almost worthless, and he had simply planned to abandon it, but here was an unexpected opportunity.
“You see,” the man was continuing, his smile now obsequious, “I can take it to pieces and sell the parts. I understand you are leaving China, so you will have no more use for it. I will give you sixty silver dollars.”
Well, thought Weiskopf, the bush telegraph is working with its customary efficiency.
“One hundred,” he countered in Chinese, to the man’s evident surprise.
“Sixty-five,” said the man, his equilibrium shaken.
“Ninety-five.”
“Seventy,” snapped the man, in exasperation. Weiskopf could see he had not been expecting this sort of difficulty in doing business with a foreign devil. Many round-eyes were uncomfortable with the custom of haggling and tended to pay the asking price or accept the first offer.
“Ninety,” answered Weiskopf. “Take it or leave it.”
The man’s good humor had quickly evaporated, but he paid the money, albeit with no good grace, caught the keys Weiskopf threw him, and disappeared into the noisy crowds thronging the station’s forecourt. He reappeared in a moment or two accompanied by another man who looked equally disreputable, and they clambered into the truck, banging the doors shut with a tinny clank.
“There isn’t anything on that truck worth selling,” said Schilling, as he and Weiskopf watched the Ford’s new owner fighting unsuccessfully to start the engine.
“It’s a business opportunity,” said Weiskopf, grinning. “If he didn’t think he could make money off it somehow, he wouldn’t have bought it.”
“But you were just going to leave it here anyway,” said Schilling. “He might have got the thing for nothing.”
“True,” said Weiskopf, with another grin, “but he didn’t know that, did he? As I said, he saw a business opportunity, but so did I.”
The truck still would not start. Schilling looked at Weiskopf and said, “Well, your opportunity was a lot better than his, I think.”
Inside the station, they were confronted by a scene of bewildering pandemonium. On every side there were milling, shouting crowds, surging lines of people, demanding to buy tickets. The din was intensified by squealing herds of terrified pigs being pushed into holding pens, and dozens of crates of quacking ducks piled anywhere space could be found. The thick air reeked of dung, coal smoke, and the pungent aroma of unwashed human bodies.
“Is this a railway station or a farmyard?” grunted Schilling, shouldering aside a young woman shrieking in a voice to shatter glass that she had a ticket to Shanghai she was willing to sell.
“Follow me,” Weiskopf shouted, squeezing through a narrow steel-barred gate into the main station’s inner concourse.
“I’m trying to,” gasped Schilling, somewhere behind him. “There are entirely too many people in this country, and they’re all in this railway station.”
“We have our tickets already,” shouted Weiskopf, and he thought he heard Schilling answer, “Praise God,” but he was not sure.
“What we need now, Eduard,” said Weiskopf, once they reached a place of relative calm, “is some men to help us unload.”
Weiskopf knew the station well. There were always men loitering about on the chance someone would want help with luggage or freight.
“Come on,” he said, heading for the platforms.
Within a few minutes he had found a squad of men happy to unload the eight trucks and transfer the cargo to the special boxcar attached at the rear of the regular passenger train. The men, most of them wearing only baggy trousers, were organized by Schilling into a work party, and soon proved appearances to be deceiving. In spite of their thin arms and narrow chests, they showed themselves strong and energetic. As each item was transferred, Schilling checked it off against his master list while Weiskopf supervised the loading of the train. It was tedious, but the risk of theft was too omnipresent to leave the work to the railway officials who stood watching, anger and resentment etched clearly on their disapproving faces.
“They expected to be paid in return for allowing us to load,” said Weiskopf, in German. “They were not at all pleased to see we had authorization from the provincial government. There was no way they could prevent us from loading, nor could they demand a bribe.”
As Schilling checked off the last crate, a bronze cauldron which it took four men to move, a young soldier wearing the brown uniform of a Guomindang officer strode up to Weiskopf, his expression a good deal less than friendly.
“Who are you, and what is in all these packing cases? Where are your papers?”
Weiskopf was all too familiar with this sort of individual. Here in Zhengzhou, as in much of the rest of the country, the influence of the Beijing government was scarcely felt, leaving petty civic bureaucrats and junior officers from the local garrison to run the city and the surrounding countryside almost as a private fiefdom. Bureaucrats kept records — of a sort — while soldiers kept order — of a sort — and imperfect as it was, the system somehow managed to prevent China from disintegrating into anarchy, but only just. When he spoke to this belligerent young man, therefore, Weiskopf kept his voice level and respectful. A confrontation could be disastrous.
“I am Dr. Aaron Weiskopf, of the University of Leipzig, Germany, sir, and the cases you see here contain archeological material which I have permission to take out of China for study. Here is a copy of the certificate of authorization from your government through the Academia Sinica in Beijing.”
“It is a forgery,” snapped the officer, barely glancing at the sheet of paper Weiskopf held out. “This is all stolen property. You are thieves and criminals.”
“No, sir, it is not a forgery,” said Weiskopf, patiently, “and we are not thieves. I have worked in China for many years, and my writings on Chinese history are well known in your finest universities. This paper bears the seal of the Department of Antiquities, and, as you know, to forge it would be a capital offence.”
Out of the corner of his eye, Weiskopf saw the men hauling shut the sliding door of the freight car, while Schilling stood by with a heavy padlock. Even though the trains seldom ran on time these days, Weiskopf knew it would not wait for him if he were detained arguing with this arrogant young martinet.
“With your permission, sir,” he said, “I must go now. The train is leaving.”
“You do not have my permission,” said the officer. “I wish to question you further.”
“I must go, sir,” Weiskopf repeated, being careful not to sound peremptory or condescending.
The man hesitated, then, glancing at the train, its steam locomotive belching gray billows of coal smoke, he turned without a further word, and stalked off, leaving Weiskopf with a strong feeling the encounter did not bode well.
As whistles sounded and doors slammed up and down the length of the train, the locomotive discharged a great hissing cloud of steam from the cylinders whose glistening steel pistons delivered power to the three huge driving wheels on each side. Beginning to roll ponderously forward, it repeatedly chuffed tall columns of smoke into the evening air. Weiskopf, his heart pounding, sprinted for the door Schilling held open for him.
“Run, Aaron,” Schilling shouted, quite unnecessarily. “Come on…you can do it.”
The train faltered for a moment as the driving wheels lost their grip and spun on the rails, but it was all Weiskopf needed. In that short second or two he was able to fling himself into the compartment, gasping for breath. The train regained speed, and they were underway.
Dropping into their seats facing each other, Schilling withdrew a flask from an inside pocket, tapped it with his forefinger, and smiled.
“Here’s what we need.”
* * *
“What’s going on?” Weiskopf mumbled, startled from a deep sleep by the shriek and squeal of steel on steel as the train braked hard. Their compartment shuddered as the train ground to a halt amid the banging and clanking of couplings.
“God knows,” Schilling answered, lowering the window and looking out into the night. Weiskopf joined him, and as they peered towards the front of the train, glaring yellow floodlights leapt into life, revealing dozens, perhaps hundreds, of soldiers lining the tracks.
“What the hell’s going on?” asked Schilling.
“They’ve stopped the train,” said Weiskopf. “Something must be up. Bandits somewhere, perhaps, or a skirmish with some local tin-pot warlord who wants to be an emperor.”
They heard the sound of heavy boots coming down the corridor, and someone shouted, “European professor, professor from Germany. Identify yourself immediately”
“There’s no use in trying to hide,” said Weiskopf. “They obviously know we’re here. That officer in Zhengzhou must have called ahead.”
Weiskopf slid the door open, and three Guomindang soldiers, one of them a senior officer judging from the red epaulettes and brass buttons on his well-tailored uniform, crowded into the compartment.
“We have information you are attempting to steal ancient treasures from China,” snapped the officer, a thin-faced man of about fifty. “I order you to unlock the freight wagon at the rear of this train.”
“We have permission from—” Weiskopf began, but the officer interrupted, shouting, “You have no such thing. You will open the door to the freight wagon, or we shall blow it open.”
“They want the gold,” said Schilling in German, and Weiskopf nodded.
“There’s nothing we can do.”
“Bribe?” suggested Schilling, but Weiskopf shook his head.
“What are you saying?” shouted the officer. “Speak Chinese. Unlock the wagon, now!”
Climbing down from the train, Weiskopf, fearing the loss of all they had worked so hard for, led the way to the rear of the train. He felt numb. It was as if he were watching, incredulous, from some external place, removed from the reality of what was happening. There were soldiers everywhere, the harsh glare of the floodlights illuminating the expressions of anger, hostility, and greed on their young faces.
Mere boys, thought Weiskopf, bleakly. Do they seriously think any of the treasure will be shared with them?
As though in some waking nightmare, he undid the padlock securing the heavy wooden door and it was flung open with a crash. Soldiers leapt into the freight car and began throwing out boxes and crates. Weiskopf saw the train had been diverted onto a siding in a small rural station and knew with certainty the entire ambush had been carefully planned. Here was the Chinese army itself, behaving like the very bandits from which it was supposed to protect both he and his precious cargo. Glancing at his pocket watch, he saw it had been but two hours since they had left Zhengzhou; more than enough time to arrange this reception. Appalled and sickened, he watched the boxes being split and broken open as they were flung out of the boxcar. Schilling, who had come up behind him, lost his temper entirely and began shouting in German.
“Stop it, you ignorant savages, you…you vandals, you uncouth barbarians.”
A soldier raised his rifle, and Weiskopf hissed, “Shut up, Eduard, for God’s sake. You’ll get us killed.”
Weiskopf, consumed by impotent rage and horror saw box after box torn open, its contents tipped onto the ground. A soldier picked up a large ceramic jar, and Weiskopf moved forward, his hands outstretched.
“No! Be careful. Please don’t damage that.”
Three more soldiers levelled their weapons at them, and he stopped where he was. The soldier threw the jar out of the train, and it shattered on the ground, as men began shouting and cursing.
“There’s nothing here but old pottery and other useless junk. We’re wasting our time.”
“Keep looking,” the thin-faced officer barked, and within a few more minutes they found what they were after. The gold and silver, the gemstones, and jade pieces had been packed in plain wooden boxes to avoid attracting undue attention, but they were soon pried open with whoops of triumph. The crates were delivered to the officer where he stood next to Weiskopf.
“So,” he sneered, with a malicious smile, as the boxes were unpacked on the ground before him, the gold and gemstones gleaming in the yellow light, “it is as I thought. You are stealing this treasure. I could have you shot, here and now. China will no longer allow her riches to be pillaged by foreign racketeers. Those days are finished.”
“Does he seriously think that little bit of high-sounding jingoism justifies what he is doing?” asked Schilling, bitterly. “And he calls us thieves.”
“Speak Chinese,” shouted the officer.
Weiskopf, all but overwhelmed by grief and crushing disappointment, could do nothing but stare in dumb horror at the scene before him.
A soldier standing at the open freight wagon door shouted, “There are many boxes of old bones in here. Do you want them?”
“No,” the officer shouted, “but go through them to be sure nothing has been hidden there.”
The soldiers tipped out the boxes of oracle bones while others stamped on them, shattering the fragile plastrons into countless fragments. Weiskopf, aghast at the wanton destruction of so much valuable historical material, became suddenly conscious of the pouch at his side containing the Mingtiao bone, and blessed his decision not to allow it to be packed with the others. He prayed no one would think to search him. The thought of losing the Mingtiao tormented him as he stood, trembling, in the brassy light.
At length, the ruinous rampage was finished. The soldiers were formed into a column and marched away, leaving Weiskopf and Schilling standing with the officer. The ground was littered with empty boxes, shredded packing paper, straw, and broken pieces of wood. Ceramics lay shattered, oracle bones scattered in disarray or smashed. Anger welled up in Weiskopf like hot lava within a volcano to a pitch almost beyond endurance. This had never before happened to him in all his years in China, and the sight of such mindless carnage sickened and disgusted him. Only the largest bronze vessels remained untouched; the soldiers declaring they were too ugly and heavy to bother with.
“This is outrageous,” he shouted at the officer. “Look what your men have done here. Irreplaceable treasures, all gone. You are worse than a gang of bandits. You call yourselves soldiers? You are thieves, that’s all you are.”
“I am a soldier in the army of the Republic of China,” retorted the officer, glaring at Weiskopf. “The valuables my men have found hidden by you amongst this old junk belong to China. How can you presume to accuse me of stealing what is already ours?”
“Bah,” snorted Schilling, and the officer rounded on him aggressively.
“You should consider yourselves very lucky you are not under arrest. I advise you to board the train and leave here before I change my mind. The valuables you were attempting to steal will be displayed in a museum here in China where they belong.”
And on the day that happens, thought Weiskopf bitterly, the dead will rise and dance the polka.
The taste of bitter disappointment corroded his throat like an acid.
“Does he think we’re fools?” asked Schilling, as they watched the officer strutting away after his men.
“He will have it all sold and the money pocketed within the hour,” said Weiskopf. He felt empty, drained, and defeated, but the train’s whistle jarred him back to reality.
“Hurry Eduard, for God’s sake.”
They rushed to collect what they could, rapidly stuffing oracle bones and any small artifacts and ceramics they could find that remained unbroken into boxes, but within a few minutes the whistle sounded a second peremptory warning blast. Schilling took Weiskopf by the elbow and pulled him away.
“Come, Aaron, there’s nothing more we can do. We must get back on the train.”
Shaking Schilling’s hand away, Weiskopf continued to search for undamaged articles until Schilling forcibly restrained him. He quickly loaded the boxes they had filled and told Weiskopf to find the lock.
Schilling slid the door shut, locked it, although there was very little remaining inside, and they pelted back to their compartment as the train began slowly to move off in clouds of smoke and steam. As it pulled out of the siding and rejoined the main line, some unseen hand somewhere turned off the floodlights leaving everywhere as dark as a stage at the end of a play.