Through the teeming rain, the squad of uniformed police carried the coffin to the graveyard from the hearse. Drops formed on the peaks of their caps, dripping on to their blue-serge shoulders. Strachan had insisted his mother be buried in the same grave as her husband, his father, in Siccawei cemetery.
Detective Inspector Danilov stood next to his detective sergeant in front of the open grave, leaving the police pall-bearers space to manoeuvre the coffin into position. Coir matting covered the base of the grave with two wings flowing out of the rectangular hole. At the side, a hill of dirty brown clods of soil lay glistening in its skin of rain.
The soil of Shanghai, the city of Danilov’s redemption and of his sorrow.
The service had been brief and economical. A short address by the Commissioner of Police, a eulogy from the vicar, a few hymns, sung out of tune by an aged choir, accompanied by an even older organist. The mourners, dressed in black to match the colour of the sky, marched out to the graveyard led by the young vicar.
Only two people looked different from the rest. True to his mother’s tradition, Strachan was dressed in white from head to toe. White shoes, white trousers, white sackcloth shirt. His shoulders were hunched over, his head down, staring at the dark earth beneath his feet.
Only one other mourner looked like him; Strachan’s Uncle Chang. He had come dressed in the traditional white sackcloth and hood, looking like a refugee from some Ku Klux Klan movie by D.W. Griffith. Nobody else from Strachan’s family attended, the banishment decreed so many years ago by a grandfather disappointed with her marriage to a foreigner still in place at her death as it had been during her life.
Only Uncle Chang had disobeyed the grandfather’s edict, the man who did exactly as he wanted, without fear of anybody else, the Mandarin’s seal he carried a powerful force even in a Republican world.
Now she lay in a wooden coffin, shot to death by a killer intent on removing all knowledge of his crimes. Strachan should never have asked his mother to help shelter the only witness in her home. But Danilov knew such regrets were pointless. You can never change the past, as he himself knew so well.
The rain swept down from the louring, grey skies, drowning everything in a sludge of dirty, coal-stained water. The forest of black umbrellas following the coffin assembled around the grave.
Danilov touched Strachan’s arm, gently urging him forward.
Together with Uncle Chang, they moved next to the grave as the coffin was lowered into the ground by the police pall-bearers. Opposite, the priest from St Andrews intoned, ‘May her soul and the souls of all the faithful departed through the mercy of God rest in peace.’
The man was young and nervous, a tremolo in his voice and his glasses already steaming up. He tugged at the side of his dog collar to release the sweat forming beneath his shirt as he spoke.
Danilov knew Strachan didn’t believe in the Western God, but he had gone through with the usual rites. His mother expected it of him. The duty of a child to a parent.
Danilov looked over at the slender figure of his daughter across the abyss of the grave. The girl, noticing his stare, gave him a single nod in return. It was a very Russian reaction, withholding emotion in the presence of others, holding back what was felt. She reminded him so much of his wife; the way she tilted her head, the hair swept back from her forehead, the small smile dangling at the edge of her lips as if she knew a secret but wasn’t revealing it to anybody, least of all him.
One day he would find his wife and son, bring them all together again. Six years was a long time to be separated but he would reunite them all, if it was the last thing he did in life.
Up above, a lark trilled its song in the rain. A battleship-grey sky set off the stark lines of the plane trees around the graveyard. The black umbrellas solid against the wavering drizzle. Danilov could feel the cold damp seep through his new suit, the one his daughter had made him buy for the funeral. The hard edge of the new collar on the white shirt chafed against his neck.
The vicar had finished speaking. All the mourners were looking at Strachan, waiting for him to make the first move. Danilov nudged him on the arm again. The detective sergeant started as if woken from a dream. He looked at Danilov through red-rimmed, tired eyes, before stepping forward to pick up a lump of dark earth, dropping it on to the coffin, where it landed with a soft thud on the brass nameplate.
At the head of the grave stood a marble stone, stained by pastel green, white and yellow lichen.
Sacred to the loving memory of
Hamish Alexander Strachan
Police sergeant, father and husband.A brave man who gave his life for Shanghai.
1882–1919
Danilov stared at the headstone. Strachan would have to find room on it for his mother’s name, spoiling the symmetry of the letters. A shame.
Uncle Chang beckoned him forward to the edge of the grave. He picked up a lump of the dark soil, dropping it on top of the coffin. One day, his daughter would be doing the same for him, mourning his death. The thought sent a shudder down his spine. It was too early to think like that; he still had so much to do.
As if reading his thoughts, Strachan asked him, ‘Was it worth it, sir? Both of them dying for nothing.’
Danilov thought for a moment before answering. ‘They didn’t die for nothing, Strachan. They both chose to protect those less fortunate than themselves, allowing them to live in peace.’
‘I wish I could believe that, sir.’
Danilov sighed. ‘Our job is to protect the weak from the wolves, Strachan, it’s what gives our lives meaning.’
‘And our deaths, sir?’
Before Danilov could answer, Uncle Chang signalled for them to move away to allow other mourners to say their last respects.
Danilov took Strachan’s arm. ‘We should go now.’
For a moment, the detective hesitated, then he nodded and they both moved away.
Danilov could hear the soft thuds of earth landing on wood, as his colleagues from the police force stepped forward to drop the soil of Shanghai on to the coffin. A soft echo of sound, burying the wooden box and the body within its tomb of earth.
Strachan stood in the correct position, waiting for the mourners to walk past, Uncle Chang on one side and Danilov on the other.
Chief Inspector Boyle was the first to clasp both his hands. ‘I’m so sorry for your loss, Detective Strachan.’
‘Thank you, sir.’ Strachan obeyed the formalities.
‘I wish it could have happened under different circumstances.’
‘So do I, sir.’
‘But you mustn’t blame yourself. You weren’t to know’
Danilov looked across at Strachan. The detective’s shoulders were rounded as if he was carrying all the sins of the world on them. With the addition of one extra, just for him.
‘But I should have known, sir. It was my job to know.’
‘You’re being too harsh on yourself. Who could predict what a madman would do?’
Chief Inspector Boyle stood waiting for a response for a few moments, before nodding his head and turning to go.
‘Good luck, sir,’ Strachan finally blurted out.
‘Thank you, Detective Strachan. Retirement has come earlier than I thought it would.’ He looked all around him. ‘I’ll miss all this.’
‘Shanghai, sir?’
‘Shanghai. And its people.’ With those words, he nodded once more and moved on.
Danilov remained by Strachan’s side for the blur of handshakes and accompanying words from a long line of Strachan’s colleagues, some in the blue uniform of the Shanghai Police and others in the mufti of the detective force.
‘So sorry for your loss.’
‘Heartfelt commiserations.’
‘We’ll pray for her.’
Then, Inspector Cartwright was standing in front of Strachan, with Meaker by his side. Why had these two come here?
‘My condolences on your loss,’ said Cartwright. Meaker stepped forward and shook his hand, the alcohol on his breath fogging the air.
‘My condolences,’ Meaker echoed before licking his moustache.
After what had happened, these two were the last people Danilov expected to see at the funeral. Strachan mumbled a response, but they had both moved away, Meaker stumbling over a clod of earth.
The line seemed to go on for ever. More hands were stuck out, words mumbled, sorrows expressed.
Finally, everybody had moved away and only the inspector, his daughter and Uncle Chang remained with Strachan.
‘When are you coming back to work?’ Danilov asked.
Elina nudged her father, chastising him with her bright-green eyes.
‘Tomorrow, sir, if it’s okay with you?’
‘The sooner, the better.’
‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like to take more time off, David? Sort out your mother’s affairs?’ said Elina.
Danilov noticed she called him David. When had they become so close?
‘I would prefer to be working, Miss Danilova.’
She leant forward and whispered in Strachan’s ear, then she stepped back, took her father’s elbow and guided him away, walking towards the main road.
‘What did you say to him?’
‘I just said he shouldn’t blame himself.’
‘Who should he blame?’
Elina pulled her arm away from her father. ‘Sometimes, Father, you can be too cold.’
‘Sympathy doesn’t help at times like this, Elina.’
‘Is that how you managed to survive?’
Danilov thought of the years alone in Shanghai. Throwing himself into work had helped him forget the loss of his daughter, wife and son. And, in the evening, losing himself in the smoke-scented dreams of the opium pipe. Last year, he had found Elina; now all he had to do was reunite the rest of his family. It was that hope that kept him alive.
Hope.
Strachan and his uncle joined them before he could answer his daughter.
Uncle Chang stuck out his hand. ‘It has been a pleasure meeting you again, Inspector Danilov.’
‘I wish we could have met under better circumstances.’
‘If you need any help with your investigations, please don’t hesitate to call on me. My door is always open.’
The man walked off towards the main gate of the cemetery, where the houses of Shanghai crept up to the boundaries of the city of the dead, threatening to invade the land but kept at bay by superstition and fear.
Strachan took one last look back at his mother’s grave. The gravediggers were already shovelling the dark Shanghai soil on top of her coffin.
‘It’s time to go now, David,’ Elina said.
Danilov touched Strachan lightly on the arm. The rain still swept down, the smell of fresh earth filled the air, and behind them the rattle of the car engine echoed among the headstones as it waited at the main road.
Reluctantly, he turned away.
Danilov watched him walk slowly out of the main gates. The image of an old man carrying a heavy samovar on his back flashed though his mind. Was it an old folk tale? Or a song? Or something his father had told him years ago?
He couldn’t remember, but it came back to him now as Strachan walked away.
It wasn’t a happy memory.