Once alone again with Sir William, Johann said, "They won't abide by it."

"Yes, I know. Never mind."

"Sir William, my contract's up in a couple of months. I won't renew."

Sir William said sharply, "I can't do without your services for at least six months."

"It's time to go home. This place is going to be a bloodbath soon and I've no want to have my head on a spike."

"I'll increase your salary by fifty pounds a year."

"It's not the money, Sir William. I'm tired. Ninety-eight percent of all the talk is sheiss. I've no patience now to sift the kernel of wheat from the barrel of dung!"

"I need you for these two meetings."

"They'll never take place. Two months odd, then I'm off, the exact day is on the paper. Sorry, Sir William, but that's the end, and now I am going to get drunk." He left.

Sir William went across the hall to his office window and searched the horizon. It was nearing sunset now. No sign of any of the fleet. My God, I hope they're safe. Must keep Johann somehow. Tyrer won't be ready for a year at least. Who can I get that I can trust? God damn it!

Light from the dying sun illuminated the sparsely furnished room, not enough to see by so he lit an oil lamp, adjusting the wick carefully. On his desk were neat piles of dispatches, his edition of All the Year Round --long since read from cover to cover, with all the newspapers from the last mail ship, several editions of Illustrated London News and Punch. He picked up the advance copy of Turgenev's Fathers and Sons in Russian sent to him by a friend at the Court of St.

Petersburg, amongst other English and French books, started to read it then, distracted, put it aside and began the second letter of the day to the Governor of Hong Kong, giving details of today's meeting, and asking for a replacement for Johann. Lun came in silently, closing the door.

"Yes, Lun?"

Lun came up to his desk, hesitated, then dropped his voice. "Mass'er," he said cautiously, "hear trou'bel, trou'bel soon Yedo Big House, big trou'bel."

Sir William stared up at him. Big House was what the Chinese servants called their Yedo Legation. "What trouble?"

Lun shrugged. "Trou'bel."

"When trouble?"

Again Lun shrugged. "Whisk'y water, heya?"

Sir William nodded thoughtfully. From time to time Lun whispered rumors to him with an uncanny knack of being right. He watched him pad over to the sideboard and make the drink, just as he liked it.

Phillip Tyrer and the kilted Captain were watching the same sunset from an upstairs window of the Legation at Yedo, the usual groups of samurai stationed outside the walls and in all approaches up the hill. Dark reds and orange and browns on the empty horizon mixed with a strip of blue above the sea. "Will the weather be good tomorrow?"

"Don't know much about the weather here, Mr.Tyrer. If we were in Scotland I could give you a wee forecast," the Captain, a sandy-haired, thirty-year-old ramrod, laughed. "Rain with scattered showers... but, och ay, it's no' so bad."

"I've never been to Scotland, but I will on my next leave. When do you go home?"

"Maybe next year, or the year after. This is only my second year." Their attention went back to the square. Four Highlanders and a sergeant plodded up the hill through the samurai and entered the iron gates, returning from a routine patrol to the wharf where a detachment of marines and a cutter were stationed. Samurai were always in attendance, standing around, sometimes chatting, or in clusters near fires that they lit if it was cold, movement constant. No one, soldier or Legation employee, had been prevented from leaving or entering, though all had passed through intense, always silent scrutiny.

"Excuse me, I'll see the Sergeant, make sure our cutter's there, in case, and close down for the night. Dinner at seven as usual?"

"Yes." When he was alone Tyrer stifled a nervous yawn, stretched and moved his arm to ease the slight ache there. His wound had healed perfectly, no longer any need to use a sling. I'm bloody lucky, he thought, except for Wee Willie. Damn the man for sending me here, I'm supposed to be training to be an interpreter, not a dogsbody. Damn damn damn. And now I'll miss Andr`e's recital that I was so looking forward to. Angelique is certain to be there.

Rumors of her secret betrothal had rushed around the Settlement like a foehn wind-- unsettling. Hints dropped to her or to Struan had brought forth neither denial or confirmation, or even a clue. In the Club the betting was two to one that it was a fact, twenty to one that the marriage would never take place: "Struan's as sick as a dog, she's Catholic and you know his mum for God's sake, Jamie!"

"Taken! He's better every day and you don't know him like I do. Ten guineas against two hundred."

"Charlie, what odds you give me that one's up the spout?"' "Oh for God's sake!"

"Angel Tits ain't a doxy for Chris' sake!"

"A thousand to one?"' "Done by God... a golden guinea!"

To Tyrer and Pallidar's disgust, the odds and bets, ever more personal and detailed, changed daily. "The buggers here are a lot of guttersnipes!"

"You're right of course, Pallidar. A scummy lot!"

With intense speculation going on about Struan and Angelique, there was more about the extent of the storm and the fleet, worse that it might be in dire trouble, and doom generally. Japanese merchants were more nervous than usual too, whispering rumors of insurrections all over Japan against or for the Bakufu, that the mystical Mikado, supposed high priest of all Japanese who held sway in Kyoto, had ordered all samurai to attack Yokohama.

"Poppycock, if you ask me," the Westerners told one another, but more and more guns were purchased and even the two trader wives slept with a loaded weapon beside their beds. Drunk Town was rumored to be an armed camp.

Then, a few days ago, an act of war: an American merchantman, storm battered, had limped into Yokohama. In the Shimonoseki Straits, inbound from Shanghai for Yokohama with a cargo of silver, ammunition and arms, then onwards to the Philippines with opium, tea and general trade goods, she had been fired upon by shore batteries.

"The devil you were!" someone called out over the explosion of anger in the Club.

"You're goddam right we were! And us as peaceful as a buttercup! Those Choshu bastards were mighty accurate--what crazy bastard sold them goddam cannon? Blew off our top t'gallants before we knew what was happening and could take evading action. Sure, we returned their fire but we've only a couple of stinky goddam five-pounders that'd not give a body much cause to hiccup. We counted as many as twenty cannon." "My God, twenty cannon and expert gunners could easily close Shimonoseki, and if that happens we're in dead trouble. That's the quickest and only safe way here."

"Ay! The Inland Waters are a must, by God!"

"Where the hell's the fleet? They could go and knock out those batteries! What about our trade?"' "Ay, where's the fleet, hope to God she's safe!"

"And if she's not?"' "Charlie, we'll just have to send for another..."

Stupid people, Tyrer thought, all they can think of is send for the fleet, boozing and money.

Thank God the French Admiral brought back Andr`e with him. Thank God for Andr`e even though he's volatile and strange but that's only because he's French. Thanks to him I've already two exercise books crammed with Japanese words and phrases, my daily journal's chockablock with an abundance of folklore, I've a rendezvous with a Jesuit when we're again in Yokohama. Such marvelous progress and so important for me to learn quickly --and that's without even thinking about the Yoshiwara.

Three visits. The first two guided, the third alone.

"Andr`e, I just can't tell you how much I appreciate all the time you've given me, and all the help. And as to tonight, I can never repay you, never."