The Prophet of the Wharf (2)
When Captain Cecil came to Joseon last year and then sailed home again, he naturally reported that there was a “British agent” in Joseon.
That way, he could be hailed as a capable captain who had opened up a secret channel with Joseon while still taking “international balance” into account.
Given the unfavorable circumstances—his soldiers had suffered heavy losses to a miserable epidemic—Cecil’s competence looked even more impressive. As always, France’s defeats owed no small debt to the élan vital of cholera.
Since Louis Philippe’s government was hardly what you’d call stable, that was where things ended for France, at least for the time being.
In history, Captain La Pierre of the Gloire would have blundered his way into humiliating himself here as well, but in this altered timeline he never came to Joseon at all, having only managed to wreck things as far as Vietnam. Thierry, the broker who kept tinkering with this “delicate balance,” was the only one who seemed pleased.
Britain, however, was a different matter.
It was hard not to be puzzled when France claimed some James Bond they’d never heard of had suddenly premiered a new 007 series in Joseon all by himself.
“The French are saying some strange things. Did somebody send a ship to Joseon or what?”
“Come to think of it, our opium inventory seems to be a little short...”
“Wasn’t me! I absolutely did not siphon off opium meant for Guangzhou!”
“Hang that bastard first. Then contact headquarters.”
The East India–China Fleet Command decided to appoint the finest Joseon expert in the empire.
The man was Captain Edward Belcher of HMS Samarang, a 22-gun frigate—the very same ship that had visited Jeju Island and Geomundo two years earlier, drawn detailed charts, and collected cultural materials, leading Captain Cecil to suspect that he had been Taesu’s emissary.
Belcher had originally planned to finish his survey of “Japan to Mauritius,” including Joseon, by this year and return home to publish an adventure memoir. But thanks to the altered history, he had been assigned one more mission.
The waters off Gyeokpo looked peaceful.
In the original history, Captain La Pierre of the Gloire should have suffered a spectacular humiliation here around this very moment, but by never coming to Joseon, he had bought himself peace.
That decision was twice as wise as it would have been in the original timeline.
Because he didn’t have to meet the Royal Navy.
Captain Belcher tipped his cap. What little hair he had left fluttered in the sea breeze.
“Hot, isn’t it? We came at this season last time too.”
A young lieutenant beside him said, “Headquarters has high expectations. After all, aside from that old Lord Amherst, we’re the only ones with any experience in Joseon.”
“When I was asked whether I’d planted a man in Joseon too, I could hardly believe it. Lieutenant Ogle, for the sake of clearing our name, we’d best investigate thoroughly.”
Ogle, who had also been Belcher’s companion two years ago, laughed at the captain’s British joke for a moment. Because he was English.
“If we’d made ourselves more familiar with the local officials back then, it would’ve been easier. Like the officials in China—if you just hand them opium, the information comes to you without any running around.”
“At the time, the place looked so worthless. Besides, the Joseon officer who said he’d introduce us to the lord of Quelpart, or whatever they call the magistrate there, never followed through.”
That was because Belcher had taken a passing remark from the Joseon men—something they had tossed out just to keep him from shelling them—and interpreted it in deadly earnest, then marched all the way to the Jeju magistrate’s office. The naval officer had probably not even been a real military man.
Typical in Asia, Lieutenant Ogle said.
“This time it’s the mainland instead of an island landing, so they won’t be able to use that classic Asian bureaucrat trick. They won’t be able to play dumb forever.”
Belcher reined in the young man’s zeal.
“It would be a problem if they didn’t play dumb. Our mission isn’t to support free trade. Joseon is a tributary state of Qing, and in any case we’ve signed a treaty with Qing, so we need to respect Qing’s claims. We can’t make too much noise.”
In his voyage notes, Belcher had described Joseon as “extremely primitive.”
There was no need to create uncertainty in a market worth hundreds of millions of pounds of opium just to open up such a country.
“Our job is simply to investigate until the ‘British agent,’ once he notices us, makes contact. For now, we’ll start here and head north along the coast.”
Unlike France, Britain did not have Kim Dae-geon as a guide. He was a heathen.
So Britain knew only the routes it had already explored along Joseon’s southwestern coast.
That was why they were currently off the coast of Buan, near the Gogunsan Islands. It was all the fault of Henry VIII and his need to invent a new religion just because he wanted to commit adultery.
“If things go badly, we may have to make it all the way to that place called Ganghwado. It lies farther north than Quelpart or Port Hamilton, which we visited before. Lord Amherst got the closest of anyone, near Hongju, but it was so long ago that the information can’t be trusted.”
Belcher tapped the ash out of his pipe.
“Steel yourselves for adventure again, as before. I think it’s about time you returned to your own ship, Captain.”
Ogle grinned.
At present, Ogle was no mere subordinate to Captain Belcher.
He was the proud captain of his own ship, HMS Royalist. He had only crossed over briefly to discuss navigation.
It was a frigate sent as escort once Britain realized France had encountered some form of hostility in Joseon.
“Escort” was a generous term, since a six-gun brig was not something you’d call a serious fighting ship, but to the natives it was still a fearsome vessel. More than anything else, one ship and two ships are worlds apart when it comes to emergency response.
That was why Belcher had recommended his old acquaintance Ogle, then a lieutenant, to command it. Since he had experience exploring Joseon, headquarters had no objections.
It was only natural that “Captain” Ogle was rather full of energy.
“The so-called British agent is probably nonsense the French made up to excuse their defeat, but thanks to it we’ve come back to Joseon, so we may as well get our money’s worth.”
“Looting? Forget it. It’ll only cause trouble, and there’s nothing worth taking. You saw it yourself. Their tools and clothes weren’t much different from some primitive tribe in the jungle.”
“Haha. The value I mean is scholarly, of course. Economically, I agree with you, Captain—but as a biological matter, aren’t primitive tribes rather valuable?”
When people thought of Britain’s signature academic fields, they usually thought of poppy agriculture, opium pharmacology, and heroin chemistry.
But as evolution itself proves, Britain is also an authority in biology. It excels, above all, at carrying out mass extinctions and then calling it “natural selection.”
And now was the romantic age, when the Earth was still an unknown planet. A man-eating tree or a Himalayan yeti could be treated as serious academic material.
“I hear Prince Albert is planning the Great Exhibition—the first London Expo, that is. Wouldn’t it be fine to catch a few and put them on display in London? It would be a marvelous curiosity.”
“Well, if that’s all, then it should be fine. My adventure memoir will become much more substantial too. If this voyage ends successfully, your name will be the first one in the preface.”
“I’m honored.”
The two men smiled brightly.
* * *
Cha Un-hong looked at Taesu in bewilderment.
She thought she had gotten used to his ways by now, but Taesu had gone and pulled another stunt.
He gathered everyone together and said, “You won’t be able to catch fish in these waters anymore. Rather than sit here and watch your livelihood die, I’ll buy up every dried yellow corvina and every fishing boat I can, as far as my strength allows. Anyone who trusts me and wants to follow, come with me.”
The fishermen stared blankly at him, their dark, weather-beaten faces and sunburned arms wrapped in tattered nets and fishing gear.
Cha Un-hong whispered, though her voice carried like a hiss.
“Have you lost your mind? The yellow corvina season ends in a month. Why would these people follow you? And what do you mean, buy their boats too? If you want to sell dried corvina, you’d be better off gathering peddlers instead...”
Taesu didn’t even look at Cha Un-hong. Instead, he gave his reason.
“A British ship is coming soon.”
“British? You mean the English? What nonsense is that?”
Taesu said nothing more, only looked at Cha Un-hong.
Then she understood her own mistake.
The first person who should believe in Taesu was herself. If he had brushed off her proposal as nonsense from the beginning, none of this would have started in the first place.
Cha Un-hong set aside every doubt.
Turning back to the people, she said simply, “The English are a strange breed of the same sort as the French who invaded last year.”
It was a statement that managed to rile up two of the world’s greatest powers in one stroke. Still, if Normandy’s Duke William’s England had been mistaken for some French version of Gija Joseon, that wasn’t Cha Un-hong’s fault so much as a failure of explanation on Choi Yang-eop’s part.
In any case, she wasn’t entirely wrong to say they were cut from the same cloth.
“Just like they did in Ganghwado, those bastards will fire cannons without warning and slaughter commoners. And if government troops come pouring in to stop the barbarians, how are you supposed to keep fishing in peace?”
The second part of what she said jolted the fishermen more than the first.
They didn’t know much about the English, but they knew government troops very well.
Even in actual history, the court had ordered local officials to feed the French ship that had run aground off Buan, and the resulting nuisance was outrageous.
The Buan magistrate finally had to keep sending desperate reports to the court, asking whether it was really all right to provide aid to Westerners. It was the howl of a man screaming, If something goes wrong, don’t make it my fault.
But the court punished the magistrate anyway. They had said, “Hurry up and get it done,” but that didn’t mean, “Ignore every safety rule.” The nerve of a local official who could see through that trick was truly disgusting.
Besides, with the Chungcheong Naval Command more or less ruined, the fastest naval force that could reach Buan would be the Jeolla Left Naval Command in Haenam.
Unlike on the map, the traditional frontline against Japanese raiders was not Gyeongsang Province but the southwestern coast of Jeolla. During the Imjin War, Japan attacked Gyeongsang because it knew Joseon would be preparing for an assault in Jeolla—and because Gyeongsang had Won Gyun.
So the Jeolla Left Naval Command was Joseon’s greatest naval force, the strongest of the Seven Warlords of the Sea.
People trembled at its majestic name. For the Joseon people of this moment, it was the most suitable tactic of all.
“Government troops? Government troops are coming?”
“Aigoo, we’re done for!”
“They’re going to take all these yellow corvina anyway... should we just sell them off now?”
In the meantime, Cha Un-hong quickly brought up the most important point.
“Our Dobansu is the Park Axe from Ganghwado, whom some of you may have heard of by name. Since he once drove back an invasion by the French, he has come early this time as well, to warn you for the sake of all living spirits.”
Soon, the old tale of Park Axe from the firelight was broadcast again, this time with fantasy-grade CG and video editing.
Normally, a story even the speaker doesn’t believe has very little persuasive power.
But Cha Un-hong was buying time while she waited.
It was the yellow corvina season. Many boats were already out fishing.
The moment she had been waiting for soon arrived.
One fisherman leaped from a boat that had rushed back to the harbor and came running, waving his arms.
“A foreign ship!”
The people looked at Taesu with expressions twisted by fear and shock.
“That man... is he really seeing through the Westerners?”
People began selling off their yellow corvina and boats in a frantic rush.
Neither Taesu nor Cha Un-hong was the type to exploit the situation and ruthlessly drive the price down.
But the Mountain Spirit was exactly that type, and unfortunately, the situation played out exactly as he had hoped.
People offered feverish bargain bids, terrified that Taesu might run out of money. That was how the market worked; there was nothing to be done about it.
By the time Taesu and Cha Un-hong were finished, they had loaded the boat with so much dried yellow corvina that the phrase “full catch” hardly did it justice.
* * *
Taesu asked the Mountain Spirit, How far have they come?
[Don’t be so impatient. There is a mighty god here.]
Didn’t you just say a god can’t help us?
[Of course I cannot summon a storm and sink them. But I can, say, not help them at all.]
Taesu thought about that.
Coming from the Mountain Spirit, it sounded suspiciously like contract-law wordplay.
[The goddess Gae-yang-halmeoni protects fishing boats. What do you think happens if that goddess does not protect a foreign ship?]
Taesu, now well acquainted with the Mountain Spirit’s long and miserable habit of bad blood, understood the implication at once.
So there’s a high chance of an accident.
[Didn’t I tell you I once went to war in my heyday? Hearing the shape of the sea around here, I suspect these barbarians may end up paying the price for their own nature. This is the proper study of Neo-Confucianism, so if you ever have grand ambitions, keep it in mind.]
Taesu was furious. It sounded wrong, but he didn’t know enough about Neo-Confucianism to refute it.
Not to mention that the “Mountain Spirit,” who had nothing whatsoever to do with Confucianism, was speaking with leisurely self-satisfaction.
[In any case, if the government troops come, everything will be stripped bare all the same. And from a commercial standpoint, this is a fine opportunity, so keep selling the corvina as planned. I’ll let you know once word comes in.]
* * *
Captain Belcher gnawed on his pipe stem.
“Signal from the Royalist out ahead! All clear!”
“Hmm. So the charted depth of fourteen fathoms was accurate after all.”
At fourteen fathoms, even a frigate ought to pass through without trouble.
Still, Belcher had wisely sent the Royalist ahead first.
He couldn’t very well stop every few steps to measure the depth, and since the ship had made it through, it seemed there was no issue.
This was the difference between him and the French navy, which trusted the chart blindly and ran itself aground. The French navy wasn’t called the British navy’s bread-bringer for nothing.
Belcher nodded in satisfaction and guided the Samarang forward.
“The tide will probably turn before long. We’ll get clear before that.”
“Aye, sir!”
Belcher’s judgment was the best available in this situation.
You couldn’t exactly blame him for the fact that, in the twenty-odd years since Lord Amherst’s visit, sand had piled up layer upon layer until it formed a natural sawtooth.
And you couldn’t blame him for the fact that the altered depth, which the Royalist could pass through, left the Samarang stranded at around five fathoms.
How much time passed?
With a heavy thud, the entire ship shuddered.
At that moment, a very primal certainty washed over Captain Belcher.
We’re fucked.
He didn’t need the officers’ reports to know what had happened. He should have measured the depth accurately before advancing.
Belcher immediately gave another perfectly reasonable order.
“Stay calm! We can still get out. Helm thirty degrees to port! Let out every sail you’ve got! Catch the wind!”
In any case, in the sense of making it look as though he was doing something, Captain Belcher was an excellent commander.
The problem was that the situation had already ceased to have much to do with excellence. The Royalist had also turned her bow, but all they could do now was cheer.
After several hours of desperate prancing before Mother Nature, a hollow voice, as if its soul had already slipped out, finally drifted over.
“It’s the ebb tide.”
Author’s Note
1. Britain really did develop biology early, and it was also the first country to refine heroin from opium.
2. Four years after the time of this story, the first London Expo was held in 1851. Until Belgium’s last human exhibition, when it brought Congolese people over and put them on display in 1953, European science fairs rarely went without human exhibits. Japan did the same in its 1903 and 1907 expositions, where it took Koreans and displayed them as curiosities.