Chapter 1488 - Result of the Duel
"Rest assured—their attitude has changed," Hale said. "Additionally, I understand you have many connections in Japan. If you could arrange for more Catholics from Japan to settle in the Philippines and help build an Eden on earth, I would be infinitely grateful."
"Population from Fujian poses no difficulty. Japanese Catholics, I fear, are another matter entirely. The Shogunate permits virtually no one to travel abroad..."
"Consider this: if everything had to go through official channels, men like us would have no reason to exist, would we?"
Zheng Zhifeng laughed heartily—his first genuine laughter since the disaster at Weitou Bay. "You truly are a remarkable man!"
Next, Hale demonstrated the launch of Congreve rockets. Zheng Zhifeng understood their power intimately—he had witnessed with his own eyes how rockets fired from ships transformed the entire anchorage into a sea of flame when Australian warships attacked Kinmen Island. Discovering now that the man before him could also supply similar rockets left him elated.
"You see, if those wooden boxes of yours are equipped with rocket launchers, a single salvo can deal a fatal blow to any enemy. Especially effective for attacks on enemy ports—putting them to the torch becomes child's play."
"I only want to know how many rockets you can sell me next time I return."
"That presents no difficulty whatsoever. Now let us discuss the price..."
Watching Zheng Zhifeng's ship recede into the distance, Hale's men packed up their equipment and began loading boats in preparation for the return to the estate outside Manila. The chests unloaded from Zheng Zhifeng's vessel contained not only silver—Spanish pesos and Chinese ingots alike—but also exquisite handicrafts and silks specially requested for currying favor with local dignitaries.
Marcos arrived to report that everything had been loaded onto the flagship.
"Marcos, do you suppose this Chinese man truly understands the real power contained behind cannons?"
"I think he does not..."
"Precisely. If he understood, he would have long since knelt in surrender to the Australians, rather than persisting in this futile struggle." Hale pulled up his hood.
Behind cannons lay a nation's industrial might. Not dozens of cannons—even several times more could not alter the Zheng family's decisive disadvantage against the Australians. Those Chinese calling themselves Australians already possessed steamships, rifled guns, rifled cannons bearing obvious signs of indigenous manufacture. This represented strength founded upon primary industrial capability—no longer something any agricultural nation of this era could hope to contend with.
"He possesses great courage—like us. Otherwise, we too should surrender immediately."
"Exactly, my dear Marcos," Hale said. "Let us return to the estate with all haste. I expect the Baroness will have another invitation for this evening."
In Manila, when the rains held off, the approach of noon forced everyone to retreat indoors, whiling away the terrible heat behind mosquito nets and upon beds. Even the colony's heart—the Governor's Palace, shaded by lush greenery—seemed no exception. First-floor windows hid behind wooden shutters, and the massive louvers on the second floor were sealed tight. Silence reigned. Even the sentries beneath the porch clutched their pikes while leaning against door pillars, half-dozing.
Yet the residence housing the heart and brain of the Philippine colony could hardly afford such leisure. This imposing two-story stone structure stood beside an eye-catching square bursting with flowers and verdant trees in the core of Intramuros. In a colony dotted with bamboo stilt houses and thatched huts, stone buildings served as unmistakable symbols of Spanish authority. Like most high-class buildings in the Philippines, the ground floor housed storerooms and servant quarters, while the second floor provided the master's living space. Between them lay a mezzanine where Governor Juan Salamanca had chosen to conduct his work and receive government officials.
Louvers sealed against the fierce sunlight plunged the already dim hall into deeper shadow. A small glass oil lamp flickered on the long table, its feeble glow illuminating the Governor and several of Manila's most prominent figures.
"Mr. Osvaldo, I am confounded as to how you and your clerks produced such an absurd report." Governor Salamanca jabbed a finger at a stack of Australian paper scattered across the table. "Do you not understand what the niter collection ponds Mr. Paul mentioned actually are? One need only dig a few pits and fill them with excrement, refuse, and wood ash. Yet you expect me to believe this trifling work costs two thousand pesos, with an additional five hundred annually? The niter ponds at the munitions factory already produce saltpeter without a single copper of extra cost."
"You know, Manila City Hall has labored under insufficient public funds for years. Out of sheer necessity, I am forced to hire those dim-witted natives—naturally, they grasp nothing of advanced mathematics." The Mayor sipped his Australian water, set down the glass bottle, and replied with leisurely indifference: "You are welcome to have Mr. Andrade recalculate."
"The munitions factory, of course. Wood ash from the smelting yard is inexhaustible. If only it could produce wealth as readily as it produces ash..."
"No—your statement is absurd. I need not remind you of your station. As municipal magistrate of this colony, you and I share responsibility for guarding His Majesty's territory. The importance of improved artillery ammunition is self-evident, for we have never had sufficient troops in the Philippines. Should the damned Dutchmen decide to target these islands, they could easily recruit a hundred thousand Chinese and Japanese mercenaries. Now perhaps we must add Australians to that list."
"Even from a purely financial perspective, niter ponds could reduce our annual expenditure on Indian saltpeter. Surely you comprehend the significance of that?"
"Poor Esteban—he would surely go mad hearing this edict of yours," Manila's Chief of Police cracked a joke in response. This youngest son of a Milanese country squire liked telling vulgar jests to mask his own sinister greed. "Fortunately, he can hear nothing now."
The conversation shifted here. Esteban Sanabria had accumulated far more enemies than friends in the Philippines, so his spectacular duel with the Count remained a favorite topic of gossip. Even more dramatic: five days after the duel, the Navy Commodore's fleet arrived in Manila bearing a special passenger—a Special Prosecutor dispatched by the High Court of Madrid to investigate a series of fraudulent crimes committed by Esteban Sanabria in Seville, New Spain, and the Far Eastern colonies. Naturally, the suspect he came to investigate had already been permanently silenced. The timing could not have been more convenient. As for the immense wealth the deceased had once flaunted, it had brought him no benefit in the end. Whether anyone could inherit it remained uncertain. From New Spain to Manila, vultures circled everywhere, ready to descend upon this corpse for a feast.
Even in the chatter and arguments of municipal officials, multiple versions of how the colony's wealthiest merchant and most notorious fraudster had met his end circulated freely. In the Mayor's telling, Sanabria's skull had been half cleaved away. The Royal Ensign gestured enthusiastically to demonstrate how the Count had run Sanabria through from chest to back with a single thrust. The most outlandish account came from Parian District Chief Juan Aguilar, who insisted poor Esteban Sanabria had been split cleanly in two—man and sword together—by the Count's blade.
"Now our ears may have some peace," a municipal councilor remarked. "No one left to seize you by the collar and chatter endlessly all day, as if slandering others' reputations were his only joy in living."
"And who would dare slander Count Vananois now? Someone has already traced his lineage to the Lando family of Lombardy. Perhaps his family tree will continue to sprout new branches, reaching back before the Common Era, all the way to ancient Rome."
"Impossible. When have you ever heard that man speak a sentence of proper Latin?" The Chief of Police retorted. "He speaks with a Tuscan peasant's accent, at most reciting scraps of doggerel from Dante or Petrarch. If that constitutes the extent of his noble education, his tutor must have been an ignorant fraud. All his aristocratic airs are mere façade, meant to deceive naive, simple-minded women. We really should investigate his background more thoroughly."
Two knocks sounded at the door. It opened to reveal the slender, frail figure of the Governor's Secretary, Eugenio Garcia Zapatero. His face appeared pale, as if something had frightened him. "Count Vananois has arrived. He is waiting in the small drawing room and wishes to present a gift to Your Excellency first, as a token of respect."
A servant from the Governor's Palace entered, bearing the Count's gift. The Secretary shrank back instinctively, as though what rested in the servant's hands were a venomous serpent wrapped in silk. Everyone recognized it immediately: nestled in folds of silk lay an ornately decorated saber in its scabbard—the very weapon the Count habitually wore to various occasions.
"Heavens! Is this not the very blade that so brutally killed Esteban?" Mayor Osvaldo exclaimed. No one echoed him. All pretense of aristocratic reserve and decorum vanished as everyone craned their necks to examine the saber made famous by the duel.
In truth, this was an authentic "Made in Lingao" product—a premium export item, a slightly modified version of the standard Fubo Army officer's saber, itself modeled after the Meiji Type 32 NCO sword. The gold and silver inlaid fittings and cloisonné-decorated scabbard were certainly eye-catching, but when the blade was drawn, the Royal Ensign exclaimed in admiration. He collected Oriental weapons and fancied himself an expert, and the steel quality of this blade was superb. The patterns flowing across its surface looked even more exquisite than the finest Japanese katanas or Arab scimitars. The Spaniards naturally had no way of knowing that the effect came from acid etching combined with mechanical polishing.
(End of Chapter)