The Year's Best Science Fiction & Fantasy 7

ALL THE TEA IN CHINA by R. Bretnor

I was suitably startled to learn last year that a recent conference of the Modern Language Association had included a seminar on science fiction — but my sense of shock was in no way due to the realization that s-f has exerted its influence on our language, as it had on our literature. What surprised me was that official cognizance of this self-evident phenomenon should have been taken, so readily, by a learned body of academicians.

Actually, publishers of science fantasy have known for some time that the colleges and universities provide some of their best markets! but s-f reading was something almost everybody did, and practically nobody talked about. I wonder how much of this emergence of science fiction from the academic kitchen to its parlor is due to the change in media (so much easier to discuss a story from Atlantic or even the Post, than one from Thrilling Wonder), and how much to the persistent subversive efforts of a few literary guerrillas who have been sniping steadily from positions of irreproachable intellectual eminence at the guardians of literary snobbery. The more celebrated of these have included Anthony Boucher, Clifton Fadiman, and the late Fletcher Pratt; but none have been more staunchly effective than Reg Bretnor.

Linguist, Orientalist, lecturer, critic, and author, Bretnor’s last two books have been a translation of Moncrif’s Les Chats (Golden Cockerel Press; 400 copies; morocco, $40; cloth, $20); and a paperback collection of vignette-length extended s-f puns. In the past he has served as adviser on Asian affairs to the U.S. Government; taught writing at San Quentin; edited one of the earliest and best volumes of s-f criticism (Modern Science Fiction, Coward-McCann, 1953). His short stories appear, ordinarily, either in literary quarterlies or in s-f magazines.

It was mighty lucky for me that my Grandma Whitford caught on in time. If she hadn’t, chances are I would’ve grown up just like her Great-uncle Jonas Hackett, and come to the same sort of end, shaking hands with the Devil himself before breakfast, and with not even a Christian tombstone over me at the last for folks to come look at.

I was down in an empty stall at the barn, making a trade with Jim Bledsoe. Jim was sniveling and crying and begging me not to make him go through with the trade, which he’d already agreed to, and I wasn’t giving an inch.

He picked up his 12-gauge Iver-Johnson, and his two Belgian hares, and his skates, and fondled them kind of, and put them back down with the rest of his stuff; and he said, maybe for the twentieth time, “Aw, B-Bill, you — you can have all the rest. But p-p-please lemme keep my old shotgun, p-please.”

And I said, “Not for all the tea in China, I won’t. No sirree bob!”

It was right then Grandma showed up, her little eyes crackling and sparkling, and her lips set as tight as when she was mad at some fresh city peddler. Small as she was, she grabbed my left ear and twisted real hard.

“Ow!” I said.

She twisted again. “All the tea in China, indeed!” she snapped. “I’ll all-the-tea-in-China you, boy. Now you give those things back to Jimmy — this instant! And Jimmy, you take ‘em and skeddaddle on home.”

“Aw, Gran’ma,” I grumbled, “we’re only making a trade. There’s nothing wrong with just— Yow!”

“Don’t lie to me, boy. You were chiseling him out of his eyeteeth. That whole big pile for a one-bladed jack-knife and a busted war sword! It’s that bad Hackett blood in you, I do declare. You’re getting to be as wicked and sinful as Great-uncle Jonas.” She looked at Jimmy again, who was fiddling around, still scared to pick up his things. “Go ahead, take ‘em,” she told him. “The sheriff won’t ever hear how you burned down his outhouse — that’s a promise. When I get through with Bill here, he won’t say a word.” She twisted my ear harder than ever. “No sirree bob — not for all the tea in China, he won’t!”

And as soon as Jimmy had beat it, she marched me out of the barn, and straight past the house while the hired-hand snickered, and around the big corn-patch and right up the east slope of Hackett’s Hill. She didn’t slow down or let go of my ear till we got clean to the top; and even though Hackett’s Hill isn’t more than a couple hundred feet high, I was just about out of breath.

She told me to sit. “Wonder why I brought you up here?”

Hackett’s Hill wasn’t worth climbing. It was sort of lumpy and brown, with nothing but scrubby dry weeds growing on it. All you could see from the top was the Post Road winding around it before straightening out down the valley, and our house, and Smathers’. So I nodded.

“I brought you,” she said, “because it was right about here that Jonas Hackett’s place was before he was took by the Devil, and because I can see his spirit’s strong in you, and because I aim to drive it clean out.”

She stared at me till it seemed that a cold little wind blew across Hackett’s Hill and into my spine. “Boy,” she asked, “what do you want to be when you’ grown?”

I looked down at my shoes. “I want to be rich,” I told her defiantly. “I want to move down to Boston, and have a big house, and a carriage, and a gold watch and chain, and tell folks what to do.”

“I thought so,” she said. “Well, that’s all right for some, whose natures are honest and can stand off temptation — but it isn’t for you. You’re going to Harvard College instead, and let ‘em make you a doctor.”

“No, ma’am,” I answered right back. “I wouldn’t do that. No, siree bob. Not for—” Then I remembered my ear and shut up.

“Not for all the tea in China,” she finished up for me. “No siree bob. And that’s just what Great-uncle Jonas answered them back when they wanted him to go down to Harvard. Now you sit real still, and don’t interrupt, and I’ll tell you the story. Only don’t go telling anyone else, because it’s nothing we’re proud of, and it’s best kept in the family.”

She gave me a look, and I promised….

By the time Jonas was forty (Grandma said), he was a fine-looking man. Maybe he was a little too lean, and I guess his eyes looked a little too much like cold chunks of gray glass in dark caves. They say, too, that his big, pale hands were always opening and closing all by themselves, as if they were hungry. But he had curly black hair, and a good set of white teeth, and a walk like a lion out hunting.

(In my mind, I saw Great-uncle Jonas clear as could be, and I shivered.)

Besides (she went on), by that time he owned a good part of the land around here, and had loans out on lots more. He had some business in Boston, and down in New York, which he kept to himself. But everyone knew that he owned a three-quarter share in the tea-clipper Queen of the East, because everyone knew young Middleton Martin, who was her first mate and the one friend Jonas had in the world.

You’d have thought there’d have been lots of men willing to call him their friend, and plenty of women hereabouts to marry him at the drop of a hat. But there weren’t. Only Middleton Martin forgave him for the things he had done — maybe because he’d been off to sea so much of the time, and never seen Jonas at work. You see, boy, Jonas was never content just making a dollar. He had to make it off someone, so it hurt — and the more it hurt the better he liked it.

Let’s say a neighbor had something that’d just about kill him if anyone knew, and Jonas found out. Pretty soon he’d show up and offer to buy the man’s team, or his pasture, or even his house. He’d look it over, taking his time, and they’d have a talk, friendly like, and finally they’d get to the price — and Jonas’d offer a dollar, or maybe fifteen, or fifty at the outside. Usually his neighbor would shout he was crazy. Then Jonas would tighten the screws. He’d whisper what he’d found out. He’d let the man cuss and threaten, and argue and beg. He’d pretend to give in. And right at the last, he’d tighten his jaw and say, “No siree bob. Not for all the tea in China, I won’t.”

(Grandma paused for a minute, but I just pulled at the dry grass at my feet instead of looking up at her.)

He always did it that way (Grandma said). It was the same when he’d clamp down on a loan. He was hated by every man, woman, and child within fifteen miles. He’d built a fine, big, new house, and he lived there alone except for two foreign servants he’d brought in from the city. He never went out to visit, even his kin, or showed up at church, or had anyone over except Middleton Martin. And all through the years, he never so much as looked at one of the girls. Then all of a sudden, when he’d turned forty, he started courting Mary Ann Thorpe.

She was the prettiest girl in the valley, twenty years younger than he, with hair like honey. It was known that Jonas had a money hold on her father, but what really started tongues wagging was that she’d been promised to Middleton Martin for close on three years. A few said it was queer that Jonas Hackett would do such a thing to the one friend he had, but mostly folks thought it was just like his nature. She was Middleton’s girl, and no man could find anyone finer; and betraying a friendship just made him want her the more. The whole valley waited for the Queen of the East to come back with her cargo of tea. And because Jonas was Middleton’s friend, and for fear of what he could do to her father, Mary Ann let him sit on her porch in the evenings, and tried to pretend she didn’t know what he’d come for.

That went on for three months, with Mary Ann crying herself quietly to sleep every night; and after a while there was even some lowdown gossip that she was going to accept Jonas Hackett for his money, and because of what he might do, and because his house was the finest house in the county, in the prettiest place.

(Grandma broke off, and I thought to myself she was making it up, because Hackett’s Hill was the ugliest place in the county, not the prettiest. Besides, searching around, I couldn’t see any sign of where a house might have been, not even a small one. But her face looked as if she was telling the truth. It made me feel queer.)

Then (Grandma said), the Queen of the East came in from the sea with Middleton Martin aboard, and he took the stage straight for home, wanting to get back to Mary Ann as fast as he could. But first, not knowing a thing, and it being right on the way, he stopped off a minute or two to leave Jonas a present. Jonas shook hands with him just as if nothing had happened, and Middleton gave him a bundle tied up in canvas, which he’d brought all the way from Foochow.

“Open it up,” Middleton said.

So Jonas took off the canvas, and there was a sort of a cage about two feet square. It was made of lacquered wood and bamboo, and pieces of fancy red cord laced around and criss-crossed inside, and there were bits of silk like bright little flags at the corners, with Oriental writings.

“What is it?” asked Jonas.

“A tea merchant had it,” Middleton told him. “He’d got it from one of the caravan men, who’d brought it in from the mountains out behind China. It’s a demon trap. Suppose you want to catch you a demon. You set it down by some track where they run, and by morning most likely you’ll find a big fat one.” He slapped Jonas’ back, and roared with laughter. “Works every time. Doesn’t even need bait. It’s just what you need!”

“What do they do with the demon?” Jonas asked him, not laughing at all.

Middleton cocked a red eyebrow, but he saw that Jonas was serious, so he made out like he was. “If he’s a water-demon,” he said, “they burn him up right there in the cage, but if he’s a fire-demon — you can tell by the smell — then they chuck him into a well or a lake, cage and all.”

Jonas frowned. Quickly he shoved the cage back behind him, as if to protect it. “I wouldn’t do that,” he declared.

Then Middleton told him good-by, and went on up to Mary Ann’s house. But that was just the first time he saw Jonas Hackett that day.

(Grandma snorted.) He found out soon enough. He was back inside half an hour, and Jonas, standing out on the porch, saw by the look on his face that he knew.

“Well?” he said.

Middleton spoke very softly, “Jonas, I didn’t use to believe what folks said about you. I almost do now. What do you want with my Mary Ann?”

“I’m going to marry her,” Jonas answered.

“Suppose she says no?”

“I can ruin her dad,” Jonas said.

The shoulders of Middleton Martin’s blue jacket went tight. “Suppose I say no, Jonas?”

“Berths are scarce, and you won’t have yours,” Jonas told him. “The Queen is my ship.”

For a while they looked at each other without saying a word. Then Middleton said, “We’ve been friends, Jonas. We’ve been friends a long time. I guess we can still be. Just say you don’t want her — that it’s been a mistake. Give her up, Jonas.”

All the blood left Jonas’ lips. “Not for all the tea in China!” he snapped.

Middleton laughed in his face. “All right, have it your way. I’ve talked to Mary Ann. I’ve talked to her father. We’re getting married next week. Wreck him — he’ll be living with us. Take my berth — I’ve got a new one, a command of my own, bigger and faster.” And with that he turned his back and walked off.

(Grandma shaded her eyes from the sun, and pointed east of the road.) The Thorpe place was just beyond Smathers’. Even now, you can hardly see it from here. Jonas spent some bad nights, I’ve been told, pacing the floor and saying never a word, all eaten inside because not two miles off were three people who’d told him where to head in. The truth was he’d gone off half-cocked. Middleton and Mary Ann and her pa knew the worst he could do, and they just didn’t care. He kept thinking of Mary Ann being Mrs. Middleton Martin, and how folks in the valley would laugh in his face; and the closer they got to the wedding, the worse he became. Those who saw him said his hands were clinching and clenching harder than ever, and he walked with his teeth skinned back like a wolfs. Then, just two nights before the wedding was set to take place, he got his idea.

He was sitting in the dark in his parlor, thinking what he’d like to do to Middleton Martin, and racking his brains for some new dirty trick, when all of a sudden he stretched out his hand — and there was the demon-trap, which he’d completely forgotten. As soon as he touched it, the idea came into his head.

Jonas knew that Orientals know a lot of things better not known, and he figured that if they took the time to build demon-traps, those traps would most likely catch demons. Also, he knew there’d been demons and devils aplenty in Massachusetts back in the old Salem days, and that Satan himself still had business in Boston, because he’d been mixed up in it often enough. And he reasoned that if a little trap’d catch little devils, why it’d only take a great big one to catch the biggest of all.

Showing his teeth in the moonlight, Jonas walked out in the night to the Post Road, which ran right past his gate, and he looked up and down. In those days, it was straight as an arrow all the way down the valley, and he guessed that it was the track the Devil would use when he went up to Boston. Right away, he made up his mind that he’d catch him — but he wasn’t intending to waste him by chucking him, sizzling and sputtering, into the ocean — not Jonas! He was going to keep him right there in the cage till he fixed it so he could get Mary Ann.

Jonas looked at the moon, and laughed without making a sound, and he went back in the house, and woke up his two foreign servants, a man and a woman, and sent them off into town to buy stuff — lumber and silk, and red-colored paint, and cord and bamboo. Later that day, old Lem Smathers saw him hammering away in the yard like a madman, with the big trap darned near finished, but he wouldn’t tell Lem anything. It was the servants that told it next day, after it happened, because right at the last they found out what he was up to and ran off and quit him. The rest folks just figured out.

Night came, dark and angry, with storm clouds drowning the stars and hiding the moon except once in a while for just a few seconds. And Great-uncle Jonas hitched a team to his devil trap — for, making it strong, he’d built it too heavy to carry — and dragged it out, and set it up by the road right under his window. Then he went back in to stay up and watch, leaving the window propped open in spite of the weather so he could hear if anything happened. It stormed and it rained, and the wind blew and blew, and several times he had to go take a look, just in case, and he got soaked to the skin. But he didn’t think about that. Then, toward three o’clock, the sky started to clear, and gales up aloft tore the black clouds to shreds — and all of a sudden, down by the trap, Jonas heard a stumbling and stamping, and a roaring and ranting like he’d never heard in his life.

Jonas knew that the worst thing you could do, going into a deal, was to seem to be anxious, so he walked down as slow as he could, his hands in his pockets. Sure enough, there was his trap, with its little silk flags fluttering their Oriental letters in the cold breeze. And sure enough, in it, all tangled up in the strings, was the Devil.

He didn’t have hoofs or a tail, or anything like it. He was six foot tall, dark and handsome. He wore a big beaver hat, and a greatcoat, and flowers all over his vest, and a gold watch and chain. When he saw Jonas Hackett, he quit his struggling and swearing, and tried to pretend not to be mad, and actually smiled.

“Good mawnin’, suh,” he said, bowing. “Mah name is Legree. Ah’m a tobacco auctioneer from No’th Carolina, headin’ for Boston. Ah seem to have blundered into this heah Yankee contraption.”

Jonas didn’t bow back. ‘That’s right,” he agreed, “sure seems like you have. But you’re no auctioneer, no more’n I am.”

The Devil shrugged just a little, and fixed up his smile. “Ah see, suh,” he said, “that Ah’m dealin’ with a true judge of man’s nature. Ah was lyin’, suh, Ah admit it. But Ah was only tryin’ to spare the Abolitionist sentiments heahabouts. Truth is, Ah’m a slave-dealer from way down in Memphis. And now, suh, Ahll oblige you to set me free from this gadget—”

“You’re a slave-dealer, right enough,” Jonas answered, “but not like you meant it. Down South, you’d show up as a Yankee. I know you, Satan.”

At that, the Devil couldn’t help letting a wisp of steam, smoke, and flame leak out of his nostrils, and he quickly lit a cheroot trying to cover it up. Then he smiled again, a smile that would’ve scared most any man clean out of his skin. “You’d best open the door of this thing,” he suggested, “before I break it down and come get you.”

Jonas just shook his head. “If you could’ve, I guess you’d have got me already,” he said coldly.

Well, the Devil couldn’t control himself any longer, and the show he put on made all the cussing and roaring he’d gone in for before seem like nothing at all. He described the things that would happen to Jonas if he ever got out. He spouted out cinders and sparks, and smoke poured from him, and red flames; and the sulphur and brimstone smelled up the valley for days. He even took his true natural shape a few times.

But Jonas hung on, and didn’t heed him at all, because he knew he could force him into a deal. And, watching real close, after almost an hour he saw him beginning to tire.

Finally, the Devil worked himself up to a real fever pitch. He grabbed the bars of the cage, and shook them till all the ground quaked, and in a voice like thunder and lightning he bawled, “OPEN THE DOOR!”

And Jonas knew at once that the Devil was just about done. He looked him right in the eye. “I wouldn’t do that,” he said firmly. “Not for all the tea in China. No siree bob.”

There was a great dreadful hush, as if everything over the world had just stopped. Slowly, the Devil eased up. He lit another cheroot. He twirled his mustache. “Wouldn’t you?” he said with a smile. “Wouldn’t you, Jonas?”

Then and there, Jonas forgot all about Mary Ann, and what all the neighbors would say, and Middleton Martin. All he could think of was how much money there would be in that tea. “We-ell,” he said to the Devil, “maybe I would.”

“That’s fine,” said the Devil. “It’s a deal!”

Jonas backed away from the door. He knew that the Devil had to keep that sort of a bargain. “Hold on a minute. That tea’ll have to be packed in tea chests and bales, and set down right here.”

“You’re a hard man,” the Devil declared, “but you’ve got me. That’s the way it’ll be.”

“Shake,” said Great-uncle Jonas; and they shook.

And then he opened the door.

Grandma eyed me very severely. ‘That was how Jonas Hackett came to his end,” she said after a minute. “Let it be a lesson to you, boy. Don’t you ever forget it!”

“Did — did he get all that tea from the Devil?” I gasped.

“Every last bit. There was one peal of thunder, and a flash from one end of the sky to the other, and sure enough there it was.”

She paused. With a heel, she kicked at the thin inch of topsoil covering up Hackett’s Hill. Under it was a thick, dark brown leaf-mold, and some rotten wood like the corner of a broken old chest; and the smell of tannin came up as strong as could be.

We looked at the Hill, more than two hundred feet high and a thousand feet long, sitting squarely on top of where Jonas’ place used to be.

“All the tea in China,” Grandma said. “Yes siree bob. There was a lot of it, too.”