Eight o'clock in the morning on June 5, 1936, Bangkok Railway Station, Siam.
The luxury train is ready for departure. The front locomotive has already burned up enough steam, and white smoke is floating out of the chimney. It is ready to sound the whistle at any time and run north. On the platform, the young prince of Siam, the future Rama VIII, Anand
Prince Tha-Mahidun, under the heavy protection of the palace guards, gave an impromptu speech to the foreign reporters outside.
There were hundreds of reporters, half of them with Caucasian faces, usually with yellow faces, all wearing suits, vests, and hats, holding notebooks, spotlights, cameras, and some carrying hand-cranked cameras.
The dazzling magnesium light and white smoke flashed by from time to time, but the prince was not affected at all and continued to talk.
His Royal Highness is obviously an outstanding politician in the future, and he is very eloquent. Not only is his eloquence good, but his foreign language skills are also obviously very good, not even inferior to Zhu Yourong. He mainly speaks in Chinese, with proficient English or French interspersed from time to time, but basically
No need to speak Siamese. Siam is bounded by the Ming Dynasty to the north, French Indochina to the east, and British Burma to the west. His Royal Highness obviously has a good grasp of the languages of the powerful neighbors around him.
"...The Siam I am about to take over is still a very backward country in all aspects...Because of the efforts of my ancestors and the protection of the Ming Empire, when the kingdoms in Southeast Asia were reduced to white colonies, Siam was very lucky.
The land has maintained its independence... For this, I would like to thank my ancestors again, as well as the Ming Empire in the north... But I am not satisfied with this...
"My boyhood was educated in the Ming Dynasty. There, for the first time in my life, I saw a different monarchy. I saw an enlightened, democratic, legal monarchy, where the people were happy.
The royal family is wealthy and loves them from the bottom of their hearts... There, when the subjects see the king, they only need to bow to greet the king, not like us, who have to prostrate themselves on the ground... For the first time, I know that the monarchy is a country.
It can still be like this... I realized that if the king can make the people live with dignity, then the people will love their king from the bottom of their hearts..."
The surrounding camera flashed, and the white reporters took the lead in applauding. Then all the reporters, regardless of whether they were yellow or white, applauded and cheered in different languages.
The prince smiled and waved his hands. When the applause subsided, he continued:
"So since I was a teenager, I have determined to turn Siam into a country like the Ming Dynasty. After ten years of study, research, and thinking, I can now say that backward Siam can fully open its arms and become a country like the Ming Dynasty.
The Ming Dynasty also embraced democracy, the rule of law, constitutional government, and the open and civilized twentieth century..."
The foreign reporters around him were once again infected by him and spontaneously applauded.
The prince smiled and continued:
"Today, I am going to the Ming Dynasty again. What I bring with me is the loyal friendship of the Kingdom of Siam, and my sincere heart... What I bring back will be the future of Siam!"
Having said this, he excitedly raised his arms and looked at the sky. The applause and cheers around him reached a climax, flash lights shot up one after another, and clouds of white smoke rose into the sky.
…
Suddenly, an Asian reporter in the group of reporters threw away his camera, pushed aside the people next to him, squeezed forward with all his strength, and rushed through the cordon of the palace guards.
Before anyone could exclaim, he pulled out a pistol from his arms, pointed it at the prince and pulled the trigger.
"Ka! Ka!"
The pistol jammed.
The man immediately pulled the gun bolt and tried to withdraw the dumb bomb, but the palace guards on both sides had already swarmed him and pushed him to the ground. At the same time, several other guards immediately surrounded the prince and boarded the train carriage.
The hundreds of reporters around him began to exclaim. At the same time, all the cameras and cameras were filming frantically, and they all crowded towards the downed assassin.
On top of the assassin, there were at least five or six guards holding him down, forming a pile of people. The assassin himself could not be seen at all. Suddenly, the bottom guard shouted something, and then several guards shouted and climbed up one after another.
Get up, leaving only the last two people to hold down the assassin.
One of the guards raised his head and said something.
Many reporters around who knew Siamese "bang", they knew that the guard said "he is dead". The assassin was dead.
The guards were shouting, and the captain of the guard ran to the train to report. After a while, several guards came over surrounded by an old foreign man. This was the doctor of His Royal Highness the Prince.
The doctor knelt down next to the assassin. Seeing that the assassin was pale and his lips were blue, he opened his eyelids and checked his pupils. Then he opened the medical kit, took out his stethoscope, and listened several times on the assassin's chest.
.
"he died."
The doctor raised his head and affirmed in Siamese.
Immediately afterwards, he took out a small flashlight from the box, opened the assassin's mouth, and looked inside. Then he took out a pair of tweezers, reached into the corpse's throat, and pulled out a small, broken capsule.
The doctor used tweezers to pick up the small capsule, looked at the light, took out a small bottle, put it in, and put it away.
Although he didn't say anything, now all fools know what the assassin eats.
…
The body was carried away. The pistol held by the assassin and the camera dropped were also carefully wrapped and taken away.
The reporters present were as excited as chicken blood. They were originally here just to interview the Prince of Siam on his trip. Although it was not boring, it was not exciting either. But now it has been revealed.
Such an assassination incident immediately became world-class news. Reporters pressed the shutter frantically, shouted at the top of their lungs, and asked questions to every palace guard officer and soldier present. Many reporters were already behind others' backs.
I started writing a manuscript on the Internet, and then I grabbed the manuscript and ran out to grab the first news.
I don’t know how long it took, but the loudspeaker on the platform sounded. A voice said:
"Gentlemen, His Highness the Prince is very indignant about what just happened. He will never be intimidated... Now His Highness the Prince has decided to postpone the departure for half an hour and accept your interview on the spot."
The reporters gradually became quiet. Many people understood that this hot-blooded "royal reformer" would seize the assassination incident to make trouble, and maybe take the opportunity to eradicate his dissidents.
They found that several guards had pulled out several wires from the train carriage, one end was connected to the loudspeaker on the platform, and the other was connected to a microphone. A guard officer took the microphone and shouted to the reporters:
"If you want to ask a question to His Royal Highness, use this..."
Before he finished speaking, the platform was boiling again. Hundreds of people were rushing for the microphone. Finally, a tall white reporter grabbed the microphone first. He held the microphone and said in French:
"Your Highness, I am the Bangkok correspondent of Le Figaro... Your Highness, what do you think of this attempted assassination? Who or what force do you think might have been responsible for it? Of course, the assassin committed suicide.
, the evidence has disappeared. Although you cannot pronounce judgment as a judge, you can guess as a victim..."
The prince's voice appeared on the loudspeaker on the platform. His voice was relatively calm, but his anger was clearly audible. He also said in French:
"Sir, you are right. Of course I can guess! And I am very willing to guess! I want to state first that my guess will scare some people! ... A crime has occurred. The oldest and most effective way to find the murderer is
The way is to see who is the beneficiary of the crime... Obviously, I am about to go to Ming Dynasty. In Nanjing, I will work with Her Majesty the Queen to promote sincere cooperation between Ming Dynasty and Siam...
"When I come back, I will bring back a constitution, democracy, rule of law, and top-down reforms to Siam! So, who is most afraid of all this? There is no doubt that it is us in Siam.
Some conservative forces in Romania! They are afraid that Siam will become like the Ming Dynasty, and they are afraid that there will be a constitution to restrict their rights..."
The French reporter asked again while the iron was hot:
"Your Highness, who do you think these conservative forces are specifically?"
"This... I don't know!" the prince said excitedly, "but I will find out! And I can say that I already have some suspects, but as I said just now, I am just guessing, not pronouncing a verdict. Now
Saying their names is tantamount to pronouncing a sentence. But none of this can scare me or stop me! I will still go to Ming Dynasty and do what history has given me to do!"
The French reporter wanted to ask again, but a vigorous and clever Japanese reporter next to him saw the opportunity, grabbed the microphone, hugged him tightly, and said directly in Siamese:
"Your Highness, I am the Yomiuri Shimbun reporter in Bangkok! Your Highness, what do you think of Her Majesty Zhu Yourong, the current empress of the Ming Dynasty?"
The reporters on the platform were very surprised and turned to look at him. Of course they all understood that the Prince of Siam was going to Ming Dynasty and what was about to happen to the Empress of Ming Dynasty. If not for this assassination, this would certainly be a big news point.
But everyone doesn't understand why this little Japanese still has the heart to ask this at this time.
The prince was quiet for a moment, and his voice became much softer. He said slowly and with admiration:
"How should I put it... I... I have been with her for a while... When I was a middle school student, I was educated in the Ming Dynasty... At that time, Her Majesty the Queen was still very young, and she was still Princess Yong'an... It can be said that,
Both of us are children... We used to play very happily together... Although Her Royal Highness the Princess was younger than me at that time, she seemed to know much more than me... Looking back now, many new things are still from Her Royal Highness Princess Yong'an.
Taught me...
"Later, Her Royal Highness Princess Yong'an also went to high school, but I returned to China... Later, I returned to Ming Dynasty to attend university, and Princess Yong'an also went to the UK to attend university... Looking back now, when we were together,
It seems like a period of time when I was a child...but it seems very precious..."
The Japanese reporter did not wait for him to continue to be crazy and asked decisively:
"Your Highness, I would like to take the liberty to ask, do you love Her Majesty the Empress of Ming Dynasty?"
The "buzzing" sound in the crowd suddenly rose an octave higher, and the reporters were speculating excitedly, waiting for His Highness the Prince's answer.
The prince was quiet for a while, and then suddenly said excitedly in an almost off-key voice:
"Okay, you asked a very good question... Normally, I would avoid answering... not because of hypocrisy, but to take into account Her Majesty the Queen's reputation... But now, I just had a brush with death, and I am standing here
The edge of death...I'm not sure this is the last time...I can escape this time, but I don't know if I can escape the next time. If...then I won't have the chance to say it...I will regret it...
...So, I decided to speak out..."
He took a deep breath and said affectionately, gently and excitedly:
"Yes, I love Her Majesty the Empress of the Ming Dynasty, I love her... This time I go to the Ming Dynasty, I will tell her my love..."
The reporters on the platform were all excited. They were so excited that they couldn't contain themselves. Compared with now, the assassination incident just now seemed not to be news.
His Royal Highness finally said it himself.
…
But the Japanese reporter's cold voice sounded from the loudspeaker on the platform again, covering up the reporters' voices:
"Then, Your Highness, you probably don't know that you are not the only one who loves Her Majesty the Queen."
As soon as the sentence came out, the platform slowly became quiet, and soon there was no sound.
Many well-informed reporters also thought of something.
The prince's voice asked in surprise:
"You...what do you mean?"
The Japanese reporter’s voice said with a sneer:
"Your Highness, what I mean is that the matter may not be as complicated as you guessed. There may be no conservative forces in Siam at all... There is also a force in the Ming Empire that is very reluctant to see you and Her Majesty the Queen.
Come together... The leader of that force is said to love Her Majesty the Queen just like you... Your Highness, what do you think?"
Hundreds of reporters exploded again. Countless mouths were speculating and discussing. They were all repeating one name: