Kingdom (34 page)

‘Now what’s he doing?’ he said with irritation in his voice.

Nancy turned to look. ‘Something’s wrong . . .’ She began to walk quickly back towards the prisoner and raising her voice she almost shouted, ‘What is it?’

She could see from the expression on his face that he was frantic. Why doesn’t he answer, why doesn’t he just shout? she thought. When she was a couple of yards away he said, desperately, his face moist with sweat, ‘They’re coming. The soldiers. You have to move me off the path. We have to hide. Please – hurry.’

Jack had arrived at Nancy’s side. It was true, they could hear movement further down the path, coming towards them. She grabbed the rucksacks, hurled them into the undergrowth and then flung the netting after them as well. Jack grabbed Colonel Jen under the arms again and pulled him into the jungle. Nancy just had enough time to see a uniformed figure bobbing into view one hundred feet further along the path. Her heart pounding, nauseous in her terror, she dived behind a tree.

Seconds later, a long line of Chinese soldiers, thirty strong, she estimated, filed past, their weapons at the ready. Nancy’s face was only a few feet from the path and, as she saw their boots go by, she closed her eyes and prayed. It was a full two minutes after the last pair of army boots had stamped past her that she lifted her head and looked around.

‘Jack?’ she whispered hoarsely.

‘Over here.’

Limbs trembling, she crawled though the vegetation. Jack was looking suspiciously at Colonel Jen, who was still lying on his side on the jungle floor, half hidden by vegetation.

‘Why didn’t you cry to your countrymen for help?’ Jack asked the Colonel.

‘I told you,’ Jen replied without emotion. ‘I am working alone. The soldiers have orders to destroy the book. I can’t allow that to happen. I am now an outlaw, they will have orders to shoot me on sight.’

‘So, if I untie you, we will travel together?’

‘Yes.’

Jack glanced at Nancy and then leaned forwards and, with a few sharp movements of his knife, severed the cords at Colonel Jen’s hands and feet. The Chinese man stretched out his limbs and then, for the first time, tried to stand up. Staggering like a newborn foal, leaning on the tree limbs and sturdier bushes, he slowly limped his way on to the path. Slowly dragging himself up to his full height, massaging his wrists, he scanned the track in the direction that the soldiers had gone. He had transformed into an altogether different figure now that he was free from the net and had recovered from the cramp. Nancy could tell that he was a man to be reckoned with: highly capable and no doubt used to getting his own way.

In a terse clipped voice, he said, ‘We need to continue down here for about one mile, then we have to head up the valley side. And we will have to hurry if we want to have any chance of catching them. ’

‘And where will that get us?’ said Jack.

Colonel Jen’s tone of voice was firm and decisive, and Nancy suspected that he was not used to being disagreed with.

‘The monks have taken Herzog to the Cave of the Magicians. It is the entrance to an ancient tunnel system that links up all the old gompas of Tibet and that also leads to Agarthi.’ He glanced sharply at Jack and then added pointedly, ‘The holy city of Agarthi most certainly does exist, by the way.’

‘And do you know the way there?’ asked Jack.

‘No. That is why we have to catch them before they get inside. It is not possible to follow them into the tunnels, it would be suicide. We are not far behind but we must hurry.’

As they began hurrying along, Nancy shot a question at their former captive, who had now – it seemed – become their guide.

‘Colonel Jen, how long were you hanging up there?’

He looked at her, with a little more kindness in his expression that made her hope he was not a bad man.

‘Please call me Jen, you are not in the Chinese military.’

‘Thanks. I’m Nancy Kelly and this is Jack Adams.’

‘To answer your question, I was hanging there for about three hours.’

‘But who laid the trap?’

‘Mompas, I expect. Local tribespeople, hoping to catch a deer.’

‘And who attacked you?’

‘As I said, I don’t know.’

‘But was it men, or . . .’

‘Or what?’ The Colonel smiled at her. ‘A migu? I only saw men. Probably Mompas again. They don’t like Chinese soldiers or monks.’

He seemed very blasé about it all, or perhaps he was just pragmatic. Maybe that was what got you promoted to the rank of Colonel at such a young age.

‘You said you had other men with you?’

‘Yes. A dozen men. But they were not good troops. They were garrison soldiers; conscripts, cannon fodder. They didn’t hold the formation, they scattered and fell.’

‘But were there gunshots?’

‘No. The Mompas rarely have guns, they have other weapons. But we must leave,’ said Jen, glancing up the path. ‘We cannot afford to waste a second. Let me carry your rucksack.’

As Nancy handed her rucksack to him, it suddenly occurred to her that he could just run off with all her water and supplies. She hesitated, and straight away he understood what she was thinking.

‘I will not take it. I could overpower you both if I chose.’

He glanced at Jack, who was frowning at this suggestion, and then added, ‘I have been trained.’ He left it at that.

‘It is useful that you are not Chinese, that you are Westerners,’ he said. ‘It may help me to get the monks to hand over Anton Herzog, if he is still alive. I am wearing army uniform and I suspect they would not roll out the red carpet if they saw me approaching alone, and now I have lost my men, I will have to rely on methods other than brute force . . .’

He turned and looked down the track.

‘Keep your eyes open for more animal traps. We will be safe once we’re off this main path.’

They had been marching quickly for several hours, gradually climbing the bowl-like incline of the valley side, when finally Jen called a halt. He had set a blistering pace, and Nancy and Jack had scarcely exchanged a word since they had started on the trek. Panting with exhaustion and grateful for the respite, Nancy put her hands on her hips and took a series of long, deep breaths. She reached for her water bottle and drank deeply.

They were standing in dense jungle at the base of an immense ivy-covered boulder. Jen was hunting around for something, peering into the undergrowth. Jack joined them, his shirt drenched in sweat and his face glowing red from the exertion.

‘Why have we stopped? The path is still good.’

Jen knelt down and motioned for them to follow.

‘Here – I’ll show you why.’

After a brief crawl up a scree slope, they emerged

onto a rocky ledge about five yards in length and two yards wide. The view almost took Nancy’s breath away, so used had she become to the endless wall of green. She had failed to consider that they had climbed several thousand feet from the valley floor, and now on this ledge they had a tremendous view over the lush, almost primeval valley below. She could clearly see the Yarlang Tsangpo winding its way towards the mountains to the south. The sun had already dropped behind the high mountains; the daylight was beginning to mellow and fade.

‘There,’ Jen said. Nancy turned to him. He was pointing in the other direction, up the side of the valley. She followed the line of his finger: at first she couldn’t see what he was pointing to.

‘What are we meant to be looking at?’ she asked, still breathless.

‘There. Just above the treeline. Two miles away. That’s them.’

Nancy’s heart almost stopped. Suddenly she saw them, just above the treeline on the scree slope; a line of tiny antlike figures, laboriously picking their way along what looked to be a very narrow precipitous path. Jack delved into his pack and produced a miniature pair of binoculars.

‘My God,’ he said, looking through them. ‘I see monks, two dozen of them, and yes: a stretcher.’

His hands fell to his side in amazement. Nancy grabbed the binoculars from him, and following the treeline she found the train of men. Yes, Jack was right. She counted twenty-four men and it was true that they were carrying someone. It must be Herzog. She almost choked. Finally, she could see him, almost, and yet his body and head were covered in a blue sheet, or robe. Her heart racing, she passed the binoculars to Jen, who quickly scanned the line of men. Then he turned to them both and in a businesslike tone said:

‘Quick, we haven’t a second to lose. It will be dark in one hour. And in two hours they will be at the Caves and all will be lost.’

At last the monks had reached the sanctuary of the Cave of the Magicians. The walls within were covered in ancient rock paintings of sorcerers and shamans wearing wild headdresses and dancing around fires, and long-extinct animals being hunted across the Tibetan plateau. Human and animal bones littered the floor, and the debris of long-extinguished fires stained the dark sand with black circles. The air smelt of magic and death. Ten feet further in, the caves became as black as night and opened out into a hundred sinuous, angular corridors that descended deep into the earth. Even with knowledge of the route, enormous skill would be needed to navigate a step further without slipping to a wretched death down a bottomless crevasse, or descending into a blind pothole from which no way back could ever be found.

The Abbot’s deputy knew that they could not afford to hesitate even for a moment. The Abbot had said that if they found themselves being pursued, they should seek sanctuary in Agarthi, deep within the ancient cave system. They would not be safe until they entered the dark labyrinth beyond, and yet he hesitated. The bitter truth was that they could not take the white man any further. They could not carry the stretcher through the caves, and the doctor said the white man would never survive the journey without it. Though they had come all this way, bearing him aloft like a saint, like a king, they would have to leave him to the wolves and the Chinese soldiers. Leaving him to die or to be captured filled the Abbot’s deputy with immense sadness, but at one level he was relieved that the decision had been made for him by the severity of their flight and the treacherous terrain of the caves. The stranger was a dangerous wizard, weak physically but psychically still strong. He should not be allowed into the holy city of Agarthi.

The Abbot’s deputy leaned forward so that his lips almost touched the white man’s ear. He said, softly, not sure if the man was awake or sleeping, ‘You are going to rest here for a while. I am going to leave, I may be some time but do not worry, we will be back for you.’

Even as he said the treacherous words he felt his heart rebel – but he had no choice. Very quietly he articulated his final question:

‘Before I go, please tell me how you escaped from Shangri-La. And . . . and . . . I must know. Did you ever see the Book of Dzyan?’

The man’s eyes opened. His skeletal fingers met, as if he was praying. Lifting his eyes to the roof of the cave – and the Abbot’s deputy wondered what he saw, and if he knew where he was – he said, ‘I am growing weak. Are we almost there yet? Is this Agarthi? I am so very weary.’

The Abbot’s deputy said nothing; he could find no response to the man’s words. A terrible silence filled the cave. Did the white man understand what was really happening? Did he realize he was being abandoned, being left to die alone? After a pause – perhaps he was hoping for reassurance that never came – the stranger resumed.

‘I will tell you how I escaped and I will tell you the terrible truth about the Book of Dzyan.’

Silence again, as he collected his thoughts, drifting across the days and nights, wandering back to Shangri-La. Then for one last time, he began:

‘Once I had discovered what a horrifying end lay in store for me, as King to be, my mind was made up and I immediately decided to make a thorough exploration of the lamasery and grounds, or should I say a thorough exploration of my prison . . .’

The Abbot’s deputy settled into a guilty silence, glad that he would learn the end of the stranger’s tale, aghast that he was on the point of abandoning him to his death.

The charismatic voice projected through the darkness.

‘I descended the stairs to the ground floor and then walked around the tower in what I thought was the direction of the inner courtyard and the dreaded bonfire. But I came to a locked door. There was no one around to ask for assistance so I turned back and began to wander the interior passages of the lamasery. I passed the dining room, now empty, and continued unchallenged through several other staterooms. Everything was very quiet, a silence which merely menaced me further. Finally, I went through a doorway and found myself in the front courtyard, on the other side of which lay the massive wooden entrance gates and, beyond the gates, the battlements. Standing guard by the gates was a solitary sherpa.

It was then that I had an idea; I crossed the courtyard and in Nepali I said to the sherpa. ‘“Where is the King?”

‘The sherpa put his hands together and bowed, and then pointing back over my head, he said, ‘“He is at the top of the tower, sir.”

‘I spun around; the tower rose up against the clear pale blue sky, and at the top was a forbidding line of battlements.

‘Can I speak to him?’

‘“I cannot answer that, sir. It is up to his Highness.”

‘Then as an afterthought, I turned back to him and asked, “Can you open the gates for me? I would like to walk along the battlement.”

‘“I am sorry, sir, I am not allowed to open the gates for anyone except the Abbot.”

‘“Not even the King?”

‘ “Yes, sir, not even the King.”

‘He was a very thickset stocky man, and although he was smiling and bowing now, I reckoned that if I attempted to overpower him he would quickly get the better of me. I couldn’t risk it.

‘“Thank you.”

‘Back to the tower I went, walking as quickly as propriety allowed, not wanting to look in any way hurried or desperate, but all the time conscious of the fact that time was running out. It would be dusk in three hours, I reckoned, and then their ghastly ceremony would commence.