The Ninth Buddha (22 page)

Because of the wind, Christopher was not at first aware that the boy was groaning.
 
Then he heard him, moaning into the darkness like a dog cast out into the storm.
 
Christopher shifted towards him.

“Lhaten,” he called, trying to make himself heard above the din.

“It’s me, Christopher!
 
Are you all right?”

There was no answer, so he bent down closer, bringing his mouth near the boy’s ear.
 
This time Lhaten responded.

“I’m cold, sahib.
 
And my leg hurts.
 
Someone has tied them together my legs.
 
But my fingers are too cold.
 
I can’t untie them.

And there’s a terrible pain in my left leg.”

Christopher explained what had happened and the boy grew calmer.
 
Then he pulled Christopher close and said, “We’ve got to find shelter, sahib.
 
If we stay in this, we’ll die.”

The boy was right.
 
In their weakened condition, exposure would kill both of them, if not tonight, then tomorrow or the day after.
 
In a matter of hours, Christopher might be too frozen to stir, and once that happened they were both doomed.
 
Fortunately, the enforced rest had done him some good.
 
It was the longest stop he had made in a while, and it had given his body a chance to make some progress with acclimatization.
 
His previous experience at high altitudes had rendered his system better able to cope with the abrupt changes of the past few days, and after his crisis he was beginning to return to normal.
 
Now, the real danger was not height, it was the wind and the rapidity with which it could strip the human body of heat.

Christopher found the large canvas bag that had been slung round Lhaten’s neck and which had still been with him when he was found.
 
His own smaller bag had been lost in the slide.
 
Inside Lhaten’s, he found the tiny trenching tool he had insisted they bring with them.
 
It was small, but sturdy.
 
With luck, it would save their lives.

The wind was still rising as Christopher made his way back to the site of the avalanche, crouching low to prevent himself being picked up and spun over by the gale.
 
There was just enough light to find his way by.
 
Once in the snow, he began to cut out blocks, each about two and a half feet long by a foot wide.
 
When he had cleared a six-foot area in this way, he started to stack the blocks edgeways, forming a wall.
 
It took him an hour to build a crude, rectangular igloo, roofed by slightly thicker, longer blocks.

When he got back to Lhaten, the boy was shivering uncontrollably and showing signs of severe heat-loss.
 
He was moaning again and muttering to himself.
 
When Christopher tried to talk to him, he showed no sign of hearing him.
 
His pulse was sluggish and his breathing slow and shallow.
 
It would be impossible for him to walk to the shelter, even with Christopher’s assistance.
 
If nothing else, the wind would just tilt them over like skittles.

Christopher dragged him.
 
It was only a matter of about ten yards, but the wind and Christopher’s desire not to dislocate the boy’s leg again made it seem like a hundred.
 
After the exertion of building the snow-shelter, his lungs were making it clear they would not stand much more of this treatment.
 
He closed his eyes and hauled.
 
Not now, he prayed, not now.

The words of prayer came easily to him.
 
They came unbidden but necessary to his lips, the child in him praying for the man, the believer for the unbeliever.
 
In the howling wind, like Lhaten with his mantras, in another tongue, in another season of faith, he prayed to the Virgin.
 
He prayed for love, for life, for strength to pull the boy another foot across the wind-torn floor of the valley.

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
 
Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death.
 
Holy Mary, Mother of God .. .

The words were torn from him by the wind.
 
He rested briefly, then pulled again.
 
The boy felt heavy, though he should have been light to Christopher.
 
It seemed an age before they made it to the shelter.

Christopher settled the boy in the back of the dug-out, on a blanket taken from his bag.
 
That done, he sealed the entrance with more blocks cut for the purpose, trimming and squaring them as best he could to ensure a close fit.
 
As the last block slotted into place, the noise of the wind was abruptly cut ofT, leaving Christopher and the boy in the midst of silence, as though they had found the eye of the storm and entered it.
 
Christopher filled the gaps in the makeshift construction with loose snow and curled himself up at the boy’s feet.
 
Within minutes, he was asleep again.
 
He dreamed of harvest and abundance in autumn, of golden sheaves and ripening apples on the bough.

That was the night the weather changed.
 
It was the twelfth of January.
 
The night two caravans were trapped on the Nathu-la and a hurricane tore the roof from the temple at Mindroling.
 
The night a meteor was seen in the sky above Tashi Lhumpo.

That was the night the gods stopped playing and came to walk in places they had never walked before.

By morning, the temperature inside the shelter had risen to a comfortable level.
 
Lhaten had recovered consciousness and said he felt all right, except for the pain in his leg, about which Christopher could do nothing.
 
Christopher found some dried yak-dung left by a summer caravan further up the defile and used it to light a fire.

In Tibet, where there were so few trees, it was almost the only fuel.

He had to light the fire inside the shelter, making a hole to let out the smoke.
 
Outside, the wind still raged.
 
At one point, thick, stinging hail hurled itself into the canyon.
 
In a black sky, rolling clouds collided angrily with one another.

He made hot tea and added it to some tsampa in a bowl.
 
There was a little butter in Lhaten’s bag, and Christopher added this to the tsampa mixture.
 
The boy ate it greedily, then drank some lightly buttered tea.
 
In spite of his pain, he was beginning to look more himself.
 
But Christopher knew it was only a matter of time before he began to weaken again.
 
He would have to have proper attention as soon as possible.

“We’ll have to head back as soon as you’re able to walk,” he told the boy.

“I’ll need a splint,” Lhaten said.

“I’ve thought of that.
 
I’m going out now to find my bag and my climbing stick.
 
They’ll be near the spot where I was hit by the avalanche.
 
It should be no trouble to dig them out.
 
The stick can be cut to fit your leg.
 
It won’t be easy, but if you lean on me, we should be able to get down.”

“What about the avalanche?
 
The snow.
 
The canyon must be blocked.
 
I won’t be able to get through.
 
Leave me here.
 
You can get help at Tsontang.
 
If you hurry, you can be back here in a few days.”

But the boy was lying.
 
He knew what way the weather was going.
 
And there was something else, something he kept to himself as well.
 
Just before the avalanche started, he had heard a sharp crack, high up, like a gunshot.
 
Someone had started the snow-slide deliberately.
 
Perhaps Christopher too had heard the crack.
 
But he had not known they were being followed.

“I thought there might be a way round.
 
Even if we have to go up a little to join it.
 
Surely you know of a way.”

Lhaten shook his head.

“I’m sorry, sahib.
 
There’s only one way that’s back the way we came.
 
Every inch of the way.
 
You must start soon if you’re to clear the snow before nightfall.”

Christopher did not answer.
 
There could be no question of his going back without the boy.
 
And he was not sure that he himself could make it through the avalanche.
 
There was only one alternative: they would have to go on into Tibet and make for the nearest village.
 
It would probably mean Christopher’s capture, but at the moment the boy’s life seemed more important to him even than finding his son.

They set off just before noon that day.
 
Christopher walked bent over so that the boy could use him as a crutch.
 
Even with the splint, Lhaten’s leg would not bear the slightest weight.
 
When, by accident, he leaned on it, it gave, causing them both to stumble.

In the afternoon, the wind rose.
 
An hour later, snow began to fall.
 
Except that it did not fall, but became part of the wind.
 
It was as if the wind had been a spirit that craved a body and now found it in the snow.
 
The higher they climbed, the fiercer the wind grew.

It was like walking against razors.
 
Every breath had to be snatched before the wind could tear it away.
 
They took hours to cover as much ground as they would previously have walked in an hour.

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That night, they were too tired even to build a proper shelter.

Christopher dug a deep trench in the snow and they sheltered in that, huddling beneath Lhaten’s namda, a large felt blanket like a rug.

In the morning, Lhaten complained that his left foot hurt more than on the previous day.
 
Christopher undid the boy’s boot and removed the sock underneath.
 
The foot was hard and white and freezing to the touch, like stone.
 
The cold had combined with the interrupted blood-flow to cause severe frost-bite.
 
Saying nothing, Christopher replaced the sock and boot.

“What is it, sahib?
 
Is it frost-bite?”

Christopher nodded.

“Yes.”

There was no point in trying to thaw the foot it would only freeze again, worse than ever.
 
Christopher was worried that the boy’s other foot might go the same way.
 
His boots were made of cheap leather and his socks were too thin.
 
Christopher sacrificed two strips from the namda to provide extra insulation, but he feared it would not be enough.

That day the blizzard set in in earnest.
 
It was as if the fabric of the world was being torn apart.
 
Wind and snow hurtled down from the passes in fits of insanity.
 
Visibility was reduced to almost zero.
 
When they could no longer walk, they crawled, Lhaten dragging his leg.

He made no sound, but Christopher knew he must be in unbearable pain.

By midday they had covered very little distance, but Lhaten could go no further.
 
The gale had not lessened in the slightest, and they still had not reached the pass.
 
Christopher was beginning to think he would have to leave the boy after all, to go for help.
 
But would he be able to persuade anyone to return with him in these conditions?

He built another shelter from the snow.
 
They huddled inside, shivering.
 
From time to time, Christopher made Lhaten eat dry tsampa and wash it down with a handful of snow.
 
In his mind, Christopher was back at Carfax, in front of the roaring fire of logs in the library, reading a tale of Arthur Mee’s to William.

In the night, Lhaten grew feverish and talked in a delirium of frightened words and inarticulate cries.

“Take it away,” he shouted loudly, loud enough to cover the screams of the wind outside.

“Take what away?”
 
asked Christopher.

“What do you see?”

But the boy never answered clearly, and Christopher could only talk to him, offering reassurance that he knew was meaningless.

The night was long.
 
When dawn came, it brought only the faintest of lights.

Lhaten slept at last, like a baby worn out by crying.
 
When he woke, his head was clear, but he complained of feeling weak.
 
He could not keep down the tsampa Christopher offered him.
 
His other foot was frost-bitten now.

Christopher made him walk.
 
It was that or leave him to die.

Like children in a nightmare, holding on to one another as anchors, they clawed their way through the madness of the storm.

They reached the first pass, Sebu-la, that afternoon.
 
Its surface was broad and flat, and they could see a little more clearly through the blizzard there.

“Lha-gyal-lo.
 
De tamche pham,” Lhaten whispered, thanking his gods for giving them this victory.

“The gods have triumphed,” he said.

“The demons have been defeated.”
 
It was this formula all travellers used when they reached the top of a pass in safety.
 
But on the boy’s frozen lips, the words were charged with an intense and cruel irony.