The Road Back

by Liz Harris

Kalden turned to Patricia. ‘Rucksack not too heavy, Patricia-le?’

  ‘It’s heavy, but not too heavy, thank you. And that’s because you’re carrying almost all of the supplies for the three of us, as well as everything else you’re carrying.’

  ‘Is necessary bring more barley flour, salt, tea and dried apricots for brothers.’

  ‘It would be better not to talk, Patricia. We need to conserve our energy for the climb ahead of us. As I’m sure Kalden does, too.’

  They took the wide path that led down to the narrow wooden bridge at the foot of the valley and crossed to the other side of the river without difficulty, then they began to climb up the mountain track. At the entrance to the first mountain pass they reached, they paused to look at a cairn festooned with prayer flags. Kalden suggested that they take a short rest, and they did. Then they continued their journey and didn’t stop again until they reached their destination.

  The top of the track opened out on to a wide expanse of undulating pastureland. Panting from their exertion, the Major and Patricia took a few steps across the grass, dropped their bags and stared around them, spellbound, at the sprawling vista of crags and towering peaks that stood proud against the blue sky, their snow-covered tips glittering in the bright light of the afternoon sun.

  Patricia turned to look back down the path they’d walked up. ‘Look at the view of the ravine from up here. Mother would have loved it.’

  ‘Indeed, it is very lovely, Patricia,’ the Major said, following the direction of her gaze. He paused a moment. ‘I sometimes feel that I should have considered bringing your mother with us. However, as I’ve said before … the difficulty … the rigours of the journey being as they are … We’ll make sure that we include a detailed description of these two days when next we write. Better still, we shall take a photograph that we can frame for the wall and give to your mother on our return. I think she would like that.’

  ‘I’m sure she would, Father. It’s a lovely idea. And I shall write to her tomorrow, as soon as I’ve been to see Deki’s sister.’

  The Major nodded. ‘We will both do so.’

  ‘You come, please,’ they heard Kalden call.

  Turning, they saw that he was standing in front of a stone hut set back on the pastureland, handing the extra bags that he’d brought with him to one of his brothers. They picked up their rucksacks and went over to join him.

  ‘The chairs are a most welcome sight, Patricia,’ the Major remarked as they reached the hut and saw the four wooden chairs that had been set out in front of the hut. They hovered by the chairs. Kalden indicated that they should sit, and they sat down next to each other. He then went and sat opposite them, put his bag on his lap, took out the lunch that Wangyal had made for them and handed them each a bowl.

  ‘Anil and Rinchen are with animals. Tenzin go in house to bring us salty butter tea,’ he told them. ‘Tomorrow Tenzin come back to village with us. Has things must do in village.’

  Just as they were finishing their lunch, Tenzin came out of the hut carrying three small pots.

  ‘Ju-le,’ he said with a smile, and handed them each a pot of tea. He returned to the hut, and reappeared a few minutes later with another pot of tea. He went over to the fourth chair, moved it slightly away from the other three, and sat down.

  Patricia took a sip of her drink. ‘That feels amazingly good!’ she exclaimed as the buttery liquid slid across her parched lips, coating them with grease. ‘My lips were about to crack, they were so dry, but this has really made them feel better.’ The Major nodded, trying to stifle a yawn. ‘You must be tired, Father,’ she said quickly. ‘It’s been one hill after another, which is exhausting. Why don’t you have a short sleep so that you can enjoy the rest of the day?’

  ‘I must confess, I do feel a trifle weary.’

  ‘You could rest in hut, Major-le,’ Kalden suggested.

  ‘Thank you, Kalden. You know, I think I might just do that, if you’re sure that I won’t be inconveniencing anyone. If I’m going to help with herding the animals later, which I hope your brothers will permit me to do, I’d like to feel somewhat fresher than I do at the moment.’

  Kalden rose to his feet. ‘I take you into house, Major-le.’ The Major stood up, and together they went to the hut. As they disappeared through the doorway, Patricia heard Kalden promise to ensure that her father was awake well before it was time to put the sheep and goats into the pens, away from the reach of the wolves.

  When the Major was settled, Kalden came back out and went over towards the empty chair next to Patricia. He started to sit down, glanced at Tenzin, stopped where he was and straightened up. For a moment, the two brothers stared at each other, neither saying a word.

  Then Tenzin said something in Ladahki and Kalden replied. After a short exchange of words with Tenzin, Kalden went and sat opposite Patricia. A few minutes later, Tenzin got up, made a brief comment to Kalden, and went off to join Anil and Rinchen, who could be glimpsed in the distance among the dzo.

  ‘What did Tenzin say to you?’ Patricia asked Kalden.

  He shrugged. ‘He say is better I not sit next to you. And he ask why I always wear trousers when I with you, not Ladakhi robes. I tell him it is easy in trousers and I like them. Next he ask what we are going to do now, and if we want to go with him and Anil.’

  ‘What did you tell him?’

  ‘That we are going to watch ama – my mother – make cheese. But I not say how long we watch ama,’ he added, and they smiled slowly at each other. ‘So come, Patricia. We go see cheese.’

  They went round to the back of the stone hut, and Patricia saw that there were a couple of smaller stone huts across a stretch of pasture. This was where his mother made cheese, Kalden told her, leading the way over the grass to the first of the huts. They went inside just as his mother was taking a cheese out of its mould. She looked up, smiled at them, then put the cheese on a block and started to press down on it, pushing the liquid out.

  From time to time, she paused and glanced up at Patricia. Nodding slightly, she’d turn her gaze to Kalden, look at him long and hard, and then return to the cheese, pressing it more forcibly each time.

  ‘Although ama-le and aba-le are now in small house,’ Kalden said while they watched his mother working, ‘they still part of family. They help in fields, they come to mountains in summer, making cheese and butter and helping with animals, and they help with grandchildren, too. They still very busy, very important people in the family.’

  ‘They’re really lucky, always being at the heart of their family. It doesn’t work like that in England. Mind you,’ she added with a smile, ‘I don’t know quite how keen I’d be to have my father involved in everything I did for the rest of my life.’ They both laughed. His mother looked up sharply and spoke to Kalden. He replied, then nudged Patricia to start moving.

  ‘Ju-le,’ she said to Kalden’s mother, who nodded at her again, unsmiling, and she went out of the small building, followed by Kalden, who immediately moved to her side.

  As they walked away, Patricia could feel his mother’s eyes on her back. She glanced over her shoulder and saw that his mother was standing in the doorway, watching them, her expression inscrutable.

  ‘I don’t think your mother likes me,’ she said, turning back.

  ‘Is not that. Ama-le worry about my heart.’ He gave her a wry smile, and led them on to a narrow path that tapered down a steep slope. ‘We not far from hut for herders,’ he said, taking her hand. ‘If you like, we go to hut.’

  ‘I do like,’ she said, and her steps quickened.

  By the time that they reached the hut, both of them were running.

  Later, with Patricia enclosed in Kalden’s arms, their clothes in disarray on the floor, they lay with the front door wide open and watched the sun paint the sky a vivid red and gold as it sank behind a black silhouette of jagged peaks.

  Slanting through the doorway, the rays of the dying sun found their bodies and dressed their naked skin in a mantle
of gold. Kalden looked down at Patricia’s face, his eyes darkening.

  ‘Sun is beautiful,’ he said, ‘but you more beautiful.’

  He leaned over and kissed first her upper lip, then her lower lip. Then he raised his hand, and lightly traced the arch of her brow with his thumb, the line of her cheekbones, the curve of her mouth, the slope of her shoulders. Bending his head, he buried his face in the shadowy hollow between her breasts.

  ‘I wish I be with you forever,’ he whispered into her soft skin.

  ‘And I do, too,’ she said. ‘I really do.’ She trailed her fingers down the length of his spine, wrapped her legs around his back, and pulled him to her.

  ‘Kalden!’ Tenzin’s voice from afar broke into the calm of the late afternoon.

  They flew apart. Then they heard Tenzin shout something else out. He was still some distance from them, but closer.

  She scrambled up from the bed. ‘What’s he saying?’ she asked, snatching up her jeans and T-shirt.

  ‘He asking where we are.’ Kalden stood up, picked up the clothes he’d thrown over a stone bench and started pulling his trousers on. ‘But he know where we are.’

  Patricia stood still and stared at him, panic in her eyes. ‘If he knows, do you think he’ll tell my father? I don’t know what he’d do if he found out.’

  He dropped the shirt he was holding, put a hand on each of her shoulders and stared deep into her eyes. ‘I be with you, Patricia. You not worry. You be safe when I be with you,’ he said quietly.

  ‘And we’ve forgotten to wake him up! It’s getting dark; they’ll have rounded up the animals by now. He’ll have to know some time, but not now, not like this.’

  He gave her a wry smile. ‘Tenzin able say Good Morning in English, but that be all. And he is my brother – he not try to tell Major-le. You not worry.’ He bent down and kissed her.

  She tried to smile, and they finished dressing, left the hut and went quickly to the narrow path.

  When they reached the foot of the path, they saw Tenzin standing at the top, a dark figure, stark against the crimson sky. They glanced at each other. Kalden gave her a reassuring smile, then they turned back to the path and started to walk up. As they got close to Tenzin, they saw lines of worry etched into his face. His expression relaxed as they came nearer, but his relief was mingled with anxiety.

  Just before they reached Tenzin, Kalden motioned to Patricia to stop walking, and he went up to his brother by himself. He stood still and waited for him to speak. Tenzin said something, and Patricia heard the concern in his voice. Kalden answered him evenly. She strained harder to make out what they were saying. Tenzin definitely repeated ma-cho several times, which she knew meant don’t do, and also lama, monk. And she was pretty sure that she heard him say gyalla mi-rak, it’s not good, on more than one occasion. But the rest she couldn’t follow as they were speaking too quickly.

  At one point, Tenzin put his hands on Kalden’s shoulders and looked into his face with undisguised anxiety. And with love, Patricia saw. A lump came into her throat.

  Kalden gently removed Tenzin’s hands, and stepped back. After a further short exchange during which she heard Tenzin say dzo a couple of times, Tenzin threw her a look of displeasure, spun round on his heels and walked briskly in the direction of the hut.

  She went quickly up to Kalden. ‘What did he say?’

  ‘Nothing important,’ he said, and they started walking again.

  ‘You can tell me honestly what he said. I know he doesn’t like me.’

  ‘He doesn’t know you. If he know you, he like you. He is worried for me, worried I get hurt. He sees in our faces that we feel much for each other, and he reminds me I am to be a monk.’

  ‘But you’re not a monk yet so you’re not doing anything wrong. Did you tell him that?’

  ‘Tenzin is worried only that I get hurt. He is good man. He says we tell Major-le that we been looking for dzo that have gone away, and that we have to go far to find them. This afternoon, Major-le look for missing dzo with Anil and Rinchen, so he believe what we say.’

  ‘I hope you’re right, but we’ll soon find out – there’s Father now and he doesn’t look happy.’ She went a few steps ahead of Kalden. ‘Father,’ she called, hurrying up to the Major, who was standing rigidly in front of the main stone hut, watching them come towards him, his lips set in a thin line of anger.

  ‘I’m sorry that we’ve been gone for so long,’ she said as soon as she reached him, her words tumbling out on top of each other. ‘It was the dzo. They’d wandered off and gone miles away. It took us ages to find them.’

  The Major’s face relaxed a little. ‘I see we were on the same mission,’ he said tersely. ‘It would, however, have been preferable to have been on that mission together. There were one or two things that I would have liked to have known and I could have done with Kalden’s help.’

  ‘I’m sorry it took us so long,’ she repeated. She saw his face relax a little more.

  ‘Well at least you’re back in time for dinner. If I understood everything correctly, we’re going to eat in their small kitchen. It’ll be somewhat cramped, I daresay, not to mention smoky because of the fire, but I’m sure we’ll manage.’

  ‘They’re bound to make you as comfortable as possible, Father.’

  ‘I think I can endure discomfort for one night, Patricia. What is a degree of discomfort when compared with the chance to live like the natives for an evening? No, whatever the inconvenience, tonight is going to be an invaluable part of our Ladakhi experience.’ He patted his stomach. ‘I must confess that I’m ready to eat. Healthy labour brings with it a good appetite. And it’ll be interesting to have food prepared by someone other than Wangyal, or rather his wife.’

  ‘Me, too. I’m looking forward to that. I’m so hungry, I could eat a dzo,’ she said, with a laugh.

  ‘You might be about to do just that,’ the Major remarked dryly, and together they turned to go into the house, Patricia acutely aware that a few steps behind them, Kalden followed, his eyes on her back.

  The next day, having stopped at the post house for only as long as it took to leave their rucksacks and see the Major comfortably settled for a late afternoon rest, Patricia and Kalden went directly to the far side of the village to visit Deki’s sister and her new baby.

  ‘He is so sweet!’ she exclaimed, leaning over the bed to look at the baby, Chospel, who was half hidden in his mother’s arms. ‘Bumbarik!’ she said. She glanced back at Kalden, who was staring at the baby over her shoulder. ‘I hope that was the right word for congratulations for when someone has had a baby. If I’m wrong, will you say the correct thing, and also tell her that Chospel’s lovely?’

  In a few sentences, Kalden conveyed Patricia’s words to Deki’s sister, who beamed up at her and changed her position slightly so that Patricia had a better view of Chospel’s face. As Patricia gazed down at the tiny face, at the shiny dark hair that stood up in silken tufts, at the soft golden skin, at the eyes tightly closed against the flickering light of the wick lamp, at the minuscule fingers curling in the air, her eyes misted.

  ‘He is lovely,’ she whispered, ‘really lovely.’

  Deki’s sister said something to Kalden. ‘We are two of her first visitors,’ he translated. ‘She thinks we bring good luck as you are special visitor.’ Then he pointed to the willow-plaited ceiling. ‘That arrow we put up there also bring her good luck. It keeps bad demon away. She is very happy to have much chance for good luck.’

  ‘Well, I hope the arrow’s more successful at keeping the bad demon away than the dried apricots were at keeping the good demon happy,’ she said, laughing.

  ‘You don’t think good demon was helping us that day in the strong wind?’ he asked in amusement. ‘I do, Patricia, and I feel that he still with us,’ he added, staring into her face, his eyes full of love.

  There was a sudden noise behind them. They jumped and turned round. Tenzin stood in the doorway, holding plates of flour, butter and tiny m
odels of an ibex. His eyes were on Patricia.

  ‘Ju-le,’ she said hesitantly.

  ‘Ju-le,’ he muttered, and came into the room.

  She stepped back to let him go over to the table beside the bed. He placed his gifts next to the presents that Kalden had brought, leaned over and stroked the baby’s cheek. Then he spoke softly to Deki’s sister, and she smiled gratefully up at him.

  Straightening up, he looked from Kalden to Patricia and back again to Kalden. He said something to Kalden, who shook his head and gestured indecision with his hands. Throwing a quick smile to Deki’s sister, Tenzin started towards the door. As he passed in front of Kalden, he stopped, put his hand on his brother’s shoulder, looked long into his face, then he removed his hand and left the room.

  ‘He want to know if I go with you to party,’ Kalden said.

  Patricia looked questioningly at him. A baby is born to the whole village, he explained, and when the baby is a month old, the whole village celebrates with a big party and presents.

  ‘It is only possible if Major-le comes, too. If I go with you to party and Major-le not come, whole village will know what I feel for you. Major-le will know, too. But perhaps Major-le will want to come. Is part of Ladakhi way of life,’ he added with a wry grin. ‘But we go for short walk now. Major-le wake up soon.’

  They said goodbye to Deki’s sister, promising her that they’d try to come and see her and Chospel again before long, and then they went downstairs. As they left the house, a little boy ran past them into the house, his arms full of dough animals.

  ‘Ju-le,’ he shouted over his shoulders as he ran up the stairs.

  ‘That be Tashi,’ Kalden said, laughing as he looked back at the stairs. ‘My brothers are his fathers. He very good boy.’ He turned back to the path and they strolled towards the main entrance to the village. ‘After village party,’ he continued, ‘onpo will say when Chospel can go out of house for first time. It must be a day when all omens are favourable.’

  ‘So he’ll be at least a month old before he gets any fresh air,’ she said in amazement.