Coromandel!

by John Masters

  The bandits might return, but that couldn’t be helped--in fact it would be fine; then there’d be a real fight. Jason would have to fight. There was definitely something wrong with the boy. Ishmael decided to ride forward with him tomorrow and give him a good talking to.

  The sun sank, and all warmth left the harsh landscape. They hobbled the horses and unrolled their blankets near the stream. In Tibet there could be no sitting round a great campfire, because there was no fuel. Sometimes they had found dried yak dung at a camp site, but here there was nothing. They worked a little butter into a little tsampa, kneaded water into the whole, and ate the cold, soggy mess with their fingers. They drank from the stream and lay down to sleep.

  Ishmael thought: I’ll talk to him tomorrow, without fail. Or I’ll ride ahead and leave Catherine to talk. Something’s got to be done. This wild journey ought to have been so wonderful--even though their map is as unreliable as my ambassador’s diary. Have to tell them about that soon. But there must be a twin-peaked mountain somewhere around here. Jason was a good young man, perhaps the best he’d ever known. What to tell him, how to show him, so that he wouldn’t keep going off at dangerous tangents? It had happened all his life, from what he’d said about England and London and Manairuppu. The woman, his wife, was probably the answer. Jason needed anchoring to a firm piece of earth--wise, beautiful, understanding earth, that recognized the glory of the dream, but knew which dreams were good and which evil. Catherine . . .

  Darkness did not come quite so suddenly here. For half an hour Jason watched the pale slope of the hill blacken against the sky. The stars came out, and Catherine’s flank moved warm against his through the blankets. He marvelled at the fiery brilliance of the stars. Again, as at Badrinath, the wind left the plain, so that the blades of grass stood unmoved and silent by his ear, but high in the sky, between earth and stars, he heard the drone of the wind in its long passage.

  The bandits might come back, and then Ishmael would want to fight. But fighting never did any good. He, Jason, would go out to them, his hands upraised and love in his heart, and they’d all sit down together and be friends. When he got back to India he’d be careful never again to put himself in the way of such distractions.

  Molly saw those stars, and Emily and Mabel in London by the Thames, and Parvati outside the temple. He had loved them all, in their ways, and they were all unhappy because he had loved them. It had been the wrong kind of love.

  The stars were fierce as the eyes of queens tonight, and the air flowed like ice round his ears, and Catherine snuggled against him. How could a man contemplate in this world of ice and fire and women?

  Ishmael said, ‘Catherine, there are at least six horses.’--Jason smiled. The old man was talking in his sleep again. But Ishmael said, ‘At least six. Nearer eight.’

  Catherine started up and said, ‘I’ll put down the tent.’ Ishmael scrambled out, and his sword-blade flashed in the starlight. He whispered, ‘The bandits have come back. Draw your sword, Jason. Get down the stream bed a few paces, and then--‘

  Jason sat up. He had heard the clatter of a horse’s hoof against a rock. That was all. The loess soil buried all other noise the approaching horsemen might be making. He said quietly, ‘No. We mustn’t fight. I will go and tell them we are men of peace.’ He set off towards the faint sounds.

  Ishmael muttered, ‘Come back! They’ll kill you!’ But Jason walked slowly on along the bank of the stream. The unseen strangers had reached a stony outcrop among the loess, and their horses made a continuous low clatter. The starlight painted all things equal, whether light or dark--rocks and men, some moving, some still.

  A tremendous whinny ran like maniacal laughter along the hillside. From startlingly close, two other horses answered the whinny. For a moment many horses cackled together in question and answer. A voice called sharply, but in a language Jason did not know.

  He found himself in the middle of a group. There were six men altogether--three riding, three walking--and several pack horses already grazing, the sound of the tearing grass and champing teeth very clear in the silence. The men wore long- skirted coats, high boots, and cowled cloaks that came to a point above their heads. A light flared up, and the circle of faces took colour and form--bronze-red, hairless faces, fiercely tilted eyes, no eyebrows, expressionless. The riders dismounted and let their horses wander.

  Jason said, ‘We are men of peace. Welcome to our camp.’ He tried to feel peaceable, but he thought they were a dangerous-looking crew and was guiltily glad he had his knife.

  Ishmael was at his side, the sword in his hand and his old face alert and wary. He whispered, They are going to try to surprise us when we’ve gone back to sleep. But we’re going now. Too many to fight. Catherine’s unpicketing the horses.’

  Jason said, ‘Very well.’ Better run than fight. A scholar had no business even thinking of fighting.

  Ishmael said, ‘They don’t understand Urdu. I have a little Tibetan. I’ll tell them we must go. Then be ready. If they mean harm they’ll try to prevent us.’

  He turned to the newcomers and broke into another language, speaking slowly and with obvious difficulty.

  The leader of the strangers was a small old man with a face like a dried apple. When Ishmael finished speaking this man answered.

  Ishmael translated. ‘He says, blessings be on us. He doesn’t seem to care whether we go or stay.’

  Jason thought: They are certainly bandits. What else can they be, moving about over this featureless plain in the middle of the night?

  The old man’s followers set about unloading their pack horses. They had brought fuel with them, and already a small fire glowed near the stream. The small wrinkled man spoke again.

  Ishmael said, ‘He wants us to drink with them! By Allah, there will be poison in the wine. Get ready!’

  The old leader clapped his hands. One of his men came running with a small goatskin under one arm and a pile of nesting cups in the other hand. He poured out the liquid into the tiny cups and handed one each to Ishmael, Catherine, and Jason. The little old leader made a courtly, obvious gesture--Drink.

  Jason said, ‘Please to drink first,’ and held out the cup to him. His mind began to move fast and with a resentful desire to fight. But he must not fight. But was this fighting with words and wits any better than fighting with swords and arrows?

  Ishmael said, ‘He never drinks spirits.’ He sniffed his own cup. ‘Barley brandy. It smells good. I don’t think it is poisoned, after all.’

  Jason said, ‘Don’t drink!’ He saw another goatskin among a pile of rolled cloth and silver pots on the ground nearby. He said, ‘Tell him we’ll drink from that.’

  Ishmael spoke, pointing to the goatskin on the ground.

  The man holding the other cups dropped them. The murmuring in the background ceased. The little wrinkled leader spoke slowly.

  Ishmael translated. ‘You mean--that?’

  Jason nodded.

  The leader picked up the goatskin, and then Jason saw that there were two, one slightly larger than the other. The small one had a leather case tied to the outside of it. The leader held them up, one in each hand.

  Ishmael said, ‘Which?’

  Jason said, ‘The small one.’ It would make no difference, because neither of them was likely to be poisoned. He had been too clever for the bandits.

  The leader opened the leather case and lifted out a jade cup. It was very small, and there were black veins in the stone, which was so thin that the lamplight shone through from underneath it. He poured spirit into it from the small goatskin and gave it to Jason.

  Jason took the cup in his left hand. His right hand slipped back to rest on the rough, comforting handle of his knife--just in case. But violence was not for him. He let go of the knife and drank.

  The strangers sighed. The spirit burned in Jason’s throat and chest. After a time he said, ‘It’s not poisoned. Don’t forget you have the spirit from the other goatskin, the first one. Throw it away
.’

  But the leader seemed to have forgotten that Catherine and Ishmael existed. He stared only at Jason, his dark old eyes full of amazement.

  Jason banded back the little cup and said, ‘Thank you. Now tell him we’re going.’

  Ishmael spoke. Simultaneously the old leader began to speak rapidly. He beat his hands together in anguish. He conferred with another, larger man, almost as old as himself. He kept staring at Jason.

  Ishmael said, ‘He wants to know where you were born, what your house looked like.’--Jason said, ‘God’s blood!’ He forced himself back into his new-loved calm. If he was patient all this excitement would pass away. He described the farmhouse under the Plain.

  Catherine said, ‘The horses are ready.’

  Ishmael translated, even more slowly than before, for the idea of an English farmhouse under the Plain could not be easy to explain.

  The leader began to speak. Ishmael said, ‘Jason, they’re not bandits! They are monks. The leader is called Tendong, and he is the chief abbot of Tsaparang Monastery. He doesn’t want you to go. He must give you another--I think the word means “examination!” ‘

  Jason looked at the old leader with new interest. Tendong, an abbot of a monastery! There was a monastery down the vale, four or five miles from Pennel--a big ruin with no roof and stinging nettles in the forecourt. A monastery used to be something like a temple. He’d like to go and see this Tsaparang. Probably it would still have a roof on it, if all these men lived there.

  With his own hands Tendong unrolled a carefully tied bundle. He spread it out beside the lamp and stood back. On a large sheet of yellow silk lay three brass cylinders, three squares of yellowed paper, three silver handbells.

  Ishmael said, ‘You know what those cylinders are? Prayer wheels. And the papers have the Wheel of Life painted on them. Beautiful!’ He hurried forward, adjusting his spectacles and murmuring apologies to the abbot. Tendong gravely held him back and spoke a few words.

  Ishmael said, ‘Jason, he wants you to touch one of each--one prayer wheel, one painting, one bell.’

  ‘Why?’ Jason said.

  ‘He won’t tell me.’

  Jason bent down and touched his finger to the prayer wheel on the right, the painting in the centre, the bell on the left. He waited tensely. This was a queer, exciting examination.

  The Abbot Tendong stood up and seemed to grow larger. The light glowed in his bronze-red face, his men fell away from him so that he stood alone, and his voice rang like a trumpet.

  He spoke a long time, using small gestures powerfully controlled. He pointed to the east, the direction whence he had come with his followers. He pointed to the west. He pointed at Jason.

  Ishmael kept looking at Jason with a more and more startled expression. By the time the Abbot finished, Ishmael had turned pale and begun to tremble. Catherine left the horses to wander at their will, and came to Jason’s side.

  Ishmael said huskily, ‘My daughter, our talk this morning was so much wasted breath. Jason may be the reborn Lama of Tsaparang, for whom the abbot is searching.’

  Catherine said, ‘He’s no such thing!’

  Jason stood away from them. He found it difficult to breathe, though the night air was like ice in his lungs. Something large, larger than he had ever imagined, something like an enormous red bird, hung over him with slowly beating wings. He looked at Catherine and noticed that her eyes were wet. He said, ‘Let the abbot explain further.’

  Ishmael said, ‘Tsaparang is a big monastery with two thousand monks. Some of it is very old. There are three abbots in charge of the monks, but the head of the monastery is the Lama. The Lama of Tsaparang is not chosen, like the abbots. He--‘ Ishmael’s voice became suddenly sarcastic and angry. He said, ‘But you know all this, lord. Why am I telling you?’

  ‘Go on,’ Jason said without anger.

  Ishmael said, ‘The Lama never dies. When he seems to die the abbots go out to find the boy in whose body the Lama has chosen to be reborn. The monastery oracle tells them where to look. This time it said, in the west. And what kind of a house to look for--it said, a house under a hill.’

  A house under a hill. Yes, the farm lay under the Plain and in the west.

  Ishmael said, ‘It always takes the abbots several years to find the new Lama. This time, much longer than usual--twenty-two years--because several candidates were found to be impostors when they took the final tests at Tsaparang. In truth, Jason, there is intrigue among the abbots, I expect, each putting forward his own candidate. It is not real, this thing! It is a kind of folly--a divine folly, Jason, but a folly. It is not real. You must understand that. The searching abbots carry with them relics of the Lama’s last time on earth, such as his prayer wheel, his bell, and his cup. Obviously the Lama will recognize his own belongings. That is what you have done!’

  Ishmael went on. ‘The abbot is disturbed that you were not born into the Lama’s religion. Also he fears that you look like a man of blood--of flesh and blood, Jason--with your bleached skin and pale eyes. There are the other tests which you must undergo in the monastery before he can be sure. But so far the signs are unmistakable. You would not drink from any but the Lama’s cup ‘

  Jason said, ‘Yes.’

  Ishmael snapped, ‘But it was the goatskin that you were pointing at ... You drank with your left hand, as the dead Lama used to, though he was not left-handed.’

  Jason said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘You used your left hand because you had your right on your knife. I saw ... You limp, as the dead Lama did.’

  Jason said, ‘Yes.’

  ‘You fell off your horse today! ... You picked the dead Lama’s prayer wheel, bell, and Wheel of Life.’

  Jason said, ‘Yes.’

  Ishmael growled. ‘Pure chance! ... And of course your age is right. Why didn’t I tell the fools you were only eleven? You are behaving like it.’

  Jason stared at the Abbot Tendong. So I am the Lama. I always wondered what I was. The lamp gave out an oily smoke in the clear night. The stars were a long way up, where the wind blew. He walked unsteadily up and down. He was a Lama. He had been a Roman. He had built Stonehenge. He had climbed the wall of the Spanish galleon before he was born. He had lain with queens, strangled tigers with his bare hands, played melting music on the flute. He had been a seagull and a fish. He had inhabited Shiva and taken the god’s lawful wife, Parvati. Who knew what happened when a man died, if all this happened while he lived?

  He looked down into Catherine’s eyes. He thought: I am a blur to her, but she can see the stars. She has never seen my whole face and never will. She has looked at me, piece by piece, her spectacles an inch away, and laughed and smiled. ... He would never see her again. This was what he had been waiting for, not solitary contemplation, not the taking of alms before an idol, but this--books without end, two thousand monks under his orders. The work should be done. What work? A history of the world, to begin with.

  Catherine would never reach the end of the map now. He could give her money, though, to enable her to go wherever else she wanted. He said, ‘Tell the abbot I will come to the monastery, that they may test me.’ But really there was no need for tests. It was so. But let it be disclosed in due form, that Catherine might see the truth,

  Ishmael spoke. The Abbot Tendong hid his hands in his sleeves and bowed.

  They travelled two days eastward, Jason in a near-trance the whole time. He saw nothing of the road or of his companions until in the middle of the third day a slow perception reached him that he was approaching a great house--no, a city.

  He reined in his horse and, when his eyes came into focus, examined what he saw. He was in the centre of a circular plain, perhaps twelve miles across. Black mountains rose out of the plain on all sides, and snow dusted the serrated line of their peaks. The sun shone in a cloudless sky. A small river flowed silently with him, at his left hand. Men and women were working in the fields; the tassels of the barley waved in the wind; and three women were bathing in
an irrigation channel. The women sat in the shallow water with their clothes hanging in thick bundles round their waists, and splashed each other’s naked bodies and laughed shrilly with delight.

  The city stood against the farther wall of the mountains--a white city, brilliant, its feet in the plain and its summit high against the black rocks behind it.

  ‘The monastery of Tsaparang,’ Catherine said.--Jason rode on, now never taking his eyes off the monastery, for that was to be his kingdom.

  They reached it at sunset, a towering city such as the Himalaya itself, but of a dimension sufficiently smaller for men to understand every detail of its vastness. Its walls rose in tiers to a height of three hundred feet above the plain. Tall golden cylinders stood like an army on the topmost roofs, and below them, along the upper wall, were fixed a thousand gold shields. There were balconies and terraces almost hidden by black and gold cloth which fluttered in the wind, and in the walls the rows of windows gaped like square black gunports in the side of a monstrous ship. Atop the gate ten red-robed monks blew into the mouthpieces of ten long trumpets. A little shaven boy stood between each pair of trumpets, a yoke over his shoulders supporting the two bell-mouths. The hollow, booming drone shook the air so that the massive wall itself rattled and the great gate buzzed.

  They entered the courtyard and dismounted. There were stalls here, and women selling vegetables and milk, and on each side a row of doors such as Jason had seen in many Indian caravanserais. The double-bass throb of the trumpets began to quake like a fever in his body, and his head throbbed in painful sympathy.

  A door opened, and they entered the lowest level of the monastery. To right and left stood a row of monks, some beating gongs and some rattling drums made of human skulls. They climbed a ladder and walked through a darkly echoing hall. Gods and devils, all hung with silk scarves, necklaces, and ropes of jewels, towered gloomily against the walls. They climbed another ladder, its rungs black and slippery--another chamber, longer, narrower, and darker than the last. On in smoky darkness--up, up ladders, and past idols; past wooden pillars like a forest, their lower parts swathed in dull red cloth; past smells of sweat and rancid butter and incense; through great halls with a hundred doors, all alike, and dim corridors alive with the sound of gongs and bells and trumpets.