Complete Works of Talbot Mundy

by Talbot Mundy

  She knew it by heart. She said it over and over again to herself as she rode beside Monsieur X. She didn’t dare to call him by his right name, even in secret thought. He had forbidden. His word was law. Her reverence for him had nothing whatever to do with his present condition or with what she knew of his past. At Gombaria’s she had seen him in all his glory, unimprisoned by time and space, transcending by infinities the same man, the mere mortal statesman whom she had seen leading an army, capturing the Thunder Dragon Gate, ordering the whip for monks who needed the corruption beaten out of them. He could be cruel. Or was it cruelty? She remembered his verdict:

  “Persons offending personally needing personal rebuke!”

  An amazing mixture of a man, three states of consciousness in one. The rebuke, she remembered, was in no case less than fifty lashes with a rawhide whip. She had wondered then, as she wondered now, riding beside him, how anyone who believed in karma and reincarnation, could inflict such cruelty on others, knowing well it must return upon himself, sooner or later, somewhere, sometime. But then she remembered his other remark:

  “There being duty. Duty — neglect — because — fearing — consequences being greater sin than anger. People-taking-oath-of- holiness, neglecting to be holy, blasphemously mouthing piety like monkeys — perpetrating dirtiness and murder — envying, stealing, lying, setting bad example — huh! — flogging it out of them-huh! Greatest good of greatest number!” He had added, after a moment, staring at her: “Therefore wise ones not hurrying too fast toward beatitude, because as above, so below: the more the blessed knowledge, the greater the cursed sin. Go slow!”

  Now, though he made no remarks, she felt her own thoughts, her sorrow, even her loneliness yield and give place to another consciousness. It was not wholly unlike the calm produced by organ music. She perceived, knew, almost captured in thought and framed in words the key of the mystery that her companion pondered as he marched. He was reaching, reaching upward, carrying her thought with his, raised by his spirit. He was opening his consciousness to Idea, his inner eye to Vision, his inner ear to Rhythm whence inspiration comes. So Elsa’s heart too was lightened, as by inner sunshine, and for moments on end she understood the meaning of the law that he who will save his life shall lose it. Earth and its agonies — rainbows and their promises, are shadows of things to come. The shadow-lurker, the rainbow-hunter and the jackal are brothers. The glamour of captains and kings is the glitter of Life where it touches the waves of illusion. For moments on end she lived above intellect, beyond reason. Thought was wordless, like the vivid dreams, which waking veils again behind dreary realism.

  From that high consciousness, looking downward, as she could look down at the tragic valleys from the trail they climbed, at last she objectively saw her own dilemma — herself, Tom Grayne, Andrew. Tom Grayne and herself. She was Tom’s wife. She loved Andrew. God, how she loved him! Andrew did not love her. No doubt he liked her. She liked Tom Grayne, and no doubt Tom Grayne thought well of her, but love her he did not, nor ever would — nor she him. For love of dignity and pride if nothing else, she would not let liking serve as an excuse for clinging like a limpet to a man who craved freedom. Both men were chivalrous. Neither should have excuse or opportunity from her to sacrifice as much as one more hour for her sake. As Andrew had so often insisted, she too had rights. Rights are spiritual, won and kept by spiritual courage. There is no such thing as a material right. She had the spiritual right to take herself out of their lives — to refuse to resist the clash of conflicting forces — to rise above those forces, harming neither man, leaving each to his own destiny, while she attended her own. She saw her way clear — not in detail — only its direction. It looked as lonely and as barren as the man’s who strode beside her. But it did have dignity. She would not be the first who had faced Tibet without material resources in reserve. There had, for instance, been Nancy Strong.

  The well-remembered trail along the ledges zigzagged toward the ravine where Tom Grayne was supposed to be waiting. Three more days, and at last, on a crag in the distance, the Shig-po-ling monastery glistened into view like a shiny mud-wasps’ nest. She could see the roof bells through Andrew’s binoculars. The phony lama’s face became as greedy as a buzzard’s. He was already counting the price he would get for betraying Ugly-face. A blind man could have guessed that. Greed and shamelessness are one; he even tried to search his former master for parched barley or some other food that perhaps he had secreted with a view to escape. Elsa signaled and Andrew saw that. He landed a punch on the phony lama that nearly knocked him off the ledge. Then crisis came.

  Bulah Singh, egged on by St. Malo, seized that moment to take Andrew off guard and kill him. He rushed him suddenly — hurled his weight against him, trying to force him over the cliff backward. No one dared to interfere. Andrew reeled over the edge, clinging to Bulah Singh, who beat at him with both fists, kneeling, bracing his legs against a rock. For nearly a minute they swayed in the balance, until Andrew’s strength at last prevailed and he hauled himself back to the ledge. The Sikh shook himself loose and fled out of reach, scrambling between Elsa and the cliff to reach the one pony whose turn it was to carry no load. The pony kicked him and he almost went over the ledge a second time. He recoiled toward St. Malo, limping.

  Then St. Malo pulled an ace out of his sleeve and played it with ruthless cunning. Using his left like a trained fighter, he jabbed at the Sikh’s face. He caught him off balance. He jabbed again and again. Bulah Singh staggered. He recovered. He staggered again. He tried to throw himself forward on hands and knees. But the fist jabbed him again too quickly. He screamed hoarsely and reeled backward off the ledge to the rocks a hundred feet below.

  No one spoke for a moment, except Bompo Tsering. He sent a man down to strip the body and leave it naked for the birds. After that, the first who spoke was Ambrose St. Malo. Chafing his knuckles, he approached Andrew, rather skillfully assuming a casual, well-bred manner, stage Englishman style. It was only very vaguely overdone. His accent was unpleasant, but his manner might have been almost disarming if it hadn’t been for the pistol that Andrew had let him keep. Its bulge was visible, inside his overcoat.

  “Well. I had an idea, if I waited long enough, I’d have an opportunity to prove whose side I’m on.”

  He continued chafing his knuckles, where he had cut them a little on Bulah Singh’s teeth. No one spoke. He pulled on his fur glove. Then he patted the bulge of the pistol.

  “It was good judgment to trust me with this. I didn’t draw it, to shoot that dog of a Sikh, for the same reason that you didn’t draw yours. The gesture might have been misunderstood.”

  No answer from anyone. St. Malo’s eyes held steady. Their intelligence, expression, color were almost beautiful; but beneath the surface they were cold, like the eyes of a robot. His lips smiled pleasantly, but his voice gave the lie to the smile:

  “Ever since we met, that wash-out has been trying to get me to shoot you. He was self-hypnotized. Obsessed by an idea. He wanted to get possession of your girl friend and to put her to use.” At last he favored Elsa with one of his cold glances: “Yes, young lady! Bulah Singh believed that through you he’d be able to control your husband.”

  The silence at last told on him. It wore him down. He had to acknowledge it.

  “Hell,” he remarked. “What is this? A seance? Can’t anyone speak?”

  Andrew blew his whistle, one blast, meaning stand by. “Time’s up,” he said. “Hand over your pistol.”

  “But surely you understand now that I’m on your side—”

  Andrew took one stride forward and plunged his hand into the breast of St. Malo’s overcoat. It was a Tibetan coat; it had the usual voluminous bokkus. He pulled out the Smith and Wesson, unloaded it and stowed it away in Elsa’s saddle-bag:

  “Play Number One having failed, Play Two, I expect, would be to take a shot at me. That’s stymied. Have you Play Three ready?”

  St. Malo smiled. He looked scornful and rather surpris
ed. “I had begun to think you were a sensible man.”

  “I didn’t invite your opinion,” Andrew answered.

  “Andrew Gunning, I’m a safe man to bet on. I’m a dangerous man to deny! I have dealt myself in on this expedition.”

  “Tell that to Tom Grayne,” Andrew retorted.

  He blew his whistle again. The column moved forward. Ambrose St. Malo shrugged insolent shoulders and strode ahead to where the phony lama waited, trembling, impatient. They two walked side by side, talking, continually glancing backward to see where Andrew was. Before pressing forward for word with Bompo Tsering, Andrew spoke to Elsa:

  “Keep an eye on ’em. Please. Watch ’em carefully. Either they don’t wish to be overheard, or they do wish me to think they’re plotting something. Either way means trouble. The trail is tough from here on. I’ll be busy. So take this whistle. If they quit talking and you spot they’re starting anything, blow three long blasts to warn me.”

  Then he was gone, to overtake Bompo Tsering. He strode past St. Malo and the phony lama as if they weren’t there.

  CHAPTER 47

  The trail reached the limit beyond which even the yaks could no longer climb unaided. They and the ponies had to be lifted or else unloaded and then reloaded when their packs had been carried up by hand. In places the ledge was less than three feet wide, with an impending cliff on the right hand. The slippery rock was like a devil’s stairway. But it was the last lap; the animals knew it; so they got along without accident, everyone lending a hand. When the phony lama made the mistake of refusing to work, Andrew kicked him and made him put his shoulder under a pony’s rump to help it scramble while Andrew took the worst of the strain. That was a mistake. He should have known better. Fake dignity can’t endure too much humiliation. His life wasn’t worth ten cents from that minute, if it should be up to the lama.

  Tom Grayne’s secret hiding-place was away up on the face of a cliff, at least a thousand feet above that terrific trail. It was utterly impossible to reach with the pack animals. There were two ways to it, and Andrew knew the landmarks; but one way would have made a wild goat hesitate, and the other was a cascade, iced over by the frozen vapor from a hot spring. However, there was a more accessible and much larger cavern lower down, where they had cached quite a lot of fodder left over from last year’s expedition. It wasn’t secret, like Tom Grayne’s cave; it was too close to the trail, and too near to a weird community of hermits, who are the least talkative but most vigilant spies in the world. It was that lower cavern that Andrew headed for, hoping Tom Grayne bad seen them from far off and would save him the trouble of climbing to the hide-out.

  He scrambled to the head of the line, to get first word with Tom in case he should have come down from the hide-out. He had a notion it might be wise to break the news about Elsa before Elsa and Tom could confront each other. Elsa’s unexpected arrival might embarrass Tom, and his embarrassment might be a shock to her. Andrew’s own dread that three good friends might lose their friendship in a collision of wills where each had done his honorable best according to his lights — was something that he kept out of his mind, imprisoned behind the veil that even Elsa’s clairvoyance couldn’t penetrate. He suspected what Elsa was feeling. He proposed to spare her as much as he could.

  And as he led the way around a projecting spur of cliff, there Tom was, striding toward him — the same Tom Grayne, except that his beard was more unkempt. He was clean, but a bit ragged from a winter’s hard living. He was wearing the same old windproof hunting suit and laced boots, although he usually wore Tibetan clothing. So Andrew concluded that they were in no danger of being seen by monastery scouts. He stood where he was, to block the trail behind him and swap the first news without being overheard. The wind was blustering along the ledge and what they said to each other couldn’t have been heard six feet away.

  “How’s Elsa?” Tom asked.

  “The baby died. She’s fine. I have her with me.”

  Tom froze. It was almost imperceptible, like the effect of a blow in the ring. One couldn’t guess what he felt. He recovered instantly.

  “You’re a day early,” he said.

  “A day late,” Andrew answered.

  “I expected you tomorrow,” said Tom. “I heard of your getting hung up at the Shigatse River when the ferry broke away. So I counted out two days. Someone else with you, isn’t there?”

  “You bet. Your spies must have been busy.”

  “Lobsang Pun?”

  “Yes — Old Ugly-face in person.”

  “Good,” Tom answered.

  “And — but — also—”

  “I know. Ambrose St. Malo.”

  “How did you know? Were you expecting him?”

  “Yes. Who else?”

  “Some unarmed Tibetans and a sham-lama who can’t even pray without making mistakes. You’ll have trouble with him too.”

  “Okay. We’ll fix him. Where’s the other who was with Old Ugly-face?

  “Dead. Ugly-face gave him the proper obsequies.”

  Tom nodded: “That other fellow was a good guy, but soft — couldn’t take it. Now Lobsang Pun hasn’t a friend in the world — barring us. Did he say much on the road?”

  “Snubbed me a couple of times.”

  “Oh. Likes you, does he? That’s good. Even so, he’ll be a handful.” Tom grinned at last. “He and I are old enemies. Friends to the last ditch. Enemies at the drop of a hat. There isn’t a move on the board that he wouldn’t play against me. So watch out.”

  “Any news at this end?” Andrew didn’t dare to use the name of the young Dalai Lama, even with that wind blowing and the curve of a cliff between him and the men.

  Tom nodded. “The infant Dalai Lama is in the monastery. He’s for sale to the highest bidder. The latest high bid is from Hitler’s Gestapo outfit — by secret courier from Lhasa.”

  “Did the courier get through?”

  “He’s dead. But we’ll have to work fast.”

  “Any trouble with your Tibetans?”

  “Yes. Two died. Three couldn’t stick it. I’ve two left. How’s Bompo Tsering?”

  “Getting wise,” said Andrew. “Good headman. He’s learned how to make the others do most of the work. But he needs watching. He’d bribe himself if no one else ‘ud do it.”

  “Okay. We’ll fix him too. Has he spotted the prelate?”

  “I don’t know.”

  Tom grinned again. “We’ll see. Have you brought some jam?”

  “Yes. Plenty of soft tack.”

  “Good. Where’s Elsa?”

  Andrew moved his head to indicate that she was somewhere down along the trail beyond the bulge of the cliff. The trail was so narrow just there that Andrew had to hug the cliff to get out of Tom’s way and let him pass.

  “Look out for the yaks around the bend,” he advised.

  Yaks are as unpredictable as camels, but the wind was the wrong way. The leading yak was around the corner of the cliff. So it couldn’t have been smell, hearing, or eyesight that set the brute going the moment Tom moved. Either the phony lama or else St. Malo or one of their men prodded the leading yak in the rump with a sharp goad. It came around the corner like an avalanche. There wasn’t room to get out of the way, nor time nor room for either man to shoot. Tom Grayne seized it by the horns, slithered on ice and raw rock and hung three thousand feet sheer above a ravine that howled in the wind as if all the devils in a Tantric Buddhist’s hell were clamoring for victims. Somehow or other he clung to the yak’s horns. Andrew vaulted the loaded yak. At the risk of being trampled to death he seized Tom’s arms and hauled him back to safety, letting the frightened beast go hurrying alone along the trail.

  “God, you weigh a ton,” he remarked.

  There was no time to say more — nothing more to be said. Elsa came, riding alone. Not far behind her, beyond the turn, Bompo Tsering was holding back the column. Elsa got down off her pony.

  “Oh, Tom, I’m glad! I was afraid the yak had—”

&
nbsp; “Near thing,” he answered. “Gunning saved me.” He was rubbing his wrists that had taken a grueling punishment from the yak’s horns, but he left off doing it to take Elsa in his arms. They kissed. Then Elsa’s face pressed his shoulder:

  “Tom, our baby died.”

  “I know it.”

  “Tom, I did my uttermost best to be the mother of your son, and to—” She was crying.

  “I know. I know.” He sounded grieved. He looked grieved. He was. But it was because she was suffering. “You shouldn’t have come back,” he said, clumsily gentle. “Gunning could have brought the news.” His voice was as kind as a lover’s, but he didn’t say bad news. He patted her back and waited for her to cease crying, but he looked too patient, as if restraining a storm inside himself.

  “You agreed to stay in India. Why did you come?” he asked — kindly again, almost too kind.

  “Must I tell it here — now?”

  “No, of course not. Let’s go to the cavern.”

  But Tom didn’t move, for a moment. She looked up at him through tear- dimmed eyes. He glanced from her to Andrew.

  “No,” said Andrew.

  Tom grinned, not exactly incredulous, but alert. “Aren’t you quick on the uptake? I asked no question.”

  Andrew retorted: “I saved you the need.”

  “Thanks. — Where’s Ugly-face?”

  “He is near the rear of the column,” said Elsa.

  “Okay. We’ll let him follow. Let’s go to the cavern.”

  Elsa put her arm through the pony’s reins and Tom led the way. But Andrew turned back, partly to let Tom and Elsa be alone together — partly to prevent any last-minute treachery. As he took the wall of St. Malo, St. Malo grinned in his face — superior, indulgent, sly:

  “Still alive, brother cat? We’ll come to terms,” he said. “You wait and see.”