The Forbidden Temple

by Patrick Woodhead

  The soldiers’ boots crunched to a halt ahead of him. René stopped, thankful for the rest, and watched as Chen walked back down the line and stopped in front of Zhu. He was holding a military issue map and a GPS in his other hand.

  ‘We are on the outskirts of another village, sir,’ he said.

  Zhu looked up at the ridge and the smoke curling into the sky.

  ‘Which one?’

  ‘The last, Captain. It’s called Menkom.’

  They both walked to the front of the line. An old monk was sitting on a mound of earth, basking in the sunshine.

  ‘Ask him if he has seen any Westerners pass this way,’ Zhu said, motioning for Chen to translate.

  Chen spoke a few words in halting Tibetan but the old monk stayed silent, staring right through him, his prayer wheel spinning with gentle sweeps of his wrist.

  ‘Foreigners,’ Chen repeated again, sensing the soldiers pulling up behind him to watch what was going on. ‘Have you seen any?’

  The monk didn’t answer.

  Inclining his head so it was only an inch from the old man’s ear, Chen whispered in Tibetan, ‘Don’t make it hard on yourself, old man. I know you understand me.’

  There was a faint crunch of gravel as someone shifted their weight from one leg to the next and then the soft, crackling sound of Zhu inhaling on his cigarette. They were all watching him. Waiting for him to do something. Still the monk didn’t answer.

  Biting down on his bottom lip, Chen swung back his arm and brought the flat of his hand whipping across the old monk’s face. The slap sent him rolling back through the dirt, knocking the prayer wheel he had been holding out of his hand.

  Zhu took a step forward, idly picking it up, his left hand stroking the line of beads. The old monk stared up at him from the ground, watching him finger his most sacred possession.

  ‘You need to be more persuasive,’ Zhu said. ‘He doesn’t seem to understand.’

  For a split second Chen hesitated. Then he moved forward again, grabbing the monk by the front of his tunic and lifting him off his feet. The old man swung in his hands like a rag doll, toes paddling the air as if still trying desperately to connect with the ground.

  Chen stared into his eyes, willing him to say something, anything. He knew how far the captain would take this just on a whim.

  ‘For Christ’s sake, put him down,’ René said, pushing his way to the front of the group. Chen paused, still holding the monk in the air, while Zhu spun round, his black eyes hardening.

  ‘This monk wears a red robe, or what’s left of one anyway,’ said René. ‘That means he’s part of the Gelugpa sect and they often take a vow of silence. Even if he wanted to answer, from the look of him he probably lost the power of speech years ago.’

  There was a pause as Chen looked at Zhu and Zhu stared at René, trying to assess whether he was telling the truth. René could feel sweat gathering in pools under his arms.

  Eventually Zhu gave a brief nod and Chen released his grip on the old monk who crumpled in a heap on the ground.

  ‘Thank you for enlightening us,’ Zhu said, with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes. He then moved closer, whispering into René’s ear, ‘Interfere again and I will have one of the soldiers break your legs.’

  René stared at the ground as Zhu flicked away his cigarette and without another word, continued up the trail towards the village. The other soldiers hoisted their packs and followed, leaving René standing next to Chen.

  ‘Must have been scary, huh?’

  Chen turned, surprised to hear the Westerner speak to him.

  ‘A pacifist the same age as my grandmother. And all you’ve got is a machine gun.’

  As he spoke, René looked directly into Chen’s eyes and for the briefest moment, thought he saw a trace of doubt there. He opened his mouth to say something more but Chen grabbed his shoulder, swivelling him round so he faced the village once more.

  ‘Back in line,’ he said in broken English, pushing René forward.

  Ahead of them Zhu walked on, finally coming to a halt in the central part of the village. His eyes ranged over a few of the villagers lying emaciated and sick in their doorways, unmoved even by the sight of a Chinese patrol.

  A stream of water trickled past each house, wending its way around piles of rubbish that had been left to putrify in the mud. Bottles, old bits of rope and plastic bags were scattered over the ground. A few goats and a dog sniffed through the rubbish in front of one of the larger houses. The dog was bone-thin, its ribs visible through its matted coat as it chewed on the end of a splintered bone. As Zhu watched, the dog’s jaw widened and it retched. It sniffed a couple of times, then started eating its own vomit.

  Zhu approached one of the piles of rubbish, his boots squelching in the soft mud by the stream. He moved slowly, eyes scanning the ground. From his years of experience at the PSB, it was something he did automatically. Rubbish was the one thing everyone forgot to hide. A hundred yards further up he stopped, eyes settling on a small, plastic bottle partially concealed in the dirt. With the tip of his boot, he carefully flipped over the object and peered down at the writing. It was in English – an empty bottle of painkillers.

  The Westerners had been here after all.

  Zhu allowed himself a brief smile. Along the last stretch of the trail, he had started to worry that they had broken off earlier and headed up the mountains. The sheer walls of rock looked impassable to him, but then again, he didn’t pretend to be any kind of mountaineer. But this village was the end of the trail. They must have started climbing from here.

  Pulling a white handkerchief from his pocket, Zhu dabbed his forehead. The sun was directly above them now, its glare intensified by the rarefied mountain air. Moving back a few paces towards one of the larger wooden shacks, he stood under its eaves by the front door, his eyes gradually adjusting to the shadow.

  A moment later he saw Chen approaching, striding across the open ground.

  ‘Your orders, sir?

  ‘Set up camp in the lower fields away from this place,’ he said, eyes taking in the rest of the houses where a few of the villagers sat languidly on the steps. ‘The Westerners were here and somebody saw something. Line up the women by the stream for questioning. And, Lieutenant, don’t stop until you find out exactly what they know.’

  ‘Yes, sir. And the rest of the village?’

  Zhu paused for a moment in thought, his hands clasped lightly behind his back. He was about to speak when he felt something behind him brush against his right hand. He flinched, spinning round on his heel in alarm.

  Lying on the wooden doorstep of the house was a small boy in an oversized shirt that was bleached by dirt and age. He had been tucked behind a decrepit bench by the door and Zhu hadn’t even noticed him when he had first come in under the shade. While they had been speaking, he had crawled forward and stretched up to touch the nail-less fingers of Zhu’s right hand in an effort to get his attention. The boy looked up at him with pleading eyes, his scrawny body ravaged by cholera.

  ‘Help us,’ he breathed, his chest working up and down from the effort, making his collar bones stand out under his sunken skin. From the look on his face, it was all too obvious what he was saying. Zhu didn’t need a translation.

  Zhu stared down at him, frozen by the physical contact. His eyes ran over the boy’s small hands, dirtied and grasping as they pulled on his fingers once again, touching the stretched skin on the tips where his nails had once been.

  Wrenching his arm free, Zhu stumbled back into the harsh sunlight, his lips curled in revulsion. He frantically wiped his right hand on the side of his trousers, retreating as far from the child as he could.

  ‘Burn the village,’ he hissed, wiping his hand one last time and placing it deep in his trouser pocket. He looked across at Chen who stood bewildered by the front step of the house.

  ‘Burn it to the ground.’

  Chapter 36

  LUCA OPENED HIS eyes to see the afternoon sun slanting thro
ugh the open window. For a moment he lay flat on the narrow bunk, staring out vacantly across the small, bare room. Then he exhaled slowly and dragged himself to his feet. Every muscle in his body felt stretched and bruised and there was a dull thumping in his head.

  Moving over to a porcelain bowl by the bed, he wet a small cloth and ran it over his face and hands. The palms of his hands were still stained black with dried blood. By the time he wrung out the cloth, the water had turned the colour of rust.

  Last night’s ordeal was coming back to him in flashes now: Bill’s piercing scream by the cave, the burning sensation in his own arms and legs as he’d clambered after Shara. It had taken every ounce of his strength to get them to the monastery, and despite what he sensed must have been a long, deep sleep, he still felt weak and depleted.

  Leaving the cloth by the basin, Luca stepped up to the window and took in the view. The monastery seemed just as unreal in the daylight. As he peered straight down from the ledge he saw that the building stretched away beneath him, level after level, to the mountain’s base. It looked to be at least two hundred metres high, as if two large cathedrals had been stacked one on top of the other.

  On the horizon was a series of interlocking valleys. Each had layers of green terraced fields running round the side of the mountains in narrow bands, like the contours on a map. Luca could just make out the silhouettes of people, planting long rows of crops, their backs hunched as they worked the earth.

  ‘Geltang Monastery.’ Luca said the words out loud, as if they would make more sense that way. What was this place? A secret sect of monks, hidden away in the mountains? But if so, what were they all doing here, and how had Shara known about them in the first place?

  A knock on the door made him swing round in surprise, causing his back to spasm. Reaching behind him to lean on the bed, he was still cursing softly as the door was unbolted from the outside.

  From the shadows of the corridor, a monk appeared in the doorway.

  ‘Tashi delek, Mr Matthews. I trust you have slept well?’

  The man must have been somewhere between forty and fifty, but it was hard to tell given the perfectly smooth texture of his skin. His head was shaved in the traditional monastic style above gently upward-slanting eyes, and he wore the same cornflower blue robes as Luca had seen on the monks who had taken Bill away. The man extended a hand in greeting, his lips curving into a faint smile.

  ‘My name is Dorje,’ he said, his voice gentle and deliberate. ‘I am one of the few at Geltang who speak English, and have been instructed to be your guide.’

  ‘Hello,’ Luca said, offering his hand. Dorje shook it while studying Luca openly, his expression one of unhurried calm. Luca felt he should say something more to break the silence.

  ‘Your English is very good,’ he said finally.

  ‘Thank you, Mr Matthews,’ Dorje replied, his smile widening a little. ‘Now, if you would please follow me, Miss Shara would like to see you. On the way, perhaps I will have a chance to acquaint you with a little more of our humble monastery.’

  With that he set off sedately down the corridor, hands clasped behind his back like a college professor. Luca followed and, despite his aching legs, had to measure his stride to stop himself from stepping on the hem of Dorje’s robe. They made their way down the tight corridor, passing flaming yak-butter lamps that had been lit in small alcoves cut into the stone walls.

  ‘Is there any news of Bill?’ Luca asked after a while, when it became obvious that Dorje’s guided tour was going to be conducted in silence.

  ‘Regrettably, it is too early to tell,’ Dorje answered, speaking over his shoulder. ‘Your companion was in very poor health when he arrived, but I understand that our physicians have been working on his legs all through the day.’

  ‘But he is going to be OK, isn’t he?’

  ‘We must wait, Mr Matthews. We cannot do more than that.’

  ‘Is he at least conscious?’ said Luca, his voice rising a little. ‘I’d really like to go and see how he’s doing.’

  Dorje paused by a wooden staircase.

  ‘Miss Shara will be able to give you more information, so I must ask you to wait until then. For my part, I have been told that your companion needs complete rest and that it is impossible for you to see him at this time.’

  The way he spoke suggested the matter was gently, but firmly, closed. He continued walking again. After a second Luca shrugged and followed, staring down at the back of his shaved head. A few hundred yards further they passed a wider section of hallway where two young monks were standing, speaking in low whispers. As Luca and Dorje passed, both gave low, respectful bows, but their eyes studied every movement Luca made.

  ‘Can you tell me more about this place, Dorje? What is Geltang exactly?’

  Dorje raised one arm, as if gesturing to the entire monastery.

  ‘Geltang is a place of preservation. It is a repository of culture, wisdom and enlightenment.’

  Luca nodded, waiting for him to elaborate, but Dorje lapsed into silence again.

  ‘But why has it been built out here in the middle of nowhere?’

  ‘Indeed, I must congratulate you on completing a most arduous journey. It is no small matter to reach our walls. But I am quite certain your training as a mountaineer stood you in good stead.’

  ‘Yeah, it helped,’ said Luca impatiently. ‘But what about the monastery? Why’s it been built so far up in the mountains?’

  Dorje smiled apologetically.

  ‘I’m afraid my English is not good enough to answer such questions adequately,’ he said. ‘Ah, but here we are already – the eastern balcony.’

  They rounded a corner and the corridor opened up into a vast terraced area made of huge white marble flagstones and surrounded by gleaming walls. The only splashes of colour on the terrace came from an array of miniature trees and plants, similar to Japanese bonsai, which studded the walls in small, individual alcoves.

  At the centre, a stone fountain poured water into a shallow receptacle below. The overflow of water then travelled through an open channel in the ground until it reached the balcony’s edge where it fell hundreds of feet down, past the foundations of the monastery and on to the cliffs below.

  Spectacular as the balcony was, it was not designed to be introspective. As the water tumbled down like a moving sheet of glass, it drew the eye to the view above it.

  Luca’s gaze was directed upwards, coming to a halt halfway up the perfect lines of a familiar mountain.

  ‘I don’t believe it,’ he said, forgetting the stiffness in his legs as he stepped eagerly forward. ‘It’s actually here.’

  Framed by two larger peaks in the foreground, he could see the chiselled outline of the pyramid mountain. There could be no mistake – this was the same mountain he had seen all those weeks ago on Makalu. Despite the summit being concealed by a thick layer of cloud and the lower flanks lost to surrounding foothills, it still looked absolutely magnificent.

  ‘It’s unbelievable.’

  ‘Indeed,’ Dorje replied softly.

  Both men stood gazing at the view. As Luca’s eyes traced the sides of the mountain he imagined himself up there, slowly picking a route along the cracks in the rock, gradually working higher until he reached the very top.

  ‘Always cloud,’ he muttered to himself before swinging round to face Dorje. ‘I looked at so many satellite maps, trying to catch a glimpse of it, but the whole mountain was always covered by cloud.’

  ‘That is its nature,’ agreed Dorje. ‘Like us, it prefers to remain hidden from the world.’

  Luca nodded, turning back to the view. ‘Has anyone climbed it?’

  Dorje shrugged. ‘While collecting herbs or performing similar errands, members of our order have certainly walked across its foothills.’

  ‘And the summit? Has anyone been to the summit?’

  Dorje sighed quietly.

  ‘No one has been there. I am afraid we do not share your Western predilection for �
�conquering” such wondrous feats of nature.’

  ‘Does it even have a name?’

  ‘Name? No. No, Mr Matthews,’ Dorje continued, his nose wrinkling a little, as if he had just noticed an unpleasant smell. ‘Our mountain does not have a name. Just as climbing it would be an act of quantifying it, or, to put it another way, of being able to measure oneself against it, we believe naming it would have a similar effect. It is enough for us that it is simply there.’

  Luca nodded distractedly. He drew his gaze away from the mountain and over the intervening valleys to where they stood. Now that he was here, he could see how similar the landscape was to that shown on the thangka Jack had given him. He thought back to the professor at Cambridge too and the comments she had made about the ‘mountain beyul’. Dorje had said Geltang was a repository of enlightenment . . .

  There had to be some kind of a connection.

  Turning away from the mountain, Luca glanced over at Dorje.

  ‘Is there a relationship between the mountain and the monastery?’ he asked.

  Dorje looked startled for an instant, then his expression assumed its habitual calm.

  ‘Mr Matthews, I am just a lowly monk here at Geltang and nothing more than a humble translator. I think it best you talk to someone else more qualified to discuss such matters. But what I can tell you is that the mountain creates moisture. Its sheer presence generates clouds and precipitation, which in turn feed the crops you see in the fields below our monastery. We grow all that is consumed here and it is the mountain that enables our existence. Rare indeed for a place as inhospitable as the Himalayas.’

  ‘I wasn’t meaning the crops so much . . . more the religious significance. You said Geltang was a repository, right? Well . . .’

  Luca’s voice trailed off as Dorje turned away from him towards the entrance to the balcony.

  ‘Ah,’ he said, his expression clearing with relief. ‘Miss Shara has arrived.’

  Despite his growing frustration, Luca felt his pulse quicken as he turned to see Shara crossing the balcony towards them. She had changed from her climbing clothes and now wore blue monastic robes similar to Dorje’s.