The Devil's Guard, page 11
He came and stood in front of each of us in turn, his eyes lighting with humor as our host announced our real names. When I shook his hand his skin felt soft in contrast to mine, but the muscles were firm underneath it, and he seemed to have plenty of physical strength.
He spoke English with a pause between each word, as if he had lost a former fluency, but there was not much accent. He made no mistakes of grammar. His voice was quiet, deep—manly.
"I was sent for," he said. "I must go soon. What can I do for you?"
He sat in the seat neat to Grim, studying Chullunder Ghose, who bulked between him and the firelight; but he looked away when he saw the babu was growing nervous. `"Tell these sahibs how to find Sham-bha-la!" said Sidiki ben Mahommed, in a voice like a schoolmaster's showing off his favorite pupil.
Lhaten leaned back in his chair and laughed; but whereas laughter in the East is usually scornful, his was not; it was friendly. He looked at Chullunder Ghose again for a moment, and then at each of us, and said:
"Some have done it. It is not for me to say you can't. A number of people have found that place in the course of centuries . . . . Why do you wish to find it?" he asked.
None answered and he looked at us again.
"The hardest part is not the difficulties," he remarked. "What route have you?"
"Benjamin's," said Grim.
"None better to begin with. But you go in winter? Why?"
Grim told him about Rait and Rait's letter to me. I showed him the letter. He frowned as he read it.
"That man failed before he started," he remarked.
Grim made as if to say something, but changed his mind. Narayan Singh spoke up:
"Where is the place?"
Lhaten looked straight into Sikh's eyes for a moment and then answered slowly:
"Whoever knows will never tell. I think you understand that. Why, then, did you ask?"
"To test you," said the Sikh. Then, leisurely, he got up from the floor and stretched himself. "You are no liar. Can you fight?" he asked.
But Lhaten only smiled and watched him.
"I fight well with any weapon. I shall make you show me where the place is," said Narayan Singh, his eyes blazing as if he had gone mad. Our host began to show signs of panic. I tried to catch Grim's eye, but he would not look at me.
"I prefer not to argue," said Lhaten. "If I know or can do anything there is no need to talk of it."
"Sit down!" commanded Grim abruptly and Narayan Singh obeyed.
"Very good indeed," remarked Lhaten, but it was not clear whether he referred to Grim or to the Sikh.
"You asked, what can you do for us," said Grim.
"Why not tell me?" he answered. He appeared to like Grim.
"Help us to get there."
"I may not."
"You shall!" said the Sikh, and was on his feet again, arms folded.
Lhaten studied Narayan Singh thoughtfully for thirty seconds.
"I could ask for permission," he said. "But to enter requires strength. You show a weakness."
Narayan Singh sat down as if his knees had slackened under him. Chullunder Ghose chuckled; it pleased him to see the Sikh have the worst of an encounter. Lhaten glanced at the babu.
"Is ridicule strength?" he inquired. "That honorable man" (he indicated Narayan Singh, who was glaring sullenly) "has courage. I bow to it."
"And me you mock?" the babu asked. He began nervously throwing a handkerchief from hand to hand, but his grin was challenging.
"No," said Lhaten, "but I think you will not see what you go for. These two sahibs from the West may win through—possibly.—perhaps— I don't know. I will ask permission and if that is granted there will be help. But many were helped and have turned back—more have failed utterly though they have been helped." He looked at Grim. "That one, I think, may succeed." He looked at me. "Friendship," he said, "has saved many a man from failure. May I caution all of you?"
Grim nodded.
"Be silent! Whoever asks, don't tell him your objective. If you do, an enemy will hear of it. Even so, as it is—"
He looked sharply at Sidiki ben Mahommed.
"Do you know Tsang-yang and Tsang-Mondrong?" Grim asked him.
"I have spoken with them outside in the shed," said Lhaten. "No matter what they may have told you, they are ex-monks who belonged to a secret order, from which they were expelled. They are following you, instead of murdering or betraying you, because they believe you are following another man who—"
"Rait?" Grim interrupted.
Lhaten nodded. He appeared to dislike naming names.
"—a man to whom they once sold some of the secrets of the order to which they formerly belonged. Those two are superstitious, which makes them doubly dangerous, but at the same time doubly foolish. They think that when they die they will be reborn into animals unless they kill the man to whom they sold forbidden knowledge. They also hope that, having killed the man, they may be readmitted to the order from which they were long ago expelled. Beware of their superstition. They are as likely as not to kill you when its frenzy seizes them."
"There are slippery places on the way to Tibet!" said Chullunder Ghose.
"Beware you, then, of a false step!" Lhaten answered. "Do you think that with blood on your hands you can—?"
For thirty seconds he observed the babu keenly.
"You spoke of enemies," said Grim.
Lhaten nodded. "The place," he said, "to which you wish to go is hard to find. Thousands wish to enter it, who have no right, and some of those are as jealous as night is of day. They will try to decoy you. If traps fail, they will try to kill you. If that fails, they will try to follow in with you. But in their company you can neither find the way nor enter, because those who keep the place know it would be safer to bring matches into a magazine than to open the door to those destroyers."
It was dark talk—cryptograms to me. I grew impatient with it.
"Look here," I said, "we want to reach—"
He stopped me. "Don't speak the name! Don't mention them who live there!"
He seemed, not exactly afraid to hear the word Sham-bha-la spoken, but to treat it as if it were dynamite for use only with precautions. And as if to prevent my mentioning the word, he left his chair abruptly and began bidding us good-by. Sidiki ben Mahommed showed him more respect than Moslems usually do to men of alien faith; he made almost an obeisance, which Lhaten treated scornfully, appearing to have a manly dislike for such foolishness. He left the room before we could say another word to him and our host did not follow him to the door, but sat down looking snubbed and discontented.
"He has brought me ill-luck! He has disapproved of me. Confound him!" he grumbled. "May his shadow dwindle until it ceases! How I do hate men who give themselves such airs!"
But it seemed to me that Lhaten had given himself no airs whatever and had very adroitly avoided quarreling with our pugnacious Sikh.
Chapter Ten—The man without a name.
Be sure of this: if you have courage it shall certainly be tested; because in all this universe no quality lies latent forever, but the undeveloped is discarded back into the melting-pot, and that which is ready is put to use; therefore he who has true courage welcomes trial, neither because of bravado nor from any other form of vanity, but because he is strong and the strength asserts itself as sap in springtime.—From The Book Of The Sayings Of Tsiang Samdup
It was remarkable that our host seemed more insignificant than ever after Lhaten left the room; by contrast he had become uninteresting, colorless—a little man with overlarge opinions. It was difficult not to betray the change in our attitude toward him. We all felt it.
For an hour we tried to get from him an account of Lhaten—who and what he might be—where he had his education—how he bad learned English. We might as well have questioned a four-year-old child. His self-assurance and vocabulary all seemed to have vanished. He broke into the native language frequently and, when he did use English, stammered. He explained he really hardly knew Lhaten at all and had merely invited him to come and visit us because he thought we might be interested. That, however, was a long way from explaining why he showed the man such deference, and why he was afraid now he had gone.
He was full of fear, and the fear was half-contagious; Narayan Singh heaped more wood on the fire with a gruff excuse about the draught that made him shudder. In the gallery the women kept up such a whispering that Sidiki ben Mahommed raised his voice and rebuked them irritably. Then presently one of the women screamed as if she had seen a ghost. Another woman leaned over the gallery and shrilled at her husband three or four sentences whose meaning I could not catch. Then silence, and we listened to the wind under the eaves.
The only other noise came from the compound where the cattle and ponies rattled at their chains. It was a quiet night for Ladakh; the wind moaned, but it was not blowing hard as yet; the storm was coming. A bull bellowed in the stall; an ass brayed; then two or three sheep bleated.
"But I have no sheep!"
Sidiki ben Mohammed went into a panic. Grim laid hands on him to keep him from doing himself an injury; he was rushing about the room upsetting things; he tripped over the hearth and nearly fell into the fire.
"Black magic!" Chullunder Ghose remarked and shuddered.
Sidiki ben Mahommed turned and swore at him, struggling to wrench himself free from Grim.
"First Mordecai—now you! What next?" he screamed. "I tell you, those are not my sheep. I have none!"
"Let's go and look," Grim suggested.
Narayan Singh strode over to the door and stood there listening. I followed him and the floor-boards creaked under my weight, so I did not hear what he did, although I could see by his expression that he had caught some unexplained sound.
"Your guns!" our host yelled. "Get your guns! That bleating outside is a signal?"
Grim let go of him and he began shouting to his wives so loudly and rapidly that we could not hear anything else. Narayan Singh opened the door; he, Grim and I strode out into a dark passage, at the end of which the outer door was rattling in the wind.
"Get your guns, and then to the watch-tower! Hurry!" our host shouted, and pushed past us. We could hear him scrambling up an unseen stairway—and then the women shrilling to him in a panic greater than his own.
We all had automatics, but it took about half a minute to get them loose from the cloth wrappings under our arm-pits. Grim was ready first and tried to find the door bolts, but failed until I struck a match. The draught blew out the match, and that same second came a yell that made our blood run cold. It was probably two yells, simultaneous. Grim threw the door wide and we all stepped out, leaving it open behind us. Narayan Singh called back to Chullunder Ghose to bring a lantern, but the babu did not answer.
It was bitter cold and we had no overcoats. There were no stars visible—no moon. The compound was a black pit with the dung stiff-frozen underfoot, and the wind over the wall stung like a whip lash. The cattle were all quiet in the sheds, but there seemed to be something stirring over in the left-hand corner near the shed where our Tibetans had been lodged, though there was no light in the Tibetans' shed. Grim led the way toward the sound.
We stumbled over mixen and the odds and ends of useless rubbish that cluttered the compound, keeping touch with our hands because we could not see one another. Up behind us on the watch-tower a wooden shutter opened, thunderclapping as the wind slammed it against the masonry; but no light shone through the opening, which would have made a too good target in the dark.
Our Tibetans had vanished. Their shed door was open and the place stark empty except for two wool-stuffed mattresses. I struck a match, but there were no signs of a struggle.
"They have run off to betray us," said Narayan Singh. "There will come policemen and a burra sahib.[7] Let us escape toward Tibet. Who can catch us if we make haste?"
We agreed on the instant. Grim began to lead the way toward the shed where we had stalled the ponies; he had not gone ten feet when he stumbled over something, but recovered. I fell, close behind him—something under me. I groped. There was blood on my hand—sticky—already half-frozen. Grim struck a match.
Both Tibetans lay murdered, faces upward on the dung. Noses and ears were cut off. There was a knife wound under the heart of each of them. Their clothes had been ripped in a hurried search and there was nothing left that had the slightest value. We struck match after match, until Sidiki ben Mahommed began shooting at us from the watch-tower; then Grim went back to the house in a hurry to stop him, and Narayan Singh and I went to the stable.
Loads and ponies were all where we had left them. We followed Grim into the house, finding our way by a crack of light at the edge of a shutter, then feeling our way along the wall. Grim had gone up to the watch-tower and there was no light in the big room, except the hearth blaze that flickered and shone intermittently, making deep long shadows dance in all the corners. Chullunder Ghose was sitting stock-still where we left him by the hearth, his fat face rigid with fear as if he had been hypnotized. He was staring into a corner and for several seconds we could not make out what he was staring at. Then a root crashed into the ashes on the hearth; a flame and a shower of sparks shot up and we saw what the trouble was.
In the darkest corner, with his back toward a bookcase filled with bound volumes of ancient English illustrated magazines, there sat a coppery skinned man in a drab-colored turban, whose black hair fell in waves over his shoulders. He had more hair than a woman, but his face was almost tigerishly masculine, eyes large and rather wide apart. He had a silky black beard and mustache that by half- concealment multiplied the fierceness of his lip line. He was tall, strong-looking, well dressed in a costume that suggested Tibet, and entirely at his ease. He did not move, except to blink occasionally, and as he appeared to have no weapon, I stowed my automatic where I could reach it instantly; but Narayan Singh kept his in his right hand ready for use, making no secret of his mistrust of the man.
"Who's your friend?" I asked, but Chullunder Ghose did not answer. I stirred him with my right toe and repeated: "Who's your friend?"
He came out of a sort of trance. I don't think that until I touched him he had been conscious of our presence in the room.
"My God!" he exclaimed. "Sahibs, who is he? Very potent person, I believe!"
I approached the stranger and asked him rather curtly who he was and why he had entered unannounced.
"The door was open," he answered.
His voice was not pleasing, but it suggested strength and the last limit of self-confidence. Insolence was only half-veiled.
"What do you know about those two Tibetans in the yard?" I asked.
"They are dead," he answered.
"Who killed them?" growled Narayan Singh.
"They killed themselves."
"Cut their own noses off?" I asked.
"Whatever has been done to them they did long ago when they set in motion causes that produced results," he answered, smiling at me. He had wonderful white teeth, so perfect as almost to look artificial.
Grim came in, looked at the man once and walked across the room toward him.
"Friend or enemy!" he demanded. "Sharp now with your answer! There's been murder. What's your name and business?"
"Is this your house?" asked the stranger. His voice had steel in it.
"The dead men were my servants," Grim said. "Worse for you! They who slew may say you did it! "
"What are you here for?" Grim asked.
"To save you."
"From what!"
"From those who sent Lhaten here. Lhaten was here, wasn't he? I came to find what mischief Lhaten had been doing. Before your Tibetan servants died they told their whole story to those who slew them. They, in turn, told it to me. You wish to find Sham-bha-la-is it not so?"
"No," Grim answered. "That hunt's off."
"I think not," said the stranger.
"My friends and I will track these murderers first," said Grim. "Tibet can wait."
"I think not," our visitor repeated.
"Why not?" Narayan Singh demanded, weighing the automatic in the palm of his right hand, dancing it up and down to call attention to it.
"You befriended the man who was known as Lung-tok," the stranger answered. "Your servants told how he died in your tent near Zogi-la. He told you his story; therefore you know too much. Another also called himself Lung-tok, but there is now no falsehood left in that man and it is known his name is Rait."
"What happened to him?" Grim asked.
"He lives, because he said a man named Ramsden is to follow him. One of you is Ramsden. It is said he shall live until Ramsden comes."
"Who says so? You?"
"They in whose hands he is. I offer to save Ramsden from them."
"How? When?"
"When he goes to rescue Rait."
"Why don't you yourself rescue Rait?" I asked.
"I have nothing to do with Rait, or with those who have caught him," he answered. "They are bad men. So are these, who came by Lhaten's wish to slay your servants. They will slay you, if you stay here or if you turn back, because you know too much, you having heard the story of that man who died in your tent in the Zogi-la. You may only go forward, because that way is simplest."
Chullunder Ghose, his face the color of raw liver from the fear he felt, stepped forward between Grim and me, clutching our arms.
"Sahibs! Sahibs!" he said. "There is a British officer in Leh. Appeal to him!"
"If you do that, you can not save Rait," said the stranger quietly.
"Let Rait die! What does he matter! What proof is there that he is living?" almost screamed Chullunder.
The stranger put his hand into his breast and produced a sheet of paper, folded twice.
"I had this," he said, "from one of those who slew your servants."
He handed the paper to Grim. It was thumbed and dirty, frayed at the corners and greasy with ghee. Grim opened it. Over his shoulder I could see Rait's hand-writing
"Rammy, old top, for God's sake come and rescue me. One of these fellows is friendly and has promised to try to find you. If you receive this, trust the bearer, who will lead you to where I am. Come quickly. They're torturing me. The best way to get me out will be to catch one of their principal men and threaten to kill him unless they exchange. I've begged them to kill me. They refuse, and they won't give me a chance to kill myself. I don't know why. The man who will take this is one of my guards. He will give it to another man, whose name I don't know. Rammy, old top, do hurry! And when you get here use all your brains and muscle—all you have!
