Beyond the Summit (47 page)

She read it over and over, memorizing every word and knew that it was true. Dorje would always be a part of her in this life and any that followed.

His older son lying wrapped in a bag on the ground, Mingma gently lifted Beth to her feet and held her in one arm and Nima in the other, both children crying. He had lost his wife and watched two small boys go away, lost Nimputi and his daughters, and lost his livelihood. Through it all, he had tried to remain strong, but this was more than he could endure. While knowing death was a critical part of the cycle of birth, death, and rebirth, Mingma didn’t want to let go of the son he had just found again. Beth seemed so fragile as if the life had poured out of her. After walking her to the dining tent, he joined Nima and Pemba to grieve in private. Worried about his son’s untimely death, Mingma feared Dorje’s ghost would become a
shrindi
wandering and waiting to be dispatched to heaven or one several hells. Some ghosts were simply lost and roamed about unaware that they were dead, but others became malignant spirits causing much trouble.

“We must do everything we can to help your brother reach a favorable rebirth,” he told Nima. Pemba and I will leave at sunrise with Dorje to prepare his funeral before it is too late. Follow soon with Beth and the Americans who treat her so kindly.” As Nima agreed, his mournful face reminded Mingma that his younger son was also grieving. In a softer voice he added, “And sleep in warm houses on your way down. You know Sherpa doors are always open.”

At sunrise, Pemba loaded all the expedition supplies he had bargained for, the tents, and bedding. The fourth yak bore Dorje’s wrapped corpse and the fifth would carry the personal gear of Beth, Nima, and the three Americans. The sirdar had already left to hire additional porters to break camp.

Mingma knew he must put away his sorrow for now and direct all efforts toward helping Dorje’s spirit. Immediately upon reaching Namche, he sent for a lama to properly dispatch Dorje to his next life. The lama arrived in a sleeveless, magenta cassock wrapped over a gold, high-collared brocade shirt and tied with a sash at the waist. While pulling a few hairs from Dorje’s head to create an opening for his spirit (
sem
) to depart, he recited prayers to help send it to the heaven of boundless light. Consulting his astrological charts, the lama announced that the most auspicious time for disposing of the body was three days hence and it should be cremated facing east.

The initial ceremony concluded, a man from the village prepared Dorje by wrapping him completely in a white cloth and then tying him in a seated position in front of a temporary altar. Behind him stood six
torma
dough cakes coated with colored, melted butter and decorated to represent deities to whom the lama prayed to relieve Dorje of the burden of sin. While reciting from the
Tibetan Book of the Dead,
the lama prepared the
sem
to travel through the after-death state that lasted 49 days. Speaking directly to Dorje, he instructed him not to be afraid of the startling, horrific deities he will encounter but to know they have come to protect and lead him to one of the six spheres of the wheel of life.

When Beth and Nima arrived the following afternoon, Mingma sent for the Khunde doctor to explain Sherpa rituals to her. While lamas chanted solemn recitations accompanied by drums, the clash of cymbals, and blowing of a thighbone trumpet, friends and family came to express sympathy and make offerings to Dorje. They placed flasks of
chang
on a table before him to be consumed later by all present.

Watching Beth sitting stone faced and silent, an object of great curiosity to all, Mingma wondered what she was thinking. How did she feel? He had no way of communicating with her other than the tone of his voice and softness in his eyes. Rarely moving from the window bench, she remained the full two days and nights with Nima ever at her side. On the final day, Shanti arrived swollen with Mingma’s grandchild. When she dropped to her knees crying before Dorje, he glanced at Beth wondering if she knew and decided that she must. But instead of anger or jealousy, Beth’s face expressed sympathy.

Nima interrupted his thoughts. “Father, I’ve decided to use my rights as the younger brother. I will marry Shanti and take care of Dorje’s child so I can always feel him with me.”

While relieved because the marriage could take place without the necessity of another expensive
sodene
or
dem-chang,
Mingma worried that his younger son might not experience the passion he and Dorje had felt in their love. “Is there no one else, someone you love?”

“No one I can have,” Nima murmured with downcast eyes.

When Shanti rose and saw Beth, her face changed from grief to bewilderment. Mingma quickly asked Nima, “Have you spoken to her of this?”

“No, but I will do so now,” he said and strode across the room, a boy about to become a man.

At sunrise the morning of Dorje’s cremation, a thighbone trumpet announced the funeral procession leaving Mingma’s house that was led by a young lama carrying a prayer flag. Following him were other lamas and a man carrying the corpse still wrapped in white cloth for the journey. Long, telescoping
dung-chens
droned a death dirge reverberating through the hills as the procession climbed the highest ridge to place Dorje on a pyre close to the sky. Walking slowly, lamas recited from a book showing the path to Devachen, the heaven of Sherpa belief. Only Mingma and a few helpers who would prepare the fire and tend to the lamas’ needs accompanied them. This was all that custom required. Hoping Beth would understand, Mingma asked the Khunde doctor to explain she must remain behind because women never attended cremations.

Setting Dorje aside for a moment, the lamas prepared a temporary altar made of stones arranged in two tiers and covered with a yak wool blanket. They placed the six
tormas
from inside the house on the upper row and ritual items on the lower one. Playing cymbals, trumpets, and drums, they began more recitations while helpers carried Dorje to the pyre and undressed him. After attaching pieces of paper containing prayers to seven parts of his body and placing an imprint of the wheel of life above his head, they placed him on the pyre in a seated position surrounded by logs covered with juniper branches. The senior lama gave Dorje’s
sem
the necessary direction and motivation to move to the next stage by saying he must give up all thought and attachments to this life because he no longer belonged to this earth. He must go happily to the next world and not trouble the living as a restless
shrindi.
As the lamas resumed their chanting, helpers lit the funeral pyre from the four cardinal corners. While the fire burned, they fed the flames with offerings of grain, grass, butter, honey, and small sticks.

Watching the fire slowly consume his son’s body, Mingma prayed that Dorje would have a favorable rebirth. Much depended on the merit and karma accumulated in his lifetime, but friends and family could assist in earning more during the 49-day transitional period between death and reincarnation, the
bardo.
For this, Mingma would go in debt for many years paying lamas to repeat a sacred text at least 1,000 times and financing the final distribution of food and money to all the surrounding villagers. Fortunately, Pemba had offered to donate the supplies he purchased at Base Camp and Droma Sunjo would prepare rice balls, butter, and
chang.
Each item accepted by a villager or any stranger passing through earned
sönam
for Dorje's reincarnation occurring on the 49
^th
day

When the pyre burned down, Mingma returned home for the final
narpa
rites where a lama called upon Dorje to present himself on a name card and remain there until directed where to go. At the conclusion of the long ritual, the lama sent him to Devachen and then dipped the name card in melted butter and lit it. From then on, Dorje’s name would never be mentioned again lest his
sem
be confused and believe he was still alive, thus hindering his transition to the next life. Even though Mingma would never utter the word
Dorje
again, his son would remain forever in his heart and thoughts. With Nima married to Shanti, Mingma could smother his grandchild with the love circumstances had denied his own children

Two days after the cremation, Beth said she must return home. Having grown to love her like a daughter, Mingma didn’t want her to leave, but he understood there was no place for her here. Needing to remain in Namche until the end of the
bardo,
he couldn’t accompany her to Lukla but the Americans had waited to make the two-day trek with her. With Marty already in Kathmandu for frostbite treatment, Mingma and Nima walked to the village edge with Beth, Mark, and Sean. His fingers trembling and his insides weeping, Mingma placed a silk
kata
around her neck, bowed with his hands together, and whispered, “Namaste.”

“Namaste,” she replied with moisture forming at the corners of her eyes like drops of morning dew. When she grabbed him in a long, tight hug, he stroked her beautiful, silky hair and kissed her forehead, fighting desperately to reign in his own tears. After hugging Nima who couldn’t contain his sorrow, Beth turned and headed out of their lives forever.

The trip back to Lukla was worse than Beth feared. Memories of Dorje ambushed her at every turn in the trail. She saw him helping the old ladies over the bridge, skiing down a muddy hill, explaining the meaning of the prayer flags, advising them to walk to the left of mani stones. His presence was so strong, she kept hearing him whisper, “I love you,” and feeling his breath on her cheek. Too often she took her eyes from the trail to search for him and lost her footing. Only Mark kept her from falling over the edge emotionally and physically. Every moment alone, she re-read Dorje’s letter
promising they would be together in this life and all those that follow. Accepting his faith, she would hold onto it forever.

Sitting in the twin otter at Lukla, Beth remembered a Sherpa in a green hat that said SKI VAIL competing in a hand jive with an American wearing socks that didn’t match. And something stirred deep inside her. As the small plane sped down the runway to lift off just before reaching the cliff, she pressed her face to the window, looking behind her, certain that Dorje was calling her back. Tears filmed the glass as the plane rose over giant ridge systems stretching in all directions and steep hills scored by deep gullies. As the ice-clad mountains filling the horizon to the north slowly disappeared, the finality of Dorje’s death cut an immense hole inside, leaving her raw and bleeding.

“Are you all right?” Mark asked when she threw her head back and closed her eyes, biting her lips.

“No,” she whispered, trembling.

“I understand but you will be in time,” he said touching her arm. “You’re a beautiful, intelligent, desirable woman with your whole life ahead.”

While she and the Americans waited two days in Kathmandu for the next flight out, Beth strolled the streets she had visited the first time here with Eric. Poor man. She hadn’t thought of him in weeks. Where was he now, still in Nam, still alive? Or had she sent him off to die too? Unable to deal with such thoughts now, she shoved them from her mind. Perhaps when she was back home, they would talk and discover each other again.

Entering Freak Street where flower children existed on pies and hash, she looked for the woman with pale green eyes and delicate mouth. “The cause of all human suffering is desiring what we can’t have,” the woman had told her. “To become truly awake like Buddha, we must be unflappable and accept whatever comes along as part of a divine and perfect universe.” Beth had fought all morning to keep from crying but grief was a powerful force. Sinking to the curb, she wept trying to understand how Dorje’s death was part of a divine and perfect universe. It didn’t make sense. None of it did right now. Maybe when she got back home, things would become clearer, but the pain would never disappear. It had crept into every pore.

On board the plane, Mark and Sean were seated across the aisle. Beth was next to the window with an elderly woman beside her, the veins in her aging arms as fine as the tracery in a leaf. Twenty minutes into the air, the captain announced, “Ladies and Gentlemen, those of you seated on the left now have your last view of the majestic Himalayas and their crown jewel, Mount Everest.”

When the mountains were out of sight, the woman leaned back against her seat. “You’re a long way from home, dear. Are you here all alone?”