Black Flame (13 page)

They boarded the train at Golmud.

Han Ma put Kelsang in a cage that was then lifted into the baggage car. Instinct told Kelsang to refuse to be put into this narrow space with barely enough room to turn around, yet something else told him to trust his master. He knew he was leaving the plateau, but his life on the grasslands was already so far behind him. The strange thing was he didn't feel afraid or even sentimental. He trusted Han Ma. This young man was more important to him than the plateau.

Kelsang patiently lay down in his cage. The door closed, and the baggage car was plunged into darkness. He didn't see Han Ma for the rest of the journey.

The attendant who came to feed Kelsang was terrified that he might break out of the cage and maul him. Each time he would slide the food and water through a narrow hatch before turning and running, locking the baggage car door as quickly as he could.

Kelsang could only tell when day turned to night and back again by the light that came through the crack under the door. His sense of smell was sharper in the dark, picking up on anything that made it through the crack. He could tell when they were passing a lake, or maybe a forest, by the smell of dampness that greeted his nose. He was especially excited when they pulled into a station, and a whole mix of new and strange smells invaded the baggage car. Each one was cross-referenced against his bank of known scents, providing him with enough entertainment to last for hours once the train was on the move again. He couldn't see the world outside his car, but he knew that it was unusually rich in smells.

They had to change trains twice. People streamed through the crowded platforms, and even though everyone was busy trying to find their train, a glimpse of Kelsang was enough to elicit excited gasps. The passengers would find their seats, stow their luggage, then turn to the other passengers, exclaiming, “I just saw the most enormous dog!” Many journeys over those few days were spent discussing the fine black animal in the cage.

As evening approached, Kelsang entered a dream world where he could return to the pastures of his birth. Once he felt as if he was really clambering to the top of a pile of fleeces, his paws sinking into the softness, until he could keep his balance no longer and tumbled to the ground.

Suddenly a dazzling beam of light flicked across the baggage car. An even larger cage was carried in and placed beside Kelsang's. This is how the nightmare began.

As the first rays of morning light shone through the crack at the bottom of the door, Kelsang saw that the cage beside him contained seven small dogs of a kind he had never seen before. They were slender, with short white fur, so short that the pink of their skin shimmered beneath it, and it was embellished with an even spattering of black spots. Their crystalline black eyes blinked at him, each pair matching the black spots, so that he had to look extremely carefully to distinguish between the two.

Of course, Kelsang couldn't know that ever since the release of
101 Dalmations
people had become obsessed with these cute dogs and had discovered that they made perfect pets. Their value had rocketed accordingly, and so it was that these seven puppies had one day found themselves caged and put on a train on its way to the city, where they would be sold.

But Kelsang didn't give a hoot for these dogs.

Then the puppies began barking. It started with just one of them. Perhaps the cage was too crowded, and one puppy had stepped on another. Or maybe one had been on the receiving end of some misdeed by one of its identical friends, like having its face pressed up against the bars. The others were then somehow infected and began wailing in distress, the sound escalating within moments to a full-blown puppy chorus that filled the baggage car.

Once it started, it didn't stop. The puppies were yelping and wailing. They were so loud that as the train passed through stations along the way, people waiting on the platforms could almost imagine that the dogs inside were having a drunken New Year's party. The puppies had first staged this performance when the door closed on them, and they were left in the dark. Kelsang managed to shut them up, at least temporarily, with a few fierce barks, only to discover seven pairs of fearful eyes staring back at him.

That was the end of Kelsang's authority. After that, no matter how much he barked or crashed against the sides of his cage, the puppies continued to wail. This was an unimaginable torment. Their emotional state was infectious, and he, too, started to find the never-ending darkness unbearable. He began to hate his cage and started thudding against it, walloping against the bars that bore traces of the scents of other animals.

Luckily, he only had to spend a day in the company of the black-and-white spotty dogs. Before they knew it, they arrived at the last stop — Harbin. It was just as well. If the journey had been any longer, Kelsang would have gone mad.

After emerging from the baggage car, Kelsang's excitement to see Han Ma was instantly dampened by what he saw around him. The station was full of people — men, women and children — people with all different smells. Of course, Han Ma and Yang Yan would have preferred to see the wilds of Hoh Xil bustling with antelope.

Kelsang had never in his life seen so many people. The variety of smells made him feel dizzy. He wanted nothing more than to press himself up against his master, and Han Ma tightened his rope. Having Han Ma with him dispelled his desire to bite and tear everything around him.

Kelsang had grown up near the snow-capped mountains of the Tibetan plateau in landscapes that could only be described as imposing and magnificent. But now, looking out at a completely manmade environment, he couldn't help but feel respect. Buildings encased in glass reached up into the sky, their shiny blue skins reflecting its color in the evening sun, just like the snowy peaks. This was the only part of what lay before him that made him feel at home.

“He's probably the first Tibetan mastiff ever to have made it to Harbin, wouldn't you say?” Yang Yan said, lugging his huge backpack.

“Probably,” Han Ma replied.

They threaded their way through the crowds on their way out of the station. How Kelsang would react to all the people thronging at the exit like huddled sheep was anyone's guess.

Kelsang had come to a conclusion while sitting in his cage on the train. A large, energetic dog like him needed plenty of space. Luckily, Yang Yan's family lived in a villa with a huge lawn that the two men believed would make a perfect new home for him.

8

LIFE WITHOUT HAN MA

AFTER THE TIRING
journey, Kelsang was pleased to find that the villa was situated on a large stretch of grass. As soon as his paws touched the soft green carpet, a spasm of pleasure shot through his legs. This was the real stuff — hot mud full of life — so different from the dusty rubber floor of the baggage car. Perhaps because he was distracted, or perhaps just because he was tired, he did not resist when Yang Yan replaced his collar and attached a new set of chains to it. And so it was that Kelsang moved into a luxury residential estate on the banks of the Songhua River in Harbin.

Kelsang sniffed at his kennel and detected the faint trace of another dog. It was all so new and strange. He stared at the long bridge that lay across the river. Since getting off the train at Harbin, he had seen things he never would have encountered had he stayed on the grasslands. On the first day, a train whistled across the bridge, and Kelsang ran toward it, barking. He had seen trains before, of course, but they had been stationary when he had been loaded in and out of baggage cars, and as far as he was concerned, he had essentially been housed in a series of storage rooms.

Yang Yan laughed at Kelsang's childishness. But it only happened once. By the time the second train passed less than an hour later, he merely looked up from where he lay in front of his kennel. Trains were nothing special now.

“Hmm… never thought you'd get used to things so quickly,” Yang Yan said, thinking out loud.

But when the sun set, something happened that Kelsang couldn't have imagined in his wildest dreams. A steamship whistle blew into the silence. Kelsang exploded at the sight of the long, narrow object on the river and watched nervously as it went by, its decks filled with people looking out at the scenery. From the corner of his eye, he caught sight of Yang Yan standing on the balcony, and so he suppressed his instinct to howl — the only way he knew how to express his curiosity, fear and confusion.

The boat and the train were both large and noisy. Everything was so much more complicated than up on the plateau, and he was struggling to process it all. He watched attentively as the boat spurted steam across the surface of the water, now painted a bright red by the setting sun.

Kelsang was adapting well. It was the only way he would survive. This was what enabled mastiffs to live on the Tibetan plateau, what made them able to cope with the lack of oxygen and become an integral part of the grasslands.

Kelsang's life was once again full of firsts — the first time he saw a bicycle outside the gate, his first bus, his first plane. The air was full of new smells, which took a lot of effort to categorize and store, and which he wasn't always successful in placing. He tried to connect all these new experiences with Yang Yan, who had brought him here but now only seemed to appear when he drove his car into the garage at night. He tried to persuade himself that Yang Yan was now his master, and that he must obey this man who always came home with the strong, sharp smell of alcohol.

But Kelsang couldn't make himself respect Yang Yan enough, let alone love him the way he did Han Ma. Kelsang still thought of Han Ma, the young man who had tended his wounds. The concept of “master” had never felt so remote, not since he left the grasslands, and even when he had been with Tenzin, he hadn't really understood what it meant. He had only ever been playing the role that all shepherd dogs are supposed to. He hadn't needed Tenzin.

A week passed and still Han Ma didn't come. Kelsang began to wail in sorrow. Life had lost its meaning. All he did every day was lie in his kennel with the air-conditioning on and stare blankly at the cars that passed by every now and again. In the evenings, he paced, dragging his chains behind him. He drank, and he ate the finest imported dog food that money could buy.

Kelsang hadn't exactly gone mad, but he had taken to barking at the empty street for over half an hour at a time. He fell into a simple, unchanging rhythm, so regular that it made people think they were listening to the turning cogs of a machine. For Kelsang, being trapped on these grounds was just like being tied up on the mountain. The only difference was that he now had an air-conditioned kennel that provided him with a cool breeze in the scorching heat.

Occasionally, Yang Yan would take Kelsang for a walk, but it was only so that he could show him off. The walks went no way toward satisfying Kelsang's desire to exercise. In order to get some relief, he'd pull on his chains and pounce on imaginary enemies. The green grass in front of his kennel was quickly torn up as though a horse had galloped over it.

When Kelsang went out with Yang Yan, he was shocked to discover that there were a great many dogs in the neighborhood. He couldn't imagine how they had possibly grown up here. Some of them looked like balls of fur. Others were sturdy, with extremely short hair. Kelsang was particularly intrigued by a Shar-Pei, its gray skin folded into deep wrinkles around its face as though it carried all the world's worries. Yang Yan pulled him past, but he still kept turning around to look at it, attempting to find its eyes hidden among the folds of skin.

Han Ma usually came to visit once a fortnight. These days were grand occasions, almost like holidays for Kelsang. He could detect Han Ma's footsteps from two hundred yards away, and he would leap out of his kennel in excitement and stand staring at the main gate. When Han Ma appeared, he would start jumping and yapping, and when he left, Kelsang wailed mournfully, already waiting for his return.

Kelsang was developing a real sense of time and somehow began to know instinctively when two weeks had passed. On days when Yang Yan found him spinning in circles in front of his kennel, looking up every now and then in the direction of the gate, he knew it must be Sunday — the day Han Ma was due to visit.

You could say that the reason Kelsang left the villa was because a dog shouldn't have such an accurate body clock. For some reason, three months after his arrival, there was a three-week period in which Han Ma didn't come. Kelsang thought he heard his master's footsteps a few times one week, but the repeated disappointment turned him to hysterical barking and made him violent. His teeth began to itch, so strong was his desire to bite into something. In fact, the desire to sink his teeth into hot flesh swallowed up everything else.

One evening, as the sky grew dark, Yang Yan took Kelsang for a walk. He didn't notice any particular change in the dog, who pulled at the leash as he always did. A successful young businessman was taking his mastiff to the local square and would then go back to his beautiful house. They walked around the patch of neatly trimmed grass in the square. Everything was as usual, right up until the sudden appearance of a Great Dane, that is.

Kelsang already knew about this dog. Sometimes, when he was barking on the lawn, he heard the sound of another dog barking along with him. It was a terrible bark, like someone striking a metal bucket with a stick. The noise alone told Kelsang that it came from an enormous dog.

The dog was indeed large, with black and white spots and pointy ears. It was being led by a plump man, who had obviously taken great care in raising it. Its long limbs raised it half a head above Kelsang. It was strong and arrogant, with a glossy coat.

The desire for a fight had been building up in Kelsang, yet he didn't much feel like stirring up trouble. The Great Dane slowed as it caught sight of him and stared suspiciously. As the distance between them narrowed, it tried to run at Kelsang, pulling tight on its studded leash.

The Great Dane had fought a German shepherd and a Doberman, winning each time, thanks to its considerable size. As if showing off, the plump man didn't pull on the leash, but loosened it instead. The Great Dane galloped up to Kelsang like a small horse and tore into his hind leg.

Tibetan mastiffs are particularly skilled at staying calm in an attack. Kelsang had already smelled the Great Dane's agitated scent and seen its tail pointing up in the air like a stick. He knew an attack was coming, and he was prepared for it. The only thing preventing him from acting was the fact that Yang Yan had subconsciously pulled tight on his leash. Despite this, Kelsang used his right shoulder to slam into his attacker. The Great Dane gained no advantage by attacking first.

Great Danes must have mastiff genes. When Genghis Khan defeated Europe, his army had with them a second army of Tibetan mastiffs. And so it was that the Mongols brought these fine dogs to Europe. Of course, this Great Dane couldn't know that the dog it faced had even purer blood flowing in his veins than it did.

Loosening the leash was a trick that the plump man used regularly. He made it look as if he was letting go by accident. The Doberman had had his ear torn, and the prize-winning German shepherd could never race again as a direct result of this underhanded trick. But the Great Dane's clumsy lurch forward was really only enough to make a smaller dog lose its balance and its chance to retaliate. There was no greater skill to it than that. Kelsang, however, thought the Great Dane was about to attack his master, and with one firm tug he freed his chains from Yang Yan's hand.

The first clash. They were evenly matched, but the Great Dane was standing in a stronger position, and Kelsang nearly lost his balance. Kelsang changed his tactics. His experience on the streets of Lhasa told him not to be too rash. When it came to size, he was no match for the Great Dane. In the second clash, the Great Dane trundled forward like a fully loaded truck, and Kelsang dodged it. Being so large, it couldn't change direction very quickly, and so Kelsang took the opportunity to sink his teeth into the other dog's shoulder. It ripped open like a piece of paper and seemed to detach from the rippling muscles underneath.

The Great Dane turned, howling in pain, and lunged at Kelsang again. Once more Kelsang took advantage of his nimbler frame and evaded the attack. But he wasn't going to give the Great Dane another chance, and he tore into its neck. Momentum propelled Kelsang forward, and he nearly lost his balance but recovered it just in time. His jaw muscles were powerful, and his teeth snapped the exposed vein in the other dog's neck.

The Great Dane seemed to want to keep fighting, but it could no longer support the weight of its own body. It fell, blood pouring from its wound. Kelsang kept his teeth firmly lodged in its neck. He had finally found a way to release the anger he felt over missing Han Ma. He shook his head but still didn't let go of the limp dog, all 175 pounds of it hanging from his mouth. Kelsang couldn't hear Yang Yan's shouting. Instead he narrowed his eyes and tried to imagine that he was reliving his triumphs against wolves up on the grasslands and the fights he had had against the dogs of Lhasa.

Finally, Kelsang threw the Great Dane's body to the ground. It was most definitely dead. He narrowed his red eyes under his dishevelled mess of fur and stared at the people who had gathered around. The plump man didn't dare make a sound. The hair on the back of Kelsang's neck flopped back down, and dragging his clanking chains with him, he made off in the direction of Yang Yan's house.

Yang Yan called after him, but Kelsang ignored his master. It took a scream loud enough to shatter glass to make Kelsang turn around and stare coldly at him, the hair on his neck standing on end again. Yang Yan swallowed what remained of his shout.

The crowd burst into laughter, despite having witnessed such ferocity. The plump man seemed to draw comfort from the crowd's reaction, and without checking whether his dog was really dead, said to Yang Yan, “What are you going to do, Mister? That was a purebred Great Dane.”

By the time Yang Yan returned home, completely flustered, Kelsang was already lying in front of his kennel with his eyes closed, as if nothing had happened. Yang Yan edged toward him, concerned that Kelsang might still be agitated by the fight, but his expression was unusually calm. He wasn't going to jump at Yang Yan's outstretched hand.

Kelsang had finally given vent to his anger, and yet he still couldn't feel any love for the man standing before him. Even as he had been launching himself at the Great Dane, he hadn't been sure if he was doing it to protect Yang Yan or just to let out his frustration and hurt. Of course, protecting his master was an instinct that he couldn't be rid of, but he just couldn't love this man. He missed Han Ma more than ever. It was he who had cut him free from his collar. The thought made his neck tickle.

Yang Yan's voice was thick with hatred as he chained Kelsang up again. “Nice one. I lost twenty thousand
yuan
because of you. But don't worry. I'll find a nice new home for you.”

Kelsang ignored him, still deep in his own world. This irritated Yang Yan even more. The dog had paid no attention to his commands in front of all those people. He had been powerless. He didn't care about the money, but he couldn't stand such an arrogant, willful dog.