Prayer of the Dragon (30 page)

As Shan reached his friend he caught several wary glances in his own direction. He had not changed his clothes since he’d been attacked. His pants were torn at the knee, his shirt mottled with dried blood. He drew Hostene into the shadows, calming him, hoping none of the Tibetans had paid attention to his urgent words in Chinese about an American woman.

Gao went out into the sparse crowd now, passing out small-denomination notes, asking softly about a woman who had become separated from a mountain-climbing party after an accident and might be seeking transport to Lhasa.

Too late Shan saw the gray uniforms among the throng of men at the disabled bus. The Public Security officers, often called knobs for the ornaments on their shoulders, were led by a man who, though middle-aged and overweight, had the sharp predatory eyes of every knob Shan had ever known. The officer’s steely gaze fell on Yangke and Shan. With a hand on the radio at his belt he approached. Yangke sank helplessly onto a bench.

Suddenly, Gao was at Shan’s side, thrusting a dark brown souvenir sweatshirt into his hands. XIZANG, it said in gold letters— Western Storehouse, the Chinese name for Tibet—arranged in an arc over overlapping images of a mountain, a yak, and a truck. Shan turned it inside out and pulled it over his soiled, torn shirt. He was heading for Yangke when he froze, every instinct sounding alarms. The station had nearly emptied. The dumpling vendor sat as if paralyzed, knuckles white on the rim of her bucket. The wall behind her began changing colors—dirty brown, then dirty blue, then brown, then blue. He overcame his paralysis to take another step as Hostene was guided by a knob to Yangke’s side, then he felt a firm grip on his lower arm. He did not speak, could not speak, as another knob led him to a bench and pushed him down.

“You can’t take them!” The words, meant as a shout, emerged from Shan’s throat like a moan. With a patient, businesslike air the knob at his side withdrew a baton from his belt. The sight of the weapon sent a new ripple along Shan’s ribs. He could not take another beating, not now, not without the risk of injuries that could force him off his feet for days.

Yangke and Hostene offered no resistance as they were manacled together and led into the prisoner wagon that waited, blue lights flashing, at the front of the station. Shan struggled to his feet, his wrists in front of him, to accept manacles. Then, when none were presented, he staggered toward the wagon. He had caused this. He had to be with them. But the knob at his side grabbed him again, pulling him back, as the doors of the van closed. The last thing Shan saw inside was Hostene, pressing his sacred feather against his forehead.

Chapter Ten

SHAN COLLAPSED ONTO a bench as the prisoner wagon sped away, disappearing in the direction of the government center. There would be holding cells in its basement—dim, damp places with insects and mold and dark, ominous stains on the walls. The two men had come to Tashtul because of Shan’s wishes and now they would be photographed, fingerprinted, and sprayed with disinfectant. Then the knobs would begin their entertainment.

Gradually he became aware of his surroundings, of people filing back into the station, of the girl hawking her dumplings in an unsteady voice, of the first set of knobs who had been in the station going to their car, then driving slowly down the road, of Gao sitting on a bench across the street, calmly reading a copy of the
Lhasa Daily
.

“Yangke won’t have a chance,” he said as he lowered himself onto the bench beside Gao. “Once they discover he was ejected from a monastery they will be like dogs fighting over fresh meat.” Shan spied something at Gao’s feet. Hostene’s pack.

“They overlooked it,” Gao said.

Shan unzipped the front pocket and saw the American’s passport. “Without this they’ll assume he is one of the old Tibetans. You know what that means.” Hostene would become part of the Ax to Root campaign. They called the special reeducation camps for such men sausage grinders, for the way so many types of Tibetans were thrown into them, only to emerge two or three years later, unrecognizable, in neat homogeneous forms. “Or else he will start speaking Navajo and they’ll declare him crazy. They’ll feed him through a slot in a cell door for the rest of his life.”

Gao gestured to a brown sedan that had pulled to a stop at the curb. A short, stout Chinese man in a blue cardigan sweater and white shirt climbed out of the driver’s seat, offered Gao a quick bow, and opened the rear door. Gao rose and, taking Hostene’s bag, stepped into the car then waited with the door open. It took nearly a minute for Shan to decide to join him.

For much of the drive Shan’s eyes were fixed on the central structure of the town, its front clad in faux marble, as he made quick calculations. How fast could he reach the basement of the building if he leaped out of the car? How long would it take Yangke and Hostene to be processed before they were thrown into the cells and the torment began? Where could he flee with them if he could somehow effect their escape? He was responsible for them, and, blinded by everything except the need to help Abigail and Lokesh and Gendun, he had led them into a trap. He had trusted Gao and now Yangke and Hostene were paying for his mistake.

“On my very first day of training as a physicist,” Gao declared, “my professor, an elderly Russian, told me, ‘Never trust reality.’ He wrote it on the chalkboard in Chinese and Russian. ‘You will spend the next few years learning that the reality you have always experienced is a myth,’ he said. ‘You will spend the rest of your lives proving that all the important forces of the universe are unreal.’ ” Gao gazed from the car at the banner floating above the government center.

Shan studied the famed scientist, perplexed by Gao’s interest in the black-and-red banner that fluttered over the government center. “I wasn’t thinking about physics. I was thinking about birds,” Shan said.

“Birds?”

“Your lammergeiers. Karl, Friedrich, Albert. Their names say it all.”

Gao carefully folded the newspaper. “I don’t understand.”

“I think you do. Famous theoreticians. They never had to be accountable for the terrible effects of their words and their equations, never had to act in the real world. You’re going to have to choose, Gao.”

The scientist did not respond. He stared out the window for the rest of the ride.

They arrived at a tidy two-story building that consisted of two traditional Tibetan houses that had been joined together with stuccoed walls. SNOW LEOPARD CULTURAL NOVELTIES INC. proclaimed a small sign over the central entry.

“Kohler,” Shan guessed.

“A joint enterprise,” Gao explained. “He is managing director, but we are equal owners.”

A sober well-dressed Chinese matron, introduced as the office manager, met them at the door and escorted them through a hallway lined with shelves full of figurines in porcelain, clay, bronze, and brass. Fat laughing Buddhas. Yaks, some wearing comical expressions. The Potola Palace. Camels. Mythical garuda birds. Tibetan goddesses.

They arrived at a simply furnished office in the front of one of the joined houses, where a tea tray awaited them. Shan poured out two cups as Gao conferred with the woman, who wiped tears from her eyes as she spoke. He studied the office. A framed certificate hung above a desk, testifying to the registration of the company ten years earlier. On another wall was a map with pins inserted in over thirty cities, inside and outside China, including half a dozen in India. Framed photographs stood on a small table. Kohler, with a dozen workers posed in front of the building, apparently at some kind of company celebration. Gao with Kohler, ceremonially shaking hands behind a table spread with two dozen different types of figurines. Kohler in front of the Taj Mahal. Kohler on a white sand beach with a woman in a very brief swimming suit. Several photos featured Thomas, spanning a period from when he was perhaps twelve years of age to the recent past. In one, the boy held four figurines of bronze in his hand.

“He designed those,” Gao explained over his shoulder. “It was the first run out of the little foundry Heinz installed last year. Thomas would always spend a week or two here each summer.”

Through the window Shan saw the woman trot to the car, where she spoke to the driver, then got in. A moment later the sedan sped away, back toward town.

“Where is Heinz?” Shan asked.

“Lhasa. When I called him on the satellite phone to say Abigail was with us in the mountains he was about to come back but he received word that there was some trouble with a shipment. He decided to take care of it before returning, to avoid the need for a trip later. We spoke again when . . . after Thomas left. Now he’s also making arrangements for Thomas’s body, which rests in the morgue here.”

Shan poured himself more tea as Gao sorted through papers on the desk. Through the window, in the distance, dimly outlined against the cobalt sky, he could make out the low ranges that led to Sleeping Dragon Mountain. “Where does the trail emerge from the mountains?” he asked.

“It branches into three forks as it approaches the town, following different streams. There are farmers living along each fork. Abigail will be seen by someone.”

“You need to speak with them,” Shan stated. “I am going to Public Security.”

“The driver is asking the farmers now. And the worst thing you could do for your friends would be to go to the government center.”

Shan searched Gao’s face, trying to decide if his words were meant as a threat. “Then there is somewhere else we must visit,” he announced, and bent near Gao’s ear to speak in a low voice. Gao called for the office manager.

SHAN EXPECTED CHODRON’S Tashtul home to be a small apartment, perhaps even an assigned room in a government guest quarters, not an ample bungalow at the edge of town. It was larger than the headman’s home in Drango village, with well-tended flower gardens surrounding it. Two bicycles leaned against a railing of painted metal pipes that flanked the concrete walkway to the door.

Gao declined with a shake of his head as Shan got out of the car and gestured toward the house. Shan ventured up the walkway, studying the house, trying to assess what he would find inside, worried about the two bicycles. The house was of simple, new construction, a beige-painted block with brown metal shutters. The front windows were covered with curtains. The glass panes in the door displayed decals of flowers and panda bears.

There was no answer when he knocked. He tried the doorknob, found the door unlocked, and stepped inside.

The lining of Chodron’s Tashtul nest was far more luxurious than its modest exterior. The spacious sitting room Shan stood in held four upholstered chairs and two sofas, arrayed around a lush sculptured carpet to face a unit on the wall holding a large television set and other electronic equipment, and shelves of videos and discs.

Fast-paced music came from a room down a dim corridor, a Western instrumental featuring saxophones, drums, and electric guitars. He should flee, a voice inside him shouted. He would be unable to help Hostene and Yangke if he were thrown into the same cell. Instead, he went farther, reaching a dining area with chrome-framed chairs surrounding a table rimmed with carved lotus flowers. The kitchen counter bore an array of small appliances he could not name. It was not the house of a Tibetan family. Behind the dining table, opposite the kitchen, was a half-open door that led to a room that seemed to be half office, half storage area. Along one wall were cardboard cartons bearing labels for various electronic devices. Beyond them was a desk on which stood a radio similar to that which he had seen Chodron use in Drango. Over the desk, pinned to the wall, was a collection of name tags bearing Chodron’s name, with legends identifying Party gatherings, some with clips, some on lanyards.

Shan began opening drawers, quickly passing over one that contained office supplies, another brimming with personal items like disposable razors, skin cream, unused wallets, and packages of breath mints. He paused over one that was crammed with file folders and settled upon two files and a ledger book from the bottom drawer, whose separate lock yielded to the careful levering motion of a letter opener. When he had read through them he reentered the dining room and gazed upon the riches of the house. In his mind’s eye he saw Gendun lying prostrate in Chodron’s village, his limbs shaking from nerve damage. Shan started at a noise from the rear of the house. Through the kitchen window he saw an old Tibetan hoeing weeds in a bed along the wall.

At the kitchen sink Shan washed his hands and face. He quickly explored the closet by the front door, then grabbed a hanger that bore a dark suit and a gray shirt inside in a plastic cleaner’s bag. In the office he stuffed the sweatshirt Gao had bought for him behind a box, threw on the shirt and the suit jacket, and pulled the trousers, far too loose to fit properly, over his own tattered pants, fastening them at the back with a spring clamp. He grabbed a lanyard from which a name tag was suspended, selected the thinnest of the wallets, and hastily worked with a rubber band and paper clips. Before leaving the office he retrieved the letter opener, unscrewed the back cover of the radio, and pried several components away from their fittings before replacing the cover.

SHE WA S I N her midthirties, taller than Chodron, with the strong, full features of a Manchurian. Still dripping from her bath, she wore only white briefs, her long hair covering her breasts. She did not raise the towel she held, did not even seem to breathe when she discovered Shan sitting facing her at the end of the dining table, his hands folded over the ledger and files in front of him.

Shan had chosen the chair by window, with the glare of daylight behind him. Chodron’s gray suit jacket was only slightly too large in the shoulders. He had blocked the view of his feet with a briefcase, knowing his tattered boots would betray him in an instant. But he need not have worried for the woman’s gaze remained on the little black leather folder hanging from the lanyard around his neck.

He opened the top file and lifted a pencil from the table. “Let’s start with your name,” he said in a level voice. He had spent twenty years on this side of the interrogator’s table.

The woman’s mouth opened and shut several times but no words came out.

“Get dressed,” Shan instructed, the weary impatience of a senior official in his tone. “Get a glass of water. Get a chair.”

Chodron’s mistress was named Jiling. She worked in the municipal affairs office and was responsible for census data and the distribution of funds to the county’s villages. Chodron had found the perfect partner. Now Shan understood how he was able to function in an official capacity in an unofficial village.

“I don’t know you. Are you from Lhasa?” Jiling asked after his first quick round of questions. She had chosen to wear an austere dark blue suit. She took back her identity card when Shan finished with it and kept it in her hand. “I saw the banner,” she said in a hoarse whisper.

“I am from Beijing.”

The woman slumped.

“Cooperate now and you may not hear from us again.”

“I don’t know anything.”

“You have already told me you are involved in the administration of the villages in this county.”

Jiling looked down at her identity card. “It is a big county,” she observed, beginning her defense.

“Surely you know the penalty for misappropriation and misal-location of public funds.”

The color drained from her face. Executions were almost always public events in China, but the ones that were given the most publicity, that sometimes filled entire stadiums, were those of corrupt officials.

“I have over a hundred villages—”

Shan cut her off with a wave of his hand. “There is a saying in English—If a tree falls in the woods and no one is there to hear it, does it make a sound?”

“I don’t—I don’t understand.”

“If villagers don’t exist, are their tax payments considered public funds?” He gestured toward the opulent furnishings of the sitting room. “If we have to continue this after today’s visit, you will be required to provide receipts for everything in this house, with the source of payment for each.”