Peter Dickinson - Tulku

‘But you said you weren’t going to have the baby here,’ said Theodore.

‘Course I ain’t – I was just giving you a f’rinstance of how sly old Amchi is. And we got to seem to go along with him, what’s more. One sign we’re trying to scarper and he’ll watch us like a cat at a mousehole. But we’re going to, and we got to start thinking out how straight off, ’cause if we leave it too long all them passes will be blocked with snow, and besides I’m not going swinging across any of them bridges when I’m eight months gone.

‘Now, listen, there’s a lot of things we can try. First off do I tell old Amchi I’m not carrying, after all? I ain’t so sure that’ll work, ’cause I ’spect it ain’t true and he’s got a way of guessing – and once he gets it into his head we ain’t on his side then he’ll keep a tight hold on us – lock us up, I shouldn’t wonder. So I think I won’t say nothing about that for a bit.

‘So, next, we start looking for a different way out. I can do that while I’m off botanizing. I know he told you as the way we come was the only way into this here valley, but he’s quite up to pulling a fast one over something like that, make us think we hadn’t a hope of getting out. Next, you remember what he said about this Tojing bloke being scuppered by traitor monks? I’ll bet there’s one or two of them still about. You don’t get a place like this run all of a piece. There’s all sorts of splits and gangs under the holy surface. I reckon that’s one for you, Lung – you hang around, keep your eyes open, see if anyone seems a bit extra friendly, keep your wits about you. You’ll know him when you meet him, some bloke as asks a lot of little questions and then keeps shying away from the subject . . .’

‘Why will this man help us?’ asked Lung dubiously.

‘Dish old Amchi, of course. There must be a gang here as don’t want him to come up with the new Tulku, go on running things another twenty years. Now look, you won’t have to go hunting around for this bloke, ’cause if he’s there he’ll come to you. All you got to do is be where he can find you. There’s got to be a library, place like this, so why don’t you go scholaring – you’ll like that. Lot of ’em will be shy of you, ’cause of you being Chinese, so I think you’ll know the right bloke when he comes along. Take your time. Act shy. Don’t rush it . . . Now, young Theo, you’ve got to see if you can’t pick up a bit of the lingo. That’s important.’

‘Learn Tibetan? Me? Why?’

‘Because we’re going to need it whatever happens. I’m not laying much odds on me finding a way out of here what we can manage by ourselves. Lung’s got a bit better chance, finding a bloke what’ll help us. But my bet is in the end we’re going to have to buy our way out – find a gang of yak-drivers or blokes like that what’s prepared to risk it, or even some of these escort wallahs that’s supposed to keep an eye on us – that’d be favourite, ’cause they could pretend to take us off botanizing and we might get a whole day’s start – two days, if we make out we’re going right over the far side of the valley so we’ve got to camp out . . . but anyway, Theo, if we’re going to do that we got to be able to talk the lingo. There’s not many peasants as know Chinee, I bet. And even suppose we get out one of the other ways, we’ll still have to do a bit of chit-chat, time to time. Now, I ain’t no good at languages, never have been; and Lung here, well, he’s had plenty practice in English but the way he’s got on don’t give me that much confidence. So it’s up to you . . .’

Her ill temper had gone. It was as though a sulky, dank dawn had been cleared by a driving north wind, lifting doubt and low spirits like dead leaves and making the blood sing. The lines on Lung’s face had hardened and his eyes were sparkling – after the days of dejection this was his soldier-woman come back again. Theodore wanted to laugh, not with mockery but with the same sudden exhilaration.

‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I’ll learn Tibetan.’

The mood lasted while they groomed the horses. They found an old man there who had brought some coarse feed and was now spreading dried fern over the floor of the shed they had been given for a stable. He treated Mrs Jones with awe and tried to prevent her grooming Sir Nigel, but she quickly bent him to her will and made him watch while she showed him exactly how she wanted everything done.

‘Every comfort, you see,’ she said to Theodore. ‘Grooms, stable-boys – if we wanted footmen with white knee-breeches I bet they’d lay them on somehow. I won’t be taking the horses, couple of days at least. They’re fagged out, and it’ll look lots more natural if I start my botanizing close at hand, get the monks used to the idea that’s how I spend my time, before I start off on proper expeditions . . . Ta very much, Theo. Jorrocks here and me can finish off. You go and find some nice monk what wants to teach a kid his own language . . .’

Theodore was hesitating just inside the main gate of the monastery when an old monk came shuffling along the inner wall, automatically twitching a line of little copper cylinders – another sort of prayer-wheel, Theodore guessed – into motion as he passed. They revolved with an erratic thin clinking. He ignored Theodore’s Mandarin greeting, took him by the shoulder, and made gestures towards the southern end of the maze of buildings. Then he himself went shuffling out of the gate. Theodore shrugged, but obediently turned left and began his exploration. (Weeks later he found that the old man had been telling him that one is supposed to move around sacred ground in a clockwise direction – had he realized that at the time, Theodore might well have gone the other way.)

He walked at random through the maze. The monastery was a series of interlocking courtyards, mostly small and irregular, and often at different levels imposed by the underlying mountain. Dark archways, ramps or stairs connected the ground levels, and the upper storey was a second maze of wooden galleries, where the russet-robed monks went to and fro. It was all built of anything that had come to hand, white-washed stone, flaking plaster stuck with cobbles, wood, woven bamboo, tiles, with here and there billowing swags of creeper clothing whole walls. Each courtyard had its own character, like a village; one might be tumbledown and untidy, with a yak tethered against a wall, a dung-pile in one corner, a couple of women pounding something in a tub near by; then, through the next arch Theodore would come out into a smooth-paved rectangle, neat walls hung with banners and all freshly painted since the winter, with a half-formal procession of monks walking across the space, carrying ritual objects.

The exhilaration Mrs Jones had whipped up in him had dwindled by now, but obediently he greeted everyone who seemed free to speak to him. Some smiled, some made signs, some ignored him entirely. He began to realize that the sensible thing would have been to ask Tomdzay to find him a teacher, rather than looking for one at random. Yes. And that would put it off for another day. Perhaps Mrs Jones might even have changed her mind by then . . .

He reached this conclusion just as he came up a shallow ramp to a larger arch than most. Beyond it lay yet another courtyard, but quite different from any he had so far seen. This one was huge. On its further side rose the building with the gold-roofed dome which had dominated the monastery on their first sight of Dong Pe; below that glittering curve and spike was a heavy, plain wall of pale stone, almost undecorated and with no opening except for a pair of large doors which stood wide open. This square black hollow and the slablike wall around it contrasted strongly with the exotic dome, and indeed with all of the rest of the monastery, which seemed to Theodore to have a frilly, tinselly, almost rubbishy quality about it, with the gaudy paintings and the flapping flags and the rows of battered prayer-wheels and the general lack of any obvious plan in its building.