Soul of the Fire (32 page)

Shan struggled to keep despair from his voice. “No,” he said. “They are in you, and Tserung, and the others here. You are the vessels of the Yamdrok gods.”

Dolma offered a melancholy smile and turned back to her work.

In the hands of his uncle, the rake on the gravel no longer uttered a prayer. It trembled in his hands and shrieked against stones. For months after the temple was destroyed, the old man had still taken ten-year-old Shan there, telling his father they were just going to the park to watch kites. The priests were gone—some killed by a mob of young communists, others shipped to labor camps. The temple had been annihilated. Only the stone garden remained, and a handful of old men and women did what they could to maintain it. His uncle no longer spoke of the communists as children who would soon exhaust themselves. He no longer spoke much at all, just solemnly raked the gravel until the sound grated on Shan's nerves. Sometimes groups of Young Pioneers, fledgling Party members, would throw rotten vegetables at them. Shan would then lead the old man into a grove of trees, where he would brace him against a tree and recite verses of the
Tao Te Ching
for him. It was the only thing that could summon a spark into the vacant eyes of the tormented former professor. They had burned all his books and roasted his precious pigeons in front of him.

“I was wrong, Shan,” he confessed one day. “They are not going to leave. They just cast us adrift in an ocean of sorrow. You have to remember the old ways, boy. You are our only hope.”

Suddenly a stone struck Shan's shoulder.

“You did this!” one of the men by the rubble pile shouted at Shan. “Interfering with our lives!” He threw another stone that bit into Shan's knee. “No one asked you here!”

“Bastard!” screeched a woman standing by one of the surviving junipers.

Another stone came, and another. Shan froze, letting the stones hit him as the truth of their terrible words sank in. Pao had learned of Shan's prying into his affairs, discovered that he caused the adjournment of the Commission's urgent business, and knew of his fierce loyalty to the old Tibetans. The chapel was gone because of Shan's defiance.

Suddenly an old man in a tattered felt vest leapt in front of another flying stone.

“Lokesh!” Shan cried as his friend blocked another stone, then another, letting them hit him instead of Shan. A second man with a grizzled chin appeared, holding a broomstick, and deftly hit the next rock back at the angry woman who had thrown it. It glanced off her arm, and one of the other women laughed. A stone flew in another direction, and Shan saw Tuan, standing by one of the junipers now, duck and then retreat into the orchard.

Shan seemed to watch from a distance as Lokesh and Tserung defused the tension. He found himself short of breath. The despair that had seized him was crushing him. If he had kept away, Yamdrok would still have its precious, irreplaceable chapel. The scar inflicted by Pao would always be on the ground before him. The scar would always be on Shan's heart.

He let himself be led away by Dolma and became vaguely aware that they were approaching the couple's farmhouse. He found himself before the altar, and after several minutes, realized Lokesh and Tserung were at his side. The two old men lifted him, half carrying him to a pallet where Dolma waited with a cup of her special tea.

He awoke in the evening, lying along the wall, a blanket thrown over him. Through a warm haze, he saw the three old Tibetans in the kitchen alcove, drinking tea and energetically chatting. He lay still for several more minutes, relishing the domestic warmth and the anticipation of joining them, knowing that at least here, he would be welcomed. Finally he braced himself up on his elbows and was about to rise when he noticed an out-of-place object that had rolled up against the wall near his head. He reached out and lifted it, confused. It was a battery cell. A battery cell, though Dolma and Tserung had nothing electric in their house. He dropped it behind the pallet, then stretched and sat up, the aches in his arms and legs reminding him of how Lokesh and Tserung had taken blows themselves to protect him.

As he stood, Dolma gestured him toward a fourth cup on the low table. Shan was halfway across the room when someone struck the door. It was not a knock, but a frantic hammering. Dolma inched the door open, then stepped back in alarm, letting it swing open.

“You have to come!” Tuan said to Shan in a frightened voice. “You have to come now.” Beyond the Religious Affairs officer, waiting in the street, was a uniformed knob. “He is here.”

The three black utility vehicles seemed to take up all of Yamdrok's central square. A squad of knobs was photographing the buildings and people, forcing the terrified inhabitants to hold up their identity cards below their chins as they were captured on Public Security cameras. Tuan offered no explanation, just opened the door of the center vehicle, which was longer and more luxurious than the other two.

The interior was thick with cigarette smoke. Deputy Secretary Pao motioned Shan to the broad leather seat as Tuan shut the door and climbed into the front.

“Comrade Commissioner, I like you,” Pao began. A folding tray had been built into the back of the driver's seat, and on it was a laptop computer, a pack of cigarettes, and a satellite phone. “An independent thinker like myself. A man of action like myself.” He closed the computer and leaned closer. “You return from a mysterious trip to the north, and suddenly Sung has a video of my embarrassing behavior last spring. The bastard wants to play the game. I admire him for that. And you gave it to him. You played him like a puppet. Do you deny it?”

Shan glanced at the door beside him, trying to see if it was locked.

“No denial?” Pao flashed a smile, showing his perfect teeth. “Good. You encourage me. You're a man who knows that the most important messages are sent without words, again like myself.” To emphasize his point, he gestured to the soldiers in the square.

“Surely tearing down their chapel was enough.”

Pao's smile did not change. “That decrepit thing? As soon as I heard about it, I was terrified it would collapse on some poor old Tibetan woman.” He gazed pointedly at Shan. “Just last week, I gave a speech about how we have to redouble our efforts to address the crumbling infrastructure in the province. We're doing a rough count of people and buildings to see what other precautions might be needed.”

Shan's shudder did not go unnoticed.

“Excellent. I have your attention. Now, tell me how you are going to bring me this damned woman Dawa.”

“A common name. Must be thousands in Tibet.”

Pao gave a disappointed shrug. “You yourself infiltrated my man into her nest. You kept him protected, made sure he got out to report to me. You are practically one of us already. We just haven't established your final price.”

“A member of the Commission has to maintain independence from the Party.”

“The appearance of independence, you mean. Why do you think I approved Tan's recommendation for you to join? By all outward appearances, you are as far as anyone can be from the Party. At least anyone outside of prison,” he added. “I've seen few operatives more effective.”

“Operatives?”

“You. You maintain this humble appearance of a man of the people when you are in fact the shrewdest of manipulators. You could be one of my greatest assets. I have a whole world to offer you: A house. A car. A job in Lhasa. A post on my personal staff.”

“I already have a job,” Shan replied.

Pao's frigid smile returned. “It's just a matter of time, comrade. Everyone always cooperates in the end. How many times do you have to learn that particular lesson?” He turned back to the street, where the villagers were being lined up along the walls of the buildings and began counting them off. “One, two, three—” He indicated a woman with an adolescent boy. “—four. Look at her, silly thing has flour on her face. “Five, six—” He lingered over a teenaged girl. “Slim and athletic. Clean her up, and I could use her at my parties. Seven—” He pointed to a farmer with a basket of apples. “There's a chemical worker if I ever saw one. Eight, nine, ten.” He indicated three elderly women. “We have a new complex of barracks for the aged. Very efficient. We pack them in twelve to a room.”

“She keeps her movements secret from all.”

The Deputy Secretary settled back into his leather seat. “They're so naïve. That video of me was taken by the dissidents, of course. And thank you for teaching Sung how to play it for us.” Pao opened his laptop, and with a few keystrokes called up the video. He seemed highly entertained, raising his finger in the air like a pistol and snapping it in the air as the Pao on the screen fired to scare the Tibetans before aiming a shot into Captain Lu's head. When the video ended, Pao turned to Shan with a smug grin. “The fools don't understand that videos from phones have embedded codes, and this code identifies the exact phone she uses. Whenever she enters an area with cell coverage, we can track her. It showed up ten miles from here late this afternoon. Exactly the breakthrough we have been waiting for. We have been listening to all her calls.”

Shan stared into his hands. He was not going to tell Pao the phone had been Gingri's. He recalled the sophisticated electronic equipment at the Taktsang library. Surely Dawa would have understood about the codes. The
purbas
' strength lay in subtlety and deception.

“I am pleased to say your visit emboldened them. We know from her calls, confirmed by our faithful Tuan”—Pao patted Tuan on the back—“that they are planning some kind of rally in two days. If we have to arrest her there, we will. But we would prefer a quieter place. Fewer people to get hurt, fewer witnesses. She has such damned charisma, this Dawa. If we're forced to move on the rally, I'll have to open a whole new internment camp just to fit all the new prisoners. Do you have any idea how expensive that is, feeding and sheltering a few hundred Tibetans for months at a time?”

A knob officer appeared and handed Tuan a slip of paper, which Tuan read and extended to Pao.

“You are saying you want me to help set a trap for Dawa,” Shan said.

“What I am saying is help me save all this.” He gestured out the window, then glanced at the slip of paper again. “Seventy-one Tibetans and forty-three buildings. Help me, or Yamdrok and your old Tibetan friend disappear forever.”

*   *   *

Shan walked as if in a dream up to his quarters. He stood in a hot shower for long minutes, but the grime of the Deputy Secretary and Shan's fear for Lokesh and Yamdrok would not be washed away. At least Yosen and Pema were free, he finally told himself. He could cling to that one small victory despite knowing all else would fail. The Commission, with his name attached to it, would proceed with its mission of criminalizing the protesters. Dawa would be captured, sooner or later. Pao would win. Pao would always win.

He dressed and made his way to the kitchens, where he cajoled the staff into giving him a plate of cold leftovers. As he carried it into the nearly empty dining hall, he discovered a solitary figure working at a window table, a thermos of tea beside him as he wrote in a notebook. Judson silently nodded and continued writing as Shan joined him.

“How many manuscripts would you say were in that library?” the American suddenly asked.

Shan cast an alarmed glance around the hall. “You're writing about Taktsang?”

“Its story needs to be told, to be preserved. As far as anyone knows, I am just a Commissioner diligently writing up case notes.”

Shan chewed on his cold vegetables and considered the answer. “Eight thousand at least.”

“More like ten. I was thinking we should start an official depository for Tibetan
peches
in America. That will have them howling in Beijing.”

“I hope Hannah is sleeping. She worried me.”

“She's much better,” Judson quickly said. “Eight hours, and she'll be a new person.” The American lifted his pen. “How well would such manuscripts endure travel? Digital photos are helpful, but a
peche
was never meant to be read on a screen. You have to sit and experience it, you have to—” Judson abruptly closed his notebook.

Tuan sat down beside them, carrying a steaming mug. “The Deputy Secretary has gone,” Tuan announced. “Back to Lhasa. Already preparing his victory speech.”

Judson gave an exaggerated stretch and rose. “Gents. See you at the next glorious Commission meeting.”

Shan waited until the American left the hall before turning back to Tuan. “You knew about that chapel being destroyed.”

“Not really. I told him about it after that first time you took me to Yamdrok. Like I said, he always expects something to be reported. The old fools thought their gods would protect it.”

“Like the old fools who revere your mother's poetry.”

Tuan looked into his mug. “I didn't give him details about Taktsang. I said there was just a cave with a bunch of exhausted fugitives living hand to mouth. Nothing about the Americans being there. Pao would throw them out of the country if he knew.” Shan stared at him, weighing his words. Without the Americans, there could be no Commission.

Tuan glanced up. At least there was a shadow of guilt in his eyes. “Yamdrok is an anomaly. They can't expect to go on like that. They have to acknowledge their new gods.”

“Pao is no god.”

“Define ‘god.' He has the power of life and death over hundreds of thousands of people. Bestower of blessings. Punisher of sins.” As Tuan sipped his tea, he felt Shan's smoldering expression. “It was just a building.”

“It wasn't just a building. You know that, Tuan. Will you let the rest of the town be destroyed?”

“Not up to me. I told you before. I don't make decisions—I just watch and report.”

“Pao didn't even know that chapel existed. You told him about it, and days later he flattened it. You don't truly share Pao's beliefs. I saw the way you listened to the nuns, the way you read your mother's lost poetry.”