precipitous ledge.
But the added firepower proved unnecessary. Raeder had a crazed glint to his eyes, his Luger smoking, and as he considered the next animal in line the chieftain ran past him and hastily ordered his own caravan to wheel and retreat.
“Now, after them!” the German snapped.
The mules were kicked and lashed forward, chasing the rumps of the lumbering yaks, until the latter came to a wider shelf and huddled next to a cliff. The Europeans pushed arrogantly past, jostling the Asians, the Uygurs looking at them with hatred. Their chieftain howled at Raeder’s back as the Nazi ascended, gesturing with his rifle, but he didn’t aim it. Raeder ignored him. And then the Nazis and their porters were around a bend and had the cliff to themselves, panting in the thin air.
“My God, Raeder, are you insane?” Muller asked. “All we had ready was your pistol. What if the Uygurs had fought?”
“Strike with surprise and you crush their will,” Raeder said, reloading the Luger. “We’re outnumbered a million to one, Julius, and have to act like we’re the superior. That much I’ve learned from the British.”
“Are we going to fight our way into Tibet?”
“We won’t have to,” the zoologist said, looking back. They could hear bells on the yaks as the surviving animals hurried down the trail. “Word of this will spread, and they’ll give us the respect we deserve.”
Hans Diels stepped forward and clapped the Untersturmfuhrer on the shoulder. “Now I know why Himmler picked you to lead us,” he said. “You understand how things are.”
“And how they should be.”
“Life is struggle,” Kranz agreed. “We need ruthlessness.”
“Then be prepared to follow, my friends.”
They surmounted the canyon and came out into alpine meadows full of purple gentians, blue poppies, and wild strawberries. Raeder ordered a rest while the others changed their caps for the more imposing SS pith helmets. Then they lashed red pennants with the Nazi swastika to the pommel of each mule. The men were nearing Tibet, and he wanted the diplomatic nature of their mission made clear.
Ahead, clearing skies were dark as a lake. Peaks dazzled in the blinding clarity of pure air. Mountain snow was flawless. Buttresses of rock glittered in the sun. Behind them, the great Plain of Bengal was lost in cotton clouds.
Heat gave way to nighttime cold, and the progress slowed still more as Muller used his magnetometer to measure the magnetic field of the earth. Anomalies, he said, might show the caverns of underground cities.
Anomalies might reveal Shambhala.
Kranz made measurements of the Tibetans and Bhutanese they’d hired. He pinched their heads with calipers and cast plaster masks of their faces, tubes jutting from nostrils to prevent suffocation. “No Jews here!” he announced. Since eyes were closed for the casting, the result made their masks look like those of dead men. Word of this torture spread, too, and soon Tibetans kept warily away from the anthropologist.
“Are they Aryans?” Muller asked his colleague skeptically.
“Maybe.”
Eckells did double duty by both documenting their progress on film and deploying the expedition’s aneroids to record atmospheric pressure. Raeder insisted on the scientific measurements, saying it would legitimize the expedition by contributing to German science. “We’ll win fame from the government and respect from the academies.”
It was July 25, 1938, when a British lieutenant named Lionel Sopwith-Hastings, riding a lathered mule, finally caught up with the SS expedition and presented orders from the consulate in Gangtok to return to India immediately. The Germans were not, the orders read, to risk a diplomatic uproar by violating the border of Tibet.
Sopwith-Hastings waited stiffly for response. He tried to muster the authority of a British imperial but at age twenty-two, with just a blond wisp on his upper lip and a frame so thin that he’d traded his military cap for that of a khampa, a fur herder, to stay warm, he was not a very intimidating presence. His pale blue eyes betrayed unhappiness at his mission, and he kept glancing at the Nazis, one by one, as if counting the odds over and over again. The Germans were brown, dirty, and bearded, with the lean athleticism that comes from years of exercise. They’d watched the Englishman approach from miles away, and arrayed on the rocks of their little encampment were three rifles, the submachine gun, boxes of cartridges, and Raeder’s Luger pistol.
“But we do have permission,” Raeder said mildly.
“Not according to the British consul,” the lieutenant said. He licked his lips. “I’m to escort you to Gangtok and from there to Darjeeling and Calcutta to present your case to the authorities.”
“Ah, to present our case. We’ll get a fair hearing, then?”
He colored. “This is the British Empire.”
“Well.” The German stood. “You’ve displayed remarkable energy to catch up with us.”
“You’re fast. I had to leave my police attachment and push ahead.” He gave a peek at the guns. “I can assure you they are still coming.”
“Yes, but right now you are entirely alone.”
“I met some Uygurs who were quite upset.”
“They didn’t understand the rules of the road.”
Sopwith-Hastings stood as tall as he could. “Are you going to obey the directive?” His eyes strayed to the guns again.
“British pluck can only inspire Germany,” Raeder said. “We’ve extra mules, now that we’ve gone through some food, and two are lame. It will be efficient if you take them down for us.” He sat on a boulder and picked up the Luger, working the mechanism. There was a click as a bullet slid into the chamber. “Then it will be faster to follow.”
Diels sat, too, picked up a Mauser, opened the bolt, and examined the weapon as if for dirt. “Perhaps you can also mark the way, where the trail is badly eroded,” Hans said. “I’ve no doubt those Uygur yaks have worsened it.”
Sopwith-Hastings stood at attention, looking from one to the other. Then he gave a short nod. “Very well. On your honor.”
“We’ll be on your heels unless the trail collapses,” Raeder assured. “There’s nothing up here, as you can see. It’s pointless to go on.” The little swastika pennants snapped in the wind.
“I will await you in Gangtok.” The Brit saluted, wheeled, and went to fetch the lame mules.
As soon as the lieutenant disappeared from view, Raeder ordered camp broken and a quick last push to the pass at Kangra La. As the others started this final climb, the German retrieved five pounds of high explosive from one of the trunks.
“Come on, Muller. I’m tired of the English following us.”
“Are you going to start a war?”
“I’m going to make it impossible to have one.”
They went downslope to a precipitous pitch above the winding trail and climbed a hundred yards above, setting the charge on a hump of fractured rock.
“Kurt, I don’t know if this is wise,” Muller said. “This is a trade route, a lifeline. Do we have to destroy it? If word gets out, the natives could turn against us.”
“I thought you liked to make things go boom, Julius.”
“For science and research. Not vandalism.”
“Reichsfuhrer Himmler will be interested to hear you describe the necessary advancement of this expedition as vandalism.”
“That British boy is no threat to us.”
“That boy could bring men.” He began walking back, unreeling the fuse cord. “When Cortes reached Mexico, he burned his ships.”
“That’s not reassuring.”
“We can’t go home this way anyway. It will be through Persia or China or Russia.”
Muller resignedly helped splice the wires to the detonator.
“Now, twist the plunger,” Raeder ordered.
