the walls, thick curtains embroidered with red and yellow silk formed a sort of sofa. Low lacquered tables of Chinese manufacture sat among richly carved and gilded cabinets festooned with angry dragons and soft-petalled peonies. On the walls, naked gods made love, encircled by tongues of fire. At one end stood an altar of gold, studded with precious stones, on which were grouped the images of Tibetan gods and saints. Incense burned in little golden stands, filling the room with dark, intoxicating fumes. In front of the altar, silver butter-lamps gave ofFa yellow, ethereal light.
And then, as though he had just that moment materialized in the room, Christopher caught sight of Norbhu Dzasa himself- a man masquerading as a god, a human image fashioned from silk and coral and precious stones. His dyed jet-black hair was set in tightly coiled bunches above his head, and from his left ear dangled a single long ear-ring of turquoise and gold. His upper robe was of finely woven yellow silk, delicately patterned with dragons and held at the waist by a crimson sash. He was standing motionless in a corner of the room near the altar, his hands crossed in front of him, concealed by the long sleeves of his robe.
On his way, Christopher had found a stall in the bazaar that sold kfiatags, the thin white silk scarves used throughout the region as tokens of respect at formal introductions. He held out the scarf, loosely woven from strands of the finest silk, like gossamer, and approached the tsong-chi. Norbhu Dzasa extended his arms and took the scarf with a slight bow, placed it on a low table, and, with his hands free of the sleeves, lifted a second scarf, which he passed to Christopher. He looked bored. The two men exchanged stiff greetings, and the little Tibetan invited Christopher to join him on cushions near the window.
A moment later, the servant who had shown Christopher in opened the door and bowed low.
“Cha kqy-sho,” ordered Norbhu Dzasa.
“Bring us tea.”
The servant bowed, sucked in his breath, and simultaneously muttered ‘la-les’.
Abruptly, Norbhu Dzasa turned to Christopher, speaking in English.
“I’m sorry. Not ask. Take Indian tea or Tibetan tea?”
Christopher asked for Tibetan, and the tsong-chi spoke again to his servant.
To cha kay-sho - ‘bring some Tibetan tea.”
“So,” Norbhu Dzasa said when the servant had gone.
“Drink Tibetan tea. Been in Tibet?” He had learnt what English he knew here in Kalimpong, out of necessity.
Christopher was unsure how to answer. So many of his visits
there had been made illegally. With rare exceptions, Tibet was barred to foreigners and Christopher knew from personal experience that the ban was no mere formality.
“I was in Lhasa in 1904,” he said.
“With Younghusband.”
In 1903, Lord Curzon, the Viceroy of India, had been disturbed by reports of growing Russian influence in the Tibetan capital.
Determined to force the reclusive Tibetans to discuss the issue of commercial and diplomatic relations with Britain, he despatched a small force to Kampa Dzong under the command of Colonel Francis Younghusband. Ignored by the Tibetans, Younghusband obtained reinforcements 1,000 soldiers, 1,450 coolies, 70,000 mules, 3,451 yaks, and six unhappy camels and moved up the Chumbi valley in force.
Christopher still remembered the journey: the freezing cold, the misery of the foot-soldiers unaccustomed to the winds and the altitude, skin sticking to gun-metal in the frost, men tearing skin from their lips with frozen spoons, the sudden deaths, men and baggage plunging from narrow ledges into the abyss. Above all, he remembered the insanity of Christmas Day, when the men had been served plum pudding and turkey, and the officers had tried to drink frozen champagne.
But the real madness had begun outside Gyantse. Tibetan troops carrying muzzle-loading guns and broadswords, and wearing charms to turn aside British bullets, had advanced against men armed with modern rifles and machine guns. Christopher would never forget the massacre that followed. In four minutes, seven hundred Tibetans lay dead on the battlefield, dozens more were screaming in pain. The expedition took Gyantse and moved on unopposed to Lhasa, where it arrived in August 1904. The Dalai Lama had fled in the meantime to Urga in Mongolia to take refuge with the Living Buddha there, and the Regent was forced in his absence to sign a peace treaty with Britain on very unfavorable terms.
“Don’t remember you,” Norbhu Dzasa said.
“I was much younger then,” answered Christopher, ‘and of no importance.
We would not have been introduced.”
Norbhu Dzasa sighed.
“Younger then, too,” he said. Their eyes met for a moment, but the tsong-chi gave nothing away. That, as he interpreted it, was his job: to give nothing away. He was very good at it.
Tea arrived quickly. It was served in ornamental cups of jade decorated with silver. Norbhu’s man had brewed it in the kitchen from semi-fermented tea bricks imported from Yunnan, mixing it in a wooden churn with boiling water, salt, wood-ash soda, and dri-butter. It was more a soup than tea, but Tibetans drank it in vast quantities forty Or fifty cups a day was not at all unusual.
Christopher could tell at once from the way he quaffed his first cupful that Norbhu Dzasa was a record- breaker even in Tibetan terms.
Norbhu had been tsong-chi at Kalimpong for seven years now and was doing very nicely out of it. He could afford to drink tea in urnfuls if he wanted to. His greatest fear was to be recalled to Lhasa prematurely, that is, before he had stashed away enough rupees to ensure a comfortable future for himself and, above all, his children. He was over sixty now, though he could not be sure exactly how old he was. His mother thought he had been born in the year of the Fire Serpent in the Fourteenth Cycle, which would have made him sixty-three. But his father had been equally sure he had been born in the Wood Hare year, which would make him all of sixty-five.
“What I do for you, Wylam-la?” asked the little tsong-chi as he poured himself a second cup of the thick, pinkish beverage.
Christopher hesitated. He felt he had got off to a bad start with Norbhu Dzasa by referring to the Younghusband expedition. In the end, the British had gained the respect of the Tibetans they had looted no temples, raped no women, and withdrawn their forces at the earliest possible opportunity but the memory of the more than seven hundred dead and the profound sense of vulnerability that the expedition had created in their minds lingered even now.
The problem about the present business was that Christopher could not mention the real reason for his visit. There was ample evidence that the Mongol Agent, Mishig, had been contacted by Tsewong. But it was always possible that the Tibetan tsong-chi might also be involved. For all they knew, he might have been the person responsible for transmitting Zamyatin’s message to the Mongol. The tsong-chi’s residence lay between the mountains and the spot where Tsewong was supposed to have been found. The monk could very easily have paid a visit to Norbhu Dzasa before continuing his ill-fated journey.
“It’s very little, really,” Christopher said.
“Perhaps you will find it sentimental of me. You’ll have seen from my letter that I am a businessman. I’m here in Kalimpong to do business with Mr.
Frazer. I knew him years ago, back in Patna. He knows about an incident that happened back then something that happened to my son, William. We were in Bodh Gaya, William and I, just passing through, on our way to Aurangabad. We lived in Patna then, when .. . my wife was still alive.” The combination of fact and fiction would, Christopher hoped, serve to convey a feeling of conviction to the tsong-chi.
“William fell ill,” he went on.
“There was no British doctor in
Bodh Gaya, none anywhere near. I was desperate. The child was very sick, I thought he would die. And then one of the pilgrims visiting the sacred tree ... It is a tree they have there, isn’t it, Mr.
Dzasa?”
Norbhu nodded. It was a tree; he had seen it. Lord Buddha had gained enlightenment while sitting under it.
“Right,” said Christopher, warming to his tale.
“Well, one of the pilgrims heard William was ill, you see. He came to visit us and told me there was a
