‘That would not be good for our guests,’ the owner said. ‘They are tired from day walking the trail. They do not need this fright.’
‘We’re tired, too.’
‘Okay. I will help you. Will you wait out here?’
‘Of course.’
‘I will be honest. You are good men. I need to tell you truth.’
King said, ‘Okay.’
‘After I make you food, I must call number and tell them you here. So you must eat, then you must go. If I no tell them, and word gets to them that I help, then me and my family die. I cannot risk this.’
Slater thought about it. After all, he had the leverage. But ultimately he said, ‘Okay.’
‘Do you hate me?’
‘No,’ Slater said. ‘This is life. Sometimes it’s messy.’
‘Yes,’ the man said, and gazed down the mountainside. ‘Sometimes messy.’
‘Thank you for helping us.’
‘You need water?’
‘Yes,’ they both said in unison.
The owner nodded curtly, said, ‘Wait here,’ and trudged back into the guest house.
Sometimes Slater didn’t like what he had to do.
But he wasn’t about to ruin a hard-working innocent man’s life over refusing to shelter them. Not under these circumstances, anyway. And he knew King felt the same.
They sat down on the lower steps, and watched the dull twilight settle over the mountain range.
Beside Slater, King started to shiver.
Slater said, ‘So do we walk all the way back up to Long-Ma, or do we give up and bed down in the woods?’
‘I can’t make it back up that hill tonight,’ King admitted in a rare moment of honesty. ‘There’s only so much longer I can tough this out for.’
‘How’s your ankle?’
‘Bad. But resting helps. Our sleeping bags are good enough. We can bed down anywhere and cover ourselves in layers, and we’ll be okay.’
‘We might not get the best sleep.’
‘You got a better idea?’
‘No,’ Slater said. ‘I really don’t.’
‘Then we press forward maybe a few hundred feet and bunker down in the woods.’
‘You heard what that guy said. Some of the rebels stayed back to intercept us. They knew this would happen. They knew how far we’d make it, and they knew this place would turn us away.’
‘They probably projected it based on how much ground they already knew we’d covered. That doesn’t mean anything.’
Slater stared. ‘Doesn’t it? Or does it mean they’re getting help?’
‘If you’re implying it’s Parker feeding them information, then you’re wrong. He has no idea where we are.’
Paranoid, Slater patted down the outside of his pack. ‘Unless he’s tracking us…’
King reached over and put a calloused hand on Slater’s wrist. ‘Stop.’
Slater sat back, and adjusted himself. ‘I don’t know… I just can’t work this out. We should have figured out who’s behind this by now.’
‘We won’t until we get there.’
They lapsed into silence, and twenty minutes later the owner returned with a handful of plates sporting steamed momos, mountains of vegetable fried rice, and a half-dozen fried eggs. Slater and King accepted the food graciously as the daylight receded and devoured the meals within a couple of minutes. The owner waited for them to finish with his hands behind his back, observing the darkening sky, watching for any sign of the rebels returning.
When they handed the plates back, the owner handed over sealed plastic bottles filled with clean water.
They drank, and drank, and drank, and then tucked what was left over into their packs.
‘Please go,’ the owner said. ‘And good luck.’
‘One last thing,’ Slater said. ‘Did you notice a blond American with the group yesterday?’
The owner didn’t answer.
Slater said, ‘Please.’
‘Yes,’ the owner said. ‘He was here.’
46
King bristled until the man followed up with, ‘They had him tied up.’
‘And you saw that?’
‘I saw them do it,’ the owner said. ‘They had gun pointed at his back, whole way down. I saw them coming from long way away. They try to conceal gun, but I can tell by the way they walk. It was … not normal.’
‘So he was unrestrained until he got here?’
‘Yes. So was girl. They came in separately, with rebel walking behind each of them. Then when they get here the rebel take them round back and tie them up. I cannot say anything. They can kill me if I speak.’
King said, ‘Did they tie up a small Nepali guy, too?’
The owner shrugged. ‘Not that I saw. But I stay busy in kitchen to feed them all. I no see much.’
‘You saw,’ Slater said. ‘You’re perceptive, and you have good info on the girl and the blond guy. Was there a Nepali guy tied up at any point they were here?’
A pause.
And then, ‘No.’
Slater didn’t answer.
King didn’t answer.
They just stood in stunned silence.
‘You must go,’ the owner said. ‘I don’t know what this means — what I just told you — but you are both shocked. You must get out of here. Too risky.’
They didn’t protest. They just nodded their thanks for the food and drink, and set off trudging down the trail into the dark.
There was the faint remnants of light leftover in the sky, barely perceptible, but it was enough for them to make out the dirt underfoot. They watched for potholes, steep drop-offs — anything that could compromise them. Each step set off a fiery ache in King’s ankle, but it wasn’t as severe as early the previous day. He could handle it. His mind was bulletproof.
As they strode away from the guest house’s exterior lights and plunged into shadow, Slater said, ‘It’s got to be the porter.’
‘We don’t know anything,’ King said. ‘Not until we catch them.’
‘You think we can?’
‘We just need to survive the night.’
A twig snapped, perhaps a hundred feet ahead.
The remnants of the sound echoed in the semi-darkness.
They both froze.
And waited.
The seconds drew out, becoming long minutes. King kept his hand on his weapon, and he knew Slater would be mirroring his actions. They didn’t look at each other — tactical awareness took over, and they became statues against the dark backdrop of the mountain. The wind seemed to pick up, but it was probably an invention of the mind.
Sounds amplified
