The Messiah Secret

‘Yes. The airport’s about seven miles south of the town, so we’ll have to take a cab there. Now, just a warning. We’re up at about eleven and a half thousand feet here, so don’t over-exert yourself – it’ll take time to acclimatize to that altitude. Within about twenty-four hours we should be feeling fine again.’

‘I’m already out of breath,’ Bronson said. ‘But at least it’s nothing like as hot here as it was back in Mumbai.’

‘That’s the low humidity. The temperature’s probably not a lot different; it just feels a lot cooler.’

The cab ride didn’t take long, but the road was far from the smoothest surface Bronson had ever driven along. From the research he’d done before they left Cairo, he knew that in the winter much of the area was impassable because of thick snow, and he guessed that the harsh weather conditions contributed to the very broken and potholed road surface.

‘It’s bigger than I expected,’ Bronson said, as the cab – an elderly Mitsubishi four-by-four – drove down Main Bazaar Road, where there seemed to be plenty of shops and restaurants, including a vehicle hire outlet, then turned off into Fort Road and pulled up beside the kerb.

‘Hotel, guest house, here,’ the driver said, gesticulating in both directions along the street as he lifted their bags out of the boot.

‘Jule,’ Angela said, bowing slightly.

‘Joo-lay?’ Bronson asked, mimicking Angela’s pronunciation. ‘What does that mean?’

‘It’s perhaps the single most useful word in the Ladakhi language,’ she replied. ‘It’s a kind of multi-purpose word that can be translated as “hello”, “goodbye”, “please” or “thank you”. What it means really depends on the context and the circumstances.’

As the taxi drove away, they looked up and down the street. There were numerous signs outside the buildings indicating the locations of guest houses, small hotels and various restaurants.

‘This is great,’ Bronson said. ‘My kind of place!’

‘Just don’t expect too much, Chris. En-suite and five-star these hotels aren’t, but all the reports I’ve read say that they’re good and clean, and the owners are usually very welcoming.’

They chose one of the bigger guest houses, and after Angela’s prediction about the lack of facilities, they were pleasantly surprised to find that the twin room they chose had got an en-suite bathroom, or rather a shower room, with running hot and cold water. They left their bags in their room, then walked back outside. They had several things to do, and not much time to do them in.

‘The first thing we must find is a travel agent,’ Angela said. ‘We’ve got to get the Inner Line entry permits so we can visit the Nubra Valley.’

There were a number of travel agents in the Main Bazaar Road. They chose one, who promised that their documents would be ready for them if they returned at the end of the afternoon.

They then walked on to the car hire agency Bronson had spotted on the way into Leh. They already knew that the two most common forms of transport hired by tourists in the area were motorcycles – trail-bikes, in fact – and four-by-four jeeps.

Bronson finally settled on a Nissan Patrol with a diesel engine – big, tough and hopefully unbreakable – with extra fuel cans strapped inside the rear compartment, and with two spare wheels and tyres. It looked like the kind of truck that could cross the Sahara Desert without the slightest problem.

He drove it to the closest filling station, topped up the tank and all the extra cans with diesel, checked the tyre pressures and then parked it just down the street while they sorted out the rest of the things they’d need. They walked into a trekking hire shop and rented a tent, two sleeping bags and ground sheets, a portable stove and cooking equipment, because they didn’t know where they’d end up each evening, and it was obviously better to be prepared, just in case they did get stuck out in the countryside.

They knew that the overnight temperature could plummet to below zero, even in the summer months, so they bought warm clothing – woollen shirts, anoraks and padded trousers – that they’d certainly need once they left the shelter of the vehicle to begin their search. Finally, they bought a dozen water containers and filled them all to the brim, and then bought sufficient tinned and packet food to last them at least four days.

They still had a little while to wait until their permits would be ready for collection, so they headed towards the old town that lay at the base of Namgyal Hill. It was a labyrinth of narrow alleys and passageways, lined with houses.

Bronson could see piles of wood stacked outside most of the properties, and other heaps of a lumpy brown substance that was more difficult to identify.

‘I suppose that’s firewood for the winter,’ he said, pointing at the stacks of wood, ‘but what’s that other stuff?’

‘Shit,’ Angela replied.

Bronson raised his eyebrows.

‘No, it really is. It’s dried dung, mainly from camels – they use it for fuel in the winter as well.’

‘Ah,’ Bronson said, looking with renewed interest at the piles of knobbly brown stuff. ‘Doesn’t it chuck up a bit when they burn it?’

‘The guidebook doesn’t say, but I guess it’s probably best to be upwind of Leh when they light this stuff.’

They walked on, past a couple of small stone structures shaped something like miniature towers or domes.

‘Those are chortens,’ Angela said. ‘They contain holy relics of various types. And that’s a mani wall.’

She pointed at a wall directly in front of them. It was inset with a couple of stone slabs, and each of them was carved with some kind of script.

‘That’s the sacred invocation Om mani padme hum, which translates as “Hail to the Jewel in the Lotus”. You’re always supposed to walk past mani walls clockwise – and do the same with prayer wheels and chortens, in fact – which means you keep them on your right. I’ve no idea why.’

Then, as the sun slipped beneath the top of the hills lying to the west, they returned to the travel agent. Only a few weeks earlier, Bronson had been driving through the English countryside to meet Angela. Now, here he was on the roof of the world looking for a priceless treasure that had been lost for two millennia. He felt a surge of excitement at what lay ahead.

‘These your permits,’ the agent said with a smile, his English surprisingly good. ‘And these photocopies for you.’

He handed over several sheets of paper, and Angela and Bronson looked at them with interest.

‘Why so many photocopies?’ Bronson asked.

‘For checkpoints,’ the agent explained. ‘Each checkpoint look at original, and take one copy. I give you each ten copies. Should be enough. Later you want more, you come back see me, yes?’

Bronson nodded agreement.

‘They’re valid for seven days from tomorrow,’ Bronson said as they left the agency. ‘Will that be long enough?’

‘I bloody well hope so. The valley’s pretty big, but I think I know where we should start looking.’

48

‘It’s all set,’ Rodini said when Nick Masters sat down opposite him in another cafe in a quiet street in the centre of Islamabad – a different cafe this time, just in case anyone was taking an interest in either of them. Rodini