The Skull Mantra (33 page)

The two men were taking measurements on one of the colorful charts he had seen before. It had a blue rectangle
in the center, below rows of smaller blue-green rectangles. Suddenly Shan recognized the images.

“It's the ponds, isn't it? I have never seen such a map,” he marveled. “Do you make them here?”

Luntok looked up with a grin. “Better than a map. A photograph. From the sky. From a satellite.”

Shan stared dumbly. It was not that satellite photography was beyond his imagination; it was just beyond his expectations. Tibet truly existed in many different centuries at once.

“We have to know about snow melt,” Luntok explained. “About river flows. About avalanches above us. About road conditions when shipments go out. Without these, we would need survey crews in the mountains every week.”

Luntok pointed out the mine's lakes, the buildings of the camp, and a cluster of geometric shapes at the far left that was the outskirts of Lhadrung town. He outlined with his finger the big dike at the head of the Dragon Throat, then picked up the map and pointed to a second, earlier photo. “Here it is two weeks ago, just before construction was completed.” Shan saw the spots of color that must have been pieces of equipment near the center of the brown dike.

“But how do you obtain these?”

“There is an American satellite and a French satellite. We have subscriptions. The surface of the earth is divided into sections, in a catalog. We can order up a print by section number. It gets transmitted to our console,” he said, pointing his thumb toward the red door.

“But the army—” Shan began.

“There is a license,” Luntok explained patiently. “Everything is legal.”

A license for a Western venture to operate equipment that could survey troop movements, air exercises, and army installations as easily as it could survey snow accumulations. The Americans had worked a miracle, to obtain such a permit in Tibet.

Shan found the road leading to the mine, visible as a tiny gray line that wandered in and out of the shadows cast by the peaks. He found the road from the north, to Saskya gompa, and finally the 404th worksite. The new bridge was
a narrow hyphen that intersected the serpentine grayness of the Dragon's Throat.

Shan sat beside Luntok. “I've been to the
ragyapa
village,” he announced. The man beside Luntok tensed, and glanced at Luntok, who kept studying the maps without reacting. The man grabbed his hat and stepped out of the building.

“I spoke with Merak,” Shan said. “Do you know Merak?”

“It is a small community,” Luntok observed tersely.

“It must be difficult.”

“There are quotas for us now. I was allowed to attend university. I have a good job.”

“I meant for them. Seeing the people here and in town, but knowing most will never break away.”

Luntok's eyes narrowed, but he did not look up from the photo map. “The
ragyapa
are proud of their work. It is a sacred trust, the only religious practice that has been allowed to continue without restriction.”

“They seem well provided for. Happy children. Lots of warm clothes.”

As if Shan's comment were a cue he had been awaiting, Luntok picked up his own hat and rose. “It is considered bad luck to underpay a
ragyapa
,” he said with a wary glance, then turned and left.

That the
ragyapa
had the ability to carry out Jao's murder Shan had no doubt. Had the military supplies been a reward? If so, someone else paid them to kill Jao. Someone with control over military supplies. Shan stepped back and studied the room. The woman was snoring now. No one else was present. Shan moved to the red door and opened it.

Computer terminals, four in all, dominated the room. A few bowls with noodles clinging to the rims, the remains of lunch, were on a large conference table. Two Chinese, dressed in Western clothes, one wearing a baseball cap pulled low over his head, sat studying glossy catalogs and sipping tea. From an expensive sound system came Western rock and roll. At a corner desk sat Tyler Kincaid, cleaning his camera.

“Comrade Shan,” said a familiar voice from the back of the room. Li Aidang rose from a sofa. “If only I had known,
I would have invited you to ride with me.” He gestured toward the table. “We have a luncheon meeting twice a month. The supervisory committee.”

Shan moved slowly around the room. There was an empty cassette case on top of a speaker. The Grateful Dead, it said. Perhaps, Shan considered without remorse, it was what Chang listened to as he and his truck tumbled into the abyss. Li retrieved a Coca-Cola from a small refrigerator and extended it toward him.

There were photo maps on one wall. Photographs were fastened with pins to another: more studies of Tibetan faces, taken with the same sensitivity as those Shan had seen in Kincaid's office. Li handed Shan the soft drink.

“I didn't realize the prosecutor's office had an interest in mining,” Shan said, and set the can on the table, unopened.

“We are the Ministry of Justice. The mine is the only foreign investment in the district. The people's government must be certain it succeeds. There are so many issues. Labor organization. Export permits. Foreign exchange permits. Work permits. Environmental permits. The Ministry must be consulted for such approvals.”

“I had no idea boron was such an important product.”

The assistant prosecutor smiled generously. “We want our American friends to stay happy. One third of the royalties stay in the district. After three years of production we will be able to build a new school. After five, maybe a new clinic.”

Shan moved to one of the computer monitors, closer to Kincaid. Numbers were scrolling across the screen.

“You know our friend Comrade Hu,” Li said, pointing to the first of the two men at the table. Hu gave him the same mock salute he had left Shan with in Tan's office. Shan had not recognized him with the hat. He studied the Director of Geology closely. Was Hu surprised to see him?

“Comrade Inspector,” Hu acknowledged in a curt tone, his little beetle eyes fixing Shan for a moment, then turning back to the catalog. The one he was reading had pictures of smiling blond couples standing in snow, wearing sweaters of brilliant colors.

“Still giving driving lessons, Comrade Director?” Shan
asked, trying to look distracted by the console.

Hu laughed.

Li gestured toward the second man, a well-groomed, athletic figure who stood as though to better survey Shan. “The major is from the border command.” Li looked meaningfully at Shan. “His resources are sometimes useful for our project.” The major, nothing more. He was so polished that he could have been lifted from the pages of the catalog, Shan thought at first. But then he turned his head toward Shan. A gutter of scar tissue ran across his left cheek; it could only have been made by a bullet. His lips curled up in greeting but his eyes remained lifeless. It was a familiar insolence. The major, Shan decided, belonged to the Public Security Bureau.

“A fascinating facility,” Shan said absently, continuing to wander about the room. “Full of surprises.” He paused in front of the photographs.

“A triumph of socialism,” the major observed. His voice had a boyish tone belied by his countenance.

Tyler Kincaid gave a slow nod toward Shan but did not speak. Half his forearm was wrapped with a large piece of gauze taped over a recent injury. A shadow of dried blood could be seen through the gauze.

“Comrade Shan is investigating a murder,” Li announced to the major. “Once he led anti-corruption campaigns in Beijing. The famous Hainan Island affair was his.” The Hainan Island case, in which Shan had discovered that provincial officials were purchasing shiploads of Japanese automobiles—for an island with only a hundred miles of roads—and diverting them to the black market on the mainland, had made Shan a celebrity for a few months. But that had been fifteen years earlier. Who had the assistant prosecutor been speaking to? The warden? Beijing?

Shan studied the major, who had no interest in Li's words. There had been no challenge in his eyes, no question in his voice despite Shan's abrupt intrusion. He already knew who Shan was.

“This is where your telephone system operates?” Shan asked Kincaid.

The American rose, and forced a smile. “Over there,” he
said, indicating a speaker above a console on a small desk against the wall. “Wanna order a pizza from New York?”

Li and the major laughed hard.

“And the maps?”

“Maps? We have a whole reference library. Atlases. Engineering journals.”

“I mean the ones from the sky.”

“Amazing, aren't they?” Li interrupted. “The first time we saw them, it seemed like a miracle. The world looks so different.” He moved toward Shan and leaned toward his ear. “We must talk about our files, Comrade. The trial is only a few days away. No need for undue embarrassment.”

As Shan considered the assistant prosecutor's invitation, the door opened and Luntok appeared. He nodded to Kincaid and quickly left, leaving the door open. Kincaid stretched and made a gesture of invitation toward Shan. “Afternoon climbing classes. How about some rappelling?”

“You're climbing with your injury?”

“This?” the American asked good-naturedly, raising his arm. “Walking wounded. Came down on a jagged piece of quartz. Can't let it stop me. Always get back on the horse, you know.”

Li laughed again and moved back toward the sofa. Hu returned to his catalogs. The major lit a cigarette and pushed Shan out of the room with a daggerlike stare.

Outside he found Rebecca Fowler sitting on the hood of her truck, studying the valley.

He didn't think she had noticed him until she suddenly spoke. “I can't imagine what it must be like for you,” she said.

He was uncomfortable with her sympathy. “If I had never been sent to Tibet I would never have met Tibetans.”

She turned to him with a sad smile and reached into the deep pocket of her nylon vest. “Here,” she said, producing two paperback books. “Just a couple of novels, in English. I thought you might . . .”

Shan accepted them with a small bow of his head. “You are kind. I miss reading in English.” The books indeed would be a treasure, except that they would be confiscated
when he was returned to the 404th. He didn't have the heart to tell her.

He leaned back on the truck, gazing at the surrounding peaks. The snowcaps were glowing in the late afternoon sun. “The soldiers are gone,” he observed.

Fowler followed his gaze over the ponds. “Not one of my better ideas. Called away for some other emergency.”

“Emergency?”

“The major had something to do with it.”

Shan paced along the front of the truck, surveying the compound. Someone was sitting on one of the dikes, staring at the mountains. He squinted and saw that it was Yeshe. Sergeant Feng was sitting on the hood of their own truck. As his field of view extended behind the buildings, Shan froze. Behind the first one was a familiar vehicle. A red Land Rover. Another red Land Rover. “Whose car is that?”

Fowler looked up. “The red one? Must be Director Hu's.”

He resisted the urge to run to the vehicle and search it. The committee members could emerge at any moment.

“These Land Rovers. Do they all belong to the Ministry of Geology?”

“Don't know. I don't think so. I saw the major driving one.”

Shan nodded, as though he expected the answer. “What do you know about this major?”

“One powerful son of a bitch, is all. He scares me.”

“Why is he on your committee?”

“Because we're so close to the border. It was a condition of our satellite license.”

Somehow Shan felt he knew the man. With a wrench of his gut he remembered. Jigme's description of the man who had come for Sungpo. A man with a slice on his face, a deep scar. His name, Jigme had said, was Meh Jah.

“What if it wasn't Hu who wanted your license suspended?” he asked abruptly.

“He signed the notice.”

“He would have to sign it, as Director of Mines, but it may be at the order of someone else. Or a political favor to someone.”

“What do you mean?” Fowler asked, suddenly interested.

“I don't know what I mean.” He shook his head despondently. “I'm supposed to be finding answers, and all I find is more questions.” He gazed out over the pond complex.

Workers were moving along the dikes at a relaxed pace with shovels and pipe fittings. Yeshe and Feng were moving back down the slope, approaching the buildings.

“Did someone—did you have a ceremony? For your workers.”

She looked at him with a pained expression. “I almost forgot—it was your idea, wasn't it?” The nervousness had not left her eyes.

“I never thought it would be so soon.”

The American woman jumped down and gestured for him to follow her along the line of buildings.

“Who was the priest who came?”

“There was no name,” Fowler said in a near whisper. “I don't think we were supposed to use his name. An old priest. Strange.”

“How old?”

“Not old in years. Middle-aged. But old like austere. Like timeless. Thin as a rail. An ascetic, I guess.”

“What do you mean strange?”

“Like from another century. His eyes. I don't know. Sometimes it seemed like he didn't see anyone. Or he saw things we could not see. And his hands.”

“His hands?”

“He had no thumbs.”

On the side of the last building, facing the valley, was a patchwork charm, a square an arm's length on each side. It was filled with complex pictograms and writing. Two poles flanked it, draped with prayer flags.

Yeshe appeared behind him and muttered something under his breath. It had the tone of a prayer. “Powerful magic,” he gasped. He held up his rosary as though for protection, and stepped back.