“Yes, exactly that,” the doctor continued. “This one will be quite enjoyable, for you. I need you take care of an issue with the congressman. There is a situation.” Badeeb paused to take a long drag on his cigarette. “A situation I have been, of necessity, keeping from you…”
Beg picked up Garcia’s striped pillow and held it to his nose.
“Of course.” He closed his eyes and inhaled deeply, unwilling to leave the scent of Veronica Garcia so quickly for any reason. “I will meet you in two hours’ time.”
CHAPTER FORTY
Xinjiang Province/Uyghur Autonomous Region China
D ressed in matching olive two-piece Rev’it textile riding suits against the chill of high altitude, Quinn and Garcia reached the police checkpoint at Tashkurgan before lunch. They’d stopped on the way for a bathroom break along the Karakoram Highway at the black waters of Lake Karakul. Quinn paid a Uyghur man five quai — less than a dollar-to take a photo of Ronnie sitting on a camel. They didn’t have the time for such things, but a tourist who rode by the high desert lake and didn’t take stop for photos would be highly suspect. And, he had to admit, she looked pretty good sitting up there, snowcapped peaks in the background, her hair blowing in the wind.
The ramshackle outpost of Tashkurgan was little more than a faceless government building and a touristy hotel with a line of fake yurts. They would need a special permit to continue down the Karakoram to their ostensible destination of the Khunjerab Pass leading into Pakistan. Umar had assured them the police were used to letting people riding his motorcycles through. As it turned out, the three Chinese guards, who were barely out of their teens, offered to let Garcia get her picture taken wearing one of their hats for twenty U.S. dollars-each. Quinn gladly paid the sixty bucks and they were able to slip through as long as they promised to just “go and come back” to the Pakistani border.
“Not a bad fee all in all,” Quinn said as they pushed the Enfields away from the concrete barricades and back on to the Karakoram heading south.
“That wasn’t a fee.” Ronnie wrinkled her nose. “That was a bribe.”
Quinn swung a leg over his bike. “You say tomato… We made it through without having to duct tape anyone and leave them in the closet. That’s what matters.”
Thirty miles south of Tashkurgan, they cut right, leaving the relative comfort of the paved Karakoram Highway to head west on an old jeep trail toward the sixteen-thousand-foot level marking Wakhir Pass and Afghanistan. Luckily, they saw no other traffic at the diversion from their promised route.
Garcia handled the rock-strewn road like Quinn had seen her handle everything in the short time he’d know her: by pretending she was an expert long enough that she became one. She was a strong woman, naturally athletic. Off-road motorcycling appeared to come easily to her.
As Umar had promised, the Enfield Bullets thumped along the rutted trail without complaint. Quinn had expected some drop in performance as they climbed near six thousand meters, but the bikes took Gabrielle’s impossibly steep smugglers’ trail along a sheer rock wall like metal mountain goats.
The only lag in performance was of the human kind. Both Quinn and Garcia were in excellent physical shape, but they were accustomed to living at sea level. By twelve thousand feet, even the act of horsing the motorcycles over gravel and dust forced them to stop for frequent breathers and sips of water. He’d read stories of ancient Buddhist monks who gave these places names like Big Headache and Nosebleed Pass. The throbbing killer at Quinn’s temples made him understand why.
Garcia made no secret of the fact that she hated the dizzying heights, refusing to look down and urging Quinn to get going again shortly after they’d stopped. He was sure her knuckles were white under the thick leather gloves.
Fatigue wasn’t their only problem. At thirteen thousand feet, they ran into a wall of blowing gray dust, ground fine as talc by the host of glaciers among the endless sawtooth peaks that stretched before them. The air was thin enough already and the dust made it nearly impossible to draw a breath.
Used for centuries by Silk Road travelers who wanted no contact with government officials, the hidden trail rose quickly, jogging around slabs of rock the size of houses and fields of gray boulders that fanned from snowcapped crags on all sides. Finally battling their way above the dust storm, they were able to make good progress until they were three miles from the pass.
Quinn saw the lone man from nearly a mile away, picking his way across a boulder-strewn side hill leading seven camels.
Quinn motioned for Garcia to pull off the trail alongside him on an uphill swell of gravel and dismount. There was just enough room for both bikes. It took his breath away when she shook her thick hair free of her helmet. He looked away quickly, back at the approaching camel herder, hoping she hadn’t noticed his stares.
The herdsman’s clucking and scolding could be heard for ten minutes before the little troupe crested the rise in the trail. Each camel had a barbed stick through its nose attached to a cord connecting it to the animal ahead. The man held a piece of rope from the nose of the lead beast. Only the baby trotted independently of the rest, even more knock-kneed and gangly than the adults.
“You have your camera handy?” Quinn asked.
Garcia tapped the chest pocket of her riding jacket. “Right here.”
The copper bell on the baby’s halter clanged happily as it plodded closer over the stony path.
“Go ahead and get it out,” he whispered, smiling at the approaching man. “It’s always some herder that trips you up… He needs to think we’re just tourists.”
The herdsman raised his right hand to his breast, bowing his head slightly. He was young, still in his twenties with a flint-hard look in his eye the smile couldn’t conceal. A FAM, fighting-age male, he carried a paratrooper Kalashnikov with a folding stock hung on a cloth sling over his shoulder. The Wahkir didn’t see enough traffic for professional bandits, but if one smuggler happened to be better armed than another he met along the path, there was no honor among those in the black market. The collar of a wool suit jacket was turned up against the chill. The tail of his flimsy shirt hung out over stained khaki military trousers. Thin leather sandals did little to protect his cracked feet from the ravages of weather and stone.
Quinn thought it best to play dumb and gave an awkward Chinese greeting.
The camel man shook his head, grinning with a mouth full of indigo and snuff-stained teeth.
“No Chinaman,” he said. He puffed up his chest. “Pashtu.”
The herder eyed the Royal Enfields with a keen interest, dropping the rope to his lead camel. He patted the seat on Jericho’s bike. “You sell?”
Quinn shook his head. It never surprised him when traders talked business in a whole multitude of languages. They might not be able to tell you the time, but they could barter, curse, and call you a cheapskate in the language of your choice.
Quinn shook his head. “Not mine. Umar’s bikes. You know Umar?”
The herdsman’s eyes went wide. He showed his blue-black teeth. “Umar’s bikes,” he repeated. He turned to stare at Garcia for a moment, took a deep breath, and stooped to pick up his lead rope.
Without a word of good-bye he clucked at his camels and started down the trail toward the Karakoram Highway. His animals trundled along after him bawling and farting until they fell back into their traveling jog.
“That was weird,” Garcia said tucking the camera back in her pocket.
Quinn threw a leg over his Enfield, anxious to be moving again. “I’m pretty sure he was looking at you as much as the bikes.”
Garcia paused. “What if he pulled the rifle?”
Quinn pretended to act incredulous. “And that from a woman who just witnessed my physical prowess at not beating Umar the giant. Come on, we should get going. That fight gave us a late start. We need to make it over Gabrielle’s secret pass by nightfall.”