‘Jesus Christ,’ muttered Luca, raising his hand to cover his mouth. ‘What the hell happened here?’
Bill shook his head, looking down the line of shacks to where another movement had caught his eye. A couple of mangy dogs were picking their way through the piles of rubbish by the banks of the stream, the lines of their ribs clearly visible.
‘I don’t know, but I don’t like being here one bit,’ he whispered. ‘This place looks more like a morgue than a village.’
As he spoke he looked over to the nearest of the shacks where a small girl was lying in the shadow of the roof. Strands of matted black hair covered her face, but aside from the shallow rising of her chest, she was completely still.
Bill moved over and crouched down beside her. As he came close, her eyes flickered slightly and then were still, seemingly oblivious to the shock of seeing a white man standing above her. Sweat beaded her skin, and the fevered beating of a pulse was visible between her angular collar bones.
‘It’s probably not a good idea to get too close,’ Luca said from behind him. ‘Let’s get on with finding the well and use the purification pump back in camp.’
Bill didn’t answer, his thoughts drifting as he imagined his own daughter in the same situation — wearing nothing more than a dirty dress, with bare feet and no one to feed her. He wondered if this girl’s parents had already died from the sickness and if so, why someone else had not taken her in so that she at least had someone with her during the final few days of her life. She seemed so unwanted and alone — a life just left to slowly flicker out.
Behind him, Luca was still speaking.
‘I reckon it must be something like typhoid or cholera. We’ve had both those jabs so I’m pretty sure we’re in no danger…’
Without hesitating, Bill scooped his hands under the little girl’s body and lifted her into his arms. Luca gave a shout of alarm, but Bill ignored him. She was as light as feather, no heavier than his daughter despite the fact that she was probably twice her age.
‘We’ll get the antibiotics from our medical kit,’ he whispered to her. ‘They’ll clear you up in a few days.’
Luca shook his head.
‘You can’t do that, mate. You have to put her down.’ He moved closer. ‘There’s a whole village suffering here and we’ve only packed a few courses of antibiotics. We might well need them ourselves.’
Bill’s forehead wrinkled in disbelief.
‘Tell me you’re not serious?’ he said. ‘Come on, we can help this little girl. We’re stronger than she is.’
Luca looked skywards, closing his eyes briefly.
‘It’s not that I don’t want to help her, but we can’t go round doling out medicine. That’s not what we are here for. We’ve got a tiny medical kit and only two or three courses of antibiotics. What happens if one of us needs them?’
‘I don’t give a shit if we need them,’ Bill countered, his voice rising. ‘I’m prepared to take that risk.’
‘Yeah? Well, I’m not. You can’t do this, mate. Think about it.’
There was a silence as both men stared each other out.
‘Look, we’ve been here before,’ said Luca, more gently. ‘There are always children or women whose lives could be saved by some drug that only costs a tenner. It’s horrible, I know, but it’s also the reality of being out here in Tibet. It’s not for us to start handing out drugs just because it makes us feel better.’
He paused, staring down at the little girl in Bill’s arms.
‘For Christ’s sake, I want to give her the drugs just as much as you do, but it just doesn’t make sense. Who are we to decide who gets them and who doesn’t? Why not the women so they can look after the children, or some of the younger guys so they can work the fields?’
Bill didn’t answer.
‘Come on, mate. I know it’s shit, but we’ve got to be practical here.’
There was a long silence before Bill eventually turned and very carefully laid the girl down on the step where she had been lying. He stared at her for a while before reaching into the breast pocket of his jacket and curling her hand round a crumpled chocolate bar.
‘I’m sorry,’ he whispered, then stood up, squaring his shoulders. As he looked at Luca, his eyes hardened.
‘Come on then. Let’s get that fucking water.’
Luca nodded grimly, his grey eyes fixed on Bill’s. Then, together, they marched up the track, their boots crunching over the rocky ground.
Chapter 23
When they woke up the next morning, the herders were gone.
For the first time on the expedition Bill was the first to rise, immediately taking in the smouldering remains of the campfire and the baggage dumped in a pile beside it. He swore, then slapped his hand against the fly-sheet of Luca’s tent.
‘OK, OK.’ Luca emerged with tousled hair, rubbing his eyes. ‘What’s the problem?’
Bill simply pointed to the baggage and for a moment Luca craned his neck round, looking for the herders.
‘Oh, shit.’
Wearing only his thermal long johns, he walked barefoot across the dusty ground to the pile of heavy bags. Crouching down, he unzipped each one to double-check its contents. Without his top on, the alabaster white of his torso contrasted against the dark tan of his forearms and face. From the last week of being on the trail, he had lost a few pounds in weight and now looked lithe and wiry. As he crouched on the ground, with his body coiled over the bags, the entire line of his ribs was visible down his back.
Picking up one of the two wooden boxes that lay to either side of the fire, Luca prised open the top. Both boxes had a few broken slats from days of being strapped to the yaks, but the supplies were still carefully packed within.
‘At least they left the food and our gear.’
‘Yeah,’ said Bill. ‘But we’re stuffed if we don’t find a route up from here. There’s no way we can carry on with everything ourselves. How many days’ food do you think we have left?’
Luca shifted the boxes to one side and looked from bag to bag again, his frown deepening. ‘I don’t know, but we can’t afford to waste any more time. We’ve got to find a way up that rock-face. I’ll go up this morning and see whether there’s anything that will work. Are you okay staying here and sorting through the gear?’
Bill nodded. Twenty minutes later he was building up the fire as Luca tightened the laces on his climbing boots and, without another word, left in the direction of the mountains, his shoulders hunched with fresh determination.
He spent most of the day pacing up and down the base, scanning every inch of the mountains’ curving flanks. There was something about the cliff-face that was bothering him. No matter which angle he viewed it from, he couldn’t quite visualise the way ahead. The cliff itself was a vertical drop of about eight hundred metres with long, ragged cracks running down its entire length. It was solid granite and would hold their protection well, but it was the route itself that looked almost impossible. It was a maze of overhangs and long sections of perfectly smooth rock.
From time to time his vision blurred and for a few moments it would seem as if the rock itself was changing shape. But then he would blink again and it would change back, so that he was left looking at smooth, unpassable sections of rock.
By the time he got back to camp it was late afternoon and his eyes were aching.
There was no sign of Bill. A small fire made from clods of dried yak dung smouldered away by the tent and neat coils of rope were laid out over the fly-sheet. Resting on one of bags were bundles of nuts and friends, while the carabineers had been clipped by size on to slings.
Luca grabbed the battered kettle and shook it, feeling water slosh around inside before balancing it on the corner of the fire. For a moment he looked back at the mountains, his eyes searching for a route. There must be a way through. There just must be.