As Shan retreated a step Tsipon’s hand closed around his arm.
“At work before dawn as usual,” Tsipon declared to Xie, pulling Shan with him toward the car. “Two of the sharpest minds in Tibet gracing our little town at the same time. Great deeds can’t be far behind.” He herded Shan into the rear seat as Xie walked around and climbed in the opposite side, leaving Shan trapped between the two men as the sedan pulled away.
The Snow Leopard Guesthouse was a compact two story building of stucco and wood with a steep roof designed, Shan surmised, to conform to a Chinese concept of an alpine chalet. As the sedan pulled up to its front door the sun burst out through low-hanging clouds to the east, casting a brilliant gold light on snowcapped Chomolungma. Shan walked casually along the front of the building as Tsipon boasted to Xie about his new hotel, proudly pointing out its Western structural features and the adjacent plot they had targeted for expansion with a swimming pool. Shan reached the end of the building, looking around the corner before turning back. The old Jiefang truck was visible at the side of the hotel, two Public Security cars at the back of the parking lot.
Director Xie insisted that the driver take photos of him posing with his new friends with the mountain as a backdrop before following Tsipon inside, past the reception desk, into a private room with a table set for breakfast. The walls in the room were adorned with photographs not of the Himalayan highlands but of Beijing, with one wall bearing nothing but a large airbrushed portrait of the Great Helmsman. The buffet on the sideboard was a cosmopolitan blend of dumplings, rice porridge, pickled vegetables, red bean soup, fried bread, pastries, tea, and coffee. As Director Xie settled into a chair at the head of the table with a cup of coffee and a plate of pastries and vegetables, a solemn middle-aged woman in a dark business suit slipped into the chair at the opposite end. “Madame Zheng from Beijing,” the director offered in introduction.
“It isn’t often we are given an opportunity to so directly serve Beijing,” Tsipon said with an uncertain glance at the woman before turning back to Xie. “Shan will be pleased to tell you all about the local gompas.”
Shan’s hand tightened around his cup of tea.
“The soft spots on our southern underbelly,” Director Xie put in as he lifted a pickle in his chopsticks. “We have long suspected renewed criminal efforts by the Dalai Clique.” Although the government never officially referred to the Dalai Lama by name, this new, more conceptual term had crept into government pronouncements, always the two words together, in the same tone used for the notorious Gang of Four.
“The gompas are small,” Shan replied in a tight voice. “Harmless.”
“If they were harmless my office wouldn’t exist,” Xie offered good-naturedly. “And once,” he added, looking at Madame Zheng now, “they were much bigger, building great wealth by oppressing the peasant class.”
Tsipon sampled one of the small, hard pastries. “Director Xie has a fascinating theory.”
“They had jewel-mounted statues, figures made of gold accumulated over centuries,” Xie announced, “the fruits of their enslavement of the masses. Are you aware, Comrade Shan, the Party has decreed that all religious artifacts belong to the state?”
“Of course.” Shan felt the steady, probing gaze of Madame Zheng. Although Tsipon had stopped looking at her, apparently dismissing the silent woman as a clerk, Shan had learned to be wary of anonymous, well-dressed bureaucrats from Beijing.
“We have chronic problems with the accuracy of our inventories. I believe we will find these monks were smuggling state artifacts across the border to fund the criminal element, the splitists, in exile. Why else would they refuse to sign their loyalty oaths?”
Shan struggle to keep emotion out of his face as he studied the bureaucrat from Lhasa. Here, according to government doctrine, was one of the handful of officials to whom Tibetan Buddhists were accountable, a supreme regulator of lamas, a genuine wheelsmasher. Under the direction of officials like Xie, teams had been moving through Tibet during the past year, replacing prayer banners with slogans in praise of Mao.
Xie pushed back his dishes and began to unfold a map. “I look forward, Comrade Shan, to working with you in apprehending our fugitives. They no doubt have conspirators in other monasteries.”
Shan stopped breathing for a moment. He looked at Tsipon. The Tibetan had not planned on Shan’s joining his private breakfast. He had brought him as punishment for trespassing in his office, had brought him to demonstrate again that no matter how hopeless Shan’s plight might seem, Tsipon was always able to make it worse.
The Tibetan rose and poured more coffee for Xie. “I apologize,” Tsipon said in a generous tone, “if I gave the impression that Shan could be spared at this particular time. The entire climbing industry depends on a handful of skilled individuals. Of course, just a few insights for now from our envoy to the mountain people could be invaluable. Comrade Shan, you should point out on the map locations of the gompas that are active.”
Some might have thought it merely ironic that a Tibetan would force a Chinese to identify the location of monks targeted by Religious Affairs. But for Tsipon it wasn’t about intimidating monks, it was about intimidating Shan. Any number of people, including Tsipon, could have given Xie the location of the gompas, he could even have obtained them with a quick stop at the town’s library. But Tsipon meant to shove Shan into Xie’s scheme.
Shan swallowed hard, extracted a pencil, and began to draw little circles on Xie’s map.
“And that of the fugitives?” Xie asked. “Sarma gompa, I believe it is called.”
Shan hesitated, feeling Tsipon’s hard stare, and made one more mark on the map, down a dirt track a few miles off the road to Chomolungma.
Thirty minutes later, Tsipon having at last departed with Director Xie, Shan walked down the second-floor corridor of the guesthouse, attired in clean coveralls, carrying on his shoulder a canvas bag of tools borrowed from Kypo, whom he had found in the garage. As he expected, a Public Security guard sat on a chair outside the best corner room, eyeing him with idle curiosity. Tacked to the door was a sign declaring the room sealed by order of Public Security. A tray with dirty dishes lay on the floor beside the guard’s chair. He was not leaving for meals. Shan was not going to get past him.
Outside, along the edge of the parking lot, he found a ladder being used to paint the balconies of the second-floor rooms.
“Those guards will shoot you if they find you inside that room,” Kypo warned over his shoulder.
“I need you to switch the ladder to the adjoining balcony after I climb up, hang a bucket of paint on it. Then put it back ten minutes later.”
“Not a chance. Then they’ll know you had an accomplice.”
Shan eyed the old truck parked beside the rental shed. “Then get in the Jiefang. Start it up if anyone in a uniform comes around the front corner. I’ll hear it.”
Moments later Shan had the ladder up and was over the balcony. With a prayer to the protector deities he put his hand on the sliding door. It silently slid open.
Stepping to the inside wall he lowered himself to the floor, folding his legs underneath him, moving his head from side to side as he studied the room. From left to right he saw a writing table, a trash can, then the open bathroom door, a side table with a lamp, an unmade bed with a coverlet decorated with pandas playing on clouds, a stand holding an open suitcase bearing an Italian logo, and finally a small closet with a half opened door. He pressed his hands together, his index fingers raised like a steeple, focusing himself, then repeated the process, turning his head much more slowly. On the desk the writing pad supplied by the hotel had been used; a ballpoint pen leaned against a blue three ring binder beside a clear glass ashtray bearing two cigarette butts, both with smears of dark lipstick. On the floor beside the trashcan was a sheet of paper that had been wadded then later straightened out, probably by a Public Security photographer. The bathroom rug was askew, towels tossed on the floor. The lamp on the bedtable had something of red silk, a blouse or nightgown, thrown over the shade. On the floor beneath the open suitcase was a pile of clothes.