Jamie found he was holding his breath and when he looked at Sarah, he saw her eyes were wide, like a little girl listening to a frightening bedtime story.
‘The Sun Stone. It was like nothing they had ever seen before – dark, perfectly spherical – and it had a quality that amazed them. It was not subject to the laws of gravity. Or more correctly it was gravity neutral. It floated. The ancients believed that the Sun god had sent them the seed of the earth’s destruction and they feared it. They decided that it must never again be touched by the light of its creator. For two hundred generations the Sun Stone was kept in its lead-lined casket, never again to pollute the earth or the water or the air. Then the Germans came.’
XLVI
BACK IN THE relative sanctuary of the monastery, Sarah stared into the flickering, oxygen-starved flames of a tiny fire. Thick cloth squares covered the windows of this lower room to ensure no light could escape, and the smoke filtered up through a hole in the roof to dissipate through openings in the upper storeys. She could hear the soft snicker and rustle as the building’s population of bats prepared for their nightly hunt. The contrast between now and the immense focusing of technology they had witnessed earlier made her head swim. It was as if she had been sucked into some kind of time warp that had swept her back to the fourteenth century. Yet the reality of the crater had accompanied them like some vengeful spectre and was here all around them in the room.
‘So the Sun Stone is the key? Walter Brohm discovered a substance from another world and was determined to exploit it?’
‘Whatever we happen to think of Brohm, he was a brilliant physicist,’ Jamie agreed. ‘Right up there with Oppenheimer, maybe even Einstein. It wouldn’t have taken him long to work out that this was something completely outside his experience.’
‘And he spent the next eight years working to divine its secrets.’
‘Yes, and if he’d had the chance to work on it exclusively he might have done it, except the war got in the way. When he was recruited to the project to build Hitler’s nuclear bomb nobody would have given a damn about his obsession. From what my grandfather said in the journal he was forced to work in secret. That would have been at best disloyalty, maybe even treason. Walter Brohm was the original misunderstood genius.’
‘But he never gave up.’
‘Not Brohm. He was ruthless and ambitious and he saw in the Sun Stone an opportunity to carve his place in history. Ethical or moral dilemmas would never have entered his mind. Somehow he discovered what the material was and what it could be used for. It was his misfortune that by the time he had proof of its true potential Adolf Hitler had lost faith in his nuclear scientists.’
‘He also feared it. What does that tell us?’
Tenzin’s voice cut across the conversation. ‘It tells us the ancient priests were correct, Miss Grant. The Sun Stone has the potential to destroy the world.’
They stared at him.
‘Don’t you understand?’ the Tibetan went on. ‘In the Sun Stone lies the power of the sun. It is the material that fuels the stars. A source of infinite energy but also a source of infinite destruction. What has more potential than nuclear fission? What is the Holy Grail of science?’
Still they didn’t grasp what he was telling them.
‘Nuclear fusion. Controlled, limitless power from the joining of two atomic nuclei to form a heavier single nucleus. Fusion was first achieved in the nineteen thirties, but it has never been harnessed as a reliable source of nuclear energy. Whoever discovers a way to control it will have the economic power to hold the world to ransom. And the military power. Because with controlled nuclear fusion, comes the fusion bomb. Potentially a hundred times more powerful than a conventional nuclear bomb.’
‘If they know so much about nuclear fusion and have been working on it for so long why can’t they control it?’ Jamie asked.
‘Because they have never been able to discover the necessary catalyst that would give them both the high energy output they need and the control to contain it in a fusion reactor. I think this Walter Brohm believed he had discovered that catalyst.’
‘The Sun Stone?’
Tenzin nodded and his unsmiling face darkened, but Sarah interrupted before he could continue.
‘You said a fusion bomb could be a hundred times more powerful than anything we have now? That would be hugely destructive but it still wouldn’t destroy the world.’
‘That is correct, but it assumes that whoever builds the bomb understands what they are dealing with. A fusion bomb is basically uncontrolled nuclear fusion, a chain reaction that results in a thermonuclear explosion. What if there is no limit to that chain reaction? If the stone is truly the material that fuels the stars, it could be the catalyst not for an unlimited source of energy, but one that turns the earth into an inferno that burns for a hundred million years.’
For a few moments, they were each lost in their own vision of the end of the world. Eventually, Jamie said quietly, ‘Why did you bring us here?’
Tenzin’s eyes narrowed and his voice became solemn. ‘It seems to me that some force has linked you irrevocably to the Sun Stone. You were given the journal, which in turn provided you with Walter Brohm’s name. Now it has brought you here. You were sent to me for a reason. I think every step of your journey has been guided towards one outcome.’
‘And what is that outcome?’
‘You must return to Europe and continue your quest. I believe that only you can ensure the Sun Stone never falls into the hands of those whose greed or ambition or foolishness will destroy us all.’
Sarah stared at him, confusion plain in her eyes – along with something else that Jamie couldn’t read.
‘But how are we supposed to do that? You can’t place this responsibility on us. We’re just . . . just two ordinary people. We don’t have the strength, or the resources.’ She shook her head. ‘It’s too big. This is something for governments to deal with.’
‘On the contrary, Miss Grant.’ Tenzin’s face was grave. ‘It is governments you must beware. Governments like the one that has invaded and oppressed my country would give anything and do anything to lay their hands on the Sun Stone and release its power. Communism has no soul, just as fascism had none, but what about capitalism? Do you think the Americans would be different? In nineteen seventy-one Richard Nixon betrayed my people for a handshake and a smile from Mao Zedong; are we to expect any better from the current president?’
‘But what can we do?’
‘When the time comes you will have a decision to make, only then will you know what to do.’
Sarah shot an anguished glance towards Jamie, but he had already made up his mind. He felt as if he was bathed in the aura created by the monk’s strength and resolve. This had been his fate from the start. This was the final chapter of Matthew Sinclair’s story. He would finish what his grandfather had started.
‘We should leave in the morning.’
Tenzin set a punishing pace as the fourteen-strong column headed back towards the border, but on the second and third days he became progressively warier. Twice they took cover beneath the rocks at the sound of an aircraft flying at altitude somewhere above them.
‘We are fortunate that they do not have the spare parts to keep their Black Hawk helicopters in the air,’ the Tibetan confided to Jamie. ‘The J-7 and J-11 jets based up at Lhasa are too fast to do us any harm among the mountains, but there are reconnaissance planes flying from smaller airfields all along the frontier and if they spotted us, they would call in a patrol to intercept us.’
‘I thought the Black Hawk was an American helicopter,’ Sarah said.
‘That is correct, Miss Grant. Your American defenders of democracy sanctioned the sale of twenty UH-60s to China during the nineteen eighties, which they swiftly used to suppress any resurgence of democracy in Tibet. Ironic, is it not?’
Late in the afternoon, one of the insurgents who had been covering the rear of the little column jogged up and conferred
with Tenzin. The monk nodded and his face was grim when he turned to Jamie and Sarah.
‘They are coming.’
If Jamie believed the pace had been hard over the past three days he quickly discovered how wrong he’d been. The Tibetans relieved them of their rucksacks and Tenzin set off at a trot that quickly had Jamie’s lungs screaming for oxygen. Only the knowledge of what would happen if the Chinese caught them kept him going, but, even so, after ten minutes he was willing the monk to ease off or turn an ankle, anything to stop the pain in his chest. It wasn’t until Sarah began reeling on her feet and two of the insurgents were forced to support her that Tenzin slowed to a brisk walk.
‘We must stay ahead of them until dark,’ the Tibetan leader explained. ‘If they are wujing, they have learned to fear the night and the Ghosts of the Four Rivers and they will halt, while we carry on.’ Jamie’s heart almost stopped at the thought of crossing this unforgiving landscape in the inky blackness of a Himalayan night, but Tenzin’s next words sobered him still further. ‘It is possible the soldiers who follow us are mountain-trained special forces troops. These men fear nothing and are equipped with night-vision equipment.’
‘How will we know?’ Jamie gasped.
‘If they are still with us at dawn,’ Tenzin said, and picked up the pace again.
What followed was the longest night of their lives. Tenzin kept up the relentless rhythm of the march for hour after hour, stopping only once to allow them to rest and take a drink. Ten minutes at the trot, followed by ten minutes at the walk to conserve their dwindling strength. Jamie and Sarah ran with a Tibetan on either side whispering incomprehensible words of encouragement as they kept their faltering charges upright through the rocks. In the gossamer-aired darkness every breath felt like a dying gasp, every heartbeat the hammer blow that preceded a seizure. Eventually, they travelled as if in a dream, their bodies pushed beyond the human norms of pain and exhaustion, their movements automatic and their minds seeking refuge in some weightless nirvana. Time or distance had no meaning, they could have marched three miles or thirty. It was only with the gathering Himalayan dawn, that soft, roseate light which garlanded the faraway peaks like a pink halo, that they realized they were alive, would live, and with it came the dread knowledge that soon they would know whether the martyrdom in the darkness had been worthwhile.
Thirty minutes into the new day Tenzin ordered a halt, but insisted everyone stay on their feet. Jamie hated him for it, but he knew that if he had slumped to the ground he would never have risen again. Sarah swayed between her two minders with her eyes closed, mumbling to herself. The Tibetan stared at the far horizon. Jamie followed his gaze, but could see nothing but barren grey rocks.
‘They are here. Two miles.’
‘How do you know?’
‘The wind carries their message. I do not know how, I only know.’
‘Then we’re finished.’ Jamie fought the urge to let himself collapse to the ground. He and Sarah might be kept alive, but there was no hope for this man he had come to respect and admire.
‘Perhaps not,’ Tenzin said. ‘Like most special forces, they operate in small units, perhaps only four or five strong. If they originally accompanied a wujing patrol they will have left them behind during the night. It’s possible they may look at us and decide we are too strong for them. Then again, they are the best trained troops in the People’s Liberation Army – the equivalent of your Special Air Service – and they have pride. That pride may keep them coming. One thing is in our favour: we are less than two miles from the border. If we can stay ahead of them we will reach Indian territory.’
‘Will they stop at the border?’
Tenzin shrugged. ‘We will see. It depends on what orders they have and how important to them we are. If they came across our trail by chance and decided to track us, they will not cross. If they know we were at the crater . . .’
He shouted a command and the column moved off, with two scouts in the lead and two guarding the rear. The man on Jamie’s left grinned at him, but the grin didn’t reach his eyes. Above the usual aroma of yak butter and unwashed body Jamie could smell something else, rank and strong. Fear. He knew the other man would have the same scent in his nostrils.
He turned to encourage Sarah, but she was beyond encouragement, hanging between the two Tibetans like a rag doll. He gritted his teeth and ran.
The first shot came when they had covered less than a mile, a whipcrack in the thin air that echoed like a volley from the mountains around them. Jamie staggered to a halt and looked backwards along the track. He could see them now, six tiny figures dogging their trail the way a stoat follows a rabbit.
‘Come.’ Tenzin shook his shoulder. ‘That was just a warning shot. They will be in range soon. Keep going.’
Jamie willed his legs to move and took up the mental refrain of the military route march. One foot in front of the other. One foot in front of the other. Another shot cracked out and he heard the distinctive zzzip-zzzzing of a bullet ricocheting from a boulder to their left.
Tenzin barked a new order and two of the Tibetans peeled off and moved into the rocks by the side of the trail. Jamie felt sick. The two men were the price of his life, and Sarah’s. No matter how determined the pursuit, the Chinese soldiers would have to deal with the threat to their flank. It would delay them. Not for long. Two barely trained guerrillas against the élite of the Chinese army. But long enough for Tenzin to get them to the border.
With the knowledge that they were going to survive, his legs found new strength and he shrugged off the man beside him, staggering along under his own power. More shots followed but none came close. They had reached a broad escarpment fringed by jagged, boulder-strewn hills that first rose then plummeted away almost vertically to the south. The only way out was ahead where two peaks were split by a pass that Jamie assumed must mark the border.
He risked a glance back just as a rattle of automatic fire confirmed the first contact between the pursuers and the two men left behind. Jamie knew it would only be a matter of minutes, but the pass was closer now and—
A muted thunder turned into a paralysing, gut-shaking roar. For a split second a monstrous shadow blotted out the sky, then it was gone. He looked up to see a turbo-prop plane similar to an RAF Hercules sailing towards the pass. As he watched the pilot banked across their route and a string of white dots left the big plane. Within seconds they had blossomed into fifteen or twenty massive parachutes. At first he thought it must be some sort of supply drop, then he realized that the size of the parachutes was to compensate for the thin air in the mountains and what hung below them was not canisters, but more of the special forces troops who pursued them. They were trapped.
XLVII
TENZIN REACTED INSTANTLY. He broke right towards the hills a quarter of a mile away where the boulders offered more cover than the open trail. Chiru, the youngest of the guerrillas, attached himself to Jamie’s shoulder and shepherded him away from danger, all the time darting wary glances back to where the paratroops were now deploying in loose formation. The Tibetans formed a protective circle round the two outsiders, but Jamie knew it was only a matter of time before they were overwhelmed. Against six, even six of the Chinese élite special forces, they would have had a chance, but not against four times that number. They were hopelessly outgunned.
A rock formation in front of Jamie shattered and a heartbeat later he heard the distinctive ripsaw clatter of a burst of automatic weapons fire. As a storm of lead savaged the air around them the man to his left gave a sharp cry and fell to the ground. Without thinking, Jamie picked up the fighter’s rifle and stripped him of his ammunition while Chiru checked the fallen man for signs of life. The boy shook his head and they ran together to the base of the hills where Tenzin had set up a defensive perimeter among the rocks, with Sarah, who looked dazed and sick, at its centre.
‘What now?’ Jamie demanded.
‘We can hold them here for a while, I think,’ Tenzin said, his dust-c
oated hawk’s face creased in a frown of concentration.
Jamie saw he was right. The Chinese paratroop commander now faced the choice of attacking over the open ground the Tibetans had just crossed or a long flanking movement to the east. The first would cost him casualties, the second might give the beleaguered insurgents a chance to escape. It all depended on just how determined he was to kill them.
A sustained burst from a dozen assault rifles on fully automatic signalled his decision. Jamie curled into a foetal ball as the rocks around him exploded. For the first time in many days he thought of his grandfather. This combination of exhaustion and sheer terror was the life Matthew Sinclair had lived for six long years. The knowledge lit some spark in him and he raised his head and sighted the Type 56 carbine on the open ground just as a dozen green-clad soldiers broke cover and rushed forward, shooting as they ran. All hell broke loose around him as the Tibetans opened fire and Jamie joined in with short controlled bursts that set the rifle shuddering in his hands. The man who had found Matthew Sinclair’s journal would have fired warning shots over the attacker’s heads. The man who had read it and fought for it took deliberate aim at the chest of the leading attacker. His first shots flew high and he automatically sighted lower, watching as the shots kicked up dust among the charging men. First one went down, spun by a burst that caught him in the upper chest, then a second who dropped like a stone. In an instant, the landscape was empty, the survivors melting into the dusty ground.
Tenzin called out an order and the firing died away, apart from a few desultory single shots from the Chinese four hundred yards off on the far side of the track.
Jamie turned and saw Sarah struggling to get to her feet. He ran to her at a crouch and pulled her down. ‘Do you want to get your bloody head shot off?’
‘Hey, Saintclair,’ she mumbled, ‘I can look after myself.’
The Doomsday Testament Page 26