White Peak

by Ronan Frost

  FIFTY-FOUR

  The next town was more than six hours’ drive, and it was more like a shanty town, with buildings of plywood, bamboo, corrugated metal, and sheets of plastic, than anything like a permanent town. There were no satellite dishes or other signs of the modern world. They approached from above, the temporary settlement spilling out across a valley floor where the small river provided the stuff of life. Rye saw yaks grazing in the fields and, a little way removed from them, a campfire with a number of people gathered around it, either cooking or warming themselves. It was impossible to tell from that distance.

  Their original plan had been to rest up at one or two of these temporary villages on the way to base camp, but with Cressida Mohr’s mercenaries behind them, the idea of standing still felt like suicide.

  Rye did see cars, though: not many, but enough to convince him they’d be able to source more gas for the remainder of their journey.

  He followed the SUV into town.

  They passed children playing barefoot in a stream. Childhood was hardly the same everywhere in the world, but the essence of fun was. An old man with a face weathered to resemble a wrinkled prune watched the children play while his wife scrubbed away at trousers in a steel bucket. Her backbreaking work had got the soap lathered. A younger man came out to join the older man, taking up a seat on a stool beside him, and together they smoked something herbal. This was life, so different from the one they’d left behind Stateside, but essentially so familiar just the same.

  They saw more people as they drove deeper into the shanty dwellings, but there was no sign of any gas station, makeshift or otherwise.

  Rye slowed, pulling up alongside a group of men sitting roadside. He wound down the window and asked, “Do any of you understand English?” to blank stares. “Gas?” Then he tried, “Gasoline? Petrol?” And patted the outside of the truck’s door, miming driving. It was crude, but seemingly effective as one of the old men pointed farther along the road. He nodded, encouraging them to go. Rye nodded his thanks and rolled on deeper into the shanties.

  The place reeked of humanity: bodies unwashed, or at least lacking the perfumed deodorants and those other masks he associated with cities—everything from the unique signatures of gas and exhaust fumes to the fusions of every cooking style imaginable and coffee and beer and everything he took for granted. The smells coming in through the truck’s window were far more natural: manure from the yaks in the fields, the aromas of meat cooking in a fire pit, and the sweats and natural oils of every man, woman, and child living together in these lean-to houses.

  Several, he noticed, hadn’t bothered with roofs, making him think that come the monsoon rains they’d be long gone, moved on to some other valley floor out of the path of the rains.

  Without being able to speak Dzongkha or Nepali, Rye had a feeling they were going to be shit out of luck. Still, he drove on, slowly, looking for anything that might pass as a gas station. Off to the left he saw a larger building, still very much temporary with walls of corrugated steel, but as he drove past half a dozen kids came streaming out of the door. A younger woman followed, lingering on the threshold. She was dressed in a white blouse and jeans. She had blond hair and a tanned but very European complexion. Rye leaned out of the window and called, “Excuse me?” earning a smile and a wave from the woman. She came over to the truck.

  “Do you speak English?”

  “I do. So do all of the kids. It’s the language of school lessons here. Are you guys lost?”

  “I hope not,” Rye said with a smile. “We’re looking for somewhere we can get gas,” and seeing the confusion on the school-teacher’s face added, “petrol.”

  “Ah, you need Sonam, he’s on the edge of town. His place looks like a scrapyard. You can’t miss it, just keep on down this road until you’re leaving town. There’s a huge red corrugated iron wall—it’s rust, not paint—that’s Sonam’s place. Don’t let him fool you, he speaks English perfectly well. I should know, he’s my greatest achievement.” She grinned, but her pride was obvious.

  “That’s great, thanks. Can I ask how long you’ve been here?”

  “Here, six months; with the tribe, closer to six years now. We’re nomadic. We move two or three times a year, depending upon the severity of the seasons. I came over on a mission and ended up falling in love with the place. I’m not sure I’ll ever go home again. Or at least back to Sweden. This is my home now.”

  “Nice.”

  “What about you guys? Trekking I assume.”

  “Climbing, up to the north in the glacial peaks.”

  “Good luck with that,” the young teacher said, shaking her head. “Even getting to those peaks is an absolute nightmare. They reckon it’s the toughest trek in the world. And then you intend to climb? You’re braver souls than me.”

  “Thanks for those inspiring words,” Carter said, leaning across to flash a cheeky grin at the teacher. “If this doesn’t work out you should think about motivational speaking.”

  She laughed at that. “Now that’s a thought. Anyway, Sonam can sort you out. And if you want, you’re welcome to come back and join us. We’ve got a stew on the fire pit. Lhaden is a wonderful cook. She’s been working on the stew all afternoon. It’s lentils, rice, and vegetables spiced with chili peppers and yak’s cheese, with chunks of meat.” She didn’t say what meat.

  “We wouldn’t want to impose.”

  “Nonsense. It would be good for the children to practice their English. It’ll give them an excuse to show off.”

  Rye looked at Carter. They needed to eat. But that had to be offset against losing ground to the chasing pack.

  “We won’t be able to stay long,” Carter answered for him, “but who can resist the lure of mystery meats?”

  “It’s a date. The kids are going to love you guys,” she promised.

  They followed the road through the rest of the shantytown, seeing more of the same, with older men watching while their women worked, until finally a long rust-red wall of corrugated iron came into sight. Rye couldn’t see over it, even from the truck’s elevated seat. He flashed his lights at Iskra in the other car, before he swung through the wide gap in the iron wall that served as a gateway. He could see what the teacher meant about a junkyard. There was scrap metal everywhere, with bits of car chassis and bodywork in various states of decay lined up to one side where a young man in his early twenties was working on them.

  He watched them as they rolled to a stop.

  Rye saw that he had a welder’s torch in his hand, but no mask to protect his eyes. He killed the engine and clambered out of the truck, raising a hand in greeting as he did.

  Carter got out the other side as Iskra brought the SUV into the junkyard behind them.

  “We need gas,” Rye called. “We were told you were the man we needed to speak to?”

  He set the torch aside and walked over to them. Close up, he was a good-looking kid, but it was obvious he was closer to twenty than thirty. Rye scanned the junkyard, noting what appeared to be the body of an old Shell gas tanker up against the side of an office structure where Sonam made his home.

  He said something to them, which Rye assumed was an “I don’t understand” in his native tongue, so he answered, “Your teacher warned us you’d try that. She also said you were her best student.”

  “She’s a terrible liar,” Sonam said. “But she’s sleeping with me, so she had to say that.”

  That earned a wry smile from the thief.

  “So, you can help us out?”

  “Sure, we’ve got gas.” He pointed toward the huge cylindrical drum. “But like all good things, it comes at a price. Supply and demand, you Americans call it? I have something you want, and only I have it.”

  “That seems to be the way the world works,” Rye agreed. “So how much?”

  “For both vehicles?” Rye nodded. “Not cheap. We won’t get another delivery before it’s time to move out, so whatever I sell you I can’t sell to my own people. It cou
ld be the difference between a couple of families making it to the next camp or not, so how do you put a price on that?”

  “I’m sure you can manage to somehow,” Rye said.

  “It depends. Are we talking American dollars, Indian rupees, or Bhutanese ngultrum?”

  “American,” he said.

  “Ah, see, then I need to get it changed into money I can spend, so that will be more.”

  “Of course it will,” Carter agreed. “Just as if we’d said ngultrum, you’d have said American would be better.”

  “You are a cynical man,” Sonam said, but he was grinning like he’d just been found out.

  “How much?”

  “Two full tanks? So, we’re looking at what—forty gallons? Three hundred dollars.”

  Carter didn’t even argue; he stripped three hundred in notes from the five hundred he’d got in his pocket and handed them over. “You should have said five hundred.”

  Sonam grinned, palming the notes. “Did I say three? I meant five.”

  “Nice try,” Carter said, “but given your girlfriend has invited us for dinner tonight I figure three hundred’s a more than adequate day’s profit. Hell, I doubt you see that much money in a week.”

  “A month.” Sonam’s grin just grew wider, stretching into a proper Cheshire Cat smile. “Move your truck over to the tank and I’ll take care of it.”

  They filled the truck first.

  There was no pump mechanism to speak of, just a hose with a shutoff valve that worked by a system of basic fluid dynamics. Sonam fed one end of the hose into the truck’s gas tank and opened the valve, letting it flow until gasoline bubbled out from the overfull tank. He shook off the end of the hose and wiped down the side of the truck with a rag before recapping the tank.

  He repeated the procedure on the SUV.

  It took no more than five minutes to fill both vehicles.

  In that time, Rye decided to explore the junkyard. Sonam had a mongrel chained up to one of the stripped chassis. The animal showed no interest in him. It had a plastic ice cream container as a water bowl. The container was empty, the plastic stained brown around the side with a crust of something unpleasant. He took some of his own water and poured it into the container. The dog came forward hesitantly, not sure it could trust him, until its thirst got the better of it and the animal began to lap at the water.

  “That was kind of you,” Vic said, behind him. “I am learning more about you, Rye McKenna, every day we spend together. An explorer and an animal lover.”

  Rye knelt, holding out a hand for the dog to come forward and sniff in its own time. It didn’t take long for the mongrel to creep forward a couple of tentative steps, and then he felt its wet nose nuzzling against the palm of his hand. Learning him. “Who’s a good boy?” Rye said.

  The dog quickly lost interest in him and returned to the shade beneath the metal struts of the chassis and settled down.

  The thief had negotiated with the nomad to throw in two extra gas cans at no charge, meaning they at least had enough to reach Tangbi Mani, which would serve as the base camp for their trek to the world’s highest unclimbed peak.

  They’d worry about the whole “getting back again” when the time came.

  They put the metal canisters in with the rest of the gear and secured the back.

  Rye checked his watch. It was three hours since they’d brought the side of the mountain down. He had no idea how long it would take twelve men to clear the road, assuming they could without any specialist equipment.

  They could be through already for all he knew.

  “Come, then, my new friends. Let us go back to school and feast on Lhaden’s stew.”

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m so hungry I could eat a yak,” Carter said, falling into step beside Rye.

  “Funny you should say that,” the tribesman said with that wicked grin of his fixed firmly in place.

  “Don’t tell me that,” Carter told the other man, “you know the deal: what I don’t know won’t hurt me.”

  “There must be a lot that doesn’t hurt you,” Rye deadpanned, earning a belly laugh from Sonam.

  The five-block walk back to the makeshift school building took no more than five minutes. It felt good to stretch their legs and work some blood through the muscles after so long cooped up inside the cars, but Rye couldn’t shake the feeling that it was five minutes too long and they were going to regret not having the vehicles close by when they’d finished the meal. He’d tried to put it out of his mind, but caught himself looking back up the mountainside in the direction they’d come from, looking for any sign of those three black cars.

  The road was empty.

  Everything the Scandinavian schoolteacher had said about Lhaden’s stew was true. The old woman truly was a wonderful cook. The simple flavors were a revelation, but besides the sheer amount of taste within the relatively simple dish, the real kicker was just how spicy it was.

  “The chilies,” Sonam said, licking his fingers as he wiped a piece of flatbread around the rim of his metal bowl. “The woman is a fiend with them. I swear she has no tastebuds left, so she puts enough in until she can finally taste them.”

  Rye didn’t doubt it for a minute. But Hannah had been the same. She’d loved a good curry, the spicier the better as far as she was concerned. Thinking about her made him turn his gaze toward the higher peaks all around them. She would have loved this place. Everywhere you turned there was a summit beckoning. There was so much good climbing to be had he could have lived in this high valley for a month without repeating a route.

  “Penny for them?” Carter asked, coming to sit beside him.

  “I’m not sure they’re worth it,” Rye said.

  “I’m a rich man, I’ll risk it.”

  “I was just thinking how much Hannah would have loved it here.”

  “How are you doing? I mean really.”

  “Coping,” he said, which was the truth. “Mainly because I’m trying not to think about it. It feels like we’ve been running nonstop; it’s only when we slow down I start to remember.”

  “I can’t imagine. Honestly. But you need to know, we’re basically family now. You’re one of us. That means I’m the pain-in-the-ass little brother. Anything you need, if I can help, I will. You’ve just got to ask.”

  “I appreciate it,” Rye said, and realized he did. The one thing he needed right now was somewhere to belong, and if Carter Vickers wanted to make out that Rask had put together some sort of dysfunctional family, well that was fine by him.

  It was better than being alone in the world for the first time in his life.

  “Hey, I’m not just the pretty face around here, I’m the heart and soul of the team. Vic’s the muscle, and Iskra, well, she’s just a fucking enigma, to be honest. She’s not exactly talkative. She’s been with us for two years. I know less about her now than I did the day she walked through the door and Rask introduced us. I’m not sure what her deal is, but she’s saved my life half a dozen times already, and that’s good enough for me.”

  “Mine too,” Rye agreed, thinking back to the temple in Kathmandu. “But when we move on, who’s going to look out for these people?” He inclined his head slightly toward the group of kids who had gathered around Vic to listen to him tell a story of his homeland. They hung on his every word. Rye couldn’t help but wonder if he was the first black man they’d ever met, because every now and then one of them would reach out to touch his skin, like they thought the color might rub off.

  “They aren’t alone. Two or three hundred people live in this place.”

  “Against twelve armed men?”

  “You can’t let yourself think like that. The people chasing us aren’t indiscriminate killers, they’re hunting us. They want what we want. They’re not looking to rack up a body count.”

  “You can’t know that.”

  “Maybe not, but I have to believe it. And so do you. We can’t be responsible for everyone.”

  But he wa
sn’t listening to the thief. Rye pushed himself up to his feet and wandered across to join the schoolteacher at the fire pit.

  The young Swede was perched on a log, leaning forward to heat something in the dwindling flame. “I need to tell you something,” he said, sitting down beside her.

  “If you’re going to complain about the food, you need to take it up with the chef,” she said, then saw Rye’s expression and immediately changed. “What is it?”

  “There are some very bad men chasing us,” Rye said, knowing he sounded stupid, but knowing he had to warn the woman.

  “How bad?”

  “They killed people back in Phuntsholing.”

  “And knowing this you brought them to us?” There was no escaping the betrayal in the young teacher’s voice. “We’ve got children here.”

  “It’s not like that. They are after the same thing we are. They are ruthless, but they’re not monsters. I don’t think they’ll hurt you, but they’re going to want to know where we’ve gone, and how far behind us they are.”

  “What do you want me to tell them?”

  Rye thought about it. “We’re going to Tangbi Mani up in the north, tell them we’re heading west, toward the Chinese border. Tell them we’re going to climb Jomolhari. Or tell them nothing, simply tell them you don’t know, that we didn’t talk about it.”

  “Why are they chasing you?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “Then at least tell me if you are the good guys or the bad guys,” the teacher said.

  “Doesn’t everyone think they’re the heroes of their own life?” Rye told her.

  “If they ask, I’ll lie for you. But if they hurt the children—”

  “Then you tell them the truth. You do whatever you have to to protect those kids.”

  The Swede nodded.

  He hadn’t realized that Sonam was standing behind them, listening. “I will help you,” he promised.

  Rye shook his head. “It’s too dangerous.”

  “Which is how I like it.” He grinned, but Rye could tell he was terrified and this was his bravest face. “I will gather the hunters. We shall buy you time.”