The Ninth Buddha

by Daniel Easterman

  “Do you believe I am an incarnation?”

  “No,” she replied.

  “Was I ever one?”

  “Perhaps,” she answered.

  “Before the child was born.”

  “Then what would you advise me to do?”

  She was silent.

  “I cannot advise. I am only a woman.”

  He shrugged.

  “And I am only a man. You have said so yourself. Advise me what to do. As one human being to another.”

  She was long in answering. When she spoke, her voice was dull and flat with defeat.

  “You must sign the papers. You have no choice. If you don’t, they will kill you. They already have the boy. They have all they need.”

  He said nothing. She was right. They would kill him, and what would that achieve? He turned and faced the Burial.

  “Are you still here, Za-abughai?” he asked. He meant Zamyatin.

  “Yes. I’m waiting for your decision.”

  “Very well,” he said.

  “Give me my pen. I’ll sign your papers.

  Then you can get out.”

  Christopher wondered when the nightmare was going to end. They had shot Tsering seconds after entering the yurt. Then he and Chindamani had been tightly bound and taken outside with William and Samdup. There had been a long wait-while Zamyatin got his men ready for their move against the Khutukhtu’s palace.

  Christopher had somehow managed to get close enough to William to talk to the boy, reassuring him, telling him his ordeal would soon be over. They had set off about an hour after Zamyatin first discovered them.

  He remembered a maze of crooked alleyways and streets smelling of ordure and decomposition, hands holding him, pinching him, guiding him, voices whispering and whimpering in the troubled darkness, the darkness itself struggling to become flesh as faces swam in and out of view.

  Then the moon had glided out from behind the clouds, copper and stained in a turbid sky, and the alleyways had become silent streets of silver filled with dogs and the dim, shrouded bodies of the newly dead. Above them, the towers of the Maidari Temple, eighty feet high, made bold pillars against the sky; on the Tower of Astrology, a single light burned in readiness for tomorrow’s Festival.

  It had been a simple matter for Zamyatin and his men to effect an entry to the palace. There were fewer guards on duty than usual, with half of them preparing for the festival. Those that remained had put up little resistance, and the revolutionaries had rounded them up in a matter of minutes.

  William sat on his knee, the way he had once sat when he had been a much younger child, many years ago, before all this began.

  He was telling his father the details of his journey to Dorje-la.

  Christopher let him talk, urging the boy to get everything off his

  chest. He wondered if William would ever recover properly from

  his ordeal assuming, that was, that they ever got out of this place and made it back to England alive.

  Samdup had told them that the swelling on William’s neck had started to go black about a week ago. Zamyatin had been too preoccupied making the arrangement for his coup to waste time getting a doctor for the boy.

  “How does your neck feel now, son?” Christopher asked.

  “It’s no better. I think it’s going to burst all the time. It feels as though things are crawling round and round inside. If I touch it, it hurts terribly. Sometimes I want to scratch it off, it gets so bad.

  Samdup had to tie my hands behind my back two nights ago. I’m frightened. You’ll make it get better now you’re here, won’t you?”

  The boy’s trust was almost unbearable. Christopher felt more helpless than at any time in the past months. The Khutukhtu had sent instructions for his personal physician to come. Now all they could do was wait.

  The Khutukhtu was growing drunk on his port. He sat on a long sofa in one cornel of the room, smoking long Turkish cigarettes with the peculiar affectation of the blind. Chindamani and Samdup sat beside him. For all the differences between them, they understood one another. They were all trulkus, they all suffered from the same deformity.

  Samdup was tired, but he could not even think of sleep.

  Chindamani was with him again, and the pee-ling who had helped to rescue them from Dorje-la that night, Wil-yarn’s father. He felt uncontrollably excited: perhaps something would happen now, perhaps he and Wil-yarn could escape from Zamyatin at last.

  He did not like his other body. The Khutukhtu drank alcohol as though he were an ordinary person, and he appeared to be quite drunk. Samdup disliked the way the fat old man stroked and frotted him with smooth, clammy fingers. The vacant expression in those blind white eyes unnerved him. Unaccustomed to either vice or sensuality, the boy had no capacity for sympathy. He was too young to understand that sin was just as much a part of life as prayer, or that holiness, like water, would grow stagnant if it were allowed to lie too long without being stirred.

  “Come here,” the Khutukhtu said, standing and taking Samdup’s hand. Samdup followed him across to a huge table on which stood a huge machine with a wooden horn. It reminded Samdup of the great trumpets on the terraces of Dorje-la. The Khutukhtu bent down and cranked a handle in the side of the machine, then, with blind fingers that shook from a combination of port and nervousness, dropped the needle heavily on to a spinning black disc.

  Instantly, a raucous voice blared from the horn, accompanied by rapid, jumping music.

  I would say such wonderful things to you There would be such wonderful things to do If you were the only girl in the world And I were the only boy.

  “That’s a gramophone,” said the Khutukhtu.

  “It makes music, as though someone were inside, singing.”

  “Turn that infernal thing off!” Zamyatin was sitting at a little table at the far end of the room, sorting out the various papers he would need to legitimize his coup.

  “Until my Lord Samdup is installed as my successor tomorrow,” said the Khutukhtu, ‘this is still my palace. If you want silence, there are plenty of other rooms to go to.”

  “The boy should not be listening to music. He should be sleeping.

  Tomorrow will be a long day. He is about to have responsibilities thrust upon him.”

  The Khutukhtu snorted loudly.

  “The boy should not be sleeping. He should be in my private chapel, praying, meditating, and generally preparing himself for his proclamation. The formalities must be observed. The boy must not go cold to his destiny.”

  He paused and inhaled a stream of smoke. He remembered the days before his own enthronement as Khutukhtu: the vigils, the offerings, the fasts, the long, dull hours of liturgical recitals. Such a terrible waste of time. But he wanted the boy away from here before trouble started.

  “This no longer concerns you.” Zamyatin creased his brows, more in irritation than anger. Tonight, he would not be angry.

  Mongolia was his. Next month, he would sit in a gilded room at the Kremlin and dine with Lenin and Zinoviev as their equal.

  “I am the boy’s tutor now,” said the Khutukhtu.

  “Who better than I to train him? I mean to teach him everything I know. Don’t worry I’ll spare him my vices, if you spare him yours. He won’t need them. But he will need my experience; and my memories. I tell you that he will need prayer more than sleep tonight. And meditation more than prayer. Or do you intend to act as spiritual director to your new ruler? I hardly think you’re qualified.”

  Zamyatin said nothing. Whether the boy slept or prayed meant nothing to him. So long as the child was pliable. So long as he was fit to be paraded in the proper regalia and knew how to make the right gestures tomorrow. He already had men scouring the storerooms of the palace for the clothes the Khutukhtus wore as children.

  From somewhere in the distance, the sound of shouting came, followed by silence. A door slammed, heavy and muffled. Then, quite distinct, between the ticks of a clock, a series of shots rang out, clear and
perfect in the stillness of the night.

  Zamyatin ordered two of the guards to the door.

  “See what’s happening,” he said, ‘and get back to me as quickly as possible. I’ll stay here with our prisoners. Hurry.” He took a revolver from his pocket and checked it.

  The guards hurried through the door, taking their rifles with them. No-one spoke. The counter-attack had come sooner than expected, and Zamyatin’s men were thin on the ground.

  Less than a minute later, the guards returned looking visibly frightened.

  “An attack. Von Ungern Sternberg. He has the palace surrounded.”

  “How many men?”

  “Impossible to say, but the men at the gate think we’re outnumbered.”

  “Any news of Sukebator and his men?”

  “They’re tied up at the radio station. Ungern’s Chahar units have them pinned down.”

  Zamyatin turned to Bodo.

  “Think, man! Is there another way out of here? A secret passage?

  This place must be riddled with them.”

  The lama shook his head.

  “They were blocked up by the Chinese when they held the

  Khutukhtu prisoner. They’ve not been opened up again.

  Except .. .”

  “Yes?”

  “Except for one, I think. Behind the treasure rooms. It’s better hidden than the others There’s a tunnel behind it leading to the Tsokchin. Once we’re there I can arrange for horses.”

  Zamyatin thought quickly. If they could make it to Allan Bulak, where the provisional government was located, there was still a chance that they might join up with the Bolshevik forces moving in from the north. He had the Khutukhtu and the boy. All the aces were still in his hands.

  “Quickly then,” he shouted.

  “Lead the way. You and you’ he pointed at the two guards ‘keep our rear covered. Hurry up.”

  The sound of shooting was growing louder. Ungern could be here in a matter of minutes.

  The little group was assembled quickly, Bodo in front, then the prisoners, followed by Zamyatin and his guards.

  The corridor outside the Khutukhtu’s study took them directly into his treasure rooms. They were like Aladdin’s cave, crammed from end to end with bric-a-brac of every description, the product of a lifetime’s obsession.

  Chandeliers hung everywhere like patterns of webbed and shattered ice. Vases from China, rugs from Persia, peacock feathers from India, two dozen samovars of every size and style from Russia, pearl necklaces from Japan all jostled each other in cosmopolitan disorder. The Khutukhtu had ordered goods in multiples: a dozen of these, a score of those, sometimes the entire contents of a trading house during a visit to Mai-mai-ch’eng. It was a vast jumble sale to which no buyers ever came.

  In one room, there were long rows of guns in glass cases: rook rifles, sniders, Remington repeaters, breech-loading pistols, carbines some purely ornamental, others quite deadly, all of them unfired. In the next was the Khutukhtu’s vast collection of mechanical inventions. There were dolls at a small piano that could play Strauss waltzes one after the other without ever tiring;

  a monkey that could climb a pole and another that could spin round and round a horizontal bar; tin soldiers that marched, motor cars that rolled on painted wheels, ships that bobbed on metal seas, birds that sang and flapped their wings or hopped along branches of gold tipped with leaves of emerald all still and silent and rusting now.

  Zamyatin hurried them along too quickly to see anything very clearly. They could hear loud explosions from the front of the building now, and shooting had opened up on both sides. Chindamani slipped and fell against one of the cases. At first, Christopher thought she had hurt herself. But after a few moments, she picked herself up and took Christopher’s hand. He thought she had picked up something from the case, but it was too late for him to see what its contents had been.

  William kept falling behind. He was tired and sick, and running exhausted him; but he would not let Christopher pick him up and carry him. Zamyatin pushed and prodded the boy, urging him to make haste. When Christopher made to defend him, the Russian just waved his pistol at him and told him to keep going. Christopher knew the only reason Zamyatin kept him alive was the thought that he might come in useful as a bargaining counter.

  They reached the last room. It was a plain room panelled in dark wood and hung with rich Tibetan tapestries. Zamyatin hustled everyone inside and shut the door.

  “Where’s the way out?” he shouted.

  Bodo scrambled over a pile of cushions at the rear of the room and pulled back one of the tapestries. The entrance to the tunnel had been concealed with very great skill, having been set into the panelling without any obvious join. It was opened by means of a small lever in the floor. Bodo pulled the lever and the panels slid back with a low grinding sound.

  “What are you waiting for?” cried Zamyatin.

  “Let’s go!”

  Bodo stepped into the entrance. Chindamani stepped up, followed by the Khutukhtu and Samdup. Suddenly, there was a cry from near the main door.

  “I’m not going into another tunnel! Please, father, don’t let him make me!”

  It was William. The sight of the dark opening had awakened in him memories of the tunnels beneath Dorje-la. He hung back, clinging to Christopher.

  “What does he say?” demanded Zamyatin.

  “What’s wrong with him?” The man was growing terrified now. He was so close to victory, yet the sounds of defeat were all about him: guns, high explosives, the child whimpering.

  “He says he’s frightened. He won’t go into your blasted tunnel.

  You know what happened at Dorje-la. For God’s sake, let him stay here with me. He’s no danger to you.”

  “And let you show Ungern straight to our exit? No-one stays. If he won’t come, I’ll shoot him here and be done with it!”

  Zamyatin reached out a hand and grabbed for the boy. William struggled, twisting away from the grasping fingers. The Russian lunged and found the boy’s shoulder, but as he did so his hand slipped and struck his neck.

  William screamed with pain. Zamyatin’s hand had struck the swelling, breaking the skin. The boy collapsed, falling into Christopher’s outstretched arms. Zamyatin reeled back, horror-struck.

  They expected blood or poisoned matter. But there was no blood. It made no sense at first, there was just a seething, something black moving on the child’s neck. And then the blackness broke and became multiple.

  The spiders had been on the verge of hatching. Now, suddenly released from the body of their host, they tumbled into the light, tiny legs unfolding and quivering across William’s neck and on to his shoulder. There were hundreds of them, each one no bigger than a very small ant.

  Christopher cried out in horror and disgust. The tiny spiders were running everywhere now, masses of them, in search of food.

  Chindamani ran across to Christoper and helped him brush the last of the brood from William’s neck. As though transfixed, Zamyatin stood staring at the boy. Spiders ran across his feet and vanished.

  Christopher looked up at the Russian. His face was expressionless, his eyes empty of any emotion.

  “He’s dead,” he whispered.

  Zamyatin looked at him blankly. He did not understand.

  “He’s dead,” Christopher repeated in Tibetan.

  “My son is dead.”

  What happened next was a blur. There was a sound of shouting outside, followed almost immediately by a crash as the door was smashed open. The two guards inside the room panicked and opened fire. Two seconds later, the barrel of a heavy pistol appeared from behind the door-jamb The guards had forgotten to take cover before firing and presented easy targets. Three shots rang out in quick succession, taking the guards and Bodo.

  As that happened, Zamyatin whipped out his own pistol and waved it at the Khutukhtu, who was sitting beside Christopher alongside William’s body. Chindamani grabbed Samdup and made for a door at the rear of th
e room, leading into the tunnel.

  The man at the door stepped across the bodies of the guards into the room. He held his pistol high, pointed at Zamyatin’s head.

  It was Sepailov.

  “Drop your gun, Mister Zamyatin,” he said in Russian.

  “Otherwise, I will be forced to shoot.”

  “One step closer,” Zamyatin replied without looking round, ‘and your Living Buddha is a dead one.”

  “Be my guest.” It was a different voice this time. Von Ungern Sternberg eased himself past Sepailov into the room. He cast a quick glance at William’s body, unable to make out what lay behind the small tragedy. His men were in control of the palace.

  Sukebator’s forces had pulled back to the outskirts of the city. The remaining revolutionaries had been rounded up and were already being executed or interrogated. There was just this little matter to clear up.

  “The Khutukhtu is a traitor,” he went on.

  “I have in my pocket a document signed by him, instructing his forces to transfer their allegiance to the revolutionary army. I have already issued instructions for his execution. You’re wasting your time, Zamyatin. Go ahead and shoot him if you want: you’ll only be doing my job for me.

  Zamyatin glanced round. Ungern and Sepailov were in the room now. Only Sepailov held a gun; the baron was too much in control to feel he needed one. Zamyatin looked back at the Khutukhtu, then at Christopher. He needed another card to play, one that would force the baron to bargain. He turned and caught sight of Chindamani and Samdup at the rear door, still hesitating.

  ‘For God’s sake, Chindamani!” shouted Christopher.

  “Get out of here! Take Samdup and run!”

  “I can’t go Ka-ris To-feh, not without you. Don’t ask me to leave you.” She had the boy and she knew she ought to make a run for it. His life was at stake: it was her duty to save him. But she could not move. With William dead, Christopher needed her more than ever. Her love for him tore at her love for the boy, like a trapped beast with its claws.

  Zamyatin lifted his pistol and pointed it at Samdup.

  “You!” he shouted in Tibetan.