Rick Brant 8 The Caves of Fear Page 9

  Rick and Scotty examined one with interest. It was a whole skin, except for head and feet. Even the tail was still attached. The ends of the legs had been sewed up, but the neck was left open. Attached to the neck opening was a rawhide thong that could be used to bind the opening tight when the skin was filled with water.

  “These are good bags,” Sing said. “Better than most.”

  “Perhaps he planned to sell them,” Rick suggested.

  “Don’t think so.” The Chinese guide shook his head. “People here make their own. Every time they kill a goat for meat, that’s a new goatskin. The Buddhist Tibetans, who don’t kill anything, even flies, use pottery jugs.”

  Scotty had started counting the bags. He paused at the ninth and held it up. “This one is split open. Looks like the seam gave way. There’s a sort of funny lining.”

  Rick took the skin and turned it inside out. It was smooth and glassy on the inside, and the substance was completely transparent because he could see the skin underneath.

  Sing felt of it. “Never saw anything like that before.”

  Rick held it to his nose and sniffed. It was odorless. He took his pocketknife and scraped at it while the others watched. A tiny flake shaved off. He tested it between his fingers, and it was flexible as rubber. An idea was growing in his head.

  “It’s crazy,” he said. “But you know what I think this is? I think it’s plastic!”

  “The professor can tell us,” Scotty suggested. “Come on. Let’s take it to him.”

  They ran back up the trail, Rick leading with the skin. If the stuff were plastic, it could mean only one thing. He lengthened his stride.

  Zircon looked up from his notebook as they topped the hill and ran toward him. He dropped the book and jumped to his feet, reaching for his rifle.

  “It’s not another ambush,” Rick panted. He held out the skin. “It’s this. Professor, what is this transparent stuff inside?”

  Zircon took the skin and ran his finger tips over the lining. He held it up so that it caught the light, then looked at Rick curiously. “That’s odd,” he muttered. “This is certainly a goatskin. And almost surely, this is a plastic lining. I can’t be sure, of course, but I’ve never seen anything like this in nature.”

  “It’s a goatskin water bag,” Rick said excitedly. He pointed to Ko. “He had a dozen of them.”

  Zircon bellowed, “So! Then if this is plastic . . .”

  “It was a clever stunt,” Rick finished. “No one would suspect coolies toting goatskin water bags. And even if anyone did suspect, he wouldn’t be able to tell anything by a casual examination.”

  Sing scratched his head. “Forgive my stupidity,” he said. “The suspicious one wouldn’t be able to tell what? If this lining is plastic, it is a senseless waste. Water keeps cool in a goatskin bag because of evaporation through the pores. It certainly couldn’t evaporate through plastic.”

  “No,” Zircon agreed. “That is the idea. They don’t want evaporation. Also, the plastic guarantees the water’s purity.”

  Sing said no more, but he was obviously puzzled. Nor could the Americans tell him what had excited them, that they had found the means by which the substance they sought was carried to the coast.

  Rick had a quick vision of Chinese coolies making their slow way through the countryside, unnoticed because water-bearers were so commonplace. But the coolies in this case carried bags lined with plastic, and the stuff that made the legs thrust out stiffly and that swelled the bag was not ordinary water! It was the stuff which had brought them halfway across the world.

  CHAPTER XII

  The Buddhist Monk

  The party topped a high rise and stopped, spellbound at the scene that spread before them. They were on the rim of a great valley. Far on the other side of the valley stood the high peaks of the Himalayas, a mighty screen between them and India.

  Below, a lush green path marked the course of a wide river. On either side of it, sloping up to the mountains, was the lighter green of grasslands.

  Sing pointed. “There is Korse Lenken.”

  Rick had to look hard before he saw it. Then he began to make it out. The monastery was built under a great cliff on one side of the valley. At first glance it seemed like part of the cliff itself. It was huge, with tier after tier of gray stone buildings rising in piled masses from the valley floor. Around it, like tiny mounds of earth, were the hair tents of the Tibetans.

  “Magnificent,” Zircon rumbled. “Well worth coming to see, even if we find nothing at the end of the trail.”

  “We’ll find Chahda,” Scotty said. “I’m sure we will. And the sooner the better.”

  Rick felt the same way. Now that the end of the trail was in sight, excitement was rising within him. He was anxious to find his Hindu friend and to find at the same time answers to some of the mysteries they had encountered.

  “Let’s hurry,” he said impatiently.

  Sing shouted at the bearers and the party took a narrow trail that dipped into the valley. Scotty rode ahead with Sing, and his rifle was ready for instant use. Rick and Zircon brought up the rear, their own rifles held ready. They had taken no chances since the fight on the hilltop. Worthington Ko had been left afoot far behind them, but there was no assurance his friends hadn’t come to the rescue with horses. Rick kept glancing behind him, just in case of an attack from the rear.

  They had reached the rim of the valley by midmorning. All through the day they made their way down the mountain, reaching the valley floor about three in the afternoon. Another two hours of steady travel took them past the yurts of Tibetan herders-conical tents made of horsehair felt. The stolid Tibetans watched them pass, no interest in their beady eyes.

  Then, as darkness began to set in, they reached the monastery. Korse Lenken towered above them, already shaded in twilight. From somewhere within the great pile they heard the tinkle of bells, then the deep tones of a mighty gong. Lamas, priests in yellow robes, walked past with bowed heads. Some of them spun their prayer wheels and intoned the Buddhist ritual.

  Om Mani Padme Hum. Hail, the jewel in the lotus!

  The jewel, of course, was the Lord Buddha.

  They watched the pageant for a few moments, enthralled. Then Zircon commanded Sing. “Find someone you can talk to. We’ll want to see the High Lama.”

  Sing nodded. “I will go into the monastery. The bearers will find a place to camp.” He issued orders in Chinese.

  The bearers scattered at once, searching for a suitable place to pitch camp. The three Americans sat their horses and watched the activities around the great monastery, too interested even to talk.

  Rick saw countless yellow robes on the various balconies. There must be thousands of monks, he thought. And there were an equal number of Tibetans, many of them already busy at cooking fires near the base of the gray stone buildings. He smelled mutton cooking, and the acrid, unpleasant odor he had learned to identify with yak butter. Hot buttered tea was a Tibetan staple. He had tried it on the trail, because he was interested in everything, even yak butter. But he didn’t think it would ever take the place of ice cream in his affections.

  One of the bearers came back and motioned to them. They followed as he led the pack mules to a place in the shelter of a great rock. The other bearers were foraging for wood. In a few moments a fire was going and camp was being set up.

  Sing returned. “No one may see the High Lama,” he reported. “He is in the middle of some kind of ceremony that takes a month. But I talked with an important priest. He was friendly. He said he would send one of the lamas to be our guide and to help us find your friend.”

  “Good,” Zircon said. “Now, let’s have some dinner. I’m famished.”

  The boys echoed his sentiments.

  It was fully dark before they ended their meal. They were squatting around the fire, sipping coffee and listening to Zircon’s description of the Buddhist ritual when one of the bearers suddenly called out. The three Americans and Sing reached for the
ir weapons as a yellow-robed lama shuffled out of the darkness.

  This, evidently, was their guide. He was of less than medium height, but that was all Rick could tell about him. His loose robe draped around his body and his cowl was pulled up, hiding his face.

  “Welcome,” Zircon boomed. “Sing, speak to him and tell him we are grateful for his coming.”

  Sing spoke to the monk in Chinese.

  The robed lama stood immobile, just within range of the firelight. The yellow flames made shadows across his cowled figure. Rick felt a little shudder run through him. The quiet figure was somehow weird.

  Sing shifted to another language, but the lama made no reply. Then, slowly, he brought his hands up level, outstretched toward them. He chanted slowly, his voice muffled under the cowl. Then the chant died and his hands were lowered once more.

  Sing turned to the group. “I don’t know what he said. It’s not in a language I understand.” He spoke to the apparition. The monk stood motionless.

  “Wish they’d sent us someone we could talk with,” Scotty grumbled. “A lot of use this joker will be!”

  The monk’s cowl turned slowly toward Scotty. The figure moved majestically toward the boy, then the hands lifted again. From under the cowl a sepulchral voice issued.

  “Could be more use than you think, muttonhead.”

  For an instant there was stunned silence, then Rick and Scotty leaped for the robed figure with yells of delight. Rick hit him high and Scotty hit him low. They held him down and pulled the cowl from him, then pommeled him unmercifully, while Zircon cheered them on.

  Only when the monk begged for mercy did they let him up. He tossed the robe aside and grinned at them.

  “Okay,” Chahda said. “You win. But it took you plenty time to get here! Why you take so long?”

  The slim Hindu boy hugged them solemnly, one at a time, and shook hands with Sing. “Now,” he announced, “I eat. Got plenty sick of sheep meat, you bet!”

  Then they were all laughing and talking at once while the cook hastened to prepare a meal. In a few moments Chahda was attacking a high-piled plate and talking between bites.

  “Good you came now,” he said. “I got plenty worry. You find Bradley?”

  Zircon told him of the meeting in the hotel.

  Chahda nodded. “Good. I think he show up soon.”

  “Start at the beginning,” Rick demanded. “There’s a whole lot we don’t know. In fact, if you come right down to it, we don’t know anything.”

  “Okay.” Chahda took a sip of coffee. “I start at start. In Bombay.”

  Chahda had been visiting with his family in Bombay when Bradley arrived in the Indian city. The two had met by accident. Chahda had gone to the Taj Mahal Hotel to write a letter to the boys, because there was no paper or ink at home. Bradley, who happened to be in the lobby, had noticed the address on the envelope as Chahda handed it to the desk clerk.

  Once the scientist discovered that Chahda knew the Spindrift group and had been on expeditions with them, the rest followed naturally. Bradley, realizing that the clever little Hindu boy would be of great value in his undercover work, had hired him. Chahda didn’t say so, but Rick could understand that such was the case.

  Chahda’s duties had been those of general assistant. He had cared for baggage, run errands, acted as secretary, and on a few occasions had been assigned to follow people in whose destinations Bradley was interested. The two had gone from Bombay to New Delhi and Calcutta, then to Singapore. At Singapore, while following up another matter, Bradley accidentally had discovered that heavy water was being sold.

  “He was much excited,” Chahda said. “I did not know why. Heavy water? I asked myself what is heavy water. I knew about ice, which is frozen water and which is heavy. But who would have much excitement about ice? The Sahib Bradley hurried to the Consulate of America and he sent a cable to Washington.”

  Then the scientist had assigned Chahda to watch a certain house in Singapore, the place from which the heavy water was being taken to unknown destinations. Chahda had watched for three days without relief, and he had seen Worthington Ko. Then, since Bradley had not come for him, he deserted his post long enough to return to their quarters, a room in an obscure Chinese hotel in Singapore. There he had found evidence of a fight and bloodstains on the floor. There was no sign of Bradley.

  It was then, Chahda guessed, that Long Shadow had found him. He saw the shadow several times while he hunted for Bradley. Then, while searching for his boss in the Tamil quarter, he had been attacked by Chinese thugs led by Worthington Ko. They had beaten him into insensibility, hustled him into a taxi, and were carrying him somewhere into the inland of Malaya when he regained consciousness. He escaped by going headlong through a window while the car was traveling and then taking cover in the jungle alongside the road. Going by a roundabout route, he reached Singapore again. There he found that their luggage was held by the hotel and the room had been rented to someone else.

  Chahda polished his plate with a biscuit and groaned expressively. “I say to myself then, Chahda, now is time to think real hard. What to do?”

  He knew that the cable Bradley had sent asked for Hartson Brant to be assigned to the job. And he knew also that from Singapore they were to head for Hong Kong. He knew nothing about Hong Kong, but he did know that Bradley was acquainted at a place called the Golden Mouse because he had heard him mention it to a Chinese the scientist used for undercover work now and then.

  “The Long Shadow came again while I was thinking,” Chahda continued. “I saw it in front of the hotel. So I went quick-fast out the back, and ran through many places until I was sure he could not find me. I went to where many Indians live in Singapore, and I found a friend.”

  The friend, another Indian, had gone to the United States Information Library in Singapore and borrowed a copy of The World Almanac. Chahda already had decided he would cable the boys, and how he would do it. He knew, because of what they had told him, that they would be able to figure out a book code and that they would realize his choice naturally would be the Almanac. Knowing the annual by heart, he naturally also knew the table that converted Roman numerals to Arabic numbers and had used the letter L as a clue to the right volume.

  “But how did you know about nulls?” Rick asked.

  “Oh, that was very lucky. I learned how to put Sahib Bradley’s messages in code, and there were many nulls.” He grinned impishly. “Of course I did not know if you also knew what are nulls. I was thinking, they are two who are good with science. But are they also good with code? Maybe not. But, anyway, they are plenty smart to read a book. That will tell them about nulls.”

  “We didn’t have to read a book,” Scotty said. “Dad told us about them.”

  “Scientist father also plenty smart even without books,” Chahda agreed. “Anyway, I make the message and I send cable.”

  Rick interrupted again. “How did you know Ko had a glass eye?”

  Chahda smiled. “When they capture me, I fight like maybe ten wild elephants. I kick honorable Mr. Ko in the face. And what happens? His glasses fall off and one of his eyes falls out! Also, it breaks when it falls and I see it is glass. I am so surprised I forget to fight and someone hits me from the back of my neck, and then all is dark. I did not know Mr. Ko’s name then. My boss tells me it later.”

  “No more questions for the moment,” Zircon ordered. “I want to hear the rest of this. Go ahead, Chahda.”

  The Hindu boy had used his friend as a go-between and had arranged for the consul general to advance him funds. Since the official knew he worked for Bradley, that was not difficult. Then he had arranged for their baggage to be shipped and held at the airport in Hong Kong, and had taken a plane there himself.

  At the Golden Mouse, Canton Charlie had given him quarters. In another day, Bradley showed up. The scientist had been caught in the Singapore hotel room by Ko and company, but had fought his way clear. There wasn’t time to leave a note for Chahda at the hotel and
he didn’t dare return to the room for fear of having the enemy locate him again. So he had depended on Chahda’s wits to tell him the next step and had gone ahead to Hong Kong, hoping to find more information about the heavy water.

  At Hong Kong, Long Shadow had shown up again.

  Bradley, in the meanwhile, had not been idle. Through his various sources of information he had determined that the source of the heavy water was in the neighborhood of Korse Lenken. Chahda was instructed to go there at once and start reconnoitering while they waited for the party from the States. Bradley deliberately dropped the disguise he had been using, that of a Portuguese seaman, and let Long Shadow locate him. Then he had started out, hoping to draw the enemy away from Chahda long enough for the boy to get clear and start for Korse Lenken. Bradley was to shake the enemy when he could and resume his investigation. Finding the source of the water was not enough, he had said. It also was necessary to find out how it was reaching Singapore, and what its ultimate destination might be.

  Chahda had experience with Buddhist monasteries dating back to the time when he had worked in Nepal. Also, many Indians were Buddhists. There were some in almost every monastery, and of that number a few could be depended on to speak Hindi, or Hindustani as it was called, which was Chahda’s language. He also knew a little Tibetan from his years in Nepal.

  “I came here easy,” Chahda finished. “There was a big lot of pilgrims and they took me in.” He grinned.

  “They thought I was a monk. And I found Indians, like I had thought. They hid me, so I do not think Long Shadow knows I am here. And now I know where the heavy water comes from.”

  Zircon gave an exclamation. “Chahda, you’re a marvel! Where does it come from?”

  “Tomorrow I show you,” Chahda promised.

  “Who is Long Shadow?” Rick demanded.

  Chahda shrugged. “Not knowing. We never see him. Only the shadow.”

  Scotty stirred up the fire a little. “How come Canton Charlie didn’t turn you over to the enemy as he did us?”